Prologue

Jo Finster waited until she heard her dad snoring in the other bedroom.  Waited until there was no light leaking from beneath her brothers’ bedroom door.  Then she tiptoed out of the house, grabbing her keys from the peg next to the door that led to the garage.  She congratulated herself for having the foresight to leave the car on the driveway so no one would hear the garage door groaning open.

Staring at the house to make sure no lights came on, she climbed into the ancient Oldsmobile.  She and her brothers shared the car, but she rarely had a chance to use it.  Her older brothers both had jobs, and they needed the car to get to work.

But there was a party at the lake tonight, and Cameron Pierce had invited her to go.  He’d offered to pick her up, but she’d told him she’d drive herself.  If Cam started drinking, she didn’t want to be stuck without a ride home.  Or be forced to ride home with a drunk guy.

Shivering with excitement, she drove the two miles to the lake, then parked her car on the road outside the park, the last in a long line of cars beside a corn field.  Shoving the keys deep into her pocket, she trotted along the asphalt toward the lake and its campground.

As she turned into the park, she saw a bonfire blazing in the fire pit of an unoccupied campsite.  An almost-full moon shone down through the trees, the light illuminating the way.  She slowed down but didn’t see Cam in the group circling the fire.

She kept walking and saw a couple more fires in fire pits, but still no Cam.  Her footsteps slowed.  Maybe he hadn’t shown up.  If she didn’t find him in the next five minutes, she’d turn around and go home.

A group of girls passed her, all of them holding bottles of beer.  They were seniors, just like her, but she wasn’t friends with any of them.  They all glanced at her, nodded and kept walking.

Most of the kids were sitting on the picnic tables near the lake, clutching cans of beer.  Coolers stood at the ends of all the tables — had to be where the beer was stored.  She scanned the crowd, and when she still didn’t see Cam, she began to back away.

Cam was in a lot of her classes, and she had a love/hate relationship with him.  She had a crush on him, but she hid it because he teased her mercilessly.  In all the classes they had together, she always ended up sitting next to him.  Was that her choice?  Cam’s?  She didn’t think she unconsciously chose to sit beside him, but maybe she did.  Or maybe he chose to sit next to her.

Cam made her twitchy.  Uncomfortable, as if her skin was too small for her body.  She always knew the exact moment he walked into the classroom.  Was always hyper-aware of where he was.  Awareness of Cam was a constant hum beneath her skin.

Jo was counting the days until graduation, when she could escape this uncomfortable awareness, join the Army and escape the tiny town of Ogden, Illinois, the farthest suburb west of Chicago.  Once she’d finished her stint in the Army, she’d attend college on the GI Bill.

She was backing toward the road when a hand clamped her shoulder.  “Hey, Finster, where you goin’?”

She whirled around and saw Cam, weaving on his feet with a bottle of beer in his hand.  “Pierce.  You look like you started to party a long time ago.”

Cam grinned.  “What a party’s for.  Right, Finster?”

She shrugged one shoulder.  “If you say so, Pierce.”

He grabbed her hand and tugged her toward one of the coolers.  Opening it, he lifted out a can dripping water and popped open the tab.  “Here you go.  Stroh’s.  Michigan’s finest.”

She lifted the can to her mouth and took a sip of the sour, bitter brew.  Frowning, she held it up and studied the label.  “Does beer always taste this bad?”

Cam laughed.  “Gotta get used to it,” he said.  “Once you do, it goes down real easy.”

Eyeing the can dubiously, she took another sip.  Still sour.  Maybe not so bitter, though.  Emboldened, she took another drink, then another.

Cam set his hand on her shoulder.  “Stay put, Finster.  I’ll get you a hot dog.  Someone’s grilling ‘em a few tables over.”

“Okay,” she said, taking another sip of beer.

Leaning against the picnic table, she studied the crowd in the picnic area of the lake.  It looked as if almost everyone in her class was here, as well as a bunch of the juniors.

As she drank the last gulp of beer in the can, she set it on the table and found herself wobbly.  A little dizzy.  Grabbing the table for support, she looked in the direction that Cam had gone, but didn’t see him.

As she was about to slide onto the bench, a couple of guys in her class sidled over.  “Finster,” one of them said.  Randy Michaels.  One of the football players and not the brightest bulb in the chandelier.

