by Alexa Dare
How could she ponder killing her own child?
Yes, he tried to kill her, but all teenagers made mistakes, didn’t they? Her son, so troubled, needed help. Not death. Yet, as with Delbert and Ross, the need to kill churned.
Nora grasped her metal-banded necklace and pulled at the edges to tear the latch free. She angled the ring and she rubbed the stinging rawness along the back of her neck. Unable to tilt her chin aside, she closed her eyes and worked by touch.
Darn her unsteady fingers and short brittle nails.
In the past, she’d killed over and over again. Yet, in all that time, the idea of taking her son’s life never entered her mind.
If he were dead, the world would be a much safer place.
Nora’s search turned frantic until her jagged nail caught the inset release, and the tiny button of a hidden clasp dipped within the outer curve of the collar. With a gruff moan, she bent the ring and flung the collar away.
Like the rim of a silver disc the necklace slash control device spun through the air and landed amid the gore.
After sixteen years, she was completely free of the pain and cruelty of the silver band. She stroked the sudden wetness on her cheeks. How long had it been since she’d cried as a free woman? Eyes still closed, she lifted her face and let the rising wind swipe away her tears.
“Well,” a man’s voice reached through the lash of tree branches and the grating rumble beneath the ground, “look what we got here.”
Nora dropped her head. Her heavy sigh failed to ease the aching knot in her belly. Forcing herself to lift her gaze, she stared deeper into the woods.
Her heart lurched.
Several yards out and bringing the road kill exhaust of the area along with him, Yates grinned like a drunken possum. Across from him, his associate’s deadpan face showed vacant stupidity. Between the two of them, Vincent stood, hemmed in from the sides.
Somehow, his sulking features soothed Nora. “Vincent, I came for you.”
“Well ain’t that a kick in the caboose. One big happy family, plus one.” Yates, seeming oblivious to the fact she no longer wore gloves, strode over and offered his hand to her. “The mess seems to spread outward, so we decided to head back in.”
“The members of the militia you left behind are dead. There’s nothing left of the camp except debris and body parts.” The horror flitted through her memory, but the sight of her son’s haunted expression imprinted in her memory forever.
“God rest their souls,” muttered Yates’s cohort.
Nora blinked and stood without help. “Vincent, I need to remove your collar. Without mine, I see things so much more clearly now.”
“We were meant to be.” Yates shook his head. “The three of us.”
“Right.” Nora snorted. “Like you said. A happy family.”
Yates barreled toward her, grabbed her hair, and pulled. “Do not talk down to me.”
Head yanked back, pain sliced Nora’s skull. Gloveless, she whirled around. Hair ripped out of her skull, leaving behind a sharp burn. Yates yanked her away from him, yet she managed to grab his throat. “How dare you put your hands on me.”
At the rim of her gaze, the second man’s hand flew up.
Boom.
A bullet struck Nora’s upper arm. She reeled—the pain hot and slicing—to the side but didn’t let go. At the crown of her head, Yates’s hand convulsed and dropped.
“Too late, you’re a dead man,” said Nora. “Your pride made you forget, didn’t you? You forgot that I’m the woman you are unable to love because you can’t touch her.”
Yates’s eyes rolled back. His upper body seized. In an instant, his heart stopped.
Nora let his body fall.
“Vincent, I’m sorry you had to see this.” Ripe pain seared the flesh of her outer arm. She gripped above her elbow and rocked her upper torso. She hissed from the hurt, yet savored the pain of being alive, even the aftermath in her head that followed.
Vincent tilted his head to the side, like an animal staking out prey. “You have no idea what you have done.”
“So, it’s done? For real?” Yates’s minion’s wild-eyed gaze whipped from his boss’s body and back to her.
Nora took a step toward the idiot.
Eardrum splitting booms banged.
The man, shooting wild shots into the trees, ran. As the man fled out of sight, mother and son faced off.
“You just set the ruin of mankind into motion.” Vincent, his face pale and drawn, stood hunched over his father’s corpse. His pasty, sun-starved complexion bordered on a green-tinged gray color.
