The Disappearance

Part I

One

The desert stretched out before them, a tan plain dotted by occasional brown brush and bordered at the far edges by small mountains painted purple by the rising sun. Aside from Reyn, who was driving, Gary was the only one in the car still awake, and he shifted slightly in the middle of the backseat, both to relieve some of the pressure that Joan’s elbow was putting on his midsection and to move away from Brian’s leg, which was pressing uncomfortably close. From the passenger seat in front, Stacy stirred, letting out a muffled sound that was half snore, half snort.

That’s why I love her, Reyn whispered back.

Gary smiled.

They’d been driving since midnight, when Brian had gotten off work at Del Taco, and were now out of California and well into Nevada. If Brian had been awake, he would have insisted they stick to their planned itinerary and stop off in Vegas for a few hours, but luckily for the rest of them he had been out like a light since San Bernardino, and they had decided on the spur of the moment, in the middle of the darkness, in the middle of the desert, to skip Las Vegas and had turned onto a state highway at Baker.

They were on their way to Burning Man, the tribal gathering held each summer in the Black Rock Desert. Gary knew next to nothing about the festival, only that it had something to do with a big effigy that got set on fire each year like the straw figure in The Wicker Man. Stacy had been before, and it was she who’d initially suggested they make this trek. They’d had fun at Coachella together, she’d said. This would be even better.

Indeed, they had all gone to Coachella together—all of them except Joan—and while that had been fun and there’d been no problems, it had also been only a two-hour drive from UCLA, with Palm Springs, Indio and a host of sprawling, newly developed desert cities in the immediate surrounding area.

This was totally different.

For one thing, Burning Man was ten hours away, out in the middle of nowhere and lasted a week. For another, it was not a well-planned commercial endeavor but a hippieish event where participants were supposed to create a temporary community dedicated to art, self-expression and self-reliance.

Two days at Coachella had been fine, but Gary wasn’t sure the five of them could spend a week together without ending up at one another’s throats, and he was glad that their respective work schedules had precluded them from attending all save these climactic three days. Unfortunately, it was also Labor Day weekend, which meant that they were going to be stuck in endless lines of traffic when they tried to return to Southern California.

Joan stirred awake, opening her eyes and smiling at him. She kissed his cheek and wrapped an arm around his midsection. Even here in the car, hair tangled and face groggy, she looked absolutely beautiful, and as always, he was astounded by the fact that she was going out with him. Although he’d seen her around campus before—and noticed her—they had met only last semester in a music appreciation class they had together. He could not remember now how or why they had started talking. He seemed to recall that either she had asked him for a pencil or he had asked her for one, but the memory of that first meeting was vague and hazy. He’d been dating someone else at the time—Meg Wells, a hyperefficient advertising major whose life was so well organized that even the specifics of her leisure activities were accounted for on her PDA—but he’d found himself thinking more and more about Joan, looking for her in the crowd outside the music building before class, going out of his way to walk with her after class, although nothing had happened between them. It wasn’t until earlier this summer, after Meg had landed a summer internship at a high-powered advertising agency and abruptly dumped him, that Gary had run into Joan at a party and had gathered up enough courage to ask her out on an official date. It turned out that she was just as interested in him as he was in her—and had been all the past semester—and they moved seamlessly from casual acquaintances to friends to…more than friends. Boyfriend and girlfriend, he would have said, but she didn’t like those terms. Lover was out, too, as was the perennially unpopular significant other.

Whatever they were, they were together, and he was humbled by the fact that he was with someone so clearly out of his league.

There was another snort from the front seat.

Stacy and Reyn, on the other hand, were a perfect match.

Bright white light burst through the passenger windows as the sun surmounted whatever obstacle on the eastern horizon had kept its rays from shining on the highway. There was a chorus of groans and complaints as Stacy and Brian were jolted awake.

About time, Gary told them.

Where are we? Stacy wanted to know.

Past the nuclear test range, Reyn said.

Are you serious? Brian asked.

Yeah. There was a fence about twenty miles long.

I don’t like that. Brian glanced back out the rear windshield. Can we go home another way?

People drive past here all the time.

Yeah, and look at the incidence of cancer in this country.

It’s not coming from the Nevada desert, Reyn said patiently.

I don’t want to take chances, Brian said. You can gamble with your sperm count, but I didn’t sign up for that.

