Bitter Falls (Stillhouse Lake #4)(63)

“She’s old enough,” he says, and I don’t like the way he looks at her, like she’s a piece of meat in a market. If I have to go out fighting, I will, and one move toward my daughter . . . My whole body is trembling in time with the heavy, racing thud of my heartbeat. I’m coiled like a watch spring and ready to explode.

“Carol took a bus to Pennsylvania.” The lie comes out of me in a rush, and the words feel like they cut my tongue, they’re so sharp.

“A false witness shall not be unpunished, and he that speaketh lies shall perish,” the man with the shotgun says. “Proverbs.” He aims at me, and I draw in a sharp breath. Fear is like a knife down my spine. “You’re lying.”

There are only two men now. The one with the shotgun, and the one who came from the RV and is blocking the front door. The third is looking through the house for Connor. I hear him opening doors down the hall.

I need to play for time.

“Check my phone,” I say. “I have a text.”

“God is watching you, woman,” the man with the shotgun says. I can tell he’s chewing it over, and I see a flash of frustration in his eyes. “Phone. Now.”

“It’s in the other room,” I lie. “The office. On my desk.” If I can split them up even more, maybe we’ll have a chance. If nothing else, it delays them.

The man who went in search of Connor comes back. “Not here,” he says. “Maybe went out a window.”

“Go find him,” the man with the shotgun says. He’s in charge, no doubt about it. I watch as the man opens the door and rushes outside. Run, baby. Just run. “You. You’re stalling.” He’s talking to me again. There’s real confidence in him, and that scares me. “I studied up on you, Gwen Proctor. Gina Royal. And your phone ain’t in your office.”

“It is.”

“You sure about that? Because liars get punished.” He takes a phone out of the pocket of his police uniform and dials.

I clearly hear the low buzz from the purse that sits on the coffee table. I don’t say anything. I can’t.

He hangs up the call, and my phone stops buzzing. He raises the shotgun to his shoulder, and I feel him aiming. It’s like a spotlight on my face.

The front door opens, and his friend is back. Strong and lean and merciless.

He’s got my son.

He’s holding a knife to Connor’s throat. And I feel all my fragile plans come apart, and now there’s nothing but fear, waves of it.

“Put him in the RV,” the man in charge says without looking away from me. I let out a little cry and lean forward, reaching out. “We want Carol. If you want your boy back, you find him. You, her, and the child. You’ve got two days.” He tosses a small disposable phone on the carpet next to me, but I can’t look away from Connor as he’s yanked away. The stark look on his face, the pleading in his eyes . . . I let out a sound that’s half-scream, but before I can launch myself up and fight, the man in charge shuts the door, and Connor’s just . . . gone. “There’s a number programmed in. Call when you have her. Better be fast.”

“She’s gone!” I yell it at him, hopeless and furious and hating myself. “Carol’s gone, and I don’t know how to find her!”

“If you don’t, then your son joins the saints,” he tells me. “You should be honored. As Exodus says, the males belong to the Lord.”

“Amen,” the other man says solemnly.

I’m going to fucking kill them all.

I hear a sound erupt outside, a shrieking howl that splits the night, and in an instant I know what it is. My son’s hit the panic button on his key chain.

“Mel!” the man in charge snaps. “Go shut that racket up!” The man who’s been on the door opens it and moves out. There’s a split second where the noise ramps up as the door swings, and the man with the shotgun glances that direction.

Lanny’s slipping her own key chain out of her pocket, and I see it. Sam sees it too. We have one shot. Just one. And we have to do this together.

Lanny hits the panic button on her own key chain, and the noise is explosive, like a sonic grenade; it feels like being hit in the head with a hammer, but I’m braced for that.

The man in charge is not.

Sam and I launch as one, while Lanny rolls away to take shelter at the end of the couch. I’m screaming, but I can’t hear it, the noise is a red blur pulsing through my brain. I’m moving fast, but I don’t know if I’m fast enough. Sam and I hit him with all our weight and momentum. The shotgun goes off with a boom, but it’s only blown a ragged hole in the ceiling.

The leader slams the butt of the shotgun into Sam’s head, and Sam staggers back. He’s wide open, off balance; I kick out wildly at our enemy, and connect. It spoils his shot at Sam, and the buckshot rips a hole in the wall instead.

Sam hits the coffee table and topples drunkenly sideways. He’s half-out, struggling to stay in the fight.

I see my gun still lying by the wall, and I scramble for it. I get it and roll over and take aim at the leader just as he swings the shotgun toward me, and we both freeze. The shriek of Lanny’s panic alarm is so loud it drowns out anything I could say.

But we both know that even if I get him, he’s going to get me, too, and that shotgun will rip me to ribbons.