“So, you’re just staring at me like a creep?”
I swallowed a lump of embarrassment sitting in my throat as my chest tightened to painful levels. The cab of the car became incredibly hot. “I was—” I scratched my nose and exhaled. “I don’t know,” I said, hating myself for being so terrible with women.
“You think I’m cute, don’t you?
“No!” I said.
She tore her eyes from the street. “No?”
“I mean… fuck. Why are you like this?”
“Like what? Full of charm?”
I pushed the radio knob, turning the sound to a volume that threatened the safety of my eardrums. “I can’t hear you!” I screamed.
Dakota smirked, though she didn’t respond otherwise. We exited north onto Watt Avenue and drove through residential neighborhoods until we came to the fields spread out between Roseville and Sacramento.
Dakota parked on the shoulder of a back road bunkered by plowed fields. Drawn in the faded asphalt were pentagrams and swastikas and dicks ejaculating and scribblings that read 666 and Turn Around Now and Mark & Abby 4EVR. The trees on the side of the road and in the fields had similar carvings in their trunks.
“Nice place,” I said. “Very inviting.”
Dakota unbuckled, opening the driver’s door. “You scared?”
“Terrified.” I unbuckled and stepped out of the car, nearly stomping the head of a muddy baby doll not wearing any clothes. “Fuck,” I said, startling at the sight. My heart rate accelerated. I wasn’t usually spooked by play dolls, but this one had one of those haunted looks about it—and I thought some blood had dried around its eyes.
“You okay?”
“Almost murdered by a Chucky doll. Other than that, I’m fine.”
A few feet from the doll sat a couch that a werewolf must have owned. It was shredded to pieces. A pile of wet, black garbage bags lay beside it, near a barbed wire fence almost leaning onto the ground. The wooden posts were rotted at the bottom, crawling with termites throughout.
“What is this place?” I asked, not believing we’d only driven twenty minutes out of Sacramento. “And why are we here?”
“For a few reasons,” Dakota said, stepping over the angled fence and into the field. “One, it’s a hot spot for supernatural activity. Ask Xander about Dyer Lane and he’ll probably have a thousand paranormal stories that originated from out here. Two, there was a report that came in late last night about a group of robed people congregating in this field. When the patrol unit came to check it out, they found nothing but dirt.”
I followed Dakota in my brand-spanking-new kicks, stomping through the moist earth. “Why did you buy me a pair of white shoes if you knew we were coming out here?” I asked, watching the mud stick to them. “It doesn’t make any sense.”
“Yesterday afternoon, about ten miles from here, a thirteen-year-old boy—Aaron Brooks—went missing. He was last seen walking home from school. According to his mom, the distance between their house and the school campus was just under a mile.” She stopped walking and faced me with a grin.
“Why are you smiling? That’s super creepy, telling me a story like that and smiling.”
“So,” she continued, “we’re going to spend the afternoon scanning this field for any sign of a cult or a young boy.”
“Believe it or not, that’s not the creepiest thing I’ve been commanded to do in a barren field.” I stared off over the horizon and clicked my tongue. The winter sun glared into my eyes and warmed my face, spawning an afternoon headache after my morning of drinking. “How many acres is this?”
Dakota shrugged and glanced over her shoulder, surveying the property. “Don’t know. Three… five tops. Enough so that we’ll be here until dark—when the monsters come out. Are you afraid of some monsters?”
“Let me get this straight. Dyer Lane—clever name, by the way—has a history associated with paranormal activity—and not the terrible movie, either. Last night, some random person happened to be out here, in the middle of butt-fuck nowhere, and called in a group of robed figures being creepy in the middle of this field. One of your deputies drove out here, checked it out, and cleared the call.”
Dakota stuck her hand to her hip and scowled at me. “Correct.”
“A kid went missing after school yesterday.” I scratched my neck, trying to find the dots she’d connected. “You believe that whoever called the station about a cult ritualizing in this field was telling the truth. And you’re assuming that the cult ritualizing in this field kidnapped that kid and sacrificed him.”
“That’s my reasoning. Why make up such a ludicrous call to the sheriff’s department? Who comes up with that shit?”
“People are batshit,” I said, scanning the field. “This was what you had planned for the day? Stomping through a field in search of clues to a… what?”
Dakota scowled again, and the sunlight drenched her in radiance. “Look on the bright side. It’s better than Hephaestus finding and killing you, right?”
I cleared my throat. “I don’t know about that.” Staring at her, I asked, “How do you want to do this? You take half, I take half?”
She pursed her lips. “I was sort of hoping we could just stick together.”
“Okay,” I said. “But let me warn you, I’m prone to bitching and complaining quite a bit.”
“Oh, I caught on.”
Walking three yards apart, we shuffled across the first stretch. Finding nothing, we about-faced and began lap number two. The air was thick—not with humidity or fog or anything natural, but with a dark energy. It almost felt like something just out of sight was watching us, and its eyes held a menacing weight.
Trying to ignore my paranoia, I sighed and said, “Tell me about Mel.”
“What?” Dakota asked.
“About Melanie. Not about the evidence you found. We can save that for Xander. But I know, while following me, you had to have collected information
