This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Otherwise, any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Text copyright © 2024 by Rachel Howzell Hall

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

Published by Amazon Original Stories, Seattle

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ISBN-13: 9781662517365 (digital)

Cover design by David Litman

Cover image: © Image Source, © ra3rn / Getty

Now

The world around me glimmers as the sun greets the horizon. The desert is so hot that I smell the baking rubber soles of my boots. The salty dirt coats my lips, gluing them shut. The bundles of cash I packed all around me soak up my sweat and weigh me down as I walk, slowing my progress. Every flat space looks like I’m just steps away from civilization.

A mirage.

I peel the cash from my bra and toss it to the sand. I feel cooler, better.

It’s gotta be a hundred degrees out here.

There’s the highway!

Lightheaded, I wobble forward, closer . . .

Not the highway. Just more sand.

I dump the cash I tucked into my pants . . . into my socks . . . into my boots, and I trudge . . . forward . . .

There’s a Joshua tree offering shade, even though I don’t need shade cuz my skin feels cold, clammy. My head hurts. My pulse is wacky. Sunstroke?

I wanna pray, but the only prayer I know . . .

Enlarge my hand evil territory bless me evil . . .

Territory for a bless, dear Lord . . .

The gnarled branches of the Joshua tree beckon to me.

I stumble into its arms, my memory twisted around that prayer of Jabez . . . and those berries.

If I hadn’t forgotten to complete my financial aid application for sophomore year, I wouldn’t have boosted blueberries, avocados, and chia seeds from a grocery store five years ago; I wouldn’t have gone to jail. And I wouldn’t be currently seated beneath a prickly tree, a victim of scorpions.

I did three months in jail, and then I found God, thanks to a late-night TV preacher. Pastor Bernard Cheddar preached about the windows of heaven opening and riches pouring down on His believers. All I needed to do was repent.

So I repented because only then could I pray the prayer of Jabez from 1 Chronicles 4:10:

“Oh, that you would bless me and enlarge my territory. Let your hand be with me and keep me from harm so that I will be free from pain.”

And now, at twenty-five years old, I’m sitting in this territory, in pain, for one reason.

I need those riches.

Four days ago

Nothing on Ruben Mayer works, and everything that does work . . . leaks.

His blood flows like gravy to a heart that probably resembles a burned meatball. His lungs sound like crumpled paper caught in an engine on a humid day. He has no natural teeth. His prostate is larger than Miami.

I lift him from his wheelchair onto the toilet.

He lets one rip. His body sounds like a deflating balloon being run over by a truck.

The stink melts my eyes.

For the last four years, I’ve been caring for Ruben Mayer in this butter-colored two-story house located in the “adjacent” part of a fancy neighborhood. He’s eighty-seven years old. Shit happens—and Ruben has stopped apologizing for the splats, squirts, and clouds of killer flatulence.

Deal with it, girlie. That’s what Ruben told me on my first day as a certified nurse assistant. He’d just spat up and laughed as I gagged.

Jocelyn, his visiting ex-wife, had glared at the liquid dribbling down his chin and muttered, “You’re disgusting.” She pivoted to me and said, “He’s yours now, Francesca.” She clickety-clacked out of the room, leaving me in her wake of cigarette smoke and Elizabeth Taylor’s White Diamonds.

If I’d stayed the course and completed my four years and grad school . . .

I didn’t choose that path, and now, my hands are chapped from constant washing. My nose is stuffed with cotton balls to combat the smell. My hoodie pocket sags with ivory cuff links, a wad of euros, and a mint-green marble that reminds me of Uranus—junk I pulled from plastic bags that Jocelyn had set out on the curb for trash collection.

Back in bed, Ruben burps again. “Gimme a Dr Pepper, and make me one of those onion and hot link sandwiches—”

“Like the hot link sandwich you threw at the wall yesterday?” I ask, squinting at him.

“I thought you were tryna kill me with all that spice.”

This morning, Ruben tossed me a gold-plated cigarette lighter as an apology for his tantrum. Previously, he’s tossed me diamond rings, cigarette cases, and a Montblanc pen. I sold them all to pay for living expenses.

In the kitchen, oil from the sizzling hot links splatters against the tile work that Jocelyn had installed a decade ago. As I cook, my phone chimes from my pocket.

It’s Karsyn Carson, PhD, my BFF since our first (and my only) year at Cal Poly. “What’s up, Frankie baby?”

I poke the links in the skillet with a fork. “I scheduled the interview.”

“You don’t sound excited,” Karsyn says.

“Working in an East Hollywood diner with cottage cheese ceilings, wiping up hangover vomit for the rest of my life? Not excited? Are you kidding? I’m practically ovulating.”

The hot link grease pops my skin.

I wince from the pain, but only halfheartedly—I don’t have the entire heart to do anything lately.

Karsyn says, “It’s not the worst job in the world—”

“Says the literal rocket scientist—”

“—because you already have the worst job in the world. You could’ve been a rocket scientist. Angela Bassett would’ve played you in the movie. But someone forgot to complete her financial aid app and couldn’t afford to go back to school.”

I blink back tears. “With friends like you—”

“Before I die, please?” Ruben shouts.

“I’m sorry, but you’re better than this,” Karsyn says. “He’s holding you back. You almost got put in jail cuz of his diet product pyramid scheme—”

“I didn’t know SlimBlend was a scheme—”

“And for what?” Karsyn continues. “Back problems, carpal tunnel, and mesothelioma from living in that crappy house.”

“First,” I say, “I don’t have mesothelioma. Just allergies. Second, Ruben’s crappy house is better than living in my crappy car. And third, I have a record.”

Karsyn is the only friend who knows about my three-month . . . study abroad program sponsored by the esteemed Department of Corrections.

“Come live with me,” she says.

“I’m allergic to your cats.”

“Ruben’s taking advantage of you.”

“He wouldn’t be the first man to do that.”

My ex Vince stole my car. My ex Tyler “borrowed” my bank card and bought all the weed at a dispensary in West Hollywood. I will never forgive them.

“When will I triumph, just once?” I whine. “I’m trying, but nothing ever goes right for me. Once this old guy dies, then what?”

“Frankie baby,” Karsyn coos, “nothing is easy. You gotta take the punches to win the fight.”

Three days ago

I’m interviewing for the server job in a shithole diner, and this lady is really asking me to share my strengths and weaknesses.

Strength: I can deadlift a 130-pound man.

Strength: I can make a bomb-ass hot link and onion sandwich.

Strength: I can make a jailhouse McFlurry using ice cubes, powdered creamer, salt, milk, M&M’s, Sweet’n Low, and plastic baggies. This may be a strength and a weakness, depending on the audience.

