Cindy was standing about ten feet away on the pathway I'd just walked.
She was smiling at me a bit exasperated. Strands of her blond hair was plastered to her cheeks despite her hood, and her clothes showed the same soaked-through state as my own, but she seemed completely unbothered by physical discomfort.
"Cindy," I said simply.
"You really thought you could escape us?" Cindy asked with gentle teasing as she approached across the rain-slicked concrete decking. "We already knew that if you disappeared, you'd lose yourself in your thoughts and probably wouldn't come back until nightfall. You have a pattern, you know."
"No..." I started to protest, but the word died in my throat because she was absolutely right and we both knew it.
