False Step

by Victoria Helen Stone

  She knew he didn’t really want to talk. He was proceeding with this charade of a discussion because he didn’t want evidence in his car. Evidence like her blood and brain matter. Veronica shook her head and braced her feet against the floorboard.

  “Unbuckle the seat belt and come inside. We’ll spend the night here, then go back tomorrow.”

  “No.” She wouldn’t make this easy for him. She had to fight for Sydney.

  “Veronica, get out of the car.”

  The second “No” was only forming on her tongue when he grabbed her hair and yanked her halfway out of the car, playing tug-of-war with the seat belt that pulled at her neck and waist. Her head flamed with pain. She grabbed his fist, trying to hang on, trying to ease the tension. And then something heavy fell and dropped her into numb darkness.

  CHAPTER 26

  Her head throbbed and spun. Her shoulder ached. Something was very wrong with her. There’d been a wreck of some kind. Johnny had rolled the truck. Or she’d crashed her car? Was that what had happened?

  The skin of her neck and hip burned, and she thought she could map the injury in the shape of a seat belt. But those pains were a vague annoyance compared to the throbbing beat that had once been the left side of her skull. Every pulse of her blood swelled the pain to an unbearable level before it briefly subsided again.

  She tried to raise a hand but, instead of touching her head, she hit herself in the face. That one small defeat felt too difficult to overcome, so she gave up with a groan and let her hands fall to her stomach. She wanted to dip back beneath the surface again. She wanted to sleep until the pain was over. If someone had given her morphine, it had worn off.

  “Help,” she whispered. “Help.” The word stirred alarm inside her rib cage. Her heart fluttered and stammered out a faster beat, and she felt a tear leak from her eye at the quicker pace of the pounding in her head.

  Had Veronica been alone? Was Sydney okay?

  The eyes she’d kept tightly shut popped open at that thought. Veronica braced herself for the bright lights of a hospital room, but she was met by only a gentle glow somewhere behind her. The rest of the space was a shadowed gradient of brown to black. The soft light behind her revealed only a circle of her world. The bright-blue nylon fabric that covered her chest. A few drops of blood on her sleeve. The vague shapes of her hands. She raised them again, and both her hands came together, bound by a zip tie.

  Help.

  Not a car accident. Not an accident at all. She remembered the drive and the mountains and she remembered Micah.

  Air choked out of her, as if she were retching it from her body.

  Micah had shot her. Micah had killed her.

  But no. He hadn’t done a very thorough job of it. Not only was she not dead, she could still move all her limbs. Careful now that she knew her hands were bound together, she slowly raised them and stretched to touch her scalp as softly as she could. The flesh felt swollen but not destroyed. When she drew back, her fingertips were smeared with only a tiny amount of blood.

  Drawing encouragement from that, she touched again, probing a little more firmly. It hurt like hell, but she didn’t feel any skull or brain. Apparently he’d only pistol-whipped her.

  Did that mean he wasn’t going to kill her after all? Even more unlikely, maybe he hadn’t even hit her. Maybe she’d just tumbled from the car and slammed her head on the ground.

  “Micah?” she croaked. When he didn’t answer, she felt a surge of hope that he had simply left her there. She couldn’t fathom why he would, but she could hardly think at all. Perhaps he’d changed his mind. Perhaps he’d found his soul.

  Her eyes had managed to focus a bit more in the dark. Now she could see a wooden wall across from her and a closed door. She shifted and the bed she was on shifted a little too, making her grab awkwardly at the edge to hold herself still. Her hands found a metal bar. Not a mattress. She was on a cot. The same cot Tanner had slept on, no doubt.

  As soon as the thought hit her, she realized she could smell urine, and she pictured poor little Tanner huddled here for four nights, terrified and alone. A man she’d thought she loved had done that to him.

  Horror rolled through her, turning her stomach. She swallowed against it. Tried to breathe. Panted instead.

  She’d told herself that Johnny had been just as guilty as anyone he’d conspired with, but it wasn’t true. Johnny hadn’t grabbed that boy and covered his mouth. He hadn’t heard that child crying. He hadn’t stuffed him with drugs to keep him docile. Micah had done all of that, and—lying here in this dark, dirty cabin—she could feel the terror of it. The heartlessness.

