Scott Free

by John Gilstrap

  “Believe this, too,” Brandon said. “Your saying that means a lot to me.”

  A minute later, Sherry said, “I am sick with worry, you know.”

  “I know you are. Too many people are watching for you to show it.” Brandon chuckled. “I personally prove one of your primary points, you know.” He had her attention. “I’m living proof of what happens when you allow your kid to become your primary focus. Over these past six years, I’ve allowed Scott to become my life—or, mine to become his—and look at me now.”

  “You’re a good dad, Brandon.”

  His eyes glinted again.

  Sherry laughed in spite of herself. “Don’t gape at me like that,” she said. “You know you’re a good dad. Scott knows you’re a good dad. Just as he knows that I’m a crappy mom.”

  “Oh, Sherry—”

  “Don’t patronize. I know what I know. I’m not a totally bad mother, mind you; I just suck as a mom. There is a difference.”

  Brandon nodded in the darkness. Yes, there was a difference, and he knew exactly what she meant.

  For the longest time, they sat there together, staring out the frosted window at the vast expanse of the mountains, each reveling in the first civil words they’d shared in over half a decade.

  “Larry’s panicking, you know,” she said. “I told him you were staying here in Scott’s room and he freaked.”

  “What’s wrong with me staying here?”

  “Not a thing. He’s just afraid we might try to get back together.”

  Brandon still didn’t get it.

  “He said that he’s very happy with us quietly hating each other. He’s afraid that if we reconcile, it’s only a matter of time before the cold war goes hot again, and then he’ll have to endure the fallout.”

  Brandon smiled. “He’s probably got a point.”

  But maybe he didn’t, Sherry thought. Sitting here in the dark, wrapped in her heavy wool blanket, Sherry tried to imagine what it would be like to reconcile, to be a family again. The images came easily. It wouldn’t be the same family structure that she’d rejected all those years ago, that was for sure. She could afford housekeepers now, and someone to do the cooking. A new house with Brandon would be the household of adults. Even Scotty was grown now, though only God knew how he’d shot up so fast.

  Sherry Carrigan O’Toole was nobody’s sentimental sap. She knew the damage that had been done over the years, but sitting here in the quiet, next to Brandon, watching his shadow, she could again see the man with whom she’d fallen in love, nearly at first sight. Somehow, the heat of their crisis here in Utah had smoothed the edges of her anger, and as that poisonous emotion eroded away, she found herself facing a hole in her heart. All the success in the world wouldn’t fill the other side of the bed every night.

  These thoughts were silly, she told herself—the stuff of desperate battlefield romances. Still, where flames once flourished, surely there was a chance of a lingering spark. Maybe if they took it slowly. It wasn’t as if they had nothing in common—

  “It won’t happen, you know,” Brandon said.

  “Huh? I’m sorry?” She could see his scowl, even in the darkness.

  “I hope you told Larry to relax. There won’t be a reconciliation.”

  Sherry scoffed, as if it were the most preposterous thing she’d ever heard. “Of course not.”

  “It’d be nice not to be at each other’s throats all the time, but to get back together…” Brandon leaned forward, as if trying to get a better look at her face in the shine of the moon. “I hope I haven’t signaled otherwise.”

  Sherry laughed a little too hard. “I don’t care what you’ve signaled,” she said. “I’m too smart to make the same mistake twice.”

  Brandon let the comment hang for a moment, trying to read it. “Good,” he said, finally. Placing his empty glass on the coffee table, he pulled himself out of the sofa and stood. “Thanks for the press conference, Sherry.”

  She waved him off. “I’m just glad to help.”

  “Well, I know you’re not completely comfortable with it, and I wanted you to know—”

  “Really, it’s nothing.”

  Brandon felt uneasy, confused by the change in the atmosphere. “Okay, then,” he said. “I’m going to try to get some sleep.” He paused. “Are you okay?”

  “Good night, Brandon.”

