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My cell phone rings, and I nearly bolt out of bed at the sound. I roll over and look at the clock. It’s after one o’clock in the morning. No one calls me at this hour. They know I’m either out at the bar or asleep, and if I’m asleep, I’m dead to the world.
I pick my cell phone up off the nightstand and see Jesse’s calling me.
“Everything okay?” I ask with urgency.
“Tara,” he starts, and I can hear the plight in his tone. The sixteen-year-old, who has quite the bravado when it comes to his own teenage angst, sounds like a young boy as he pleads on the other end of the phone, “I need your help.”
“Emotionally or physically?”
“Please, come get me.”
My feet hit the carpeted floor in seconds. “I’m on my way.”
Jesse has called my cell phone before. Molly and I were late to pick him up from his driver’s ed class, so he called to see why we were running late. I’ve even received a text or two from him while we were working on the castle, confirming what supplies were needed before driving the four-wheeler back from the shed.
We’ve had many conversations in person over the past week especially. I’ve learned he’s actually a funny kid, smarter than I assumed, and he really likes to talk about history and world politics.
What I’ve never heard was him sounding so desperate.
I keep him on the line while I get dressed quickly, slide on a pair of shoes, and head out the door.
My engine revs as I hightail it out of my driveway and head toward him.
“It’s gonna take me a while. I’m in Newbury, but I’m on my way. Where exactly are you?”
He drops me a location pin, and I enter the information into my navigation. It says I’ll be there in forty minutes. He doesn’t want to talk, but agrees to stay on the line. Sometimes, I hear voices around him, but mostly, it’s just silence and his breathing coming through the receiver. I hope his cell phone doesn’t die.
My foot hits the gas, and I drive faster than normal as I speed on the highway toward him. This would not be an ideal night to get pulled over. I’d be let go with a speeding ticket, but there is no time to waste.
I need to get to Jesse.
The address he sent is a house on the outskirts of Castleton. While the town Jesse and Molly live in with their mom is a beautiful suburb, it is bordered by a less-than-ideal section of row houses that aren’t quite abandoned yet riddled with neglect as people continue to occupy them fail to upkeep. Will has stated that he gets called to this section of town quite often as a police officer and was once shot in a nearby store.
“Jesse, what the hell are you doing on this side of town?” I ask him as I turn my shiny red convertible down the street.
He doesn’t reply.
My car sticks out like a sore thumb. I’m not worried about being carjacked. I just really don’t want to draw attention to myself, especially since Jesse has been silent on the other end of the phone, as if he doesn’t want those he’s with to know he’s being picked up.
“I’m here,” I state as I park on the curb and turn my headlights off.
To my surprise, Jesse doesn’t come out of a building. He emerges from behind a dumpster and jogs toward my car. As soon as he’s in the passenger seat, we drive away.
He’s wearing jeans and a T-shirt that has a stain down the front. His backpack is tossed onto the floor between his legs, which are vibrating with nervous energy. He looks pale despite his sun-kissed skin. Flushed, like he’s about to vomit or just did.
It’s a hot summer evening, yet he’s shaking beside me. I grab his hand and hold on to it. He squeezes it back.
“Are you high?”
He shakes his head. “I didn’t take anything.”
When I look at his knee that’s bouncing and his face that’s clenched tight with the downturn of his eyes, my heart sinks. “You’re frightened.”
“I didn’t know what to do.”
I head onto the highway and drive toward the nicer side of town. “Did someone hurt you?”
He swallows. “No. They were just doing some scary shit, and I didn’t want to be a part of it. I left and hid outside because I didn’t know what they’d do if they found me.”
