Ethan provided a distraction. As long as they were focused on him, they wouldn't be looking around for her. Speed had suddenly become far more important than silence. Daisy had to get to the creek. Even if the men noticed her before she made it down the hill, she could lose them when she hit the thicket on the other side. No one knew Fox Hollow as well as she did. She could have hidden on the property for days. Not even her momma would have been able to find her. Except Ethan didn't have days. He needed her help now.

Daisy fixed the plan in her mind. Jump up, whirl around, race toward the embankment. Don't look at anything. Don't listen to anything. Don't stop for anything. Just go. Go fast. Worry about everything elsea"her soon-to-be-raw feet, the proximity of the AR-15s, her strategy when she reached Fox Hollowa"later.

Taking a deep breath to steel her nerves, she counted to three. Then Daisy went. She stood up. She turned around. She took four or five flying steps. There was a yell. It was rapidly succeeded by more yelling. The men were yelling in her direction. They had spotted her. She pumped her legs furiously. She could see the shadowy drop-off leading to the creek up ahead, waiting for her like a shimmering, beckoning oasis. Just a dozen more steps. Then the odds of her getting away shifted significantly in her favor. They couldn't shoot after her into the thicket, not with any real accuracy. Six or seven feet farther and thena"

And then the ground vanished. It dropped away beneath her without the slightest warning. One moment there was steady, solid dirt under her toes, and the next moment it was gone, replaced by open air. She began to fall. Instinctively Daisy kicked and flailed about, but she touched nothing. There was nothing to hold her or for her to grab onto. She simply continued to fall, until she landed with a jarring thud on a rough surface that was as dense and unyielding as concrete.

Black, pulsating waves of confusion followed. Daisy lay sprawled on her side with one arm twisted painfully under her. Her brain was jumbled, and her spine sent searing lightning bolts up into her neck and along the length of her back. There were voices. Men's voices. They were loud and sounded agitated. Who were they? She shook her head, trying to clear it. What had happened?

She remembered runninga"and fallinga"and crashing down hard. Why had she been running? Daisy shook her head again. It made her neck throb violently, but the waves pounding through her brain subsided somewhat. Slowly she sat up. Her shoulders hurt. Her hips and ankles hurt. One of her arms really hurt. Her whole body felt weak and clumsy, so much that she didn't try to rise any further.

Where was she? She was surrounded by darkness. Daisy blinked. Still darkness. She put out a tentative hand. Clay. There was clay in front of her. She knew it even though she couldn't see it. Nearly every inch of Pittsylvania County soil consisted of heavy, compact red clay. Daisy reached behind her. More clay. Shifting on shaky muscles, she felt around gingerly. Clay beneath her. Clay on all sides. She was in a clay pit. She was sitting at the bottom of a clay pit.

A pale light fell on her face. Daisy looked up and blinked some more. She could make out the top of the pit. It was eight feet high, give or take a few inches. The edge was too dim for her to judge exactly. A row of eyes stared back at her. She could see their reflection like a group of raccoons clustered around a Dumpster in the middle of the night. One pair of eyes was more distinct than the rest. The flashlight shining down on her was closest to this pair and to the thick shock of curly silver hair above them. It wasn't a raccoon. It was a poodle. A wet poodle. It was Carlton Waters.

CHAPTER.

28.

In an instant Daisy's mind cleared and she remembered everything. The explosion. The big-city folks and their drilling equipment in the cemetery. The butt of Joe's AR-15 cracking against Ethan's temple. She didn't know how, but she had found help. She didn't know why he was there, but Carlton would help her and Ethan.

Daisy looked up at him eagerly, waiting for an explanationa"and reassurancea"and instructions on how to get out of the strange pit that she was sitting in. Carlton looked back at her for several long seconds, then he laughed.

"How convenient," he said.

"Isn't she that waitress?" Joe asked, squinting down at her.

"She is." Carlton went on laughing. "And she's saved me a hell of a lot of bother. I've been trying to find a way to trap that little bird for some time now. But I don't need to no more."

All the men laughed. It was a harsh, contemptuous laugh that seemed to increase with wicked glee as it echoed down the clay walls toward Daisy.

"Oh, my dear," Carlton drawled in his raspy Appalachian accent. "You look so surprised."

