Page 15 of Monster

Braxton nodded.

“We need to call the cops—” I started, but Braxton shook his head sharply.

“No cops.”

“Braxton—”

“You call the cops, and you’ll be on the record. They’ll know who you are and that you helped me. You’ll be in danger.”

“They can help us—”

He laughed. “No. They can’t.”

Since when were twelve-year-old so distrustful of the authorities?

“They won’t be able to do anything about this. Those men will either catch us before the cops show up, or we’ll escape. But you call the cops, then we’ll be involving a lot of people we don’t want.”

What the fuck?

Since when he sounded so mature?

And not call the cops?

“Please,” he said, “Trust me.”

I looked at him briefly before turning back to the road, torn.

Fuck.

“Ms. Wilde.”

I nodded. “Okay. No cops. But we better get away from them.”

He shot me a small smile and nodded. “Okay.”

I closed my eyes and prayed I was making the right decision.

I found a small rural street, and we pulled onto it.

My car beeped, and the gas light went on.

Braxton looked at me.

Yeah. We were about to be stranded.

I looked around.

To my right was an open field of weeds.

We wouldn’t be safe there.

To the left was a little better. It looked like some small, enclosed woods, with hundreds of trees lining closely to each other that should provide some coverage.

I looked at Braxton before I drove the car further into the side. There was a small hole there, the ground had crack opened for some reason, and the nose of the car touched the end of the hole. I winced, thinking about how much money this would cost me to fix once this was all over.

If we made it out of this alive, that was.

“Come on,” I said. “We have to hide.”

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