Serial Read Online Free PDF Page A

through the weeds. She came over and sat on his chest, giving him a missing-toothed smile.
    “Morning, Donaldson. You of all people will appreciate what’s about to happen.”
    Donaldson yawned, then winked at her. “Aren’t you just the prettiest thing to wake up to?”
    Lucy batted her eyelashes.
    “Thank you. That’s sweet. Now, the helmet is so you don’t die too fast. Head injuries ruin the fun. We’ll go slow in the beginning. Barely walking speed. Then we’ll speed up a bit when we get you onto asphalt. The last ones screamed for five miles. They where skeletons when I finally pulled over. But you’re so heavy, I think you just might break that record.”
    “I have some bleach spray in the trunk,” Donaldson said. “You might want to spritz me with that first, make it hurt even more.”
    “I prefer lemon juice, but it’s no good until after the first half mile.”
    Donaldson laughed.
    “You think this is a joke?”
    He shook his head. “No. But when you have the opportunity to kill, you should kill. Not talk.”
    Donaldson sat up, quick for a man his size, and rammed his helmet into Lucy’s face. As she reeled back, he caught her shirt with his swollen hands and rolled on top of her, his bulk making her gasp.
    “The keys,” he ordered. “Undo my hands, right now.”
    Lucy tried to talk, but her lungs were crushed. Donaldson shifted and she gulped in some air.
    “In… the… guitar case…”
    “That’s a shame. That means you die right here. Personally, I think suffocation is the way to go. All that panic and struggle. Dragging some poor sap behind you? Where’s the fun in that? Hell, you can’t even see it without taking your eyes off the road, and that’s a dangerous way to drive, girl.”
    Lucy’s eyes bulged, her face turning scarlet. “Poc… ket.”
    “Take your time. I’ll wait.”
    Lucy managed to fish out the handcuff keys. Donaldson shifted again, giving her a fraction more room, and she unlocked a cuff from one of his wrists.
    He winced, his face getting mean.
    “Now let me tell you about the survival of the fittest, little lady. There’s a…”
    The chain suddenly jerked, tugging Donaldson across the ground. He clutched Lucy.
    “Where are the car keys, you stupid bitch?”
    “In the ignition…”
    “You didn’t set the parking brake! Give me the handcuff key!”
    The car crept forward, beginning to pick up speed as it rolled quietly down the road.
    The skin of Donaldson’s right leg tore against the ground, peeling off, and the girl pounded on him, fighting to get away.
    “The key!” he howled, losing his grip on her. He clawed at her waist, her hips, and snagged her foot.
    Lucy screamed when the cuff snicked tightly around her ankle.
    “No! No no no!” She tried to sit up, to work the key into the lock, but they hit a hole and it bounced from her grasp. They were dragged off the dirt and onto the road.
    Lucy felt the pavement eating through her trench coat, Donaldson in hysterics as it chewed through the fat of his ass, and the car still accelerating down the five-percent grade.
    At thirty miles per hour, the fibers of Lucy’s trench coat were sanded away, along with her camouflage panties, and just as she tugged a folding knife out of her pocket and began to hack at her ankle, the rough county road began to grind through her coccyx.
    She dropped the knife and they screamed together for two of the longest miles of their wretched lives, until the road curved and the Honda didn’t, and the car and Lucy and Donaldson all punched together through a guardrail and took the fastest route down the mountain.
     
On the following pages you’ll find the authors interviewing each other, their bibliographies, and an excerpt from Jack Kilborn’s debut novel
Afraid
, and Blake Crouch’s new novel
Abandon
     
In which Joe and Blake interview each other about the experience of writing “Serial”
    BLAKE: I know it must be a great thrill getting to work with me, probably the