I smile at Haleigh, a bottle brunette wearing cat-eye glasses. “I’m customer-service oriented. I’m patient with difficult clients, and I’m comfortable in impossible situations. As for weaknesses . . .”

According to Mom: I hide my emotions, I’m stubborn, I’m unforgiving.

That was then. She doesn’t know me now.

Anyway, I look up to that cottage cheese ceiling and pretend to think really hard. “I have trouble delegating. I wanna make sure that the task is done right.”

Haleigh cocks her eyebrow at the woman of sorrow and suffering sitting on the other side of the booth wearing her client’s third ex-wife’s sunflower-printed blouse. “Okay . . .”

Shit. Does she want another weakness?

“I also have a fear of public speaking—”

Haleigh tosses the clipboard holding my application. “Welcome to Kitty’s Korner. Be here tomorrow at four.”

“Four in the evening?” I ask.

“Four in the morning, Princess Diaries.” She slaps a napkin over an insect now crawling across the table that isn’t an ant but is not quite a roach. “Sixteen dollars an hour. We split the tips. Crap pay, but an honest living. Your probation officer will be proud.”

I gather my purse and blazer, more items pulled from Jocelyn’s curbside collection of things left behind in the divorce. “I don’t have a PO.”

Haleigh blinks at me. “How long you been off the paper?”

My stomach knots. “Five years.”

Haleigh rolls her eyes. “See you tomorrow, Zsa Zsa.”

Destinee is snorkeling in Turks and Caicos.

Amiya is attending her sorority’s conference in Chicago.

Justice’s pink-painted toenails shine bright against the black sands of the Big Island.

If I posted right now, it would read, “Sitting in my 2005 Pontiac Grand Am with its loose muffler and sunroof that doesn’t close all the way.”

Fighting back tears, I swipe out of my former friends’ Instagram pages. Along with Karsyn, the five of us started our freshman year at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, Black Girl STEM Magic. We studied, cried, and missed parties just to get ahead.

I still cry, I still miss parties, and I wish—

My phone vibrates from the cup holder.

A text from Jocelyn Mayer.

Ruben’s dead

Come get your shit and get out of my house

I pull into my oil-slicked space in Ruben’s driveway. A man is sliding Ruben’s temporary casket into the rear of a hearse from Mount Sinai Mortuary.

Jocelyn, a graying blonde who favors thick belts and sunflower prints—and she’s now wearing both—clenches a long, white cigarette between her lips as the death attendant points on a form she’s supposed to sign. She eyes the man as he tears the top sheet of a triplicate and hands it to her. She sees me and squints at her old blouse and blazer.

With hands cupping my elbows, I approach her. “Hey, Joce. I’m so . . .”

Sorry? No—she loathed Ruben.

Thrilled for you? Too on the nose.

She flicks cigarette ashes into the bird-of-paradise planted on the side of the door. “The putz couldn’t do this on your shift?”

I blink at her, hate wafting through me like that cigarette smoke. “Guess he wanted to go in peace with a loved one at his side.”

Jocelyn drops the cigarette to the walkway, smashes it beneath her espadrille. “You’re done here. Pack up and go.”

I shove my personal belongings into battered suitcases that Mom bought me at the start of my freshman year in college. That day in August, we’d shopped at the mall, and she told every store clerk we met that I was following in her footsteps to become an aerospace engineer. She hugged me a lot that day. Despite Dad dying two years before—a week after my sweet sixteen party—and despite battling severe depression, Mom was proud that I’d graduated as high school salutatorian. There’s nothing you can do that will make me love you less than I do right now—that’s what she told me.

Nine months later, I completed my freshman year at Cal Poly and returned to LA. My college life over, I found a job at a grocery store. Mom had neglected to complete her disability application (like mother, like daughter) and had no income. She’d started drinking and stopped taking her meds because pills made her feel weird.

(See? If I’d stayed in school, who would’ve taken care of her?)

Dropping out was inevitable—I couldn’t leave her like that.

That summer, instead of interning at JPL, I read articles about natural solutions to battle depression. Mushrooms and kale helped Mom find some balance. Walnuts and turmeric, too. But each remedy required regular consumption, and none of this was cheap. In one moment of desperation, after working at the store for just five months . . . I boosted them berries, gaffled that guac, and swiped those seeds.

And got caught.

Turns out there was something I could do that would make Mom love me less: landing that three-month sentence in downtown LA’s Twin Tower Two. On November 8, my sentencing day, I turned twenty years old. I blamed Dad for not leaving enough money for Mom and me. I blamed Mom for refusing to seek a better solution to combat depression. I blamed me for being in this mess.

Now I’m twenty-five and still lost, still angry, while standing in a dead man’s guest bedroom and packing my things.

After emptying the top drawer, I notice a piece of mustard-stained notebook paper folded into a tight square. I unfold the square: two notes instead of one.

Ruben’s brittle-looking handwriting fills both pages.

Dearest Frankie,

Of all the people I hated, I hated you the least. Because of that, I’m gonna share a secret with you.

My name is not Ruben Mayer.

I’m Victor Rangel.

I’m not a Holocaust survivor.

I AM Jewish because my mother was. I was born in Compton. Son of a goy.

I also didn’t march with Reverend King. I didn’t fight in Vietnam and I didn’t make pancakes the morning after I shtupped Liz Taylor. We did drink Harvey Wallbangers and chain-smoke a pack of Pall Malls, though.

I’m a thief. The King of Thieves. Back in ’71, my crew robbed an armored truck off the Grapevine. Didn’t spill a drop of blood and got away with $1.5 million (which would be like stealing $11.5 million today). We didn’t get caught but we couldn’t immediately spend all that dough. So we split $500k into four, just enough to live a little better, you know? We hid the rest and planned to retrieve it once the statute of limitations expired. In California, that’s 6 years!

But by then, Four Toes had gotten whacked at a laundromat over in Koreatown.

Little Caesar drowned on vacation at Lake Mead.

Doctors opened Queenie up and found cancer everywhere. He parked in the path of a Union Pacific locomotive.

I was shocked to make it past those six years, and if you’re reading this, then I’m dead and my lovely ex-bride has certainly kicked you out.

No one knows this money exists. I never told Jocelyn. And if Shane knew, my nudnik son would’ve killed me long ago.

Please read the folded piece of paper very carefully. It is a map and instructions to find my secret treasure. SHARE IT WITH NO ONE.

I can’t remember where I hid the key to open the lock. It’s in the house somewhere. You’ll find it. You’re smart.

Yours truly,

Vic

P.S. I know you combed through the trash and found those euros, the cuff links, and that marble. The links aren’t ivory. The euros come from Epcot Center. The marble is plastic. That lighter I gave you, though, is real gold, a Cartier.

