You're Next

Chapter 54

The first thought to break through Mike’s delirious relief was that Dodge and William had found her and forced her to call. He didn’t know what he was saying, but in between the rush of his words and the thrum of his thoughts he registered his wife’s replies: ‘Yes, I’m alive. I’m alive. I’m right here, babe.’

And: ‘-need you. Need you here. I’m so scared.’

And: ‘No, no one’s got me. I’m safe. Laid out, sore as hell, and I smell like a nursing home, but I’m safe.’

His brain finally caught up to what was happening, sounding a single clarion note over the din of their voices: She’s alive.

She was sobbing, her voice cracked and aching. ‘-was terrified when I woke up yesterday. Thought you were-’

She’s alive.

And: ‘-almost twenty-four hours to get my voice working. I had Shep’s number, the one you gave to me back-’

Alive.

And: ‘No, I haven’t called anyone. They told me my father’s been on a scorched-earth campaign to find me, but I knew to wait, to only talk to you. Shep told me some crazy stuff – an Indian tribe? – and that no one can know where I am. That you guys are on the run.’

Her next question brought him crashing back into his body, stilling the background buzz of his own words. It sent him into a kind of reverse shock, his senses heightened to a painful clarity.

She asked, again, ‘How’s my baby?’

There was nothing but pure, raw sensation. The plastic bumps of the steering wheel digging into the meat of his fingers. Windshield condensation blurring the edges of the yellow sign of Hank’s motel up ahead. The wrinkles of his shirt forming ridges against his lower back.

Mike cleared his throat, hard. ‘Shep… Shep didn’t tell you?’

‘Tell me what?’ All the warmth had gone from her voice.

He forced out the words. ‘I had to leave her.’

‘Leave her? Leave her? How long ago?’

Five days, fourteen hours, and seventeen minutes.

He said brusquely, ‘Couple of days.’

‘Days? Did you say…’

‘Annabel, I promise you-’

‘Have you checked on her?’

‘I… I couldn’t. I can’t. There were-’

‘She’s been alone? Without you?’ Her words deteriorated into something unintelligible. Her breath came in loud puffs across the receiver. ‘You know she’s okay, though? Right now?’

He heard himself hesitate a beat too long. ‘… Yes.’

‘No.’ Her voice had turned fragile, tiny, pleading. ‘Uh-uh. No. Where is she?’

Shep said, ‘Um…’

Mike had forgotten they were on a three-way call. The sound of his wife’s voice had overwhelmed all other considerations, but Shep’s interjection knocked him back to harsh reality.

He said, ‘I can’t… I can’t tell you.’

Annabel was breathing hard, maybe hyperventilating. In the background he heard the beep of a cardiac monitor. ‘What does that mean?’ she said.

‘You’re on a hospital phone,’ he said.

‘I can’t walk yet, Mike.’ Her tone had gone flat. ‘Where else would I be?’

‘They’re still looking for us. And you. They came after you once to get to me and Kat. We don’t know if they’re monitoring your line right now. I can’t tell you over this phone.’

‘Where’s my daughter?’

‘They could be listening. Right now.’

‘Does Shep know where she is?’

‘No one knows.’

‘Except you.’

‘I’m getting her tomorrow, Annabel. We’re almost out of this. We are one step from nailing them and starting to put our lives back together. Hours away, honey. Hours.’

She was crying again, hopelessly. He imagined her, injured and bed-bound in a strange room, pumped full of drugs and terror.

Without registering it he had pulled in to a parking space by Hank’s door and set the car in park. ‘I will pick her up tomorrow,’ he said, ‘and bring her to you.’

‘Please just tell me where she… that she’s…’

He summoned all of his strength to harden his heart to her.

Not a husband.

‘Tomorrow,’ he said. ‘Everything will be okay.’

‘I need to know.’ Her words, drawn out through sobs. ‘I just need to hear my baby’s voice.’

‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I love you.’

He snapped the phone shut. ‘I’m sorry,’ he told it. ‘I’m sorry I’m sorry.’ Heat rolled up from his neck into his face, and he punched the steering wheel. Once, twice, three times. His knuckles screamed.

He sat panting. Hours away, he reminded himself. Hours.

Annabel was alive. Impossibly, he had even more at stake now.

He grabbed the gray envelope and hurried across the parking lot to Hank’s room. When he knocked on the door, Hank called out, ‘Yeah, come in.’

The door was unlocked. Mike pushed in, the room led to by a brief hall. It was dark, lit only by the laptop, which sat open on the tiny desk, throwing off a lavender swirl of screen saver. Hank sat on the bed, facing away, his shoulders slumped. ‘Yeah, come in,’ Hank said again. The screen saver threw dappled light across half of his body before the glow shifted to the ceiling.

Mike stopped at the verge of the room, felt the smile bloom on his face. ‘We did it, Hank.’

A meow came out of the dark, and Hank’s fat tabby oozed from the blackness to rub against Mike’s leg. It sat on his foot and began assiduously licking its front paw.

Mike held up the envelope. ‘It’s all right here.’

The screen saver kept on, mapping blocks of light on the far wall, the lampshade, Mike’s shoes. A section of warped floorboards flashed into sight ahead. A trail of tiny paw prints, rendered in smeared black, led from around the side of the bed to the cat at Mike’s feet.

Icy horripilation moved up Mike’s arms, crawling across the back of his shoulders.

He dropped the envelope, reaching for the.357 tucked into his jeans. The envelope slapped the floorboards, and the cat started, scampering off, leaving fresh prints of blood.

Mike brought the revolver up, aiming, pivoting to take in the half dark around him. Across the room Hank sat as still as marble, facing away. Only then did Mike see the microcassette recorder on the comforter beside him. Hank’s voice issued again from the tiny speakers: ‘Yeah, come in.’

Mike put his back to the wall, barely hearing his thoughts above the roar of blood in his head. A faint rustle came from the unlit bathroom between him and the front door. He was pinned in the brief hall. Inching forward into the room, he charted a trembling course toward a corner. The screen saver kept on with its disco alteration, bringing the walls and ceiling to life, making them bulge and contract like lungs. In the watery light, he noted the Ethernet cord trailing from the back of the laptop to the outlet beneath the desk, and he knew with fierce, distraught conviction that they’d tracked Hank to the motel when he’d logged in.

The cat bolted back into view, a whisper against the dust ruffle, and Mike started, a quick movement matching him in the space beside the curtains. He pivoted ninety degrees and pulled the trigger, the muzzle flash lighting the wall mirror already spiderwebbing around the bullet hole.

Too late he heard something whistling through the air behind him, and then the warped floorboards rushed up and hit him in the face.