Free The Creeping by Alexandra Sirowy Page A

from his coat pocket, and I tell him everything. Well, my version of everything. I leave out Daniel, because if Shane doesn’t know he’s in town yet, it’s not for me to stir up more trouble for Jeanie’s brother. Yes, I realize I need to watch my back. Live like a paranoid schizo until he leaves town again. That I can handle. I also leave out the memory of Jeanie. Everything else, cross my heart, I am honest about.
    â€œThe little girl looks like Jeanie,” I say once he’s stowed his tablet. “I saw her picture on the news.” He caps his pen like it requires a lot of concentration, but I know he’s stalling for time. “Does this have something to do with her? I thought you said whoever took her didn’t live here.” My voice trembles. So much for staying calm. “Shane,” I plead. “I’m really frightened. Say something. Have I been walking around smiling at the guy who took Jeanie?”
    I try to blink the tears away, but a few escape. I didn’t even realize how scared I was. It could be anyone. Forever ago the police ruled out local suspects, but what the hell do they know? It could be red-faced Mr. Robins working in the office of Wildwood Elementary; or leering Jeremy Rangle filling up your gas tank at the Chevron station;or the silver-haired mailman who waves at every single kid he passes. The only way I ever felt safe in Savage was that I believed that the man who took Jeanie was gone.
    Shane leans his head back against the recliner and rubs his temples. He blinks up at the light fixture on the ceiling. “I don’t know for sure, but we may be close to making a connection with Jeanie. The little girl, she had something tucked in her fist.” I picture a scrap of fabric torn from her attacker’s clothing, the mildewy arm of a teddy bear, a fistful of smashed ladybugs that were dancing on her palm the moment she was attacked. “It’s a finger bone.”
    The words meld in my head. I stare at the seat cushion next to me. A ripple runs through the birds. It crimps their spines, twists their necks until they’re deformed, broken, dead. My breath is uneven, unpredictable. “Whose?” I wheeze. But why do I even ask? I know who it must belong to.
    â€œWe’re working to identify it. But unless their DNA is in the system, we won’t be able to find a match.” If I thought he looked ancient before, he looks like he’s aged about a hundred years in my living room.
    My brain works slow and clunky. “Do you have Jeanie’s DNA?”
    He averts his eyes. “Yes, we saved a hair sample when she disappeared. If it’s hers, we’ll know.”
    I gather up a throw pillow and hug it to my chest. It occurs to me that I can’t decide which would be worse: the finger being Jeanie’s or a stranger’s. “Could it belong to whoever took Jane Doe?” I have the fleeting sense that my own appendages could be stolen away, and I make fists to keep them safe.
    He shakes his head. “It’s picked clean. Whoever it belonged to has been dead for at least eight years. That’s how long it takes for skin and tissue to decompose.”
    The finger of someone who has been dead for years. Someone like Jeanie . I shrink back into the cushions. It’s not that I ever thought we’d find her alive. Now, sitting in my living room, it seems weird that I don’t do a double take whenever I spot a redhead my age. I don’t search the bleachers at away football games, just in case . I know Jeanie’s not somewhere, seventeen and sunburned, laughing so hard soda’s gushing from her nose. But I never thought we’d find her dead, either. Maybe it was easier to think of Jeanie like vapor, as though eleven years ago, she turned to dust and blew away.
    I catch the tail end of what Shane’s saying. “What I can tell you, promise you , is that we will keep you safe. Whether