Chapter 15
The hours before dinner passed fitfully. Adam slipped in and out of sleep, only half aware of which of the images before him were dreams and which were real. Cody was yelling at him, berating him for having let him die on the yacht, for taking the yacht for his own. “You never appreciated what I did for you!” he shouted. “You wouldn’t be alive if it wasn’t for me, and I wouldn’t be dead if it wasn’t for you!”
Then Cody’s face shifted and he became a nightmarish hybrid of Langley and Rhett. In the way of dreams, the person standing before Adam was somehow both twins. He held a gun to Ella’s head. “We can’t trust her,” he said. “She could have the virus.”
Adam tried to object, to explain that Ella had been with the Birkins all this time and that there was no way she could have been exposed to the virus, but he was ignored. There was the terrible sound of the gun being cocked, and then the explosive blast as the trigger was pulled, and Adam jerked awake, staring wildly around, expecting to see Ella falling lifelessly to the floor of his bedroom.
Of course, she wasn’t even there.
Then there was a knock at the door.
That must have been what I heard, he realized, rubbing his eyes in an attempt to wake himself up more fully and getting slowly to his feet. He felt stiff and uncomfortable, not to mention older than he ever had in his life. He stretched as he made his way to the door and cautiously opened it.
It was Ella. Just the sight of her alive and well was a relief. That dream had been deeply disturbing, and it must have showed on his face, because she frowned.
“Are you okay?” Ella asked.
“Bad dreams,” he admitted.
She nodded. “I get them too. It’s a miracle we’re all still sane, isn’t it?”
Adam, who was far from sure that they all still were, merely nodded.
“Anyway,” she said, “I came to tell you that dinner’s ready. The rest of them are sitting down to eat now. So you might want to get down there before everything’s gone.”
Getting down there was actually the last thing Adam thought he wanted. Richard would have spoken to them by now, he thought, and Rhett would probably be boiling over with anger at Adam for ratting him out to his father. Still, he’d better go and face the music now. It was going to happen eventually, and it would be far better for Rhett to have to confront him in front of everyone than for Rhett to catch him alone. He knew the younger man was capable of violence, even murder, and he had to admit he wasn’t sure what Rhett might do to him now.
And, if he was being honest with himself, he was hungry. He wanted some dinner. Why should he deny himself just because Rhett might get angry with him? That was a precedent he didn’t want to set. So he followed Ella down to the dining room, bracing himself for the onslaught.
But as he approached the dining room, to his surprise, he heard the sound of laughter. What could possibly be funny tonight?
After the hours he’d spent weaving his way in and out of nightmares, it was offensive to hear the others laughing. Wasn’t anyone else bothered by what had happened? Didn’t anyone else have a problem with the fact that Rhett had shot a man?
Apparently not. As he entered the room and took the vacant seat between Ella and Olivia, he saw that everyone around the table appeared to be in a good mood. A platter of jerky was being passed around. There wasn’t much, but there was enough for everyone to have a taste.
“This is really good, son!” Charles McTerrell said. “And what an achievement! Now we’ll be able to preserve our kills, and we won’t have to worry about wasting meat.”
“It is good,” Richard Birkin agreed.
Charles blinked, apparently surprised to see a Birkin agreeing with him, not to mention offering praise to his son. But after considering for a moment, he seemed to decide to accept it at face value.
Chase himself looked pleased and proud. On one hand, Adam supposed he should be proud of himself. Charles was right—they had needed a way to preserve meat, and now they had one. That was something to take pride in. But on the other hand, there was the fact that Chase was absolutely stealing drugs from the Birkins. And he probably knew that Adam knew about it. How could he even look Adam in the eye right now?
Langley took a strip of jerky and popped it in his mouth. “It doesn’t suck,” he admitted. “I wouldn’t eat it if I had anything else, but it’s definitely better than starving.”
Olivia rolled her eyes. “Are you genetically incapable of not being rude all the time?”
Langley looked mildly surprised. “She talks!”
“She’s always talked,” Chase said.
“Yeah,” Olivia agreed. “I just didn’t talk to you.”
There was a moment of stunned silence, and then everyone burst out laughing.
Adam was appalled. True, he’d longed to see the Birkins and the McTerrells getting along and laughing together since the day he’d arrived. But was this really the day they were going to come together?
He glanced over at Ella and saw that she looked uncomfortable. At least he wasn’t the only one who saw how weird all this was.
“Excuse me,” he said.
The other looked at him.
“The jerky’s great and everything,” Adam said. “But are we going to talk about what happened today?”
“What do you mean?” Marsden asked.
“What do I mean?” He could hardly believe it. “Someone died today, and we’re sitting here talking about jerky, that’s what I mean. Aren’t we going to discuss the man Rhett killed?”
Silence fell around the table.
Richard caught Adam’s eyes and gave him such a furious glare that Adam thought he might ignite with the force of the older man’s rage.
Then everyone began to speak at once.
“Killed?” Ella said, her voice much higher-pitched than it normally was. “What do you mean, killed? Who’s been killed?” She looked around the table, and Adam had the impression she was actually counting up the people sitting there, trying to identify someone missing.
