As Night Falls

by Jenny Milchman

  In prison he’d learned to subdue its hum. To stop and take a look around, decide on his best course of action. That strategy had enabled him to build up to work duty, a job on the outs. And it was what would ensure that the night from here on out would go well, too. He just had to make sure to keep calm, act and consider things methodically.

  The search should be pulled back quickly. If he and Harlan hadn’t been located within the first few hours, law enforcement wisdom would have that they were probably out of reach.

  Nick realized the princess could become his best form of traction. But he kept the knowledge buried—he didn’t want Cassie forewarned, on her guard where he and the princess were concerned. Another bonus: the cops would give any group the princess was traveling with the royal treatment, wouldn’t they? No shoot-out or helicopter ambush from above.

  Nick peered through one of the windows beside the door. The precipitation actually seemed a little lighter, as if thinned by the sheer power of his desire. Nick looked over his shoulder, hunting Harlan, who was standing in the entrance to the kitchen.

  “Bring them here,” he ordered.

  Harlan pushed his two captives forward, and something inside Nick eased. How greatly Nick depended on his cellie. Not his cellie, his friend—even more than that. Harlan was truer with him than Nick’s own mother had been. Harlan said things like they were. He asked Nick for what he really needed. If only everyone could be like Harlan.

  Changing locations would introduce complexity, of course, but Harlan could take care of any potential complications. Nobody risked defiance when he was around.

  The opening to the kitchen was blotted out by Harlan, who kept a hold of both Cassie and her kid. Nick smiled at them. “Almost forgot something.”

  “Yeah,” the princess said in that nasty voice of hers. “Our coats.”

  Nick retained his smile. “Nope. Your father.”

  He was pleased by the effect of his words. They jolted the princess out of her stance. Her knees jerked, and she might’ve gone down completely if Harlan hadn’t yanked her up.

  Words spilled from her mouth. “Is he all right? My dad?”

  Nick grinned. “I don’t know that all right is the phrase I’d use.” He pivoted again. “What would you say, sis?”

  Silence spread itself out. Nick realized for the first time just how the quiet pressed in from outside. Enough snow had accumulated that the falling flakes landed on a muffling blanket. The wind had stopped. There were no human noises at the moment, and no animal ones either. Not so much as a single bird cry. Despite the heat in the house, Nick went cold. Out there, under a blank, anonymous sky, nobody cared whether you lived or died. Scratch that. His sister and the princess would probably be all too happy if he were dead.

  He took a few steps toward the kitchen. A pleasant numbness was spreading through his foot, as if it were already sunk outside into a wafting drift of snow. Nick grabbed Cassie. “Come on. We’d better go deliver some last minute instructions.”

  —

  After telling Harlan to stay behind with the princess, Nick headed for the flight of basement stairs, Cassie trip-stepping along beside him.

  He had a feeling what they would find down here; Nick had stalked enough animals through the woods, hunting with his father, to recognize the effect of pain that severe. Far worse than anything Nick had been through tonight. Warmth suffused him as he imagined Cassie getting her next glimpse of her husband.

  But when they found him, lying in the same spot where they’d left him, he was alive. The sight filled Nick with a clawing rage. This guy was like a fucking Timex watch.

  Cassie whimpered, and Nick had to work not to turn the anger against her. He felt like he was holding back a freight train. Cassie had no clue how lucky she was, the bullets she kept dodging. This perfect charmed life of hers had cast a spell over everything. Her house stood, her husband survived. Even the princess still seemed plucky.

  “Shut up,” Nick told Cassie.

  He crouched, and thrust his finger into the meat of the man’s thigh. The man’s body curled up like one of those bugs that went hard and round when you poked it. There was a moan, almost too low to hear.

  Nick leaned down and spoke into the man’s ear. “Listen up.”

  Cassie opened her mouth, then closed it.

  “I have a few things of yours. Your gun and your binoculars. Also, your wife and your daughter.” Nick grinned up at Cassie. “We’re going to be gone for a little while. There are no more phones, there’s nothing left in your house. Still, if you try to summon help—if you so much as tap on the ceiling—I’ll be watching and I’ll see you do it. I will know. Sis, want to tell him?”

