Where Nightmares Ride Read online

  “You might be right. It would’ve been a lot easier if my parents weren’t arguably insane. When I told them about my nightmares, you would’ve thought I’d told them I had the Ebola virus. I’ve never seen my mom flip out like that, screaming in Korean, throwing food, charging up and down the stairs.”

  “It was awkward.”

  “Then my father tried to tell me my nightmare had upset my mom because it reminded her of some experience she’d had when she was little. He’s never lied to me like that before.”

  “Frankly, I think your parents are the ones with the mental disorder.”

  Jack grinned and nodded. “I’m sure it runs in the family. Whatever’s the case, I couldn’t tell them about the dream tech at this camp.”

  “So, what did you tell them? Didn’t they read your invitation?”

  “I tore off the page that mentioned the dream tech.”

  “Good thinking. It’s cool that the camp specially invited you. You’re way smart. Your dad must’ve been proud they chose you.”

  “He was more excited than I was. The people at Camp Farley knew exactly what to say to win him over.” Jack turned to the brochure. “Advanced training in computer modeling. Credits toward college. All-in-one seven-day summer camp. My dad doesn’t even know I’ll be getting five thousand dollars for participating in their dream research.”

  “Man, I wish they’d invited me. I’ll have to talk them into letting me do the research with you. On the other hand, I hope we don’t have to do work the whole time.”

  “I doubt we will. They have three instructional sessions every day, but most of the time it’s just boating and crafts and hikes and stuff. It doesn’t sound like work.”

  “I wonder how the camp pays for it,” Taylor said. “It’s got to cost a ton of moolah providing free week-long camps for people all summer long. And that’s in addition to what they’re paying everyone in the two research cabins.”

  “They’re loaded, believe me. The camp’s run by Montathena Research. They’re the ones that do research in advanced dream technology.”

  “What do they sell?”

  “Beats me,” Jack said. “I couldn’t find a single product or service they provide, but they make billions of dollars every year. They could finance a thousand Camp Farleys.”

  Taylor slowed the car in answer to an approaching line of stopped vehicles. Fifty cars ahead, a middle-aged man stood in a florescent orange vest holding a metal pole with a stop sign on top.

  “I hope we won’t to have to deal with delays like this the whole way there,” Jack said.

  The young blonde girl stared down at Katie, her lip quivering. “I’m sorry if I woke you. Uncle Vance told me to fetch you.”

  “Look. Maybe you didn’t notice, but this happens to be my bedroom. I’m sorry if I’m not used to people barging in on me this early in the morning.”

  “But it’s one-thirty.”

  Katie glanced at the curtains, glowing with sunlight. “Whatever.” She studied the pouting girl. “Did you say, ‘Uncle Vance’? You’re not Clara, are you?”

  The girl bobbed her head.

  “Wow, I haven’t seen you in ages. You were a lot smaller back then. I haven’t seen you since your dad…” she stopped herself. “It’s been what, seven or eight years?”

  Clara nodded again, still frowning. “My mommy keeps saying daddy’s coming home soon, but it’s been so long. I think he’s forgotten us.”

  Katie’s jaw dropped. After all these years, Clara still believed her father was alive somewhere. She remembered how Clara’s mother had disappeared with her the day before the funeral. Judging from Clara’s clothing and childish demeanor, she wondered if she’d even seen the outside world since then.

  Happier memories seeped into Katie’s mind and she remembered many good times with Clara when they were kids, exploring the neighborhood, pretending they had magic powers, and running around on the Boston docks chasing seagulls.

  She grabbed Clara’s hands. “I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings. You caught me in the middle of the worst nightmare, and I wasn’t expecting you. Blame my dad for not telling me you were coming. What did he want, anyway?”

  “I think he wants you to give me a tour of your huge house. My mommy and I get to live here with you. I get to sleep in the room right next to yours, but I’ll bet we can have sleepovers every night. I’m so excited. This is the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”

  “Live here? You can’t have that room. That was Abby’s room!”

