Breakdown Read online

  Copyright © 2016 by Lerner Publishing Group, Inc.

  All rights reserved. International copyright secured. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—without the prior written permission of Lerner Publishing Group, Inc., except for the inclusion of brief quotations in an acknowledged review.

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  A division of Lerner Publishing Group, Inc.

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  Minneapolis, MN 55401 USA

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  The image in this book is used with the permission of: © Andreiuc88/Dreamstime.com (man in cave); © Andreiuc88/Dreamstime.com (man on rock); © iStockphoto.com/mustafahacalaki (skull); © iStockphoto.com/Igor Zhuravlov (storm); © iStockphoto.com/desifoto (graph paper); © iStockphoto.com/Trifonenko (blue flame); © iStockphoto.com/Anita Stizzoli (dark clouds).

  Main body text set in Janson Text LT Std 12/17.5. Typeface provided by Adobe Systems.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  The Cataloging-in-Publication Data for Breakdown is on file at the Library of Congress.

  ISBN 978-1-5124-1323-6 (lib. bdg.)

  ISBN 978-1-5124-1347-2 (pbk.)

  ISBN 978-1-5124-1348-9 (EB pdf)

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  1-39782-21320-4/7/2016

  9781512419382 ePub

  9781512419399 ePub

  9781512419405 mobi

  To all of my former students

  Chapter 1

  Owen wrapped his arms around Maddy’s waist. She felt his warm breath on her ear.

  “Have I met you before?” Owen asked as a joke.

  “Better be careful,” Maddy replied, grinning at the silliness. “I have a boyfriend and he is big and strong and will be here any minute.”

  He looked really good with his perfectly messy hair and blue shirt that matched his clear blue eyes. She stood on her tiptoes and gave him a kiss. Owen and Maddy had been dating since ninth grade.

  “I know I say this all the time, but really, you look amazing,” said Owen.

  The restaurant was built into the side of the riverbank. It used to be a cave. Now it had high, arched ceilings with crystal chandeliers twinkling. They followed the waiter across the long dining room and around couples quietly talking. As Maddy got closer to their table in the back of the restaurant, she noticed a large bouquet of daisies there. Owen pulled Maddy’s chair out for her.

  Owen said with a huge grin on his face, “You mean so much to me, Maddy. We’re seniors. Only one more year together. I don’t want to take it for granted.”

  “We’re going to college. We’re not dying. You can’t get rid of me that easily.” She winked at him. “Daisies, my favorite.” She reached out to grab a daisy. Instead she bumped her drink.

  It spilled all over the table, dribbling down the little black dress that she had borrowed from her mom.

  “Leave it to me to ruin a romantic moment,” said Maddy.

  “If you didn’t do something clumsy, then I definitely would have. That’s how I roll.”

  Maddy grinned as she stood up.

  The bathrooms were in a hallway on the side of the main room. Just inside the ladies’ room was a woman with short red hair and a gray dress—almost the same color as her skin.

  “You waiting?” Maddy asked the woman. There was something about her that seemed very old, yet she looked just a little older than Maddy.

  “You could say that,” replied the woman with the pale face.

  “So,” Maddy said, trying to make conversation, “you come here often?”

  The woman burst out in an awkward laugh. “I’m here all the time,” she said. She looked Maddy in the eyes. Blood started to drip from the woman’s left nostril.

  “Oh, God! Your nose is bleeding,” said Maddy.

  With absolutely no expression, she wiped her nose with her gray—almost blue—hand.

  Then, as though she hadn’t talked to anyone in years, she started to babble. “There was this horrible massacre that happened seventy-six years ago. A woman stormed in here and started killing people. The woman was possessed by evil, and she couldn’t stop herself.” Her words came out fast and desperate, more like a confession than a story.

  “You wouldn’t believe the blood. It was splattered right here on this wall. A young couple held each other on that bench there. The young man ran in here when he heard his girlfriend screaming. Their eyes—oh God, their eyes. She killed them, too. She didn’t want to, but her body wasn’t under her control anymore.”

