"Hey there!" one of them called after me again, but I kept my head down and rounded the corner with a sigh of relief. I could still hear them chortling behind me.
I found myself on a sidewalk leading past the backs of several somber-colored warehouses, each with large bay doors for unloading trucks, padlocked for the night. The south side of the street had no sidewalk, only a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire protecting some kind of engine parts store yard. I'd wandered far past the part of Fort Angles that I, as a simple guest, was intended to see. These were the acute differences between the tourist and tangential town areas of Fort Angles. It was getting dark, I realized, the clouds finally returning, piling up on the western horizon, creating an early sunset. The eastern sky was still clear, but graying, shot through with streaks of pink and orange. I'd left my jacket in the car, and a sudden shiver made me cross my arms tightly across my chest. As if things couldn't get any worse, a single van passed by me and honked, blaring a grotesque rendition of "La Cucaracha," and then the road was empty.
The sky suddenly darkened further, and, as I looked over my shoulder to glare at the offending cloud, I realized with a shock that two men were walking quietly twenty feet behind me, and that it was likely they who had darkened the sky with their evil intentions.
They were from the same group I'd passed at the corner, though neither was the dark one who'd spoken with me. I turned my head forward at once, quickening my pace. A chill that had nothing to do with the weather made me shiver again. My Juicy Couture purse was on a shoulder strap and I had it slung across my body, the way you were supposed to wear it so it wouldn't get snatched. I knew exactly where my pepper spray was—still in my duffle bag under the bed, never unpacked. I didn't have much money with me, just

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Chapter 8

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