Free Run to Me by Diane Hester

Corey and Reece were in it with him.
    Yes, he remembered now – the men, the accident, their lucky escape. But something had changed.
    They were no longer moving.
    He scrambled to his feet and rushed to the door, his sudden movements waking the others. Before they could speak he held up his hand, then bent to listen. No enginenoises. No sound of voices. They’d definitely stopped. But where and for how long?
    One thing for sure, they couldn’t just go marching out in the open. Three young boys, alone, climbing off the back of a truck . . . If anyone saw them they’d turn them over to the police. And grown-ups never believed what kids said, they only listened to other grown-ups. Which meant the cops would just hand themback to Nolan and Tragg.
    Zack shuddered, recalling the gun, the yawning black hole just inches from his face.
    Something touched his hand and he jumped. Reece and Corey had come up behind him, their expressions anxious. He placed a finger to his lips then pressed his ear to the door again. Nothing.
    Slowly he raised his hand to the lever. The light seeping through the seams of the hold didn’tseem as strong as it had been earlier. He sensed it was dusk, perhaps even later. With any luck the shadows would cloak them. He pushed on the handle and eased it down.
    With the door open only a finger’s width, Zack peered out. Some kind of depot. Lots of trucks, some with huge logs chained to their beds. No one in sight. He pushed the door wider and the scent of pine flooded the hold. Reeceand Corey squeezed up beside him.
    The twilight was deepened by surrounding trees – forest so thick and dense with shadow he couldn’t see more than a few yards into it. A strange kind of forest. Bare straight trunks in staggered rows, their greenery forming an impenetrable canopy high above.
    Perhaps it wasn’t so late after all, Zack thought, climbing down from the truck. The forest just blockedout most of the sun, its damp, cold, pine-scented breath raising goosebumps along his flesh. He reached up and helped the other boys down.
    ‘Where are we?’ Reece said, clutching his arm.
    ‘Don’t start that again,’ Zack hissed. ‘Just shut up and follow me.’
    The trucks were parked in two long rows that stretched either side of a gravel track. Zack led them towards the road at the end, using eachvehicle in turn for cover.
    He needn’t have bothered. There was no one around. Even the little office building they came to stood dark and deserted. In the end they ran the final stretch.
    Once on the road, Zack breathed a sigh of relief. If anyone came by and saw them now they’d just think they were some local kids out for a walk.
    But with one problem solved, the next arose. It was getting dark.They’d soon be unable to see where they were going, and there wasn’t a house or shop in sight. Just an endless corridor of massive trees.
    They’d been walking about fifteen minutes when pinpoints of light appeared up ahead. A car approaching. Zack heard the gurgle of water nearby – a stream flowing beneath the road.
    ‘This way!’ The two boys followed him down the embankment.
    When the car finallypassed, its headlights lit up the culvert enough to show three large concrete pipes passing beneath the road’s surface. Water flowed through only two of them.
    The third, blocked at one end by a tangle of branches, would be their shelter for the night.

Chapter 12
    Nolan pulled the rental car into the depot and began slowly driving up and down the rows of parked trucks. He rounded a corner and let out a curse. Too late – the boys were already here.
    He rolled to a stop with his headlights fixed on the truck’s rear door. If he hadn’t had to wait over an hour for Vanessa to get back to him with its destination he might’ve made it here in time. Shakinghis head, he climbed from the car.
    On the bright side, he could be sure of one thing – once the truck had left the gas station there were few other places it could have