Chapter 4: The Highway Drive
Ten minutes later, the vestry door rattled, but the deadbolt held firm against whoever was standing outside. I ignored the muffled, frantic pounding of Rebecca’s voice calling my name through the oak panels. Instead, I kept my focus entirely on Lily, helping her change out of her stiff, uncomfortable flower-girl dress and into the soft cotton sweater and jeans I always kept in the car emergency bag.
We slipped out through the vestry's private rear exit, which opened directly into the gravel parking lot behind the church. The midday sun was blinding, reflecting off the rows of luxury sedans belonging to our invited guests. Nobody was looking at the back exit; everyone was still gathered near the front portico, waiting for a scandal they could whisper about for years.
I strapped Lily securely into the backseat of my sedan, tucking her favorite travel blanket around her knees. She curled up against the door and closed her eyes, exhaustion finally overtaking her nervous system. I climbed into the driver’s seat, my hands resting lightly on the leather-wrapped steering wheel. My heart hammered a slow, heavy rhythm against my ribs.
I pulled out of the parking lot, steering away from the scenic country club where three hundred guests were currently sitting at empty tables beneath white silk tents. Instead, I pointed the hood of the car toward the interstate, heading south back toward the city we had left behind two days ago.
The highway stretched out before us like a grey ribbon under the glaring summer sky. The miles rolled by in heavy, suffocating silence, broken only by the hum of the tires against the asphalt. My mind raced through the timeline of the past two years. Every coincidence, every sudden financial windfall that allowed Rebecca’s family foundation to bail out my failing architectural firm, every time Sarah’s name had been mentioned and quickly dismissed by Rebecca with a sympathetic sigh—it all locked into place with terrifying clarity.
Rebecca hadn’t just managed Sarah’s disappearance; she had engineered it to secure her position in my life, trapping me in a web of obligation and gratitude. And Lily had become an unwitting pawn in a game between two women who viewed her existence as leverage.
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About thirty miles outside the city limits, I glanced into the rearview mirror. A dark, late-model sedan had merged onto the highway two cars back at the last interchange, and it had stayed directly behind us through every lane change. Even when I dropped my speed by ten miles per hour, the car matched my pace, maintaining an exact, calculated distance.
My jaw tightened. Rebecca’s security team, or perhaps someone she had hired to keep tabs on Sarah, was already tracking us.