P.P.S. Call your mother.

Find the key to open the first lock. A brass Eveready with a circled head tied to a yellow string.

Sorry, Ruben. I’m not calling my mother.

So.

The key is somewhere in this house.

My eyes skip from the gold-framed mirror to the amber-glassed lamp. Could be under that floor-console TV in the den or taped behind those decorative plates stuck on the dining room wall. Knowing Ruben, or Victor, whatever his name is, he hid the key in one of the mezuzahs at the doorpost of every room in this house.

Except for the mezuzahs (I’m not that much of a nudnik to pry those open), I search all those places—and I do find keys. Thin luggage keys. Complicated dimpled keys. Tubular keys. But no Eveready key with a circled head and yellow string.

“I’ve given you enough time to pack.” Her arms folded, Jocelyn stands in the doorway to Ruben’s bedroom. Once upon a time, in pictures taken ages ago, she was a giraffe of a woman with stilts for legs, boobs hoisted high on her chest, and a ski jump nose. Today, varicose veins crisscross her stilt legs, and those boobs require support from thick-strapped bras that cut into her shoulders. That ski jump nose, though, never leaves the clouds.

Shane Mayer is the forty-year-old son of Ruben and his second wife, Lovely, may her memory be a blessing. A banker now living in Modesto, Shane rarely visited his father—I’ve met him only three times in four years. He has the same thin, curly hair that whips across his scalp like Ruben’s did. He has a dimpled chin and a thick, long nose like Lovely’s.

According to Ruben, Shane is also an accomplished thief. As a bank teller supervisor, he verifies the amount of money on hand and enters the total in the bank’s general ledger. Sometimes, he enters an amount less than the true sum so that he can pocket the rest. Stay the hell away from that kid, Ruben always warned me.

Jocelyn now escorts me through the house in her cloud of cigarettes and White Diamonds. As I pass the bathrooms and the den, my mind paws through every drawer in those spaces. Could the key be in that box of pencils or in one of the tubs of undeveloped film? Or . . .

There!

The typewriter Ruben sat at daily to start his memoir.

“Hey, Joce,” I say. “That typewriter—” I point to the machine on the desk. “Ruben said that I could have it after he finished his—”

Jocelyn huffs. “Whatever. Take it. Go.” She flaps her hand at me.

I place the typewriter in its case, then heft it underneath my arm as I pull my suitcases with both hands.

Jocelyn doesn’t offer to help. She never has.

As soon as I step out onto the porch, she holds out her hand. “Keys. To the front door, to the Mercedes, to the gates. I want all those keys now.”

I place the typewriter case on the porch and pull the key ring from my jacket pocket. I ease a single car key off the fob and hand over the rest.

Jocelyn nods, then slams the door in my face.

I have no apartment of my own. Mom now lives in Tennessee with her sister. No friends live close—Karsyn’s condo is thirty miles away in Pasadena, near her job at JPL. Yesterday, Ruben gave me an envelope filled with thirty-four hundred-dollar bills. Looks like a lot, but this will have to last me until forever, especially since there is no key hidden inside this typewriter.

That server job at Kitty’s Korner starts tomorrow . . .

Misery punches up my throat, and now I’m crying. My heavy head sinks against the steering wheel, and I weep until I’m a husk with a headache. Exhausted, I look out to this leafy Cheviot Hills–adjacent neighborhood and up to the melting-Popsicle sky above it. I reach into Jocelyn’s duffel—another curbside collectible—and pull out The Prayer of Jabez, a book the size of a Pop-Tart.

Oh, that you would bless me and enlarge my—

I don’t read the rest. This is the only prayer that I know by heart. And I whisper these words now as my head drifts back down to the steering wheel. My eyes close, not to pray, but to sleep.

Keep me from harm so that I will be free . . .

A knock on the car window yanks me from sleep.

Night has come. Down the block, the lights in Ruben’s house burn bright in the gloom. The results from my earlier internet search on Ritter, California, still shine on my phone.

Tap-tap-tap.

A man with Ruben’s wifty hair and Lovely’s nose studies me from the other side of the window. He holds yellow roses in his hand and shouts, “Just wanted to say thank you for taking care of Dad all this time.”

I roll down the window.

He passes me the bouquet.

“Sorry about Jocelyn,” Shane says. “I know she rushed you out of there. Did you leave anything behind? I’ll look for it myself and bring it to wherever you land next.”

My mind buzzes. “The key to my mother’s memory box. It’s an Eveready with a round head and yellow string tied around it. I can’t remember where I placed it.”

Shane holds my gaze. “Does it look like . . . ?” He holds up a round-headed key tied to yellow string.

Shit.

He smirks. “We need to talk.”

Seconds later, Shane slides into the front passenger seat of my car. “I know about Dad’s hidden cash.”

I don’t speak to either confirm or deny his claim. Instead, I stare past the windshield and watch a man walk twin Dobermans.

“He didn’t tell me about the heist,” Shane continues. “Queenie did. I’d gone over once to celebrate Passover, and he told me how they’d robbed an armored truck off the Grapevine. They tied up the drivers at a rest stop and drove the money into the desert. Queenie wasn’t the wheelman, though. He couldn’t remember which part of the desert.”

Shane points at me. “Dad told you where he hid the cash. You’re the only person he liked.”

I peer at Shane with spiking anger. “Don’t you have enough?”

Shane picks up The Prayer of Jabez from the dashboard and flips through the pages. “You went to Cal Poly to learn how to put a man on the moon again, correct? Physics. Math. Big-brain shit. But you dropped out and stole groceries for your mom, right?” He drops the book back on the dashboard. “You’re a smart ex-con. But can you pick a lock?”

I stare at him—he already knows the answer.

Shane leans closer to me, his breath smelling of chewable Pepto-Bismol tablets. “What if we work together? Even if we split it, that’s still a helluva lot of cash.”

Yeah, I could do a lot with that kind of cash. But in my internet sleuthing, I stumbled upon a problem. According to Ruben’s instructions, the cash is hidden in an unfinished mine shaft outside a ghost town named Ritter—a ghost town just purchased by an entertainment company in Las Vegas. Developers plan to revive that dusty dump into an attraction with saloons, showgirls, and slot machines. Phase one—teardown—starts in two weeks. If I don’t go out there soon, that money will be found during demolition and will be forever lost to me. As for getting to Ritter . . .

My car can’t even reliably drive twenty miles from here. Reaching that hidden cash? An impossible journey.

But can I trust a man not even trusted by his own father? Stay the hell away from that kid—that’s what Ruben told me.

Maybe Ruben was exaggerating. My mother also thinks I’m the worst, and she’s wrong.