  If Micah had left her alone here, she had to escape. If he hadn’t, she’d do whatever she needed to do to get back to Sydney.

  Veronica twisted to her side and dropped her legs over the edge of the cot. Her shoes scuffed against grit and dirt as she pressed her hands against the stiff edge of the cot and pushed up as hard as she could. Her head screamed in protest and her stomach lurched. She felt her throat pushing up, bile rising, and dropped to her hands and knees on the floor just in time to vomit.

  “Oh God,” she panted as soon as the waves of nausea subsided. “Oh God.”

  Everything felt steadier, though, as if her body had made its objection clear and was willing to calm down. She spit and closed her eyes for a moment, waiting for her head to stop spinning. The cold air soothed her and cleared her mind. She could do this.

  Sliding her hands back onto the cot, she braced her weight in the middle of the canvas and pushed up, wincing as the frame rocked under the force. But the muscles of her legs eventually decided to contribute and she managed to unfold herself into a standing position.

  A brief flare of triumph blazed in her chest, but it faded to nothing when she remembered that standing wasn’t the ultimate goal and wouldn’t be close to the hardest part of this. She wanted to collapse and cry, but she straightened her shoulders instead, readying herself to walk across the room. She just had a bump on the head. She was fine.

  She turned carefully, arms outstretched for balance as she shuffled across the floor, terrified of tripping over some unseen obstacle. When she made it to the door, she leaned against the rough, swollen wood in relief.

  There was no knob, only a kitchen cabinet–style handle. She pulled gently at it but felt no give. Holding her breath in fear, she pulled harder. The metal handle dug into her fingers. The door didn’t budge.

  Hoping it had only swollen into the frame over the decades, she gave up on subtlety and yanked hard, then yanked even harder. Her fingers slipped off the metal, singing with pain. The door wasn’t stuck; it was locked or bolted or nailed from the other side.

  Pressing her hands to it, she held her breath again and strained to hear any noise through the wood. Was this the front door of the cabin, or was there another room? She’d had only the briefest glimpse when they drove up, but she thought she remembered shuttered windows. There were no windows in this wall. There was another room on the other side, then, and Micah could be right there.

  When she turned to survey the rest of the room, there wasn’t much to see. An electric lantern hung from a hook in a ceiling beam, and it revealed the cot, a bucket, and a cooler sitting on a bare dirt floor.

  The dry sourness of her mouth suddenly overwhelmed her, and she stumbled to the cooler to open it. Fetid air greeted her with no hint of cold. The cooler contained no ice, only an old stick of string cheese and a juice box. She snatched the juice box up and managed to work the straw loose; then she held the box between her knees and pierced it with the straw.

  Her stomach rolled when she drank it, but she kept sucking until it was dry. She could almost feel the sugar hit her bloodstream as she walked the perimeter of the room. There was a window just past the cot, or there had been. It had been boarded over with thick planks of wood screwed into the window frame. She gave one of the planks a hopeless tug, but it proved as immovable as the door.

  That was it. Th
ere was nothing else. Escape was off the table. She’d never get back to Sydney. Never see her as a teenager or adult. Never tell her that her father had done something wrong, but he hadn’t hurt that boy. He wasn’t a monster; he was only a fool.

  She felt her face crumple with tears and groaned. No, she wouldn’t break down. She wouldn’t give up.

  Returning to the door, she leaned close, drawing up every ounce of courage in her cowardly soul. “Micah?” she rasped. He didn’t answer. She pressed her ear to the wood and listened for movement. “Micah, are you there? Can we talk now?”

  Nothing.

  Head pounding, she lowered herself carefully to the floor and slumped against the door to wait for the dizziness to pass. Then she’d try the door again. The window. She’d dig at the dirt of the floor. She’d find a way out.

  Sleep must have pulled her under, because she jerked awake at a faint crunching sound, her neck protesting the sudden movement with a jolt of pain. Utterly disoriented, she looked blankly around the room for a moment. A car door closed somewhere, and she was still trying to piece her memory together when she heard a voice.

