by James Sperl
Dustin came out from behind the desk where he had been organizing paperwork. He moved to Clarissa and gently took her arm, as she hoisted a diaper bag onto her shoulder.
“Wait a second,” he said, holding a blink. “What're you talking about? Who's coming?”
Clarissa stopped to take a breath. She was certain she came off sounding like a crazy person, but she didn't have time to assure Dustin of her sanity. She needed to make sure he and everyone in the daycare got away safely. But when she looked into his eyes, that urgency fell away. God, she liked him. In all of the hullabaloo, she hadn't stopped to consider that this may very well be the last time she saw him. Her already depleted spirit sank to a new low.
Maybe he would come with them. Help them rescue Rachel, and discover once and for all what Rosenstein had done. It was all a fantastical wish, she knew, but she couldn't deny the spark that flew between them. She would love nothing more than to foster that attraction, but they didn't have time for romance. If Dustin felt as she did, he would have to make the decision to come with her on his own.
“There's a guy coming,” she began. “As we speak. Someone who's extremely dangerous and who's bringing an army with him to take this place.”
Dustin recoiled with disbelief. “What? What army?” He peered through the windows at the front of the store. “I haven't heard anything about this.”
“It's just now going down. You have to believe me.”
“Well, it's...it's not that I don't believe you,” he said, looking at her, “but how do you know about this and no one else seems to?” He nudged his chin toward the front of the store and the people who milled about on the other side of the glass. “I mean, no one looks particularly panicked at the...”
Dustin's words trailed when no less than three men wearing blue shirts and badges ran past the entrance. Another man in similar clothing charged after them from a different direction. Dustin turned back to Clarissa.
“Let's just say I have it on good authority that it's happening,” she said. “I don't know when they'll get here, but they're coming.”
Dustin walked to the entrance and peered outside. People reacted to the commotion. Heads turned in confusion, brows forming Vs over narrowed eyes. Another five men—only two of which were outfitted with blue shirts and badges—sifted through the crowd in the same direction as the previous four.
Three on-duty assistants had congregated by the receptionist's desk.
“What is it?” said a plump woman, who Clarissa thought was named Nora. “What's going on?”
Dustin turned around slowly, his face a mask of gloom. Though his response was intended for Nora, he looked directly at the ground and said, “Prepare everyone for evacuation.”
Nora and the other two women reacted with expected shock.
“What?” Nora exclaimed. “Evacuation? Why?”
Dustin charged past them and rounded the reception desk to collect some papers. “Some people are coming, and we don't want to be here when they arrive.”
“Someone's coming?” Nora said. She clutched the hands of the woman closest to her. “To New Framingham?”
“They are,” Clarissa said. “And they're going to be here real soon. So if you have a procedure to get these kids out of here, you need to do it.” She cut a look to Dustin. “Do you have a procedure?”
“Yes,” he said, shoving documents into a leather bag and slinging the bag over his shoulder. “We have a designated school bus parked out back for just this sort of emergency. Many of the seats have been modified with bassinets to accommodate infants and small children, so it's only a matter of transferring supplies and the kids that parents can't or don't pick up.”
Nora was fraught with anxiety. “But Dustin...the bus is in the garage.”
Dustin froze. “What?”
“Our bus came up in the queue for routine maintenance, remember? Steven over at the motor pool picked it up two days ago.”
Dustin thrust his hands to his hips and let his head drop. “Son of a bitch,” he grumbled, along with a string of other barely audible expletives. “Okay, we're going to have to go get it. Nora, take Samantha and get over there. Tell Steven or whoever's on duty that Dustin sent you and that we need our bus back, pronto. If things are truly happening, they won't argue.”
“Me?” Nora said, exchanging looks of panic with another woman, who Clarissa surmised must be Samantha.
“Yes, you. We don't have time to debate this. I'd do it myself, but I need to stay here and start gathering supplies. When you get here, leave the bus parked out back on Shopper's Word Drive. Don't pull into the loading area. I'll have everything we need waiting at the back entrance. I'll just need help transferring the children.”