Surprised wasn't a sufficient description. The shock paralyzed her. Daisy's mouth didn't move. Her eyes didn't blink. Even her brain was partially frozen. She couldn't understand. Why was Carlton laughing? Why was he talking to Joe and the other men? Why wasn't he helping her out of the pit?

"Well, I suppose we should get down to business." Carlton shrugged. "Since you're here you must know what I want."

Daisy didn't respond. She couldn't.

He clucked his tongue at her. "Don't play dumb with me."

She struggled to breathe. To think. Think smart, Ducky. That was what Aunt Emily always said. She had to think smart.

"So I'll ask you again. Do you know what I want?"

What did Carlton want? He was with Joe. That had to mean he wanted the same thing Joe wanted. Her momma's land.

Carlton's voice rose. "Do you know what I want?"

This time Daisy answered with a small nod.

"Good. And are you gonna give it to me?"

"Ia"" Her lips were stiff. "I can't give it to you. It's not mine."

"I'm aware of that, but you can tell your momma what she ought to do with it."

"My a my momma feels very strongly about family. And it's her family cemetery."

"Hank told me the same damn thing. I told him family's only as good as what they can do for you today."

At the mention of Hank, Daisy's stomach churned and a thick lump swelled in her throat.

"He was loyal to you," Carlton said. "Like you and your momma were his real family, even though you weren't. I'll give Hank that. Stupid loyal he was. I offered him a deal. Told him I'd give him a cut of what I got out of this place if he'd take care of you like I took care of old man Dickerson when he started getting in my way. I figured it'd be easy for Hank. You ate his food every day. What's a little rat poison mixed in the chicken stew? Nobody would find out. Nobody would even care after a week or two. That's how it is when you die. Here yesterday, forgotten tomorrow."

Her stomach churned harder. It wasn't the big-city folks. It was Carlton. Carlton had poisoned Fred.

"But he wouldn't do it. Not stupid loyal Hank. Said he wouldn't betray your daddy by hurting his baby girl. Of course I couldn't have him go squealing to you afterward. Or to the sheriff neither. Something had to be done with him. So Hank ended up taking a long drink from a short creek."

Daisy felt all the oxygen go out of her lungs. It wasn't just Fred. It was Hank too. Carlton had killed Hank. Hank had been his friend, and he had murdered him. He had even gone to Hank's funeral!

Carlton chortled. "Will you listen to me? Crowin' like a fool cock. Telling you all my dirty secrets. I guess now I'll have to do something with you too."

A wave of panic rose in her chest. It seemed impossible to get any air. The stench of charred earth was so strong, and the pit was so deep and dark. It felt as though the clay walls were closing in on every side.

"The funny thing is"a"Carlton chortled even hardera""you're already in a grave. It's not one of our holes you fell into. We haven't started drilling yet. So it's an honest-to-goodness gravesite. I don't know who it was dug for, but it looks like it belongs to you now!"

Daisy cringed in horror. Aside from Hank's final resting place near her daddy, there had been only one new grave dug at the cemetery recently. Fred Dickerson's. And as far as she was aware, it remained empty. They were still waiting for his remains to be sent back from the autopsy. That meant she wasn't sitting in the bottom of some pit. She was sitting in Fred's grave.

It was a gruesome realization. And in that moment Daisy knew she had to make a decision. She could either cry and beg and curl up in a ball like a petrified possum, or she could fight. It was an easy choice. She was a Berger. The Bergers were a family of fighters. Just ask Great-Uncle Jacob. Did he lie down and wait for the redcoats to roll over him and his wagon? Of course not, as proven by the fact that Virginia was no longer a British colony. And she wasn't going to be rolled over either, not if she had anything to say about it.

"One Berger almost dead," Carlton continued cheerfully. "That leaves just one to go. It shouldn't be too hard to get rid of your momma. She's a sickly croaker as it is."

Daisy forced herself not to get mad. Fear and rage were futile. She had to think smart. That was the only way to get out of the damn grave.

"So we're dead," she replied with a coolness that surprised even her. "You kill us. There are no more Bergers in Pittsylvania County. What good is that going to do you? You're still not going to own the land."

For the first time since he and his silver shock of hair had gazed down on her with his flashlight, Carlton Waters grew solemn. Daisy hoped that was a good sign.

