Chapter 5
The freezing rain slammed into Tessa’s face like hundreds of tiny needles as she scrambled down the slippery metal steps of the fire escape.
Behind her, the heavy iron door burst open, and the beam of a high-powered flashlight swept across the wet framework.
"Tessa! Stop running!" Evan’s voice echoed down through the howling wind, laced with a terrifying blend of fear and anger.
Tessa didn't look back; her boots pounded against the iron rungs until her feet hit the gravel alleyway behind the hospital.
The dark pines surrounding the hospital facility towered like giant, silent spectators, their thick branches swaying wildly in the storm.
She knew she couldn't take her car; the police had undoubtedly blocked the main parking lot access points already.
Her only option was the dense forest running along the edge of the county highway toward the old logging route.
"Mommy, I'm cold," Maisie whimpered, her small body shivering violently inside the soaked flannel blanket.
"I know, baby, I know. Keep your eyes closed," Tessa murmured, ducking under the low canopy of pine trees to escape the rain.
The forest was pitch-black, illuminated only by the occasional flash of lightning illuminating the distant mountains.
Tessa navigated by memory, remembering the summer drives she had taken along Route 9, heading toward the state line.
Every snap of a twig behind her made her heart hammer against her ribs, her breath rising in thick white clouds.
She knew the local law enforcement officers were born and raised in these woods; they had all the advantages of terrain and equipment.
After twenty minutes of blind, exhausting scrambling through the thick underbrush, Tessa collapsed against the massive trunk of an ancient oak tree.
Her lungs burned with cold air, and her thigh muscles quivered under the sheer strain of carrying her daughter over uneven ground.
She pulled her phone from her pocket, but the screen remained dark—dead from water damage or exhausted battery.
"Damn it," she whispered, tears mixing with the rain streaming down her cheeks.
"Mommy?" Maisie asked softly, reaching up to touch Tessa’s wet face with her tiny fingers.
"Yes, sweetie?"
"The little girl is standing behind you," Maisie said plainly, her voice completely devoid of fear.
Tessa’s entire body went deathly still, the hair on the back of her neck standing straight up in instant, primal terror.
Slowly, agonizingly, Tessa turned her head to look over her shoulder into the deep shadows behind the oak tree.
Standing less than ten feet away in the pouring rain was a little girl wearing a dirty blue sundress and bright red patent-leather shoes.
Her skin was unnaturally pale, almost luminous in the dim night light, and her blond hair hung in wet, tangled mats around her face.
She wasn't wet from the rain; the drops seemed to pass right through her body like a projection on a screen.
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The little girl lifted her right hand, pointing a thin, pale finger straight toward the distant ridge where the Hawthorne manor stood.
"He lied to you," the child whispered, her voice echoing not through the air, but directly inside Tessa's head. "He pushed me."
