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by Matthew Costello

  For a moment, Kate didn’t move.

  “Go!”

  Kate turned and ran over to the room, while Christie started to hobble toward the tunnel.

  She went as fast as she could, as fast as the agony would allow.

  Still so excruciatingly slow.

  And with every step, she moaned.

  * * *

  Men popped up from behind bushes, from behind trees, even from the corner of the building.

  They all had guns.

  And at first Simon thought they were the guards from the inn.

  But he didn’t recognize any of the faces.

  And as he watched, they began to lower their guns.

  Helen had stopped moving, and before she could get her big rifle up, a bullet hit her.

  She turned to Simon, eyes wide.

  He knew what to do.

  He didn’t have to think.

  He raised his gun and looked away from Helen.

  Which is when one of the men had come close and smacked at his hand with the butt end of his rifle.

  His gun fell to the ground.

  Another shot.

  And this time he turned to see Helen doubled over.

  No, no, no, he kept thinking.

  She’s a friend. Why would these men do this?

  They’re not Can Heads.

  Helen fell to her knees, and she was barely able to get her head up.

  Simon took a step backward.

  He’d be next, he knew that.

  But then he felt something slip over his head. A loop of rope that went right over his head just as he was about to start for Helen.

  And it tightened.

  So tight that he couldn’t move at all.

  * * *

  As Christie hobbled, Kate loaded one gun, then the other.

  Christie didn’t look at the trail of blood she was leaving as they moved through this tunnel, then up the stairs that would take them close to the back entrance.

  To the car.

  To a way out of here.

  If—

  If, she thought.

  —I don’t bleed to death before I get there.

  She kept one hand on the wound, applying as much pressure as she could to stem the flow.

  But it needed to be bandaged.

  And after that, who knew what it would be like.

  Each step brought insane waves of pain crashing into her.

  “Mom, you—”

  “Shhh,” Christie said.

  Who knew what was ahead.

  Best they do this journey in silence.

  Step after step after step.

  * * *

  Simon’s hand went to the rope, tugging at it. He could see that one of the men held a long stick that was attached to the rope. Almost like … a fishing rod. Or … something you would use at a rodeo.

  Simon tried to jerk his head, but that only made the rope tighter.

  Another man came to the side, picked up Simon’s gun.

  “Easy, boy. Easy, and you will be all right.”

  Simon started struggling.

  Then the man laughed.

  “Look. He even had a gun.”

  The man turned back to Simon.

  “You were going to shoot us boy? Kill us?”

  Simon didn’t move. Didn’t say anything.

  The man slapped him with the backside of his hand.

  “From now on, you better do exactly what we say.”

  The man paused.

  “Got that?”

  The rope tightened a bit.

  Simon nodded.

  Then the man turned to the others.

  “Okay, we got to catch up to the others. Let’s get the hell out of here.”

  And the man with the stick and rope used it to guide Simon, choking and coughing, up the path.

  One last thing he did, even though it made the rope pull at his throat … he looked at Helen, on the ground, face down.

  But then all his mind could think of was …

  Mom and Kate. Mom and Kate.

  Mom.

  Kate.

  46

  The Discovery

  The pain grew with every step, and Christie could feel how the blood oozed through her fingers with her hand pressed flush to the wound.

  She fought hard not to whimper.

  Kate had taken her arm, and Christie struggled to not let all her weight fall on her daughter.

  When they reached the upper floor, and started toward the back, Christie heard the sounds of cars moving, then truck engines.

  Whatever had happened here, at the inn, was ending.

  How long had Helen and Simon been waiting? she wondered.

  Was the car still safe, undiscovered?

  She wanted to hurry, but this was the fastest speed she could manage.

  “Almost there,” she whispered hoarsely to Kate.

  “Good.”

  Then they came to the end of the dark hallway. The outside, the car, and escape were only minutes away.

  Christie turned to her daughter.

  “But be ready.”

  Christie held her gun up a bit. And she knew she didn’t have to tell Kate what to be ready for.

  * * *

  Out the door, and Christie started to think of next steps.

  How they’d back out, lights off, secretly slip down off the mountain.

  Get away.

  That was the first thing.

  Then her wound. She needed to do something about that fast. She didn’t feel dizzy, wasn’t losing consciousness yet, but that couldn’t be far away.

  Steps on the dirt ground.

  She stumbled a bit and Kate was barely able to hold her up.

  Recovering, she looked ahead, making out the car in the shadows.

  Still here.

  Still safe.

  Soon she’d see Simon and Helen inside, waiting.

  More steps.

  And then, with such amazing slow speed, the horror hit her like a breeze that gradually builds and builds, rising to the force of a hurricane.

  * * *

  The car was empty.

  Kate spoke quickly.

  “Where are they? Where’s Simon? And Helen? I thought you said—”

  First thoughts: they hadn’t made it back here. Somehow they had been caught.

