I dart to the inward side of the room, as far as the chain will let me, and lean back.

There's a noise outside, like distant thunder, or a big, big animal snarling. Then the sound of rubber on pavement, squealing, and the loudest noise I've ever heard, even louder than the flashbang. The wall folds in, cracking all around the middle, folding and breaking into pieces like a Pop-Tart in a kid's hands. Chunks of masonry fall inwards and dust slides off the surface of a... thing.

It's on tires half as tall as I am, big k.n.o.bby swamp rompers, it's all black, and as it backs up I swear a see a freaking tank tread in the back, like it's some kind of weird whipped off half-track trike. The whole thing shudders backwards, the top opens, Jennifer leaps out, and runs over to me, jumping over the debris. She's all in black, the same outfit she had on the other night. Without a word she grabs my hands and undoes the cuffs with a key.

"Let's go."

"Where-"

"Go!"

Then the door swings open.

She looks up. A Paradise Falls cop steps into the room, holding his gun out in an awkward, improper Isosceles stance.

Jennifer whirls, pivots on one heel, and kicks the gun out of his hand. In the same motion she turns on her other foot and her heel catches him square in the face, and she yanks the door shut.

"I said go!"

Okay.

I tromp over the debris and alongside the... thing. It does have a tank tread in the back. The engine is loud. Jennifer climbs up inside and offers me a hand. I find handholds and climb up the sides, and she hands me a headset as I slip into the seat behind her, and the canopy slides shut.

Her voice is tinny in my ear.

"Are you hurt?"

"The h.e.l.l with me, where's Alexis?"

"They're moving her. I heard on the police scanner."

"What the f.u.c.k is this thing?"

"My other car."

She pulls back on a yoke, like an airplane, and the big machine rumbles backwards, lurching with surprising power. She turns the yoke and it turns in place, rumbling, and she kicks in her foot and it starts forward, throwing me back into the seat.

The big front tires. .h.i.t the front end of a Paradise Falls cruiser, the tires lift up, and there's a crunch and a metallic squeal as the tread in the back shreds the front end of the vehicle.

I blink a few times. I heard about these things. This is one of those experimental high speed tactical vehicles. I read an article about them in a magazine. Popular Science. The government sc.r.a.pped them, they were too expensive.

f.u.c.k that, I have to get to Alexis.

"She's not at your house," Jennifer shouts. "Any ideas?"

"Yeah, get this thing off the road before they call the National Guard."

"Relax. I do this all the time."

"What, is this an extracurricular activity?"

"Yeah," she snaps. "Let's go get your girl."

"Where's hubby?"

"He's busy."

"With what?"

"You know that meth lab?"

"What, the Amish one?"

I could almost laugh. The Amish meth lab. I'm talking about an Amish meth lab riding with an English teacher in a f.u.c.king tank.

"Yeah. He's going to blow it up."

"At least tell me you got something off my father's computer."

"Yeah," she shouts. "We got what we needed."

"What the f.u.c.k are we going to do?"

"Where would they take her?"

"I don't know!"

Think, Hawk. He didn't take her home. He'd have to- "f.u.c.k," I snap. "The hospital. He'll put her back in the psych ward."

She glances back at me. "You sure? We might only get one shot at this."

"Yes, I'm f.u.c.king sure. Do you know where they took her before? Which hospital?"

"Yes, I do. That's where we're going?"

"Yeah."

She touches her ear. She's talking to someone else.

"Yeah, I read. Where? Good. Got it."

"What was that?"

"Jacob. He has somebody listening to the police scanner. A Paradise Falls cop just called in, trying to raise the police station. Secret's out."

"s.h.i.t."

"The good news is, he was at the hospital. Let's go."

"How far?"

She looks at the screen in front of her, like a GPS with detail beyond anything I've ever seen.

"Forty-five minutes by road. Faster in a straight line. Buckle your seat belt."

She's not joking. I pull the harness on and lock it over my chest. Jennifer veers the big machine right off the road, over a ditch and into a bean field, tearing up a big track of foliage and earth behind us.

"We'll pay them back," she says, glancing back at me.

She opens the throttle and the thing speeds up, throwing me around in half a dozen different directions, bouncing me against the seat, while she remains calm as could be, her tightly corded forearms wrestling with the steering yoke.

"We can't go in guns blazing," she says.

"Why not?"

"Because they'll know we're coming. I just hope we can get there before they move the girl. If we don't nail this we'll lose her."