  Cassie’s words came out of some distant valley whose echo carried toward Nick. Once before, he had heard his sister beg a person not to die. “Please, Ben. Hold on. Oh, please just hold on a little while longer.”

  “You see, it turns out I have a bit of a temper,” Nick explained. “And I broke something that your lovely daughter was kind enough to remind me that we need.”

  Nick reached down to the man’s leg and stuck his finger in forcefully again. He felt the place where the bones shifted and ground together. And he watched the man pass out, his face and body almost completely unchanged, eyes still staring upwards, but something ineffable indicating the loss of conscious resolve.

  Cassie clamped her hand against her mouth. As if this were bad. Seeing her tough and stringy husband laid out would be nothing compared to the departure of the dewy princess.

  He looked back down at her husband. “Is that clear?”

  No response from the floor.

  Nick got up and faced Cassie. “I’d say we’re good.”

  He grabbed the back of his sister’s shirt and pulled her toward the stairs.

  —

  “Good,” Nick said, when they returned. Harlan had gotten dressed; he was sweaty and overheating in the warm house. The kid’s coat hung open on her. “Looks like everyone is ready for a trip.” He indicated a coat draped over the couch, and Cassie leaned to pick it up.

  “This is how the next part is going to go,” Nick said. “I’ve got the gun, and I’ve got Harlan.”

  “Nick?” Harlan said.

  Nick wasn’t quite able to quash impatience. “Yeah?”

  “I left—something upstairs. Can I get it before we go?”

  “What are you doing, moving in here?” Nick said.

  Harlan shook his great head. “I’m not moving in. You said this was just going to be for a little while. To get a few things we needed.”

  “That’s right. I did.”

  “But see, I put something down on the bed—”

  Nick interrupted him. “Is it really important to you, Harlan?”

  Harlan nodded. “Yeah, Nick. It’s real important.”

  “Something you like a lot?”

  Harlan nodded quickly again.

  “Something you love even?”

  Another nod.

  Nick nodded back. Then he yelled, “No, you cannot go upstairs!”

  Harlan lowered his head. His shoulders dropped, and his back slumped. On the few occasions when Nick shouted at him, Harlan almost seemed like a normal-sized person.

  Nick continued as if there’d been no pause. “In other words, I have more than enough ammo to make sure we all arrive at the bottom of the road,” he said. “If we do, and if everyone plays their part, then you two don’t get hurt.”

  Cassie spoke up. “We don’t get hurt. What about our neighbors?”

  Nick shrugged. “We’ll deal with them when we get there.”

  The princess regained her nasty tone. “Like it’d be a real loss if you did anything to the Nelsons.”

  Cassie frowned. She reached out a hand in her kid’s direction, but the princess backed away. Nick felt a smile build. Their mother had hated Cassie, and from the looks of things, her kid didn’t have much use for her either. Maybe the princess would even prefer it in Canada.


  “OK?” Nick brought his hands together. “We ready to go?”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  The snow lightened momentarily as they left, flakes falling through the night like stars. Sandy walked behind Nick, while Ivy kept her distance as much as Harlan would allow. Despite the sad and straggly group they made, the sudden burst of freedom, no walls penning them in, made Sandy feel as if she were on one of Ben’s expeditions.

  Ben.

  A weight settled over her like slowly draping cloth. Her husband was going to die. Sandy had seen that look in people’s eyes at the hospital when she’d had counseling to do on the medical side. The ties that kept a person tethered to the earth were many, but Ben’s were being snipped one by one. He was already partway gone.

  Tears traveled down her raw, cold cheeks, and she savagely wiped them away.

  Nick had taken everything from her, starting with their mother’s love. Now he had her husband, and he wanted their daughter. Sandy had seen that desire, molten inside him, when they’d been in the basement.

  But then, she had been living on borrowed time ever since she’d left home and made a life for herself here. How had she dared to think otherwise? You could never really escape the past; she told people that all the time in therapy. And sure enough, hers had caught up with her like an unwelcome visitor. She should’ve been expecting it. Hello again. Did you think you could leave me?

