The People in the Lake

by E Randall Floyd

  Had Brad run out of gas or developed some kind of engine problem? If so, perhaps he was already up at the house, warming himself by the fireplace. It seemed odd, however, that such an event would have happened so close to Danny’s house. Brad was a fanatic about maintaining his cars, especially the Mercedes. He would never let it run out of gas. And, since the Mercedes was still brand new, she doubted very much that it would have broken down. No, there had to be some other explanation for her husband’s car being parked out here behind the shrubbery.

  Laura started to hurry on ahead to the house to see if Brad was there. But that would mean leaving Bit behind, and that was out of the question. Besides, some small voice inside warned her that Brad was not there, that something terrible had already happened to him.

  Laura looked at the car, watched the raindrops beating off the gleaming black body. Then she thought about the keys. If she could find the keys to the car, she and Bit could just hop in and drive away. They’d go until they found somebody who could come back and help them find Brad, even if it meant driving all the way back to Atlanta.

  The door was unlocked—Thank God!—so she opened it up and looked around. Nothing looked out of the ordinary. No body, no bloodstains, nothing to suggest there had been a struggle of any kind.

  She slid behind the wheel and checked the ignition. It was the kind you pressed a button to start, but a key was needed to first unlock the system. But that key was nowhere to be found. She yanked down the visor, ran her fingers along the floor mat, under the seat. There was one last hope. She popped the glove compartment and rummaged through the junk—maps, a watch, car papers, almost a full carton of cigarettes—but no keys.

  She got out, slammed the door shut and trudged back toward the road where Bit stood waiting and shivering in the rain.

  “It is Brad’s car, isn’t it?” Bit asked fearfully.

  She told her that it was, but that Brad was not inside.

  “Don't worry, Mom," Bit said, wiping away her own tears while trying to cheer her mother up. "I'm sure Brad's all right."

  "Of course," Laura replied, "Maybe he's back at the house right now waiting for us."

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  BRAD WAS NOWHERE in sight—but the fire had gone out, leaving the house as cold and dark as a freshly-turned grave.

  Laura headed straight for the fireplace. As she piled kindling and logs on the grate, she said to Bit, “I want you to go upstairs and get out of those wet clothes. I’ll get a fire going and light the kerosene heaters. It’ll be warm and cozy in here in no time at all.”

  Even as she worked on the fire, Laura couldn’t stop wondering about Brad's car—or the possibility that he might have had a run-in with the killer. What else could have possibly happened to him? As she crouched before the fire, she found herself glancing back over her shoulders, as if the killer might be standing behind her watching. The truth was, he could be anywhere right now, even lurking in one of the rooms upstairs.

  As soon as the fire caught, she stood up and looked at the Bulova clock on the mantel: 4 a.m. Dawn was still three hours away. They’d have to hold out at least that much longer.

  Then what?

  Clutching the fire poker, she sloshed into the kitchen, pushed the back door shut and locked it. She covered the smashed pane with aluminum foil, then went around the house making sure all the doors and windows were locked. Satisfied, she went upstairs, took off her wet clothes and towel-dried her hair and body. She put on clean underwear and socks, then slid into a pair of jeans and a thick flannel shirt. She stopped in front of the mirror long enough to brush her hair, then went back downstairs to check on the fire.

  ⸙

  THE FIRE, THANK GOD, was roaring strong. As she stood next to the logs warming, Laura was suddenly grateful for all the wood Danny had stockpiled in advance. At the rate they were going through it, she figured there was enough to last for another couple of days. When that was gone, there was always that pile of logs next to the garage. But there was no way Laura intended for her daughter and her to remain in Danny’s house that long.

  She had to hand it to Danny, the citified “prepper.” He had thought of everything—food, water, extra batteries, even ample firewood. Everything, it seemed, except a generator and maybe an extra four-wheel drive escape vehicle with a full tank of gas.

  Bit.

  Laura had forgotten all about Bit alone upstairs.

  In a flash, she bounded up the stairs.

