Through his cracked lids, John could see one other person in the room, a woman he assumed was Carol. She knelt in the middle of the marble-floored foyer, the brief-case sized defibrillator in front of her, blatting instructions in the robotic voice John knew from the training he underwent yearly as a teacher at Denton. Right now, the device was telling Carol to remove the protective covers from the contacts and to open the victim’s shirt.
“Bring him lower,” Carol yelled at the two men handling the gurney. John felt a jolt and then he was being lowered until he was only a foot or so off the ground.
“Call Dr. Gleason,” Carol snapped at one of the men, and he took off running. Now it was just Carol and the other man, whom John had not yet seen. Deciding to take a risk, he opened his eyes, hoping neither Carol nor the man would notice.
Carol was still kneeling on the ground, and the AED was saying, “Charging, charging,” over and over. The man was kneeling beside her. He was obviously a techie, not too big or strong-looking. He wore a short-sleeved Hawaiian shirt and khaki pants. He was sweating, bothered into a state of near panic.
The AED stopped saying charging and started in on a new mantra: “Ready. Apply contacts. Ready. Apply contacts.”
“Lift his shirt up,” Carol said to the man, and he dragged John’s sodden t-shirt up to his chin, baring his chest.
“What now?” the man said.
“Back up.” Moving quickly and efficiently, Carol slapped the two contact pads, from which rubber-insulated wires trailed back to the AED, onto John’s chest, one below his left nipple, the other on his right pec, then she hit a button on the AED and it said, “Do not touch patient. Press green button.”
John opened his eyes again, feeling terror singing in his veins. If she pressed the button while the AED was still attached to him, it could stop his heart. Carol and the man were looking at each other, the AED between them.
Carol said, “Check his heart rate. If we do this wrong we could kill him.”
The man’s hands flew up in a gesture of helplessness. “Like I know how to check someone’s fucking heart rate. You do it. You’re the one with the nursing degree.”
She huffed and bent over John, extending one hand to his neck to check his pulse. Then she turned her head back toward the man and said, “Go see what’s taking Martin so goddamned long. Think you can handle that?”
The man stood, and John heard him muttering under his breath as he headed for the door at a trot. Now it was just John and Carol.
“Okay,” Carol muttered to herself. “Okay, okay, okay. Heartbeat, but jagged rhythm. Arrhythmia. Jolt him back on track. Okay, okay.” She turned back to the machine, and as she did, John ripped the contacts from his chest, slapped them onto her exposed arm, then, in the same motion, brought his hand down on the green button on the AED’s console.
There was no snap of electricity, no high pitched whine. Instead, Carol’s body went rigid for a moment, and then she collapsed onto her side, convulsed once, and then was still.
John stood up and pulled his t-shirt down, then walked quickly to the front door and pulled it open. Behind him, he heard Carol moan, and he felt a surge of relief that she was still alive. He stepped out into the sunshine.
* * *
There were three cars parked in the crescent-shaped driveway. One was the van in which Curt and Percy had driven him here, one was a black Mercedes convertible, and the last was a hunter-green Range Rover. John made his way down the line, trying doors.
The Range Rover was unlocked, and there was a key in the ignition. John climbed in and turned the key; the engine roared to life instantly. He put the truck in gear and pressed down on the gas. Ahead, the driveway joined up with a long, straight lane bordered on both sides with towering trees. Turning off the crescent and onto the straightaway, John accelerated. Before him, the driveway went on for as far as John could see.
He never saw the van.
One second he was driving confidently ahead, his spirits starting to rise as he contemplated freedom. The next, he was sideways, then upside down, then smashing to a glass-shattering halt as the Range Rover came to rest against the gigantic trunk of a tree. He brought a hand to his head and it came away bloody.
Out of the passenger side window, he could see the crumpled grill of Curt’s van, steam rising from the blown carburetor. He could smell burning circuitry and smoke and knew he needed to get out of the Range Rover.
The windshield had shattered on impact, and John pulled himself out of the truck, cutting his hands and arms on broken glass as he did so. He crawled as far as he could, then collapsed onto his side, willing himself to stand, but unable to do so. He didn’t think anything was broken, but his side hurt badly and his breath wouldn’t come back. Just a minute, he told himself. I just need a minute.
“Hey,” a voice said from behind him, and John turned to see Curt standing above him. There was a gash above the man’s right eye, and blood covered the side of his face. “Nice try,” Curt said. “But no cigar, fucker.”
Chapter 24
Rose was getting weaker.
For the last several hours she had tried to ignore the ache in her stomach, the fuzziness in her mind, but she couldn’t put it off much longer. If it hadn’t been for the gunshot wound she’d sustained in Barron’s apartment—a wound that would have killed any normal person within minutes—everything would have been fine, but when her body was healing, the demands on her system were great, and that system needed to be fed. The motel clerk the day before had provided her with some energy, but she’d used it up quickly and now felt the first waves of need washing over her.