  Sandy stopped in place, letting the cold gather around her. Her legs felt too weak to hold her up, and she leaned against the ridged bark of a tree. Snow had clotted in the crevices, and she tilted her face, welcoming the burn upon her bare skin.

  She deserved to suffer for what she had allowed to happen to Ben, to them all. Bile stung the back of her throat. Her punishment would be a lifetime without her husband, who had given her so much, shown her a different way to live. Sandy didn’t want to go on without him. How easy it would be to stay here, sink down into a mindless, frozen death. But she didn’t have the luxury of escape. She had Ivy, and no matter what, she wasn’t going to let Nick take her. Mourning Ben and all that they had lost would have to come later.

  Sandy turned to give her house one last look. It rose up as if hewn out of the sheer rock face of the cliff behind it. The wind began to blow, and veils of snow gave way to a glow of yellow lamplight. Sandy’s body shook inside her coat. She leaned over and zipped it to the neck, pulling on her hood as well.

  Nick had reached the woods by their winding length of drive. He was walking almost normally now, a slight hesitation before he set his right foot down the only sign of injury. Sandy couldn’t tell if the improvement helped or hindered them. He would be able to swap shoes for boots as soon as the weather let up, then set out on the trek he believed would carry him and Harlan to freedom. But would a weakened Nick be easier to oppose if it came to a fight? Or would such a state render him more of a threat, like a wounded animal?

  “Get a move on it,” Nick called over the plaintive wind. “I don’t like us all exposed out here.” He looked up at the blank, howling sky before starting forward again.

  If Sandy ran, Nick would shoot her, and she couldn’t leave Ivy alone. There was nowhere to go anyway. It was all but wilderness out here; there was no source of help. And weren’t they going toward help of some sort? Although Sandy couldn’t imagine drawing her neighbors into this disaster. She was already responsible for a wide swath of damage tonight.

  Her passivity assailed her. Was she merely going to bide her time, guard Ivy until Nick and Harlan left on their own? Or did she know better now than to count on Nick for anything?

  She wasn’t Cassie any longer, a tiny mouse in her brother’s batting paws.

  Nick’s shoes made a series of dark, staring eyes through the otherwise untracked white. Sandy meandered slowly along in their trail, refusing to hurry.

  —

  Their driveway took them within sight of the Macmillans’ darkened camp, its road bisected by twin tire tracks, then veered sharply for another half mile or so. A ways off at the bottom, you could catch a glimpse of the Nelsons’ smaller home, a log cabin built from a kit.

  Nick marched along as if he were leading a parade, snow dotting his borrowed coat, shoes sending up additional clods.

  Sandy fell back, hoping to get a word in with Ivy.

  The wan paleness of her daughter’s face frightened Sandy when Ivy finally caught up to her, slowly and as if against her will. Harlan formed a consuming shadow behind them, blocking out sight of the night sky and the forked fingers of trees.

  “Honey,” Sandy said, softly so as not to be heard.

  Ivy raised hooded eyes to her.

  “It’s going to be okay.”

  Ivy gave her a smile completely devoid of mirth. Yeah, right, that smile said.

  Sandy stepped close to her daughter. “Listen to me,” she hissed, clenching a fistful of Ivy’s open coat. “And zip up.”

  A smile that looked a trifle more genuine appeared on Ivy’s face, seeming to catch her off guard. The teeth on her zipper sealed together as Ivy pulled up a clump of lift tickets, affixed during happier outdoor excursions.

  “I’m not just saying so,” Sandy continued. “I lied to you in one big way, I admit that. But other than that—” Sandy turned aside, feeling tears start to swell. “Aside from that first lie, it was always important to me to be straight with you, Ive. I didn’t butter you up, or trick you, or tell little fibs. Other people—Dad even—yes. But not you. I’m not even entirely sure why.”

  The ends of Ivy’s hair had gotten caught in her coat collar. Sandy went to lift them out, but Ivy brushed her away.

