His eyes rounded.
“Lorraine,” he said, “Rachel must be one of us!”
“But Marty didn’t say there were any grown-ups,” Lorraine protested. “And if she is one of us, why did Marty make you leave her? It’s gotta be a mistake, Steven.”
“No!” Steven insisted. “Marty didn’t tell us everything. Lorraine, what if Marty is the bad one? What if he’s pulling us into a trap, away from those we love?”
“Marty helped me—”
“Do you know what he did?” Steven interrupted. “He almost killed a boy. The kid just started screaming like crazy at nothing, and then there was a big windstorm. . .”
Lorraine’s mouth dropped open.
“I saw people who were very afraid too,” she said. “But Marty said I made them afraid. But I don’t think it’s a bad thing, Steven. It’s just to scare people who try to hurt us. Like the horrible man who kidnapped me and tied me up.”
Steven frowned.
“You made them afraid?” he asked. “I can’t do that.”
“Marty says some of us have stronger powers,” Lorraine said. “That’s why we have to get together, away from the adults. So we can use those powers.”
“No,” Steven said, standing up. “I’m not listening to Marty. Rachel wants me back. She wants me so much it hurts me to feel it. And it hurts you too, Lorraine. So I can’t be wrong! If she’s sending messages like that, she has to be one of us.”
Lorraine stood up too. She brushed pebbles from the back of her shorts.
“Except, you know what?” Steven went on. “I don’t think she knows it. If she did, she would have told me.”
He took Lorraine by the arm.
“I’m tired of running away,” he said. “I’m tired of listening to Marty and being lost when he . . . ‘disappears.’ “
He waved a hand to emphasize the word.
“We need help, Lorraine,” he said. “I’m going to call Rachel. I’m going to make her come to us. You have to help me, okay?”
Lorraine sighed. She, too, was tired of running. And just because she had dealt with one bad person didn’t mean there weren’t others waiting.
“Okay,” she said. “Maybe we’ll go farther with a grown-up, anyway. It’s getting to be a pain the way people stare at me.”
Steven took her hand. They sat down again and closed their eyes. The sound around them, traffic, birds, people, faded away until they could hear only their own voices in each other’s minds. With all their mental strength, they began to call to Rachel.
In a motel room roughly forty miles away, Julie dropped the pencil she was using to draw with and swung around. Tears were dripping from her eyes.
“Barbara, I feel something,” she said. “I feel like somebody nearby is in pain.”
Barbara stared at her but didn’t say a word. Julie turned away, hugging herself. Why did she think Barbara would offer consolation? The woman hadn’t said a word since they left Colorado. She’d acted like an automaton, buying airline tickets, hailing taxis, checking into this motel as if someone else was controlling her. Julie knew that someone else was: Marty. He was calling her to him, and using Barbara made it easier.
Marty? Marty, is that you?
Marty did not answer. Julie closed her eyes, but saw nothing. She could hear only sobbing, as if from far away. And then, abruptly, she heard two small voices:
Please, please, tell us who you are.
Marty had said there were others like her. Now they were so close by that she could sense their presence. She had to find out who they were, and where they were! They had done nothing since arriving in New Jersey but sit in this motel room. Julie knew that Marty would contact her, but she could no longer wait for him. She would follow the voices. When they got stronger, she’d know they were nearby.
“Barbara, I have to go now,” she said.
Barbara simply nodded. Julie felt a moment of regret, wondering how much control Marty had over the woman. After all, she was a nice person, and she was Samantha’s friend.
Julie had never wanted anyone more than she wanted Samantha just then. But the need to find the other voices in her mind was greater.
She turned to the desk and pulled out a piece of paper. Then she began to write a note to Barbara, explaining what she was doing.
39
AN ALARM RINGING jolted Samantha out of a deep sleep. Momentarily disoriented, she didn’t realize it wasn’t the alarm at all, but the telephone. She took a deep breath to steady herself, said a quick prayer that it might be Julie, and went to answer it.
“It’s Wil,” the detective told her. “Come over to my place. There’s someone here I want you to speak with.”