by Diane Hester
‘Your hands are cold,’ she murmured, staring away from him into the flames.
‘Want me to throw on another log?’ Starting at her nape he began trailing kisses across her left shoulder. When he reached its apex he worked his way back, burrowing towards her neck to whisper his next words into her ear. ‘Or would you rather just retire to the bedroom?’
Dark hair tumbled across her face as she turned her head towards him. ‘No, we’ll stay here. I’m sure we can find some other way to warm them.’
He laughed and rolled her onto her back. Christ, he needed this! After the day he’d had such mindless diversion wasn’t just welcome, it was therapy.
The cabin at least had been a pleasant surprise. Two bedrooms, fully furnished with a huge open fire and a view of some lake – the name of which had ten syllables he couldn’t pronounce, let alone remember. The only lodging for a hundred square miles, it was normally rented by vacationers seeking to truly get away from it all. But with the foliage season nearing its end and the skiing season not yet begun they’d been lucky in finding it unreserved.
Now, after a long hot shower and a meal of venison stew and crusty wheat bread – purchased from the general store – he was ready to put the day behind him. Along with all thoughts of three feral boys and what would happen if they weren’t caught.
Vanessa moaned softly, arching against him. As he bent to her breast, he noted dimly that his mobile was ringing.
‘You’d better get that.’ Her voice was husky.
She couldn’t be serious. ‘Message bank.’
Taking his head in both her hands she pushed him away, then swung up to sit with her back to him.
Nolan swore. How did women just turn off like that? With a muttered curse he took up the phone from the coffee table.
‘I could’ve sworn my last words to you were to keep me informed.’
Nolan’s mouth went instantly dry. ‘Tragg.’
‘Yet here it is going on ten o’clock and I haven’t heard a single word from my buddy. I was starting to worry.’ The man’s rough whisper made even the most innocent words a threat.
‘Tragg, listen, I was just about –’
‘Where the fuck are you?’
‘Deadwater. Maine. The town where the kids ended up. Vanessa’s here, too. We’re at a cabin by a lake.’
‘Having a little vacation, are you?’
‘What? No! We’ve been searching all day. Got some good leads. Vanessa’s sure that by tomorrow –’
‘You mean you haven’t found them yet.’
Five minutes later when he hung up the phone, Nolan’s cold sweat had raised gooseflesh over his body. Suddenly no fire in the world could warm him.
Vanessa nodded at his shrivelled erection. ‘I take it Tragg wasn’t happy.’
He shot to his feet and began pacing. ‘This is all that kid Ballinger’s fault! I swear to God when I find that smart-ass little prick –’
‘You won’t do anything,’ Vanessa cautioned in a level voice. ‘Be clear on this, Nolan. At this stage our goal is to get them back alive.’
He laughed as he balled his hands into fists. ‘I’m sure Tragg won’t mind a mark or two.’
Chapter 20
With a white-knuckled grip on the Chevy’s steering wheel, Shyler sat staring at the back of Bill’s shop. Her palms were already slick with sweat, her breathing rapid. And she hadn’t even shut off the engine yet! Twice on her drive in she’d nearly turned around and gone home again. If not for the fact she was out of just about everything in the cabin she wouldn’t have come.
Three trips to town in as many days was definitely more than she was ready for. In the last ten months, desperate to limit her exposure to anything that might trigger an attack, she’d made only four trips altogether. Yesterday’s had already proved her concerns were well founded, resulting in one of the turns she so feared. And as if that wasn’t enough to unsettle her, there was the dream she’d had last night.
She wouldn’t have thought anything could be worse than her usual nightmare where she relived what had happened. But dreaming of Jesse alive and whole, holding him, touching him, knowing the joy of his return, only to wake and find it an illusion, had been the cruellest form of torment.
Why? Why would her dream suddenly change? The strain of the second anniversary of his death? Encountering children two days in a row? An unplanned trip to the doctor’s office? A combination?
