Sunrise

I rolled sideways, sliding off the ridge of the porch roof in an uncontrolled tumble. Suddenly I was in the air again, still turning as I plummeted into a snowbank beside the concrete steps.

I slowly pushed myself free of the snow, spitting bits of ice and blinking to clear my eyes. Darla was already up, about twenty feet ahead of me, ru

“Wait!” I yelled. “We’ve got to get the panel van out. Our pork!” We hadn’t bothered to move the pork out of the panel van—it made a handy freezer, parked in the barn next to Uncle Paul’s old tractor. If it burned up, we would starve.

Darla didn’t even slow down. “My welder first! Before it explodes!”

I redoubled my efforts to catch up with her. Ru

She hurled open the side door of the barn and ducked inside, into the workshop area. The barn was choked with thick smoke. My eyes stung as I followed her inside. The heat was oppressive, overwhelming, and suddenly I remembered charging back into Darla’s barn after Target had set it afire, trying to save our backpacks almost a year and a half ago.

Darla disco

The doorframe was afire now too. I plunged through the curtain of fire, ru

Darla was already ru

“I’ve gotta get the welder. Go for the truck!”

I forced myself upright and sprinted to the vehicle door. The top part of the wooden sliding door was alight. I grabbed it near the base and started trying to wrench it open. I slid it back three or four feet—enough to see the nose of the panel van inside. I thought I saw a flicker of movement behind the front windshield but dismissed it as a quirk of the dancing flame and shadow.

But then the van’s headlights popped on, and its engine roared to life. I was still crouched at the base of the door, straining to open it.

The van accelerated. It was aimed directly at my head.

Chapter 22

I lunged backward, trying to get out of the path of the van. There was a mighty crack as the van hit the inside of the rolling barn doors, sending bits of flaming wood flying everywhere. Half the barn door spun free. It struck the side of my head. Everything went black.

* * *

“Alex! Alex! Alex!” Darla was standing over me. “Quit yelling, would you?” I mumbled.

“Are you okay?” She pulled off my ski mask,

looking for blood. My head felt like it was burning up from the inside. “We’ve got to get farther away from the barn. Can you walk?”

I reached up took her hand, and levered myself upright with her help. The barn was fully engulfed in roaring flames. Uncle Paul and Ed were kneeling in the snow with rifles butted against their shoulders, firing at the panel van. It slid through the curve from our driveway onto Canyon Park Road and raced north. If Uncle Paul or Ed had hit the van at all, they hadn’t done any damage to it.

“We need to follow them,” I said. “Get our pork back.” “Sure you’re up to it?”

I stumbled toward the pickup truck instead of answering. It was parked beside the burning barn, close enough that I couldn’t even approach the passenger door. I slid across from the driver’s side instead, letting Darla take the wheel. Uncle Paul and Ed climbed into the bed behind the driver’s side.

As soon as she put it in gear, there were two loud pops from the passenger side. The right side of the truck suddenly dropped a few inches. I ducked—the noises sounded vaguely like gunfire. My head swam.

“Christ and the Michelin man!” Darla yelled. “The fire melted our tires.”

The wheels spun, hampered by the weight of the still-attached metal pesticide tank and the popped tires, and slowly the truck inched forward. Darla got it going pretty fast down the driveway, fighting to hold the wheel steady When she tried to make the turn onto Canyon Park Road, the truck slid sideways instead of turning, burying itself in the snow berm. The tank we were towing slammed into the bank of snow just after we did, throwing up a huge spray of ice.

Darla jiggered the truck back and forth, trying to get going again. The panel van was almost out of sight. She leapt out the door, disco

I tried to dismount the bike seat, caught my foot on the bar, and fell into the snow beside us.

Uncle Paul knelt to help me up. “You okay?”

“No,” I replied. “I mean, short term, I’m okay. But long term, we’re all screwed. Get everyone together in the living room, would you?”

“I’ll be right there,” Darla said. “I’ve got to move the welder and gas tanks farther from the barn. It’s going to collapse.”

“I’ll help,” Ed said and left with Darla.

Uncle Paul helped me into the living room and then went upstairs to find everyone else.

Max was one of the first ones downstairs. “What happened?” I asked him.

“Nobody woke me. For some reason I woke on my own and went to check if it was time for my shift or not. Nobody was on the platform, and the barn was already burning.”

“Who was supposed to be on watch?”

“Your mom,” Max said in a low voice.

A

“You think?” My fists were balled—all that bullshit about Darla and now this? “I’m moving to Delaware,” I muttered.

“Delaware?” A

“Only state where you’re allowed to divorce your parents,” Max said.

“And you know this how?” A

“It doesn’t matter,” I said. “We’re damn lucky they didn’t torch the house. Then we’d all be eating smoke right now. Go back up on watch,” I told Max. “I don’t think they’ll come back, but why take chances? I’ll fill you in later.”

Max got up but stopped beside me on his way out. “I’m sorry.”

I grabbed his arm and clasped it, bringing my face close to his. “It’s not your fault—”

“I wish I’d woken up earlier.”

“I trusted Mom. You should have told me she was missing her shifts.”

“I know,” Max said quietly. “But you two’d been fighting anyway. A

“Next time someone isn’t pulling their weight, tell me.

Our lives could depend on it.”

“I will,” Max said. He left to return to the watch platform atop the house.

Everyone except Max gathered in the living room, their go-bags still on their backs. I threw three logs on the fire and blew on it until flames licked up, bathing the room in dancing firelight. When I turned away from the fire, my eyes caught Mom’s. She didn’t look away. Her face was calm, placid even, motionless except for the shifty, red shadows cast by the fire.