Shane watches me now, clearly aware of the equations sparking through my mind. He caresses my wrist with his thumb. “I know you chose this job to atone for neglecting your mother. Admit it, though. Taking care of her and my dad has cost you everything. Your future? What future? Taking care of another pain-in-the-ass senior citizen?”

He sighs. “All of this is unexpected. Dad just died, and you just learned about the money and the key and dead cons named Four Toes and Little Caesar, and now, here I am, asking you to partner with me to find hidden treasure.”

He squeezes my wrist before letting go. “But if you really want a future, meet me at the Galaxy Inn over on Sepulveda. It’s a dump, but . . . the farther away from Jocelyn, the better. Come to room 43 by three tomorrow morning. I’m willing to walk away from this—I have money. And now, since Dad wrote Jocelyn out of his will, I’m also inheriting . . .” He waves at his father’s house, which is worth $2 million. “What about you? Can you afford to walk away?” He waits a beat, then says, “‘Bless me and enlarge my territory.’” He winks at me, then climbs out of the Pontiac. He ambles over to his BMW, now parked in my old spot.

My teeth feel like I’ve been crunching ice.

Did my prayer just get answered?

Are the windows of heaven finally opening, ready now to rain down riches?

I mean . . . I’ve already memorized Ruben’s instructions—

My phone vibrates.

A text message from Apartments2Rent.com.

The studio apartment you’re interested in is now taking applications!

On-site laundry and “moments away” from the La Brea Tarpits. A steal for $1785!

My phone vibrates again.

Destinee is going live now as she tries turtle for the first time in Turks and Caicos.

My bladder presses against my lower back—I know Jocelyn, and she’d never let me use one of the house’s four toilets.

The gas station attendant waves at me as I rush past the stands of potato chips and beef jerky to reach the bathroom.

Of the four stalls in the women’s restroom, two doors are off the hinges. Three stalls don’t have toilet paper.

Is this my life now? Peeing in a public bathroom with grimy floors sticky from bent spoons and squares of charred aluminum foil?

My bladder doesn’t care if I’m a dropout or an astrophysicist. So I choose the stall with the toilet paper and keep the door closed with one foot.

BAM! The outside bathroom door bangs open. A pair of sneakers scuffle across the wet tile until they stop right outside my stall. “Hey, that’s my spoon,” a man gurgles. He hooks his claw hand beneath the door to my stall and scrapes at the tile to fetch the spoon near the bowl. “That’s my spoon!”

My mind banshee-shrieks, and I shout, “Hold on. I’ll get it.” Even though my jeans are around my knees, I manage to grab the bent spoon with the heel of my shoe. I push the spoon out of the stall.

The crusty sneakers disappear.

But the outside bathroom door doesn’t whoosh open. A stink that smells like vinegar rises above the other stinks.

I wipe, flush, and hold my breath as I open the stall door.

Bent over in the corner of the bathroom, the man focuses on the bubbling killer that will soon overwhelm his weak veins. He glares at me until his eyes widen with a thought. This bitch probably got money.

And he’s right—I’m carrying my last bundle of cash from Ruben in my jacket pocket.

He looks down at his heroin-filled spoon, then squints at me again. Decisions, decisions.

But I don’t give him enough time to decide. I open the door and run past those Slim Jims, wasabi peas, and gummy bears with unwashed hands, a heart full of fear . . .

And my mind on money hidden in Death Valley.

Wear thick boots, thick socks, and gloves—there are scorpions out there!

It’s nearly midnight when I show up at the Galaxy Inn, directly across from the entrance of the 405 freeway. Tonight, the parking lot bursts with taxicabs and jalopies like mine with different degrees of busted up and broken down.

Room 43 sits near an ice maker. Crap! I’ve read on a Facebook page or somewhere that 43 is not a good number. That 43 means “stillbirth,” that 43 can “increase the animal instinct of a person.”

I stand at the door to room 43, thinking about these things, until I finally knock.

The door opens.

A warm draft that smells like deli pickles and Pine-Sol washes over me. Shane stands before me, wearing sweatpants and a Run-DMC T-shirt. White powder shines on the tip of his nose. “Hey, Frankie,” he says. “Glad you’re here.”

I offer a limp smile. “Yeah?”

“Yeah! Entre, s’il vous plait.”

Jocelyn Mayer—Shane’s stepmother and Ruben’s ex—sits in an armchair near the bed. An open bag of powdered doughnuts along with an unfinished pastrami sandwich and cans of Diet Dr Pepper crowd a small table.

That’s junk food on Shane’s nose, not cocaine.

I glare at Jocelyn.

“She knows about the cash and followed me here,” Shane says, blushing, answering my unasked question. “So much for Dad’s secret.”

“You need me,” Jocelyn says.

I cock an eyebrow at Shane. “Oh?”

He tosses me a smile, then rubs his hands together. “Shall we get started?”

Jocelyn owns a Jeep Wrangler with four-wheel drive, all-terrain tires, and a winch.

“Depending on what you tell us,” Shane says, “that may come in handy.”

I sip from the bottled water—distilled, not spring—and wince. I cap the nasty water, then grab a notepad and pen from the desk. “The Jeep will come in handy because . . .” I draw the state of California, then a few squares and circles. I tap the biggest circle, then write an X.

“Didn’t he leave you a real map?” Shane asks.

“He did—a letter, a janky map, and a list of instructions. All of that is in a safe place.” En route to Karsyn via overnight mail. “But I’ve memorized—”

“Memorized?” Shane asks.

“You?” Jocelyn says.

“I’m smart,” I say. “Like . . . for real for real.” I jab at the X. “This is where we’re going. A ghost town called Ritter.”

Shane and Jocelyn bend closer, as though my X has more meaning.

I give them the highlights: The town was named after its founder, Cyrus Ritter. Copper was discovered on Ritter’s surface back in 1904. The town boasted a telephone line, a saloon, a boardinghouse, and a drugstore.

“There’s an unfinished mine shaft right outside town,” I say. “But after some brief mining activity, miners hit volcanic ash and crappy ore.”

The copper rush in Ritter ended in 1909.

“There are a few old cabins,” I add. “That’s it. Ruben hid the money in the mine shaft. So we’ll need boots and socks. Lotta scorpions out there.”

Jocelyn’s phone yoo-hoos. She looks at the incoming text message.

Shane’s still staring at my X. “Hot as hell in Death Valley.”

Jocelyn’s phone yoo-hoos again.

“The hottest place on earth,” I say. “This time last year, the valley reached 111 degrees.”

“Snakes?” Shane asks.

I nod. “Probably. But they eat the scorpions.”

“We should bring a lot of water,” Shane says.

