They’d reached the crest of the hill and a long field of grass stretched in front of them. The ground was muddy under their feet and water pooled in their footprints. Lily looked around until she found a dry place in the grass closer to some pin cherry bushes near the marshy edge just where the land rose up from the riverbank.
“I’m going to go ahead and lay a trail for him to follow if he gets this far,” said Lily. “He didn’t strike me as someone who gives up easy. Plus, we have his car keys. He can’t very well drive away without them. You stay here and I’ll double back after I leave enough clues to make him think we’re in the woods over there.” She squinted into the sun with her good eye and pointed across the field.
“I want to stay with you, Lil.”
Lily looked down at her. “Your legs aren’t as fast as mine, Sun. It’s better if you can hide here until I come for you. We have to outsmart him. I won’t let him catch us again.” She spit into the dirt and used the tip of her shoe to spread the gob of phlegm around. She took Sunny’s hand again. “Here’s a spot where you’ll be out of sight. It’s our best chance, Sun. You’re not going go all baby on me, I hope.”
Sunny shook her head.
“Good because you know what I think about babies.”
Sunny thought the man was gone. She’d heard him circling around, but there hadn’t been any sounds for several minutes. It would be good to stand and stretch but Lily said not to move. She would stay hidden until Lily came for her. A noise in the grass somewhere off to her right and Sunny strained her ears to hear. Was it a mouse scampering closer to her hiding place?
A flock of birds rose in unison from a nearby tree, their wings flapping in the air above her head. Sunny tucked her head lower to the ground. Another movement in the grass, but this time she couldn’t pretend it was a harmless rodent. It was the sound of someone getting closer, pushing through the stalks of grass, tramping through the wet earth toward her.
She heard him laugh.
She turned her head slightly and opened her eyes a slit. His shadow blocked out the sun above her. Before she could move, his hand pulled the back of her sweater into a clump, yanking her from her hiding place and pitching her like a ragdoll onto her stomach in the grass. She scrambled forward on her hands and knees, but he was on her before she got far.
“Where’s your friend?” he hissed in her ear, the weight of him making it hard for her to breathe. He eased off his bulk and a hand reached under her and flipped her over so his face was inches from hers. He used his hands to pin down her arms on either side of her head. His eyes bore into her. “You didn’t think I’d see your footprints in the mud? Where is she?” he asked, louder this time. Spittle sprayed her face. “I owe her.”
Sunny turned her head sideways, trying to avoid his unblinking stare. She wouldn’t answer. Lily had gotten away and she would say nothing.
He ran his fingertips up and down her cheek. She closed her eyes. When his mouth was on hers, she started screaming inside her head. She tried to fight him off, but she was no match for his size and strength. The hand he’d used to touch her face was now sliding down her stomach. His breath was coming harder and he’d begun moaning. Sunny was frantic to get away but she couldn’t move. She couldn’t stop his hand from sliding between her legs.
Neither of them heard Lily’s angry lunge across the field until she was upon them. Sunny felt the man’s pressure lift from her as he heaved himself sideways. She could see Lily behind him. Her face was contorted in rage, the rock she held in her hand pounding again and again on the back of the man’s head until the weapon and her hand were both sticky with dark red blood, and still she would not stop. The man’s arms took the full brunt of his weight while the blows reigned down, but he was too late to protect himself from Lily’s fury. Finally, his breath escaped in a final whoosh as he collapsed onto Sunny like a sack of cement.
Sunny’s screams pierced the stillness of the afternoon, echoing across the water and filling every crevice and burrow in the grassy field. They penetrated Lily’s anger bringing her back to earth and out of the terrible place she’d disappeared. Lily lowered her head and looked down at what she’d done. She dropped the rock like a burning pan onto the ground and wiped her hand on the earth and leaves. Then she knelt into the grass next to Sunny, using all her strength to shove the man off her. She gathered Sunny weeping into her arms.
“It’s done,” Lily said. “Shush. Shush. He can’t hurt you.” She looked at the man’s still bulk next to them covered in blood. “I killed him.” She tossed the words into the wind as if waiting for them to come back. Her shoulders slumped forward as she hunched in on herself.
Sunny’s sobs lessened. She straightened and looked at the man lying on his side, his face turned toward them, his eyes open and blood pooling around him like a hood. She was glad she didn’t have to see the back of his head where Lily had bashed it in with the rock. “I was so scared, Lil.”
“I know,” Lily spoke gruffly. “I was scared too.”
“We’ll tell them what he did to us. They won’t blame us.” Sunny saw the worry in Lily’s frown, the hesitation in her eyes.
“We can’t tell anyone what I’ve done,” Lily said. “They’ll put me in juvie again, or worse.”
“I’ll tell them what he did.”
“No! Don’t you get it? They’ll never believe two Indian girls didn’t deserve what we got, especially us in foster care and me with a record. They won’t believe I had to kill him.”
“I’ll tell them, Lil. They’ll have to believe me.”
Lily stood up and looked down on her. “They won’t do nothing to you since you’re just ten, but I’m almost fifteen. They’ll lock me up again, and I would rather die than have them tell me when I have to get up and what I can eat and when I can leave my room. I ain’t doing that again. I’ll kill myself first.”
“Then what’ll we do?”
Lily blinked her good eye. “We’ll put rocks in his pockets and roll him into the river. The rocks will weigh him down, and if we’re lucky they’ll never find him. Nobody knows he took us out here. We’ll wash his blood out of your shirt and where it splattered your face.”
Tears dripped onto Sunny’s hand. She lowered her head.
“If you don’t want to help me, just say it,” said Lily. “You won’t be the first one or the last.” She squatted next to the body and reached into the dead man’s pockets. A brown leather wallet was tucked inside his nylon jacket. She scooped it out and flipped through the credit cards and bits of paper until she found his driver’s licence. She held it up to her good eye. “David Williams from Toronto. Look, Sun. Do you figure this is his wife and kids?” She held out a photo of the man with a blond woman and a boy and girl in their early teens.
Sunny glanced at the photo. “Probably. I wonder if they’ll miss him.”
Lily shrugged. “They might be glad to be rid of the dirty old bastard.” She picked up the bloody rock and started walking toward the river.
The fear started up again as Sunny watched Lily walk away from her. Lily was angry and shutting her out. Sunny felt a wave of loneliness and panic fill her. She couldn’t bear to have Lily mad at her. She stood and ran toward her.
“Okay, I’ll do it,” she called. “I’ll help you push him into the river.”
Lily stopped walking. She turned and faced Sunny. She looked at her for a few seconds as if weighing something. Finally, she nodded. “Then help me find some rocks. After we get rid of him and clean you up, I’ll drive his van back to town, dump it somewhere, and call Roger to come get us. I’ll just have to hope the cops don’t pull us over and figure out I’m underage. But first, I’m going to throw this rock that I hit him with as far into the river as I can where nobody will ever find it.”