Page 28 (1/2)

Hideaway Dean Koontz 46090K 2023-09-01

The train began to tilt

They entered the three-hundred-and-sixty-degree turn

The train was on its side

Tod tried to reainst Jereht The old rocket jockey hooping like an air-raid siren, doing his best to hype hiet the most out of the ride, now that the worst was behind them

An-tic-i-paa-aa-tion

Jeremy estimated they were a third of the way around the circle… halfway around … two-thirds…

The track leveled out The train stopped fighting gravity

With a suddenness that almost took Jeremy’s breath away, the train hit the first of the six hills and shot upward

He let go of the lap bar with his right hand, the one farthest from Tod

The train swooped down

He ht hand

And alain toward the crown of the second hill

Jere instinct to find Tod’s face

The train dropped

His fist hit ho Tod hard in the face, and he felt the boy’s nose split

The train shot upward again, with Tod screa the screaers

Just for a split second, Tod would probably think he’d send, a boy had been decapitated He would let go of the lap bar in panic At least that hat Jeremy hoped, so as soon as he hit the old rocket jockey, when the train started to drop down the third hill, Jereainst his best friend, grabbing hi to get a fistful of his hair, but he shook his head furiously and shoved harder, took a kick on the hip--

--the train shot up the fourth hill--

--Tod went over the edge, out into the darkness, away from the car, as if he had dropped into deep space Jererabbed frantically for the lap bar in the seamless blackness, found it, held on--

--down, the train swooped down the fourth hill--

--Jereht he heard one last scream from Tod and then a solid thunk! as he hit the tunnel wall and bounced back onto the tracks in the wake of the train, although it ination--

--up, the train shot up the fifth hill with a rollicking motion that made Jeremy want to whoop his cookies--

--Tod was either dead back there in the darkness or stunned, half-conscious, trying to get to his feet--

--down the fifth hill, and Jererip on the bar, then was soaring again, up the sixth and final hill--

--and if he wasn’t dead back there, Tod was --

--down, down the sixth hill and onto the last straightaway

As soon as he kneas on stable ground, Jereled under it, first his left leg, then his right leg

The last set of doors was rushing toward theht, the main cavern, and attendants ould see that he had been daredevil riding

He squirap between the back of the seat and the lap bar Not too difficult, really It was easier to slip under the bar than it had been to get out fro doors--wha speed toward the diseates through which they had entered the roller coaster People were ja back at the train as it came out of the tunnel mouth For a moment Jeremy expected them to point at him and cry, "Murderer!"