“Hey, Michaels.  How’s it going?”

“Going great now that you’re here,” he said, slurring his words and gripping a can of beer.  “Come on over to our campfire.  We have better beer.  Food, too.”

“Nah,” she said.  “Cam said he’d be right back.”

“Pierce knows where we are,” Michaels said.  He grabbed her arm and tugged.  “Come on.  We’re real close.”

As he pulled on her arm, she slid off the bench.  Stumbled and almost fell.  “Let go of me, Michaels,” she demanded.

“Just wanna make sure you don’t stumble.  Ground’s pretty uneven here.”

As they walked, she realized Michaels was leading her away from the crowd and toward a darkened part of the park.  She yanked her arm away from him and backed away.  “I don’t want to go back there.  It’s too dark.  The fun is all out here, near the campfires.”

Michaels leaned close, his beery breath washing over her face.  “You’ll have lots of fun back there, Finster,” he said, grabbing her arm again and tightening his grip.  “We all will.  You, me, Reiters and Teller.”

Those were the jocks.  The stars of the football team.  And dickheads, every one of them.  “No, thanks,” she said.  “I’ll wait for Pierce.”

“Pierce isn’t coming,” he said, jerking his head behind him.  “He’s busy right now.”

Jo turned around to look and saw two guys pounding on Cam, beating him with their hands and kicking him with their feet.  She had no idea who the guys were — all she saw was their backs.

“No!” she yelled, yanking her hand away from Michaels.  She began to run toward Cam, but Michaels grabbed her arm and tightened his fingers painfully.

“He doesn’t need your help,” he said, and all of a sudden, Michael’s voice sounded mean.  Threatening.  “We have some fun planned for you, Finster.”

He began to drag her toward a stand of trees that was screened from the lake, and Jo knew exactly what he meant by ‘fun’.  Michaels and his buddies intended to rape her.

She tried to knee him in the nuts, but he laughed and turned so she hit his thigh.  “We like ‘em feisty, Finster,” he said, squeezing her breast hard.  Pain shot through her chest as he dragged her along the rutted tracks.

Panic closed her throat and she struggled to hold back the urge to vomit.  She had to keep her head, or she was going to be gang-raped.  Drawing a deep breath, she drove the heel of her palm up into Michaels’ nose.  When he screamed and let her go, she reached into her pocket and pulled out the pepper spray her mother had given her when she got her driver’s license.  ‘Just in case’ her mom had said.  And Jo knew this was exactly the situation her mother had been worried about.

Covering her eyes and nose with her arm, she sprayed a shot into Michaels’ face.  He shrieked and stumbled backward.  From the direction of the woods, footsteps pounded the dirt.  Reiters and Teller ran toward them.  Teller tried to grab her, and she sprayed him, as well.  Then Reiters.  When all three of them were writhing on the ground, she ran toward Cam, now lying motionless on the rutted trail.

His face was almost unrecognizable, cut and bruised and bleeding.  He had a cut over his left temple, and a bloody nose.  “Cam,” she cried, crouching beside him.  “Wake up.  You’re hurt.”

But Cam didn’t move.

She reached for her phone, usually in her pocket, to call an ambulance, but came up empty.  She hadn’t brought the damn phone.  Didn’t want to be traced to the party in case her parents woke up and realized she was missing.  Last time she’d ever leave the house without her phone, she vowed.  But that wouldn’t help Cam tonight.

The pounding of feet on the dirt track made Jo stand up.  Donnie Kincaid was rushing toward her.  When he reached her, he dropped to one knee.  “Hey, Cam, wake up,” he said, nudging his shoulder.  But Cam didn’t move.

“Do you have a phone?” Jo asked.  “He needs an ambulance.”  She edged away from Donnie — he was a nasty piece of work who’d always given her the creeps.

Ignoring him and her instinct to get away from him, she touched Cam’s head, and her fingers came back red.

“Yeah,” he said, pulling a phone out of his pocket.  He hit 911.  After a moment, said, “We need an ambulance out at Ogden Lake.  Guy was beat up.  He’s in bad shape.”

Kincaid narrowed his eyes at her.  “You see who did this to Cam?” he asked.

