Held (Gone #2) (23 page)

"Like I said, I don't want to get you involved."

"And I'm already well past that point." He stopped and turned, looking into her eyes. He took her other hand. "What's your real name?"

"What?"

"I've noticed you flinch when you're called Heather. I want to know your real name."

Did she dare tell him? What if he accidentally called her Macy in front of Rebekah?

"I won't tell anyone. I just want to know who you really are."

She hesitated. "It's Macy Mercer."

"Macy. That's really pretty. It suits you." He squeezed her hands. "We'd better get back before we get into trouble. Then we wouldn't be able to follow our plan tonight, Macy."

Her heart skipped a beat. She liked the way her name rolled off his tongue.

"Okay."

He let go of her hands and they made their way back to the school house.

Rebekah ran up to them before they even crossed the dirt road. "Are you okay, Heather? What happened?"

Macy stared at her, not knowing what to say.

"She got spooked, Teacher. Do you hear the sounds of the farm slaughter?"

Rebekah looked around, appearing to listen. "No."

"Well, it was going on when we came outside," Luke said. "Heather had never heard it before and she thought something was wrong. She didn't even think, only reacted. Right, Heather?"

"Yeah. It scared me. I'm sorry."

Rebekah looked relieved. "Next time something like that happens, please ask someone rather than just taking off." She leaned close to Macy. "We don't need word of this getting back to your dad, you know what I mean?"

"I know. I'm sorry."

"Let's get back into the classroom." She led them back to the schoolhouse, telling the other kids that everything was fine.

Everyone looked at Macy and Luke, but said nothing. Dorcas gave her a knowing and sympathetic look.

When they sat down, Macy's heart still raced. Was it from running, the scare of being chased, or from Luke holding her hands again? Her heart fluttered.

He tapped her foot with his. She looked over at him and he raised an eyebrow and held up his pencil.

"Oh, right." She picked up her pencil and wrote where she'd left off. The rest of the morning dragged on until lunch finally arrived.

On the way back to the house, Rebekah warned Macy not to say anything about running off to Chester. It was obvious by the look on her face that she was still spooked about his tantrum a few weeks earlier.

When Rebekah and Macy sat down to eat lunch, Chester still hadn't arrived. That made her more nervous than if he would have actually been there. "Where is he?"

"He mentioned that Jonah and Abraham might take him out into the world soon to see if they could find anyone needing to join the community. Let me pray."

They bowed their heads and then ate after Rebekah was done with the prayer.

"How long will they be out?" Macy asked.

"Could be until the meeting tonight. It depends on whether or not they find anyone."

Macy tried to mask the excitement. If Chester and Jonah were gone, that might make it even easier to escape.

"Are you feeling better?"

Macy looked at Rebekah, confused.

"You were spooked from hearing the sounds of slaughter, remember?"

"Right. Yeah, I'm fine now." She couldn't tell by the look on Rebekah's face if she believed Luke's story or not. She didn't appear upset if she did doubt. It was also something she didn't want to discuss. "I want to hear more about your band. You told me a little that first morning, but nothing since then."

"I nearly forgot about that." She smiled, looking lost in thought for a moment. "We were really big on the indie scene on the east coast. We were performing in big clubs up and down the coast and had our sights set on Hollywood. But we figured we had a better chance starting out in Seattle. It's big, but not as big, you know?"

Macy nodded, her mouth full of food.

"The lead singer got busted for buying drugs and ratted us out. I was actually running from the cops when I ran into Jonah. They were going to arrest me and I already had a record, so the last thing I wanted was to get caught. He could see the desperation in my eyes. When he told me about the community, I thought it would be the perfect place to hide out for a while."

"But you're still here." Not that she could get out if she wanted to. "Did you ever want to leave?"

Rebekah set her glass down. "At first I was just glad to have somewhere to rest. I was pretty strung out. Eve took care of me for a couple weeks, telling me all about the community the entire time. By the time I had my unveiling and received this house, I was ready to stay. Eve and Jonah both said that I had a lot of potential. Since I had gone to school for teaching, they decided to put that to use."

"So you want to stay here forever? You never think about leaving?"

"This is much better than going to jail. I've been there, and there's nothing desirable. At least here I'm free. I can walk around without a care. Now I can even have a family."

Macy froze. The way that she said family didn't sit right with her. "Are you…expecting?"

Rebekah's face turned red. "It's too soon to tell for sure, but I think so. A woman knows these things. You can't say anything. Your dad wanted to tell you."

Why was Macy surprised? The way they went at it, she was probably carrying a litter. "Well, congratulations." Hopefully it was a little Rebekah, and not a little Chester.

She beamed. "I'm really excited. And I know you'll make a wonderful big sister. Your dad has told me how you've always wanted a sibling."

Macy fought a scowl. She
had
a sibling that she was very happy with, and she was quite eager to get back to him. "Yeah, that'll be great."

Rebekah talked about knitting baby clothes and teaching Macy how to so they could work on it together. Macy nodded, not saying anything. If she had her way, she'd be running through the woods that night looking for the highway.

"We'd better get lunch cleaned up." Rebekah stood up. "Are you all right? You're being quiet."

She forced a weak smile. "Just thinking about how great it's going to be having a baby around."

Rebekah's face lit up. "Oh, good."

They cleaned up and went back to the school. Macy made a beeline for Luke as soon as she saw him. "You haven't chickened out, have you?"