"Not right away," he admitted. "But eventually the property will belong to me. After you and your momma are gone, who's going to stop me from getting it? Nobody knows how long I've wanted it. Nobody knows why I want it. And nobody is going to pay a lick of attention when I become the new owner. It's a useless old cemetery. Worthlessa"on the outside and above grounda"to everyone but a Berger. And there won't be any Bergers around to interfere with my plans."

"Okay, you buy the land. What then? You still need approval to mine the uranium. All you've got now are some exploratory drilling permits, which might not even be valid. And even if they are, they're not the same as being allowed to actually dig up the stuff and sell it to the highest bidder."

Daisy was making it up as she went along, but she figured the longer she talked, the longer she survived. Carlton frowned at her.

"I can get anything approved. That's not a problem. They trust me. The whole county does. I've been auctioning off their meemaws' and pawpaws' bedroom sets and wedding china for more years than some of them have been alive. I've gotten them a lousy buck for their mismatched salt and pepper shakers and another for their chipped cow creamers. I know better than anyone how to convince people to buy crap. Mining and milling equals employment. All I've got to say is that pulling out the uranium will bring a whole lot of jobs to this area, and everybody'll applaud me for it. Hell, they might even raise a statue in my honor."

"But we're all gonna get cancer!"

Carlton snorted. "I won't. And no one cares about that. Not at the outset. As soon as they hear the word job, they aren't capable of thinking about anything else. So they'll gladly give me all the approvals I need, I'll get rich beyond your wildest imagination, and when people eventually do become sick, they'll blame someone other than me for it, because I'll be enjoying the good life far away from here."

His callousness was stunning. Daisy knew what Aunt Emily would have said to him. It's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. It was one of Aunt Emily's favorite sayings, but Daisy doubted it would have the slightest impact on Carlton. He had probably hawked a few lame camels in his day.

Suddenly the ground trembled beneath her and large hunks of clay crumbled down from the walls around her. There was a tremendous boom, and the sky flashed crimson. It was another explosion.

"Goddammit!" Carlton jumped in surprise.

He and all the other men in the group spun away from Daisy and the grave. They turned to look at what she could only assume was the ensuing fire. The surrounding noise level quickly doubled, then tripled. There was frenzied shouting, loud intermittent crackling and popping, and grinding machinery. It was the din of chaos.

"Goddammit," Carlton said again, only this time it was accompanied by a growl.

A new man sprinted up next to him. "Mr. Watersa"" Halting to catch his breath, he glanced over at the grave and saw Daisy. "What the hella""

"Don't worry about her," Carlton cut him off. "What is it, Sam? Have you figured out what's causing these damn explosions?"

"No. But Larry sent me. There's too much burning now. We can't get it all. He thinks we better leave. Somebody's going to see it."

Carlton ran his fingers through his silver shock of hair. "He's got a point. I don't want that much attention. Not like this. The sheriff will come. And the fire and rescue squad. They're going to have questions. I'm not ready for them yet. I've got to get the story right. I need a couple of hours to pull it all together. And thena" He let the sentence trail away.

"And then?" Sam prodded him.

Carlton turned back to the grave and looked down at Daisy. Although he no longer shone the flashlight on her, she could see his face illuminated by the red glow behind him. He was smiling at her. It was a small impish grin from one side of his mouth, but it wasn't jolly. It was cold. So cold and utterly emotionless that Daisy found herself crawling instinctively backward, trying to get as far away from it as possible. It was going to kill her.

"What about him?" Joe asked Carlton.

"Who?"

He pointed the barrel of his rifle toward the ground in the opposite direction. "The guy I caught earlier?"

"Right." Carlton ran his fingers through his hair once more, then he shrugged. "Throw him in with her. Two birds, one stone."

Joe frowned. "But you just said the sheriff was going to come. He'll find them, and they'll start talking."

"Right," Carlton said again. "Except we can't shoot them."

Daisy exhaled a shaky sigh of relief. They weren't going to shoot her and Ethan. Sheriff Lowell would come. He would find them. Everything would be okay.

"But she knows what you've done," Joe argued. "They've seen what we're doing here."

"Right," Carlton agreed a third time, calmly. "That's why we can't just shoot 'em and leave 'em. We've got to get rid of 'em completely."

