Chapter 2: The Trail Beckons
The car door clicked shut, sealing Jess in a warm capsule of light and safety. Maylee leaned through the open window, her smile soft under the parking lot’s jaundiced security light.
“I’ll be right back, love,” she said. “Two minutes.”
Jess frowned, her fingers still on the seatbelt buckle. “Your hand is still bleeding, May. It’s dark. It’s just a hair tie.”
“But you gave it to me,” Maylee said, as if that explained everything. In her world, it did. It was a totem. A token. Letting it remain on the rock where that man’s eyes had polluted their view was unthinkable. “I know exactly where I left it. Won’t even get my boots dirty.”
Jess sighed, that fond, exasperated puff of air Maylee loved to earn. “You’re ridiculous. But fine. If you’re not back in five, I’m honking the horn and embarrassing you in front of the trees.”
“The trees are judgy. I’ll hurry.” Maylee’s laugh was a light, genuine sound that dissolved into the night as she turned.
She took three steps away from the car, the cracked asphalt giving way to the soft, silent mulch of the trailhead. The world changed. The hum of distant highway traffic faded, absorbed by the dense, waiting dark of the woods. The flickering light from the lot didn’t reach here. It was a different country.
“Be careful!” Jess’s call was muffled by the glass now. Maylee didn’t turn, just raised a hand in a casual wave. She heard the solid thunk of the car doors locking. Good. Jess was safe.
Her pace shifted instantly. The casual stroll became a loose, agile jog, muscles coiling and releasing with silent efficiency. She was built for this—for strength, for pursuit. The throbbing in her palm was a metronome, a pleasant reminder of Jess’s touch. The tissue was a soggy, bloody ball in her fist.
She didn’t need a flashlight. The path was a gray ribbon in the lunar gloom, and her eyes adjusted, drinking in the shapes of things. The gnarled root she’d pointed out to Jess. The bend where the owl had called. Her mind was a perfect map.
She wasn’t going to the overlook.
The side trail the man had taken was just ahead, a gap in the underbrush like a dark mouth. She slowed, listening. The woods were never silent. Cricket song. The scuttle of a vole in the leaves. The sigh of wind in the high branches.
And then, another sound. The crunch of a careless foot on dry twigs. Thirty yards in, maybe less. A low, self-satisfied whistling—the same tuneless noise from before.
He was meandering, in no hurry. Probably thought he’d spooked the two girls, gotten under their skin. The idea was a live wire in Maylee’s blood.
She stepped off the main path and into the brush. Thorns caught her jacket, her jeans. She ignored them. She was a shadow among shadows, her movements fluid, deliberate. She closed the distance without a sound, the training from all those early-morning gym sessions translating perfectly to this: control, breath, focus.
She saw him then, a bulky silhouette against the slightly lighter night sky, paused to light a cigarette. The match flared, illuminating his smug, ordinary face for a second before he shook it out. The cherry glowed like a Cyclops eye.
Maylee’s fingers found the knife in her pocket. She unfolded it with a soft, practiced snick that was lost in the rustle of leaves. The blade was a sliver of cold darkness.
She waited until he took his next step. “You dropped something.”
His whole body jerked. He spun, the cigarette a blazing arc. “What the hell? You?” He squinted, recognition dawning, followed by a slow, oily confidence. He smiled around the cigarette. “Change your mind about that private tour? Where’s your quiet friend?”
“She’s safe,” Maylee said. Her voice was flat, conversational. She took a step forward. “You looked at her.”
The man laughed, a short, barking sound. “Are you for real? Look, kid, I was just being friendly. You need to calm—”
He didn’t finish. Maylee moved. It wasn’t a rage-fueled lunge. It was a solution, executed with the precision of a chemist pouring a measured reagent. She covered the space between them in a heartbeat. His eyes had just enough time to widen, the cigarette falling from his lips.
She didn’t go for a dramatic slash. She drove the knife up and in, just below the ribcage, angling for the complex machinery within. A efficient, clinical motion. His breath exploded out in a wet gasp, all smugness gone, replaced by pure, animal shock.
He stumbled back, hands fluttering to his stomach, coming away dark and shiny. “You… you bitch,” he choked.
Maylee watched him, her head tilted. The cosmic calm held. This was just… cleaning up. Taking out the trash. Protecting what was hers. It was simple arithmetic.
He made a gurgling sound, lurching toward her, one hand outstretched. She sidestepped easily, as if avoiding a puddle. His momentum carried him forward. He crashed into the rotten trunk of the fallen tree at the clearing’s edge, the one with branches like skeletal fingers. He slid down it, leaving a thick, dark smear on the pale wood.
Maylee stood over him. His breathing was ragged, labored. She waited until his glazing eyes found hers. “You don’t look at her,” she whispered, her tone almost pedagogical. “You don’t talk to her. You don’t even think about her. She is mine.”
He tried to speak, but only a bubble of blood formed on his lips. His head lolled to the side.
Maylee knelt. She wiped the blade clean on the moss, methodically, then on the clean inner lining of her jacket. She folded the knife and put it away. From her other pocket, she pulled the bloody tissue from her palm. She dropped it onto his chest, a tiny, crumpled flag.
She rose and walked back the way she came, her pace steady, unhurried. The night sounds, which had paused, cautiously resumed. The cricket song started again, hesitant at first, then swelling to a chorus.
By the time she emerged from the treeline at the parking lot, her breathing was even. She could see Jess in the car, illuminated by the soft glow of her phone screen, her face a perfect painting of mild concern. Maylee flexed her injured hand, feeling the sting, and felt a smile touch her lips.
She walked to the driver’s side door. Jess jumped, then unlocked it with a press of a button.
“Get it?” Jess asked, looking up. Her green eyes scanned Maylee’s face, then dropped to her empty hands.
“It was gone,” Maylee said, sliding into the seat. The interior light made everything feel warm and normal. She breathed in the scent of Jess, of the car’s vanilla air freshener. “Must have blown away. Or maybe an animal took it. Something drawn to shiny things.” She started the engine, the sound loud in the quiet lot.
“Oh, that’s a bummer,” Jess said, buckling her seatbelt again. “I’ll get you another one. A better one.” She reached over and squeezed Maylee’s forearm. “You’re cold. And you’ve got… a leaf in your hair.”
Maylee reached up, plucked the tiny fragment of a dried oak leaf from her curls. “The woods are messy tonight,” she said. She put the car in reverse, the headlights slicing through the dark, illuminating the empty path she’d just returned from. Nothing moved there. Nothing at all.
“Let’s get home,” Jess said, leaning her head back. “I’m thinking pizza and that awful reality show you hate.”
“Perfect,” Maylee said, and she meant it. Everything was perfect. The threat was erased. Jess was here, touching her arm, planning their night. The world was back in its rightful order.
She pulled onto the access road, the dark woods receding in the rearview mirror until they were just a smudge of deeper black against the night sky. Gone.