“The foundation is raised off the ground, right?”
Lawrence shrugged. Helen stomped on the floor.
“This floor is probably nailed onto a wooden frame. You can’t lay a wood floor on top of dirt because it’ll rot away.”
Lawrence shrugged again, coughed, and wiped tears from his eyes.
“If we can get through the floorboards, there might be an open space below,” Helen said.
“We’d still be trapped. The whole building will just collapse right on top of us.”
Smoke billowed along the ceiling. She heard the crack and groan of the rafters above. How long before a major support post gave way?
Helen was certain there was only one way out. Not through the ceiling or front door. Definitely not through the log walls. Straight down.
She chose a spot on the floor, raised the pickaxe, slammed into a joint between two floorboards. She lifted the axe again, sucked in a lungful of smoke, doubled over. Lawrence patted her back, unhelpfully. She pushed him away, tucked her mouth and nose into the collar of her shirt, lifted the axe, chopped at the floor. Again. And again. The wood chipped. A gap between the floorboards widened, but slowly. Too slowly.
A section of ceiling above the bed crashed down, flaming bits of wood falling onto Rita’s head and shoulders. Black smoke curled through the hole and a wave of heat baked Helen’s face. Lawrence ducked beneath the dining table.
Helen hacked away, eyes watering, coughing steadily now. She felt a tug on the axe, resisted, realized Lawrence was offering to take over. She handed him the axe. Lawrence continued attacking the floorboards.
They alternated, a few swings each, passing off the axe when their coughing became too intense to continue working. The temperature was unbearable.
She smelled cooked hair and flesh, wondered if it was her own. She wiped away tears, saw Rita’s corpse sizzling under burning debris. Human fat popped and splattered.
Christ, I’m in a living hell.
Helen took the axe from Lawrence. The hole was now the size of two fists. She slipped the blade of the axe into the hole, attempted to pry up the boards.
“Help,” she croaked.
Lawrence wrapped his hands around the handle. They pulled together. After a few seconds, there was a groan and one of the boards loosened.
Helen and Lawrence ripped and tore at the floor, half blind, each breath a searing torture. Another section of roof caved in, landing on the dining table, scattering pewter place settings and red-hot sparks.
The hole seemed too small, but the heat and smoke were overwhelming. Helen let go of the axe, gripped Lawrence’s triceps, and thrust him toward the hole. He understood. He slipped his head and shoulders into the tiny space. His jean jacket bunched on the edges of the opening. He wiggled, head below and hindquarters protruding into the room like a Corgi in a badger hole.
Helen put two hands on his butt, pushed, forcing him deeper. She was going to die if he didn’t get his ass through the floor. She shoved hard, not caring if she was hurting him.
Lawrence’s waist, legs, and feet disappeared into the opening. Helen followed, squeezing her head and shoulders through, her back scraping painfully along the needlelike edges of the splintered floorboards. She clawed at the underside of the floor, forcing her hips and legs into the gap. She felt herself falling. She plopped into the blessedly cool and pillowy embrace of wet soil.
She lay there for a moment, panting, body racked by deep, hacking coughs. She blinked hot coals from her eyes.
Groaning, she rolled over onto her belly. A heavy thud rattled the boards above her head. More bits of the ceiling falling in. Helen started crawling, a grub in the dirt.
She encountered a floor joist, followed it to a wooden barrier—the wall of the foundation. She skirted the wall, grit filling her mouth, until she discovered a metal vent. She pounded the heel of her hand on the vent frame, but it didn’t budge. She swiveled her body around and kicked with her foot. The vent gave, just a little.
A roof support crashed through a section of floorboards five feet away, scattering sparks across Helen’s face and hair, singing her skin. She brushed them away and resumed kicking the vent. On the fourth kick, it popped out of its frame.
She wormed her way headfirst through the hole. It was a tight fit. She emerged onto the ground outside the jail and lay on the ground for a moment, utterly spent, completely exposed should Frank or Teddy come around the back of the building.
Glowing embers floated from the roof, across the back yard, and into the forest like lazy fireflies. The building screeched and crackled, dying in agony.