Whatever the cause, she couldn’t see the change as a sign her condition was improving. If anything it was getting worse. The dream had felt so incredibly real, a part of her had wanted to remain in that realm. And a sense of what that would mean in reality told her she was possibly nearing a crisis point.
Staring up at the back of Bill’s store she again felt the pressure to turn and run. In her current state, who knew what another trigger might do? But she had to eat.
She shut off the engine and looked around. Early morning, no other cars in the parking lot and there hadn’t been any out front on the road. The odds that Bill was alone inside were as good as they were going to get. She pulled on her hat, climbed from the car and closed the door.
Before locking it she checked for movement in the woods that bordered the back of the lot. As always her gaze was drawn to the thicket. Broad and leafy, the copse of moosewood was a perfect screen for an ambush. Ample cover for five young men, their leader a brute with a fish hook scar, his second a scarecrow with flaxen hair . . . another with a jaunty beret . . .
She stopped, took a breath and closed her eyes. Slowly she opened them, willing herself to see only what was real, only what was there.
Nothing. No shadows, no movement, no threat of any kind. They were long gone. It’s only the ghosts that live in your mind.
‘You said you’d find out where the ambulance went. You said we’d go there and get Corey back.’
‘We will, I promise. I just need to get something to eat first, okay?’
Zack looked down into Reece’s troubled face, feeling only slightly shamed by his lie. In truth he had no idea how he was going to find out about the ambulance. He couldn’t very well walk into the doctor’s office and ask. But just at that moment, and as bad as it made him feel about himself, Corey wasn’t his top priority.
After vomiting all he’d eaten the night before he just had to get something into his stomach. His hunger was like nothing he’d ever known. It overrode every other sensation – the biting cold, even the growing pain in his leg – and was so demanding he couldn’t think about anything else.
‘You’re hungry, aren’t you?’ he said to Reece.
The boy bowed his head. ‘Starving.’
‘Well, all right then. We do this first, then we find Corey.’
Zack turned back to the general store. From their vantage point amid the bushes at the far end of the lot, he could see a woman in a white woollen hat standing a few steps from the back door. For his plan to work he needed at least one other customer inside the shop. Why was she just standing there? Why didn’t she go in? What was she doing staring off into the woods like that? What the hell was she waiting for?
‘Do you think it’s far, where they took Corey?’
‘Will you forget about Corey till after we do this? I need you to concentrate. Now you remember what I told you to do, right?’
Reece shoved a knuckle into his mouth.
Zack pulled it out again. ‘Well, do you?’
‘Yeah, but . . . I’m scared.’
‘There’s nothing to be scared of. They can’t do anything to you if it’s an accident. You just have to make sure it looks like one.’
‘But I don’t know how.’
Zack clenched his jaw. ‘I told you how. You just drop something or knock something over. But not a little thing; it has to be something big and noisy.’
‘What if the man gets mad at me?’
‘So let him get mad! You want to eat, don’t you? Or would you rather have breakfast from the garbage can again?�
��
Reece grimaced and shook his head.
Zack sighed at the pathetic sight. ‘I don’t know what you’re worried about. I’m the only one who could get in trouble. I’m the one who’ll be stealing stuff.’
‘What if they catch you?’
In that one mournful question Zack finally heard the boy’s true fear – if he were caught, Reece would be alone. ‘Get real. It’s not like I’ve never done this before.’
‘It’s not?’
‘You kidding? I’ve shoplifted heaps. And that was in department stores with lots of people and security guards. This is nothing, just one little old man.’
Reece finally managed to return his smile.
Zack looked over at the store again. The woman was just walking through the back door. He got to his feet. ‘Okay, you ready?’
Reece swallowed and gave him a nod.
‘Right, let’s go.’
‘There!’
Nolan roused from his partial doze at the wheel of the rental car. After Tragg’s phone call the night before he hadn’t slept well, but the sound of Vanessa’s excited voice brought him fully awake in an instant.
