Twenty strides forward through the center of smoke, then thirty two more directly to the right—
This was how I’d learned to navigate the TNT Twins’ holes in the meadow on the way to my dad’s trailer. Would Granny or the Colonel be there, too, since they’d agreed to watch out for him? Could I manage to get them all down to the bunker if they were injured?
I didn’t know these answers. All I knew was that I was going to do my damndest to try.
I kept dodging the flames that licked at my feet and coughing incessantly at smoke, holding my elbow over my mouth to try and deflect it. Three more strides to the right, I thought, and I should run smack into—ouch!
Holy shit! I’d made it, and I immediately sank to the dirt, my head ringing. I banged against the metal of my dad’s trailer and ran my hand along the side to try and find the door. My eyes burned like hell, and I was coughing uncontrollably now.
“Daddy!” I cried. “Hold on, I’m coming!”
There it was—I could feel the metal handle to the trailer. I flipped it open and scrambled inside.
Only to see more smoke, everywhere.
He must’ve left his windows open—
“DADDY!” I yelled.
But I heard . . . nothing.
There was no silence more sickening to me on the planet in that moment.
“Daddy, where are you?” I begged, beginning to feel woozy from the smoke in my lungs, my eyes stinging like crazy. Nevertheless, I leaped forward to where the couch must be, patting it with my hands to try and feel for my dad. I reached up to the bunk rail but only discovered a pillow and blankets, so I sank down to the floor.
“C’mon, Daddy, where are you?” I cried again, feeling my fingers over the carpet. “Please—knock on something—anything—give me a sign!”
And that’s when I saw her.
Hazy, through the smoke . . .
The woman with the dark lace shroud.
She was made of smoke, just like when I saw her in Granny’s crystal ball. I swear I could’ve put my hand straight through her.
And her eyes were closed, as if she’d been . . . praying.
Then she opened them, seeming to look right through me.
And she held up a feather.
She let it fall from her fingers.
Then disappeared.
Stunned, I watched as the feather did little curls in the smoke and floated towards the back of the trailer. I stepped forward after it, my eyes following its twists and turns, until I saw it fall . . .
Right down on my dad.
“Oh my God!” I bent down and jiggled him, but he was as still as a corpse.
“No!” I cried, coughing madly. “No, you can’t die!”
There was only one thing to do. I tilted his head back and mashed my lips to his, blowing hard.
I broke away and thumped his chest with all my strength.
Again—then again—
Furiously, I kept trying to resuscitate him, when I felt his good hand grab my arm.
“Ow,” I cried. Damn, he still had that iron grip!
My dad coughed hoarsely, so I lifted him up to a sitting position, then threw my arms around his chest and tried to drag him across the floor.
“The bunker!” I screamed, kneeling on the floor to try and feel for the handle. “Where is it?”
“Thust go, Wobbin!” I heard him sputter between coughs. “Thust go!”
And he collapsed in my arms.
No, not like this! I thought, patting the floor frantically. Then I remembered that in Granny’s wagon, the stairs to the bunker were at the bottom of a trunk.
But there was no trunk in this trailer.
Except there was a couch—
I dragged my dad over to the old couch and pushed up at the cushion, feeling a metal panel beneath it with a handle.
And I could lift it!
Glory be, there they were—the most beautiful plywood stairs I’d ever seen. Embracing my dad from underneath his arms, I lugged him down the stairs very carefully, taking backward steps and trying to keep my balance. When I’d finally gotten his feet through the opening, I saw the metal panel underneath the cushion slam hard above us and seal off the smoke. I breathed a sigh of relief.
And just then, I heard my dad utter a soft moan.
He was still alive.
I stumbled a little and leaned against the wall to steady myself, then dragged my dad to the bottom. I could see his chest rise and fall, giving me hope he might really make it. The very second I was able to hoist him into a recliner and make sure he stayed upright, I ran to a water cooler and got him a drink.