Her heart froze. Everything would not be okay. On the contrary, it was going to be the exact opposite of okay. They were going to get rid of her and Ethan. Completely.

She huddled into the back corner of the grave. What could she do? Daisy's eyes flew around frantically. Was there any way out? The walls were high, and the clay was flat and solid. There weren't many holes or ledges to hold onto, at least not that she could see. The light was poor at best, just what was cast off from the fire and a flickering flashlight or two. She thought she might be able to climb up if she had enough time, but she certainly couldn't do it with all the men standing around the edge. They would never let her make it to the top. Maybe when they were gone. Carlton had seemed to want to leave.

There were some scuffling and dragging sounds, then a black shadow blocked the scarlet sky. Daisy looked up at it, and as she did, the shadow rushed down toward her. She scrambled to get out of the way. It landed close to her with a heavy thud. Her first reaction was that Carlton and Joe had dropped something into the grave that would hurt her. It was how they were going to get rid of her. But an instant later the shadow shuddered and groaned, and she realized it was Ethan.

Daisy hurried over to his side. When she saw his face, she gasped. The man hadn't exaggerated. Joe had messed Ethan up good with the butt of his rifle. There was a welt the size of a potato on his forehead. His left eye was swollen shut. And a long gash ran from his temple over his cheek down to his jaw. It was bleeding heavily. For once she was glad she couldn't see well. She was pretty sure the injuries were far more severe than they appeared in the darkness. And she didn't know how else he was hurt. They had kicked him so hard, and there was the fall.

At least he was breathing. Daisy could feel his pulse, and Ethan moaned slightly. She wished she had a piece of cloth to put on his face to slow the bleeding, but she had nothing other than her hands. She lifted his head into her lap, hoping the elevation would help a little. His blood felt warm and sticky as it coated her palms. She tried to wipe it away, but it just kept coming.

A flashlight clicked on. Daisy looked up hurriedly. There seemed to be fewer men at the top of the grave than before. The flashlight clicked off again.

"Now that we've got that taken care of," Carlton drawled, "let's go talk to Larry. I'm afraid we don't have much time. We have to decide what equipment we need to take and what can stay behind."

"He's over by thea" Sam began.

She didn't hear the conclusion of the sentence, but Daisy could tell from the way the voices dropped that Carlton and Sam had turned around and were walking away from her. A tiny wellspring of hope bubbled in her veins. They were leaving. They were leaving while she and Ethan were still alive.

Joe called after Carlton. "So what do you want me to do with them?"

Daisy pressed her lips together so fiercely waiting for the answer, she tasted blood.

Carlton didn't stop. He kept on walking. And in a casual, inconsequential tonea"as though he was telling Joe to throw a couple of extra steaks on the grilla"he responded over his shoulder, "Bury 'em."

CHAPTER.

29.

Deafness, blindness, and muteness followed. Daisy lost every sense all at once. She was going to die. Not in fifty years. Not with a chubby grandchild perched on her knee. Not with a bouquet of stargazer lilies pressed to her nose and an extra-large piece of peach pie in her hand. She was going to die here and now, in a lonely corner of the Berger cemetery, at the bottom of a dark hole that had been dug for somebody else. At least she wasn't alone. At least she had Ethan with her. But she found no comfort in the fact that he was going to die too. He didn't deserve such a miserable fate any more than she did. It shouldn't be his time either.

Then she screamed.

"CARLTON!"

Daisy had never screamed so loudly or fervently in all of her life. But it was in a desperate attempt to save that life. And Ethan's.

"CARLTON!"

Carlton didn't reply. Nor did anybody else. Daisy stared at the top of the grave. There was no one there. All the men had disappeared. There was still noise. There was still fiery reflection. And there was still a lot of yelling. But it was all off in the distance. At the edge of the grave, there was no movement and no sound.

Daisy cleaned the blood from Ethan's jaw and temple as well as she could with the hem of her shirt, then carefully set his head down on a little incline of clay. She stood up. Carlton was gone and wouldn't return. She was convinced of that. But what about Joe? Where was he? She had to talk to him. She had to persuade him not to do what Carlton had said. There had to be a way to stop him from burying them.

"JOE!"

Was he getting a shovel?