“And not this shit,” I add, holding up the blue plastic bottle.

Jocelyn scowls at me. “Oh, and you’re better than—?”

Shane holds up his hand and throws her a glare. “No nasty water.” He rubs his chin. “I’ll find a sporting goods store that’s close to where we’re headed. We’ll buy ropes, carabiners, harnesses, lanterns . . . We can’t be too safe or too prepared.”

I shake my head. “I don’t have money to buy any of that.”

“Besides being the keeper of the key,” he says, “that’s my job. Anything else we need to know about Ritter? We gotta worry about other people there? Dad’s old partners showing up from the grave?”

I shrug, my skin flushing, because I’ve asked myself those same questions.

“How far are we driving?”

Jocelyn’s phone yoo-hoos.

“Will you stop with the texting?” Shane shouts.

“Five miles north of the Funeral Mountains,” I say. “That’s 174 miles northeast of LA. A little over four hours.”

“Four hours?” Jocelyn shrieks. “What was Ruben thinking? That asshole.” She shakes her head. “It’s impossible. His funeral is in three days. We can’t drive and come back—”

“Jocelyn, quiet.” Shane studies his phone. “There’s a wilderness-survivor store off the 395, outside Apple Valley. That highway will take us to the 190. Let’s leave in the morning and get to the store. We’ll reach Ritter as the sun goes down. It’ll start to cool as we work.”

He nods to himself. “We’ll be back in time for Dad’s memorial, which is just five people anyway, three of them standing in this room right now.” He turns to me. “Sound good?”

Two days ago

Once you reach the spot, descend forty feet below the surface . . .

I’ve come up with a plan to keep me alive. With the help of the Jeep’s winch, Shane and I will wear harnesses and rappel down into the hole. I’ll point to the spot that Shane should dig, and he’ll remove the rocks. I’ll return to the surface, since there’s not much space down there for him to work. Once the safe is exposed, Shane will return to the surface, and I’ll go down and open the safe. I’ll come up, and Shane will go down and unlock the padlock to the money bag. He’ll resurface, and I’ll descend to open the final lock of the second money bag.

Smart for real for real, Mom.

Rather than watching House Hunters International in the Mayers’ motel room, I sleep in my car. But since I can’t sleep, I go over the map in my mind and then swipe through HomeGoods to furnish my Tarpits-adjacent studio apartment with money that’ll soon rain down through the windows of heaven.

I’m on the Sharper Image website, looking at a video camera bird feeder, when someone raps on my driver’s-side window.

Shane’s peering at me again.

Morning has broken. The time is nigh.

I roll down my window.

Shane says, “Ready?”

After selecting boots and socks, Jocelyn and I wander the survival foods aisle in Jackrabbit’s. Shane loads a shopping cart with ropes and biners, LED lanterns, and a small shovel.

Ever since we pulled out of the motel’s parking lot in her yellow Jeep, Jocelyn’s been trying to catch my attention. Now that we’re alone, she creeps over to me, holding a jumbo first aid kit to block our faces.

“Say nothing,” she whispers, “and just listen.”

I nod.

“Shane’s got a gun.”

My eyebrows lift, and the hairs on the back of my neck rise.

She shrugs, so nervous that the first aid kit bobs in the air. “He thought I was asleep,” she says, “but I saw him slip it into his waistband after he got out of the shower this morning.”

“He’s gonna . . . kill us?”

“Shhhh. For this much money?” She nods. “And if you don’t think that, then you’re more stupid than I thought.”

In Southern California, there are four prevalent species of scorpions. Five, if you count Shane and Jocelyn Mayer. I’ll have to watch my back as I drop down into that hole.

Several hours later, I sit in the back seat of the Jeep.

Shane drives and Jocelyn rides shotgun. They’re now arguing about the rightful owner of the old coins Ruben stashed in Alka-Seltzer vials. Who gets the Billy the Kid photo? Who gets the Superman in Action comic no. 2?

There’s no traffic on the 395, a highway that will take us to Canada if needed. This lonely road passes Joshua trees, dry lake beds, and towns that used to be.

Even with the sun setting, the desert landscape still cooks—110 degrees, right now at six o’clock. There are two eight-packs of bottled water chilling in a cooler of ice in the back of the Jeep. That’s 5.33 bottles between us. Doesn’t seem to be enough for three people . . .

My stomach churns from anxiety and In-N-Out.

A siren blurps behind us. Swirling red-and-blue lights reflect in the Jeep’s cabin.

Shane’s eyes flick at the rearview mirror and widen.

Mutters, “Damn it. Did you renew the tags?”

Jocelyn’s eyes glimmer with freak-out tears. “Tags?”

“Registration for the car,” I say.

She whirls around to face me. “Ruben handled all that. Ohmigod, we’re going to jail.”

“Relax.” Shane meets my gaze in the rearview mirror. “No weed or shit on you, right?”

I glare at him. “No cross to burn or an AR-15 beneath your seat, right?”

Jocelyn gasps. “A cross? He’s half-Jewish, for crying out loud!”

Shane pulls to the side of the road and parks the Jeep.

The highway patrol officer has a round face and slicked-back hair. He sidles up to the driver’s-side window.

Shane relaxes his grip around the steering wheel and forces light into his eyes. “Good evening, officer.”

The winds are up right now in Death Valley, the officer told us, and Caltrans hasn’t put up the digital warning signs yet. “Be very careful,” he said. “Those gusts will tip this Jeep right over.” After peering at Jocelyn—“Hello, ma’am”—and peering back at me—“You good back there?”—he let us go.

We’re now on our way.

“Maybe you are blessed and highly favored,” Shane says, his eyes flicking at my reflection in the rearview mirror. “Dad stole this Jeep seven years ago.”

The nausea in my gut threatens to boil over, but I tamp down that sickness. The Prayer of Jabez is in my back pocket, but I don’t need to read it anymore. My portion of the fortune is waiting for me, and we’re less than 120 miles away from it.

I’ve finally gained something by caring for Ruben—and I didn’t have to steal to get it. I’ve crapped out enough in life. Maybe now, I’ve rolled a week’s worth of sevens.

Sing the birthday song once you pass two cabins. Then sing the alphabet song while walking toward the mountain range. The unfinished mine shaft will be on the left. A small cross made of rusty serving spoons marks the spot.

A few hours later, Jocelyn needs to stop and pee. “Blood pressure meds,” she explains to us the first time.

“I’m just really nervous,” she says the third time.

“Just you wait until you get my age,” she says to me after I groan from the back seat the fourth time.

“Maybe we should’ve bought her a pack of adult diapers,” Shane muses from behind the steering wheel on our fifth stop.