The winds eased around them as draped in sorrow as dreary as the tunnel from which she just fled, Nora bent as if to check out Yates’s body. What was her son talking about? Dead was dead, and her former love surely was.
In a slow, smooth motion, Nora scooped up a broken and split branch the length of her lower arm from the ground. A backup makeshift weapon might come in handy, just in case. Her own heart thundering under her ribs, she tucked the stick behind her arm and pressed her elbow to her ribs.
“The end of the world is near,” Vincent shouted. He tossed back his head, and his shrill inane mirth echoed through the hills.
Chapter 34
While headlights showed the way out front, Brody, back at the rear all-terrain window, pushed his palm to the glass so hard his finger joints ached and his elbow shook. The blood and mud words smeared between the panel and the glass zoomed into focus.
Chaos wins.
Ache, heavy as a mudslide, jammed Brody’s chest and surged like throw-up into his throat. “Him or us. The brother I grew up with would never have meant to hurt kids. I did what the man he used to be would have wanted me to do. Man, chaos wins, alright. Every danged time.”
The watch on his wrist drew his gaze, and he pulled his hand back. Air whistled through his nostrils to tug in new car smell tainted by the sourness of sweat. Hand shaking, he tapped the ruined circle of glass.
From the inch-square monitor of the video playback, Cantrell grinned. “Bro, by now you know about how they changed us when we were little. Using magnets and such. Doc’s been working on me lately. Even talking about putting some sort of an implant in my brain. All is so clear now, the never-ending string linking random things. Every day, I get closer to making sense of chaos.
Cantrell’s gaze darted about him. His focus pinged on nothing, until his gaze lasered again directly at Brody via the video. “Get rid of the bug in the girl’s toy. Once chaos hits, you must keep them safe. From me. From all outside forces. We Thackett’s must look after the children.”
The erratic thump of Brody’s pulse and a shrill ring filled his ears.
The toy?
Ah, heck, he’d forgotten about the stuffed animal that Cantrell retrieved for Darcy Lynn and that he later claimed was bugged with some sort of tracking device. Dang. The hurt inside his chest robbed his breath. Not from his heart, but his brother’s betrayal. He slumped until his brow rested against the rear glass.
Gentle pats bumped his shoulder. Darcy Lynn said, “It’s okay, Brody.”
Between his chin and shoulder, he cupped her hand and held on while inside he shattered into a million pieces of useless grief. In a choked voice, he asked, “Darcy Lynn, do you have your stuffed dog with you?”
“Junior brought him.” She leaned close bringing the smell of smoke and wind and the outdoors with her. “But he took off the pink ribbon for me. Pink is almost red, and I don’t care for red anymore.”
“I can see why.”
“Only I don’t think Junior had a chance to get your doggy for you because he was locked in the metal room with me,” Hannah said. “Where did you find the toy?”
“Sitting on the back seat where Junior left him.”
“Please give your toy to Hannah,” said Brody.
“Why?” The little girl tugged out of his grip. The warm lull of where she touched him chilled in an instant.
“Could be someth
ing is inside,” Brody gulped his words, “that will help the bad guys follow us.”
“You’re not going to hurt Fluffy Dog, are you?”
“She’ll be really easy with him.” Brody quirked a brow. “Won’t you, Hannah?”
“Hannah doesn’t know how to be easy.” Abe steered the all-terrain at a quick, bumpy clip.
Hannah, pale and wide-eyed, nodded. “Whatever happens to him, we can fix Fluffy right up. But it’s important for Brody to make sure the bad guys can’t find us.”
Abe groaned, half stood, and stomped. “Hang on, we’re hitting water. Can’t stop because of the mudslide shoving us forward.” The boy’s elbows shook from the effort to hold the steering wheel steady. “This thing’s gonna sink like a rock.”
By the back of a seat, Brody hauled himself up.
With the rear-side and back windows blocked by panels, mid-way along the aisle, uncovered windows showed heaping mud engulfing the tracks.
“Hold on,” yelled Abe.
Ahead, a mass of water filled the windshield. Under the force of the shove, the hood dipped.
