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“Little spot I found,” he said, cheerily. “I think you’re gonna love it.”
“Tell me about it,” Cora said, still trying to think.
The moment they’d pulled out onto the small, two-lane mountain road, Neil had started going much, much too fast, and now they pulled around another hairpin turn. Cora’s stomach did flip-flops as she thought she could feel the car skid toward the edge.
“It’s not far,” he said, still sounding cheery. “Just wait!”
Sure enough, it was about two more terrifying minutes before he pulled up to a vista point. There was no one else there, just a low stone wall and a beautiful view.
Is he going to propose to me?Cora thought wildly.
He gestured at her with the gun.
“Go on!” he said. “There’s a great view.”
She stood and got out of the car carefully. His weird, cheerful attitude rattled her even more than if he’d been acting threatening.
He didn’t seem dangerous, exactly, but he did seem very, very unstable.
As Cora stood in the turnout, looking over most of Granite Valley, wearing nothing more than an oversize t-shirt and a badly torn skirt, she wondered again if she should run, but then Neil was next to her, his arm around her, the gun in his other hand.
“This is a really nice spot,” she said. Her voice sounded strange and high-pitched to her own ears, and she took a deep breath to try and keep her hands from shaking.
“Isn’t it?” Neil said. He puffed up his chest and looked around, the morning sun picking out every tree in the valley in its warm golden light. “It is. What a nice spot.”
There was a long silence.
“So...” Cora said, eyes on the gun, “How have you been?”
“Not great, Cora!” he said. “And, you know, my therapist says that I need to stop blaming others for my problems, Cora, but when you left me it felt really bad.”
He took a step away and turned to face her, his back to the view.
Where are they, Cora thought.
What if it didn’t work? The skirt was it. I’m out of ideas.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I should have texted you back.”
He blinked, looking confused for a second.
Then he smiled and laughed, like they were having a silly misunderstanding.
“No, not that,” he said. “Oh, that was fine, I know how girls play hard to get.”
He winked, and Cora’s stomach turned over, a chill seeping down her spine.
“I meant when you left! You didn’t even tell me,” he went on. Now he was frowning. “And that, well,” he stopped and looked at the ground for a moment, like he was collecting his thoughts. “That really hurt my feelings.”
What the fuck is going on here, Cora thought. It was obvious that Neil was dangerous — he’d driven across the country and was waving a gun at her — but she had no idea what he wanted her to do.
Please come, she thought, straining her ears for the sound of bears in the forest.
Dead silence.
“I’m very sorry,” she said. “That wasn’t my intention, I just got a new job.”
Now he started pacing.