  When she was alone again, Sherry lay down on her side, her head resting on the warmth of the pillow where Brandon had been sitting. Pulling the blanket tight around her shoulders, she stared out at the vastness of the night. The tears came from nowhere. Once they started to flow, she was powerless to stop them.

  FOR WHAT SEEMED LIKE MINUTES, but couldn’t possibly have been more than a few seconds, Scott stared at the pistol dangling from Isaac’s hand.

  I’m dead, he thought. He’s going to kill me!

  Just like that, all options evaporated. This was no longer about whether he should stay or leave, it wasn’t about shoes. It was about getting the hell out of there. In the flash of an instant, his mind calculated the options. He had what, thirty seconds? Probably less. That’s the time it would take for Isaac to enter Scott’s room and discover that he was no longer there. Then the chase would be on. If he dashed for the front door, he’d have to run through wide open spaces, and Isaac would be able to drop him with a single shot. The very thought of it turned his stomach.

  That left only one option, and before he’d even made a conscious decision to use the tunnel, he was already on his way. He had one hinge pin to go, and a whole life to lose.

  YEARS OF EXPERIENCE had proven to Isaac that speed mattered in these things. From time to time, particularly in his dealings with organized crime, his clients specifically ordered a torturous death, but they were rare. Fact was, Isaac took no more pleasure out of his victims’ pain than a dentist did from his patients’. The job was a messy one, and a certain amount of pain was inevitable, but except in the most unusual circumstances—and for the highest prices—he liked to keep things fast and simple. Certainly, that was what he intended for the boy.

  He reached the top of the stairs and started down the hallway. Isaac had assigned Scott the second door down on the right for no real reason, other than the fact that it was the largest of what he imagined once were guest rooms. Isaac had acquired the place fully furnished, and hadn’t entertained a single guest since. Until yesterday.

  He paused at the bedroom door, gathering himself for what arguably was the most disturbing hit of his career. But waiting made nothing easier for anyone. He turned the knob and glided silently into the darkness.

  His own shadow, cast by the dim lamplight from below, blocked part of the bed, where nothing moved as he entered. Among the shades of black and gray, he clearly made out the pillow, and what he thought was the outline of the sleeping boy under the covers.

  It was important to Isaac that the boy not awaken to understand his fate, that he be taken in his sleep. Rather than risk getting too close, then, he fired from just inside the door.

  IN THE SILENCE OF THE DARK CABIN, the pistol shots sounded like hand grenades. There were three of them altogether, fired quickly, just as the pin cleared the bottom hinge.

  Stealth meant nothing anymore. From here on out, it was all about speed and distance.

  With the hinges free, he jammed the knife blade into the thin crack where the side of the door met the jamb and he pulled hard, trying to pry them apart. The knife bent from the effort, and with no time to switch it out for a new one, he just flipped it around and pried in the other direction.

  If the door panel had been made of stouter stuff, it never would have worked, but as it was, Scott pried it out just far enough that he could slip his fingers behind. From there, it was just a matter of pulling it open. He never even saw the alarm sensor. Nothing fancy, just a stupid buzzer like you could buy in any RadioShack. But God, the noise. Imagine ripping the skin off a live cat.

  Two seconds later, the living room erup
ted in a sunburst of light.

  • • •

  “WELL, I’LL BE DAMNED,” Isaac muttered. He thought he’d seen it in the glare of the muzzle flashes, but it wasn’t till he turned on the bedroom light that he saw it was true. The kid had bolted on him. There was a hint of admiration in the thought. And a renewed commitment to kill him before he could do any damage to his plan.

  Isaac sifted all the available options in the span of two heartbeats. Every shoe in the house was locked in the closet in Isaac’s room, so that part of the plan hadn’t been violated. That meant the boy was wandering the countryside with feet that would soon freeze to uselessness.

  Funny, he thought. He’d had a sense that something was different in the living room when he’d crossed through it just a moment ago, and at the time he couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Now he knew what it was: Scott’s coat was missing from its spot on the peg. But the door was still locked, from the inside. That meant he was still in the house somewhere.