They stopped for a late lunch at an Arby’s in the small town of Fallon and reached the two-lane road leading into the Black Rock Desert by midafternoon. The traffic was bumper to bumper, and it took them more than an hour to get to a spot where they could drive off the road and onto the playa.

The festival had been going on for five days now, and what Stacy called Black Rock City had sprouted from the flat ground like a recycled shantytown in a postapocalyptic world. They could see brightly painted retro shacks and white futuristic domes spread out before them, an assortment of curious flags flying from makeshift towers. People were milling about, gathered in groups, walking alone, working on sculptures, playing instruments, lecturing, listening, dancing. Smoke rose from various bonfires, though the temperature was well over one hundred degrees. A stick-figure effigy atop a high wooden platform—the Burning Man himself—overlooked it all.

Seems cool, Reyn said unconvincingly.

Find a place to set up camp, Stacy told him.

They drove around the outskirts of the activity until they found a section of open space between what appeared to be an oversized Lego building (Meredith’s Candy House, according to a hand-painted sign) and a black, graffiti-covered block of wood, bigger than their car, whose torn sheet of a flag announced Joe Strummer lives! Reyn pulled to a stop, and they all got out. It felt good to be able to stretch, and Gary jogged in place for a moment while Joan performed a few quick jumping jacks beside him. The air was heavy and hot, and smelled of smoke and garbage, paint and pot.

Reyn opened the trunk. They’d brought a big ice chest filled with food and drink, as well as three sacks of snacks from Trader Joe’s. Gary and Joan had packed a tent for the two of them to share, as had Reyn and Stacy, but Brian had only his sleeping bag. I’m staying on the ground, he said. Under the stars. I don’t want some advanced polymer coming between me and Mother Nature. That’s against everything Burning Man stands for. He grinned. Unless, of course, I meet a comely young lass who asks me to share her domicile for the evening.

Brian unrolled his sleeping bag on the dirt directly in front of the car, then sat on top of it, listening to his iPod while the two couples each put up their respective tents. Gary and Joan’s was the simpler of the two, and they were set up and ready to go before Reyn and Stacy had finished arguing over where to pound in their stakes. Gary walked over to the open trunk and grabbed a bag of spiced pita chips. Why don’t you put everything in the backseat? Reyn said. It’s cooler.

What about the ice chest? Should I—?

Just put it on the seat. If any of us wants anything, we can open the door and get it. Two bearded, shirtless guys about their age ran by, squirting each other with Super Soakers. Besides, I don’t want anyone else stealing our stuff.

Gary moved the ice chest and snack sacks to the backseat of the car; then he, Joan and Brian ate chips while Reyn and Stacy finished putting up their tent.

I guess we’re done, Reyn said, stepping away from the tent to look at it.

Brian held up the empty pita chip bag. We are, too.

So, what’s the plan? Gary asked.

They all looked at Stacy. She was the one who’d been here before, who’d convinced them to come in the first place, and if there was any sort of program, schedule or timetable, she would know.

Why don’t we just…explore? she suggested. She waved her hand toward the motley collection of structures in front of them. Within Black Rock City there are many villages, and they all have their own artwork, manifestos and music. That’s the best thing about being here.

Aren’t we going to be in trouble because we’re not building something? Joan asked.

Gary smiled. We could dig a latrine.

Stacy sighed. That’s the spirit.

A gray-dreadlocked man in a loincloth danced by, blue zodiac symbols painted on his hairy chest and arms. Behind the Joe Strummer cube, in front of a tie-dyed Bedouin tent, a group of young women in colorful gauzy dresses stood in a circle with their eyes closed, holding hands and chanting.

Brian rubbed his hands in a parody of greed. Just point me toward the E.

Reyn and Stacy laughed.

Gary looked meaningfully over at Joan. The two of them were the weekend’s sober chaperones, the in-place equivalent of designated drivers. Although Gary liked an occasional beer, he was deathly afraid of drugs, and Joan came from a strict religious background and did not even drink. So it was their responsibility to make sure the rest of them did not overindulge or get involved in potentially dangerous activities.

Oh, Brian said in a tone of exaggerated simplicity. I almost forgot. I have my own. He reached into the pocket of his jeans and pulled out a wrinkled plastic sandwich bag filled with pills. Ta-da!

Gary’s heart lurched in his chest. Where did you get that? he demanded.

