Alex Kava - Hotwire

ALSO BY ALEX KAVA

Damaged
Black Friday
Exposed
Whitewash
A Necessary Evil
One False Move
At the Stroke of Madness
The Soul Catcher
Split Second
A Perfect Evil

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright 2011 by S. M. Kava

All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Doubleday, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.

www.doubleday.com

DOUBLEDAY and the portrayal of an anchor with a dolphin are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Kava, Alex.
Hotwire / by Alex Kava. 1st ed.
p. cm.
A Maggie ODell Novel.
1. ODell, Maggie (Fictitious character)Fiction. 2. Criminal profilersFiction. 3. TeenagersCrimes againstFiction. 4. ChildrenCrimes againstFiction. 5. Serial murder investigationFiction. 6. ConspiraciesFiction. 7. Biological warfareFiction. I. Title.

PS3561.A8682H68 2011

813.54dc22 2010052991

eISBN: 978-0-385-53202-0

Jacket photograph: fence Design Pics/Kelly Redinger/Getty Images; shooting stars Blaine Franger/Uppercut Images/Getty Images

Jacket design by Michael J.Windsor

v3.1

TO DEBORAH GROH CARLIN ,
the wizard behind the curtain

NEBRASKA NATIONAL FOREST

HALSEY, NEBRASKA

Dawson Hayes looked around the campfire and immediately recognized the losers. It was almost too easy to spot them.

He could pretend he had some super radar in reading people, but the truth was he knew the losers because what was that old saying? It takes one to know one. It wasnt that long ago that he would have been huddled over there with them, wondering why he had been invited, sweating and waiting to see what the price of the invitation was.

He didnt feel sorry for them. They didnt have to show up. Nobody dragged them here. So anything that happened was sort of their own fault. Their price for wanting to be somebody they werent. Admission to the cool club didnt come without some sacrifice. If they thought otherwise, then they really were hopeless losers.

At least Dawson accepted who he was. Actually he didnt mind. He liked being different from his classmates and sometimes he played up the part, purposely wearing all black on football Fridays when everyone else wore school colors. Being the geek got him noticed, even garnered an eye roll from Coach Hickman, who before Dawson started wearing black on Fridays hadnt bothered to remember Dawsons name.

At the beginning of the school year, during roll call for history class Coach would yell out Dawson Hayes and look around the entire room, over Dawsons head and sometimes straight at him. When Dawson raised his hand, Coach Hickmans eyebrows would dart up like the man would never in a million years have put a cool name like Dawson Hayes together with the pimpled face and the hesitant, skinny arm claiming it. Dawson didnt mind. He was finally starting to get noticed and it didnt matter how it came about.

Even now he knew the only reason for his continued invitation to these exclusive retreats in the forest was because Johnny Bosh liked what Dawson brought to the party. Tonight that something was burning a hole in Dawsons jacket pocket. He tried not to think about it. Tried not to think how earlier he had lifted itthats right, lifted, borrowed, not stolenfrom his dads holster while the man slept on his one night off. His dad probably wouldnt care as soon as he heard Dawson was hanging with Johnny B. Okay, that wasnt true. His dad would be pissed. But wasnt he always encouraging Dawson to make friends, go do stuff that other kids were doing? In other words, be a normal teenager for a change.

Dawson thought that was part of his problemhe was too normal. He wasnt a superstar athlete like Johnny B or a tobacco-chewing cowboy like Trevor or a brainiac like Kyle, but just holding the Taser X26, with its lightweight, bright-yellow casing that fit perfectly in his hand, gave him a new identity and a sense of confidence. All he had to do was point and wham, there goes fifty thousand volts of electricity. And suddenly Dawson Hayes, the powerless, became powerful. He could control anyone and everyone. With this sleek piece of technology in the palm of his hand Dawson felt like he could do anything.

Okay, maybe it wasnt just the Taser. Maybe the salvia had a little something to do with it. Hed been chewing his wad for about fifteen minutes and he could already feel the effect. That was just one of the highlights of tonight.

Dawson looked for the camera hidden behind some low sweeping pine branches. Though it remained camouflaged he could see the green dot blinking only because he had helped Johnny set it up earlier, making sure the tripod blended in with the trees. No one else knew it was there. Being the geek in residence did have its advantages.

Dawson glanced around at the campground. They had stomped out an area for themselves in a secluded part of the pine forest where they probably shouldnt have a frickin campfire. Johnny B said no one could see them from the road or the lookout tower, though it didnt matter. Both would be vacant. On one side was an open field, a swell of tall rolling grass separated by a barbed-wire fence. On the other side was the thick beginning of ponderosa pine. About ten yards away the Dismal River snaked by. Dawson could hear the water tonight, just a whisper running over the rocks.

They had left their vehicles about a quarter mile down in a deserted turnoff, a two-tire trail worn into the knee-high grass. They had to climb over a barbed-wire fence to enter the forest. The trek was only the first test of the night but Dawson thought it revealed quite a lot about tonights guests. How they maneuvered and crawled over the sharp barbs showed just how capable they were. Whether they turned to help the next person get over or under the fence or if instead, they looked for assistance. Or worse, expected assistance.

That was another thing about Dawson that made him different from other kids his age. He liked watching how people reacted to each other, to their surroundings, and especially to the unpredictable. His generation had become mindless zombies, mimicking and copying each other, caught up in their own little worlds of what is rather than what if. That was probably what interested him most about Johnnys experiments.

There were only seven of them here tonight and yet they still grouped together in their cliques. Johnny was surrounded by the babes, Courtney and Amanda. Tonight even Nikki had inserted herself into the cool clique, which disappointed Dawson. He had hopes that Nikki would be better than that. All three girls looked like they were hanging on every one of Johnnys words, laughing and tossing their hair back then tilting their chins in that way girls do to show their interest.