  The pain in the woman’s eyes was so real. It was as though she had been there on the night she was describing. But that was impossible. This woman was only in her twenties.

  Clearly, she had lost her mind. She stared into Maddy’s dark brown eyes. “Have you ever had your mind scream, but your body do nothing?”

  Maddy knew what the woman was talking about. She remembered back to when she was a little girl. She used to watch her dad beat her mom. As a little girl she would hide in the coat closet and peek through the crack in the door. She wanted to scream at him him, to stop him, to save her mom, but all she could do was hide until it was over. Then when he had passed out, she would curl up beside her mom.

  The woman was now staring off into space. Lips quivering, she said, “There is evil. Evil that can take over someone’s body. Even if their mind screams NO! The evil can still take your body. And all you can do is scream inside your mind.” Then she grabbed Maddy by the wrist and whispered as if someone might hear, “It was Pike.”

  Her hand was as cold as ice. Maddy yelped and ripped her arm free.

  A look of terror came over the woman’s face. She shouted, “It is P—!”

  Before she could finish the statement there was a loud rumble. A brick fell from the ceiling. Then the ceiling collapsed altogether—right on top of the woman. The only thing that could be seen under the rubble was one corner of the bench she had been sitting on. Maddy screamed, “Help! Please, somebody help!” Maddy clawed helplessly at the heavy pile of bricks and old mortar.

  Chapter 2

  Screams from the main room could be heard. The power was out, and because the restaurant was built into the riverbank, there were no windows. The whole place was in darkness. Cell phones became flashlights.

  “It’s caving in! Run! We’re going to be trapped!” someone shouted.

  Everyone in the restaurant dashed to the exit. Owen shouted for Maddy as the crowd of people pushed him toward the door. Owen scooped up a thin, elderly man who had tripped in all the panic. People were stepping on each other. Owen rescued others who had fallen in the frenzy to the exit, one person after another. The restaurant was almost empty. Still no Maddy. Outside Owen looked through the crowd, thinking she must have made it out already. But she was nowhere to be found. He tried to go back in, but people stopped him. It was too dangerous, they said.

  “But Madison Connelly is in there. My Maddy is in there!” he shouted desperately.

  He ran over to the side door used by employees only. Once inside, he turned on his cell phone light. In the blue beam he could see Maddy on her hands and knees drenched in sweat and dirt. She was scraping at a pile of rubble. He tried not to look at her fingers. They were bloody and sliced up from the digging.

  “Maddy! We have to get out of here,” Owen said. “This whole place could collapse any second.”

  “I can’t! She was right here, sitting. She told me about a massacre and Pike. I have to find her. I won’t leave her behind.”

  “We have to go, Maddy.” Owen pulled Maddy up by her waist.


  “She was sitting right there!” Maddy pointed to the pile that was as high as the ceiling. “She’s under here.”

  Owen knew how determined Maddy could be, so he bent low to her ear. “Maddy, you’re not strong enough, babe. There are rescue people coming who know how to find people. We’ll make sure they search here first. They have the strength and equipment to get her out safely. Now, please, Maddy, trust me.”

  Maddy knew he was right, but he still had to drag her away.

  The wait felt like hours. Finally firefighters arrived and Maddy told them about the woman. They searched for her amid the rubble, and then spoke again with Maddy.

  “We didn’t find anyone. We lifted the rubble, even dug up the pile of sandstone. Nothing. She may have been there right before the collapse, but she was not there during the collapse.”

  Maddy couldn’t believe it. “You’re wrong! She was sitting there on the bench.”

  “We found the bench. Nothing else.”

  “I watched the ceiling fall on top of her,” pleaded Maddy.

  “Unless she disappeared into thin air, there is no way a woman was sitting where you say.”

  Maddy tried to run toward the restaurant. A firefighter restrained her, wrapped his arms around her. “Listen! Our minds can play tricks on us, especially when something bad happens.”

  “But I—” Maddy started to cry.

  “I know you think you saw someone, but we can’t always trust what we see,” the firefighter said.