I remember changing Mom’s clothes after a weekend bender with Courvoisier. Maybe I’ll use some of my treasure to bring her back to California and the skies she loved. I pull my phone from my pocket and text her.

Thinking of you.

Eventually, we pull off the 395 and onto Highway 190. Can’t see anything in this darkness.

“Just keep driving,” I say to Shane.

The moon and every star in the galaxy pierce the black.

“Okay,” I say, “there should be a sign coming up for Echo Canyon Road . . . Turn here.”

Shane turns onto a dirt road.

Good thing we’re driving a Jeep. There are twisty places. Narrow places. Places where rocks and barrel cactus spring out of nowhere.

Jocelyn has sweated through her flannel shirt, and now the Jeep smells of damp armpits, White Diamonds, and Double-Doubles. “How did Ruben find this place?” she wonders aloud.

Once we near the two cabins, we climb out of the Jeep.

Once we walk past those cabins, I sing the birthday song and walk.

“What the hell?” Shane mutters.

“She’s lost her mind,” Jocelyn whispers.

Once I finish that song, I launch into the alphabet song and walk toward the mountains.

Shane and Jocelyn gape at me.

I shine my lantern to the ground, searching . . .

There! The small cross made of rusty serving spoons, nearly hidden by the brush!

“We’re here,” I say, my fingers tingling. “Shane, get the Jeep.”

Yesterday

Move those heavy rocks. They’re just one more obstacle to success—but movable if you’re strong enough.

Surrounded by nighttime desert, we let out the new ropes and the harness and la-la this and la-la that. The Jeep’s headlamps light the dig area as Shane clips me into the first harness before clipping himself into the second. He connects his rope to the Jeep’s winch—he’ll go into the hole first.

A brown-and-yellow-striped scorpion skitters over Jocelyn’s boot. She shrieks, hops away, and nearly tumbles into the mine shaft.

Shane shouts, “Shit!” and stomps on the scorpion.

Crunch.

I glare at the pair. “You know this is the desert, right?”

“You know those fuckers sting and got venom, right?” Shane spits back.

“You know we’re about to go into a hole at night in the middle of Death Valley, where they live, right?” I hold out my arms. “Why did we buy boots, socks, and gloves if you’re gonna jump outta your skin?”

Shane holds up his hand. “We’re wasting time.” He coughs and mutters a curse beneath his breath. He coughs some more, then glares at Jocelyn. “What are you waiting for? Go get the remote control to work the winch.” He spits into the dirt.

Jocelyn bustles toward the Jeep, then turns back to us, then starts to bustle back again. “I’m so nervous, Shane. Do I have to do that? Do I have to press the—?”

“Why are you here, then?” Shane snaps. “I swear, you’ve been nothing but a mooch and a—” He reaches for his waistband.

My heart jumps in my chest.

“Don’t you move,” Jocelyn shouts.

Shane’s hands shoot high into the air.

“What the hell?” I gasp.

Jocelyn is aiming a Ruger at Shane’s chest. “You’ve always wanted to get rid of me, and this is the perfect place, isn’t it?”

“Joce,” he shouts, “why the hell—?”

“Frankie, get his gun,” she tells me. “Didn’t I warn you?”

With two solid steps, Shane crosses to where his stepmother stands.

Jocelyn pulls the trigger.

The pistol clicks but doesn’t fire.

“Cheap ammo again, Joce?” Shane grabs for the gun, but Jocelyn doesn’t let go.

They pull and push each other, dancing closer to that hole, kicking up dust . . . heels on the edge of that hole—

Pop!

Jocelyn’s legs crumple as she clutches the side of her neck. Blood spurts over her fingers and sprays the desert floor.

Bug-eyed, Shane watches his stepmother fall to the ground.

I’m sweating and panting, frozen in place, hoping that I’ve blended in with the other frightened brown things in the desert.

But Shane finds me with those satellite-dish eyes. “I-I-I . . .” He drops the Ruger like it’s just stung him. “Wh-wh-what the fuck?”

“She thought you were reaching for a gun,” I whisper.

His mouth hangs open as he slowly lifts his shirt to show off his muffin top. He reaches into his back pocket with one hand as he keeps the other held high. “I was reaching for . . .” He pulls a red inhaler from his pocket, then shakes it. “Asthma,” he says.

Asthma kills more than three thousand people a day—Jocelyn should be included in next year’s census.

Ten minutes to ten o’clock. Right now, it’s ninety degrees even though the moon shines high above us.

Shane checks Jocelyn’s wrist for a pulse, then shakes his head.

My limbs feel heavy as the woman’s life seeps into the wasteland and soaks the scorpion Shane just stomped.

This . . . wasn’t in the plan. We needed Jocelyn to work the winch.

Shane paces, stomping more scorpions as he walks and thinks, crunch-crunch-crunch. He grabs a bottled water from the Jeep—that’s when I grab the discarded Ruger and stick it in the pocket of my cargo pants. Shane takes a few glugs of water, then pours the rest over his head. “Okay.” He kneels beside his stepmother, rifles through her jeans pockets, plucks out the keys to the Jeep, and shoves them into his pocket. “Let’s get started.”

I shake my head. “You’re not still planning to . . . ?”

“Leave a bunch of money in the ground for some circus clowns to find?”

My neck tingles. Moving forward doesn’t feel right, doesn’t feel ordered, doesn’t feel . . . blessed. A part of me wants to climb back into the Jeep, race to the closest highway patrol station, and tell them about the struggle with the gun and the dead boomer five miles north of the Funeral Mountains. Then I’d race back to LA and pull on that Kitty’s Korner apron and a pair of sensible shoes. Feed people who dine and ditch me. Buy a balm to treat the blisters on my feet. Accept that I will forever smell like fried meat and eggs.

The other part of me wants to dip into that hole and snag my prize. My mother hated that part of me, the survivor, the single-minded, all-or-nothing-at-all Scorpio part.

Ain’t nothing good will ever come to you. Mom told me that after her only visit to me in jail for stealing those berries and chia seeds, things I stole for her. I don’t even like berries, and what the hell is a chia seed? But she needed those things, and it was my job to provide.

I can’t stand looking at you, Mom also told me. She hasn’t looked at me in five years. Since she thought I was trash, I stopped trying. I had no one left to impress and was exhausted by my earlier successes. Mom’s dismissal gave me license to slum . . . which led me to make stupid decisions.

But coming to Death Valley wasn’t a stupid decision. I didn’t shoot Jocelyn. I didn’t steal anything to get here. I’m supposed to be here. Providence or fate or whatever led me here after I spent the last four years being Ruben’s home aide.

That money is my reward.

The money is in a safe and a money bag with chains and a padlock.