Brody’s feet flew out from underneath him, and he skittered toward the dashboard. Mid-slide, he caught his hands on both rows of seats. The patter of his pulse sped but beat strong and even. “Not dead yet.”
“You will be if we go under.” Abe sat back in his seat.
A rush of water swamped the front hull. The impact rammed the all-terrain to a sudden halt.
Eardrums pierced by the girls’ squeals of fear, Brody pitched forward. Planting both hands on the dash with loud smacks, he studied the instrument controls. “There.” He pointed. “Push that button.”
Abe poked a black indented nub. All three window panels, both sides and the back, lowered. Shoved yards into the river, the all-terrain canted front first.
“Not that button. The red one. On top of the lever. Then pull the handle toward you.”
Set off by the press of the red button, whirs set the track frames in motion. The tracks moved away from the tank body and turned on their sides. Gears shifted and bumped into place at the bottom of the hull. In a glide, the all-terrain rose to the surface of muddy water.
“We’re a boat,” Abe said. “Woot and hot dang.”
“Abe, careful what you say.” Hannah shot her gaze at Darcy Lynn, then she turned to Brody. “How did you know what to do?”
“Some documentary I watched, I think.”
Abe steered with a swing of his entire torso to the right.
“How are we afloat if this thing is plated with metal?” Hannah asked.
“Air tanks.” Brody dropped to his knees. “There has to be some sort of tool kit in here.”
“We’re actually floating in the Holston River.” Abe’s butt stance bobbed his rear as the current swayed the vehicle.
Brody found a toolkit in an under-seat stow-area.
Hannah took a canvas zip bag from a storage cabinet above a window. “Medical kit with needle and thread.”
Darcy Lynn sniffed. “Will it hurt Fluffy?”
“It may look icky, but he won’t feel a thing. Promise.” In no time, the teen clipped pink seam thread with tiny scissors. “We have to look inside, then we’ll get him all fixed right up.”
“Eew. I can’t watch.” Darcy Lynn turned away.
Hannah opened a seam on the toy and removed cotton from the tan fur. She piled padding in the seat beside her, sending white bits of fluff and a berry sweetness flying. “So far, I’m only finding cotton stuffing inside.”
“Poor Fluffy!” Darcy Lynn moaned. “He still smells like strawberry lip balm.”
None to gently, Hannah pinched the ears and the tail.
Brody gripped a mini-screwdriver. He put off the inevitable and leaned in close to check out the stuffed animal parts. “Is that a scratch along the button eye rim?”
“Mamaw sewed the coat buttons after the other ones came off.” She covered her eyes, although her back was turned and moaned. “Oh no.”
Hannah snipped the black button from the hunk of fur and passed it to Brody.
Wary of being right, he pried the halves apart. In seconds, he held two button-half pieces. The bottom part cupped a shiny metal disk half the size of and twice as thick as a dime.
“A bug, like on TV,” Hannah said. “Look, Darcy Lynn.”
Darcy Lynn squealed and flapped her hands. “That’s no crawly bug. You made me look at poor Fluffy.”
Inside breezes shifted and blew.
“Stop. Hold your hands still.” Hannah snorted. “I told you I’d fix him.”
A hard gust swished from the ceiling and blasted into Brody. Knocked off balance, he toppled back and crashed into the dash.
An alarm sounded in drawn-out pulses.
“Dive in progress,” warned a metallic voice.
“What did you push? How did you start the dive?” Abe turned in a frantic search of buttons and levers. “Ah, shit fire and save matches.”
“Abe Jenkins, shame on you.” Hannah screeched. “Watch your language.”
“Brody.” Abe’s voice broke in a boy-teen squeak.
The voice from the video on Brody’s watch-cam warbled, then a line repeated, “Bro, by now you know…” The last word drew out and faded. “Knnnnnoooowwwww.” The crack across the glass face had widened.
“Hold up.” Brody tilted the watch face from left to right. “Shatterproof glass doesn’t break.” His chest ached. “I made sure to use high-quality glass when I designed the video camera watches.”
