“Hello, Scott.” She managed a little smile through the pain. “I had some trouble.”
“No shit. We’ve got to get you out of here.”
She nodded and struggled to sit up. The knife still protruded from her side. Scott started to reach for it, but she shook her head. “Don’t touch it,” she insisted.
He nodded. “Okay.”
He half-lifted her up, and Hope pushed herself to her feet. The movement increased her dizziness, but she overcame the sensation. Gritting her teeth and leaning on Scott, she stepped over O’Connell’s father’s body. “I need help.” She draped an arm around his shoulder, and he started to steer her to the door. “The gun,” she whispered. “The gun, we can’t leave it.”
Scott looked around and saw the weapon on the floor. He picked it up and removed Hope’s backpack. He dropped the gun back into the plastic bag, sealed it, then threw the backpack over his free shoulder. “Let’s get outside,” he said.
They stumbled through the door, and Scott helped Hope to the dark side of the carport. He propped her up against the wall. “I’ve got to think.”
She nodded, drinking in the cold air. It helped to clear her head, and just exiting the close confines of death strengthened her. She pushed herself up a bit. “I can move.”
Scott was someplace between horror, panic, and determination. He understood he had to think clearly and efficiently. He lifted Hope’s face mask and could see why Sally had fallen in love with her. It was as if the pain of what she had done had etched itself on her face in the bravest of strokes. In that second, he realized that what she had done had been as much for him as it had been for Sally and Ashley.
“I must have bled, on the floor. If the police…”
Scott nodded. He thought hard, then knew what he had to do.
“Wait here. Can you manage?”
“I’m okay,” Hope said, although she clearly was not. “I’m hurt. Not injured,” she said, using an old athletic cliche. If you are merely hurt, you can still play. If you are injured, you cannot.
“I’ll be right back.”
Scott ducked around the corner of the carport and crouched down, hiding as best he could as he surveyed the mess of machine parts, stray tools, empty paint cans, and stacks of roofing shingles. He knew that somewhere within a few feet was what he needed, but was unsure whether he would be able to spot it among the weak shadows.
Be lucky, he whispered to himself.
Then he saw what he needed. It was a red plastic container.
Please, he spoke to himself. Don’t be empty.
He picked up the container, shook it, and could feel about a third of the container sloshing liquid back and forth. He unscrewed the top and immediately smelled the unmistakable odor of old gasoline.
Scott bent over and, as quickly as he could, slipped from the carport, into the light and through the door.
For an instant, he wanted to be sick, and he fought off a sudden surge of nausea. The first time he’d entered the house that night, he had been completely focused on Hope, and extricating her from the scene of her fight. This time he was alone with O’Connell’s father’s body, and for the first time he looked down and saw the gore, the man’s gargoylelike, ravaged face. He gasped and told himself to remain calm, which was useless. He could feel his heart pounding, and everything around him seemed somehow illuminated. The mess from the fight and the blood seemed to glow as if painted with vibrant colors. He thought that violent death made everything brighter, not darker.
Scott was stealing every breath he could, moving unsteadily.
He looked over to the spot where he’d found her pinned beneath O’Connell’s father, where there was likely to be blood, and he saw red droplets marring the floor. He sloshed some of the gasoline in that spot. Then he poured the remainder on the father’s shirt and slacks. He looked around, saw a dish towel, and dipped it into the mixture of blood and gas on the man’s chest. He stuck this in his pocket.
Again a wave of nausea threatened him, and he reached out to steady himself, then stopped. Every second he was inside the murder place, he thought, the likelihood of leaving some telltale clue increased. He stood up, dropped the container into the pools of gasoline, and stepped to the stove. There were matches on the counter next to the gas burners.
He stepped close to the door, lit the entire box, and tossed it onto O’Connell’s father’s chest.
The gasoline exploded into flame. For a second, Scott remained frozen, watching the fire start to spread, then he spun about and ducked back into the night.
He found Hope leaning against the carport. She had her gloved hand wrapped around the knife handle, still protruding from her side. “You’ve got to be able to move,” he said.
“I can walk.” Her words seemed raspy.
The two of them clung to the shadows until they reached the street. Scott slid his arm under Hope, so that she could lean against him, and they stepped slowly through the darkness. She was steering him toward her car. Neither looked back at the O’Connell house. Scott prayed that the fire he’d set would take some time to get going, that it would be several minutes before anyone in any of the adjacent homes spotted the flames.
“Are you okay?” he whispered.
“I can make it,” Hope replied, leaning against him. The night air had helped to clear her thoughts, and she was controlling the hurt, although every step she took sent a spike of electric pain through her. She ricocheted between confidence and strength and despair and weakness. She knew that no matter how Sally had plotted the remainder of the night, it wasn’t going to happen as planned. The blood she could sense pulsing through the wound told her that.
“Keep going,” Scott urged.
“Just a couple out for a brisk night stroll,” Hope said, joking through the pain. “Left at the corner, and the car should be just ahead, halfway down the street.”
Each step seemed slower than the last. Scott didn’t know what he would do if a car came along, or if someone came outside and eyed them. In the distance he could hear dogs barking. As they staggered around the corner, looking like a couple that had belted down too much at dinner, he saw her car. The party going on in the house nearby had gotten a bit louder.
Hope managed to stiffen herself. She felt as if she were using every muscle in her body, taking every ounce of strength she had.
“Get me behind the wheel.” She tried to speak with the authority that would leave nothing to debate.
“You can’t drive. You need a doctor and a hospital.”
“Yeah. But not here. Not anywhere close to here.”
Hope was calculating, trying to remain clearheaded, although the pain made it difficult. “The goddamn license plates,” she said. “The ones that were such a big deal to change. Change ’em back.”
Scott was confused. He didn’t see why this was a priority when stanching the wound in her side and getting her to an emergency room seemed far more critical. “Look-” he started.
“Just do it!”
He steered her into the driver’s seat as she’d requested. He grabbed at the bag with the plates and, with a frown and deep breath, a single glance at the house where the party was, ducked to the front and back of the car as rapidly as he could, putting the proper Massachusetts plates on the rental car. He took the others and threw them into the backpack along with the gun, and he stuffed the dish towel marred with gasoline and blood into the plastic bag alongside the weapon.
He went back to the driver’s side. Hope had put the key into the ignition, and he could see her face contort with pain as she stripped the tape from her ankles and pulled the tape and the two sets of gloves from her hands. She handed these and her balaclava to Scott. He stood by helplessly as she pulled the knife blade out of her body.
“Jesus!” she gasped. Her head lolled back, and she nearly passed out. But as quickly as this