Jo shook her head.  “Two guys.  Only saw their backs.”  Her mouth trembled as she struggled to keep the tears from falling.  “Michaels, Reiter and Teller were… harassing me.  Holding my arm.  When I used my pepper spray on them, they let me go.”

“You sure you don’t know?”

“If I knew, I’d say.  Cam’s my friend.  I want whoever did this to him to pay for it.”

“You gonna stay with him until the ambulance comes?” Don Kincaid asked.

Jo began backing away, looking over her shoulder for Reiter, Michaels and Tiller.  “You have to stay with him.  I can’t.  I have to… I have to leave.  Right now.”  Before the pepper spray she’d used on Reiter, Michaels and Tiller wore off.

“I thought you were Cam’s friend,” Kincaid said.

“I am.  But you’re here now.  You live with him.  Better if you stay with him.”

She was stuttering because her teeth were chattering.  “I’ve gotta go.”

She turned and began sprinting toward the road and the safety of her car.  Michaels, Teller and Reiters were rolling on the ground, rubbing their eyes as she ran past.  When they saw her, all three of them stumbled to their feet and chased her.

She made it to her car a handful of steps ahead of them.  Opened the door, dove in, then hit the door lock.  As one of the boys tugged at the door handle, Jo started the car, her hands shaking and her chest pounding.  Throwing the car into gear, she stomped on the gas.  Tiller, who was grabbing the door handle, tumbled to the asphalt.  Michaels and Reiter stood in front of the car, and her shoulders tensed.  Did they really think she was going to stop?  After they’d as much as told her they were going to rape her?

Instead of hitting the brakes, she floored the accelerator.  Reiter and Michaels dove out of the way, and the car blew past both of them.  When she looked in her rear-view mirror, she saw them sprawled on the asphalt.

Instead of turning around and going back the way she came, she drove to the next crossroad, turned toward town, and made her way home.  But she drove past the house and headed into town.  Went to the police station.  Still shaking, she exited the car, holding her keys like a weapon.

When she walked into the building, the cop at the desk narrowed his eyes at her.  “Joanna.  What’s wrong?”

“There’s a p… p… party at the lake,” she said.  “Cam Pierce was beaten badly.  He was unconscious when I left him.”

The cop frowned at her.  “Why didn’t you stay with him and call us?”

“Because Eddie Tiller, Randy Michaels and Tommy Reiters tried to rape me.  And I knew my only chance was to run.  Donnie Kincaid called 911 and he stayed with Cam.  You need to send some officers out there to pick those guys up.”

The officer narrowed his eyes at her.  “You sure about those three names?” he asked.

“Of course I’m sure,” she said, scowling.  “We’ve been in the same grade since kindergarten.”

“And you’re sure those boys are the ones who tried to rape you?”

“Yeah.  All three of them.”  Donnie Kincaid was one of their friends, but she didn’t think he was part of the plan — he’d been too concerned about Cam.

“You know Dwayne Michaels is the police chief’s son.”

Jo scowled at him.  “What difference does it make who Michaels’s father is?  He tried to rape me.”

Watching her with narrowed eyes, the cop hit a button and leaned close to a microphone.  “I’ve got a report of an injured boy out at the lake.  Along with three guys who tried to rape a young woman.  I need two or three squads out there to sort things out.”

After he turned off the microphone, looked at Jo again.  “You need to go to a hospital?”

“No.  I’m okay.  Just get Cam Pierce to a hospital.  He looked pretty bad.”

“I’ve got two squads and the EMT’s on the way.”  He studied her for a long moment.  “You need to stay here to identify your attackers.  Make sure the three boys you named were the ones.”

“I know they were.  I’ve gone to school with them since kindergarten.”  She shuddered at the thought of confronting them.  “I don’t want to be in the same room with them.  I told you who they are.  I’m going home.”

When she headed for the door, the officer stood up and grabbed her arm.  It was exactly what Michaels, Tiller and Reiter had done, and her stomach heaved.  She made it to a wastebasket just in time.

An hour later, after looking through a window at her three attackers and managing to say, “Yes, those are the three boys,” she ran out the police station door, down the steps and leapt into her car.  She locked the doors, then laid her head on the steering wheel and began to sob.