Free Between the Cracks and Burning Doors: Book 2 of The Extraction List Series by Renee N. Meland

from across the table. I tightened the grip around my fork. “Plenty of runaways around here. Small town, no jobs. When you buy one there’s always another.” I glanced up at her as she smiled and stuck a forkful of lasagna in her mouth. “Always.”
    After inhaling my food as fast as I could, I wanted out. I wanted to go back to the church and do something normal, like clean a bathroom. Anything that wasn’t life and death, something unimportant. Maybe I would play a board game with the kids, and try not to think about the fact that Dom’s money wasn’t going to last very long. I pushed the thought out of my mind, not wanting to picture his face after he came back from jail and saw that not only was the church covered in dust and the paint flaking off but there was a slumber party going on in his apartment.
    As I was heading for the door, I heard the voice of the beautiful blonde woman from the TV come on the radio. The sound was so soft when it echoed from the living room that if I didn’t know her, if she hadn’t been with me all those nights at my parents, comforting me with her words, I wouldn’t have heard it.
    Maureen had walked me to the door but I pushed past her. When I found the radio, I crouched next to it and listened. “We’re getting close, getting close to a solution. You know the situation that has rotted through the nation better than anyone. Our town is crawling with gangs, like an infestation of cockroaches. But they will not survive this. We will save the children from their clutches, from the streets, and from a life of crime. All you have to do is vote yes.”
    They better hurry.

CHAPTER FOUR
    That night, as much as I wanted us to have a feast, I made sure we each had an apple, a bowl of cereal, and some milk. What I wouldn’t have given to have the juices of a medium rare New York steak drip down my chin. Just about the only good thing about living with my parents was that we always ate well. Dad did know how to appreciate a great chunk of meat.
    I hoped that was the only thing he passed on to me.
    But for Nick, Alexis, and Felix, I pretended that bowl of Cheerios and that apple was the best thing I’d ever had. The three of them smiled back at me as we ate. Maybe they were just doing it to humor me, but their big smiles made me forget for just a minute that when you got right down to it, all four of us were criminals.
    When I heard a loud banging on the front door, I almost spit out my cereal. Nick ran to the window and peered out. “Looks like the top of Maureen’s head.”
    I resolved to remember to tell her to come through the back.
    She didn’t smile at me when I opened the door. “Get in the car.”
    “What, no hello?”
    “There’s something you need to see. So you don’t do anything stupid.”
     
    We drove down to the opposite end of town from where she lived and parked in the shadow of a giant tree, across the street from a small white building. I then saw why she lived where she did. She wanted to be as far from the police station as possible.
    “We’re gonna sit here till every one of those jerk-offs comes out. So you can see what they look like. And know who to shut up to.”
    Her car was stuffy, and I felt like I was cooking even though the weather outside wasn’t even warm. “What if one of them goes out the back and we don’t see?”
    “There’s only one door. I checked.”
    “Oh. Seems weird for a police station to only have one door.”
    She scolded me through clenched teeth. “Here they come. Pay attention.”
    From the shadows, we watched each of them come out. In our town there was always someone doing something illegal, somewhere. The real shock was how slow they were getting there. A few smoked cigarettes before getting in their squad car; if you could even call it a squad car. It was so old and worn with rust I couldn’t even tell what model it was. The only thing distinguishing it as a police car was the siren on the roof.
    After seeing each of