She knew what the progression would be from here. It would start with the feeling she had right now of growing torpidity, like all she wanted to do was curl up somewhere dark and sleep. But that would just be the beginning. In hours, she would start having trouble breathing, her heart would slow in her chest, her vision would grow darker and darker…
An hour earlier, just as the light was beginning to fade from the sky, she had pulled into a hotel in northern Virginia, just off I-95. It had been a long day’s drive, and her eyes were bleary and grainy from the road. Navigating during the day had been an exercise in torture, and Rose’s head pounded from the effort of keeping her mind focused on the task. It had been years since she’d made such extensive use of daylight hours, but with her quarry on the move, she had seen no alternative.
Mary Ann was asleep in the passenger side seat, and she didn’t wake up until Rose climbed back into the car after checking into the motel. Rose could see the hate and frustration burning in the woman’s eyes, hate for what Rose had done to her husband, frustration because she had missed her chance to run while Rose was in the office.
Now, they sat quietly in the room, Rose in a chair, Mary Ann on one of the beds, her hands and feet secured with duct tape. Helpless as she was, though, Mary Ann hadn’t stopped looking at Rose since she woke up, her eyes wide and intense, almost smoking with pent up anger.
Rose had been thinking about what to do with the woman. Her usefulness was almost exhausted, and Rose had only held on to her for this long out of hope that Mary Ann would be able to offer additional insight into Rose’s situation. Soon, she’d kill Mary Ann and feed on her, but not yet, not while there was still an outside chance she could be useful.
Rose stood and walked to the television, picked up the remote and switched on the TV. It was tuned to MTV, and some hideous reality show was playing.
“I’m going out,” she said to Mary Ann, looking at the woman but not making eye contact. “I won’t be long, so don’t get any ideas. In fact…” Rose grabbed the roll of duct tape from where it sat on the bed-side table and walked over to Mary Ann. “Hold still,” she said.
She grabbed Mary Ann by the shoulders and pushed her back against the headboard, then looped tape around Mary Ann’s chest and around the bars of the bed-frame. She made several loops around Mary Ann, then stood back and appraised her work. “Good?” s
he asked. “Comfy?”
Still, Mary Ann said nothing to her, only stared at her with those eyes full of silent rage and loathing.
“Okey dokey,” Rose said. “Only one more thing.” She grabbed a pillow off the bed, shucked the pillow case off, then wrapped the dusty-smelling fabric around Mary Ann’s lower face and duct taped it into place. “Just in case you feel like making a ruckus,” Rose said. She dropped the roll of tape on the bed and walked to the door. “Back in a jiff,” she said, then left.
* * *
When the woman left, Mary Ann closed her eyes and began to sob, the sounds muffled by the pillow case jammed into her mouth, the fabric dusty and stale tasting against her lips and tongue.
Cut this shit out, she told herself. You do not have this luxury right now. Who knows how long she’ll be gone.
Slowly, Mary Ann pulled herself together, taking deep breaths through her nose, which was still exposed. When her shaking had diminished to a manageable tremor, Mary Ann closed her eyes and thought.
She was taped to the bed. That was the first problem. The second was that the woman had not only taped her wrists together; she’d also taped Mary Ann’s wrists to her thighs, passing the tape under her legs and over her wrists. The only movement Mary Ann could really manage was in her fingers, and they felt numb and far away, like soldiers about to pass out of radio range. Trying to regain feeling in her hands, she flexed her fingers, curling them and then stretching them out, and gradually she began to feel the prickling sensation of blood returning.
Next, she tested each of her bonds, one by one. Her legs were tightly wrapped around the ankles, no problem to take care of if her hands were free, but really, she thought, useless in the long run as long as her wrists were taped. Next, she tried pulling away from the headboard, straining her stomach muscles against the tape. There was almost no give, and the wood around which the woman had passed the tape felt strong, not brittle with age, as Mary Ann had hoped.
Okay, she thought, you’re not going to pull free. You need something. Something sharp…
Looking around the room, her eyes lighted on a glint of silver from the bedside table. She squinted and bent her head as far as she could in that direction. What was it? And then she saw. It was a paper clip binding together the pages of the local attractions menu that had been resting on the bed when they walked in. Mary Ann could remember the woman picking it up and tossing it aside.
Now what? The pamphlet was some three feet away from Mary Ann, a distance that might as well have been two miles, bound as she was. She felt despair hovering just above her heart and pushed it away. No, goddamnit. Not yet.
Her eyes lighted on the duct tape, which the woman had tossed on the bed as she was walking out. Mary Ann reached out a foot—she’d been wearing sandals when the woman grabbed her and had taken them off when they entered the hotel room—and grabbed the roll between the first and second toes of her left foot.
She leaned forward as far as she could and saw what she’d hoped to see. As so many people did out of habit, the woman had bent the tape to the side after she’d ripped the last strip off, leaving perhaps half an inch of the sticky underside exposed. A flare of timid excitement rose in Mary Ann’s heart. But the hard part was still ahead, and Mary Ann thought it was probably going to cost her. Still, it was this or nothing, and at this point nothing wasn’t an option.