Don’t worry about it, Mr. Clean.

What if we’d gotten pulled over? What if a cop found that on you? We’d all be in jail right now!

Brian grinned. This will all be gone by Sunday. The car will be totally clean on the way back.

Gary was furious. You stupid asshole!

I’ll punish him, Reyn promised. I’ll make sure we drive past that test range on the way home.

Hey, I wasn’t joking about that!

It’s my car, Reyn reminded him.

Then I’ll catch a ride with someone else.

Let him, Gary said. He reached for Joan’s hand and turned away, pulling her with him as the two of them headed through the crowd toward some of the villages and artwork. The festival had an overall theme, as it did each year, but he’d forgotten it and could not tell what it was from the installations around them. Behind a long white wall, onto which were tacked photographs of isolated smiles, he heard the sounds of acoustic guitar and flute. Joan pulled him in that direction, and he allowed himself to be led. Can you believe that asshole? Carrying drugs?

You knew this was going to happen, Joan pointed out. "What did you think they were going to do when they got here?"

I didn’t think there’d be drugs in the car with me.

Just because they’re into that doesn’t mean that you have to be. As I understand it, that’s what Burning Man is all about: letting everyone celebrate in their own way.

You’re very nonjudgmental, he said.

She performed a small curtsy. It’s one of my most attractive qualities.

Smiling, Gary kissed her. You’re good for me, he said.

They walked around the side of the wall and saw a bald woman and a long-haired man seated in folding chairs atop a provisional stage. The woman was playing flute, the man guitar, and they were performing for a group of twenty-odd people sitting cross-legged on the bare dirt. Gary and Joan moved to the back of the crowd and stood there, listening. But the duo did only two more songs before vacating the stage for an angry poet who started shouting his work into a child’s Mr. Microphone toy.

Gary and Joan wandered away.

So, did you tell your parents you were coming here? Gary asked.

Joan looked shocked. Of course not! There was a pause. You? she asked.

Yeah, he said. Sort of. I mean, my parents aren’t the hippest people on the planet, and I don’t think they’d ever heard of Burning Man before, so I didn’t tell them details about it. But they know I’m here.

I’m jealous, she said. I wish I had that sort of relationship with my parents.

"You’re jealous of my relationship with my parents? He shook his head. Your envy is sadly misplaced, young lady."

The sun was getting low, but the air was still hot, and they went through an intricate maze made out of palm fronds before taking refuge beneath a giant umbrella spraying mist on those below it. Finally they made their way back to their own camp. The ice chest was out of the trunk and on the ground, and over it Reyn had fashioned a type of awning to provide shade, raiding the box of black trash bags they’d brought and clamping the ends of three bags between the tops of the car’s passenger doors while affixing the other ends to some sticks he’d found and stuck in the ground. Reyn’s little hibachi was set up next to the tents, and Stacy was cooking hot dogs over charcoal. She grinned. Want a wiener? she asked.

Already have one, Gary told her.

I can vouch for that, Joan added.

The others laughed. Stacy used a fork to pick up the hot dogs that were finished grilling. She piled them on a plate, then put on two more for Gary and Joan.

Brian looked apologetic. Sorry, man. I should’ve told you I was carrying. I just didn’t think about it. Honest.

Gary nodded. It’s all right.

I guess I assumed you knew.

It’s okay, Gary assured him.

Brian dropped his voice. Then do you think you can get him not to drive back by that radiated area? He touched his crotch. I don’t want my guys here contaminated. And I’m sure you don’t, either. We have to think about the future, bro. We’re not going to be twenty-one forever.

Gary clapped a hand on his back. I’ll see what I can do.

That night there were fireworks. A rave started up in one of the villages and gradually spread outward through Black Rock City, the pulsing music growing louder as additional speakers were improvisationally added. Brian was blissed out and disappeared somewhere in the strobe-accented darkness, while Reyn and Stacy slithered together to slow music that only they could hear. Gary danced with Joan, completely sober. For the first time, he thought he understood Burning Man, and though he wasn’t on the same wavelength as most of these people, he still felt part of it all.

The next day, they took Stacy’s advice and just wandered around, exploring. In one village, Gary actually finger painted for the first time since grammar school, the distinctive smell of the thick paint bringing on a wave of nostalgia that left him feeling almost giddy. A Mad Max–looking Winnebago was tricked out as a lunch wagon, its occupants giving out free veggie burgers, and all five of them ate until they were full before setting off once again across the playa.