Helen reached an arm inside the hole, felt around for Lawrence. Her hands encountered only empty air. She waited as long as she dared, then got up and stumbled across the yard into the tree line. She took shelter behind a tangle of undergrowth. The cold mountain air sizzled against her skin like water on a hot skillet.
The jail was now fully aflame, ten-foot flames shooting from its roof, dripping down the sides of the outer walls. No sign of Teddy and Frank, who she suspected were still around front, waiting for her and Lawrence to burst through the door.
And speaking of Lawrence … Smoke leaked from the open vent like a factory smoke stack. Helen felt a wrenching twist of guilt. She couldn’t just abandon him. She left the shelter of the trees and lurched back to the side of the building.
Just as she reached the wall, a blackened hand shot through the vent. Helen grasped it, pulled. Slowly, she tugged Lawrence onto the grass. His eyes were swollen, his sides heaving, spittle dotting his lips. She got an arm around his waist, helped him across the yard and into the forest.
She leaned Lawrence against the trunk of a pine tree, massaged his chest. He coughed, shoved her hand aside.
“I thought I lost you in there,” she said. “If you’d been ten pounds heavier, you would’ve never made it through that hole.”
He wheezed, unable to speak.
Helen heard a voice, Teddy or Frank, she couldn’t be sure which. She was afraid they would hear Lawrence’s coughing, so she helped him to his feet and they retreated further into the forest, where they collapsed in a heap again.
Minutes passed before Helen had the strength to sit up. The night air, so refreshing when she’d first come out of the jail, was now seeping into her bones. Lawrence was lying on his side, hacking phlegm into the dirt.
“Lawrence. We have to keep moving.”
He groaned, his eyes angry red slits.
“My lungs,” he said. “Hurts … ”
“I know, Lawrence. Now listen to me. Your car … it runs, right?”
He nodded.
“That’s our way out. We need to get to your house. Do you have any guns there?”
He shook his head.
“Okay,” she said. “We’ll stay in the shelter of the forest until we get close. Then we’ll cut across Main Street, sneak into your car, get out of here.”
“What if … Teddy blocks road … with … Explorer?”
“How about we deal with one deadly obstacle at a time?”
Frank spied the open vent, knew the tricky little bitch was free. Lawrence? If the marshal had any sense, she would’ve just left that useless faggot inside to burn, but even if she hadn’t, Frank wasn’t exactly worried about Lawrence.
To be honest, he was glad she’d escaped.
He wanted to kill her himself. He owed that to Mike.
He limped back around to the front of the jail. Teddy had moved the Explorer to the other side of the road, away from the furious heat. He was leaning against the front fender, face tinted red in the glow of the fire.
“I think she’s out,” Frank told him. “Through a vent in the foundation.”
Teddy spat a stream of tobacco juice in the dirt.
“Why don’t you go wake up old man Yates, if all this ruckus ain’t woke him up already. Tell him to bring Coonie.”
Frank didn’t like being ordered around, least of all by Teddy. Growing up, T
eddy had always been the butt of his and Mike’s jokes, the tag-along and wannabe. Even after joining the sheriff’s department he was still the same old dumpy loser, desperate for his daddy’s approval and Frank and Mike’s friendship.
But the events of the day seemed to have completely transformed Teddy from ass-sniffing runt to king of the jungle. Gone was his customary nervous laugh, ingratiating smile, halting manner. He was cool as a cucumber, as if they were doing nothing more than sitting around the trailer, drinking beers, watching a ballgame on their shitty TV.
Before tonight, Frank would never have credited Teddy with the guts to move his foot out of the way if someone was pissing on it. And now he’d gone and killed his own father, a man even Frank was secretly terrified of.
He hated to admit it, but for the first time in his life, Frank felt something besides a moderate disdain for Teddy. A touch of respect, yes, but more than that. A sliver of fear.
