Sharing The Darkness. Marilyn Tracy

He, of all people, knows what will happen,” she protested.

      Pablo looked back at the car, his dark eyes penetrating the even darker interior. He looked more miserable than ever. Melanie held her breath as he studied Chris.

      Finally he sighed heavily, muttered something in Spanish beneath his breath, and said, “Go one mile down the highway—” he jutted his chin in the direction Melanie had originally been heading “—and then turn left onto the dirt road. You won’t be able to go all the way in that car. You will have to walk. You and…your child.”

      “Thank you,” she said. “Thank you so much.” She swiftly strapped Chris into the back seat, and locked and shut the back door. She had turned and already started to get into the car when she remembered that she hadn’t yet paid him for the gasoline. Dragging her purse over, she started to pull out some dollar bills.

      The attendant waved her offering away and stepped back beneath the canting portal. “De nada,” he said, then added in English, “For nothing. You touched him. For that, I think I would pay you.”

      “Thank you—” Melanie began, but Pablo held up one mud-and grease-stained hand.

      “Trust me, señora, you should not thank me.”

      Melanie, too dazed by the day’s events, the furious storm overhead, and with the end of her quest in sight, only put the car in gear and steered to the narrow highway.

      When she glanced into the rearview mirror, she saw Chris and his dancing toys. And beyond him, standing in the furious rain, the gas station attendant. He was back there, watching her slow progress up the mountain.

      Just before she rounded a curve that would cut him from view, she saw him cross himself and look up at the flashes of lightning zigzagging across the night sky.

      Was he praying that Teo Sandoval wouldn’t enact retribution on him for telling her how to find him?

      Or was he praying for her?