…it lit up with a text that read:
“Extraction complete. Troopers are clear. Bring the driver to the silo.”
I stared at the glowing screen, the harsh blue light illuminating the cramped back seat of my Subaru. My breath caught in my throat. Bring the driver. That was me. This wasn’t Sarah’s spare phone for emergencies. This was a direct line to whoever had taken her—or worse, whoever she was working with.
A heavy metallic clunk echoed across the desolate asphalt.
I ducked down, peering just over the edge of the car window. The cashier—the same greasy-haired guy who had spent the last three hours feigning apathy and polishing the same spotless counter—was flipping the neon “Open” sign to “Closed.” He slid a heavy iron deadbolt into place, his eyes scanning the parking lot. He wasn’t looking for a lost girl. He was looking for me.
Everything clicked with sickening clarity. The window painted shut from the inside. The state troopers who seemed a little too eager to write off a missing nineteen-year-old girl. Sarah hadn’t vanished. She was the bait. And I had walked right into the trap, staying behind in this ghost town just like they knew a “best friend” would.
I scrambled into the driver’s seat, keeping my head low, and jammed the keys into the ignition. I twisted it.
Click. Click. Click. Dead. I popped the hood release and saw exactly what I expected through the windshield gap: the battery cables had been cleanly severed.
“Hey!” a voice barked from the station. The cashier was stepping out of the side door, a heavy steel tire iron swinging casually from his right hand. “I know you’re still out here, kid. Let’s make this easy.”
Panic flared, but the white-hot fury I felt earlier burned it away. Sarah had sold me out. After twelve years of shared secrets, sleepovers, and promises of the future, she had driven me to the middle of nowhere to be handed over to strangers.
I grabbed my keys, a half-empty can of pepper spray from the center console, and Sarah’s burner phone. I slipped out the passenger side door, keeping the bulk of the Subaru between me and the cashier. The sun had fully dipped below the horizon, plunging the Nevada desert into a deep, oppressive blue.
“We don’t want to hurt you,” the cashier called out, his boots crunching on the gravel. He was getting closer. “She told us you were reasonable.”
She told us. I crept toward the rear of the gas station, sliding behind a rusting ice freezer. Behind the station lay an endless expanse of scrub brush, scattered boulders, and the rusting carcasses of abandoned vehicles. If I ran onto the highway, I’d be easily spotted by headlights. The desert was my only cover.
I bolted.
I ran low and fast, the dry desert air burning my lungs. I didn’t look back until I reached the rusted shell of an old pickup truck about fifty yards out. I pressed my back against the cold metal, gasping for air.
Back at the station, two sets of headlights flicked on, illuminating my Subaru. A heavily modified black truck had pulled up next to the gas pumps. Three figures stepped out. Even from this distance, I recognized the silhouette of the third person. The posture, the familiar oversized denim jacket.
Sarah.
She wasn’t tied up. She wasn’t fighting. She casually walked over to the cashier, took something from him, and pointed directly into the dark expanse of the desert. She was showing them where I would go.
My chest tightened, but the tears wouldn’t come. This wasn’t the time for heartbreak; it was the time for survival. I looked down at the burner phone in my hand. It was still unlocked. I quickly navigated to the settings, turned the volume all the way up, and set an alarm to go off in exactly two minutes.
I tossed the burner phone deep into the bed of the rusted pickup truck, then turned and sprinted eastward into the pitch-black desert, toward a rocky ridge I had seen on our drive in.
Behind me, the jarring, digital blare of a phone alarm pierced the quiet night. Shouts erupted from the gas station, and flashlight beams immediately converged on the abandoned truck. They were taking the bait.
I didn’t stop running. I didn’t know what “the silo” was, and I didn’t know why my best friend had decided to trade my life for whatever she was getting. But as the cold Nevada wind whipped against my face, I made myself a promise.
I was going to survive this desert. And when I made it back to civilization, Sarah was going to find out exactly what happens when you leave your best friend behind.