  The goddamned tunnel.

  But he’d have noticed if that door had been opened. Certainly, the alarm—

  To Isaac’s ear the shriek of the alarm seemed even louder than the gunshots.

  He pivoted on his heel and made the hallway in two quick strides, slapping the wall switch as he passed and bringing daylight to the cabin in the middle of the night. He stepped onto the mezzanine balcony just in time to see his prey slipping into the secret room. He reacted instinctively, snapping the pistol up to firing position and taking aim with both eyes.

  SCOTT YELLED AT THE SOUND of the gunshot, a scream devoid of thought or intent, erupting from his throat as he dove onto the floor of the secret room. Two more shots followed in rapid succession, each of them punching holes through the wood paneling. He heard Isaac’s voice yelling something, but he didn’t care. He didn’t have time to listen. Seconds made all the difference now.

  Moving with speed that he didn’t know he could muster, Scott threw open the trap door, slamming it loudly against the floor. Behind him, he could hear the sound of approaching footsteps. Isaac was running. And from the sound of it, he was fast.

  Scott hesitated for a second, long enough to yank open the desk drawer and snatch the satellite phone. He stuffed it into his coat pocket and dashed to the hole in the floor. The ladder’s iron rungs bent his feet painfully at the arches as he balanced there, trying to grab the hatch door to close it down on top of him. That’s when he saw the MagLites sitting in their chargers, just inches out of reach.

  Scott made the decision in an instant. In that kind of darkness, he’d never have a chance. In one fluid motion, he heaved himself out of the hole. For one long moment, he felt suspended in the air, like Michael Jordan slam-dunking a basketball. He grabbed a flashlight from the charger with his left hand, even as his right stayed closed around the handle of the hatch. On his way back down, he saw Isaac in the kitchen, braced for his next shot.

  ISAAC COULD HAVE KICKED himself for even taking the shots from the mezzanine. His target was just a flash of fabric, really, as Scott dove for cover behind the wall. He’d tried his best to judge where the boy would land, but he knew it was useless even as he pulled the trigger. Even the best shot in the world couldn’t hit a hidden target.

  He was halfway down the stairs when he heard the tunnel hatch slam open, and he knew that the timing would be tight. He charged across the living room toward the kitchen, his weapon up and poised for a clear shot. Seconds counted.

  Then the most amazing thing happened. Scott O’Toole jumped out of the opening in the floor, high into the air to snatch a light from its charger. It was the mistake that would cost the boy his life.

  Isaac slid to a halt, braced himself, and took his shot.

  THE MOMENTUM OF SCOTT’S FALL raised the heavy trap door just in time to take the bullet that would have killed him. He pulled the hatch up and over, the final slam nearly tearing his shoulder from its socket as he desperately hung on. He just dangled there, one-handed, his feet bicycling in the air. Somewhere down below, the MagLite clattered to the ground. With his free hand, Scott searched for the sliding bolt that would lock the hatch shut from the inside. It had to be there. Hell, he’d seen it just a few hours before, but in the impenetrable pitch blackness, it was all by feel.

  There! There it was! He’d just wrapped his hand around the knob when he felt himself rising. Isaac was pulling the door open, lifting him right along with it.

  IT WAS ONE OF THE MOST athletic moves that Isaac had ever seen, and it caught him totally by surprise. The hatch swung up from the floor the instant he pulled the trigger. But for the wooden barrier, the bullet would have torn through Scott’s face.

  “God damm it!” That kid was the luckiest son of a bitch on the planet.

  He hurried to the hatch and tried to lift it. It moved, but barely, as if it weighed a couple of hundred pounds. Then he realized that it actually did. The kid had hung on! Isaac knew how small that handle on the other side was. It must have hurt like hell to do that. His admiration continued to bloom. Now, it would be an honor to kill him.

  Isaac took a wide stance, the elbow of his gun hand braced against his thigh as he grabbed the handle on his side of the hatch and heaved with everything he had. On his worst day, he could outlift a sixteen-year-old boy.