  “That’s okay. I’ll sleep anywhere you want. I’m sure we’ll be best friends again. I’ve never really had any friends before. Mommy doesn’t let me. She likes you, though. She told me so, dozens of times. She forgets a lot of things lately, but you shouldn’t worry. She won’t be any trouble. I could’ve taken care of her myself, but Uncle Vance’s friends wouldn’t let me. He says you get to take care of me.”

  “What?” Katie stiffened, then grabbed Clara’s arm and dragged her into the dark corridor of the Victorian mansion. She led her down two flights of curving wood steps, past century-old paintings, antique rugs, flowered wallpaper, and stained wood cabinetry that heralded the excessive wealth of the old Bostonian estate. She arrived at her father’s office on the ground floor and yanked the oiled-bronze door lever before barging inside.

  “How dare you!” Katie flung Clara forward like evidence before a judge.

  Katie’s father, Vance Frost, an overweight man in a black suit, leaned over his wide mahogany desk, his eyebrows raised. Two men sat to either side of him in red, leather-clad chairs. Katie knew Fenton Murdock, a business associate of her father’s, sitting to his left. He gave Katie a blank stare and pushed his wire glasses further up the bridge of his nose.

  “Not acceptable!” said a sallow-faced, elderly stranger to her father’s right. He glared at Katie with contempt and clutched the silver octopus-head handle of his cane; the creature’s tentacles seemed to emerge from the man’s bony fingers and wrap around the collar of the cane. “Mr. Frost, detain this woman before I’m forced to summon my own security detail!”

  Katie riveted her eyes on her father. Vance Frost stood and faced the man who spoke up, a nervous twitch in his forced grin. “I apologize, Mr. Lynch. This is my daughter, Katie. I’m afraid she wasn’t aware of this emergency meeting.” He turned to her. “We can discuss whatever’s bothering you later, Katie. Get along now. I’m sure you and Clara have a lot to catch up on.”

  “I have my own life, Dad. You know how much I hate it when you try to force me into things. I’m not a child. If you want to invite people to live with us, that’s fine, but you could at least tell me before you volunteer me to take care of them.”

  Now that she’d said her piece, she scanned the rest of the room and noticed Fenton’s only son, Damien Murdock, leaning against a bookcase behind her. He grinned, clearly finding her display thoroughly entertaining. Then she saw her reflection in a decorative mirror behind him and she wanted to evaporate. She’d dashed into her father’s office in her nightgown, with no makeup, and hair like a rat’s nest. It was her anger, however—the raw, ugly rage in her face—that caused her the most distress. When had she become so cold-hearted and calloused?

  Her father stared at her for a moment before speaking. “Young lady, I’m in the middle of an important meeting. If you have something to say to me, I suggest you first remember who puts the food on the table in this house. I want you to run back upstairs, take a shower, and get dressed. Then come back here when you’re ready to speak to me in a tone of voice that will convince me you’re a mature human being. If you can do that, I’ll be happy to discuss the matter with you privately.”

  “There’s no privacy in this house! Stephanie told me. Your security guards are always watching us. We can’t do anything without your board’s permission. I never asked for any of this!”

  The elderly stranger perked up. “What else did this housekeeper tell you?”

  “Excuse m
e, Mr. Lynch. This will just be a moment.” Katie’s father rushed to Katie’s side and grabbed her arm. “We will discuss this in the hallway.”

  “I don’t care where we discuss it. I’m not the one with all the secrets.” Katie strode past Damien, trying not to look at him.

  Vance glared daggers at her and closed the door, yet the lines of his forehead told more of worry than anger. “You mustn’t talk like that in front of my associates.”

  “I don’t care what they think. I have a right to control my own life!”

  “But that’s just it, Katie. You don’t control it. You sleep in every day past noon. You refuse to finish school. You won’t get a job. You’ve alienated yourself from your friends. Believe me, I know my company makes our lives difficult, but this behavior cannot continue.”

  “My life is my business.”

