Windigo Fire by M.H. Callway

Author:M.H. Callway
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: thriller, crime, suspense, murder, mystery, action, windigo, forest fire, native legend
Publisher: M.H. Callway

22

The spare room in Camp Nirvana’s office cabin was a tiny space, no more than a cupboard really, backing off the main office where Barry Tucker kept his computer. It held a cot, a night table and a cheap bookcase, empty except for grit in the inside corners. A rough, grey Boy Scout blanket covered the cot’s bare mattress.

Barry had shoved Rachel into the spare room the minute Sergeant McKenna headed back to her cruiser. Its door had a shiny brass lock that he bolted shut from the outside. For hours she’d sat huddled on the floor, back to the bare plywood wall, struggling to stay awake in case Barry came back.

Thankfully, he never did.

Sometime in the night she had crawled onto the cot and fallen asleep. She woke up, curled on top of the blanket, light trickling in through the single dirt-streaked window. She felt cold and stiff, and she needed to pee.

She sat up, chewing her thumb. Barry can’t keep me locked up here forever, she thought. For one thing, I’ll pee and poop all over the floor. But from the way Barry was acting, he’d never let her back into camp, even if she swore to act like a team player.

Fear gnawed through her stomach. Barry would never call Dad; he’d call the social workers. They’d grab her and give her to foster parents and she’d never see Dad again. Barry would keep her locked up until the social workers arrived. If she peed her pants, he’d say she did it on purpose. If she complained that he didn’t give her any food, he’d say she was lying. Sergeant McKenna had called her a liar, too. That’s what adults always said, especially when she was telling the truth.

I want my dad.

She tasted blood on her thumb. Stop being a baby. She jerked it out of her mouth and wiped it on her shorts.

By now Odile and Sergeant McKenna would have been at the police station for hours. She wanted to believe that rescue helicopters were flying out to Fire Island to pull Danny out of the forest fire. But she couldn’t. It felt too much like having faith.

After Mum died, the priest kept telling her and Dad to have faith. That meant sitting around, going to Mass and praying all the time. Faith never stopped her wishing that Mum would come home from the hospital. Faith never stopped Dad from getting sad and taking those yellow pills.

Faith was useless.

She could see Danny’s smooth olive skin, blistering and charring in the flames. Getting burnt up would hurt so much…

I have to get out of here.

She leapt off the cot and ran to the window. It was made up of a large single pane of glass set above two narrow overlapping panes, which slid sideways to let in the air.

The window catch on the sliding panes was stiff and rusty. She bruised her fingers trying to work it loose. She kept at it but it wouldn’t budge.

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