by Ryan Casey
And as she held onto him, tears rolling down her face, she could convince herself just for a few seconds that it was Bobby she was holding all over again.
And that made her feel so guilty.
She crouched down. Grabbed Will’s hands.
“Your mum’s going to come back, okay? She’s going to come back soon. And when she does, you have to know Will that nobody’s going to leave you. Nobody else is going away. Because we’re strong. All of us are so strong. And we’re going to stick together, right? We’re—we’re going to stick together and we’re going to get through this.”
She saw Will looking into her eyes and as difficult as it was, and as much as she was never, ever going to get over what’d happened to her son, she believed what she’d said.
They were going to find strength from this.
Somehow, they were going to keep on going from this.
She just had to hope Alex got back fast so they could get started with that.
“Look,” Will said. He pointed over Sarah’s shoulder. “They’re here.”
Sarah’s heart felt like it stopped. She turned around. Alex? Could it be?
She saw the people walking towards the farm.
And for a second, just a second, she believed it.
She really believed it was them.
And then she saw the man leading the group, dressed in all black, and she realised it wasn’t them at all.
“Get inside, Will,” Sarah said.
Will didn’t respond. He didn’t move.
“I said get inside.”
Will stumbled away then. But Sarah held her ground.
Because she recognised the man walking towards her.
She recognised him very well.
He stopped. Just metres away from her. And all sorts of emotions stirred up inside her body. All kinds of urges. All kinds of desires.
All kinds of fears.
Jon lifted his hand. “Hello again. Alex not home?”
Sarah didn’t say a word.
Jon smiled. “Good,” he said. “Then we’d better get started.”
He pulled out his knife.
And then, together with his people, he stepped towards Sarah.
Chapter Twenty-Four
When I saw the squirrel logo pasted across the main gate of the campsite—Hawthorne’s—I knew for a fact that we’d made it.
The clouds of evening had thickened overhead. The campsite itself wasn’t exactly in the easiest of locations to access by holidaymakers. It was literally in the middle of the woods. I figured only people who really knew the area would be aware of this place, like a hidden secret right on nature’s doorstep.
Only now it was home to something entirely different.
Someone entirely different.
I listened to the total silence as I stood there, Peter and Suzy by my side. My heart raced as I took deep, steadying breaths of the cool, breezy air. I could taste acidic bile at the back of my throat as the reality of the situation dawned on me.
I’d made it to Jon’s camp. We’d all made it to Jon’s camp.
And now we were going to do what we’d come here to do.
I took a few steps towards the campsite, but then I felt a hand on my arm. When I turned, I saw that it was Suzy.
She was looking at me with wide, narrowed eyes. Like she wasn’t sure about this.
“What?” I said.
She audibly swallowed a lump in her throat, shook her head. “Just… just let’s be careful about this, okay? Let’s not do anything rash.”
I wanted to pull away from her and march into the camp. I wanted to find Jon, to wrap my hands around his throat and squeeze the life from his body. I could feel the urge to do so building up inside me, getting progressively more intense.
But at the same time, I knew that Suzy was right.
I had to be careful. We all had to be careful.
We didn’t know anything about what might be on the other side of the campsite gates.
We didn’t know who or what might be there, already waiting for us.
I examined the surrounding area. There were no signs of people on watch. No sign of anything like that, really. And in a way, that disconcerted me. Because the fact that this place was silent, although a positive in some respects, just created an eerie, ominous vibe that I couldn’t help but feel cautious about.
The silence didn’t recede any further as I made my way closer to the gates of the campsite. In fact, I was pretty certain there were no sounds coming from inside there. Nothing but the wind brushing against the trees; the birds singing away, still totally oblivious to the changes in the world.
I wasn’t sure how long we spent just standing outside the campsite. But the longer we spent, the more the urge and desire to get in there and find Jon grew inside me.
I looked around at Suzy and at Peter. “We’re going in,” I said.
Peter shook his head. “Alex—”
“You’ve been at this place as long as I have. Surely by now you’ve seen there’s nobody around.”
“We can’t know that for certain,” Suzy said, joining Peter.
I looked at the pair of them and I shook my head. “I knew I should’ve done this alone.”
“Alex, don’t be like—”
“I told you if you weren’t happy about this, you should head back. But you insisted you came with me. You did. Don’t forget that.”
“We’re trying to keep you alive,” Peter said.
“Well maybe it’s time you started thinking about keeping yourselves alive. Because I have to do this. For my Bobby. For my son.”
My voice broke when I said Bobby’s name. And I found myself looking at the ground, a gaping hole stretching through my body, wounding me.
I took a sharp breath and looked back up at Peter and Suzy.
“I go inside,” I said. “I check this place out. You don’t have to come with me. I don’t expect it of you. Just… just keep yourself out of the way. And keep yourself safe. Okay?”
I could see from the looks on Suzy and Peter’s faces that they wanted to argue; they wanted to disagree.
