Chapter 2

"That little squirt is worth half a million dollars. That money should be ours and I want it. According to the trust agreement set up by your grandfather, if anything happens to that kid before he turns twenty- one, the trust is terminated and the money is yours. All we have to do is kill him, make it look like an accident, and we're half a million dollars richer."

"I don't know Dave, he's my little brother."

"Karen, who cares, you never liked him anyway. That old man screwed you by only leaving you a thousand bucks out of his estate. As the oldest child you should have gotten the money, not him. We'll kill the kid, stick his body in the car, drive him out to the desert and then put him behind the wheel and let the car drive off the road into an arroyo, and set the car on fire. The only way they will be able to identify the kid is from his dental records."

Billy had heard enough; he had to get out of there that night before his sister and that crazy boy-friend of hers could kill him. But where would he go. He had just turned seventeen, he had no money and had no proof of what he had heard. He had come here to live with his sister after his Mom had died. He didn't know why his grandfather had left all his money to him. He could only assume that his sister must have done something pretty bad to tick him off that much.

That night, after his sister was asleep, he snuck out to the kitchen with a duffle bag full of his clothes, took whatever money he had along with any money he could find in the grocery food jar and left. By four a.m. he had walked about ten miles. His goal was to get as far away as possible, stand by the on-ramp for Interstate 17 and catch a ride anywhere. As he was walking along a deserted road, he could see a small house in the middle of nowhere. On the side of the house was a large truck. Suddenly, the truck roared to life. The driver jumped out of the truck and walked back into the house.

"Here's my chance," he thought, and ran to the truck, peered in, saw the entrance into the sleeping berth and climbed in and hid himself as best he could. He held his breath as the driver got back in a few minutes later and drove off. They only drove for what seemed like about fifteen minutes or so when he felt the truck pull off the road. The driver maneuvered the truck backward until he felt a bump and a loud bang; then the driver got out of the cab again. Billy peeked through the curtain that separated the berth from the driver's compartment. They were in some sort of warehouse parking lot. He could see several trailers parked in the lot.

'He must be picking up a trailer, ' Billy thought.

Suddenly, he heard the door begin to open. He was able to close the curtain just before the driver climbed back into the cab. Then, with a toot of the air horn, the truck started out of the lot and onto the road. Billy had no idea where they were headed; all he knew was that it couldn't be far enough from his sister Karen and Dave. He had enough space on the driver's side of the cab, to look around the curtain. When he saw that they were heading on to Interstate 17, he settled himself down to rest.