“It’s your fault where you steered us, and you’re never going to get your full license—”

“You can stop yelling. Anytime.”

No airbags. The airbags hadn’t deployed. Elle pulled herself up by the steering wheel and looked over the hood. Whatever had shot across the icy road was gone, the black shadow scurrying off as strays did. In contrast, the snowbank they were headfirst into was about five feet tall and a whole block long of going-nowhere. Beyond it? Nothing but a warehouse the color of a mud puddle that was covered with graffiti and absolutely no exterior lights.

Two seconds sooner or later and this would never have happened. The dog would have crossed the street before or after them, and right now they’d be elsewhere—although probably not where she’d meant to be going. She’d been trying to get onto Trade Street, and she’d thought, as she’d made a bunch of turns after taking the—hello—Trade Street exit off Northway, that it’d be no problem to find her way. Instead, they were…

Cranking around in her seat, she looked past Terrie, who was still talking, her hands all animated, her indignity act on a solid roll. The Northway was down about four blocks, at the Hudson River’s edge, and Elle pictured herself back on the four-laner going out of town, headlights leading the way home. Too bad there was no on-ramp that she could see and no signs to one, either—plus the highway was super-raised up on pylons. But, like, what did she think she’d do if it were on the level? Bust through a guardrail?

On the other side of things there was… nothing much. Just a bunch of dark buildings that offered no help. No security lights on them, either. Were they all abandoned?

“—going to tell Dad everything. How you stole his keys and took us downtown—”

Elle turned to her passenger with the big frickin’ opinions. “It’s not like I put a gun to your head. You said you were bored, so you were coming.”

“I’m twelve, you know, I’m a minor and it’s ten o’clock at night, and if you left home I’d be alone there, and that defeats the whole purpose of babysitting, doesn’t it. And where are we.”

Barely a break between words, much less pauses for sentences. If there had even been more than one.

“We’re here,” Elle muttered. “I mean, don’t freak out.”

“Who do we call?” her sister demanded. “We can’t call Dad—”

“Shut up

, Terrie. I’ll take care of it.”

“Don’t tell me to shut up! You know, this is just like the time you…”

As Terrie got back on the bitch train, Elle couldn’t decide whether she wanted to be home because it was safe and this stretch of Caldwell’s downtown felt anything but that, or because she could not stand to be in an enclosed space with Terrie the Big Mouth. The good news? Now that the shock was wearing off, she realized the engine was still running, the heater was still on, and she couldn’t smell any smoke or anything burning. And hey, “abandoned” meant no one was around to get involved, right?

Get involved = call her father. Or call the police, who would then call her father.

All she had to do was reverse. Reverse was everything. And then she was getting them the hell out of here, and never, ever babysitting her sister again.

“You are such an idiot,” Terrie announced.

“Shut up.”

Putting things in reverse, Elle hit the gas. There was a jerk, and then a whrrrrrrrr. So she pushed down more on the accelerator. Whereupon the whrrrrrrr from the back end of the car just got higher pitched and louder.

Terrie cocked an eyebrow. “That’s not working.”

“Thank you, Mr. Faulk.” Mr. Faulk was the seventy-million-year-old English teacher at Caldwell Middle School. They’d both had him, and they’d both hated him. It was the only thing they’d ever agreed on. “And it will work.”

Elle stomped on the accelerator. And all she got was more volume out of the spinning rear tires, so she eased off. Then tried again, with less gas.

“FYI, this isn’t helping us.”

Elle put the car in park and thought seriously about pulling out all of her sister’s hair. “I’m never taking you anywhere ever again. Like, ever. You’re a fucking pain in my ass.”

“Just wait until I tell Dad ALL about this. Including that f-word.”

“Good. Then you’re in trouble, too, because you were supposed to be in bed an hour ago.”

“My bedtime was your responsibility. He’s never going to let you babysit—”

“Who the fuck else do you think is going to sit with you when we’re at Dad’s and he’s on a date?”