But instead, they just kept quiet, and they nodded their heads. “Stay alive, Alex,” Suzy said. “Please.”
I nodded, began to turn around. “I’ll do my b…”
I stopped speaking then.
I stopped because I’d seen something.
Something right behind Peter and Suzy.
“There’s someone there,” I said.
Peter frowned. Suzy looked around, alarmed. “What’re you talking about?”
I looked all around at the trees and I felt like they were closing in on me. The wind sounded louder. The birdsong grew more intense.
And suddenly everything started to come together.
The silence inside the campsite.
The eerie feeling I’d felt as I stood there, waiting to enter.
“We have to get away from here,” I said.
Suzy’s eyes narrowed. “Alex? What’re you—”
“We have to get away from here. Now!”
I grabbed Suzy and Peter’s hand and I started to run, run off into the trees, run anywhere.
I didn’t get far.
Not when I saw who was standing opposite me.
“Okay,” Jon said. “Okay. Making another move would be a bad idea. Believe me.”
But it wasn’t just the fact that Jon was here.
It wasn’t just the fact he was holding a long, sharp blade.
It was the people kneeling in front of him.
Will.
Beth’s daughter, Kaileigh.
Ellie.
And Sarah.
“No!” Suzy said.
She staggered towards Jon, eyes on her son.
I grabbed her arm. Pulled her back.
“You can’t do this,” I said.
Suzy kicked out and struggled. “Don’t tell me that. Not after all you’ve dragged us through don’t—”
“Suzy,”
Peter said, grabbing her other side. “Alex is right. We can’t do this. We can’t put them all in danger. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
Suzy started crying, then. And as I tried to hold her back, her efforts to reach her hostage-held son weakened.
Jon stood there, thin smile on his face. “So I’ll tell you how this is going to go. You’re going to turn around. You’re going to walk away. And you’re going to never set foot in this camp again. Because if you do…”
He moved the blade to Sarah’s neck. Lifted it hard enough to cut her skin.
“You know what happens if you do.”
He looked me in the eye.
Smiled.
Then he pulled the knife away from Sarah’s neck.
I looked at Sarah all this time. I looked at her defeated, bloodshot eyes. And I could tell that she was worn down. Totally worn down.
She’d lost her belief and that destroyed me. Totally destroyed me.
But I had to be bold.
I had to make a brave move.
“If you step one foot closer to me right now,” Jon said, “they die. The lot of them. They all die, then you die.”
“No,” Suzy said, struggling again. “My son. You leave my son alone!”
“And we will,” Jon said. “As long as you co-operate, we’ll leave him completely alone. But you have to co-operate. Gonna need your word on that one. And while you’re here, we’re gonna need your supplies and your weapons, too.”
I looked at the people kneeling before Jon. I looked at Will, the tears rolling down his soft cheeks. I looked at Kaileigh by his side, the little girl I’d promised to protect. Then I looked at Ellie. She had a nasty bruise on the front of her head. She looked half the person she was earlier.
And then I looked again at Sarah.
I could see that look in Sarah’s eyes. I could see what she wanted me to do; what she was trying to make me do.
But I could see a path in front of me, as I gripped tightly to my knife.
The only path that could get me my vengeance.
I looked up at Jon and felt the rage towards him building, more and more.
Then, I took a deep breath and I dropped my knife.
And then my rucksack.
Peter and Suzy looked at me, baffled.
“What?” Suzy said. “You can’t just… They have my son, Alex. They have my son.”
I looked right into Suzy’s eyes. “I’m sorry,” I said. “But we don’t have a choice.”
I looked to Peter and after a few seconds of silence, he followed me in dropping his weapons, his rucksack.
Then together we took Suzy’s rucksack away, pulled the knife from her hand, threw it to the ground as she kicked out, screamed out, showing an intensity I’d never seen from her before.
I looked back at Jon as Peter and I held onto Suzy. I looked into his eyes, at his flat smile, and I thought of all the things I wanted to say to him, all the things I wanted to do to him.
“You made the right call,” he said. “We’ll look after your friends. Don’t you worry about that.”
His eyes twinkled.
I gritted my teeth. Came so close to throwing myself at him.
But I held my nerve.
I looked at Sarah then. I looked right into her eyes. And even though she looked totally lost, I hoped she could see the way I was looking at her. I hope she knew what I was thinking. What I was doing.
But in the end, I couldn’t say a word to her.
I couldn’t say a word to anyone.
I just turned around, Peter and Suzy by my side, and I walked off into the woods.
I didn’t look back.
Not once.
Chapter Twenty-Five
“I can’t believe you’d do that, Alex. After how far we’ve come. After everything we’ve gone through. All for you. You just walk away? You make me walk away? How can you do that?”
I listened to Suzy’s voice and I kept on walking. It was dark now. All around us, trees, as we kept on going through the woods. I listened to our footsteps crack through the branches and I heard Suzy’s shouting, her crying, and I knew for a fact that I was right to feel guilty.
