Taeyeon turned off the highway just past a sign marked Liberty County, Texas and veered onto a county road. “It’s not much farther to my uncle’s.”

I gave him an incredulous look. “What’d you say?”

“I said it’s not much farther—”

“No, not that. The other thing you said.”

Taeyeon kept his eyes on the road. “What?”

“The part where you said you’d been in my shoes before.”

“It’s not important. I wanted you to know that I understand what you’re going through. I’ve been there. I know it’s not easy.”

“What happened? Why were you—”

“It doesn’t matter. I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Taeyeon, you can’t say something like that and not tell me the rest of the story.”

“Just forget it.”

Quietly, I wondered what possibly could’ve happened to him that he would’ve needed witness protection when he was younger. The mystery was enough to drive my imagination wild. I let it go for the time being, but Taeyeon had to know I wouldn’t give up until I found out more. You can’t dangle a carrot in front of this bunny’s nose unless you want me to run away with it.

But I let it drop. Temporarily.

I thought the county road would go on forever, but finally we came to an intersection in the shape of a T. The sign across the road read Trinity River Flood Zone. I looked over at Taeyeon, but he was too busy turning left to notice.

“Flood zone?”

“Yeah, don’t worry. My uncle said the river’s down right now.”

“Where’s this forest you keep talking about? All I’m seeing is fields and pastures.”

“Just ahead, a few roads over, where the tree line starts.”

“Are you sure you know where you’re going?”

“Of course, I do. It’s easy. All I have to do is go left. It’s eight lefts to my uncle’s house.”

“If you go left eight times, we’d be going in circles.”

Taeyeon laughed. “That only applies if you’re talking about a city block. This is the countryside. Trust me when I say you can take eight lefts and not end up crossing your own trail. Look at it like a spiral rather than a square, as if we’re circling our way into the forest.”

“I’ll take your word for it.”

Taeyeon crossed over some railroad tracks and veered left. There were more fields than houses, no streetlights, and the road got narrower by the minute. About five miles down, a fork in the road came into view, but Taeyeon stayed left. At another stop sign, he swung another left, then continued down the road.

“See? Four lefts and we haven’t crossed ourselves yet.”

“Doesn’t mean we won’t,” I said doubtfully.

We slowed down as we crossed an old one-lane, barrel-style bridge, then picked up speed until we neared the next curve. As we rounded the sharp left curve, Taeyeon slammed on his brakes as two white-tailed deer darted across the road before us. I clutched my chest and drew in a deep breath.

“Scared?”

“I thought they weren’t going to get across before you creamed one. Why don’t you drive slower, Mario Andretti? This isn’t a race, and I’m in no hurry to die.”

“Everyone drives like this back here,” he replied. “You’ll get used to it.”

“Please slow down. The trees are right at the edge of the road. I have enough people trying to kill me without the car reaching out to hug one.”

Begrudgingly, he did as I asked. A few more miles up the road, he curved to the right sharply, then took another left.

“You went right back there,” I said with a smug grin. “Guess it’s not all lefts.”

“Doesn’t count.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s a curve. No other way to go.”

“Yeah, but…”

“Doesn’t count,” Taeyeon repeated.

“You always make up rules as you go along. Like you saying no family reunions, then heading to your uncle’s house.”

“Those were your rules, not mine.”

After the next left turn, I spied an old pickup truck sitting on the side of the road with its headlights shining on two men as they strolled out of the woods carrying a rope and a shovel. It was the first sign of life I’d seen in the last twenty minutes. The men reached the front of the truck and stood in the headlights as we passed. I craned my neck to get a better look.

One of them had no eye in his right socket, while the other stared straight at me and gave me a toothless snarl. They were filthy, as if they’d been rolling in dirt. It reminded me of something out of Deliverance.

“Jesus,” I told Taeyeon, swallowing a knot in my throat. “What the hell were they doing out there at night?”

“No telling. Probably hunting.”

“With a rope and a shovel? I don’t think so.”

Taeyeon grinned but didn’t take his eyes off the road. “After this turn, I have to slow down.

“No! Keep going.”

He chuckled. “Oh, now you want me to drive faster.”

“Well, I sure as hell don’t want you to slow down. Those creepy guys might be coming this way.”

“Jessica, I have to. Bonnie walks this road after sundown, and she’s blacker than night. I wouldn’t want to hit her. I don’t know how many times we’ve all threatened to slap glow-in-the-dark stickers on her , but she won’t stay off the roads.”

“Taeyeon, that’s a terrible thing to say about someone.”

He smirked at me. “Bonnie is Mr. Hensley’s cow.” Taeyeon maneuvered the left turn, which landed us on a bumpy dirt road. “Look, I bet that’s her up ahead. You can barely see her.”

Sure enough, a shadowy blob moved in the darkness. As we neared, the black cow stopped eating from the overgrown weeds at the side of the road, turned its head to look back at us, and switched its tail from side to side like a cat. I grinned as Taeyeon maneuvered the Explorer around the living roadblock.

“Where does Mr. Hensley live?”

“House on the right with all the floodlights. He locks Bonnie up in a barn on the backside of his property, but he’s never been able to keep her there.”

