The Woman Hidden

by Lucas Mattias

  The impact was immediate, painfully stellar. The blow caused the crossbow to escape Clarice’s hand and fly to the opposite direction, to which she also fell, the arrow deeply stuck to her flesh, tearing both sides of her shoulder, blood coming out from both holes. The pain she felt was astoundingly terrible, even preventing her from seeing for some seconds, a time she stood on the ground, the yell stuck in her throat. She could barely scream or breath or move. It all seemed to hurt, while the pain spread, tearing her from the inside, reaching her limbs as a powerful, corrosive venom.

  She couldn’t scream, all she did was to take the impact and the pain in silently with the penance of it. Suddenly, all the other aches seemed meaningless and part of her envied Jason’s condition.

  What now?

  Now she had to run. Keeping her left arm still, she stood up again, leaving the crossbow over there, beside Jason. Although it wasn’t quite fair, his fingerprints were all over it, including his own blood and any other traces of recent use. She knew where the dawn was, the horizon, where she should run to.

  And Clarice ran the best she could, leaving all the darkness right there, in that clearing of disgraces.

  Everything happens for a reason, she thought, although she also knew all could also be rationalized. Clarice, however, needed to be a causality, an obvious reason, an unknown body. Her only thought wandered from her initial ones and they moved straight towards tragedy, considering everything could fall apart in that last hour, in that last second. Not even a Hail Mary pass could save her now.

  What she knew with all her certainties, was that they couldn’t find here in there, not so close from that house, not that close to the bodies.

  And they were coming. Soon the cavalry would arrive, with their sirens, their lights, their yells and searches. Soon they would be canvasing the area and she only prayed for Jason to remain hidden, buried under the snow, concealed by the pale and deadly vastness.

  Her ear still buzzed from the close-ranged shooting and, while she ran, it all seemed to suddenly appear in the darkness of the woods. Loose twigs, stones that rolled beneath her feet, trunks that appeared from nowhere, just to startle her even more. And what if she never reached her destination? What if she also died there, affected by so much pain and exhaustion? Her throat burned, incapable of absorbing so much air and, though she couldn’t, it all felt too rarefied for her to deal with. And she still had so many yards to cover…

  She had to get herself as further as possible.

  They cannot find me here.

  She noticed when the ground turned into a slight slope, a discreet fall towards salvation. She was running a hill by foot, running as best as she could, trying to get herself further away. In her plans, none of that would be necessary. She would leave the house, in peace, and she would enjoy the walk, perhaps even a hike to the nearest escape point in those damned mountains. She never thought Jason would ever set the house on fire, forcing her to run in a hurry, in urgency.

  She felt her foot touch something prominent on the ground and she believed it to be simply the head of a rock. Clarice didn’t consider it could be a full stone that would get loose due to the excessive weight she put onto it. The next thing she saw was the dirty snow from the ground against her face, while her hands tried to support her fall the best way possible. The sudden and desperate thud made the arrow sink a little deeper, the pain once more blinding Clarice for some moments. Her knees were sore after the fall and she couldn’t trust her body to withstand anything else much longer.

  Adrenaline was wearing off slowly and her chest burned, violently pumping, trying to find air enough, energy enough, strength enough. While she tried to bring herself up again, her head spun, increasing the difficulties in stabilizing herself.

  After a couple more minutes, Clarice was again onto her feet, trying to run, trying to walk, trying to increase her trot and her speed. The fall also hurt her knees, which now hurt as if in flames, preventing her from moving with the speed she had shown before. And there was still the fucking arrow into her shoulder. She regretted that action, but went back into considering she needed that personal touch. She needed to get away, she had to find the break of dawn before they found her.

  From there she could see the horizon line a little better, from beyond those many trees and mountains, and the first signs of morning already came up with more power, more amplitude. Perhaps the snowstorm wasn’t up to staying for a long time, maybe it would return in a second, but she no longer cared for that. Her heart clenched around itself, her anxiety growing. She was still far from her destination and morning was coming, which would place her in a worse risk in case she got delayed.

  She risked a glance back, while continuing her sharp descend, supporting herself on the pines and trunks. The smoke, the now was vanishing away, relieved her. Now it was just a dark line in a distant sky, flashing her she was now far enough and that, even if the cops arrived to the place in that exact moment, it would still take them a while to spread around and think about canvasing the whole area. And they would advance all at the same time as she would keep on putting herself away, increasing the distance more and more. She still had to beat the timeline, she couldn’t be associated in any ways to that burning house or she would be detained right when she got found.

  She sped up, firming her feet a little better and checking the soil before taking chances. It was hard, such endeavor. The layers of ice prevented her from fully seeing the ground, hiding under there a whole series of possible traps, and also traps that could actually be real ones. She tried to ignore that new fear and moved on, angering herself every time her feet sank into a hidden hole or some ground gap ahead.

  The dawn was always colder than the night and the following morning, she knew. Around her, the fog seemed denser, thicker, as if curtains of ice tightened around, blocking her view and her thoughts. Her face was almost completely numb, it was even possible to sense those icy crystals gathering around her nostrils and eyes. The cold was intense and her clothes weren’t offering her enough heat, not keeping her well warm as she had thought they would.