  SCOTT FELT HIMSELF coming right out of the hole.

  “No!” he yelled. Jesus, the seam of light at the opening was three inches wide. Six inches.

  Still hanging by one hand, he pulled his knees to his chest and gathered up his whole body. When he was nearly upside down, he planted his feet against the ceiling and pushed with everything he had. Yelling against the effort, he felt his attacker’s grip break, and the hatch slammed shut again.

  “Dammit!” the voice yelled from above.

  And then he heard more shooting. Only this time, the noise of the bullets impacting the wood panel trumped the noise of the gunshots themselves.

  Dangling again in midair, Scott’s left hand found the slide bolts and he rammed them home, driving them a good six inches into the floor joists overhead. He’d bought himself some time. He didn’t know how much, but somehow he knew it wouldn’t be enough.

  Disoriented in the blackness, he reached out with his feet to find the ladder rungs. They weren’t exactly where he’d remembered them, but they were close. He gripped the cold metal rod with his toes to steady himself, then grabbed on with his hands.

  On the ground now, he stooped to his hands and knees and searched through the darkness for the flashlight. It took too long but he found it, and the light reassured him.

  A plan would be nice, he told himself, but for the time being, running seemed like a good substitute. A whole unexplained, frigid world lay beyond the tunnel, and he had to find it before Isaac made his next move. As it was, if Scott didn’t hurry, all the killer would have to do was park himself at the end and wait.

  With the flashlight beam opened to its widest spread, he started down the tunnel. His rational side told him that nothing had changed about the place since he was last here, but the irrational side wasn’t impressed. Somehow, the shadows seemed spookier, the dark spots deadlier.

  As the adrenaline ebbed, Scott found himself keenly aware of how cold he was. As his bare feet darted in and out of his peripheral vision, he saw how frighteningly red they looked. Every step was like running on broken glass. The lectures of his old buddy Sven returned: When hands or feet or noses were red, they hurt and they were healthy. As the tissues froze, though, the skin would turn white, and the whiter they got, the less pain there would be. When the pain went away entirely, the frostbite would be so deep that amputation would likely be required.

  “Only a fool would be outdoors without proper foot protection,” Sven had said.

  Yeah, well, let’s you and I trade places for a while, Scott thought.

  At the end of the first section of tunnel, he made the hard left and started down the steeper slope. God damn the rocks hurt. His hands ha
d begun to sting as well, that burning, tingling sensation that made you think you’d been playing in a nettle patch all day. The tunnel went on and on, it seemed, an impossible tangle of rocks and roots. It seemed so much longer at night, without the shining pupil of light gleaming back at him.

  As he passed the spot where Agent Price had died, he tried to keep the light away from the crimson smears. From that point on, everything was unexplored territory. It was rockier here, and steeper still, but he pressed on, as quickly as he could—which wasn’t nearly quickly enough.

  Finally, he was out, his freedom marked by the unrestrained wind and the agony in his feet as they propelled him through the snow. He thought of those pictures he’d seen of the medieval torture devices where they’d enclose their prisoners’ feet in boots lined with nails. He’d never felt anything so agonizing—so inescapable.

  I can’t do this, he thought.

  “No, you have to. You have to, goddammit.” As if saying it aloud made it more convincing.

  But the temperature took his breath away. He’d never been in trouble this deep.

  Stumbling to a deadfall, he sat with his feet out of the snow, retracted as far as he could get them into the legs of his pants, and he set about the business of making the satellite phone work. Finding the power button was easy. A luminous green dial jumped to life, giving him data on signal strength and volume. Truly, it appeared to be no more complicated than a cell phone. Between the cold and his fear, the boy’s hands shook so badly as to be nearly useless as he dialed 9-1-1 and pressed send, only to be rewarded with a shrill error tone. What the hell…? He tried it again, with the same result.

  “Come on, work, dammit,” he growled. But it wasn’t going to. Okay, he had a better idea. He tried a new number, this one from memory, starting with the 703 area code for Virginia.