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Oliver heard Cody’s scream, which was in the same range as the pale-faced woman who stood inches before them. Then his heart felt like it seized in his chest before a flood of adrenaline sent it racing. His breath caught, and every nerve in his body lit up as he jumped back.
The woman was gone as fast as she appeared, but Oliver heard her footsteps clomping along the broken concrete beneath the overhang.
“After her!” he shouted to Cody, who stood with his mouth hanging open and one hand gripping his chest.
Oliver switched on the flashlight and raced along the front of the motel after the woman. Her dark, matted hair flew back from her head, and he could see some kind of heavy coat or sweater flapping out behind her. For an old woman, she was moving pretty damn fast. And if she was a ghost, why hadn’t she just disappeared? Or moved through a wall?
She was about twenty feet ahead of him, at the corner of the building near the ruins of the main office. Oliver tried to push himself to run faster, heart pounding, hot breath scraping the back of his throat. If she made it around the corner, he knew he would lose her. And when she vanished into the trees, she would take with her any chance for them to find Dave and Demetrius.
The woman stepped off the edge of the concrete and Oliver pushed himself even more. She would be around the corner and out of his eyeline in another second.
A shape barreled out from the side of the building with a yell like a war cry. Cody moved fast and low, grabbing the woman around the waist and driving her to the ground. Oliver skidded to a stop and stood at the edge of the overhang, staring at the two struggling in the mud and rain. The woman shrieked and screamed as she fought to get free, but Cody straddled her, captured both of her wrists, and pinned her to the ground.
“Where’s Demmy?” he shouted down at her.
The woman screamed back, her eyes wide and unblinking even as the rain fell on her face.
“Where’s my brother?” Cody shouted.
The woman screamed again and struggled beneath him, legs kicking and arms flailing wildly as Cody tried to keep them on the ground.
“I think she’s out of it,” Oliver said. “She doesn’t know what’s going on.”
“She knows something,” Cody said, then grunted as the woman arched her back in an effort to throw him off. “Feisty as all get out.”
Oliver started to feel uncomfortable watching the two struggle in the mud and rain. This woman was older than them, even though she’d been able to outrun him, and he was witnessing Cody struggling to keep her pinned to the ground as he sat on her solar plexus. Everything about the situation felt wrong, especially if she wasn’t in her right mind. And by simply standing by and letting Cody restrain her, Oliver could be held responsible as well.
But Dave and Demetrius were missing. And this woman, crazy or not, could be the only way for them to be found.
“Cody, this is making me uncomfortable.”
Cody looked up and frowned as he continued to struggle to restrain the woman who shrieked and writhed beneath him. “Dude, I’m not assaulting her. I’m trying to get her to be still so we can talk to her.”
“Yeah, but… It looks and feels wrong.”
With some effort, Cody pinned the woman’s hands to the mud again and glared at Oliver. “You want to pull a catch and release with her while Demmy and Dave are somewhere out in the woods? Because you feel uncomfortable right now, you want me to release this crazy woman instead of talk her back to the real world and find out where my husband and brother are?”
The woman stilled beneath him. She turned her face to the side and closed her eyes against the steady rain as she panted. Her fists unclenched and she stretched her legs out flat. Cody gave her a wary, assessing look, then looked at Oliver. “Hopefully she didn’t take that wrong.” He looked back at the woman. “My husband is not my brother. It sounded funny now that I’ve thought about it, so I wanted to clear that up. There are two guys missing, one of them I’m married to, and the other one is my younger brother.”
“Are you restricting her breathing by sitting on her? She’s panting pretty hard.”
“I didn’t violate her in any way.”
“Yeah, I know that. Just… can you get off her?”
Cody leveled a scowl at Oliver, then aimed it down at the woman. He slowly released his hold on one of her wrists and, when she kept her arm on the ground, pointed a finger at her face. “We just want to talk with you, okay? We’re worried about our partners. We just want to talk, that’s all.” He waited for an answer, but the woman didn’t move. “All right, I’m getting up now. Don’t run away. Please. We just want to talk with you.”
With some grunting and careful movements, he shifted his weight and raised one leg to move to the side and kneel beside her. Rain coursed down his head and dripped in a steady stream from the tip of his nose as he watched the woman carefully. He looked up at Oliver who shrugged in response, then Cody got to his feet and bent down to take her hand.
“Let me help you up,” Cody said. “I hope I didn’t hurt you. I just needed to stop you from running away.”
The woman turned her head to look up at Cody. Oliver saw him smile reassuringly, and then the woman lifted a foot and planted it in Cody’s gut. He let out a woof of expelled air and doubled over. As the woman struggled to her feet, Oliver stepped forward and grabbed her arm. He yanked on it to keep her from running toward the woods. She was off-balance and stumbled into him and they grappled together, turning in place and moving back under the overhang. Their feet tangled, and they went down onto the crumbling concrete, Oliver on top. He heard a thump and felt the woman go still under him.
“Oh fuck,” he whispered.
He rolled to the side then got to his knees and looked down. Her eyes were closed and her mouth was open, one arm stretched up over her head.
“Fuck, that hurt,” Cody moaned, on his knees in the deep mud with a hand on his belly and his head hanging down.