  Now Clarice climbed the unsteady slope, holding onto pines and nearing trees with the help of her right hand, the only available one. From there, she started noticing that the quantity of trees was diminishing, the shrubbery was turning drier and scarce – the road was near. In darkness, in exhaustion, counting time became a hard task and she couldn’t tell how long ago she had abandoned Jason, how many minutes – or hours – it had been since she had started her race. Her legs ached, threatening turning themselves off, along her whole body. She couldn’t give herself into the weakness, it was not time for giving up, not when she was so close, already being possible to feel the flavor of salvation.

  Snow and wind cut her skin, or caused her a very similar feeling. She lost her balance quickly when her feet turned in an unexpected moment, but she was able to hold on to a tree before going to the ground. If she fell, she knew she wouldn’t come up again, at least not so soon. She still had some yards to cover, she needed some few more minutes of awareness.

  Her lips, pale, trembled, asking for water, for air, for rest. Her head hurt as much as her shoulders or legs, the wounds seemed much more present and painful. Her blood was cooling down, her muscles were about to surrender to the external forces. She had no time nor fuel to burn anymore.

  Clarice considered, for some instants, the possibility of letting her body go so that it would roll downhill, arriving to its destination in a faster way. It was a possibility, though she had no full certainty that she was really willing to give it a try. It was impossible to preview the state in which she would be whenever she stopped rolling don and she wouldn’t even be sure whether she would reach the right place. It was a tempting idea, though.

  Clarice thought of the possibilities of more fractures and even death, but before she could busy herself with further possible results from her imaginative actions, a boulder went lose from the slope, under her feet, launching
her body down as if it were nothing but mere dead weight.

  Clarice felt her whole body shut down immediately and, although her head kept on working, she felt like she was a small being left inside a capsule rolling down the mountain.

  She felt the vase her body was to be tossed around at some points, hit and roll over stones at others, her limbs meeting branches and trees, the arrow moving all around, still inside her.

  And she came to a stop.

  Clarice looked up, beyond the treetops and its branches, and she saw the enlightened skies.

  She wanted to see where she had stopped at, how her body was now, she wanted to know if she still had chances to live, breathe and get away from there. She couldn’t move.

  She couldn’t scream.

  She couldn’t breathe.

  A nauseating feeling crossed her body and she felt the ground disappear until she saw, heard and felt nothing besides the darkness that embraced her and faded her to black.

  VII

  The smoke left her lips in a swirl until it disappeared completely in the thin cold air. From there, the balcony, she could see the whole city ahead of herself, and all the extension of it towards the horizon line, blocked by the buildings and the pollution. Everything was too dark and the snow no longer fell. She inhaled again, killing that cigarette on the same ashtray, her hands protected and covered by the black gloves.

  The sound coming from the room called her attention. It was not the maids, they would come in without making sure the guest was out or had requested some cleaning. And she hadn’t requested it. There was only one possibility left, an option that left her startled and, for a few seconds, aroused. More about anxiety and tension than sexually, to be honest. Anthon was not even, at the end of the night, as good as he thought he was.

  Georgia crossed the curtains, fluttering with the wind, and entered the room, with her common regal parsimony.

  And Anthon was there. Feet ahead, on the other side of the bed, as if he had seen a ghost. He was tired; the sweat breaking on his forehead and the way his clothes seemed lavish and crumple, with the sleeves aggressively rolled up to his elbows, suggested desperation, hurry and rush. He was nervous.

  “Hey.” He called without moving an inch whatsoever.

  The room was intact. She had busied herself with the cleaning during the last thirty minutes. It hadn’t been a thorough cleansing and she didn’t even intend to achieve that, it was something done just to remove the obvious signs of struggle and the crime that had just happened there. The shards of glass were inside one of her portmanteaus, a small rectangular black suitcase she kept under the bed. Most of the blood had been dried by an available towel, just like the whole remaining mess the girls’ fight had made. It was all in perfect harmony, untouched.

  And Anthon’s good nose noticed something to be wrong. Perhaps the TV that was off or…

  The bathroom double doors that were shut, although light still came out from its gaps. The room was still under dim light, scarcely enlightened by a table lamp atop one of the nightstands and the natural glow that stubbornly entered the room through the Victorian balcony.

  “How was your day?” Georgia asked, trying to keep her voice in that same monotonous and cold tone she always had used with Anthon as a way to prevent him from trying to read her emotions and responses. If everything were kept constant, there would be nothing to be worried about.

  “Good.”

  He seemed surprised by seeing her. Maybe because Georgia was completely dressed up with knee-high boots on top of the pants, the long and tight coat that fitted her so well from a foreign designer brand, besides the gloves and the hair locked inside a grey wool cap. She was perfect, but he didn’t know she was planning to leave.

  And again, he could be looking for Monica.

  The garments had her superficial bruises and wounds covered, as did the makeup on her face, concealing the small abrasions from Monica’s slaps. It was all in order, in perfect and utmost order.