That night, the Man was burned, set ablaze to cheers and dancing and revelry. They could have gone over with most of the crowd to where it was actually happening, but they could see the event fine from where they were, and the truth was that all of the heat and walking had pretty much worn them out. Joan drank water, the rest of them beer, and they remained in their camp, enjoying the sight and the sounds and one another’s company.

It was shortly after the Man fell that Gary noticed something was wrong.

Very wrong.

He was sitting in place, unmoving, but everything seemed off balance, as though he were on the deck of a seriously yawing ship. He reached for Joan’s hand, and it felt hairy, like the hand of an ape. As he turned his head to look at her, Gary was suddenly struck with a headache so severe that it felt as though a nail had been jammed through the back of his skull. He cried out in pain and grabbed the sides of his head.

As quickly as it had arrived, the headache was gone.

The lurching, off-balance feeling remained, however, and Gary tried to stand but found that he couldn’t; his legs would not listen to his brain. He’d been drugged. He was sure of it, though he did not know how or by whom. An instinct of self-preservation was telling him to get over to the car and crawl into the backseat, to remain somewhere safe until this wore off, but no matter how hard he tried, he could not get his legs to work.

Joan, he said, but he didn’t really say it. No sound came out of his mouth. He wanted to make sure she was okay, wanted to help her if she wasn’t, wanted her to help him if she was. For all he knew, she’d been drugged as well. But his muscles remained rigid, frozen, and he sat there, unable to move.

Whatever this was, he didn’t think it was ecstasy. Ecstasy was supposed to make you mellow and relaxed, to heighten the sensual component of everything. This was…

This was rough.

With a tremendous effort of will, he managed to turn to the side.

Joan was no longer Joan. She was a button-eyed, life-sized rag doll lying unmoving amid the bloody bodies of his slaughtered friends. Two bansheelike shapes emerged from the fog enveloping the outskirts of the scene and picked up the huge doll. Her arms and legs flopped limply as the cloaked and hooded figures lifted her over Brian. His neck had been slit, and both his eyes and his mouth were wide open. Next to Brian, the bodies of Reyn and Stacy were little more than pulped meat.

Gary tried to scream, but only a tiny puff of air was expelled from his mouth. The air became visible, a round, vibrating sphere. It darkened, lengthened, grew wings, then turned and attacked him, a chubby vampiric bat with sharp fangs and cold pinprick eyes. He tried to scream again, and the bat flew into his mouth, forcing its way down his throat, the rubbery winged body disgustingly tactile.

Though he was gagging and choking, he saw through teary eyes that Joan was no longer a rag doll but a little girl, and she was crying and struggling, trying to get away from her mysterious kidnappers. In the background, in the fog, the Burning Man was walking, its limbs, body and head ablaze as it moved in herky-jerky, stop-motion animation away from the carnage that was Black Rock City.

Then all was white.

Then all was black.

—

Awakening was hard and painful, like being pushed through lava into sunlight after spending weeks in a cold, dark cave. His head felt as though his skull was too small and was pressing in on his brain, and every muscle in his body was throbbing. He was flat on the ground, in the dirt, and he rose to a sitting position. The first thing he noticed was that the sun was high in the western sky. It was noon or just after, although he had no idea what day it was. The next thing he noticed was that Burning Man was winding down. The Joe Strummer cube was gone, as was the temporary structure behind it, and though he could hear the sounds of people moving about, there were a lot fewer of them than there had been before.

Brian was already awake. What. The. Fuck. Was. That?

If pressed, Gary would have guessed that Brian was the one who had dosed him. His friend was a good guy and usually respectful of boundaries, but it wasn’t too much of a stretch to assume that his judgment might have been impaired under the influence. Obviously, though, Brian had undergone the same sort of trial he had and, as he looked around, Gary saw that his other friends were similarly affected. Reyn was on the ground and moaning, listing slightly from side to side. Stacy was still out like a light.

But where was Joan?

He crawled over to their tent and looked inside. Her sleeping bag was gone, he saw. As was her little knapsack of personal effects. Frowning, he stood, lurching to his feet and holding out his arms to keep from wobbling too much. A great deal of the city had already been broken down, and the rest of it was in the process of being taken apart. The ethos of Burning Man was that the community would be temporary, a piece of performance art, vanishing after its vibrant week in the sun as though it had never existed. Already most of the people were gone, and by tonight the playa would appear as empty and untouched as it had been before their arrival.