  “What life?” He let the acid of those words sink in. “Perhaps I should’ve told you your aunt and cousin were coming to live with us. Frankly, I didn’t tell you because I’m fed up with arguing with you over every little thing. It seems like that’s all you ever want to do anymore. It hurts me to see where your life is heading. It’s like you want nothing more from your day than for it to be over with. I know it’s been hard for you since your sister died. It’s been hard for both of us, and I know you miss your mother.”

  “I don’t miss her.”

  “Don’t say that.”

  “I hate her, and so should you! She took away everything I care about and left me with a father that doesn’t care about anything but his stupid company! Stephanie was more of a mother to me than Mom was!”

  “The fact remains that after all these years, we finally located your aunt and Clara. Your aunt’s mental health has deteriorated. The state wanted to put Clara into a foster home. We have a nurse for your aunt Virginia, but I can’t take care of Clara. I have a business to run. We’re the only family she has. We can’t just abandon her. She needs your help. I spoke with my associates and they agreed that keeping her here wouldn’t interfere with our work as long as I have your help.”

  “You talked to them, but not me?”

  The door swung open. “I’ve heard enough!” Mr. Lynch’s sallow face stretched with indignation. “Montathena Research takes pride in the way we run our business, young lady. I’m appalled at your insubordinate and disrespectful behavior. We have shown leniency to your father, in light of the tragedies you’ve recently endured, but your attitude has convinced me that the game is up. It’s time to start your training.”

  “Out of the question!” Vance’s face showed fear.

  “Fenton had Damien trained years ago. You don’t see any more attitude from him. Who’s to say what your devious little housemaid shared with your daughter?”

  Katie’s father pointed a pen at Mr. Lynch like a sword. “I said no! I’ve taken every precaution to protect Katie from this business. She’s no threat.”

  “This isn’t only coming from me,” Lynch said. “Your brother is on the executive board now. It was his personal request. If you don’t want her recruited, take it up with him.”

  Vance’s eyes widened. He looked pale as he led Katie back into the office. She noticed him staring at an old family photograph hanging on the far wall. It was from a Labor Day picnic six years past. Vance was sitting on a blanket with his loving arms wrapped around his smiling wife, Trisha. Abby was glaring comically over her mother’s shoulder at a homemade strawberry pie. Trisha was holding baby Marcy, who was half-asleep. Katie was leaning against her mother and laughing. It all seemed like a dream.

  “Alright, we’ll do what we have to do.” Vance lowered his eyes.

  Katie scanned every face in the room. “You’ve got to be kidding me! You people really think I’d work for Montathena Research?” She glared at Mr. Lynch. “I don’t even know you. You presume to stand there and tell me what my future has to be?”

  “Katie,” her father said, “you can’t blame Mr. Lynch or Montathena Research for what happened to our family.”

  “So, what? That means I can’t blow my nose without their permission?”

  “You don’t understand.”

  “I hate all of you!” She ran out the door and down the hallway, until her strength abandoned her. Her heart wrenching, she dropped at the foot of the wooden stairs. She felt abandoned and alone. Where was the doting father she once knew? Even orphans probably had someone to comfort them.

  Muffled words crept from her father’s office. “You might as well just kill her now,” her father said.

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Lynch said. “They almost always survive assimilation. I’m astounded that a man of your rank and experience would allow his daughter to remain an ignorant sheep. The Intershroud is her best hope of attaining any real power in this world.”

  “Power! What good is power when you’re just a pawn of the Intershroud?”

  “Come now, Vance,” Mr. Murdock broke in. “I was just as concerned as you are when they made me send Damien to camp but look at him now. His future is set. He’ll be running his own research facility soon. It’s not as bad as you’re making it out to be.”

  “Don’t tell me that! You know what happened to Clara’s father, my wife, my daughter, Abby! Don’t you ever try to tell me it’s not as bad as I think! I know it’s useless to fight my brother on this, but I won’t force my only remaining daughter to go to that camp!”

  “I’ll have Damien talk her into it,” Fenton Murdock said. “Son, go see what you can do.”