They were parked some thirty yards up the road from the general store with a view of both its front and rear doors. Raising the binoculars, he spotted two small figures dashing across the parking lot for the building.
‘It’s them!’ he said. ‘Well, two of them anyway.’
‘Can you tell which ones?’
‘Looks like Ballinger and the middle one.’
‘Perfect. The little guy must be hiding somewhere. If we catch these two, he won’t hold out long on his own.’ Vanessa gave his shoulder a slap. ‘Didn’t I tell you they’d come back here?’
‘Yes. As always you were right.’
Impervious to his sarcasm, she pointed ahead. ‘Pull up along the side of the building. Then you go in the front and I’ll take the back.’
Chapter 21
‘Missed you yesterday,’ Bill said, stepping up behind the counter. ‘Found the boxes you left out back but you’d gone by the time I opened up.’
‘Yes, I’m sorry. I had to go.’ Shyler shot another glance around her. The store appeared empty, as she had hoped, but it didn’t do much to ease her anxieties.
‘No problem. I mighta been a few minutes late.’ Bill reached for a slip of paper and slid it across to her. ‘You had a few more sales this month. That’s yer total – not counting what’s on the tab.’
‘Thank you.’ The figure briefly caught her attention. The amount was more than she’d seen since mid-summer. She’d be able to get everything she needed and pay off a little of what she owed him. ‘I’ll take it in groceries again, if that’s okay?’
‘Fine with me.’
She moved quickly about the aisles, putting her purchases into a cart. Where once she might have shopped with care – comparing prices, choosing only the best quality produce – speed was now her top priority.
She was halfway through her list of items when she looked towards the back of the shop and froze. Two young boys stood close together near the freezer units. Where had they come from? She hadn’t heard the shop door open. Had they been here all along and she just hadn’t seen them?
In a matter of seconds a panic attack was bearing down on her. Run. Now. Before they see you. Before they come close!
She turned away, trying to slow her breathing as she scanned the list in her trembling hand. She couldn’t go yet. If she left without getting the things she needed she’d only have to come back again tomorrow.
Just don’t look at them. Keep your distance and get out of here as fast as you can.
Grimly she forced herself to walk on, throwing things into the cart as she went.
Zack started up the aisle furthest from the man at the counter. He’d been looking for a potential source of distraction but so far hadn’t spotted anything. Reece was sticking like glue to his side, growing more fearful by the second. If he didn’t hurry up and decide on something the kid would lose his nerve for sure.
Stopping before a display of garden tools, he tested a cluster of iron rakes. When he jiggled one handle the entire bunch moved, their tines interlocked. This would do.
He leaned down to Reece. ‘Okay, all you have to do is pull on this one and they’ll all fall over. It’ll make a lot of noise but it won’t break anything so the man won’t get angry.’
Reece didn’t answer.
‘When the guy comes over, keep him busy as long as you can. As soon as you see me leave the store, you leave too.’ When again the boy gave no response, Zack shook his arm. ‘You hear me or what?’
Reece raised his head, face streaked with tears.
Zack muttered all the bad words he knew. ‘Don’t be such a baby. All you gotta do is knock this down and then stand here. That’s it.’
Cowed by his tone, Reece nodded meekly.
‘Fine then. Let’s do it. Just give me a minute to get in position then watch for my signal.’
Reece clutched his arm. ‘Where are you going?’
‘Over there.’
‘Why?’
‘Because there’s no food in this aisle, dummy. You want to eat compost and cow manure?’ Zack pried his arm from the boy’s desperate grasp. ‘Everything we want is on that side of the store. That’s the idea. Just let me get over there and wait for my nod.’
Zack walked off without waiting this time. The little creep’s fears were getting contagious – if he didn’t act soon he’d lose his own nerve!