“Are you referring to the boat that washed ashore today?” Marsden asked.
Charles was frowning. “I thought the man on that boat was already dead. That’s what Richard told us.” He turned to Richard. “You said a boat washed up with a dead man aboard. You said Rhett was the one who found it. Wasn’t that what happened?”
“That’s not what happened,” Adam said. “The man was alive when we found him. Rhett shot him.” He turned to Richard. “You said you were going to tell them.”
“That’s a lie,” Kathryn Birkin said. “He’s lying. You can’t possibly believe this.”
“Rhett?” Charles said. “What really happened?”
“The guy was sick,” Rhett said. “He had the virus. It was obvious that he had it. I acted to protect all of us. Adam would have brought him back here and let him infect all of you. I did what had to be done.”
“He did not have the virus,” Adam protested. “He was dehydrated, that was all. He wasn’t well, but it wasn’t the nanovirus.”
“I thought the nanobots had all been neutralized,” Olivia said.
“They have,” Adam said.
“That’s just a theory,” Langley said. “We don’t know for sure.”
“We’re sure enough that we don’t need to shoot everyone who washes up on our shore,” Adam said. “We’re sure enough that we could have tried to help him. The power is dead. Every electrical device is dead.” He turned to Kathryn. “Look at your cell phones. No matter how many times you try, they don’t power on. Why is that?”
“The batteries are dead,” she said.
“The batteries didn’t all die at the same time on the same day. It was the EMP. It was the same thing that killed my yacht. It was the same thing that took out all the power on the mainland. And if it worked on all of those things, it worked on the virus, too. The nanobots are dead.”
“You could be lying about what happened on the mainland,” Langley s
aid. “You’re the only one who saw it.”
“Why on earth would I lie about it?” Adam demanded.
“Maybe you wanted us to think the virus had been neutralized so we’d let you stay.”
“Are we really back to this?” Adam asked. “I don’t have the goddamn virus. I would be dead by now if I did.” He turned to Rhett. “And I would be dead by now if you’d had your way, too, wouldn’t I? You would have shot me the day you found me, just like you shot the man we found today. The only reason I’m still alive is that your brother was with you that day and you didn’t want to shoot me in front of him, although God only knows why not. He doesn’t seem to mind that you shot this other guy.”
“You watch how you speak to my son,” Richard snapped. “Irrespective of how you might feel about it now, he didn’t kill you. You owe your life to my family.”
“Is all of this really true?” Charles asked. He looked from Rhett to Richard. “The man who washed ashore today was alive?”
“Rhett’s right,” Richard said. “He posed too great a risk to us.”
“But you lied to us about it,” Charles said slowly. “You covered up the fact that your son killed him.”
“Let’s not blow things out of proportion,” Richard said.
“Blow things out of proportion? You covered up a murder, Birkin. I can understand the desire to protect your son, but you let the rest of us believe something that categorically wasn’t true. We had a right, didn’t we, to know what Rhett had done? And you lied to Adam, too,” he added as an afterthought. “He doesn’t seem to have been aware that you weren’t planning to tell the truth about all this.”
“I would have brought it up,” Richard said.
“You would have? When?”
“After dinner. I was going to raise the issue when we were all fed and able to think about things a little more logically,” Richard said. His voice was calm and pacifying, and Adam wondered whether he was actually telling the truth. It seemed plausible.
Marsden seemed to have no such doubt. “You weren’t going to tell us anything,” he said. “If you’d been planning to come clean about this, you wouldn’t have lied about it in the first place. You wouldn’t have told us the story of the boat washing ashore with the dead man aboard if you’d been planning to walk that back later and admit that it was Rhett who killed him.”
“Wait a minute,” Kathryn said. “Aren’t we ignoring the most important thing here?”
“More important than what your son did?” Charles raised his eyebrows. “More important than murder?”
Kathryn flinched at the word, but plowed on nonetheless. “We’ve now seen two boats wash ashore on our island,” she said. “Both have contained living men. We need to consider that it’s only a matter of time before a boat with a whole crew washes up here.”
“What are you saying?” Richard asked his wife.
“I’m saying this island isn’t the safe place we thought it was.” Kathryn’s face was pale. “We could be facing an invasion at any time. Has anyone else really thought about that?”
“Rhett has, clearly,” Charles said. “That must be why he killed the man on the boat today.”
“That man was sick,” Rhett shouted. “He could have infected us all!”
“No, Adam’s right,” Chase argued. “The virus has been neutralized. There’s no reason to think a newcomer would be carrying it, even if he wasn’t well. Only an idiot would jump to that conclusion.”
“Are you calling me an idiot?”
“If the shoe fits.”
“You want to watch your mouth?”
“Or what? You’ll shoot me, too?” Chase rolled his eyes. “Right here in front of your parents, no doubt? I’m not afraid of you, Rhett. You’re a spoiled kid who’s always gotten everything he wants, that’s the problem with you. You see someone new on this island and you’re afraid it’s going to be a bite of food out of your mouth. That’s what’s really going on here, isn’t it? You weren’t afraid of the virus. You just don’t want to share resources.”