After all, she was right. We’d just walked away from Will. And not just Will—Ellie, Kaileigh, Sarah.
We’d stood opposite Jon and his people as they’d held these people we cared about dearly as hostages.
I’d had a chance, just for a moment, to get my revenge on Jon.
But I hadn’t taken it.
I hadn’t, because I hadn’t been able to.
And now we were walking away.
“Suzy, please,” Peter said.
“No,” she said. I didn’t look back at her, but I didn’t have to. I heard her shuffling free of Peter, picking up her pace. And it wasn’t long before I felt a hand smack into my back. “Hey,” she said. “Hey! Look at me.”
I stopped, then. I stopped because I realised there was no way I could just keep on walking, not anymore. I had to face Suzy head on. I had to face up to our problems, head on.
I turned around, sour taste in my mouth, and looked right into Suzy’s eyes.
There were dark shadows underneath them, bigger than usual. Her bottom lip was quivering. She didn’t look in a good state. And I felt guilty for that. I felt so guilty for that.
“You take us out into the woods to get revenge for your son’s death. We come with you. We come all that way with you. And what do you do? You turn away.”
“I did what I had to do to keep them safe.”
Suzy’s eyes widened. “Keep them safe?” She laughed in disbelief. “Keep them safe? Really? That’s what that was? Because from where I was standing, that bastard had a knife to your wife’s neck. Keep them safe?”
“And if we hadn’t walked away, he would’ve used that knife.”
I started to turn, to carry on walking.
But Suzy grabbed me again and pulled me back.
“I appreciate this is difficult for you. Really, I do. But this isn’t a game anymore, Alex. This isn’t just some quest for revenge. They have your wife. They have my son. And you can’t tell me you’re just going to give up. Not when you got us into this mess in the first place.”
I narrowed my eyes. “What?”
Suzy lowered her head. “Screw it.”
“No. You said I got us into this. What do you mean by that?”
Suzy shook her head. And I could tell right then that she wasn’t going to respond.
“She’s right.”
I looked over Suzy’s shoulder.
It was Peter.
I shook my head. “Not you too.”
“If you’d been more forgiving, right from the very start, then maybe we wouldn’t be out here.”
I turned away. Started to walk. I wasn’t sticking around for this.
“If you’d been more forgiving, maybe our people wouldn’t have been captured.”
“Piss off.”
“If you’d been more forgiving, maybe your son would still be alive.”
It was those words that stopped me.
Those words that made my skin turn cold.
Those words that made me turn around and face Peter, head on.
“What did you just say?”
Peter didn’t look remorseful for his words. And that’s what got to me even more.
He looked like he was genuine about them. Like he really meant them.
And that made me tighten my fists and start to walk towards him.
“Hey,” I said, the red mist rising in front of me. “I asked you a question. What did you—”
“I said if you’d been more forgiving, maybe your son would still be alive. And you know it.”
I picked up my pace. I didn’t see Peter as a friend anymore. Just someone I had to get to. Someone I had to take my anger out on.
“You know it and that’s what’s tearing you up inside. That’s what’s making you act the way you’re acting.”
Moving quicker towards Peter no
w.
So close to him.
So close to letting the anger out.
“You know it’s true and the guilt is destroying you.”
So close.
“But you can still conquer it,” Peter said. “You can still fight it. You can still put things right. And there’s only one way to do that now.”
I stopped, then. Stopped dead, just inches from Peter’s face.
I looked into his eyes. He held my gaze. I could smell his sour breath, see his heart fluttering under his shirt. And I wanted to plough my fist into his face for what he’d said. I wanted to put him on the ground.
But instead, I turned to Suzy. “I’m sorry for what I did. For leading you into this mess and then for what happened to your son.”
Then I looked at Peter.
“But if you think I’m giving up, you’re wrong. You’re so wrong.”
I walked past him. Then I turned, looked at both him and Suzy, as they stared at me, bewildered.
“I’ve made mistakes. I can see that now. I can see it clearer than ever. I’ve… I’ve not been as forgiving as I should’ve been. And maybe things would be different if I had been. But right now there’s only one thing we can do. Only one direction we can go.”
“And that is?” Peter asked.
I swallowed a lump in my dry throat and looked at Peter and Suzy. “We’re going to get Will back. We’re going to get Kaileigh back. We’re going to get Ellie back, and we’re going to get Sarah back. And I’m going to get my revenge.”
I walked past them, in the direction we’d been heading all along.
“Er, Alex?” Suzy said.
I turned around. “What?”
“Jon’s camp. It’s the other way.”
I looked in the direction we’d come from.
Then I took a deep breath and looked at the trees ahead.
“I know,” I said. “But there’s something we have to do first.”
“And what could be more important than fighting to get our people back?”
I kept my focus on the trees as a plan began to form in front of me. And it seemed clearer than ever. “Getting the supplies we need,” I said. “The supplies we need to take those bastards and their camp down. Once and for all.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Playing the long game wasn’t something any of us were in the mood for right now.