"Have you done something like this before?"

"Yes," she says. "Yes I have. Not far now."

Alexis Now Please, please, please.

Help me.

My old prayers come flooding back. The cuffs dig at my wrists, and the straps dig into my body, my stomach, my chest. They just left me in here in the dark. I hear voices outside. People pa.s.s by. I see their shadows slide across my wall, flickering into existence and pa.s.sing back out again, watching and hoping. Hawk is not dead, he's not. I can feel it, like a warm heat in my chest. They took him away from me once, they never will again. He's coming, he's coming, he's coming.

Then the door opens and a doctor walks in.

"h.e.l.lo," he says, in a voice he might use to approach a strange dog. He's carrying a set of cheap hospital pajamas. "I'm going to need you to change, hon. The nurse is going to stay here while you do."

A nurse follows him in, a heavyset woman with a sour look on her face.

"Listen to me," I plead. "This is a mistake."

"Shhh," the doctor says. "We just have to make sure you don't hurt yourself. I don't want to have to restrain you, now. So I'm going to let you up slowly and step out, and then we're going to come back in and have a talk."

I bite my lip.

Then I nod.

He nods back, and slowly undoes first the straps, then cuffs.

"Go ahead and swing your legs over and stand up for me."

I nod, and do as I'm told. I start to stand up, and the doctor backs up, heads for the door.

"Okay now, just get changed and-"

I punch him in the face. It's not a good hit, I didn't get to really wind up, but it's enough. I shove past him and run barefoot into the hall, turn, bounce off the wall, and bolt. I run full tilt. I run like the devil is at my heels. I run for my life. I run and run.

It doesn't matter how fast you run if they're already ahead of you. Two big men in scrubs run at me from the opposite direction. I skid to a stop on my slippery feet and run back the opposite way, but they have me. I'm surrounded. Big arms loop around mine and my feet leave the floor. I throw my feet up and kick, and my arms torque as they almost drop me as I heel one of them in the face.

Then they've got my legs. Two more join them, six all together now, but I'm strangely calm, writhing, almost pulling my leg free before strong arms lock my thigh in a crushing grip. They have my feet off the ground, I'm in mid-air. A ma.s.s of faces and arms. The nurse is there. She has a needle in her hand. She's taking the cap off the needle, testing it. Liquid forms a drop on the tip, breaks, the drop falls.

The needle slides into my arm. I jerk from the pain, and then the burning as the ice cold liquid slides into my muscle.

It takes only a few beats of my frantic heart before a heavy, dreamy feeling spreads through my limbs. It starts in my hands and feet, like they're filling up with sand, and then my legs and arms, and then my whole body, and they carry me, limp, back to the gurney. The men leave, the nurse stays, more come. They close the door and they take scissors with little blunt tips and they cut through my clothes.

Distantly, I remember that I borrowed these clothes, and I am very sad that they are being treated this way. I fight to stay awake but there's a pulsing warm lamp in my middle, pulling me down into a warm dark place, like a substance.

I'm sinking into it. My clothes come away in strips and they lift me up, like a doll, and pull new ones onto me. A nurse stands at the end of the bed and cleans the cuts on my feet and sticks tiny bandages on the wounds.

When I'm dressed they put the big leather cuffs on my arms and legs.

The nurse stands over me and she says, "You should just go to sleep."

"f.u.c.k you," I whisper cheerfully.

She frowns and shakes her head, like I am very sad. Then she walks out.

I will not go to sleep. I am not going to sleep and they are not going to make me. My eyes grow heavy, my eyelids sinking closed until I force them open again. I would like to go to sleep. It would feel very good. It would be better than lying here, staring at a broken ceiling tile.

d.a.m.n it all to h.e.l.l, I fall asleep.

Then I open my eyes. I still can't move. My arms and legs aren't sand anymore, they're cement. I can't even move my mouth. My tongue and throat are dry, my breathing ragged.

Tom is here.

"h.e.l.lo," he says, softly. "Alexis, how do you feel?"

"Fuh, fuh," I choke out.

"Fine?"

"Fuh... fuh... uck... you..."

He sighs. "I was hoping you'd realize how pointless this is by now."

"Hawk. Find me."

"I think not. Do you know where you are?"

I shake my head. At least I think I do. I'm not sure it moved.

"You're still in the hospital. I've had you moved to another room. I'd like to talk."

"Go. Away."