  Anthon’s eyes lingered on Georgia, losing themselves a few seconds afterwards and then facing the ground once more. He risked one step ahead, confused by the way things were arranged in there. The evidences and the papers were still scattered all around, although in a smaller quantity. Perhaps he had been asking himself were that recovered arrow and the pictures from the corpse would be, or the reason his gun was calmly asleep at the bottom of the bed. Most of that arrangement made no sense at all. He took another step in and stopped, his eyes running across the floor.

  Georgia watched. Anthon was a detective and he knew what to look for, he knew…

  There was a blood stain. A small spot of blood left on the carpet that, in regular situations would be invisible, but Anthon had a surgical eye, an eye that missed in Georgia due to a cardboard box that covered just part of that stain.

  She had ignored that detail, but not Anthon. She noticed when his brow slightly lifted, trying to withhold the reactions, and he smirked. She smiled back, trying to get into the detective’s game.

  Anthon took a few more steps ahead, his hands shoved inside his pockets. Georgia, on the other side of the bed, also took a few steps, approaching the area where the glass table used to be at. She felt something crush underneath her boot right when she stepped on the carpet, probably some small remain of glass that had been left there and she prayed Anthon hadn’t noticed that, too.

  “I could swear there was a table here.” He commented upon, his voice sounding cold and deliberately controlled.

  “I’m not sure,” She replied in the same old inexpressive tone, “I can’t remember.”

  There was this mild cynical flavor in both their voices, a mutual attempt to try to capture each other’s knowledge. Georgia had no idea of how much Anthon already knew by then, but analyzing what she could see and suspecting what he would do – that and the small rounded bandage on the inner side of his arm – she already had a clear idea of his awareness. It couldn’t be sheer coincidence he had called Monica that night, that specific and fatalistic night.

  “I had to see you.” He said, advancing another step towards her, who pretended a smile and accepted the proximity.

  Anthon neared her, leaning his head and closing his eyes. Georgia replied, accepting that kiss. She closed her eyes and let her head gently tilt to the side, while Anthon’s tongue invaded her lips. Anthon’s kiss had never been that cold, that tasteless. And she had nothing to do but to accept it and kiss him back.

  And that was the moment she ventured herself into opening her eyes, amidst the kiss, noticing Anthon’s hands no longer held her waist. His eyes were open, way before hers, and quickly they wavered towards the right… to the bed.

  Anthon moved away, trying to reach for the bed, but Georgia, predicting his movement, pushed him suddenly, advancing with more lightness to the bed and grabbing his gun.

  Done. Again, she had the control and, apparently, he had already connected the dots.

  As soon as he noticed Georgia already had his gun in hands, Anthon retreated and instinctively raised his hands, as every cop expects criminals to behave when they shout and identify themselves. For a brief moment, with his hands still up, Anthon’s glare escaped Georgia’s and were drawn to something a little further behind her, in a hidden corner between the bed and the nightstand. The place she had her stuff piled up and organized when the room was completely tossed around.

  “Give me your phone. And, Anthon?” He returned his glance to her. “No games.”

  Clearly thwarted, he kept one hand up and moved the other to his chest. Georgia waved her gun, reminding him of who was calling the shots.

  “Slow, detective.”

  He obeyed, moving his hand carefully inside his crumpled jacket, removing from there his phone. He offered it to Georgia, who used her left hand to pick the device and toss it onto the bed.

  “I know what you did. What you’re doing.”

  “You don’t.” Georgia replied, the gun steadily pointed at him.

 
; “You won’t escape this time, Georgia, or whatever your name is. Killing a cop? A detective?”

  She sneered, a gentle laugh sprinkled with sarcasm.

  “And what makes you believe that, Anthon? I’ve fooled you to this point and I heard you were the best in your department.”

  “They’ll know.”

  “How? If there’s a trait of mine I really cherish is my obsession in doing everything the right way. Thanks to my ex-husband.”

  “Ex-husband.”

  “Yeah.”

  “People know I’m here.”

  “What people? Monica?” She lifted her shoulders, without moving the gun. “I don’t think she can help you right now.”

  His eyes opened a little more, while his nostrils indicated his anger, trembling in an uncontrolled way.

  “What have you done?”

  Georgia ignored him, walking to the rack underneath the LCD screen. Some objects left there represented some utilities for the guests: a phone, a tray with some treats from the hotel, the remote control and a metal canteen beside a crystal glass.

  Still pointing the gun at him and without losing him from sight, Georgia poured some of the canteen content into the glass, filling it to its half. She grasped the cup and gave it to Anthon, firmly holding the gun with her right hand.

  “Drink it. And do not try anything, I’m an amazing shot.”

  Anthon, with care, took the request, taking the glass from her hands.

  “Drink.” She ordered, watching him while holding the gun with both her hands, like a pro would. She had watched enough to know the right way of holding a gun.

  “I don’t…”

  “Drink it. I don’t want to kill you, Anthon, but I’d have no problems in doing it. And I know there’s no one waiting for your contact because you’re so anxious and neurotic that you don’t even believe your own decisions when the situation only concerns you.”