Chapter 1 - THREE HUNDRED MILES TO WALK
The silver pickup accelerated away from the gas pumps before I understood that Kyle was not circling the station.
He was leaving.
My bare feet struck sun-baked concrete as I ran after the truck. Heat climbed through my soles like fire. The fuel island blurred around me—red pump handles, white canopy, bright blue Arizona sky, a row of dusty flags snapping above the convenience store.
Brad leaned through the rear passenger window with his phone held sideways.
He was laughing so hard the camera shook.
Chase twisted around from the front seat, one arm hanging through the open window.
“Good luck, Lena!” he shouted. “You’ve only got three hundred miles to walk!”
The truck turned toward the highway.
“Kyle!”
My voice tore against the dry air.
He slowed near the entrance.
For one desperate second, I thought he had come to his senses.
I stopped near the edge of the road and pressed one hand against my chest.
“Kyle, stop! My purse and wallet are still inside!”
The passenger window lowered.
Kyle looked back at me.
He was thirty-four, handsome in the careless way that had once made strangers trust him before he spoke. Sunlight flashed across his sunglasses. One hand rested loosely on the steering wheel.
“Calm down, babe,” he called. “It’s only a prank for our channel.”
Brad kept recording.
The pickup rolled forward.
“Kyle!”
He laughed.
Then the truck merged onto Interstate 40 and disappeared behind a line of semitrailers heading west.
I remained beside the road.
The station sat outside Kingman, surrounded by gravel, scrub, and distances that did not care whether a person had shoes. The temperature sign above the convenience store read 104°F.
My sandals were in the truck.
So was my purse.
Inside it were my wallet, driver’s license, credit cards, hotel key, company security token, prescription sunglasses, and the small notebook containing the names of every sponsor whose payments I believed Kyle had been hiding.
I still had my phone because I had carried it into the restroom.
The battery showed one percent.
I tried Kyle first.
The call connected.
He rejected it.
I called again.
Voicemail.
Brad did the same.
Chase’s phone rang until the screen dimmed.
A message appeared from Kyle.
DON’T RUIN THE REVEAL. WE’LL SEE YOU SOON.
Another followed.
WALK TOWARD THE OLD DINER. CAMERAS ARE EVERYWHERE.
I looked around.
There were no visible members of the crew.
No production vehicle.
No assistant waiting with water.
No drone I could see.
The convenience store clerk watched me through the glass but did not come outside.
My phone flashed a low-battery warning.
Kyle controlled the family mobile plan. Two months earlier, during an argument about expenses, he had remotely suspended my line for three hours and called it an accounting mistake.
The phone died in my hand.
I stood beneath the canopy, listening to the pumps hum.
Then I remembered the paper clip tucked beneath my phone case.
I removed the SIM tray, pulled out the card, and snapped it between my fingers.
The plastic resisted before breaking with a small, clean sound.
I dropped both pieces into the trash can beside the pump.
“I’m never getting into that truck again,” I whispered.
The words did not feel brave.
They felt late.
For five years, I had helped build the channel that turned Kyle, Brad, and Chase into internet celebrities.
Open Road Chaos began with harmless videos: surprise motel upgrades, roadside trivia, strangers receiving free gas, fake arguments resolved through cash gifts. I handled permits, sponsors, budgets, releases, insurance, and every boring process the audience never saw.
Kyle became the face.
Brad became the fearless cameraman.
Chase became the editor who could turn six hours of discomfort into nine minutes of laughter.
I became the woman viewers called Kyle’s uptight girlfriend whenever I asked them not to terrify strangers for clicks.
The channel had nine million subscribers.
We were driving to Los Angeles to sign the final documents for a possible eighteen-million-dollar acquisition by Northstar Network.
At least, that was what I believed.
The prank made no business sense.
Leaving a co-owner beside a highway days before closing was reckless even by Kyle’s standards.
Unless the acquisition no longer required me.
A minivan entered the station.
It was old enough that the blue paint had faded almost gray. One headlight was clouded. A white scrape ran along the passenger door.
The driver parked beside a pump and shut off the engine.
He was broad through the shoulders, with a shaved head, gray beard, and tattoos covering both forearms. A black snake wound around one wrist. Faded letters crossed his knuckles.
He looked fifty or older.
He saw my bare feet.
Then he saw the torn skin beginning to redden beneath them.
His expression changed.
Not softer.
Sharper.
He stepped out.
“You all right?”
I moved closer to the store.
“My ride left.”
“I saw.”
The way he said it made me look at him carefully.
“Were you following us?”
He stared toward the highway.
“I’ve seen that truck online.”
He knew the channel.
That made him more dangerous, not less.
“I’m going inside,” I said.
The clerk had locked the door.
A handwritten sign faced outward.
BACK IN TEN MINUTES.
I knocked.
No response.
The minivan driver pulled a phone from his pocket.
“I can call the sheriff.”
“I can call myself when the store opens.”
“You don’t have a phone.”
“I have one. The battery died.”
He held his device out without approaching.
“You dial. Keep it.”
I did not take it.
“What’s your name?”
“Wade Harlan.”
“Can I see your license?”
His eyebrows rose.
Then he removed his wallet and placed the license on the hood of his van.
Arizona.
Wade Everett Harlan.
Fifty-four.
The photograph matched.
“Take a picture of it when the clerk comes back,” he said. “Take the plate too.”
“You seem prepared for this conversation.”
“I have a daughter.”
The answer sounded rehearsed.
“Where is she?”
His jaw moved.
“Not here.”
A semitrailer passed on the highway, pushing hot wind across the station.
Wade looked at my feet again.
“There’s a clinic nine miles east. Sheriff’s substation is beside it. I’ll take you there, or I’ll wait until someone else does.”
“Why would you wait?”
He looked toward the empty highway where Kyle had vanished.
“Because men like that count on everyone deciding it isn’t their problem.”
The store clerk finally unlocked the door.
I borrowed a charger and called the Mohave County Sheriff’s Office from the store phone. I reported that three men had intentionally left me without shoes, identification, or money and had driven away with my property.
The dispatcher asked whether I had been assaulted.
“No.”
“Threatened?”
“Not directly.”
“Do you believe you are in immediate danger?”
I looked at Wade through the window.
“I don’t know.”
A deputy was more than thirty minutes away.
The clerk allowed me to photograph Wade’s license and plate using the store’s tablet. Wade gave me the address of the clinic and the name of the mechanic who serviced his van.
Then he unlocked the passenger door.
“Come with me,” he said. “I’ll make those pieces of trash pay the price.”
I stopped.
“I’m not helping you hurt anyone.”
“I didn’t say hurt.”
“You sounded like you meant it.”
His pale eyes held mine.
“For two years, I did mean it.”
The air-conditioning inside the minivan rattled weakly. A plastic rosary hung from the mirror. Fast-food napkins, work gloves, and road maps filled the center console.
On the dashboard stood a photograph of a smiling teenage girl beside Wade.
I recognized her.
She had appeared in an email buried inside the Open Road Chaos complaint folder.
Marnie Harlan.
Nineteen years old.
Deceased.
I looked at Wade.
May you like
His hands tightened around the steering wheel.
“My daughter died because of your channel,” he said. “And Kyle knows exactly who I am.”
