The Wrong Family(70)

“Come to think of it, sis, I didn’t see you pregnant.”

Chills ran across her limbs like insects.

“I—we didn’t tell anyone, remember? After the miscarriages, we kept it to ourselves until the last trimester. And you lived in Tacoma then. That’s why we didn’t see each other.”

Please God, let him accept the truth. Her voice sounded like it was grating over gravel; she didn’t know how much of it she had left to use.

He shook his head like she had it all wrong. “You didn’t even have the baby shower until after he was born. That’s kind of strange, isn’t it? I remember having to drive Manda there because she was nine months pregnant and couldn’t reach the steering wheel around her belly. I walked her in and there you were, all slim and put-together like you’d never been pregnant.” He smiled dully. “Manda even leaned over and whispered in my ear about how good you looked for having just given birth.”

Winnie was balanced on her knees. A trickle of saliva hung from her chin, but she made no move to wipe it away. Her twin brother was lifting the gun. She couldn’t think clear thoughts; she was still trying to understand what had happened that had led up to this.

“This isn’t you,” she said, before her throat closed in panic and she started to cough. “This isn’t my brother. Dakota, please—”





      32


JUNO

Juno leaned over Nigel, for once not feeling the cracking pain pinching into her back like talons, and focused on reaching her stiff fingers into the pockets of his running shorts. They were empty except for his headphones. He’d either dropped his phone outside or Dakota had taken it along with Winnie’s, which was as missing as Dakota’s mind. She heard shouting coming from the apartment, saw Nigel’s blood swimming around her feet. Her vision shook like Jell-O, and Juno thought she was going to keel over. The Crouch family portraits stared at her from the wall. She felt her survival instincts kick in.

Slow but steady, she thought, taking a step toward the front door. Sam was safe—or safer than he would be in the house; he was the only person she cared about, anyway.

Except Terry wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for her. You have to decide, Juno, are you the hero or do you creep back to your hidey-hole? She rubbed the spot behind her ear.

She could walk out the door right now, save her own skin. She stepped over Nigel. She thought she could hear Terry Russel’s voice. This was none of her business. She heard a car drive by, the radio churning out rap music. Outside was so close; just a few steps and she’d fall right into the cool night. But what about Winnie...? She tried to kick the thought, think around it.

She might hear the story on the news from the women’s shelter if she got there in time to get a cot, tomorrow, maybe, but no one would ever know she’d been here. The story wouldn’t be about her this time, and she wouldn’t be the one to go to prison. The thought of prison sent panic skittering through her limbs. She was dying, and she was not going to yield up her soul in some shit cinder-block prison cell while her roommate masturbated in the bunk above her. Her hand reached for the dead bolt.

Then she heard another gunshot, her terror so blinding she moved on instinct. She was going to have to move quickly—and quickly cost her a great deal of pain. The keypad to the alarm system was in front of her. But in her haste, her shaking fingers hit the emergency button, and instantly a terrifying wailing began to scream through the house. She fumbled with the lock, risking a glance over her shoulder, and saw Dakota lumbering through the kitchen toward her. Her attention now focused on her hands, she managed to flip the dead bolt. Then the door was open and cool air was on her face and filling her open mouth. She made it to the edge of the concrete where the walk dipped into the grass and then the sidewalk. It was dark, the street outside deserted.

Juno ran, despite her aching body, pumping her legs harder than she ever had since she’d run with her boys at the park all those years ago. But everything was wrong; she wasn’t getting anywhere. And then she felt a hand yanking her back, grabbing her before she could even reach the sidewalk. With the alarm wailing in her head, and her arms and legs flapping like those inflatable waving men that stores used to advertise, Dakota dragged her back inside the house.

By the time Juno found her voice, way back in her belly where it was hiding, Dakota was closing the door behind them, disarming the alarm. Of course he would know the code—he’d stayed here more than once, after all. He tossed her away from him, and Juno’s shoulder blade struck the closet door. Even with the breath knocked out of her, she still hadn’t screamed. Dakota, seeing his mistake in shoving her away, reached for her again, but Nigel’s body was in the way and he tripped over it, sprawling. Juno had a split second to consider her options: the front door was out of the question; she wouldn’t get two feet before he grabbed her. That left the apartment beyond the kitchen, but that door had its own dead bolt, and beyond that was the gate with the latch and the alley. And who knew what she would find in that apartment. Two dead women?

She was up the stairs before he was on his feet. She didn’t hear his footfalls behind her. That was good; she had time. As she cleared the stairs and ran for Samuel’s bedroom window, she heard him yelling something. Her lungs were almost in as much pain as her joints as she gasped for air. If he wasn’t coming up the stairs after her, maybe it meant that one of the women was alive, and she bet it was Winnie. She reached Sam’s window at the same time she noticed the house had fallen eerily silent.