  Before Damien reached the door, Katie swung it open wide. She stood before them, cheeks wet, eyes reddened and expressionless.

  “When can we leave?”

  Wisps of smoke played with the crescent moon that hung low over the sharp-tipped logs that formed the twenty-foot-tall palisade around the campground. Unintelligible voices echoed in the cool pine-scented breeze, through staggered pine trees attempting to conceal the fence.

  “Slow down, bro,” Taylor ran to catch up with Jack, gravel crunching below his feet. “We’re three hours late. A few more minutes won’t make a difference.”

  Jack stopped and let his red-and blue-canvas duffle bag flop onto the rocky ground. “I guess you’re right. I was hoping we’d at least catch the end of the opening ceremony, but I hear too many people talking. It must be over. I can’t believe there was so much road construction. We should’ve started the drive last night.”

  Taylor swung his green backpack over his shoulder and rubbed his arms against the cold. “We’d have been hating it if we did that. We probably took too many rest stops, too, but so what? We enjoyed ourselves. It’s not like they’re going to send us back home.”

  “I hope you’re right. It’s dark though, and we don’t even know where we’re sleeping.”

  They started walking again, taking care not to slip on the down-sloping gravel path leading to the entrance. A pair of tall wooden gates stood open, sandwiched between two totem poles. A large wooden sign hung above the entrance, bearing the name Camp Farley below a giant painted eye rising in place of the sun.

  Deep shadows within the trees played with Jack’s imagination.

  Taylor stopped. “Whoa, what’s that?” He pointed at a patch of scrub oak near the gates.

  Jack looked. “I don’t see anything.”

  “I thought I saw someone running through those trees. I didn’t hear anything, though. My mind must be messing with me.”

  “We both could use some sleep.” Jack peered up at the border fence. “What are we getting into? There’s barbed wire up there. Why would they need so much security?

  “They’re probably just keeping bears out. I’m okay with that.”

  “With razor wire?”

  They passed through the gate, then clomped across a painted wooden bridge which stretched over a burbling stream that ran along a stone-faced wall on the inner side of the fence. Jack’s eyes went wide at seeing the eerie darkness of the campground, bathed in the harsh light from two powerful
stadium lights at a hillside amphitheater several hundred yards to their right.

  A large crowd of campers stood in a clearing ahead of them, their excited eyes entranced by traces of white smoke flowing from the windows and doors of a nearby white clapboard building. The harsh lighting distorted everyone’s faces in half silhouettes, giving them an appearance reminiscent of a low-budget horror movie.

  “This place is in chaos,” Jack said. “I’m totally having second thoughts about this.”

  The two boys sauntered forward and joined the crowd.

  Someone had scrawled Farley Must Die in black paint across the front wall of the little structure. Two men carried a desk away from the building and dropped it next to four previously rescued desks, then stepped aside, making room for two women dragging out a wooden table. Other men and women rushed out with boxes and stacks of paper. They were all staff members, judging by their identical tan neckerchiefs, knee-length khaki shorts, and dark-blue polo shirts.

  A man with a well-trimmed beard exited the building and set a box of papers on a nearby desk. He climbed on a table and placed a small megaphone to his lips. “We apologize for this interruption to our Opening Ceremony. It appears that someone pulled a prank on our camp’s founder. The damage to our main office building isn’t as bad as it looks. Right now, I want all staff members with cabin assignments to make sure their assigned campers make it to their cabins. Then return here to help with cleanup. Breakfast starts at seven, so I’d advise you all to get some sleep.” The man leapt down from the table and rushed back into the building.

  Jack took a moment to survey the campgrounds. He counted ten cabins, each nestled among pine trees, no two of them standing on the same level plane. He figured there were more cabins up a hill to his left, where a portly woman was ushering a group of girls. To his right, the land dropped at a steep slope toward a glassy lake that reflected a mirror image of the distant mountains and the semicircular concrete amphitheater that hugged its east side. A smattering of wood pavilions and fabric canopies surrounded the clearing.