  Christie looked around, as if the two of them might be hiding in the woods. A few cars and trucks could still be out front.

  So quiet here, the night sickeningly still, and all Christie had were the slowly unfolding thoughts, the revelations that left her so confused.

  It was Kate who saw it.

  Christie about to call her son’s name.

  Her lips open, knowing that saying anything, calling out, was a bad idea. But she had to.

  Kate again.

  “Mom…”

  And Christie turned to her daughter.

  * * *

  All she had to do was look where Kate was staring.

  Follow the angle of her head.

  Something on the ground.

  Her heart sinking, actually feeling as if it would fall right out of her, as if in that moment she stood in an elevator plummeting straight down, racing to smash down on some personal ground zero.

  “No,” Christie muttered.

  Thinking the worst.

  Pulling away from Kate, hobbling as fast as she could to the shape.

  Then, torturously falling to one knee, the only knee she could use, her other leg screaming in pain.

  To see what the lump, the shape prostrate on the ground, could be.

  Fearing the worst.

  * * *

  Then, crouched next to it, she saw … Helen.

  Head down, short brown hair catching light.

  “Helen,” Christie whispered.

  A hand to the back of the woman’s neck.

  The skin cold.

  Then seeing around the body the signs of the wounds that couldn’t be seen.

  The gunshots that
had killed her.

  Kate came and crouched beside her.

  Put her arm around her as Christie stroked Helen’s hair once, then again before she turned and looked at Kate.

  Eyes wide.

  The terror.

  Simon.

  “Kate—”

  Kate said nothing.

  But the same question was roaring through both their minds.

  Where’s … Simon?

  There was no more time for mourning.

  “They got him,” Christie said. “God, Kate—they got Simon.”

  And feeling crazed, she struggled to her feet.

  “Here, help me. Help me up.”

  Kate hurried to prop up one side, and Christie was ready to find her son.

  * * *

  And when she began her hobbling walk, she started talking quickly, near manic.

  “W-we have to hurry. This just happened. He’s still here. We can—”

  But Kate put a hand on each of her mother’s shoulders.

  “No.”

  “What do you mean? We have to hurry, Simon could—”

  “No,” Kate said quietly. Her voice icy in the night. Determined.

  “Not you. Me. I can run.”

  Christie shook her head back and forth, while Kate stood perfectly still.

  And then:

  “Let me take the guns.” Then, as if Christie was too befuddled from her wound, from this night, to understand anything … “I can run fast.”

  And Christie nodded.

  She gave her daughter the two guns.

  Then a whisper, “Hurry Kate.”

  Please.

  And in an instant, her daughter turned, and sprinted through the woods, to the front of the inn as Christie stood there, wound oozing, unable to breathe, unable to cry but—somehow—still able to hope.

  47

  Sister and Brother

  Kate stopped.

  Running so fast now that, with her jerky stop just outside the pool of light at the inn’s entrance, she thought she’d fall.

  Sucking in air so quickly.

  And looking.

  To see:

  A truck pull away, and thinking … I’m too late.

  But then—as if it was a gift—she saw two men standing with a boy.

  A boy!

  Simon.

  One of them removed something from around Simon’s neck. The car door was open. Only seconds left to do anything. A quick look around to see if there was anyone else here, anyone she wasn’t seeing … that might see her, stop her.

  But only the two men.

  One pushing Simon toward the car, using the end of a rifle as if herding him.

  Kate ran out of the shadows, and into the light. At the same time, she raised her guns, running straight at them.

  Knowing that she couldn’t simply shoot—not with Simon there.

  A few steps closer to getting him in the car.

  Time … up.

  “Simon!” she yelled. “Simon—run!”

  Her voice as loud as she could make it, a scream that echoed off the stone buildings.

  And again: “Run!”

  And her brother looked over at her, taking in what she was doing. The men, now moving, getting their rifles up.

  He has to move, she thought.

  And as if an answer to a prayer, he bolted to the side.

  Leaving the two men turning to her, ready to shoot her, but hesitating—perhaps wondering … should one of them go get Simon, bring their captive back?

  And with each step into the courtyard, feeling tears in her eyes, thinking … this is so insane …

  Kate fired. And again. And again.

  Her aim wobbly with all the running, her mind reeling.

  But first one, then the other man, recoiled backward into their car.

  Kate stopped running. Stood there.

  One man fired a shot, but wounded, he missed Kate.

  The sound of ricochet off the stone wall.

  So—standing there, where she could now take aim—she fired again.

  One gun clicked, signaling an empty chamber. But the other kept firing.

  And as if they were melting, the men slowly slid to their knees, and then forward.

  These men who thought they could take her brother.

  Her breathing still fast.

  The thought:

  Take my brother?

  No fucking way!

  Then: one last bellow.

  “Simon!”