He hobbled down Main Street to Yates’s place. The marshal’s bullet had taken off the tip of his pinky toe. Teddy had bandaged it as best he could and given Frank four aspirin. And as Teddy was off getting a ladder and gasoline to burn the jail down, Frank had further medicated himself with a joint. But the foot still hurt like a sonofabitch.
When he pushed open the gate leading to Yates’s front yard, Coonie leaped out of the shadows, jerking his chain, barking and snapping.
“Shut up, you fucking dumb dog,” Frank snarled. Everyone in town was familiar with Coonie and his wild ways. Only Yates knew how to control him.
He stayed out of range of Coonie’s teeth as he climbed the porch. He opened the front door, stepped inside.
“Yates!” he yelled. “It’s Frank. Me and Teddy need your help!”
No response. Yates was old and deaf as a pile of dirt.
“Yates!” Frank yelled. “Wake up!”
Yates appeared at the top of the stairs. He was dressed in dirty underwear and tattered slippers.
“What’s goin’ on?”
“We need Coonie. Got some tracking to do.”
“Tracking what?”
“That pretty little US Marshal.”
“Huh?”
“Just get dressed and bring Coonie.”
They arrived at the burning jail ten minutes later, Yates fully dressed and carrying a shotgun, Coonie tugging at the leash in his hand.
“Frank tells me that marshal’s gone crazy and shot Big Ed,” Yates said.
Frank winked broadly at Teddy.
“Yeah, that’s right,” Teddy said. “She, uh … She shot my dad, then killed Mike and locked herself in the jail.”
“Goddarn,” Yates said. “I knew she was trouble. She’s after what’s in the mine.”
Teddy and Frank exchanged a look. Yates saw their confusion.
“The gold,” Yates explained.
“Ah, yeah, the gold,” Frank said.
“First she’ll confiscate our weapons,” Yates said. “Then the government will move in with their excavators, loaders, and whatnot.”
“That’s why we got to stop her,” Frank said.
“We tried to burn her out, but she slipped through a vent and is probably in the woods somewhere,” Teddy said. “Think Coonie can catch a scent and track her down?”
Coonie whined. He was an ugly blend of Weimaraner and coon hound.
“’Course he can. Best nose in the county. What you got that Coonie can smell?”
“Her car’s right there,” Teddy said. “He can smell the seat, and I don’t know what else she’s got in there.”
“Maybe she’s got some panties lying around,” Frank said. “Give Coonie a snoutful of that!”
“Shut up, Frank,” Teddy said.
Frank opened his mouth to retort but closed it without saying a word.
They walked to Helen’s car, shielding their faces from the heat with their hands. Yates opened the passenger door.
“In,” he said. The dog complied. Yates pushed Coonie’s face into the driver’s seat, around the steering wheel. The dog growled, wagged his tail happily.
“You smell her, boy?”
Coonie barked.
“All right, show me where she come out of the jail,” Yates said to Teddy.
They all went around to the back yard, skirting the jail walls by a good measure. Coonie sniffed around the grass for a bit, then barked and pulled on the leash.
“He’s got the scent!” Yates said.
“Frank, you go with Yates,” Teddy said.
“What about you?”
“I’ll stay with the Explorer. Make sure she don’t double back and take the road out of town.”
“My foot’s shot up. Why don’t you go with Yates and I’ll stay here?”
“I’m sticking with the vehicle.”
Frank put his hands on his hips.
“Seems like I got to do all the work around here.”
“We’ll talk about this later,” Teddy said. He turned and walked away.
Frank figured Teddy wanted to stay close to the money, which was currently in the back seat of the Explorer. But what if Teddy just took off with the cash as soon as Frank entered the woods? Nah … Where would Teddy go? He’d only ever known Kill Devil Falls. Besides, if Teddy split, he knew Frank would come looking for his share.
“We goin’ or not?” Yates asked.
“Yeah. Let’s do it.”
The old man gave Coonie some slack and the dog took off running, snapping the leash to its full extension. Yates hurried to keep up. Frank shuffled along behind.
Teddy watched them disappear into the woods, Frank limping, Yates tottering along like the old man he was, both armed with shotguns. He figured it was fifty-fifty the two of them managed to kill the marshal and Lawrence. Better than fifty-fifty that one of them died in the process.
