Page 1 of Smash

CHAPTER 1

Bzzz. Bzzz.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I muttered. “Again?”

Nat had barely eased onto the exit ramp when my cell phone started jumping around in the cupholder. Thirty-two hours into our cross-country drive from Montana to Brooklyn, and this had happened every single time we left the highway.

I didn’t even need to look. It was Vanessa. But I swiped anyway.

Vanessa: Is everything okay? I see you’ve gotten off the interstate.

Nat glanced over. “Her?”

“Who else?”

“She’s confusing this hunk-of-junk Chevy Spark with a G-Wagon.” Nat snorted. “Relax, ’Nessa. Your shit brown tin can on wheels is safe.”

A minute later, we pulled into a gas station and another text came in.

“How the hell does she know we’re at a Shell station?” I pointed to the vinyl banner only partially covering the old Mobil sign. Clearly the place had changed hands recently.

“She knows we’re at a gas station?”

I turned the phone to face my friend. “No, she knows it’s a Shell station.”

Vanessa: Why did you stop at Shell? Is the car making a noise?

To finance this trip, I’d used an app that connects people who need their car moved with people willing to drive cross-country for gas money. Vanessa needed her car transported to Queens, and I was moving to Brooklyn, so it had seemed like a win-win. But she seemed to have some sort of tracking device hidden in here, and it was starting to make me wonder if I was transporting something more valuable than a ten-year-old compact car. I’d watched To Catch a Smuggler on National Geographic one too many times.

Nat killed the ignition at the pump, and my phone buzzed yet again.

Vanessa: Please confirm the car sounds normal.

Nat snatched the phone from my hand and burst out laughing. “Well, I don’t know, ’Nessa. Does it always sound like a hamster coughing?”

Right on cue, the engine sputtered out with a faint wheeze.

“Imagine if she’s watching us in real time,” I said, tapping the rearview mirror. “Like there are cameras in here, and she’s sitting in a dark room somewhere with multiple monitors.”

“The poor thing named her crappy car Sparky. That’s tragic enough. Now you’re turning her into a serial killer?”

I got out and filled Sparky, while Nat disappeared into the gas station convenience store. She came back with two Red Bulls and a sixty-four-ounce bag of sour gummy worms.

I clicked the nozzle back onto the pump and shook my head. “We have three hours left to drive. Do you think maybe a smaller bag would’ve sufficed?”

She rolled her eyes. “Who uses the word suffice under the age of eighty? Always flexing that English degree, aren’t you, Talia?”

I stuck my tongue out and tossed her the car keys. “You’re driving the rest of the way. But let’s make a pit stop for some real food. If I eat another Pringle or Twizzler, I’m going to throw up.”

Nat caught the keys and grinned. “Oh, we’re stopping, alright. I saw a sign down the road for the perfect place.”

I side-eyed her. “Why is your tone making me nervous?”

“Because you know me so well.”

My phone buzzed from the cupholder again as we buckled up.

“She’s watching,” I whispered.