THIRTY-FOUR
Sarah turned on every light switch as we made our way into the hallway and down the steps. She was scared of the house, or scared that Derrow was waiting for her around every corner. So we went slowly. Veronica, surprisingly strong despite her drugged condition, clutched my elbow. Sarah, two steps in front of us, held the flashlight in both hands. She had shoes, a pair of ancient women’s sneakers. Veronica had no shoes, the articles of clothing she was wearing when Derrow grabbed her nowhere to be seen. But it didn’t matter. My brother’s car was in front of the house, across the street.
Less than a hundred yards away.
But when we made it to the kitchen, I heard a sound that made my heart stop.
The garage door going up.
Derrow had returned.
Sarah let out a strangled sound and said, “He’s going to kill us he’s going to kill us he’s going to kill us,” over and over.
The door to the garage was the only one without the padlock. Now there was only one way out of the house—back into the basement and through the window I broke when I came in.
Not only that, but there wouldn’t be much time before Derrow realized something was going on. If the car parked in front of his house wasn’t a dead giveaway already, he’d know it when he saw that every light in the lower level was on.
I opened the basement door and ushered the two women inside. Derrow’s giant truck gunned into the garage, then turned off. Then there was the sound of a key in the lock a few seconds later. The garage door stayed up.
“Come on,” I said. I pulled the door closed behind us, Sarah shrieking as we were plunged into darkness. I carefully felt for the next step, my whole body trembling.
But she fumbled with the flashlight and dropped it, and it bounced down the steps and went out.
“Oh my God,” she whispered.
“We’re going to be fine,” I told her with a confidence that I in no way felt.
We had to take the stairs even more slowly now in the pitch-black of the basement. I undid the snap on my holster and gripped the handle of my gun. My palms were wet. Veronica leaned heavily on my arm, her long hair brushing my wrist. Sarah’s breathing was ragged in my ear but I listened hard for an idea of where Derrow was, what he was doing.
He wasn’t doing anything, not even walking. The floorboards weren’t creaking. He was just standing there, probably just inside the house, listening too. Then he took four heavy steps, crossing the room quickly with his long strides. He stopped at the basement door, turned the knob, but didn’t open it.
“Why couldn’t you just stay away?” Derrow said through the door, his tone as dark and cold as the concrete walls around us. “You were afraid, on the phone. I could hear it in your voice.”
I said nothing.
“I should have dealt with you. I knew I should have. You’re not a good girl. You broke into my house. Both of my houses. Didn’t you?”
I still kept quiet.
“And you’re trying to turn my Sarah against me now?” he said.
I didn’t say a word, too busy trying to formulate a new plan. If Derrow opened the door and we were still on the steps, we’d all be dead in seconds.
“You miserable bitch,” he said. “I could shoot you through this door and what could anybody even say? Self-defense. Not a doubt in my mind you have that little revolver of yours in your hands right now.”
Sarah yelped a little. I got the three of us off the steps in case he decided to do just that. I wanted to shoot him through the door myself but my eyes hadn’t adjusted to the darkness yet, and I couldn’t be sure exactly where the door was, or if he was behind it or beside it. “That’s the least of your problems right now,” I said, forcing my voice to sound strong. “But you’re right, I do have my little revolver in my hands. I reloaded it, by the way. And if you open that door, all eight shots are going into your chest.”
I grabbed Sarah’s upper arm and pointed at the broken window, where the palest hint of moonlight illuminated the area on the floor just below it. She looked at me with confusion but then took Veronica’s arm and they shuffled toward it.
“The least of my problems?” Derrow said next. His voice sounded slightly farther away, then closer as he added, “I wouldn’t worry about my problems right now.”
I heard a scraping sound, and then the door rattled in its frame. He was wedging something under the doorknob, like a chair. He must have thought I broke into the house through the garage, not the basement window.
“But your problems,” Derrow said. “I’d like to see you talk your way out of this one.”
Then I heard him walk away.
I ran up the steps and jerked at the doorknob, but it wouldn’t even turn. The sweat snaking down my spine went ice cold. A beat later, his heavy footsteps returned, accompanied by a wet, sloshing sound.
Then the sharp tang of gasoline.
I half ran, half tripped back down the steps and over to the window, where Sarah was just standing, staring up at the freedom beyond the small, open rectangle. Veronica was at the weight bench, hopelessly trying to drag it across the floor. But at least she was trying.
“No, this is too heavy,” I said. I tried to think of what else I had seen in the basement. There were boxes, which might be sturdy enough to support Veronica’s weight but not mine or Sarah’s. And then I remembered.
The deep freezer.
I felt my way along the wall until I bumped into it, Veronica at my heels. I pulled the cord out of the wall and tried to drag it, but the thing weighed a ton.
“We need to push it,” I said.
Veronica and I went to the other end of the appliance and pushed and pushed, and it barely budged three inches.
From upstairs, I heard a faint crackling sound, smelled smoke in addition to gas. A smoke detector began to peal.
“Oh my God,” Sarah said.
“What the hell is in this thing?” I said. I threw open the lid to the freezer and was met with a blast of cold, wet air and a smell that instantly made me gag, and Sarah shrieked.
“Don’t open that, don’t, don’t,” she said. “Theresa is in there.”
Veronica recoiled and I slammed the lid shut, unwilling to reach inside.
Theresa.
I remembered the name from my background check. His ex-wife. My thoughts were going everywhere at once, a swarm of insects. And I had never been more afraid.
“Focus,” I said out loud.
I got lower to the ground, my hip screaming at me, and pushed as hard as I could. Veronica did the same. We got it moving, slowly, but steadily, until I heard it crunching over broken glass from the window.
“There, that’s good.” I held back a cough as I helped Veronica and Sarah get on top of the freezer.