Page 49 of Little Girls Sleeping
Her heart rate increased.
Brothers Malcolm and Rick Darren. Malcolm: lack of impulse control. Rick: stoic, steady, calculating, and strong. Protecting his brother—but at what cost?
Her lungs filled fully with oxygen and then exhaled out all the air. The cool outdoors stung her throat as she watched her breath swirl directly out in front of her.
She ran down a trail that would eventually lead her out onto the road again. Her legs never tired from carrying her to the next level.
The faces of everyone Katie had spoken to and interacted with sped through her mind in a logical stream. There were subtle details she hadn’t noticed at the time, but now she reflected on them. Everything played a part in the investigation, no matter how small and insignificant.
The case was an intricate, living, breathing puzzle. It was not the usual kind of puzzle where you knew that every piece would eventually fit somewhere. In a homicide, it was up to the detective to figure out which pieces were not of importance and which pieces meant everything, eventually solving the mystery.
The sound of a revving engine stalled her repetitive thoughts about the case. A car was approaching from behind. She adjusted her position on the roadway, veering closer to the side to allow the driver to see her in the foggy atmosphere and drive around her if necessary.
But instead of slowing, the car increased its speed and continued to approach.
Katie turned and looked behind her, but she still couldn’t see the vehicle. It didn’t have any headlights ignited and it was difficult to make out its shape through the haze.
She slowed her pace and jogged in place.
The heavy fog, which had come in much quicker than she had anticipated, seemed to suffocate the morning light. Her view became muddled. Then a shapeless vehicle burst through the murk and revealed itself to be a dark truck accelerating at high speed. It was headed directly for her.
“Hey!” she yelled, trying to get the driver’s attention. She assumed they couldn’t see her. “Hey!” she yelled again, waving her arms.
The dark truck, which she now saw had no front license plate, jumped the side of the road, driving with one wheel on the pavement and the other in the soft dirt. It didn’t swerve, but continued its course heading straight for Katie.
She glanced to her right, but there was nothing there but low-lying shrubs and trees. No paths or open areas to allow her to easily get out of the way. In any case, she guessed the vehicle would follow her if she tried to avoid it. There was only one option, and she hoped it would work.
She took a fighter’s stance and stood her ground as the one-ton truck barreled directly at her. She couldn’t see who was driving. There was no way of knowing if it was a man or a woman, or even a teenager, behind the wheel.It wasn’t out of control; it appeared to be navigated by someone intent on one thing—running Katie down. She prayed she had made the correct decision.
Three seconds…
Her body trembled, but she stood her ground.
Two seconds…
She sucked in her breath and fought the fight-or-flight response.
One second…
She mustered every ounce of strength along with the determination of an army soldier and catapulted herself to the side of the road just before the truck reached her. She smashed through the low-lying brush, sharp branches scratching her body, and fell down a hillside studded with protruding rocks. Pain radiated up and down her body, compounding her previous scrapes with fierce discomfort. With a few moans and groans, she hit the bottom.
She waited, listening.
The truck hadn’t slowed down, and now it was gone.
Silence kept her company. She sat for a few minutes to catch her breath and run through everything that had happened so she could relay it back at the police station.
Then she stood up, wobbly at first, and made the easy climb back up to the road.
One thing she knew for sure: someone didn’t like her digging up new information on Chelsea Compton—or any of the missing girls’ cases.
Twenty-Eight
Katie sat in the back of an ambulance while the attending paramedic checked her cuts and abrasions and took her vital signs. The more she thought about the incident, the more infuriated she became. Not because she’d been the target, but because she couldn’t give any decent information about the truck.
No license plate. No identifying characteristics. No description of the driver. No video cameras in the vicinity to show the incident. Nothing to help identify this person who was intent on harming her—or at the very least, trying to scare her.
The only thing she could think of was obtaining evidence from the tire marks. There were several feet of precise and perfectly preserved indentations. It would help facilitate the investigation only when there were other tire marks to compare, but Katie thought it was best to have crime-scene technicians photograph them and create impressions.