Gary’s head hurt, and his sense of balance was still shaky, but he staggered over to the car and looked inside. No Joan. He walked around the car, using the door handles, trunk and hood as guides, but there was still no sign of her.

Joan! he called. His voice wasn’t up to full strength, but it was still strong enough to be heard in and around the immediate area. He coughed, tried again. Joan!

The only answer was from Brian. She’s around, he said. Somewhere.

Gary didn’t believe that. Something was not right. He could sense it, and a feeling of panic grew within him as he scanned the desert nearby and saw no sign of her. If she had been drugged as the rest of them had, she should have still been here. If she had not been drugged, she would have gone to get help. But she seemed to have disappeared. He recalled his vision or hallucination or whatever it was, where he’d seen two hooded figures carrying off the rag doll that Joan had become, and he was suddenly certain that there was truth in it. Beneath the delusional trappings, an essential core of reality remained, and he was convinced now that she had been abducted.

Reyn was up and awake, and Stacy was stirring to life.

He didn’t like that, either, the fact that they were all coming out of drug-induced stupors at approximately the same time. It suggested a plot, a plan, a premeditated effort to render them unconscious for a specific period of time so that certain actions could be taken during their absence, and he hurried as fast as his acclimatizing legs would carry him to the nearest still-occupied site, where he learned that it was Monday. They had been out for more than a day.

Frantically he searched one disbanding village after another, joined shortly afterward by his recovering friends. No one they encountered had seen Joan or noticed anything unusual, but then, they hadn’t been paying much attention, either. That was what happened when something such as this occurred in such a setting: the natural chaos of the crowd made it virtually impossible for individual events to be noticed.

Gary held out a slim, baseless hope that Joan had wandered away, that in some drugged trance of her own she had ended up sleeping it off in someone else’s camp. But as the light in the sky shifted from bright white to a more subdued yellow and they found themselves covering the same ground they had trod earlier, that already faint hope dimmed and died. Discouraged, he led the other three back to the car.

He had to face the facts.

Joan was gone.

Two

The playa seemed practically deserted, and the orange of the slowly setting sun was intensified by intersecting clouds of dust kicked up by departing vehicles. The three others faced Gary. It was his girlfriend who had disappeared, and he was the de facto leader on this, the one to make the decisions. Beneath the fear and worry, he could see in his friends’ eyes that they were glad they were not the ones to whom this had happened, and while he didn’t blame them for that and would have felt the same if he were in their shoes, part of him resented it.

So, what do we do? Reyn asked.

Don’t you have to wait forty-eight hours or something before you can report someone missing? Brian sat on the hood of the car, legs crossed. I know you’re not supposed to get your information from movies, but… He trailed off.

Gary looked back toward the center of what had been Black Rock City. There’d been a minor police presence here all week, and though he didn’t know where the cops were from or what their ordinary jurisdiction might be, he figured that they were the ones to whom any crime should be reported. Let’s find the police, he said.

You mean one of those rent-a-cops? Brian asked doubtfully.

I think they’re real, Reyn disagreed.

Whoever they are, I’m pretty sure they’re gone, Stacy said. I didn’t see any of them while we were looking around out there.

Shut up! Gary wanted to scream. Shut up! Joan was missing and all his friends could do was bicker about the legitimacy of Burning Man’s security force. But he knew that wasn’t fair. His friends were only trying to help. It was just that every second of delay, each minute they spent not doing something, was time that Joan remained missing. He grimaced as a spasm of pain shot through his lower back and straightened, pressing a hand against his spine. Every muscle in his body was tense. He had a headache, and his neck felt as though it had been used as a punching bag; it hurt no matter which way he turned.

Without further discussion, Gary took out his cell phone, turned it on and dialed 911. But whatever temporary towers had brought this area service for the past week had been dismantled or were gone, and no matter which direction he faced, he got no signal. Shit! he yelled—so loudly that Stacy, standing next to him, jumped. He was angry enough to have thrown down the phone, the way characters do in movies, but he wasn’t stupid, and instead he tried again, with the same result.