It’s two a.m. when Shane stops pacing, then drains another water bottle. “I have a plan.”

There are fourteen bottles of water left. That’s seven between us.

“So,” he says, “you’ll work the winch to let me down to remove the debris. The money can’t be in too many places—I’ll move the rocks. You pull me up. I send you down, you open the safe. One at a time, just like before. Once that last lock opens, you load two fifty into the bag. I pull it up. I pull you up. I go down. Load the next two fifty. Back and forth like that until all the money’s up here.

“Then we’ll drop her”—Shane points to his stepmother—“into the hole and cover everything back up.”

My mind skitters from Yeah, that sounds good to That’s kinda fucked up.

“No one’s gonna find her,” he says. “If they do, she’s just one more con in a hole, like all the other cons in holes around Death Valley.”

“The developers . . . ,” I say.

“Will be here in two weeks. She’ll be a skeleton by then.”

Probably not. Shane clearly hasn’t relied on book smarts.

Shane watches me and waits—he needs me to agree.

Could I really walk away from all that money buried just forty feet beneath me?

I picture Future Frankie flecked with eggs and coffee grounds, those sensible shoes tight and sticky with pancake syrup . . .

A vise locks around my throat.

All or nothing at all.

I point to the Jeep. “Show me how to work the winch again.”

“The winch is electric,” Shane says. “It’s relying on the Jeep’s engine for power.”

He tells me a bunch more stuff, but I’m not listening. I tune in only once he says, “After putting the tarp over the cable, take the remote control—” He holds up a small gray box with a red button that can be pressed up or down.

Can’t be too hard—Jocelyn was supposed to do it.

Then Shane starts blathering about more stuff, blah blah blah. “Ready, partner?”

I give him a thumbs-up and press the down arrow on the red button. My shoulders tense, and I send some of that stress to the pressing of this button.

Shane backs away from me as the winch unspools its synthetic rope. He holds up his hand once he reaches the rim of the hole. He takes a few deep breaths, clicks on the lantern hanging around his neck, then nods.

I press down as he backs down . . . down . . . I hold my breath until he shouts, “I’ve reached the bottom.”

Maybe I shouldn’t have told Mom that I hated her—because I didn’t. But those were the last in-person words I spoke to her. I hated our situation. And the “all this is your fault” text I sent her? Felt like the truth then. I’d been in mourning, too. Abandoned. I was lashing out because I needed—

“Pull me up!” Shane shouts.

In between thinking about Mom, I’ve been freaking out every time a cloud of ghost-white dust billows in the inky-black distance, and now, my nerves are raggedy. The descendants of Ruben’s crew could be watching us from afar, waiting for Shane and me to finish the hard work, waiting for us to pull the money out of the ground so that they can take it, shoot us in the head, and roll us into the mine shaft with Jocelyn.

There is no honor among thieves.

I should know—I’m a thief.

The combination for the safe and lock on the bag is MLK’s birthday.

I press the up arrow on the remote control and glance at my watch. Four a.m.

Shane ascends from the depths of the earth. “It’s a mess down there.” He accepts the bottle of water I offer. “But I cleared it all away. Wasn’t much. The safe’s right where you said it would be.”

We high-five.

He connects my harness to the winch’s hook. “You still remember the combo?”

“Yep.”

Shane presses the down arrow as I back down the hole.

The air around me cools. The LED light from my electric lantern bathes the roots of the scrub brush and the walls of packed dirt with purple light. My feet finally touch solid ground, and I shout, “I’m here.”

Ohmigod, there’s the safe!

I kneel before the dusty metal box and touch its surface—so real, so cold. The tumbler sticks as I spin it a few times before stopping at . . .

1-1-5-2-9.

I turn the handle to the right.

Click.

I whoop.

“Open?” Shane shouts.

“Yep!” My cheeks hurt from smiling.

“Can I just toss down the key?”

“Scared of the dark?”

“Scared of tight spaces,” he says. “Catch.” He tosses a canvas bag down into the hole. “The key’s inside.”

The circle-headed key with yellow string opens the safety bag’s padlock.

“It worked!” I shout.

I spin the final tumbler, using the same combination on this lock as I did with the first.

The chain falls away. Bundles of preserved hundred-dollar bills. “Money’s here!”

“Fill it with the first two fifty,” Shane instructs.

What will happen after I send up that first quarter of a million? What will Shane do to me once I send up the next batch? The final batch? Will he try to cut me out of my share? Will he push me into the hole with his stepmother?

I have Jocelyn’s Ruger in my pocket, but it misfired once before firing and killing its owner. I can’t put my trust in a janky pistol.

The first two fifty goes into the bag.

I shove another fifty thousand into my bra, my boots, my pants, and under my arms.

Just in case.

“Ready!” I shout.

No response.

“Shane?” Panic and dread burn my throat. “Pull me up!”

The winch whines as it lifts me into the air. Will it be Shane standing at the top? Or will a stranger be there, holding a gun?

My body numbs as I ascend higher . . .

Shane stands alone at the Jeep, drinking water. He lifts the bottle. “Good job.”

I toss him the bag of money.

He dumps the stacks of Benjamins into the cooler, then covers them with ice. “My turn.” He closes the tailgate of the Wrangler, then clips into the winch.

Remote control in hand, I take my place.

My partner backs away to the hole. “Ready.”

I press down and watch him disappear into the shaft.

Seconds later, he shouts, “Okay! Stop!”

Jocelyn’s phone yoo-hoos—the device is still in her back pocket.

I say, “Sorry, Joce,” and pluck the device from her body.

The text on Jocelyn’s screen was sent by “Beans.”

SOUNDS GOOD

What sounds good? And who the hell is “Beans”?

I try to swipe in to read Jocelyn’s earlier message, but the screen wiggles. Enter passcode or Face ID. I open Jocelyn’s eyes and hold the phone in front of the dead woman’s face. The phone blinks into the home screen. I swipe over to Messages.

Don’t worry we got it under control, Jocelyn had typed.

Send her into the hole, Beans commanded.

Have her bring it all up

Leave her ass down there

Nature will take care of it

I’ll be there in two hours

Shane’s good with that, Jocelyn responds.

Stupid girl

I feel a little bad

We’ll both cry over our $$$!!

I watch one striped scorpion fight another. No gusty winds, even though the highway patrol officer warned us there would be. But the air feels like lava against my skin. Probably because I didn’t listen to Ruben and stay away from Shane. Probably because this is supposed to be my last day alive.

What did I expect?

A scorpion’s gotta scorpion.