Nora gave an uncertain nod but didn't budge. Dustin looked at her with calm assurance.
“You'll be fine, kiddo. But we've got to go.”
Nora shook off her hesitation as if it were a coating of dust and ambled for the entrance. Samantha ran ahead of her and pulled open the door. The pair shuffled outside, spoke briefly, then trotted off into a crowd that became increasingly excited.
Dustin rushed over to the remaining woman—a young, twenty-something gal with a nose ring and a half-sleeve tattooed down to her left elbow—and gingerly took her by the shoulders.
“Ronnie, I need you to start grabbing whatever formula and diapers you can and start hauling them outside. Forget the stuff in here. There are several pallets of unopened boxes in the warehouse. Get a bit of everything.”
Ronnie gave him a determined nod. “You got it.” She fast-walked through the three-to-five-year-old play area, stopping briefly to catch a rubber ball a small girl had thrown at her, then charged for the storeroom.
Dustin darted to and fro with purpose. He balanced his role of fun-loving guardian to the children who tugged at his shirttail against the pressure of having been charged with a scary and overwhelming task with startling aplomb. The situation would have tested the will of even the most uber-prepared, but Dustin was seemingly unfazed. He took selected moments to reassure and play with the kids in between collecting bottles, rags, pacifiers, bibs, or whatever else he deemed necessary, and dumping everything into empty boxes he grabbed from nearby shelves.
His swoon factor grew in direct proportion to Clarissa's admiration of him.
Naomi cried from her crib. Clarissa picked up the baby but stalled when her conscience threw up a mental roadblock. How could she just take Naomi and leave? How could she come in here, drop a bombshell, then just flee as if nothing else mattered? Could she really just abandon everyone and hope that Travis, and whatever drug-addled freaks he had doped up to tag along, showed mercy if Dustin and the others didn't make it out in time? The answer was of course, no, but she was already beholden to a plan. Clarissa's friends would be waiting for her at the storage facility, and she had every intention of meeting them. That didn't mean she couldn't spare a few minutes to assist.
“How can I help?” she said, slipping off the diaper bag from her shoulder.
Dustin paused from collecting cases of unopened baby bottles. “Yeah?”
“Of course,” Clarissa affirmed. “I mean, I have to meet my friends, but I can stay until Nora and Samantha get back with the bus.”
Dustin smiled, and Clarissa had never wanted to hug him more.
“You're awesome.”
“What do you need me to do?”
Dustin scoured the store with a pensive grimace. “In there. Bottom drawer,” he said, pointing at a file cabinet beside the reception desk. “There're numbered files that correspond to each child currently using a crib or bassinet station. Grab them and place each file with the appropriate child.”
She flew to the cabinet drawer and ripped it open. File headings were labeled clearly—0-3 months, 3-6 months, 6-12 months, 1-2 years, etc.—in bold green ink over multicolored tabs. Clarissa yanked out the pertinent files then kick-pushed the drawer closed with her heel.
“Well, I guess one thing's g
oing to have to wait,” Dustin said. He placed a stack of hypoallergenic wipes into a box then promptly taped it shut.
“What'll have to wait?”
“Asking you out on a date.”
The three-to-six-month files squirted from her hand onto the floor. She stooped to pick them up, using the moment to conceal the red that bloomed on her cheeks.
While she would have otherwise been ecstatic, Dustin's confession of mutual attraction only made things worse. If Travis was indeed coming, and leading an army as has been claimed, New Framingham was fated for extinction. There would be no future opportunity for them to be together. Clarissa would leave with her friends to try to find Rachel, and Dustin, and whoever else made it out alive, would regroup someplace well away from here. Their relationship would end before it even began.