“Here you go,” I said, still hacking but tilting up the cup so he could take a sip. God bless him, the air was clear down here. For just how long, I didn’t know, but something told me Creek probably had oxygen tanks somewhere if we really needed them. Luckily, after swallowing a little water, my dad hacked for a few seconds like I did, then took deep breaths of the clean air.
He stared into my eyes.
“Sank yoo,” he said.
His eyes didn’t dart from me, like they often did when he was spinning his usual lies. Instead, he lifted his good hand to his mouth to push his tongue over a bit to the left. I saw him close his eyes for a second, as though trying to concentrate.
“Thaaank . . . yooou,” he said deliberately, in perfect King’s English.
Tears swelled in my eyes.
He did it! He’d just proved to me that he’s actually trying to get better, not just relying on his slick victim routine to manipulate me even more.
I wanted to hug him in that moment.
Hug him and grab a washcloth and wipe some of the smoky grime from his face. But the very second I had that thought, I heard a violent, crashing boom—
I assumed it was another one of the TNT Twins’ stashes exploding. But after that, we could hear the peculiar sound of rushing water.
And to our surprise, we saw a little stream of water begin to trickle down the stairs.
“Where’s this water coming from?” I gasped. “It wasn’t even raining outside.”
My dad clutched my arm.
His eyes appeared less than alarmed—more like relieved.
“Waaaater Towwwer,” he enunciated very slowly.
Water Tower?
I shook my head, unable to picture what he was talking about, when I heard the metal door to the bunker creak open.
“You okay down there?” The Colonel poked his head in and shouted. He spied the two of us with his one eye, looking us over carefully, and then nodded. “Better check if Creek’s got some mud boots stashed, ’cause Turtle Shores is gonna be a swamp for a while. Creek done blowed up Bixby’s homemade water tower to put out the fire.”
Holy Smokes, I thought—he always did find a way of thinking big.
“Too bad about all that money you got,” the Colonel continued, looking at me. “Everyone in the compound’s fine, even my Attack Geese made it down to the bunker. And we only lost one old pop-up trailer to the fire. But them poor money bags just got all blown straight to hell.”
Chapter 18
“What?”
I dashed upstairs and out into the compound quicker than the Colonel could say “incendiary device.”
Only to see clouds of steam hovering over the entire meadow at the cusp of dawn, with pieces of confetti falling all around me like rain.
Green little pieces of confetti.
As in, our cash—
I sank to my knees in the gooey mud that had at least a quarter inch of water still on top. Desperately, I grabbed at the stray bits of damp paper.
Surely we could paste them together, I thought, coughing at the mix of steam and smoke. Somehow tape all those little pieces into bills once again?
I rose to my feet, swiping at some of the bigger shreds that floated down among the ash, my sneakers squishing in mud. Then I saw a corner of paper with the number 50 on it, convinced it was a good sign. I snatched it from the air
, feeling victorious.
But when I glanced down at the small handful of pieces I’d collected, I suddenly realized how ridiculous I was.
They looked like someone had put our cash through a blender.
And at the entrance of the compound, I spied what used to be the barrel Creek had put our bags in, now just a dark hole in the ground with shards of metal everywhere.
“Oh God,” I moaned, slumping into a crouch in the mud with my head in my hands. “Why didn’t we just drop our bags back in the woods?”
“’Cause they would’ve gotten stolen. Or worse, we’d be arrested,” I heard a familiar voice behind me say. “Those bags had our finger prints all over ’em.”
I whipped around—it was Creek!
I hardly recognized him. He was a filthy, dirt-splattered mess.
But I threw my arms around him anyway and gave him a kiss, a mud and confetti-soaked kiss.
“Ouch!” he winced.
Oh geez, I’d completely forgotten that he still had a couple of bullet wounds in his arm and shoulder.
“It’s okay—it’s okay,” he reassured me, giving me a half-smile that made his cheek scar crinkle into that wicked dagger I’d come to love. He pointed to his other cheek away from the bad shoulder and gave it a tap. “Here, maybe?”
Yes! I gave him a big smooch, so grateful he was okay—that we were all okay—because that’s the only thing that mattered to me now.
