The Overnight Guest(34)
“Did someone put tape over your mouth?” Wylie asked in a whisper.
The boy blinked up at Wylie. He wasn’t shocked by the question and didn’t react with indignation. He simply nodded.
“Who?” Wylie asked, her chest constricting with something she couldn’t quite name. Horror, anger, sadness. All three, probably. “Your dad?” Wylie asked. “Your mom?”
Before the boy could respond, there was a thunderous crack. And then another and another. Wylie jumped to her feet, smacking her shin against the cedar chest.
“Dammit,” she muttered at what sounded like breaking glass coming from outside. The windows were fogged over and Wylie rubbed her fingers over the glass to clear them. From this vantage point, she couldn’t find the source of the noise. It was still snowing, the wind had whipped itself into a frenzy, and she could barely see beyond a few feet in front of her.
Another crack splintered the air. Tas whimpered.
“The trees,” Wylie said. “Tree branches are snapping because of the weight of the ice and the snow. First the trees, next it will be the electrical wires.”
The boy looked at her questioningly.
“It means it’s going to get very dark and very cold fast,” Wylie said, moving from the window to the closet. She pulled open the door and reached for a heavy-duty flashlight on the top shelf and set it on the cedar chest. Then she opened the drawer in the end table next to the sofa and found another, smaller flashlight.
“Here,” Wylie said, handing it to the boy. “You push this button here to turn it on. Give it a try.” The boy slid the black switch upward and a beam of light appeared. “Now turn it off. Only turn it on if the lights go out.” He slid the button to the off position. “Stay here,” Wylie ordered. “I’m going to go get the other ones.”
Wylie ran from room to room, grabbing flashlights. On her arrival at the farmhouse, she had stowed several throughout the house for just such an occasion. Wylie had never needed them before, and her pulse quickened at the thought of being plunged into blackness even in a place she knew so well. If there was light, everything would be okay, she thought.
Wylie carried the flashlights back to the boy and dumped them on the sofa. “I’m going upstairs to get some more; I’ll be right back.”
Upon seeing the uncertainty on the boy’s face, Wylie paused. Wylie didn’t want to scare him any more than she already had. The dark was her issue, not his.
“Just a few more, and I’m going to grab some extra batteries,” Wylie said. Snatching one of the flashlights from the pile, Wylie hurried up the steps. She should be more worried about having enough wood for the fireplace. Rationally, Wylie knew that the dark couldn’t really hurt them, but the cold could. Once she had all the flashlights in place, she would get more wood from the barn.
Once upstairs, Wylie went to the room she used as her office. It was where she spent most of her time, so that was where she kept her storm lantern. It could last for a hundred and forty hours on one set of batteries.
Outside, the pop of fracturing tree limbs continued. Wylie watched in awe as an ice-encased limb stretched across her window, swayed and splintered like a toothpick, and crashed to the ground below. Wylie reached into the bottom desk drawer and scooped up several packs of batteries when a glint of orange shone through the storm.
Wylie leaned over her desk, pressing her face to the window to get a better look. The wind sent billowing clouds of snow across the fields. Again, another flash of orange. Was it headlights from a car or maybe an emergency vehicle? Wylie couldn’t tell.
She turned off her desk lamp in hopes of getting a better look. The light outside disappeared, and for a moment, Wylie thought she must have imagined it, but then the air stilled as if the storm was taking a deep breath. The snow parted, and a ball of fiery orange lit up the sky at the top of the lane.
It was the wrecked truck engulfed in flames.
Maybe a power line came down atop it, igniting the gas tank? That’s what had to have happened.
There was nothing to do but let it burn.
The storm exhaled, obscuring the road and enveloping the fire in a whorl of white.
Another flash of orange broke through the dark. Wylie could hear the crackle of flames through the wind. She thought of the glove box and any paperwork that might have been stored inside that could have told her the truck’s owner’s identity, literally now up in flames. She should have taken the time to check when she first found the wreckage.
Above her, the lights blinked. Wylie held her breath, but the lights stayed on. She needed to get more flashlights, more batteries.
There was nothing that Wylie could do about the truck now. She had to worry about the things she could control. Like keeping herself and the boy warm and keeping the darkness at bay.
Wylie turned away from the window and juggled the lantern and a handful of batteries as she moved through the hallway to the stairs. Just as her foot hit the first step, the house was plunged into darkness.
Wylie froze. Her fingertips tingled and her heart raced. A wave of dizziness rolled through her and she dropped the batteries. They clattered down the steps, disappearing into the dark as Wylie stared down into the black abyss below her. Her rational mind knew that she had nothing to fear, but she couldn’t think. Beads of cold sweat popped out on her forehead and a low hum filled her ears.
Unsteadily, she sat down on the top step. She couldn’t catch her breath; the air wouldn’t fully enter her lungs. It was blocked by something that had lain dormant for years. Something black and oily slid into place and took hold.