Departure(33)

I slowly rise from the wooden rocking chair, cringing as it cries out, but Nick doesn’t stir. In the kitchen, roughly two-fifths of the food waits on the table. Strange: for all the secrecy and mistrust between the five of us, there’s honor in the dining department. I take the remaining food back, place it on the bedside table, and leave the room again, closing the door behind me with care.

I set about searching the small stone farmhouse. We definitely need more food, and that’s my goal, but I can’t help taking in each room, looking for clues to when or exactly where we might be. There’s dust everywhere, bugs here and there, but no animal tracks. The former owners locked it up tight.

The bookshelves in the living room are almost bare, save for a few photo albums and a Bible. Not exactly bullish news for printed book sales. There’s no sign of a TV, although a large, slightly frosted clear plastic film on the wall, like a giant piece of tape indicates that people still watch something.

The kitchen cupboards contain no food, only mugs, utensils, and the like.

I descend the steep, narrow wooden staircase to the cellar, the light from above growing weaker with each step. I start to go back up for a candle, but stop. Yellow light glows at the bottom of the stairs—a candle on a sconce. Someone’s down here. I hear banging in the distance, at the end of the cramped stone corridor.

I step toward the noise. Cabinets slamming. Yes, maybe there is a pantry in the cellar—and one of the others had the same idea. I see a candle burning atop a shabby bar-height table in the room ahead, a black object lying beside it. I clear the threshold to the pantry, and pause. Grayson straightens up. It’s hard to read his face in the flickering candlelight, but I see him glance quickly at the table, at what I can now see is a handgun.

I open my mouth, hesitate for a moment. “I was just looking for food.”

He turns back to the shelves, pushing jars around, peering behind them. “Haven’t seen any. Anything edible, at least, but I’m not looking for food.”

I walk to the nearest shelf, which is filled with jars of fruit and jam well past their expiration date. “What are you looking for?”

“Something drinkable.”

“They may have given up drinking in the future.”

“Doubtful. Drinking’s the only solution to some problems.”

“You think it’s the answer to your problems?”

“It’s the only thing that’s ever worked.”

“Is it the only thing you’ve ever tried?”

Grayson finally faces me. “What do you know about my problems, Harper?”

“Enough.”

“You know what he told you. His side.”

“True. But I’ve seen your situation countless times. I’ve been writing about families like yours my entire career.”

“So I’m told. Did he tell you what I intend to do?”

“He did.”

He returns his focus to the shelves, rummages around, and finally finds a bottle. Scotch. “Wonder how old this is. A hundred years? Two hundred? A thousand? Can’t wait.” He uncorks it and inhales deeply, a smile spreading across his face. “The irony is that my book’ll be a boon for your career. My tell-all will probably send sales of your ‘officially authorized’ biography through the roof, make you a millionaire. You’ll never have to work again, thanks to me.”

I hear footsteps on the stone floor behind me, and Nick appears in the narrow doorway, looking a good bit better. He’s still gaunt, but his color is back, and so is the calm intensity in his eyes.

“You okay?”

Grayson answers him before I can, the sneer returning to his voice. “Yes, Prince Charming, she’s okay. Her head won’t explode if she talks to me.”

“We need your help,” Nick says flatly.

“With what?” Grayson asks, his eyes returning to the bottle.

“Yul and Sabrina. They know something about the crash. You and I have the only guns.”

“No, we don’t. Yul found a hunting rifle upstairs,” Grayson says absently, still inhaling the aroma from the uncorked bottle.

Nick’s eyes meet mine, and then he focuses on Grayson again, his tone calm, matter-of-fact. “We need your help. We need you at your best.”

Grayson’s eyes flash as he glances up. “You telling me not to drink, Dad?”

“No. I’m just telling you that we need your help. And that’s all I’m going to say.”

Nick walks out of the doorway, and I follow him down the hall. I’m about to ask him the plan when he pauses, nods to another narrow stairwell at the end of the corridor. Voices, faint, drift up. Yul and Sabrina.

“Wait,” Grayson says as he closes the distance to us. “They’ve been down there the whole time, working on something.”

I whisper quickly, telling both of them what I overheard back at the nose section—Sabrina and Yul’s hushed conversation behind the closed cockpit door, her accusations that Yul knew the plane would crash, that he had a hand in it, her theory that their actions before the flight had led to the plague that aged the survivors in the days after the crash.

Both men listen in silence, nodding in the cramped, candlelit passageway.

“How did the conversation end?” Nick asks.

“It didn’t,” I whisper. “The camouflaged invaders showed up.”