Here and Gone(86)

Danny moved to the rear of the cruiser, around the back and along the passenger side, Audra close behind. He watched the doorway for a few moments before setting off at a crouching run to the cabin. He stopped short of the porch, then stepped onto it, one foot at a time, slow as he could move.

More curses and grunts from inside.

Danny waved at Audra to come to him. She took a breath, then ran, her head down. She reached the porch, looked at the wooden boards, and wondered how she would cross them without a thunderous creak. Danny beckoned her once more, and she crossed the porch in two light strides, barely a sound.

‘Come on,’ the voice inside growled.

Audra heard a loud, hard cracking sound followed by a metallic rattle. Then a rhythmic crunching, accompanied by chesty grunts. She eased up and looked through the window. A bedroom, a simple metal-framed single bed at the center, a bare minimum of furniture. Danny inched toward the door, the whisper of his movement masked by the noise from within, Audra at his back.

When they reached the door, Danny eased himself upright, and Audra stepped around him, copying his stance, the Glock raised and ready.

Inside, on his knees, Sheriff Ronald Whiteside, his shirt spattered with blood, pried at a trapdoor with a crowbar, sweat beading on his forehead, his teeth gritted. He did not notice them, his world centered on the task of opening the door, which he had almost accomplished.

One last crack, and whatever held it closed from within gave way. Whiteside gave a triumphant roar, swapped the crowbar to his left hand, grabbed the handle, and hauled the door open.

‘Whiteside,’ Danny said.

The sheriff’s eyes widened as he swiveled to the sound of his name. His right hand grabbed for the pistol on the floor. Danny squeezed off a shot, but Whiteside dropped down to his belly as the bullet cut a hole in the wall.

The pistol in his grasp, he rolled to the side, into the mouth of the basement, and disappeared.





55


WHITESIDE TUMBLED DOWN into the dark. By instinct, his left hand released the crowbar and reached out, his fingers slapping against a rung of the ladder, grabbing the next. As the crowbar clanged on the floor, his weight wrenched at his shoulder. His fingers lost their grip and the hard floor slammed into his back. He cried out at the pain.

Above, footsteps running across the floor, then Lee appeared at the edge. Whiteside raised his Glock and fired twice up into the light, and Lee was gone. He rolled onto his side, into the shadows, then up onto his knees.

‘Christ,’ he said, the sibilant hissing through his teeth.

Pain shrieked from his back, threatened to blot out all else, but he willed it to be quiet. He had no use for it now. Suppressing another cry, he forced himself up onto his feet. He backed away from the square of dim light the open trapdoor projected onto the rough concrete floor.

His heel caught the crowbar on the floor and he stumbled back. Something loose and heavy bumped and rolled around the rear of his head. He reached up for it, found a flashlight suspended from a beam in the ceiling. Holding onto it, he turned a circle in the darkness, his eyes scanning the shades of black. He pressed the power switch and a sharp beam cut through the dimness, throwing wild shadows around the basement as the flashlight swayed on its cord.

His gaze swept across the rows of tinned food, the piled blankets and clothes, the chemical toilet. There, behind a stack of boxes at the rear of the room, the boy and the girl. Whiteside staggered toward them, the Glock aimed at the girl’s chest.

He grabbed for both of them. The boy struggled, but Whiteside slapped him hard across the head. He dragged the boy by the collar out onto the open floor, then reached for the girl and did the same. His free arm swept around them as they squealed, gathered them close. He aimed the Glock up at the trapdoor.

‘Mom!’ the boy shouted.

‘Shut up,’ Whiteside said. ‘Be quiet or I’ll kill you all.’

The woman’s head appeared in the opening, peering down at them. The boy shouted for her again.

‘Listen to me,’ Whiteside called. ‘You and your friend get out of here or I’ll take your children’s heads off.’

Her face slipped away from the opening, and for the briefest of moments Whiteside thought she had heeded his warning. Then her feet dropped down and found the ladder.

From above, ‘Audra, no.’

She climbed down, unarmed. Whiteside leveled the pistol at her as she descended. When she reached the bottom, she turned to face him, her eyes blazing as the flashlight beam danced between them. Lee’s face appeared above once more.

‘Audra, what—’

‘Stay there,’ she said. ‘If he tries to leave this basement, shoot him dead.’

‘Audra, listen to—’

‘Just do it,’ she said, taking a step closer.

‘You best back off,’ Whiteside said. ‘I’m taking these children, and that’s all there is to it.’

‘No,’ Audra said, stepping forward. ‘You won’t take them from me again.’

Whiteside backed away, bringing the boy and girl with him, his left arm still wrapped around them both.

‘Goddamn it,’ he said, his voice resonating between the concrete walls, ‘stop right there.’

‘Sean, Louise,’ she said, ‘you’re going to be all right.’

‘Shut up,’ he said, stabbing the pistol’s muzzle in her direction. ‘I’m taking them with me. Don’t make me hurt them. I killed Collins. I killed the old man. You better believe I will kill again, if you push me.’