Chapter 2

Darren got out of his Jeep and started stacking boxes in front of Tim and Elaine's garage. When he was done, he trudged over to their front door and gently knocked.

Elaine opened the door and her face broke into a smile when she saw Darren. They'd only known each other for a few months, but he was already one of her husband's best friends. Anything that made Tim happy, made Elaine happy too.

"Hi Darren, Tim kind of had to work late. You can go ahead and get started though," she said.

"Uhm, maybe I'll just come back a different night," said Darren sadly.

"Any night you'd like. You're always welcome Darren," said Elaine.

"It probably won't be for a week or so, I don't get many nights to..." began Darren.

"So, why don't you stay tonight?" asked Elaine. "At least jack the car up and put your new rims and tires on. Your brake calipers look really good."

"I don't know how to say this, Elaine," began Darren.

"You're scared to go into the garage without Tim, aren't you?" asked Elaine smiling.

Darren nodded his head. He liked Elaine and Tim. He wished that his marriage was more like theirs. In fact he had arranged the dinner with them so Melissa could see the way they were together. But after the dinner Melissa had simply forbidden him to bring either of them to their home. She'd said that there was something weird about the two of them and Darren shouldn't get any ideas in his head.

There was something weird about them but it wasn't Elaine or Tim. It was their car. Darren had heard from several others that the car had been involved in accidents where people died. Some of them even thought that the car was responsible. At first Darren wrote it off to bad luck. After all it wasn't like the car could eat people or anything.

He'd heard of at least three cases including two in one day, and one recent case where the car, with no one behind the wheel had simply run over or crushed a person. In each case Tim had told him that there'd been a logical reason usually involving some type of mechanical failure.

But Darren had seen too many weird things with that car. Like the way it seemed to respond to anything Tim or Elaine said. And their daughter was worse.

There was simply no reason to explain why a three year old girl could walk up to a locked car and the door open itself to let her in and then close back. His wife hadn't caught that, but Darren had.

In fact the recent incident with the car, which Darren heard about from Tim's nosy neighbor, had involved Christa. She'd been out playing and had been in the driveway while her mother was sitting on the deck. Elaine never let Christa out of her sight, but she'd been tired and had just taken her eyes off of the child for a second.

The second was all it took. A man driving down the street had seen the child unattended and went after her. He'd only been out of jail for a few days for doing the same thing. He was a pedophile and should have been required to register his home address before moving into the neighborhood.

He looked around and didn't see anyone. He stopped his car at the end of the driveway and got out. He told the little girl, that he had candy in his car. She smiled and said she wanted some. He picked her up and put her in the back seat. He made sure he buckled the seat belt around her, just in case he was pulled over. Of course not having a correct car seat wouldn't be a good thing, but he could think up a plausible explanation for that. Besides, the chances of him getting pulled over were slim.