  A familiar voice shouted from a squad car, “Come on, Maddy! I’ll give you a ride home!” It was Sergeant Riley, one of her mom’s coworkers. The firefighter and Owen walked Maddy to the police car.

  Owen leaned in and gave her a kiss goodbye. Maddy could still see the woman’s icy blue eyes. She remembered the woman’s last words: “It is Pike.” The very name, Pike, felt wrong, like a curse.

  The squad car slowly pulled away. “You okay, kiddo?” Sergeant Riley had known Maddy since she was eight.

  “Yeah, I’m thinking about what happened,” replied Maddy.

  “In all my years on the force, I’ve come to realize there are some things we just can’t explain. Take the latest case your mom is trying to solve. A couple, man and woman, missing. Their car must have broken down during that severe thunderstorm last week. We found their hiking gear. We even found their shoes, but no couple. The only clue is the word ‘Pike’ etched into the rearview mirror.”

  Goosebumps raced up Maddy’s back. “Who is Pike?” she asked.

  “Or what is pike? I have no idea. That’s why your mom gets paid the big bucks. She’s the best.” Sergeant Riley went on, “And to think, when I first met her, you guys were living in a shelter, hiding from some jerk.”

  “Pretty crazy,” Maddy agreed. They pulled up in front of a small green house with white shutters.

  Sergeant Riley slowly pulled over. “Say hi to your mom for me.”

  Maddy waved as she walked up to the door. In the light from her house, Maddy could see marks on her forearm from the woman in the restaurant. She was real.

  Chapter 3

  Mom was waiting at the kitchen table like she always did when Maddy was out late. She’d been listening to the police scanner all evening so she knew exactly what had happened at the restaurant.

  Maddy saw the two creases between her mom’s eyebrows. “You were really worried, huh?” Maddy asked.

  “Madison Fiona Connelly! Of course I was. I’m supposed to do that.” And then she grabbed Maddy and squeezed her tight. “I don’t know what I would do without my Mouse.”

  She was the only one who called Maddy that nickname. When Maddy was born, she was so tiny that her mom called her “Mouse.” The name stuck.

  “It was really crazy, Mom. I talked to this woman. She told me about a massacre that happened at the restaurant. She said, ‘It was Pike.’ And then in the middle of her sentence, the ceiling collapsed on top of her.”

  Maddy’s mom shifted nervously in her chair. Her worry wrinkles returned. “Did you say Pike?”

  “Yeah. Sergeant Riley told me about that breakdown case and what was etched in the rearview mirror.”

  Mom was angry. “He told you about that? That man has got a big mouth.” Mom liked to keep Maddy totally out of the cases she was trying to solve. She said it wasn’t for kids. “Let me see these.” Mom reached over and grabbed Maddy’s hands.

  The fingernails were ripped and torn away. Her knuckles had deep gouges like she had been fighting a brick wall and had lost. Even the palms of her hands had scratches and cuts across them.

  “Maddy, what were you thinking?” Her mom was more concerned than angry.

  “There was a woman sitting there. I swear. I saw her. She grabbed me, Mom.” Maddy shoved her bruised arm in front of her mom.

  “I believe that someone grabbed you. But it would have to take one heck of a strong woman to make that kind of a bruise.” Mom’s cheeks were red. She clenched her teeth while she spoke. “Are you sure you and Owen are okay? I mean, you can be honest with me.”

  Maddy’s mom did not trust men. Even though Owen was one of the kindest people Maddy knew, her mom did not like him. No man would ever be good enough for her little Mouse.

  “Mom! Owen would never do something like this! He is the one who got me out of there.” Maddy was hurt that her mom would accuse Owen of abuse, but she also understood where her mom came from. It was just over ten years ago when Maddy’s mom packed them up and ran from Maddy’s father.

  “Looking at those bloody hands, I’m surprised you didn’t have to haul Owen out. I have never met a guy so afraid of blood.”

  Mom gently washed the sand out of Maddy’s ripped-up fingers and hands. She put a lavender-scented salve on them and then wrapped them in gauze.

