Page 51 of Secrets Along the Shore

“Save me?” The recollection of his text message from earlier came back with a fury. “You send me a picture of a snake and now you want to keep me safe?”

“You don’t understand!” Alan’s voice changed from an attempt to order me to a desperation I’d never heard from him before. “You have had such a terrible life, Noa!”

I had not expected that.

Alan continued. “Everything you’ve experienced—just like me—the abuses, the lack of a true family—it all came clear to me. I need to save you just like I need to save myself.”

“Save me from what?” I dared to keep driving toward population.

“C’mon, Noa,” Alan begged. “You don’t deserve this. I can keep you safe.”

“Keep me safe from what?” I pressed my foot on the gas a little harder.

“For God’s sake!” Alan waved the gun in the air. “You want to go back tothat? After everything I’ve done for you?”

There had never been a hint that Alan had been obsessed with me. His reaction didn’t fit.

“I’ve rebuilt a home for us.” Alan shook the gun at me. “Now slow down and turn around!”

“Not until you explain what you mean.” I knew I was goading him and that was dangerous. I felt a tear trickle down my cheek. I was angry. I was petrified. I was infuriated that I was in this position again and was still as assaulted by terror as I had been the first time. I had to be careful too. If I irritated him too much, I’d push him to the point that he’d pull the trigger. He’d killed Sophia. She had probably angered him too and it didn’t seem that it took very much for Alan to switch from obsessively protective to enraged killer.

“Grandma and Mom abused you, Ashley. They abusedme.”

Dear God, he thought I was his sister.

His hand shook. I could see it in my peripheral vision. “The snakes. You hated them.”

“What about the snakes?” I had to distract him. We’d just passed the thin, green metalWhisper’s End, population 12,800sign.

Alan let out a bark of laughter. “Don’t hide it from me, Ash. All those times we were told we were wrong—that we’d beenbad? Don’t you remember what Mom would say? What Grandma would say?”

“No, Alan, I don’t.” I tried to sound far more collected than I was. I glanced at the shoulder on either side of the road. I could drive head on into a tree. It would engage the airbags. Stun Alan. But it might stun me too and then where would I be?

“Wehatedsnakes! We were terrified of them. And if we were bad, they lock us in the closet with snakes from the garden. ‘Be good,’ they said, ‘and you can come out and be rid of the serpents that cause you to sin.’ You don’t remember that?” Alan stared at me as if I’d lost my mind.

He’dlost his mind.

“I—I—yes. I do.” I played along. A little bit further and I would see the edge of town. If I could get close enough before Alan did anything crazy, I could drive the car into a ditch or tree and hopefully, someone would be around to see—to bring help. It was better than crashing the car on a rural road with no one around.

I needed to keep him talking. “What about Sophia, Alan? Why did you kill her?”

He grew ominously quiet, but wherever his thoughts had takenhim, they kept him from focusing on the fact I was still driving in the direction of town.

“She didn’t want my help. I was going to make her happy. We would have a new grandma and a new mother, a home, and—she was just like Ashley. I’d have a new Ashley too.”

Ok, he had totally lost it.

“Noa?” Alan’s voice was actually thick with emotion, and he had come back to the realization I wasn’t his sister. If I had empathy for him—which I was far from it—I would have cared.

“I just want a family. You know? And I put those snakes right under their windows and told them they couldn’t control me any longer. Ikilledthose snakes. That’s why I sent you the picture of one. To tell you. I can take care of the serpents in your life too.”

I almost choked. He had tied himself to the Serpent Killer by believing he was a savior.Myrescuer!

“Where is Rosalie, Alan? Where is Lilian?” I had to ask. Maybe, if I got lucky, he would tell me.

I could see town. Houses dotted the landscape around us. A gas station. A church. A drive-through restaurant.

“Where are they, Alan?”