“The tools scattered all over the place.” Hannah fell to her knees and peeked under the seats. “Here’s a pair of scissors.”
Brody cupped the button halves and the bug. Taking the band off his wrist, he wedged the pointed tip of one of the scissor blades against the watch casing. With a twist, he popped the back free. A metal disk like the one in the button eye sat amid tiny wires inside the guts of the watch. “More than likely, Cantrell found us by tracking one or both of these. Crap.”
“We’re heading toward a pile-up of logs.” The steering wheel rose an inch or two and slid toward Abe.
The all-terrain’s front sank and dipped. “Dive in progress,” the automated voice said. “Dive in progress.”
“We’re going under.” Abe pressed into the driver’s seat.
“Fluffy will never be the same.” Darcy Lynn snuffled.
Hannah looked up from stuffing cotton. Staring out of the windshield, she froze. “None of us will.”
Water sloshed over the all-terrain’s hood.
“Got time to roll down a window?” Brody readied the tracking bugs in his hand for tossing.
Abe flipped a switch.
“All outer hatches sealed,” the boxed voice intoned. “Descent in progress.”
“A hammer will do the job.” Brody scooped up strewn stuff. “Here’s some glue. Might help with the eyes.” The acrid glue odor overtook the stale berry scent as he handed off a leaky tube to Hannah.
“Ugh,” Hannah said. “I hate crafts.”
“Poor Fluffy Dog.” Darcy Lynn sobbed.
“He will be better off without that bug in his eyeball. Good as new.” Hannah stopped poking stuffing back into the furry body and glued the eye halves. “I hate you for this, Brody Thackett.”
“It’s not good to hate.” A breeze ruffled Darcy Lynn’s curls.
“Hold these pieces.” Hannah passed off the button eyes. “Don’t get the sticky stuff on your fingers.”
The vehicle slid into the water like a duck aiming for fish.
“Shoo, that glue’s stout.” Abe blinked, and tears slid from his eyes.
Tears from the sharp odor also rinsed Brody’s eyeballs. “The exhaust should take care of the stink.”
Only, in the cabin, the vents stayed quiet.
“System glitch. Something’s off. Big time.” He scooted the tools down the aisle. Using a wrench as an anvil and a second as a hammer, he beat the two high-tech bugs into thin, warped disks.
“Mum’s the word, except on Sundays.” His reciting of one of Cantrell’s favored sayings shot aches into his chest. If only they were back home in his trailer shop eating crunchy cheese twists and drinking orange soda.
“Our secret.” She nodded and pinched the broken button.
“Yes ma’am.” Brody shoved the wrenches and ruined bugs aside and knelt next to the driver’s seat. “Abe, what’s the oxygen level reading?”
“Too many knobs and gauges.” Abe waved at several palm-sized backlit screens where a sun visor might reside. “The readouts are in Chinese, I think.”
“Scooch over.” At the headrest area, Brody arrowed through the screens. After a few failed tries, the business card-sized monitors blinked and scrolled words in English. The readout at the bottom read:
Outer access sealed for below-surface demo.
“Ah.” Abe’s grin soured as he eyed the water halfway up the windshield glass. He whispered, “If I was older, about now, I might say a bad word.”
“Wouldn’t blame you.” Brody searched the storage areas beneath the seats. “Girls, we need your help.”
“Nearly done,” Hannah said. “The glue fumes are giving me a headache.”
Brody rummaged through riot-type gear and bulletproof vests, shoving what he didn’t need aside. “For right now, Fluffy’s going to have to wait.”
“I want him now.” Darcy Lynn held the pinched button in one hand but curled and unfurled the fingers of her other at her side. “I liked him berryish, not gluish.”
With the shift of her fingers, a light draft blew in the all-terrain cab.
“Easy,” Hannah warned. “When we get out of here, we’ll see about finding and picking some fresh strawberries. Wouldn’t that be good?”
Darcy Lynn gasped. “Maybe there’s snacks under the chairs.”
So far, two of the cargo spaces under the seat rows held only soldier-type gear. “We have to find a manual. Quick. There’s not much time.”
“But…” hedged Darcy Lynn.