The Night Parade(110)

“Earlier you told me Eleanor wants to turn herself in.”

“Her opinion doesn’t matter,” David said flatly. “I’m her father. I call the shots. And didn’t you just tell me earlier that I’m under no moral obligation to sacrifice my daughter for the rest of the world?”

“That’s true,” Tim said. “But it’s different if it isn’t a sacrifice at all. If it’s just your fear—”

“I’m not turning her in. That’s it, Tim. I won’t do it.”

“Fair enough.” Tim poured himself another shot of moonshine. “Then listen closely to me, okay?” Tim leaned over the table, bringing his face closer to David’s. Close enough that David could smell the moonshine on his breath. “If that’s what you want, then that’s what I’ll do. As long as I’m alive on this planet, I will help you take care of that beautiful little girl.”

“Thank you,” David said.

“Drink with me,” Tim said.

David picked up the glass and tossed the ’shine to the back of his throat. It felt like a fireball blasting down his esophagus.

They drank together, mostly in silence, for the next forty minutes or so. After a time, Tim stood, ambled over to where David sat, and kissed the top of David’s head.

“I love you,” Tim said. “Good night.”

Alone now, David listened to the house settle down all around him. After a time, he got up and wended his way through the halls until he came to his bedroom door. He stood there in the hallway for some time, a headache beginning to work its way up from the base of his neck and over the top of his skull. In the end, he decided he didn’t want to sleep alone.

He went into Ellie’s room and found her snoring gently in the large bed, her profile silvered by the moonlight coming through the bedroom window. The window was cracked open a bit, and a chill autumn breeze filtered into the room, cooling his flesh.

Careful not to wake his daughter, David climbed into bed and curled up behind her. He closed his eyes and inhaled the smell of her.

Little Spoon, he thought, draping an arm around her.





59


He dreamed of giant bugs again, and the world was filled with their sound—an unrelenting, mechanical buzzing that followed him out of sleep and into the real world.

Tim stood above him, shaking him awake. The bedroom light was on, and the buzzing was still there. Beside David in bed, Ellie groaned and rolled away from him.

“Get up,” Tim said. “Hurry.”

“What’s that noise?” David said.

“An alarm,” said Tim. “Someone’s coming.”

David sat up and rolled out of bed. Ellie’s eyes snapped open and found him. She asked what was going on. David said he wasn’t sure. He thought he’d misheard Tim. Out in the hallway, Tim shouted for Gany, his voice loud over the buzzing alarm.

“Stay here,” David told Ellie. He got up and hurried out into the hall.

Tim stood at the end of the hallway, opening a closet door. Gany appeared, pulling a sweatshirt down over her head.

“Who’s coming?” David said.

“I don’t know.” Tim took a long gun from the closet and held it out to him. “Take it,” he said.

David took it. It was heavy, cold, and smelled of oil.

Tim placed a hand on Gany’s shoulder. “Go sit with Ellie. Don’t come out unless I tell you to. Understand?”

“Yes,” she said, and hurried down the hall, brushing by David as she went.

Tim took a second shotgun from the closet and what looked like several boxes of ammunition.

“The f*ck’s going on, Tim?”

“Come ’ere,” Tim said, and beckoned David to follow him into the adjoining room.

It was the room with the two computer monitors, only now the screen savers were gone. David saw that each screen was divided into quadrants, each quadrant providing a live CCTV feed from various places around Tim’s property, to include the exterior of the farmhouse. The digital clock on the screen told him it was 4:53 A.M.

Tim tapped the keyboard and the buzzing alarm silenced. He tapped the keyboard a second time and the images on the computer screens changed. In one of the quadrants, a pair of headlights cut swiftly through the night along an unpaved wooded road. David recognized it as the road leading up to the farmhouse.

“Shit,” David said.

“They’re maybe three minutes out,” Tim said. “The system should have picked them up sooner. I’ve got an alarm system down in the foothills by the main road that never went off. They must have deactivated it somehow.”

“They found us . . .”

“I don’t know,” Tim said. “They don’t look like the government or the police. Something isn’t right.” His fingers danced along the keyboard, and the angle of the cameras changed yet again. This time, they were afforded a long shot of the oncoming vehicle, its dual headlamps jouncing over the rutted dirt road, the video grainy and tinted emerald green. “It’s just one vehicle.”

“Maybe more are on their way,” David said. The idea sent his stomach into his socks.

Tim tossed him a box of ammo. “You know how to use a shotgun?”

“No.”