Pretending to inspect the goods on the shelves, he wandered to the head of the third aisle over. Twin walls of treasures stretched before him – salted nuts, crackers, potato chips, Fritos. He nearly cried at the sight of them all. He stretched up to peer over the shelf at Reece and gave a nod.
The boy didn’t move.
Zack shot a glance back towards the counter. The owner was ringing up a customer’s groceries, almost done. Any minute now the woman would leave and their chance would be gone.
He looked back towards Reece. Do it! he mouthed, with a fierce expression.
Reece bowed his head and started towards him.
Shyler dumped the last of her groceries on the counter. With only the occasional curious glance, Bill continued to tally her purchases and pack them in boxes. As fast as he filled them she piled them into the cart again.
‘That comes to just under your last total sales. What do you want to do with the difference?’
‘Put it towards what I owe you, please, Bill.’ She swung the last box onto the cart, returned his goodbye and started away from him.
Fear snapped her heels as she raced up the aisle. The palpitations had already started. She had to get out!
The back door was just past the end of the counter. Almost there. But cutting the corner, she caught a display with the front of her cart. The slatted crate teetered then fell with a crash. And twenty-five pounds of McIntosh apples cascaded over the wooden floor.
Zack jumped at a rumbling sound from the far side of the shop. The owner was emerging from behind the counter. He walked a short distance, bent and picked something up off the floor. The customer he had just been serving was doing the same, muttering apologies.
At the end of the aisle, Zack saw a small red object roll by. Then several more. He pulled Reece close and started shoving groceries down the neck of his sweatshirt.
‘What are you doing?’
‘Change of plans. Hold the bottom so nothing drops out.’
Reece clutched his waistband, glancing nervously towards the counter. ‘But I thought you –’
‘Some lady just dropped a bunch of apples. The owner’s busy – now’s our chance.’
With Reece’s shirt as full as he could pack it, Zack turned to start on his own. The woman had just gone out the back. They had seconds at most.
He’d just laid his hand on a bag of Fritos when movement at the window drew his eye. He looked up to see a face peering in at them. A masculine,
smiling, familiar face.
Zack dropped the corn chips and stumbled back, dragging Reece with him.
‘What is it?’ the boy said, following his gaze. The groceries he was holding crashed to the floor when Nolan stepped through the door in front of them.
They got only ten steps up the aisle when another familiar face appeared, this one near the rear of the store.
Vanessa flashed them her sweetest smile. ‘Hello, boys. Doing some shopping?’
Nolan was coming up the aisle behind them. Zack grabbed a can off a shelf and threw it. Unprepared, the man copped a hit to the shoulder and swore.
The boys raced on, reaching the end before Vanessa could cut them off. But around the corner, Reece, in his panic, veered up the aisle while Zack went straight. And as the boy flew blindly around its end, Nolan was there.
‘Zack! Zack!’
Zack stopped dead in the next lane over. He snatched a fishing rod off its stand, stepped up onto the lowest shelf and whipped Nolan about the head. The man dropped Reece and started after him.
‘Here now, what are you people doing?’ The owner stood gaping in disbelief.
Zack doubled back. Vanessa had moved towards the front of the shop – the back door was clear. But Nolan’s footsteps were closing behind him. As he passed the display he’d checked out earlier, he grabbed at a handle. The entire bundle of iron-tined rakes crashed into the aisle. A second later, another crash as Nolan sprawled over them. Zack raced on.
‘No! Lemme go! Zack, help!’
The screams drew him up ten feet from his goal. He turned back to see Reece now firmly in Vanessa’s grasp, with Nolan getting to his feet. He looked the other way. Ten paces only to the door and freedom.
With a cry of despair he ran for the door.
Chapter 22
The trembling had moved inward towards her core. It wasn’t just her hands shaking now, but the larger, more powerful muscles of her arms, legs, and back as well. It gave her the sense that unseen hands had taken hold of her and were trying to rattle her very bones.