Endings by Linda Richards (portable ebook reader .TXT) 📗

it. If it were me, I would be the same. I don’t have the words in me to make her do what I’ve asked. Instead, I move to the trunk of the rental, open my suitcase. Arden has followed me and her eyes go wide when I pull the Bersa out of the place where I used to keep my underwear.

“Holy,” she says quietly. “Are you some kind of cop?”

I laugh. It sounds humorless, even to me. “I am no kind of cop, for sure.” I pop a magazine into the gun and rack the slide. Get her ready for business. “But I do know how to use this.” The reflection in her eyes makes me feel like an action hero. It’s an odd feeling, but I don’t hate it.

I put the gun carefully into my purse and we follow the trail. It is not much more than deer might have made. We are silent, like the leaves. We move slowly. Carefully. Feeling the dense oaks all around us. Feeling, also, every disturbance, every crack of every branch beneath our feet. Every sound ahead. We haven’t been moving like this for very long when we hear a sound that stops us both cold. The cry of a child, more shocking in the quiet of the oak forest than it would otherwise have been. I look at Arden and see a bouquet of emotions in her eyes: hope, anticipation, fear. I don’t need to motion at her to be quiet. We both understand what is at stake.

Everything.

Our eyes meet and neither of us breathe, let alone speak, but we don’t doubt it is Ashley. Arden has recognized the sound of her daughter’s cry. Something primal come home to roost.

I blink at Arden. I can almost see her thoughts. Her daughter is alive, when minutes ago she feared she might be dead. But, if we find her, will she be hurt or damaged in some way?

I nod, reassuring and silent. Her child is crying. I can see her gathering up her energy, as though she might bolt towards the sound. It might even be pure instinct. I restrain her with a look, almost a wish. The wrong move right now can change outcomes. She understands this; I see that, too. See her settle into what must be done. Her expression becomes stoic.

The cry comes again. The cry of a child who is frightened, but not in pain. I can see Arden have this thought, as well. It is all we have, in any case. We inch ahead on hope.

The oaks thin. The trail widens. The source of the flash of white Arden saw in the first place becomes apparent: a van tucked amid the trees. Magnetic signs on the side advertise Liam’s Air Conditioning. I feel a surge of anger so pure I can almost touch it. Liam. A short form of William. He is so bold! And he feels so superior, so smart, he thinks he can flaunt such a thing and get away with it.

I calm myself. Focus on breaths in. Breaths out. Anger won’t serve me here. In any case, he’d been right: he’d sailed in there and taken a child from right under their noses. And now here we all are.

I do a fast calculation. We have moved quickly. The child was taken less than three hours ago, and we have heard her, albeit briefly. She is alive and she seems unscathed. I say a prayer to someone’s unseen god and move forward, inch by careful inch, and then—suddenly—there they are, across a clearing from us. A tarp is spread on the ground next to the van. I try not to think about its purpose, why a child on a tarp. A naked child. She is spread-eagled. She is tied down. I try not to ask myself about any of those things, in part because I am so relieved about the final piece: she looks unhurt. I breathe, but not much. We’re not there yet.

Atwater’s presence commands my attention, but I notice other things about the scene. This is not a random stopping place. There are signs of frequent usage, even something that looks like a rough garden at the edge of the clearing.

I don’t have time to look around or ask myself questions. Atwater stands over the child. I don’t recognize him at first, but I know who he is. The small paleness of her makes him look even larger. He looms. There is a knife in his hand. Something long and deadly looking, as though it might be used for fighting. Or gutting a deer. I want to close my eyes, but I know that won’t make it go away.

I feel rather than hear Arden gasp. I feel it in my gut. Atwater is too far away to feel it, but he hears it and my heart sinks. The advantage of surprise was all we had. His head comes up and swivels around like a dog’s.

I want to kill him then. It would have been the simplest thing. Instead, I hear myself say in a loud, clear voice, “Stand back from the child.” A ridiculous thing to say, maybe. But it’s all that comes to me in the moment. And it’s the only thing I really want.

He doesn’t, though. He doesn’t stand back. Maybe I’d known all along he would not. To my surprise, he looks at me—straight at me—and smiles.

“I’ve been waiting for you,” he says. There is a madness in his face, in his voice. I know he is insane. Truly, I knew that going in. But the words chill me nonetheless. Who am I, that he should be waiting?

“Stand back from the child, William. Stand away from her.” The Bersa is in my hand and leveled at his chest. And Arden. I can’t hear her anymore, can’t hear the mother heart in her chest beating. It seems possible she has stopped breathing.

“Fuck you,” he says, quietly. Almost sweetly. He moves towards Ashley.