  “What the hell’s going on, man?” the muffled voice shouted.

  Johnny. She’d run from him earlier, but now her heart leapt with desperate hope. “Johnny!” she croaked out.

  “We need to talk,” Micah replied, the words soft through the walls.

  “Johnny!” she tried again, her voice barely scraping past her parched throat. Her eyes filled with tears as she was buffeted by twin gales of hope and despair. He was here. Here to save her, maybe. Here to talk, even. Maybe Micah would let them go.

  But she knew Johnny was really here because Micah wanted them in the same spot. She pushed up to her knees and banged her fists on the door.

  “Is this the place, man? What the fuck? I thought I wasn’t supposed to know where it was!” He sounded near tears, as if he’d just realized the danger himself.

  “Johnny!” This time she had a real voice but she still wasn’t loud enough. With a cry of desperation, she got one shaking leg beneath her and forced herself to stand.

  Micah murmured something too soft for her to hear past the wood walls of the cabin. Then he said, “I told her everything. She’s on board.”

  “No!” she screamed. “Run! Johnny!”

  A moment of silence, and then he shouted, “Babe?”

  “Come on,” Micah called cheerfully. “We’ll have a beer and you can drive her home.”

  “Thanks,” Johnny answered, his voice closer now. Thanks, as if he owed Micah his gratitude for this.

  “Johnny, run!” she yelled, trying to warn him. “Run! Run!”

  A lock slid on the other side. She backed up. “Wait. No! Johnny don’t—”

  The door opened. Her husband surged through the opening. She held up her bound hands, reaching for him, warning him, as he grasped her shoulders. “No!” she screamed.

  “Babe, what the hell—?” And then he was gone. Not all of him, but important parts of him. His right temple. Part of his eye. A big piece of his head flew off. Her face felt hot and wet as she blinked at him falling away from the gun that had pressed to the right side of his head.

  Johnny disappeared and it was only Micah standing there, his lips a tight, white seam. No husband between them anymore. No one at all.

  Johnny was dead.

  “I didn’t want this.” His words were far away and muted by the ringing in her ears. She took a step back, shaking her head, her whole body a terrified mess of fight or flight, the muscles screaming for help.

  Micah lifted a hand, palm up, as if asking her to understand him. “He was supposed to pick up the kid and be a hero. That was all. He was excited about it. And that was going to be the end. It would have been good for you. For your family. But he couldn’t keep his mouth shut. He couldn’t even hide a goddamn phone correctly. This is his fault for being an idiot, V. You see that, right?”

  She moved away from him, away from the light, as if the darkest corner of the room could protect her, could save her so she could get back to her daughter. Sydney’s father was gone, but her mother was still alive. Veronica couldn’t give up.

  But there was no way out. He’d brought them here to stage a murder-suicide. The only reason he hadn’t killed her hours ago was because they both needed to die at the same time, their blood mixing on the floor together.

  She could see it all. Johnny’s heartfelt suicide note. The blow to her head to keep her quiet. The phone tracing Johnny’s path up the mountains. The cabin as a perfect tie wrapping up this gift to detectives. This is where I kept the kid, and this is where I killed my wife and myself when the investigation closed in on me.

  The end.

  Veronica blinked hard, trying to stop the strange movie playing in her head. “No,” she whispered.

  Micah threw his hands in the air. Hands that had once caressed her and would kill her at any moment now. “Why the hell did he tell you?” he barked. “All he had to say was he was sleeping around. That was it. I gave him the fucking story. You were already jealous of Neesa. I told him exactly what to say.”

  “Please,” she sobbed. “Sydney. She’s my baby. She can’t be an orphan, Micah, please. She can’t be all alone.”

  “I’m sorry, V. Come on.” He reached out his hand as if she’d take it. He wanted her close to Johnny, and he thought she’d just walk over there with him and make it easy. She backed all the way to the wall and slid down into the corner to make herself small.