But until then, I hadn’t noticed that he was holding a glass jar that said Ball on it.
“Do me a favor,” Creek asked, handing me the jar. He unzipped his bloody coveralls and flinched as he slipped his arm out of his t-shirt to reveal the ghastly bullet wounds.
I threw my hand over my mouth in shock. I could see where he’d already dug out the bullets, probably with Bixby’s hunting knife. Or worse, a screw driver.
“Pour the Colonel’s moonshine over these, will you?”
Was he serious?
“Go on!” Creek barked. He pulled a stick out of his coveralls pocket and shoved it between his teeth. “Do me up.”
Shaking a little, I tipped the jar over the worst shoulder wound and shut my eyes.
I could hear Creek hissing from the pain, cursing under his breath.
“One more shot, Robin,” he insisted.
When I opened my eyes, I saw Creek’s face buckled into a cringe.
“Just get it over with—quick,” he urged.
I threw a splash on the last bullet wound on his bicep, and Creek gritted his teeth and shook his head.
“I can take care of the rest of that,” I heard Granny Tinker call out.
When I turned, I saw her slogging through the mud, not seeming to care if her lace-up boots got all filthy.
“Hot damn! We haven’t had this much water flood through Turtle Shores since the lake overflowed in nineteen sixty-nine. One of my favorite years, though, the Summer of Love—”
For once, I was overjoyed to hear her crackling voice. She carried with her a handful of herbs and a white roll of gauze bandage.
“Step aside now an’ let me put a poultice on them wounds,” she ordered, pulling a tiny pot from her pocket. She lifted the ceramic lid to reveal some kind of ointment.
I stared at her, wondering how on earth she knew Creek needed medical attention? But she just glared back at me as if that sort of insight ought to be obvious by now.
“Ow—shit, Granny!” Creek cried as she rubbed the herbs and ointment into his wounds and bandaged them. “That burns more than the moonshine.”
Granny grabbed his chin and wiggled it.
“Don’t you fuss at me, young man. I’ll have you as good as new in no time,” Granny scolded.
Then she put her fingers together and gave a loud whistle through her teeth.
Up popped the TNT Twins from two vats in the meadow, all covered in yellow custard and red jello.
But remarkably unharmed from the fire and flood.
“It’s almost daylight,” Granny warned. “Cops are gonna be sniffing around here in no time, wonderin’ what all them explosions was about. I reckon I’ll feed ’em a good story and send them on their way, as long as y’all are safe in the bunkers. Whoops, too late.”
Red and blue lights swirled across the canopy of trees just beyond the entrance to Turtle Shores, but I didn’t spot the squad car yet. Like groundhogs, the TNT Twins snapped back into their holes with a splash of water and mud, completely invisible.
“Come on!” I cried to Creek, yanking at his good arm. “Let’s get into my daddy’s bunker—”
I knew hiding at Turtle Shores wasn’t Creek’s first choice, but we didn’t have time to run for a tree stand in the woods.
Creek followed me into my dad’s trailer, where I threw up the sofa cushion and opened the metal panel to allow us down the stairs. Our feet drummed hard as we scampered below to my dad.
“Cops!” I cried to him, watching his left eye grow wide.
And then his right eye slowly opened wider, too.
Whoa, was my dad really starting to recover feeling on that side of his face?
Part of me didn’t know whether to do a happy dance for him, or to start demanding a host of explanations.
I decided to go for the latter.
“Listen up, Daddy,” I began, wondering how to dress up the fact that Creek and I had been out robbing a bank last night. But shouldn’t somebody tell the truth in my family for once? Turn a new leaf?
“Me and Creek were at Cincinnati Federal a few hours ago,” I declared boldly. “I think you know exactly why.”
To my astonishment, my dad’s eyes narrowed and he glared at Creek. He had a strangely bitter yet protective look on his face, like a . . . real father? One who actually cared where I’d run off to at night, and who I was with?