  * * *

  She held him close, one gun still up and ready.

  Neither said anything, but Simon matched her speed walking back. She thought of all the things he had seen. And even though she could easily say the same thing about herself, she thought …

  He’s so young.

  Into the darkness around the side of the house.

  She felt Simon stiffen.

  Of course.

  I’m taking him back, back to where he just saw what happened to Helen.

  She had to speak.

  “The car, Simon. Mom’s there.”

  She felt him once again fall in line with her pace.

  Until they finally reached the back of the inn.

  * * *

  Kate saw her mother in the car. The passenger door popped open.

  “Simon!” her mother said.

  Kate released her hand on her brother’s back and watched him run to his mother.

  Kate stood back while she hugged him, crying, saying words, so fast.

  Babbling.

  “You’re okay, God, you’re okay. Now … now get in and we—we—”

  She looked up at Kate as Simon opened the back door.

  Her mother in the passenger seat.

  Confusing.

  Why … would she be in the passenger seat?

  “Kate—”

  She held out the denim jacket she had been wearing.

  “Tie this around me. Around the wound, tight as you can. I can’t reach.”

  Kate took the jacket, holding out the two arms of the jacket to make it as long as possible. She bent down to wrap it around the wound.

  Her mother made a small groan with the contact of the material on the open gash.

  Then, wound bandaged—

  “Kate—get in. Over there.”

  The driver’s side.

  “Mom, what are you doing? Why are you—”

  Her mother looked up.

  “I can’t drive, Kate. Not with my leg. You have to drive.”

  And Kate just looked at her.

  * * *

  Christie looked back at Simon, sitting in the shadows of the backseat.

  Then to Kate’s hands on the wheel.

  Her daughter shook her head.

  “I don’t know, Mom. I don’t think—”

  “Kate. You have to do this. You’ve seen your dad drive, me drive. I—I’m right here. You have to … do this.”

  Kate still shook her head.

  But then stopped.

  “Turn the car on. The ignition.”

  Crazy. Insane. Someone who had never driven a car.

  Kate took her eyes away from the windshield. Down to the ignition. She grabbed the key.

  “Okay, turn it.”

  The car started.

  “Good,” Christie said, her voice strained.

  So hard to talk.

  “Now, we’re going to leave the lights off. Okay?”

  Kate was back looking at the windshield.

  “See the two side mirrors, and the rearview right above you?”

  “Yes.”

  Kate’s voice sounded totally hollow.

  “Put your foot on the brake.”

  The engine revved.

  “No. The pedal to the left of the accelerator. You have to be careful.”

  Kate banged the steering wheel. “I am!”

  “I know. I know you are. Okay. Okay, Kate. Foot on the brake now?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay, now move the
shift so that it’s on R.”

  Christie watched the dashboard go from a brightly lit N to R.

  “Now … you have to use the mirrors, and look back if you need to. Steer the car back out of here, all the way down.”

  Kate turned and looked at her.

  “Backward?”

  “There’s no place to turn it around. But if you go slowly, it’s wide enough. We can get back to the road.”

  She watched Kate look at the left and right mirrors, locking their location in.

  Then she felt the brake release.

  “Now—just a bit. Slowly. On the accelerator.”

  * * *

  Kate’s first press on the accelerator made the car lurch backward.

  But the tires were still aimed straight so the car stayed on the dirt driveway.

  Christie didn’t say anything to Kate about the too-heavy step on the gas.

  She’s smart. She’ll adjust.

  And sure enough, the next time Kate barely gave it any gas at all, and her head whipped from one side mirror to the other, then up to the rearview.

  At one point, she turned around to look back and see the road.

  “Good, Kate. You’re doing good.”

  A glance back at Simon.

  So much to talk to him about.

  But not now.

  The car edged down.

  Once, Christie heard the sound of some branches on the side of the road scraping the left side of the car.

  She remembered how hard it could be to get a sense of where the car was when you first began driving.

  Could Kate get them out of here?

  Then what? Where would they go?

  Kate kept backing the car down the dirt road.

  * * *

  Until … they were on the highway, and Christie told her to put the car into drive, and get it pointed straight on the road that led down the mountain.

  “You’re doing good, Kate. So good.”

  Her daughter said nothing, her hands locked on the wheel, and the speed … so slow.

  But that was okay.

  And Christie started to think of a plan.

  Had to be a plan, didn’t there?

  Kate looked straight ahead. And with a gentle touch, she gave the car gas, and they started down the mountain road.

  epilogue: family

  Christie held on to just a few thoughts …

  They needed to get away. From this area, whatever was going on here.

  And … she needed to get the wound treated. And fast. It still oozed blood, even through the tightly tied denim jacket.

  Then?

  Then … indeed.

  “You okay?”

  “It’s not so hard,” Kate said. “Getting the hang of it.”