Reunited by Hilary Weisman Graham

left back there?” Alice asked.
    “Nope, you’re doing fine.” Michael pointed to some pine trees at the top of a hill. “It should be just down past there.” He sounded so confident, despite the fact that they’d been driving around the woods for the last fifteen minutes and he’d said that exact same thing three times so far.
    “Hey, I’ve got an idea,” Tiernan said. “Let’s give ol’ Coach Quigley a try.”
    “Who’s Coach Quigley?” Phred asked.
    “He’s our GPS,” Tiernan explained. A few miles back, she’d been defending Michael. Now she was trying to overthrow him.
    “We don’t need any technology, darlin’. I grew up in these woods.”
    Summer couldn’t help but grin watching Tiernan bristle at the word “darlin’.”
    “Spent three weeks campin’ out by that swimmin’ hole back when I was your age,” Michael added.
    “That must have been fun,” Alice said.
    “Not really.” Michael shrugged. “Only reason I did it was ’cause the cops were lookin’ for me.”
    “You were a fugitive from the law?” Tiernan gasped withdelight, as if someone had told her she’d just won the lottery. “What did you do?”
    “I didn’t do nuthin’.” Michael’s voice was suddenly angry, defensive. “But I’ll tell you one thing. Don’t matter what the truth is. After that, people ’round here ain’t never treated me the same.”
    Summer’s breath quickened as she reeled through a list of potential crimes in her head. Was it a drug deal gone wrong? Rape? Kidnapping? Murder! A half hour ago she had been nestled away on the top bunk, perfectly content. Now there was a high probability she was going to die at the hands of this psychopath, with no one to help her but her ex–best friends and two ridiculously named strangers.
    “Crap,” said Tiernan. “No signal.” Coach Quigley’s display was TV screen blue, the words “Searching for Satellites” blinking in the center like an error message.
    This entire fiasco was Tiernan’s fault. She was the one who’d brought this lunatic into their lives. The one who’d encouraged Alice’s flirtation with that loser Phred. But did anyone ever listen to what Summer wanted? If they did, by now they’d be in an air-conditioned hotel room twenty miles up the road instead of trapped in this hillbilly hell.
    Or maybe she was overreacting. After all, this wouldn’t be the first time Summer let her imagination get the best of her. She glanced over at Toad and Phred, hoping their mellow, glazed-over expressions might offer a bit of reassurance.But the looks of sheer terror on their faces only fanned the flames of Summer’s fears. Either all that pot they’d smoked was making Toad and Phred paranoid, or coming out here with Michael Crazy-Eyes was starting to seem like a really bad idea.
    “I think we ought to just turn around,” Alice said, her usual self-assured tone betrayed by only the slightest quaver.
    Summer looked out the window into the blackness. Next to her, Toad was shaking his head back and forth, as if to say, Not good, not good at all.
    “Hey, Michael,” Tiernan said, trying desperately to keep her voice light and airy. “You’re not, like, taking us out to the woods to, like, kill us or anything, are you?” Then she gave a short chuckle just to show everyone that she wasn’t genuinely scared or anything, that she was just being her usual brash, irreverent self.
    Michael spun around to the back, his mouth stretched in a wide skeletal smile. “I ain’t gonna kill ya.” He laughed, his sharp collarbones heaving up and down under his tank top. “In fact, I’m probably the safest guy you could be out here with.”
    He twisted his torso some more, pointing to the tattoo on his right bicep. “You see that?” Summer leaned in to see an image of a winged man with a sword in his hand hovering over the devil. “I got it when I was in jail. That’s me—Michael the Archangel. Prince of Light.”
    Well, Summer thought to