by C. M. Ewan
If we wanted to hear it.
I didn’t believe Rachel would have accepted it if I’d said we should walk away. She’d craved an explanation for Michael’s behaviour too badly. She’d needed it too much.
Whatever the risks to her family.
I cradled my head in my hands and thought some more about Brodie’s role in all this. I was beginning to wonder if it cast a new light on that moment when we’d first arrived at the lodge. I’d thought Brodie had looked down and away when I’d introduced him to Rachel because he was attracted to her. But maybe he’d acted that way because he’d been conscious of the real reason why all of us were here. He knew Holly and I didn’t have a clue about it. Maybe he’d been feeling uncomfortable about that.
‘And the mugging? How does that fit into it?’
Rachel glanced at Holly, then looked away to her side. ‘It’s possible that was a warning. I’m so sorry, Holly. If you only knew how sorry I am. I’m—’
‘It’s possible?’
Rachel startled at the fury in my voice. ‘OK, maybe more than possible. I don’t know, Tom. Don’t you think I feel bad enough about it already?’
I glared at her.
‘Look, you noticed that Brodie was trying to talk to me, didn’t you? When you were bringing things in from the car?’
This time I didn’t say anything. I waited for her to go on.
‘He was warning me, Tom. He was telling me things had escalated. He was saying that I – that we – had to make a decision soon. I don’t know. Maybe he pushed too hard. Maybe he alerted these men that he was on to them, somehow.’
‘Oh, well, that’s just terrific, Rachel. And yet you and Lionel still thought it was a great idea for us all to come out here to the middle of bloody nowhere?’
Rachel raised both hands like I’d slapped her. ‘I didn’t think they’d come here, Tom. That never occurred to me. This place was meant to be safe. There’s the fence. The gate.’
‘Safe.’
I closed my eyes and squeezed the bridge of my nose between my finger and thumb. It was all so confusing. I was hurt and angry, but I also knew that part of my anger was really directed at myself. Because if I’d been a better dad – a better husband – maybe none of this would have happened in the first place. It was a lot to try and digest. Too much, just then.
And even as the anger swarmed inside my skull, I was straining to think and join other dots together. How had the men tracked us here? If they could delete footage from speed cameras it suggested they had a level of technical expertise. Same thing with disabling the telephone and the security system linked to the wine cellar. So had they tapped Rachel’s phone? My phone? Had they put some kind of GPS tracker on our car?
Or was it a lot simpler than that?
‘How do you know you can trust Brodie? How do you know he didn’t sell us out to these men?’
‘He didn’t.’
‘Maybe he’s the one that told them to bring a tranquilizer gun for Buster. Maybe he’s the one who told them about this room and how to cut if off. He could have told them the six-digit code for the door, Rachel. How was he to know Lionel was changing it?’
‘Lionel trusts him.’
‘Do you?’
Silence. Rachel didn’t respond. But I could see that some of the doubts I’d raised had hit home. She got to her feet, wobbling a little, and moved a few steps away. She raised her hand to her mouth, lowered it again. I was beginning to think that maybe she was adding some doubts of her own and it bothered me that she wasn’t sharing them.
Next to me, Holly groaned and buried her face in the sleeve of her coat. I put my arm around her, hugging her tight. I hated that this was happening, but the part I hated most of all was that it was happening with Holly here. It seemed as if these men really had been involved in my son’s death. I didn’t know why but I thought I knew that much. And I also knew there was a good chance one of them had punched Holly in London. I swore to myself I wasn’t going to give them a chance to hurt her again.
That was when a sudden, loud clang made us all jump. Holly whimpered and clung to me. We all stared in horror at the door.
The clanging noise came again.
The door thumped and trembled.
It sounded to me like one of the men was ramming the door with something heavy. Maybe even the sledgehammer I’d seen among their equipment. But surely they didn’t think they could get in here with something as crude as that?
Another blow. We heard the smashing of plastics. The crunching of circuitry and wires. The utter obliteration, I guessed, of the keypad on the front of the door and the electronics connected to it.