  ⸙

  WHEN LAURA WALKED in and saw Bit already in bed, with Anastasia and Teddy resting peacefully on top of her and the kerosene heater warm and toasty next to them, it was all she could do to hold back the flood of tears that had been threatening to erupt all night.

  Her daughter, so young and frail, had been through so much already. How much more would she have to endure until they found a way out of this nightmare?

  “Try to get some sleep,” she said, adjusting the covers. “It’ll be daylight soon. Someone is bound to come along and help us.”

  Bit suddenly asked: “Mom, do you really think Paul did all that bad stuff?”

  Laura sighed. “I’m afraid so. But let’s try not to think about it anymore tonight. We’ll talk about it in the morning.”

  Then Bit said: “Mom, I’m afraid up here. Can we sleep downstairs by the fire?”

  “Of course,” Laura replied, tenderly caressing her daughter’s soft cheeks. “No reason why not.”

  ⸙

  THEY LAY NEXT to each other on pallets in front of the fire, dry and warm with blankets piled high on top of them. Bit had changed into her favorite warm-up suit and fleece jacket. She played with the ends of a wool scarf twisted around her neck.

  “I hate this house,” Bit sobbed. “It’s all Brad’s fault. He should have been here.”

  She lay on her side, cuddling Teddy and Anastasia and staring into the flames.

  Outside, the frightful storm continued to rage.

  “I know how you feel,” Laura replied. She held the iron poker in one hand, the flashlight in the other. “But we can’t blame all this on Brad.”

  “Mom, how can you say that? He left us alone up here in this freezing weather to die.” She covered her face with her hands. “I never want to see this house again, ever,” she sobbed.

  Laura wanted to kiss her daughter and promise her that all this would be over soon. But she was just too exhausted to move or speak.

  Outside, the howl of wind continued to sweep down from the dark ridges. The ring of tall trees surrounding the house twisted and groaned, their limbs bucking and cracking in the dark. Torrents of rain slashed down from the mountains, washing over the house in great, gushing clusters. Out on the lake, waves the size of boulders rolled and banged ominously across the angry water.

  Laura drew her knees under her chin. “Will you ever forgive me for bringing you up here, sweetheart?”

  Calming, Bit said, “It wasn’t your fault, Mom. It was my idea, remember?”

  Laura caught a reflection of her face in the glass on the table next to the fireplace. She was shocked by what she saw—the dark bags under her eyes, the unruly hair, the wild, uneven look in her eyes. She hardly recognized the woman staring back at her. “Still,” she gasped, “I should have known better than to bring you up to a remote lake house in the dead of winter.”

  Bit was quick to counter, “But I was the one who wanted to go sailing, remember?”

  Laura pressed close against her daughter's back. “Tell you what," she said, struggling to hold back tears, "I promise to take you sailing as soon as we get away from here. Somewhere nice and warm and sunny.”

  "But you're afraid of the water, remember?"

  "I'll deal with it somehow."

  A crashing boom out on the deck sent Bit flying into her mother's arms. “It’s probably just the wind,” Laura speculated. “You stay here, and I’ll go have a look.”

  “Mom, no,” Bit pleaded.

  “It’s all right,” Laura co
nsoled her. “I’ll be right back.”

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  GRIPPING THE POKER WITH both hands, Laura marched across the living room floor to the kitchen like a stormtrooper on an assault maneuver. She kept her eyes on the backdoor, fearing that it would burst open any second and the attacker would be standing there, knife gleaming in his hands.

  When she got to the door she stopped. She glanced down at the table, suddenly remembering the gun Brad had given her. Why hadn’t she thought of it earlier? She slid open the drawer slowly and looked inside.

  The gun lay on a soft towel, a full magazine next to it. Laura reached down carefully, as if she were sticking her hand into a pit full of vipers, and picked up the Beretta. She hefted it in her hands a moment, as if testing the weight, then rammed the magazine inside. The next step, she recalled, was to pull back the slide. It took a couple of tries, but she finally managed to cock then uncock the pistol.