  “Yeah?” she said. “How is Dad, then?” A pulse in Ivy’s throat, visible even through the moonless dark. “Is he going to be okay?”

  Sandy stared down at the ground. The snow topped her shoes, and speckled the legs of her jeans. A falsehood was there on the tip of her tongue, as slippery as candy. How comforting it would be to protect Ivy right now, or think that she was. If all of this had never happened, if Nick and Harlan hadn’t come, would the tumult and challenges of Ivy’s encroaching adulthood have led Sandy to treat her much as she did Ben? Telling white lies, settling for shortcuts in the same automatic, taken-for-granted way?

  “Mom?”

  Sandy stepped up to the brink of reality, and when she spoke it felt more like jumping.

  “He’s hurt, honey,” she said. “Dad broke both his legs pretty badly. But he’s alive. He’s in the basement.”

  Ivy’s brows lifted. “So’s Mac.”

  For just a moment, hope sparked between them.

  Then Sandy’s arm was grasped rudely, and she found herself stumbling as Nick pulled her into deeper drifts of snow.

  —

  They stood in a loose pack amongst a stand of snow-clogged trees to the left of the log cabin. The wind stirred and flakes spattered their faces, obscuring sight. Snow started coming down hard again, and they all moved deeper into the trees.

  “So, you just want to use their computer, right?” Sandy’s voice startled a crow, which flew off with a caw and great beating of wings.

  Nick turned to her. “To be perfectly honest, Cass—”

  Ivy winced and demanded, “Does he have to keep calling you that?”

  Nick ignored her. “—I don’t think there’s any way to get what I want and preserve the Joneses over here.” He glanced at the cabin, which Ben had called by turns cozy, diminutive, and a squalid little shack, as the relationship between the two families devolved. “It’s all right,” Nick added in a musing tone. “I don’t think they were really keeping up anyway.”

  Alarm shot through Sandy as she pictured the silver gleam of gun tucked inside Nick’s sock.

  “No,” she said. “You can’t kill our—” Her lips clamped down. You can’t had always been the worst pairing of words to say to Nick. Like a red flag in front of a bull.

  “I can,” Nick said flatly. He turned to Ivy. “Cass.”

  Sandy took
his arm and spoke with a rocking cadence to her tone. “Look, you have the gun, you can do anything, you can do whatever you want.”

  It was as if Nick’s face had been waxed. A smooth pallor of satisfaction slid over his features. Snowflakes melted, dripping down.

  “But why don’t you let me try one thing?” Sandy suggested. “It’s unlikely that anyone would hear screams or gunfire on a night like tonight, but it is just this side of possible.” She watched her brother carefully, gauging, assessing. “You don’t want anything out of the ordinary called in. The police are already on alert.”

  “What are you proposing?” he asked.

  Sandy swallowed. “That I just talk to them. You know. Neighbor to neighbor.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Sandy found a scarf thrust deep into the pocket of her coat, wintered over from last season, and gave it to Ivy to wind around her face. “I won’t be long,” she whispered, trying not to mind when Ivy didn’t answer. Sandy walked forward, kicking up clumps.

  The cabin’s steps had been swept at least once, but were frosted with snow that had fallen since. Sandy’s shoes left feathery footprints as she hurried to the door and knocked.

  Where Ben had installed a pull forged from hammered iron, shipped in from a metalworker who lived in Montana, the Nelsons had a cheap chrome knob purchased at a Lowe’s or Home Depot downstate. Sandy shuddered in the steely air. She suddenly hated herself, hated them all. Why had she and Ben decided to build a grand lodge up here instead of being content with the life they had built with each other in town?

  An answer came from deep inside her, and she couldn’t help but take a reflexive step away from where Nick waited.

  Because it made you feel like you left all that behind.

  But a big house couldn’t do that. The higher she’d climbed, the closer Nick got. Or maybe it was that he’d been there all along.

  Anita Nelson pulled the door open with an unwelcoming frown. Biding herself not to look over her shoulder at the others, Sandy asked if she could come in.