My eyes went to the red light that was still flashing on the control panel. To the phone system that didn’t work. I felt my stomach twist and knot, and a sudden flush of fear, like I’d fallen in an ice-cold bath.
‘What are they doing?’ Rachel asked.
‘Keep back from the door,’ I said. I stood up and pulled Rachel away by her arm. ‘Both of you, stay back.’
‘I told you, Tom. They can’t get in here.’
I turned and scanned the cellar again. I looked at the uniform racks of bottles. The boxes of wine. The four solid walls.
My legs buckled. I lunged towards the wine boxes and pushed them aside. There was only the cement floor beneath.
‘Rachel,’ I said, standing quickly, ‘you need to start helping me to take down these wine bottles. We have to search this room for an air inlet. A vent. Anything.’
‘I don’t understand. Tom? What is it?’
‘Why, Dad?’
I stared at them both, trying to block the sensation of the walls closing in, the ceiling pressing down, my throat closing up.
‘Because your mum is right. They can’t get in here. Only, I don’t think they want to. They just want to make sure we can’t get out.’
35
Four days. No food. No water. Just bottles and bottles of wine.
I looked at Holly. I wanted so badly to lift her in my arms and hug her. We couldn’t just stay here doing nothing. We couldn’t risk her condition deteriorating or her bleeding getting worse without any way to get out.
‘Check everywhere. Do it now.’
‘It’s pointless, Tom. I told you how secure this room is.’
‘Rachel, please.’ I seized her by the upper arms and moved her over to the shelves of bottles next to the control panel and the security monitors. ‘Just try.’
She shook her head, staring forwards. ‘We should have opened the door when I said.’
‘Trust me, Rachel. You don’t want to start playing should-have-done with me.’
I backed away from her before I lost it completely and crossed to Holly. Slipping a hand under her armpit, I helped her to her feet. She blinked and swayed and leaned into me.
‘OK?’
‘Yes. Just dizzy.’
‘Do you need to sit down again? Mum and I can do this.’
‘No, it’s OK. I want to help, Dad.’
I gave her another quick hug, then swept her hair clear of her damp forehead and positioned her facing the opposite wall to Rachel. I waited until I was sure she was steady, then I took the wall at the back of the cellar for myself.
Rachel began slowly, begrudgingly, like the task was futile. Holly worked with only one hand, slipping out a bottle and setting it carefully on the floor, keeping her other hand pressed to the dressing on her side. My pace was much faster. I got into a frenzy. Snatching two bottles from their hexagonal racks. Ducking and setting them on the floor close to where Buster was laid out. Then snatching another two. And repeat.
The floor filled up around me. I kept nudging bottles with the toes of my boots. Pretty soon I had to take my coat off because I was getting too warm. But all I uncovered were empty wine racks and the bare cement wall behind them. Panic crowded in on me.
A wet thud made me turn.
‘Sorry.’
Holly grimaced. She’d dropped a bottle. The gla
ss had splintered and spread, red wine pooling around her boots.
We all glanced at the door. There was no reaction from the men.
‘Doesn’t matter,’ I said. ‘Keep looking.’
‘I don’t see any vents, Tom. It’s just brick.’
‘Don’t stop.’
I was starting to think I’d underestimated the number of wine bottles. The way it was going, pretty soon we were going to have to start reshelving the bottles we’d cleared to make space for the ones we hadn’t taken down yet.
I had another two bottles in my fists when Buster began to snarl and flinch. I looked down at him. He flexed his front legs, kicking off the towels I’d laid over his body. He rasped air through his nostrils. He bared his teeth and snarled some more. I felt a little more of my strength go out of me as I watched him, scared he was having a bad reaction to whatever sedative the men had given him.
‘What’s wrong?’ Holly asked. ‘Is he OK?’