That suited Teddy just fine. It meant more money in his pocket.
He climbed into the Explorer and drove down to the red farmhouse. He considered bringing the duffel bag inside, but it was heavy, so he settled for locking the car doors. Using his flashlight, he entered the house, ascended the creaking stairs to the second floor, went into his bedroom.
He lit a few candles given to him by Mrs. P as Christmas gifts—they were homemade and smelled pleasantly of pine needles and cinnamon. He removed a backpack from the top of the closet and packed some clothes. Underwear, socks, pants, some T-shirts and sweaters. He added a few hundred bucks from his nightstand, a box of .357 rounds, another of .38s, and the snub-nosed police special he carried when he was off duty.
He looked around the room to make sure there was nothing else, nothing that couldn’t just be bought and replaced elsewhere.
His dresser and shelves were empty of baseball trophies and track medals, his walls were bare of certificates of achievement. He had no collection of love letters or photos of old girlfriends. The emptiness of his room was depressing. He resolved to change things moving forward. The money was his golden ticket. A fresh start.
Teddy stripped off his deputy sheriff’s uniform. He carried one of the candles into the bathroom and shaved off his beard. He’d worn it pretty much since he could grow one, and the touch of cold air on his exposed skin felt strange and unpleasant. It made him feel vulnerable, naked. Then he imagined himself on a sunny beach, thirty pounds lighter, tan, a little brunette in a littler bikini lying beside him in the sand, drinking cold beer. Beards and beaches didn’t mix. Besides, for the time being, it was smart to travel incognito.
Back in his bedroom, Teddy dressed in cargo pants, a dark sweater, combat boots. He buckled on his gun belt. He shrugged into the bulletproof vest he kept under his bed. He appraised himself in the mirror by candlelight. Fucking bad-ass.
Teddy retrieved his go-bag from the closet. Inside were items he’d put aside in the event of a major disaster. Freeze-dried food. A first aid kit. Water. A heat blanket. And other equipment, some he’d found at an army surplus store, some he’d “requisitioned” from the sheriff’s department. He
set the go-bag on the floor outside his bedroom door.
Next, Teddy rooted around on the floor of the closet, shoving aside old shoes, comic books, nun chucks, and boxes of ammo and video games in order to reach an ancient, crumbling cardboard carton. He placed the carton on his bed, removed the lid. He pulled out several pairs of old underwear, a couple of shirts, a bra, some cheap jewelry. Stuff he’d stolen from Rita when she was a teenager. He chose a pair of red lacy panties (why she’d had such slutty undergarments at that age was beyond him), the bra, a V-neck soccer jersey she’d looked particularly pretty in, and a tarnished silver heart pendant that had been a favorite of hers until she’d carelessly left it on the bathroom counter one morning. He still remembered quite distinctly the way the pendant glittered as it rested just below the notch of her throat. These things he zipped into the front pocket of his backpack.
He carried a candle down the hall and into Big Ed’s bedroom. He looked at the enormous oak bed with its lumpy mattress, the walls devoid of photos or paintings, the squat nightstand and barrel-chested armoire. The room was a reflection of his dad’s personality—solid, cheerless, hard.
In the corner was a metal gun cabinet. Teddy dialed the combination, opened the cabinet, ran his fingers along the stocks of a dozen rifles stored inside. He chose an AR-15 with a flashlight attachment beneath the barrel. The magazine held sixty rounds. He grabbed a box containing another fifty rounds for good measure.
He took the assault rifle, backpack, and go-bag down to the Explorer, put them in the back seat next to the duffel bag. He paused for a long look at the red farmhouse. The only home he’d ever known.
Soon to be ashes. Like the rest of Kill Devil Falls.
An unfamiliar thrill prickled Teddy’s flesh. He couldn’t place the feeling for a moment, then all at once it came to him:
He was happy.
Helen led them through the forest, using her flashlight to pick out a path. Lawrence wheezed and gasped, stopping frequently to rest his hands on his knees.
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