Using the bed to help her, Mary Ann slid the roll of silver tape between her toes until the folded back section where the sticky underside was exposed was just above the nail of her big toe, then, gripping the tape tightly between her toes, she began to shimmy her butt in the direction of the bedside table. The tape binding her to the headboard was tight, and as her body shifted, it dug into her upper arms and put pressure on her chest, constricting her rib cage and, beneath that, her lungs. But she pressed on.
It’ll be over soon, she thought, a minute, maybe. I can hold out that long if I have to.
Her breath beginning to wheeze in and out of her nose, Mary Ann swung her left leg over her right and, with all of her strength, stretched her left foot toward the bedside table. Groaning with the effort, she saw the roll of duct tape clenched between her toes stop eight inches from the pamphlet, maybe ten. Not enough.
“Goddamnit,” she whispered, the word muffled into meaninglessness by the gag. Her face was slick with perspiration and she felt blazing hot all over. Her chest was screaming for a full breath of air.
Once again, she began to move, squirming along the bedspread, moving her rear end closer to the edge of the bed inch by inch. The tape had been tight around her chest before, but now it cinched even tighter, and Mary Ann began to wonder if she’d be able to reposition herself even if she did manage to grab the pamphlet. It wasn’t beyond the realm of her oxygen starved imagination to picture herself stuck in this tortured position when the woman came back from wherever she’d gone.
Probably to kill someone else’s husband. Mary Ann felt new, fresh anger surge into her body. She jerked another inch to the left, then another. She thought she could reach it now, extended her left leg toward the bedside table once more…and the turned-back triangle of tape came down on the near corner of the pamphlet.
For a second Mary Ann didn’t so much as breathe. Then she pushed down with her foot as hard as she could, securing the tape, she hoped, on the paper and then lifted. The pamphlet rose into the air with her foot, dangling from the corner of tape like a kite. Her heart was beating hard, and her vision was growing staticky. Mary Ann realized that she was on the verge of fainting and felt red, horrible panic growing in her brain.
Gingerly, she set the pamphlet down on the bedspread, taking care not to detach the paper from the tape, and began to squirm back into her original position on the bed. With every inch she moved, she felt the tape loosen on her chest, like a vice releasing. And then she was back, and she could breathe again. For a while, that was all she did, drawing big, greedy lungfuls of air into her nose, not even minding the dusty smell of the pillowcase anymore. The air could have smelled like manure and it still would have been heaven.
Mary Ann lifted her feet and used her heels to pull the sheaf of papers toward her butt. Charley-horses bulged in her hamstrings, but then she leaned hard to her left and her hands felt paper.
An absurdly powerful feeling of pride washed over her. Even if the woman came back now, even if this was as far as Mary Ann got, she was fighting. And if she got free, if she got out of this place, she would kill that woman if it was her last act on earth.
Moving carefully, Mary Ann rotated the papers between her fingers until her fingers felt metal. She shucked the paperclip off the sheaf, bent the shaft upright, and started to work on the tape binding her wrists.
Chapter 25
John lay in the dark room and tried not to move. His ribs throbbed terribly, pulsing with every heartbeat, and when he tried to move it felt like there were bones grinding in his left hip. And then there was his head. He’d whacked it on the driver’s side window when Curt T-boned him with the van, and he thought he’d opened a pretty good cut in his temple. After Curt had brought him back into the house, a nurse had steered him into this room and tended to the shallow cuts on his hands and on his face.
The door opened and a wide slat of light from the hallway illuminated the room. John covered his eyes, groaning at the pain in his side that resulted from even that small movement. He heard gentle footfalls approaching, then a voice.
“I have some pills for you,” a woman said. “They’re for your pain.”
John said nothing, but let the woman slip the pills into his mouth, then sipped from the glass of water she offered. When she took the glass away, he rested his head back on the pillow and closed his eyes. Behind his lids, he saw Connie, the girl he had once known when his life still held the undefined promise of the future. Without his even knowing it, hope for something more had begun to germinate inside of him again in the days since they had talked. Even knowing that there would be a t
errible physical toll to pay for healing Connie’s daughter, there was no questioning the newfound sense of forward-looking purpose in his life. But now, he knew, there was nothing he could do to avoid what Navarre had in mind.
He wondered what exactly would happen to him when he touched Navarre. With Kyra, it had been his head. He could remember the growing sense of frictive warmth in his brain and then the supernova of agony as the process of healing her broken body shifted into full effect. With Navarre, would it be his lungs? An image leaked into his mind: him, lying half-conscious in bed, wheezing for air through lungs that had, in the space of moments, grown hard and black.
How long would the crippling effects of the healing last this time? Two days? Two weeks? And after that, what? A lifetime of imprisonment here, in Navarre’s home? What of Connie, her daughter, his parents?
A soft, warm sadness spread through him, and then John was asleep.
* * *
He woke up some time later, unable to remember where he was. Then he moved to sit up and almost screamed from the pain.
It was light outside—that was the first thing he noticed. Early morning light, yellow through the gauzy curtains. He ran his hand over his ribs and stomach and felt thickly wrapped bandages there. Tape. Undoubtedly he’d cracked a rib or two, maybe broken them outright. He’d suffered a similar injury as a teenager and still recalled how the injury had seemed to linger forever. This wasn’t going to help his chances of escape.