  “So do you believe me—that someone was there?” Maddy asked.

  Mom’s eyes got real small, like she was about to say something very important. “Maddy, there have been some really strange things happening in this city. If you tell me that you were talking with a ghost, I believe you,” she said. “I’ve got to go to bed. I’m getting up early.”

  “You’re working? But it’s Sunday.”

  “I’ll be working every day until this case is solved.” Mom stopped. Maddy could see she was thinking. “You sure the woman said Pike?”

  “Yeah, Mom, Pike. It was one of her last words to me.”

  Mom’s worry wrinkles came back. “Good night.”

  “Good night, Mom.”

  Early that morning, while it was still dark, Maddy’s mom entered her room. She grabbed Maddy’s face and gave her a firm kiss on the cheek. “I love you, little Mouse.”

  Her hand was trembling. The last time Maddy saw her mom shaking was when they had to move into the women’s shelter to hide from her father. Maddy never saw him again. Mom said that was a good thing. After that night, her mom went back to school for Criminal Justice. She’d pretty much been fearless ever since. So when her mom trembled, a red flag went up in Maddy’s mind. There was something wrong.

  “You okay?” Maddy mumbled, rubbing her eyes.

  “Yeah, I’m just going to be away a lot,” said her mom.

  “Don’t forget the peanut butter and jelly.” They lived off of peanut butter and jelly. Her mom often forgot to eat when she was working on a case.

  Mom smiled and patted her work bag. “Got ’em.”

  From the hallway there was enough light to see a large red leather book sticking out of her mom’s bag. It was about four inches thick, worn on the corners, with what looked like gold letters inscribed across the binding.

  “Geez, Mom. Doing a little heavy reading, are you?” said Maddy.

  Mom got all awkward. “Oh, it’s nothing. Just something for the case.” Then she gave Maddy a long hug and said quietly, again, “I love you. See you soon, Mouse.”

  “Love you too, Mom.”

  Mom glanced back from the doorway. Her eyes looked sad.

  Chapter 4


  Her mother screamed. Pounded on the window glass. Maddy! she yelled. She was trapped in her squad car like a giant bubble sinking. Maddy could only watch as her mother was buried under the green-brown water of the Mississippi River. Her mom was still screaming, but by now Maddy could barely make out the words. She strained her eyes, trying to make out the words through the windshield: “It is Pike.” Like a light switch, Mom’s eyes changed from looking at her to a wide-eyed all-encompassing death stare.

  Maddy woke up in hysteria, screaming and crying. She was drenched in sweat. The bandages on her hands were pulled off. The dream had felt so real. Her body ached from the night before, and now her mind reeled. She couldn’t get away from this name, Pike. He seemed to be everywhere.

  She glanced at the clock. It was 11:22 a.m. She sent a text to her mom. “Just checking in. Hope ur okay.” She went to the kitchen table and poured a bowl of cereal. The house felt so empty. There was an eerie stillness, like the calm right before a tornado. Maddy picked up her phone. No text from her mom yet. She called Owen.

  “Hey, babe! How are you?” asked Owen.

  “Okay.” Maddy couldn’t shake this feeling that something was wrong. “Just wondering if you want to come over.”

  “Sure. I have to finish up some chores. Then I’ll be there.”

  Owen showed up with donuts and a peppermint mocha—her favorite. Maddy grabbed him and hugged him as though her life depended on it.

  “I have this crazy feeling like there is something wrong. I keep hearing this name, Pike. The last words of the woman in the restaurant were ‘It is Pike.’ This missing couple in a case my mom is working on also had the word Pike etched into the rearview mirror of their broken-down car. Even in my dream the name Pike came up.”

  She knew she could tell Owen anything, even if it sounded crazy. He had a way of making sense of things.

  “Slow down, Maddy. Take a deep breath.” Owen was holding her close. “Who is Pike?”

  “I don’t know. I just think he is someone very bad,” replied Maddy. “And my mom is in trouble.”