My heart warmed at the sight. But that wasn’t going to stop me from pressing for more answers.
“Dad, I saw a poster at the bank for a fundraiser at our house. Only your partner Tweedle is supposedly the owner now. How’s that possible?”
I paused for a moment, letting the information sink in for him.
“Be honest, Daddy,” I insisted. “Did you embezzle that money from the law firm?”
My dad said nothing.
In fact, he wasn’t even looking at me—he was looking through me, as though his mind had gone somewhere else entirely.
I heaved a sigh. What was I thinking? My dad had never fessed up to anything before, so why would he start now? His whole brain is stitched together with lies, so if he ever told the truth it would probably begin to unravel.
“Zah bawwwwk,” my dad slurred, interrupting my thoughts. His focus was on the floor now, as if he could see some kind of picture there.
I rolled my eyes—a classic deflection tactic that he probably learned at law school. Act like he doesn’t understand, or turn the subject onto something else so people will forget their original questions.
“Daddy,” I insisted, “Answer me! Did you embezzle the money or not? How did Tweedle get our house?”
My dad’s gaze was stubbornly fixed on the floor. He lifted his good hand and pointed at something I couldn’t see.
“Zah . . . box!” he burst with utmost effort.
The box?
I glanced at Creek and shook my head, not following my dad’s drift at all.
Creek leaned over to me. “Robin, can’t you cut him some slack for once?” he whispered. “Maybe your dad didn’t take all the money—maybe his gambling problem was chump change compared to what Tweedle was up to. Try showing him a little faith. You might be amazed at what happens to his speech.”
My cheeks stung with heat. How dare Creek scold me. It’s not like he’d lived with my dad’s lies for sixteen years. But then I remembered what he’d said about forgiveness.
I folded my arms.
Could it be possible my dad wasn’t to blame for everything?
It was a hard notion to entertain. I glanced at Creek—at the raw hone
sty that was always in his eyes, so fiercely blue and powerful it was hard to take sometimes. Drawing in a deep breath, I nodded.
Okay, I thought, maybe my dad does deserve a chance—or maybe he doesn’t. So I’m doing this for Creek.
“Daddy,” I said in as gentle a voice as I could muster. I stroked his shoulder and crouched beside the armchair, trying to look more softly into his eyes. “If you didn’t steal all the firm’s money, who did?”
My dad lifted his hand to brush a muddy lock of hair from my eyes. I’d never really noticed before, but his eyes were such a clear blue, like a country stream. And they suddenly looked fresh to me, as pure as Dooley’s, but far more intense.
“Thweeeedle,” he replied with startling force. His eyes met mine, and he cupped my cheek. “Buth he duzznt no about . . . zah box.”
I let out a sigh, hoping he wasn’t delusional. “You keep saying box, Daddy. What box are you talking about?”
My dad sucked in a deep breath, and I could’ve sworn I saw his eyes glisten. Just then, a tear chased down his cheek. He pulled me towards him and pressed a soft kiss on my forehead, then gazed at me as if all along we’d been speaking of his greatest treasure.
“Where . . . I . . . keeeep . . . Alessia,” he said perfectly.
Chapter 19
“I keep seeing her,” I confessed as I glided through the cool water of Bender Lake.
It was a scary thing to admit. Creek might think I’d gone bonkers.
We were swimming in the moonlight, after having slept on the tree stand for the rest of the day and waking up at nightfall, still grimy from all our disasters. Granny had dealt with the cops for us in her usual artful way, of course—even giving one of them an herbal tea to relieve his rheumatism before she sent him off. So our sleep had been deep and peaceful, and I’d woken up with my body entwined with Creek’s, feeling genuinely connected. But now, when I turned in the darkness to try and spot Creek, I couldn’t place him anymore. All I could hear was his voice across the water, as though he’d become part of the night mist that hovered delicately over the ripples.
“You’ve seen her. You mean, Alessia?” I heard him say. “Like where, in Granny’s crystal ball?”
Robin in the Hood (Robbin' Hearts Series Book 1) Page 16