He put the phone back into his pocket. His friends were now trying the same thing themselves, although it quickly became obvious that none of their phones was getting a signal, either.

Gary scanned the dusty and nearly empty plain for any sign of police, but Stacy was right: it appeared as though they’d left. He stood there for several seconds, looking at Brian, Reyn and Stacy, and wondering what to do next.

"Did anyone see anything? Gary asked for the umpteenth time. The other three shook their heads. Doesn’t it seem suspicious that she disappeared while we were all knocked out?"

Stacy nodded vigorously. I was thinking that, too. Maybe someone saw us all passed out here, some psycho, and he just…grabbed Joan, kidnapped her. She shivered. It could have been any of us.

Maybe they were planning to get the rest of us, too, only we started waking up! Brian jumped off the hood of the car, gesturing excitedly. That means they might not be that far away! They might not have much of a head start!

Hold on a minute, Reyn said. Think about this logically. What would be the point? Anyone who kidnapped someone would be committing a crime, a felony. He glanced at Gary. No offense, but if someone wanted to rape her, they could’ve just done it right here; they wouldn’t’ve had to drag her off somewhere. Besides, it would take more than one person to pick Joan up and carry her away, and there aren’t bands of white slavers trolling hippie festivals for victims.

And yet, Brian said, she’s gone.

You think she just wandered off? Stacy asked Reyn.

What I think is that none of us knows anything.

They were all talking too much, and this time Gary did shout. Shut up! The three immediately closed their mouths, swiveling toward him. Gary took a deep breath. He didn’t know about the others, but his own body still felt strangely heavy, and he was pretty sure he was not yet thinking clearly. His friends might have a higher tolerance level for drugs, but he doubted that they were working at peak mental capacity, either. We need to get to a place where there’s a signal so we can call the police. Or else go to the nearest town. But someone has to stay here in case Joan comes back.

No way, Stacy said, shaking her head. Not out here in the middle of nowhere. It’ll be dark before you get back.

I’ll hang out, Brian offered. I can always find some way to amuse myself.

Nothing illegal, Stacy warned him. We’ll be returning with cops.

No one’s staying here, Reyn said. He looked over at Gary. Sorry, but we can’t risk losing anyone else. Joan disappeared while there were still a lot of people around. It would be stupid for us to leave anyone behind now that nearly everyone’s gone.

Then the rest of you go, Gary insisted. I’ll wait.

No, you won’t. You’re her boyfriend. You’re the one who has to file the report. You know more about her than the rest of us; you can answer their questions.

But Gary wasn’t sure he could answer their questions. There was so much about Joan that he didn’t know. He loved her—he did know that—but they had been going out only a short time, and most of their conversations had naturally revolved around the present and the future rather than the past. There were huge gaps in her history that he couldn’t fill, and the type of knowledge he had about Joan wasn’t really the sort of hard information that the police would require.

Her parents could answer everything, but he realized that he did not know their names, their phone number or even the city in which they lived. He had the impression that they lived far away, in another state, but Joan had never really told him much about them other than the fact that they were very religious.

Could he get that information through the school? Probably not. There were always privacy issues, and for all the university knew, he was some crazed stalker with whom she had just broken up.

Was he supposed to inform the school that she was missing?

He had no idea.

Gary felt overwhelmed. His first impulse was to call his dad and ask what he should do, but his parents lived all the way across the country, in Ohio, and he didn’t want to alarm them. Besides, they couldn’t really help right now. As terrifying as the thought was, as out of his depth as he felt, he was on his own.

Okay, he said. Let’s go.

On the road that led to the highway, and then on the highway itself, Gary sat unmoving in the passenger seat while Reyn drove, his mind spinning, going over everything that had happened, trying to recall whether anyone at Burning Man had been watching them, or looking at them suspiciously, or had paid extra-close attention to Joan. He was still unable to figure out how or when they had been drugged, and the motives for all of it remained a complete and utter mystery.

He did not notice the name of the town they finally reached, but the second they pulled into the parking lot of the police station, Gary was out of the car and dashing toward the building. It was nearly night now, and the sky in the east was a threatening bluish black. All he could think about was the fact that Joan was out there somewhere and it was getting dark. Running footsteps sounded behind him, and he was only a few feet from the door when a strong hand grabbed his shoulder, fingers digging into his flesh.

Stop! Reyn’s voice in his ear was low but insistent.

Gary