“Shut up.”
“I’m right. You know I’m right. You were the same way when Adam showed up here. Hell, you were the same way when we showed up here. I bet you’d kill your own family if they got between you and a cheeseburger, wouldn’t you? You’ve got no sense of loyalty. It’s all about you and your survival, and if the rest of us die so you can live, you don’t give a damn, right?”
Rhett lunged across the table, knocking drinking glasses and plates of food to the floor, and grabbed Chase by the throat. Olivia screamed. Kathryn let out a cry and swooned, and Ella caught her and lowered her to the floor.
Langley jumped to his feet, and Adam moved instinctively, grabbing him around the torso, digging in his heels so that Langley couldn’t join the fight.
“Richard!” Adam yelled. “Help me!”
For a moment he thought Richard would refuse, would encourage his son to attack Chase, but Richard seemed to remember that there were two more adult men on the McTerrells’ side of the table. He took Langley by the arm and pulled him away.
Marsden was shepherding Olivia out of the room. Ella got up from the floor and grabbed Adam by the shoulder. “Come on,” she said.
“What? Where?”
“Out of here. Hurry.”
“I should—”
He looked back at the fight. Chase had extricated himself from Rhett’s chokehold and was now battering Rhett about the torso. Rhett was far from defeated, though, and was taking the hits in stride and landing a few of his own in response.
“You should nothing,” Ella said. “We need to get out of here, Adam.”
“We can’t leave them. This is going to escalate.”
“And do you want to be here when that happens?” she asked. “The Birkins aren’t going to forget who brought up what Rhett did, you know. Both families are going to expect you to jump in on their side. If you stay here—”
“Right. Got it.”
He turned and followed her out the door of the dining room, his stomach turning with guilt. This fight was his fault, and now he was walking away.
“Where are we going?” he asked Ella as she led him out of the clubhouse, onto the lawn.
“Outside,” she said. “Away from this. It’s not worth it.”
Chapter 16
“Ella, hang on,” Adam said as she left the lawn and made her way onto the first green of the golf course. “How far out are you planning to go here?”
“I need to talk to you,” she said. “I don’t want us to be overheard.”
“They aren’t going to come all the way out here after us,” he protested. “I bet they haven’t even noticed that we left.”
“They will eventually,” she said. “And if they do look for us, I want to be able to see anyone coming a long way off.”
He fell silent for a few minutes, trailing after her. “Do you think he’ll be all right?” he asked finally.
“Who?”
“I don’t know. Both of them, I guess. I couldn’t tell who had the upper hand in that fight when we left.”
“I don’t think Richard or Charles will let things go too far tonight,” Ella said. “Both of them will want to talk to their sons before they do anything they can’t take back. And with Kathryn and Olivia right there in the room…no, I don’t think things will get too out of control right now.”
“That wasn’t already too out of control?”
“No,” she said shortly.
“You seem like you’ve been waiting for something like this to happen,” Adam said.
She glanced over her shoulder at him. “You didn’t know that?”
“I guess it was never really…spelled out. As such.” Now that he thought about it, she’d been dropping hints about this kind of thing from the very first time he’d met her. She’d been warning him that things could be explosive between the Birkins and the McTerrells. And hadn’t she advised him to stay out of it? To make sure he didn’t appear to be
picking sides between them?
I really did some damage tonight, Adam realized. The Birkins would think he’d sold them out to the McTerrells—he’d lost any favor he’d earned with Richard by telling him first about what Rhett had done. And the McTerrells would realize that Adam was the one who had given Richard the power and the means to lie to them in the first place.
But he couldn’t think what else he should have done. From the moment Rhett Birkin had pulled that trigger, Adam’s hand had been forced. He couldn’t have kept what had happened a secret—that would have been siding with the Birkins. He couldn’t have gone directly to the McTerrells—that would have been choosing their side. There had been no good answer, no viable solution. Going to Richard was probably the best thing he could have done under the circumstances. Even forcing the conversation at dinner seemed like a good idea. Was it Adam’s fault they’d all handled it so badly?
The trouble was, he couldn’t help feeling as though it was. The dinner had been going so well before he’d opened his mouth.
I had to tell them. Everyone had a right to know about what Rhett did. And Richard shouldn’t get away with lying about it.
He wished Ella would say something. He wished she would tell him he’d handled the situation correctly. She knew so much more about these people than he did. If she approved of what he’d done, his mind would be at ease. But she didn’t speak. She didn’t even look at him.
Finally, on the fifth green, she stopped walking. The house was over a hill and out of sight now. If anyone came looking for them, they’d have to descend that hill, and Ella and Adam would be able to shift to a new topic of conversation before they arrived. But what did Ella want to talk privately about?
She looked around furtively, as if even now she was nervous that they might be overheard, then dropped to her knees on the green. Adam sat down beside her.
“What’s up?” he asked. “Why did you bring us all the way out here?”
Escape The Dark (Book 2): Fearful World Page 12