And that sucked. It sucked big time. After months of failed conquests—years, actually—she had finally found someone who was dependable, honest, and thoughtful. And he liked her. It didn't hurt that he was also drop-dead gorgeous. But once again, along came Travis to fuck things up. It seemed as if she could trace every low point in her life back to him. He was like a tenacious and immutable virus that couldn't be killed, his sole purpose to destroy—and that was inclusive of the things he loved.
He was coming for her. Clarissa didn't need Valentina to tell her this. Had she only heard that Travis was coming to New Framingham and nothing else, she would have instinctively known that she lay at the heart of it. She was the one that got away, both literally and figuratively. And he couldn't accept it. Wouldn't accept it. Somewhere along the way, from the burgeoning sociopath he was in high school to the all out murderous villain he had become in later life, Travis had taken a detour from sanity and never looked back. Now, because of her, New Framingham would pay the ultimate price.
Clarissa collected the files then stood, tucking a lock of loose hairs behind her ear. She glanced at Dustin, who waited to see how she bit at the hook he had just set.
“I guess we're going to have to take a rain check,” she said with a pained smile. “At least for the time being.”
“Yeah,” he nodded, downcast. “I guess we will.”
Two couples entered the daycare. Here we go, thought Clarissa at the sight of the two men and two women who approached the reception desk. Word is out, so now everyone will be clamoring to get their child.
Dustin trotted over to the desk. “Can I help you?”
“Yeah,” said the first man, whose gruff appearance matched his equally gruff delivery. “We're here to pick up our son.”
Dustin eyed the man then passed his eyes over the people behind him before he dropped to a knee in front of the file cabinet. It could have been Clarissa's imagination, but something in his reaction told her that Dustin had never seen these people before.
“Name?”
“Hamilton,” muttered the man.
“Age?”
The man looked at the woman as if seeking the answer.
“Three,” the woman said without an iota of maternal tenderness.
Dustin fingered his way to the three-year-old section and perused the names. He looked up, confused. “Hamilton, you said?”
“Yes,” replied the woman.
“Hmm. I don't see it.” Dustin put his head down to search again, but as he did, the man walked past Clarissa and around the desk to stand beside him.
“What time did you bring him in?” Dustin asked.
Again, the man faltered. Again, the woman with him took the reins.
“Around seven or so.”
Dustin stopped cold. “Seven o'clock this morning? I was here then. I don't remember seeing you or anyone by that name drop—”
The man dropped down on Dustin like a circling hawk. He ensnared him with one arm while the other produced a syringe. In a flash, he sank the stubby needle into Dustin's neck.
Clarissa had barely let out a shriek of confused surprise when the woman with him attacked her from her blind side. She felt a pinch at the base of her neck along the left side just as the second couple hopped over the desk to aid in the assault.
Within seconds, the effect of the drug they had undoubtedly given her began to take effect. Hazy facsimiles were born from the things she saw. Each and every object had somehow generated clones of itself, the blurry images overlapping one another imperfectly. Clarissa's knees lost their ability to hold her upright, and before she knew it, she was eye-level with the floor.
She couldn't see Dustin anymore; she only saw his legs from the knee down along with the bottom half of the man who straddled him. In the same instant, she became acutely aware of someone sitting atop her. In her delirium, she had the sensation of someone securing her arms behind her back, but that was pure speculation. Her body and mind had become so numb, her legs could have been sawed off at the waist and she wouldn't have noticed.
Her dulled senses diminished even further by the second. A forced sleep was upon her. Had she been able to think clearly, she would have railed with questions—how long would she be out? would she be alone? would she ever wake up?—but all she could rally her brain to do was focus on the pair of feet that had just entered the daycare and walked over to her.
The fuzzy stalks stopped in front of Clarissa's face, but she couldn't make her eyes look up at the owner. The person crouched, and Clarissa got a whiff of something sickly sweet. Perfume?
“You should have kept your mouth shut,” said a water-logged voice directly in front of her.