He laughed. The way the skin around his eyes crinkled made Macy melt.

Luke shook his head. "On the contrary." He tilted his head, indicating for her to follow him. Macy followed him to furthest corner of the schoolyard, where the younger kids were milling about.

Luke stood as close to Macy as possible without touching her. "Do you want to know my plan?"

"Tell me."

"We're going to burn down part of the fence and run."

Macy's eyes widened. It was brilliant. "How?"

"With matches of course. I've actually been saving them up. One here and there. I've got quite a collection."

"Why? Stamps aren't good enough for you?"

"I told you, I've been planning on escaping for a long time. I've had several ideas brewing."

"What about waiting twenty years before Jonah would take you outside?"

"That's my long-term plan. I'm not opposed to taking advantage of an opportunity arising, and in fact I've always wanted to be ready for such an event."

"When are we going to do this?"

"The way I see it, we have two options. We can try to sneak out during the meeting, when everyone is distracted or we can wait until everyone is asleep. You stay awake until I tap on your window."

Macy thought about it. "What do you think is better?"

"If Chester is in the spotlight with Jonah, then we shouldn't go then. It's possible they could call you to the front, and once it's discovered that you're missing, all hell is going to break loose. At least at night, everyone will be sleeping."

Butterflies danced in her stomach. They were really going to make a break for it that night.

"What do you think? Can you wait until everyone is sleeping?"

"I sure can."

Mall

"Can we give Alex back his electronics?" Alyssa asked. "He's been punished long enough."

Chad looked up from his laptop. He hadn't even heard Alyssa come in.

"This can't go on forever. Especially since he was only trying to protect his sister."

He closed the laptop. "You know that was the agreement to keep him from being suspended."

"Who cares? He doesn't want to go back anyway. I can homeschool him or we can sign him up for that charter school and he can do everything online. I don't want to punish him any more, Chad."

"It's not like we've sent him into exile. Zoey comes over all the time and he's had several of his other friends come by. He's been watching movies with you. He's not without human contact."

Alyssa begged him with her eyes. "Come on. This isn't the time to lay down the law. Look what happened when we were too hard on Macy."

"You're going to bring that up?" Anger ran through him. "This has nothing to do with that, and for your information, if we would have taken away her laptop and phone, guess what? She wouldn't have been
able
to contact that child abductor. She'd still be here."

"Oh, so you don't think she could have borrowed someone's tablet at school and emailed him?"

Chad dug his nails into the desk, not wanting to take out his anger on Alyssa. He was angry enough to break something. He took a deep breath and counted to ten backwards. "Call the school and find out how much longer they want this punishment to last. If it's more than a few days, fine, look into charter schools or homeschooling or whatever you feel like."

"Really?"

"Yeah. While you do that, I need to call Detective Fleshman. You'd think they'd have called about the results from the body. Even if they hadn't found anything yet, they should at least keep us in the loop."

"No news is good news, right?" Alyssa asked. She turned around and left, closing the door behind her.

Chad picked up his phone and called Fleshman, who answered right away. "Chad, I wish I had answers for you. As I told you, your family's dental records were in the part of the office that was destroyed by the fire and they didn't keep those online."

"I know that!" Chad stood up, sending his wheeled chair into the wall. "Surely, you have something to tell me. I'm not waiting for takeout—this is my daughter's life."

"We're doing everything we can. It's out of our hands now that the body has been sent to Seattle. We're anxious to know the results too, but this isn't TV. DNA results don't come back in five minutes. There's a lot to consider. They're running the girl's fingerprints through the system, but again, everything takes time—weeks, usually."

"What else are you doing? Besides waiting on Seattle?"

"We're going through all the clues. Have you seen the room we have dedicated to Macy's case? Even with my entire team focused on it, nothing is moving as fast as any of us would like. I have a son, Chad. I can imagine what you're going through. If it was my boy missing, I'd be pulling my hair out. I'm working as diligently as if it was him."

Chad let out long, slow breath. "I do appreciate everything you guys are doing."

"And I answer your calls day or night, whether I'm at work or home."

"Am I bothering you at home?"

"You're not bothering me, Chad."

So he
was
calling him at home. "I don't want to keep you. Can you call me when you're on the clock?"

"I'd be glad to."

"Thanks." He hung up and looked around his office. It felt suffocating. In fact, the entire house did. He went upstairs and found Alyssa on the phone. "What's going on?" he asked.

"The school has me on hold."

"I'm going to the store. Need anything?"

She shook her head. "Did you hear anything?"

"Still waiting on Seattle, because tests take time and our dentist is an idiot."

"Yes, I'm still here," Alyssa said into the phone.

Chad waved and headed for the door. He knew he probably looked like a wreck, but he didn't even care enough to grab a baseball cap. Everyone knew who he was thanks to the news, so no one would give it a second thought if he looked tired and stressed.

He got into his car and drove to the grocery store. Once parked, he sat in the car for a few minutes. They didn't need anything. What was he doing there? Was he going to wander around, squeezing melons? Comparing prices? That was ridiculous. The mall wasn't so far away. He could at least wander and window shop.

Not only that, but that's where Macy's clothes and phone had been found. Maybe he could find a new clue.

Chad turned the ignition and drove to the mall. He parked as far away as possible and meandered through the parking lot, starting with the edge, looking for anything that could be a clue. There was nothing other than random litter, probably dropped from people leaving the movie theater.