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HIGH VOLTAGE
RISK OF DEATH
And:
RETURN TO WAYWARD PINES
BEYOND THIS POINT YOU WILL DIE
She crumples down in the dirt.
Cold.
Shivering.
It’s dusk, on the verge of becoming too dark to see in these woods.
She’s at the end. At her end.
No one to turn to.
Nowhere left to run.
She crashes.
Hard.
Sobbing uncontrollably as the freezing rain beats down on her.
Hands grab her by the shoulders.
She reacts like a wounded animal, tearing herself away and scrambling off on all fours as a voice calls after her, “Theresa!”
But she doesn’t stop.
Struggling up onto her feet, she digs in for a sprint, feet sliding in the wet pine needles.
The hands tackle her to the ground, her face crushed into mud, pressing down on top of her and trying to roll her over. She fights back with everything she has, arms tucked into her sides, thinking, If those hands get anywhere near my mouth, this asshole is going to lose fingers.
But he manages to roll her onto her back and hold her arms down, pi
“Let go!” she screams.
“Stop fighting.”
That voice.
She looks up at her attacker. It’s almost too dark to see now, but she recognizes his face.
From another life.
A better time.
She stops struggling.
“Adam?”
“It’s me.”
He releases her arms and helps her to sit up.
“What are you . . . ? Why . . . ?” So many questions screaming through her mind she can’t focus on which one to give voice to. At last she lands on, “What’s happening to me?”
“You’re in Wayward Pines, Idaho.”
“I know that. Why is there no road out of here? Why is there a fence? Why won’t anyone tell me what’s happening?”
“I know you have questions—”
“Where’s my son?”
“I may be able to help you find Ben.”
“You know where he is?”
“No, but I—”
“Where is he?” she screams. “I have to—”
“Theresa, you’re endangering yourself right now. You’re putting both of our lives at risk. I want you to come with me.”
“Where?”
“To my house.”
“Your house?”
He takes off his rain jacket, wraps it around her shoulders, and pulls her up onto her feet.
“Why do you have a house here, Adam?”
“Because I live here.”
“For how long?”
“A year and a half.”
“That’s impossible.”
“I know it must feel that way to you right now. I’m sure everything seems strange and wrong in this moment. Where are your shoes?”
“I don’t know.”
“I’m going to carry you.”
Hassler scoops her up into his arms like she weighs nothing.
Theresa looks into his face, and despite the horror of her last five days here, she can’t deny the comfort she feels staring into familiar eyes.
“Why are you here, Adam?”
“I know you have a lot of questions. Let me just get you home first, okay? You’re practically hypothermic.”
“Have I lost my mind? I don’t know anything anymore. I woke up in the hospital here, and these last few days have been—”
“Look at me. You’re not crazy, Theresa.”
“Then what?”
“You’re just in a different kind of place now.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
“I know, but if you trust me, I swear I’ll take care of you. I’ll make sure nothing happens to you. And I’ll help you find your son.”
Despite the new protection of his jacket, she trembles violently in Hassler’s arms.
He carries her through the dark forest and the pouring rain.
Her last memory before waking in this town is of sitting in her home in Queen A
Apparently, the promise had not been kept.
Theresa lies on a sofa pulled close to an open woodstove, watching as Adam Hassler adds pine logs to the fire. The deep-down cold is begi
Hassler stokes the flames up into a roaring blaze, the sap boiling and popping inside the wood.
Every light in the living room is out.
Firelight colors the walls.
She can hear the steady rain hammering the tin roof above her head, ready to put her under.
Hassler scoots back from the fire, sits on the sofa’s edge.
He looks down at her with a kindness in his eyes that she hasn’t seen in days.
“Is there anything I can get for you?” he asks. “Water? More blankets?”
“I’m okay. Well, not okay, but . . .”
He smiles. “I know what you mean.”
She stares up at him. “These have been the weirdest, worst days of my life.”
“I know.”
“What’s happening to me?”
“I can’t explain it to you.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
“You disappeared from Seattle the night of Ethan’s celebration-of-life party. You and Ben.”
“Right.”
“I figured you had gone to Wayward Pines looking for Ethan, so I went looking for you.”
“Shit. You’re here because of me.”
“I drove into town two days before Christmas. All I remember is a Mack truck coming out of nowhere, sideswiping my car. I woke up in the hospital, just like you did. No phone, no wallet. Have you tried to call out to Seattle?”
“I phoned my sister, Darla, I don’t know how many times from that pay phone beside the bank, but it’s always either a wrong number or there’s no dial tone.”
“Same thing happened to me.”
“So how do you have a house here now?”
“I have a job too.”
“What?”
“You’re looking at the sous-chef in training at the Aspen House, nicest restaurant in Wayward Pines.”
Theresa searches his face for signs of bullshit, but he looks absolutely sincere.
She says, “You’re the special agent in charge of the Secret Service field office in Seattle. You—”
“Things have changed.”
“Adam—”
“Just listen to me.” He puts his hand on her shoulder. She can feel its weight through the blanket. “All the questions, all the fears you have, I had them too. I still have them. That doesn’t change. But there are no answers to be had in this valley. There’s only a right way to live and all the other ways that get you killed. As your friend, Theresa, I hope you can hear me. If you don’t stop ru
She looks away from Hassler, into the flames.
The firelight blurring through a sheet of tears.
The scary thing, the truly scary thing, is that she believes him.
One hundred percent. There’s something wrong, something evil about this place.