It’s my fault that I’m here. No one forced me to the desert. How can I say that I’m not trash when I’m literally down in the dirt with two-legged scorpions—one of whom is dead? Okay, fine. I didn’t complete the FAFSA because I hated Cal Poly and didn’t want to go back. With no money, I made my return impossible and said, “Oops,” even though my “forgetting” was intentional.

“Ready,” Shane shouts from the shaft.

I must acknowledge my shortcomings to become better, but right now . . .

Shane’s voice makes something inside me go cold and hard.

I shout, “Okay,” then peek over the edge of the hole. “All good?”

Shane’s face shines in the shadow. “All’s great!”

“Pulling you up now,” I shout.

That coldness—like ice cream–brain cold—freezes my veins as I stomp back to the Jeep. I grab the remote control and push up.

The winch whines as it pulls Shane higher . . .

I look down into the hole.

Shane’s halfway up . . . slowly . . . ascending . . .

Once he’s as high as he can be but still too low to climb out of the hole by himself, I remove my finger from the up arrow. The winch stops.

“I’m not moving,” he shouts.

I look down at him again.

He looks up at me, his face still relaxed. “Is the battery dead?”

I hold up Jocelyn’s phone, then read aloud, “‘Have her bring it all up.’” And then I read, “‘Leave her ass down there.’” I squint at him. “Who’s Beans?”

“Jocelyn’s boyfriend.” Shane holds out his hand to me, then says, “Frankie, listen—”

I stomp on Jocelyn’s phone until it cracks, then toss it into the hole.

“Frankie, wait!” he shouts. “Let me explain. So, here’s the deal—”

Something behind me whines and then screeches. Through the darkness, I can just see smoke drifting from the hood of the Jeep. There’s a high-pitched ting! The synthetic rope snakes lightning quick through the sand.

No no no what’s happening?

Shane screams as he falls down . . . down . . .

Oh my gosh oh hell shit no!

The earth doesn’t shake. There’s no boom of bones breaking against the rock. The rustle of light wind shushes through dry brush.

On feet that I can no longer feel, I tromp over to the hole in the ground.

“Frankie?” Shane says, his voice wet. “I think . . . I think my neck’s broken . . . I can’t . . . move my legs.”

“The winch snapped,” I say, my eyes scanning the imprints left in the sand by the rope.

“Get me out of here!”

“How?” I shout.

“Don’t you dare leave me!”

“Tell Beans to go back to where he’s coming from, then!”

“Why should I?” Shane shouts. “You don’t think I know you pocketed some of the cash? Do I look that stupid to you?” No honor among thieves.

“I’m gonna go get help,” I shout, backing away from the hole. While it’s not a million, $300,000 is more than I’ll ever—

The Jeep chirps, and its headlamps blink.

A flare shoots in my heart as I rush over to the car and grab the door handle.

Locked.

I search the dirt for the car keys.

Nothing but sand, blood, and biting flies that now dart around Jocelyn’s body.

Shane has the keys.

I stomp back over to the hole. “Throw the keys up, Shane.”

“I can’t fucking lift my arms over my head, idiot,” he shouts.

“I’ll come down and bring you up.”

“How? The rope is down here, genius.”

And I don’t know how to climb down or climb back up. I’m not effing . . . Edmund Hillary.

“Damn it!” I pull out my phone.

No service.

My text to Mom didn’t go through—there’s a red exclamation point beside my message.

My mouth and throat feel like I’ve been snorting sand. I need water. I start back to the Jeep, then stop in my steps.

The water is locked inside the Jeep . . . along with the $250,000.

I search the ground for a boulder, anything that can break the glass.

“Guess what?” Shane shouts. “We’re both gonna die.” He whoops without humor. “‘Blessed and highly favored,’ my ass.”

I try to break the glass anyway using a big boulder. Nope. Shane must hear me struggling because he says, “The guy Dad stole the Jeep from? He was a shot-caller with MS-13. That glass is bulletproof.”

I try breaking the glass with the butt of the Ruger.

Nope.

The ground shudders beneath me, and I rest my hands on my knees.

Motherfucker.

Buy a good rib eye and a round of Wallbangers for you and some friends.

The world around me glimmers as the sun greets the horizon. The bundles of cash I packed all around me soak up my sweat and weigh me down. Every flat space looks like I’m steps away from civilization.

A mirage.

I peel the cash from my bra and toss it to the sand.

There’s the highway!

Dizzy, I stumble forward . . .

Not the highway. Just more sand.

I dump the cash I tucked into my pants . . . my socks . . . my boots, and I trudge . . .

The gnarled branches of the Joshua tree beckon to me.

I stumble into its arms, my memory twisted around that prayer of Jabez and that cash. I’m probably not gonna make it out of this desert. I’ll never enjoy that steak or the cocktail Ruben told me to buy.

All this . . . could’ve been different.

I blink, my eyes heavy with sand.

Wish Mom appreciated that I did it all for her.

Epilogue

“It doesn’t matter,” Seth complains. “We don’t have the money.”

Always the complainer. It’s too cold to hike on the coast. It’s too hot to hike in the desert. It’s too windy to hike.

Molly, the dreamer, swipes tears from her eyes. She’s so close to finishing her PhD in nautical archeology, but the financial aid office never received her application. “There’s nothing we can do,” the woman on the phone had told her.

Where would she get $20,000?

Not much to see in this part of Death Valley—Ritter has no waterfalls, no vistas or arches. But it was her turn to choose the weekend activity, and she’d read that a company in Vegas had purchased Ritter and planned to transform it into a tourist spot. So here they are, visiting a ghost town before it disappears. They’ll hike now and watch the stars tonight. So far, they have the desert to themselves. Maybe now, Molly thinks, Seth will propose—

Seth stops walking.

“What’s wrong?” Molly asks. “Another scorpion?” Her eyes drop to the sand.

A hundred-dollar bill . . . Another hundred-dollar bill . . .

Is she seeing this? She’s so thirsty, and heat rash could be making her imagine . . .

Seth scoops up a pile of hundred-dollar bills . . . and then a banded stack over there, following the trail of cash until . . . The Prayer of Jabez.

Someone wrote on the inside cover:

Frankie—

Remember this prayer and do great things!

Love, Mom

“Oh shit,” Seth whispers.

A tattered sock . . . a boot . . . a woman with glazed eyes resting against a Joshua tree.

“Seth?” Molly whispers. “Is she . . . ?”

The woman blinks at them and croaks, “Shouldn’t have stolen . . . stupid berries.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Photo © 2019 Andre Ellis

Rachel Howzell Hall is the New York Times bestselling author of What Never Happened and, with James Patterson, The Good Sister, which was included in Patterson’s collection The Family Lawyer. Rachel is a two-time Los Angeles Times Book Prize finalist and an Anthony and International Thriller Writers award nominee.