His wife said nothing.
“Found them outside the Blairs’ cabin. I mean, they could be anyone’s. But something feels wrong here.”
Jack could feel her fear. Her eyes darting.
Then: “All right.” Christie took a breath. “So, now what?”
“For now, tonight—nothing. Place seems to go into lockdown mode at night. Tomorrow morning, I think we leave.”
No words back from her this time about the job offer, about the crystalline lake, the clean air.
Christie nodded. “We can play some board games with the kids. Nice and quiet. Get them to bed. Get up early. Go home.”
“Right. Listen. It could all be nothing, Christie. We live in a strange world; that makes places, people strange. Maybe it was too much to hope that we could find some place peaceful. Some place to escape.”
She turned and looked down to the lake. Getting dark. Kids skipping stones, a small fire.
“Say nothing to the kids, okay?” he said. “For now.”
“Of course. Maybe we’ll feel differently in the morning.”
“Could be.”
They started back. She grabbed and held his hand.
Holding it, giving it a squeeze every now and then, letting him know that they were together in this.
the last day
32
12:55 A.M.
He might have dozed off.
But each time sleep came close, Jack would pull himself back to alertness. He listened to Christie’s breathing, always the gentlest of sleepers. While she complained that he, on the other hand, snored like a bear through the night.
She had been asleep for a while. But he wanted to wait.
Let that sleep deepen.
Let other people in Paterville go to sleep.
Let it get as quiet as it can.
He looked at the glowing face of the travel alarm clock. Nearly 1:00 A.M. He pulled off the sheet and thin blanket. He slowly swung his legs out and moved his feet to the floor.
The pain immediate. A Vicodin would be so good.
But not now. Not tonight.
He walked over to the dresser. He had thrown his pants there. He grabbed them, and then slowly opened the drawer to recover the flashlight and his small .44.
Now that he knew how well Paterville’s security worked, he wouldn’t go anywhere on this property without a gun.
He went out to the living room, taking care to quietly shut the bedroom door behind him. Not closed so tight that there would be a telltale click. Just enough so that any noises he made would be masked. He didn’t put on a light.
He put on his running shoes.
He was ready.
Jack looked out the front window.
He could see guards out there. Back on duty. Watching all the good sleeping vacationers.
He knew that going out the front door was out of the question. Before he had gone to bed with Christie, he had checked out another possibility.
First, though, he picked up the car keys he had found off the coffee table.
He walked to the small bathroom at the back of the cabin.
Straight to the window. Open now, assorted bugs mashed up against the screen. Might just be big enough.
The toilet right next to the window.
That would give him enough height. But could he fit?
The screen—an old-fashioned piece of mesh held in place by primitive metal clips—had to be removed. Jack would need to pop it out and let it fall to the ground.
Jack put down the toilet cover and stood on it. The bowl wobbled, bolts in need of tightening.
He steadied himself on the bowl.
Then he pushed two clips on the side of the screen, and then one at the bottom. The three released, sending the screen falling back and away from the window.
It made noise hitting the brush outside.
Jack hesitated.
Not much of a noise. Not a bad noise, he thought. Not anything that could attract attention.
Now the hard part.
He brought his arms up and wedged them on either side of the open window.
Pressure to either side. He’d need to pull himself up, then somehow through the window.
Then pressure. A curl from the biceps, lifting his dead weight up and off the toilet, into the air. Now with a combination of the lift from his arms and wriggling his chest, he was able to get his upper torso part of the way through the window.
He unlocked his arms and reached outside the frame to the walls on either side. Grabbing there, palms against the wood, while he squirmed more, pressing his feet against the inner wall of the bathroom.
No purchase there, but the rubbery toes of his running shoes got some traction.
Had to be done in one move, he knew. And no grunts. No sounds.
One smooth move to slide out.
His landing would make noise. Nothing he could do about that.
He started pressing with his hands as he pushed with his sneakers, attempting to use the wall. And all the time, he wriggled from side to side.
But it worked. He slid through the hole. The frame scraped his chest, then his stomach, maybe drawing blood. It would at least leave nasty bruises. His right knee banged the inner wall, kicking, squirming.
He kept on going. This was the only way out.
One last push with his hands against the wall, and finally gravity did its work and he tumbled, headfirst, down into the brush, the sound of his landing seeming so loud.
For a few seconds, he just lay there.
Listening to see if his maneuver had aroused any attention.