Rachel put down the wine bottles she was holding and went to him. She cupped one hand under his head to stop him from hurting himself on the floor. She placed her other hand on his side, under the towel. She shushed him, stroked him. His paws thrashed against her and some of the bottles I’d stacked close by. His head jerked and flinched. I took a step towards Holly, ready to block her view if it got any worse, but after a few seconds Buster began to calm and relax.
Rachel exhaled. ‘Just a bad dream, I think. Probably worse because of the sedative.’
We watched Buster jerk a few more times, less frequently now, then he fell mostly still, his legs barely moving. Rachel covered him back over with the towel. Holly bit her lip.
‘OK.’ I let go of a breath and wiped my face with the back of my hand. ‘Let’s get back to it.’
Rachel went over and faced her wall with a shake of her head and a sigh. Holly resumed plucking out one bottle after another, sneaking lingering glances at Buster. I went back to working as fast as I could.
Two minutes later, Holly said, ‘Over here, Dad. I think I’ve found something?’
She was on tiptoes, reaching up with her right hand and carefully sliding out a portion of shelving from a sculpted hollow among the hexagonal racks. The section was large enough to hold perhaps a dozen bottles.
I moved closer. Behind where the portion of shelving had been was the fluted metal grill on the front of a white cooling unit. I felt a small surge of hope. The unit was a little bigger than a standard household microwave. I don’t know a lot about storing wine, but I do know that controlling temperature and humidity is important. This unit looked a bit like one of the through-the-wall air conditioners I’d seen on apartment buildings and motels in the United States.
‘Let me see.’
I took the section of shelving from her and set it on the ground, then climbed the empty racks to Holly’s right and placed my left hand in front of the grill. A current of cool air wobbled against my palm.
The unit was fitted flush to the wall, set back behind the shelving surrounding it. I jammed my fingers through the vent on the front and tugged. The fascia deformed but didn’t budge. I could see several flathead screws holding it in place. There were eight screws in total. Two on each side. Two on the top. Two on the bottom.
‘I think we may be able to get out this way.’
‘But do we want to?’ Rachel asked. ‘They might leave soon.’
‘You don’t believe that, Rachel. And how would we know?’
‘But if you remove it,’ Holly said, ‘won’t they be able to get in at us?’
‘Maybe. But that might be a risk we have to take.’
I tried turning one of the screws with my finger and thumb, but it was useless. Human fingers are not designed to function as screwdrivers and I’d left the screwdriver we’d used to break into the pool room outside in the dirt.
‘Your backpack,’ I told Rachel. ‘You must have something we can use.’
‘Tom, I really don’t—’
‘Just humour me, Rachel. If it doesn’t work, where’s the harm?’
She threw up her hands, shaking her head, but then she ducked down next to her backpack and unzipped a compartment on the front. I could see a collection of syringes, vials, antiseptic wipes.
‘You could try this, I suppose.’
She handed me a disposable scalpel without much enthusiasm. It had a sculpted plastic handle and a metal blade with a safety cap on the end. I pulled the cap off with my teeth and aligned the flat of the blade with the head of the first screw.
The blade was thin. The screw wouldn’t budge. I moved my finger and thumb down low on the blade and tried again. Nothing. I spit on the screw. Twisted some more, harder this time. The screw shifted a tiny fraction with a scraping, grinding noise.
It was something. But it was slow, laborious work. I didn’t know how long ago the lodge had been built. Five years? Six? My guess was this cooling unit had been installed at the same time and these screws hadn’t moved since.
I thought of the two men outside the door again. What were they doing? What would come next? Had they really killed my son? Michael was just sixteen. And yes, he’d had a wild streak. He’d got into trouble from time to time. Sometimes at school. Sometimes outside of it. But how could he have become involved with violent thugs like this? I just couldn’t see it.
And I still didn’t know why they were here. Why did they want us dead? Were they afraid that we were going to expose them? Were they trying to kill us before the truth of Michael’s death could get out? Surely they had to know Lionel was involved too. Killing us would only solve part of their problem. So was something else going on? Was there more Rachel wasn’t telling me?