  Satisfied, she picked up the flashlight and stepped closer to the door. She took a deep breath, wondering what to do next. What if the attacker should suddenly spring at her from the shadows? What then? She'd never fired a gun before in her life. Would she have the nerve to shoot?

  After everything she and her daughter had been through because of Paul, she knew exactly what she’d do:

  She’d shoot the bastard.

  That’s what she'd do.

  Blow his fucking head off.

  Steeling herself, strangely proud of her new-found courage, Laura raised the gun and yanked open the door. She swung the flashlight around, probing the darkness. Except for some limbs clattering across the deck and trees twisting and groaning in the wind, nothing was there. No grinning killer with a Jason or Michael Myers mask on, no gleaming knife with her name on it.

  Relieved, she backed away slowly, pushed the door shut and locked it. She stuck the Beretta in her pocket and turned for the living room.

  Bit sat up quickly when she saw her mom. “What was it?” she asked, apprehensively, the blankets sliding off one shoulder. “Did you see anything?”

  Laura gave an encouraging smile. “Nope. Only a few limbs blown down by the wind.”

  Bit lay back down on her side and curled the blankets around her. Staring into the fire, she started humming a tune. The tune was sweet and low, and Laura remembered it as a lullaby she used to sing to her as a baby.

  Laura recalled the words by heart:

  “Go to sleep, little baby,

  Sing while the angels serenade thee;

  When you wake the sun will shine,

  And I’ll be there by you,

  I’ll be there by you…”

  When Bit stopped humming, Laura bent low and whispered, “That was nice. I’m surprised you still remembered.”

  “It was my favorite lullaby. You used to sing it to me all the time.”

  Laura closed her eyes for a moment, tenderly recalling peaceful days with Earl, her first husband, before his last deployment as a major with a MASH unit to northern Iraq. They had been head-over-over-heels in love back then, and when she announced that she was pregnant, Earl had showered her with every level of affection possible.

  Nothing was too good or too expensive for his beloved Laura—fine jewelry, pretty clothes, even fancy new cars. They lived in a comfortable, some would say upscale, historic farmhouse on thirty acres outside Macon where Laura had her own stables for half a dozen horses. They belonged to the local country club and, when he wasn’t on call at the hospital, traveled to Europe when the mood struck them.

  They did everything together, from shopping and dining and traveling, to going to church, the theater and attending local charity events.

  They seemed together on every level but one—intimacy.

  Laura rarely complained about Earl’s lack of interest in sex. She just attributed it to his hectic schedule at the hospital. On call often, he was away all hours of the night. When he came home, he’d usually crash until it was time to go back to work.

  She never criticized him. His job as an orthopedic surgeon in Richmond paid well but kept him busy, but never too busy for Laura and making plans for the baby. When they found out it was going to be a girl, they decided to name her Beatrice, after Earl’s grandmother, Beatrice Cunningham, the family matriarch who lived like a modern Scarlett O’Hara on a multi-columned plantation in western Virginia that had been in the family since before the Civil War.

  Those were the good days, Laura recalled, some of the happiest times of her life.

  Things would soon change.

  With the second troop buildup in Iraq, it wasn’t long before Earl’s medical unit was tapped with its marching orders. One week before deployment—and less than one month before the arrival of Beatrice—Laura had come home one day and found him waiting for her in the “new baby room” with a surprise—a century-old wooden crib that had belonged to his great-grandmother, Phayzie Anne Merriwether, Beatrice Cunningham’s own mother. What made the crib so special, other than its exquisite mahogany features, was its pedigree—it had been hand-made by Earl’s own great-grandfather, a highly decorated general who had served with General “Black Jack” Pershing in France during World War I, for his own daughter, Beatrice.

  “It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen,” Laura remembered telling Earl.

  That night they made love for the first time in months.

  When Beatrice arrived, Laura couldn’t wait to take pictures of her in the crib and email them to Earl in Mosul.

