“Take it slow,” Clair told her. “Help will be here soon.”
They watched the woman follow the wall until she reached the front door and stepped outside into the darkening night. When she disappeared from sight, they both turned back and faced the staircase, weapons at the ready.
86
Porter
Day 2 ? 5:32 p.m.
Porter ran his finger over the paint. It was still wet.
The eyes were blue.
He wanted to shout out Emory’s name but knew it would do little good other than give away his position. He also knew he should bag the eyes, but he didn’t have any bags. Porter knelt down. Bishop plucked them out whole, optic nerve and all. This wasn’t easy to do. Eyes popped rather easily, and it took a skilled hand with the correct tools to properly get behind them and remove them from the socket without damage. They appeared fresh. The blood had only begun to congeal and dry.
Porter reached into his pocket and pulled out the cell phone. “Kloz? I’m inside. I found Emory’s eyes outside the emergency stairs on the first floor. Did you call for an ambulance too?”
He heard nothing and glanced at the phone—NO SIGNAL.
“Shit.”
He placed the phone back into his pocket.
His grip on the bat tightened as he stepped over the eyes and gently pushed on the door release, swung it open, and stepped into the stairwell. The beam of his flashlight rolled across dust and debris that hung in the air like a dry fog, and he had to fight the urge to cough. It was impossible to follow the trail through here. So many footprints converged on that first step, Porter couldn’t be sure how many people had traipsed through, but it could easily be dozens.
Porter directed the beam straight up.
How tall did Kloz say this building was? Had he even said? It appeared to be at least fifty stories from the outside. Porter wasn’t sure he could do that on his best day, let alone with a fresh stab wound in his thigh. He pulled the hospital greens down and got a better look at the wound. Although it was bleeding slightly earlier, it had stopped. His leg still throbbed, though. Damn near hurt more now than when the knife went in. From what he could see around the bandage and tape, the surrounding flesh was purple and black.
Porter pulled the box cutter from his pocket and used it to cut a length of cloth from his shirt. He wrapped it around the existing bandage, securing it in place. He cut another piece and tied it tight just above the wound—not as restrictive as a tourniquet, but enough to slow the blood flow. Hopefully it would be enough to hold him together, at least for a little while.
Porter started up the steps.
87
Clair
Day 2 ? 5:33 p.m.
Nash took the lead and crossed the hallway in one fluid motion. Clair followed close at his back. The setting sun had not only pitched the house into darkness, but a fall chill had found its way into the air. The hair on the back of her neck and arms stood on end, and she told herself that was because of the cold too, but the pounding of her heart within her chest told a different story.
The first step creaked under Nash’s weight, and she heard him swear softly. Clair squeezed his shoulder with her free hand. She heard the floorboards creak under her weight too and considered taking off her shoes, then figured it would probably be of little use in a house like this. Structures of this age tended to have wooden floors that groaned underfoot.
They ascended slowly in an attempt to minimize the noise, feeling their way up the steps. When Clair’s fingers trailed into something moist on the banister, she stopped and brought her fingertips to her nose. There was no mistaking the coppery scent of blood. She had smelled it more times than she could recall, but that didn’t make it any easier.
Nash stopped too and looked back at her, his face shrouded in shadows.
Clair held up her fingers.
“Blood,” she whispered, the word escaping on a single breath.
Nash looked down at his own hand. Clair watched as he wiped the blood on his pants before continuing up the stairs.
Her palms began to sweat, and the Glock grew heavy in her grip.
At the top of the steps they found a landing with a hallway branching off in either direction. There was a bathroom directly in front of them. Nash entered low with his gun out front, confirming that the room was empty.
Clair stood with her back to the wall, her own weapon pointing in from the hallway, until he returned to the landing.
A small row of LED lights built into the baseboard illuminated the hallway, and they could see three closed doors down the left and a pair of double doors at the end of the hallway on the right. The walls were lined with family photos of various shapes and sizes. Clair assumed the double doors led to the master bedroom while the others belonged to guest spaces and Carnegie’s room.
“Which way?” she asked in a whisper.
“Master,” he replied, already moving down the hall.
88
Porter
Day 2 ? 5:33 p.m.
Porter stopped just short of the third-floor landing. The small six-foot-by-four-foot space was littered with dust and discarded fast food wrappers. The walls were painted lime green.
He heard a voice.
With the bat in hand, he climbed the last few steps, swinging the beam of his flashlight back and forth against the thickening darkness.
“Are you getting tired yet, Sam?”
The voice was followed by a quick crackle, static, then silence.
“Where are you, Bishop?” Porter said, his own voice sounding higher than he had hoped as the words echoed across the concrete.
“I know you’re out of shape, but come on now, I’ve seen old ladies with walkers climb a flight of stairs faster than you.”
“Fuck you.”
“Maybe the exercise will do you some good, burn some of that gut away.” Crackle.
Porter spotted the radio as he ascended and made the landing. A small black Motorola with a rubber antenna stood against the riser at the beginning of the next flight of stairs.
When Bishop spoke again, a small red LED pulsed with his voice. “How about a little rhyme to pass the time? You up for that, Sam?”
Sam picked up the radio. Bishop’s singsong voice crackled back.
“Goose Goosey Gander, whither shall I wander? Upstairs and downstairs and in my Lady’s chamber. There I met an old man who wouldn’t say his prayers, so I took him by his left leg and threw him down the stairs. Have you ever wondered what that nursery rhyme was about, Sam? I mean, it’s a little dark for kids, but tell it to kids we do. My mother used to love to tell me that one whenever we went up or down a flight of stairs.”
Porter pressed the button on the radio and held the mike close to his lips. “I’m coming for you, you crazy fuck.”
“Sam!” Bishop’s voice came back. “You finally made it. I was getting worried about you.”
“Where are you, Bishop?”
“I’m close, Sam. I wanted to wait for you. I knew you’d puzzle it out. You’re the sharp one in your little band of misfits. It took some coaxing, but you got it. I’m so proud of you.”