I gritted my teeth. Pinched my finger and thumb hard. Rachel and Holly watched as the screw turned in slow increments and the scalpel turned with it, scratching the fascia of the cooling unit. I adjusted my grip and kept twisting. Now things were getting a little easier. The screw was starting to emerge.
It was awkward working with my left hand instead of my right, which was still gripping tight to the shelving. My fingers were cramping. I could feel tremors passing down through my hands and wrists. But after several more painstaking turns I was able to pop the handle of the scalpel in my mouth and use my fingers to loosen the screw all the way.
I dropped it on the floor and began working on the next screw.
‘Got any more of these?’ I asked Rachel.
‘Two.’
‘Then climb up here with me. You can get started on the screws on the other side.’
At first I thought Rachel was going to ignore me or refuse. But she climbed up and got to work. A few seconds later, Holly wandered over to stroke Buster. We both took a moment to watch her. Holly still looked pale and her movements were stilted, but I thought she must be doing OK because she was able to move around and talk with us. Buster simply dozed on.
After something like ten minutes, a lot of swearing and even more sweating, we had seven of the screws loosened and released. The eighth screw, located in the top left of the fascia, was proving more troublesome. Rachel had snapped her scalpel blade on it. She’d been lucky not to slice open her thumb. I told her to hop down while I tried yanking on the fascia but it wouldn’t come free. Maybe if I used my right hand? I scrambled over to the empty wine racks on the left of the unit. But before I could get started, there was a hollow clang from the metal door.
The noise reverberated inside my chest.
I turned and looked. There was nothing for several long seconds. I remained clinging to the shelving as electric fear pulsed down my arms.
Then another clang. And a third.
Something jabbed beneath the base of the door.
I felt like a blade had been pushed between my ribs.
What was it?
I jumped down from the shelving and climbed the concrete steps. The object was a tongue of black metal. Slightly chipped and oxidized. Something vaguely familiar about it.
I reached towards i
t. It was cold and hard to the touch and it twisted slightly under my fingers.
I snatched my hand away and looked back at Rachel. She rolled out her bottom lip, nonplussed. Then a deep, screeching, cranking sound made us both cringe. The noise seemed to creeeak inside my teeth. The metal door strained and groaned. The cranking sound came again, that desperate creeeak drilling through my gums into my jaw. My hand trembled as I placed my palm on the door. I could feel all kinds of stresses and strains passing through the metal. A sprinkle of dust rained down from the lintel above.
Nerves scattered across my back.
I recoiled at the sound of a splintered crunch. When I looked down, a tiny crack and a small crater had appeared in the painted concrete floor just beneath the tongue of metal.
‘Tom, what is it?’
I backed away on my heels, crossing the room in a hurry. I scrambled up the shelving and focused on the screw again. The screw still wouldn’t turn. I swore and tried spitting on it. I shifted the angle of the scalpel blade. I tugged crazily on the fascia.
More cranking from behind. More straining and groaning and dry crunching sounds. More creaking inside my molars.
‘Tom, talk to us.’
‘I think they got the car jack out of the Volvo,’ I panted. ‘I think they’re trying to lift up the door.’
Holly stood slowly. ‘Will that work?’
I didn’t answer. I gritted my teeth and exerted more pressure on the scalpel blade instead.
The blade snapped and shattered.
Damn.
‘Another one.’ I clicked my fingers. ‘Now, Rachel.’
But Rachel didn’t react. She seemed transfixed by the door. Her hands tightened into fists. The muscles of her jaw bunched and clenched.
‘Rachel,’ I hissed. ‘Another scalpel. Quick.’
Holly shot past her and fumbled in her bag, passing one to me.
‘That’s my last one,’ Rachel said. Her voice sounded hollow.
Again, I pulled off the cap with my teeth. Again, I got to work.
The cranking and creaking sounds continued. The metal door wailed and protested. The sound seemed to penetrate down through my teeth into the nerves in my neck.