  Earl had managed two quick leaves home during that second tour. His first leave had been very pleasant. He had showered her and the new baby with gifts galore and acted the perfect husband and father during his brief stay. They even managed to squeeze in a wonderful weekend trip over to Williamsburg.

  The second visit six months later was not so nice. It was then that Laura noticed some of the unpleasant changes that had come over Earl. For one, he had started drinking heavily. Only home ten days, he had sat around most of that time with a bottle of bourbon in his hand. And when he wasn’t home drinking, he would find an excuse to go out drinking with some of his single buddies from the hospital.

  Still, Laura had no way of knowing there would be even rougher days ahead.

  Before returning to Iraq, he had promised Laura to slow down on the sauce.

  But he never did.

  ⸙

  ‘I’M GOING UPSTAIRS to get some fresh batteries for the flashlight. I won’t be gone but a second. Will you be all right by yourself?”

  Bit gave her a wicked look. “I'm not a little kid, Mom.”

  Laura smiled. “I know, sweetheart.”

  "Mom, will you bring me Teddy and Anastasia? I left them on the dresser."

  ⸙

  LAURA TRUDGED UP the stairs, went to her bag and found the pack of new batteries she had found in Danny's storage shed. She popped open the plastic pouch, pulled out two “D”,s unscrewed the flashlight and seated them on the contacts. She flicked it on, and a powerful yellow beam spilled out across the floor, illuminating half the room.

  “That's more like it,” she said to herself.

  She went down the hall to Bit’s room and found the dolls perched in the middle of the bed. That occurred to her as odd. She distinctly remembered Bit telling her they were on the dresser. Perhaps she had made a mistake. After everything she had been through the last few hours, who could blame her for making a simple mistake like that?

  She scooped up the dolls and hurried downstairs.

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  THE FIRST THING LAURA noticed was that Bit was missing.

  She had left her relaxing in front of the fire, humming and snuggled beneath the blankets. Now she was gone.

  She glanced left and right. “Bit?” she called out.

  “In here,” she heard her daughter reply cheerily. “We’re in the kitchen.”

  We’re?

  Laura froze. Who was "we're?" As she strode slowly toward the kitchen, she had a bad feeling abo
ut this.

  “Look who’s here,” Bit said, a big smile on her face.

  ⸙

  LAURA STAGGERED WHEN she saw Paul standing next to her daughter. He wore a long black raincoat and matching black baseball cap. He was smiling, one hand draped casually across Bit’s narrow shoulder.

  “Some night, huh?” the handsome hunk said through a toothy smile. His voice seemed low and measured. “Guess you wonder what I’m doing here this time of night.”

  Laura straightened. Glaring at Paul, she said, “Bit, please come over here next to Mommy, sweetheart.”

  Bit looked perplexed. “But, Mom, it’s only Paul.”

  “Do as I say,” Laura said sternly. “Now.”

  Bit turned to Paul and said, “See, I told you she’s been acting real weird. She thinks you killed Dr. Coleman.”

  “What?” Paul said, more in shock—or so it seemed—than surprise.

  “Paul’s good, Mom,” Bit explained. “He didn’t do all those bad things.” She turned to Paul. “You wouldn’t hurt us, would you, Paul?”

  Paul gave no reply. Instead, he stood staring at Laura, eyes fixed on the bulge in her pocket.

  “Come to Mommy,” Laura repeated. “Now…”

  Laura waited for Bit to finally move away, then pulled the pistol from her pocket. She pointed it straight at Paul’s chest.

  Paul’s big blue eyes flared. “Hey, what’s this?” he asked, raising both hands. “Am I under arrest or something?"

  "Very funny, you bastard," Laura said.

  Paul saw how serious Laura was and said, "I don’t understand, Laura. What are you doing with a gun?”

  The stunned look on Paul's face didn't fool Laura. “Get away from my daughter, or I swear I’ll kill you.”

  Paul's face went ashen-gray. “Laura, please," he pleaded, a confounded look on his face. "Would you kindly tell me what’s going on here?”