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She ran toward my side of the car, and—too late—I remembered that my window was open. I tried to grasp the roller, but it was slick with rain, and the Lost Girl was already there. Her long, white fingers grabbed my windowsill, and for an awful second I just stared at them in horror, so close to my face.
“Help me!”
Her voice was high and reedy, mixing with the rush of rain. That wasn’t real. She isn’t real, I told myself, and then she screamed again.
“Help me! Please!”
I raised my gaze from her hands—everything was too fast and too slow at once—and I saw the livid purple bruises on her pale neck, the thick trickle of blood from one ear. The blood was smeared in her hair and across her cheek, and it was still pulsing slowly out of her, dark and viscous. Then Eddie’s big, powerful hands gripped my shoulders and pulled me away from the window.
I fell back across the console, scrambling away from the window in fear as Eddie lunged across me for the window roller. He gripped it and cranked it around once, making the window squeal as it pushed against the Lost Girl’s hands.
“Please,” she begged. Her dark eyes were huge, her lips painfully cracked. “Please.”
Eddie cranked the window roller again. And the Lost Girl reached into the car, gripped his wrist, and pulled him toward her.
He gave a surprised grunt, and I felt his entire body slide partway out of the driver’s seat and across the console. I hadn’t known that anyone could be strong enough to drag Eddie. His foot left the brake, and the car lurched, trying to drift forward but held back by something. Was the Lost Girl doing this? Was she pulling my six-feet-four husband with one hand and holding back the car at the same time?
She pulled again, and Eddie’s grunt was more of a growl. He was trying to free himself from her grip. The car lurched again.
I scrambled over him, into the driver’s seat. It was messy, with his legs in my lap, but I slid beneath his weight and put my feet down. I felt the brake against my bare foot.
“Hold on,” I said, and stomped on the gas.
The car gave a deep, frustrated roar. The back end had gone into the weeds, and I felt the wheels skid. Pieces of gravel pinged against the car’s body. The rain pounded down, and another flash of lightning lit up the sky. I spun the wheel and stomped on the gas again.
This time, something gave. The back of the car fishtailed left, then right. I spun the wheel and gassed it again, and it gave more.
In the passenger seat, the Lost Girl still had a grip on Eddie’s arm. She was screaming again, begging us to help her, to get her out of there. Her hand was the white of death against Eddie’s tanned arm.
The car loosened from whatever had trapped it and lurched forward. I looked at Eddie, who was still struggling.
“Go!” he shouted at me. “Go!”
I didn’t need to hear anything else. I floored the gas and the car came out of the weeds, off the shoulder and onto the blacktop.
Eddie shouted, but he didn’t tell me to stop. I couldn’t look at him; I was too busy righting the car on Atticus Line, trying to orient myself through the sheets of rain. The Lost Girl was still screaming.
Then she was gone, and Eddie jerked himself away from the window. I got us out of there as fast as I could.
The glowing light was gone, too, and there was only blackness and rain. I had been completely turned around, and I had no idea which direction I was driving; I only knew I was getting away from the Lost Girl. The rain was a solid mass on the windshield, the wipers groaning as I struggled to see the road.
Gradually, I realized I could see more easily. The light was turning grayish orange, tinged with purple, a stormy sky with the sun setting. The rain let up a little. I made sure I was on the right side of the yellow line, and I eased off the gas. I risked a look at Eddie.
He had pulled his legs from my lap and was sitting in the passenger seat. The window beside him was rolled up. He was soaked, his expression grim.
“Are you okay?” I asked him.
“I’m fine.”
“Did she hurt you?”
He lifted his hand, shook it. In the dim light, I couldn’t see any sign of a mark on his arm. “I don’t think so. I don’t feel any pain.”
I ran a shaking hand through my soaked hair, pushing the messy strands off my face. The hand that still held the wheel ached because I was gripping so hard. “What the hell do we do now?”
Eddie was silent in the passenger seat, watching the road.
“That was insane,” I said, because I had to hear the words out loud.