Mr. Hensley’s house was old, rickety, and neglected. Plagued with vines and rotting trim, it looked condemned—abandoned, at best. Large, orange-colored half-moons stained the sides of the house, and something resembling grass grew on the roof. I peered through the dark trying to see the barn, but the building I saw was too small for something as large as Bonnie.

“You’re kidding me, right? Tell me that wasn’t an outhouse.”

“Okay, it wasn’t an outhouse.”

I recognized his monotone for what it was. “Oh, Jesus! Where the hell have you taken me?”

“Calm down. Mr. Hensley’s an elderly man who prefers to live by simple means. Where we’re staying is more like the Hilton than Mr. Hensley’s.”

I breathed a sigh of relief. “Sorry, I thought…well, I’m not sure what I thought.”

“Almost there. Another mile up the road,” Taeyeon told me.

I glanced over at his moonlit face and slanted an eyebrow. “Let me guess, it’s on the left?”

He answered me with his silence and a wide grin.

When we turned into a long driveway, I snapped back to reality and had my first inclination that something wasn’t right. A large wooden sign with faded black letters, which said Miller’s Bird Farm, leaned against the barbed wire fence at the end of the driveway.

Taeyeon drove slowly up the drive, passing a workshop on the right, a vegetable garden on the left. He pulled up onto a large concrete pad next to an old blue pickup.

Two houses faced the concrete pad. A large white one before us—the main house, I assumed—sat high enough off the ground that you could drive a truck underneath it. The siding was unfinished, and the porch rails were likely to collapse any moment from the bowed and battered wood. Unlit Christmas lights hung from the eaves, though it was late March.

The much smaller guest house—something similar to a cottage—sat two steps off the ground, but wasn’t in any better condition. Someone had scraped the old paint, but never got around to repainting the siding. Or maybe they preferred the weathered look. I wasn’t sure, but regardless…this was the Hilton?

In that moment, all I knew was that Taeyeon had brought me here under false pretenses, and I was pissed. Okay, it wasn’t really false pretenses. After all, Taeyeon did say it was a perfect place to hide me out. Nobody in their right mind would look for me here. Of course, that’s only because I’d have to be out of mine to stay here.

He turned off the car and looked over at me. I gave him a menacing glare, hoping it filled him with as much dread as I’d felt when I realized where we’d be staying.

“Okay, Jessica, I understand you’re upset, but I think—”

“Upset? That doesn’t begin to cover it, you…you…kidnapping ! You made it sound like we were going to be staying somewhere decent. Hell, I’d have settled for something liveable. If you think I’m staying in that cardboard box, you can go get ed.”

A muscle twitched in the side of his jaw. Tension built in his shoulders as he gripped the steering wheel with tightly clasped hands. He tried to control his temper, but failed miserably.

“Kidnapping? I can’t believe you’re going to start that crap again. You’re a royal pain in my . I’ve never met a woman this frustrating in my entire life. You’re a rude, unappreciative spoiled brat!”

“Why? Because I don’t want to spend my nights in low-income housing?” I asked with a sarcastic tone. “What’s next? Are we going to share a sleeping bag in a tent out in the woods?”

“Either you can stay here or take your chances with Frankie Felts,” Taeyeon said matter-of-factly. “I’m offering you an alternative to death, but it’s up to you. If you want to leave, I’m not stopping you.”

A porch light flipped on upstairs and grabbed our attention. An older couple stepped out the front door and headed down the stairs.

“When you’re done with your tantrum, you can decide what you want to do,” Taeyeon added. “All I ask is that you don’t be rude to my aunt and uncle. They’re good people.”

I served him a sweet smile. “I’m sure I’ll like them fine. It’s you I don’t like.”

“Good. I don’t like you, either,” Taeyeon said angrily, opening his door to get out.

He knew I wouldn’t leave. Where else did I have to go? Nope, I was stuck with him, even after he called me all those names. The thing that bothered me most was that he meant them. Maybe I had reacted poorly to him misleading me, but he didn’t have to be so harsh. I let the hurt feelings percolate through my system, then pushed them away. Mental note: send the FBI hate mail for saddling me with Taeyeon.

I ran my fingers through my flat, lifeless brown hair hoping to tease it into better condition, but it was no use. After traveling cross-country, it wasn’t going to look any better until I washed it. In fact, I wasn’t going to feel better at all until I took a long, hot shower. Of course, that’s assuming these people actually had hot water. My legs cramped, my back hurt, and my stiff muscles needed to stretch. Exhausted, I opened my door and stepped out slowly wearing cement shoes.

Taeyeon shook his uncle’s hand firmly, gave him a pat on the back, and then gave his aunt a big hug, lifting her completely off the ground. They were happy to see each other, which sent a small twinge of jealousy through me. I hated to break up their reunion, but introductions were necessary.

“This is Jessica Jung,” Taeyeon said. “Jessica, my Uncle Hank and Aunt Floss.”

His uncle stepped forward to shake my hand with a slight hobble in his gait. Hank was probably somewhere in his late sixties with a head full of wavy silver hair and a neatly trimmed beard to match. He was tall, but round in the middle und