Page 65 of The Midnight Knock

A monstrous man, reduced to an infant weeping for his mami.

Those tears had been Fernanda’s salvation. Just like she used to do with her brother, she would say to the weeping Frank O’Shea, “Have you heard the story about the bear that swallowed a princess?”

“The bird who built a city?”

“The little god that made new friends?”

It was pathetic, really, how easily Frank could be soothed. Until this morning, of course, when Frank had caught her in his office with a camera in her hand.

Kyla stirred in the Malibu’s passenger seat, just in time for the two girls to watch a strange flash of silver light pass over the desert’s sky. A mountain rose into view a moment later. A solitary mountain.

Fernanda felt a cold rash of gooseflesh spread over her arms. She told herself it was absurd to fear a mountain, whatever dreams Frank might have had. No time for fear. Fernanda’s brother was waiting for her, down in Mexico. He needed her.

That was all that had kept Fernanda going these last awful months. Miguel needed her.

Kyla rubbed her forehead with a groan. “I just got the worst headache.”

The girl leaned forward, unzipped the green backpack at her feet, fished out the roll of film inside buried under all the cash. “It’s still here.”

“Did you think we had forgotten it back in Stockton?” Fernanda said.

After a long hesitation and another rub of her temples, Kyla said, “I forgotsomething. I just can’t remember what.”

Kyla was restless, twitchy. Terrified. Who could blame her? On top of everything else, the fuel gauge of the Malibu let out a soft warningding. Another thing to feel terrible about, another mess into which Fernanda had dragged this girl she barely knew: they were on the run from a very bad man, in the middle of nowhere, about to run out of gas.

Fernanda said, “Have you heard the story of the rabbit who met the pirate king?”

“No stories. I feel like I’m already living in one of the awful ones.”

A sign for a motel appeared on the road ahead. A rusted pickup truck was abandoned by the side of the road. The sight of the sign sent the gooseflesh spreading to Fernanda’s shoulders. Its paint was fresh, the wood new. Someone must have renovated the motel, put out a fresh sign. A terrible location, but they had probably bought the land for a song. Fernanda wondered how they could have kept the construction secret from Frank. He might not send his men down the Dust Road, but there was not much in west Texas he did not hear of.

BRAKE INN MOTEL

GAS—FOOD—WARM BEDS

HIKE SCENIC MT APACHE

5 MI THIS WAY

Fernanda must be thinking about a different place. Because if this was the motel of Frank’s nightmares, he would never have allowed anyone to reopen it. He would have burned it to the ground first, and with the new owners inside.

RYAN

The Honda Odyssey appeared on the road ahead. Ryan Phan almost didn’t believe his eyes. He crept forward just enough to make out the dumpy shape of the van’s back frame and its lethally drab paint and its thick tires. There was no doubt about it.

Ryan’s friend on the border patrol hadn’t been lying. Stanley Holiday was indeed traveling the Dust Road. And according to that same friend, Stanley had Penelope with him.

The last two days had been strange for Ryan, even by the standards of his very strange life. Ryan wasn’t religious—not even his father’s placid Buddhism had ever stuck—but he’d always had a soft spot for the prodigal son of the Gospels. Who wouldn’t root for a man fated by God to let down his family and squander all his opportunities and fail at just about everything he put his mind to?Literally me, Penelope would say.

The girl had no idea what failure was.

Ryan was a forty-five-year-old fuckup with a bad shoulder and a freshly broken nose and a life full of crazy stories that all added up to nothing. He’d gotten sober (twice), been to prison (twice), caught syphilis and Montezuma’s revenge and a prize mackerel and another man’s rap. He’d saved a life, taken another, had the scars to prove them both.

But there was one thing that Ryan had only ever done once in his life.

He’d made a promise.

Ryan had spent most of his life alone. People demanded consistency, follow-through, patience. They demanded all the things Ryan knew he lacked. He’d discovered, in his latest round of prison therapy, that his greatest fear was to be needed by another. To risk letting people down. So he never made promises. He never guaranteed anything except his own inconstancy.