  All she wanted was to return to her daughter. To her life. The perfect life that she’d held in her hands with no appreciation for what she had. That boring, safe, no-frills life she’d being trying so hard to escape. She wanted it back now. She’d had everything. She’d had Sydney. A safe and happy home.

  “Micah,” she tried. “You love me. You love me; you said you did. Please don’t do this. I’ll tell the police I lied about his alibi, okay? I’ll tell them he came here to commit suicide. I’ll write a new note on the computer explaining everything. Just don’t leave my baby all alone. Don’t kill me. I’ll do anything. She needs me.”

  He moved closer, blocking the light, reduced to nothing but a silhouette looming over her as she shifted, pressing her back to the wall, steadying her body. Micah was huge above her. A giant shadow of death, his familiar shoulders distorted by the low light into a darkness that filled her world.

  “I’m sorry,” he muttered. “I swear I’m sorry. But it’s over. I talked Johnny into getting your kid out of the house for the night. I did that. I’m not a monster, Veronica. I wouldn’t hurt her. I didn’t want to hurt her.”

  She felt mad, wild, unable to fathom his stupid words. “How?” she screamed. “How are you not hurting her? I’m her mother. She needs me.”

  “Johnny did this,” he insisted. “Not me. This is his fault.”

  “This is you,” she tried, desperate to change his mind. “You’re doing this. You don’t have to, Micah. You don’t have to. Just stop this. It’s not too late. I don’t care about any of this. I’ll lie. I don’t care!”

  He ducked down and she screamed when he put a hand to her cheek. This man who’d touched her a thousand times. She screamed at the horror of it.

  He murmured a soothing “Shhhh,” as if that would make her accept her own death.

  Her thighs burned from holding her weight. She shifted forward to her toes. “Help me?” she whispered, the words rising with the sickness in her throat. “Help me up and hold me for a minute, please? I’m so scared, Micah. I don’t want . . . I don’t want to die like this.”

  “Hey.” His hand moved gently to her shoulder.

  “I love you,” she sobbed, the words a fiery lie in her throat.

  “Come here.” His left arm slid toward her elbow; his voice hovered just above her. She could see the shadow of the gun in his right hand, pointed toward the wall. “Come on.” His breath just above her as if he were whispering all the endearments she’d wanted t
o hear from him once upon a time.

  Wincing in anticipation of the explosion of pain, Veronica ducked her head and surged up, springing tall with all the strength she could summon in her legs. And they were good legs. Runner’s legs. She hit him hard, the crack of his nose breaking loud in her ears like the crack of a stick against her head and then his scream filled the room.

  She swung her arms high, doing her best to knock his right arm away from her. The gun went off. A flash of light and horrible sound, but she felt no pain, not even a dull punch. Maybe he’d missed her. Maybe she had a chance.

  Using the momentum of her own stumbling body, she pressed him farther back, toward the light, toward the—

  He fell away from her, tumbled over. The backs of his knees caught against the cot, and the weight of his torso carried him past its corner and down to the floor. A black shape flew toward the doorway, and it had to be the gun or she was dead. If he still had it in his hand, he could easily shoot her whether he was on the floor or not. She jumped toward the doorway and the gun—yes, the gun—had caught up on the rough floor and stopped just outside the threshold.

  “Veronica!” he roared, his voice so close behind her. His hand closed over the heel of her shoe, but she jerked her foot free of him and grabbed the gun in both shaking hands. Turning, she fired blindly into the dim room, her bones exploding with each round, arms and head battered by the force. She fired and fired, and then it clicked and clicked and clicked in her grasp.

  She was panting. Keening. Each breath a little scream of terror. Her ears sang like twin bells, and if he was coming for her, she couldn’t hear him, and she couldn’t shoot him. He’d win.

  But he didn’t move forward. He didn’t move at all. He was twisted over Johnny’s legs, body slumped against the ground, and part of Micah was missing now too. Part of his jaw. His eyes were on her, though, watching, unblinking.

  She stared back, the gun a blur in her shivering hands. “Don’t,” she croaked one last time, still trying to calm him. He was angry. He must be angry. And she needed to calm him down. “Just don’t.”