Clarissa's eyelids fought to remain open, but it was a losing battle. Dark emptiness awaited her, and she couldn't do anything about it. Her body became weightless, the world around her a smeared and blackening image of a once-real place. Naomi cried somewhere in the void. It was the last thing Clarissa knew before a tsunami of darkness washed over her.
CHAPTER 65
It had been too long. Clarissa and Jon should have been here by now.
Andrew checked his watch again—forty-five minutes had passed since they all parted ways. He was sure that when he and Evan exited Lowe's, their arms overloaded with personal belongings, they would have discovered Jon, Clarissa, and Naomi waiting with Cesare and Elenora. But they hadn't shown up.
Something was wrong.
“We need to go back in and find them,” Andrew declared.
“Back inside?” Cesare said. “How're we going to find them with all that's going on? You're talking needle-in-the-haystack craziness.”
Cesare's analogy couldn't have been more accurate. In the time since Andrew and Evan had entered Lowe's, the climate around New Framingham had gone from curious stirrings to full-blown hysteria—everyone knew someone dangerous was coming, and they were sufficiently freaked out about it. Trying to track down not one but two individuals amid the barely controlled chaos of a community on the brink of battle was an unenviable task. But they had to try.
“That may be,” Andrew agreed. “But Jon and Clarissa should both be here by now.”
“No, I know.”
“What do we do with all this stuff?” Evan asked, indicating the pile of bags and backpacks he had just helped haul. “We can't lug everything while we're looking around, and putting it back seems dumb.”
“Yes, it does,” Andrew said. “Which is why I was kind of hoping I could count on you to watch it for us while Cesare and I went back inside to look for them.”
Evan sighed and let his shoulders slump.
“I know,” Andrew said. “Sorry.”
Elenora leaned over to Evan from her seat atop a concrete barrier. “In case you missed it,” she began, “I'm included in our little island of misfit toys.”
“Nonna...” said Cesare.
“It's fine. And it's right. While I have no doubt Evan would be of assistance in there, I would only slow everyone down. That said, I would prefer not to sit out here all alone.” She searched Evan's eyes. “What do you think? You up for keeping an old lady company?”
“Sure,” Evan sulked.
Andrew stepped over to him and crouched into his line of sight. “I know you think I'm asking you to stay because I think you're just a kid. Far from it,” he said, shaking his head. “I trust you as much as I trust anyone in our group. And the fact of the matter is, I need somebody—we need somebody—trustworthy and reliable to hang back in case something happens to us. I know it sounds like I'm feeding you a line, but I promise you, I mean every word.”
Evan lifted his chin to look at Andrew.
“It's true,” Cesare said. “This is my nonna. You think I trust just anyone to stay with her? Especially now? It brings me peace to know that you'll look out for her if things go bad.”
“Which they won't,” Elenora said. She raised an index finger for emphasis.
Andrew stood. “No, they won't.”
Evan's eyes flitted between Andrew and Cesare. “Just hurry, okay? I don't want to be sitting out here if that joker and his army of nutjobs show up.”
“You mean we don't want to be sitting here,” Elenora corrected.
“Right.”
“Then we better get moving,” Andrew said.
Cesare began backing away. “We'll be back as soon as we can.”
Elenora offered a thin smile. “Faster would be better.”
“Love you, Nonna.”
“I love you back, amore.”
Andrew waited until Evan looked at him to say, “Thanks, Evan.”
“Sure,” Evan replied. “Just please be fast.”
Andrew couldn't think of a word he wanted to be more at the moment.
* * *
“What the hell do you mean you're in lockdown?” Andrew said, his blood beginning to rise. “We were in there less than an hour ago!”
“That was an hour ago,” said the on-duty guard, who, along with seven others, blocked the entrance into New Framingham. All were heavily armed and fitted with military-grade Kevlar vests. “Folks can leave, but re-entry is prohibited for now.”
“But we've got friends in there who're supposed to meet us.”
“Then they're going to have to meet you outside.”