by Casey Dunn
A TWENTY-MINUTE SEARCH OF THE woods behind the courthouse lawn yielded no sign of Ama, and her location had yet to come up on the map. Martin stood in the middle of a grove of trees and laced his fingers together before pressing his hands down on top of his head. The pressure did nothing to slow his spinning mind. He’d lost Ama, and in losing her, he’d lost Hazel, too. He closed his eyes, wondering how he would ever be able to look Eddie in the face again, how he would be able to look at himself.
There were more people in this section of woods than Martin could count, but as the voices rang out, Martin realized he hadn’t once heard Eddie call out for Ama. He opened his eyes and turned in a circle, but Eddie wasn’t just quiet, he was gone.
“Eddie!” Martin cupped his hands, projecting his name into the night. He walked deeper into the woods. “Eddie!”
“I’m here,” Eddie answered, and his form solidified in the shadows as he appeared on a skinny trail. He was out of breath, walking faster than Martin knew he was capable of moving.
“Has her location come up yet?” Martin asked, Eddie’s urgency spurring on his own.
“No. But she’s out there somewhere,” he said, and opened his big hand, which he’d been holding in a fist. The little silver necklace Ama had been wearing at the fundraiser pooled in his palm.
“Where did you find that?” Martin demanded.
“The stone hutch.”
“Why didn’t you tell me where you were going? We could have gone together, been on their trail this whole time. Now they’re half an hour ahead of us at minimum, Eddie!”
“The hutch is half a mile from the courthouse. I didn’t tell you because if I was wrong, we’d both have wasted all that time. And Jonathon doesn’t stick to trails, Martin. He could have gone anywhere after dropping off that necklace. He could’ve even double-backed here and hopped in a car while the rest of us were walking into the woods.”
Desperation shook Martin from within. “Jesus Christ. How the hell are we going to find her? Are you sure there’s no sign of her on your phone?”
“Nothing,” Eddie said, and showed him the phone. Martin glared at the screen, tempted to snatch the phone and hurl it into the dark. A sense of utter failure struck him dead center, and it was all he could do to keep breathing, to keep pretending like he was someone who knew what to do next. But he had no idea what to do.
The impending collapse he and Eddie had talked about in Martin’s living room floor loomed high over them now, and Martin inhaled long and deep as if preparing for the moment it all came crashing down. He’d been caught up in this wave of defeat before. Maybe he’d never really left it.
“What if Ama’s location never comes up?” Eddie’s voice brought him out of the dark of his mind and back into the woods. “We can’t just stand here and wait.”
Martin cast his eyes down, unable to admit this truth while looking at Eddie. “I don’t know,” he said.
“Don’t give me that. I know these woods, but I don’t know how to hunt for a criminal. According to you, I walked all over these hills with that monster right by my side. You tell me where we should go, tell me how to find him, and I’ll get you there.”
Martin blinked, his mind falling quiet. Eddie knew how Michael would behave out here better than anyone. He also knew every inch of the woods.
“Was there an area Jonathon kept you from in the woods? Anywhere he always volunteered to look or told you not to bother with?”
“No,” Eddie answered, but now he sounded unsure.
“There had to be,” Martin said, his thoughts gaining traction. “We know he’s in these woods. He has been all along. He either tried to keep you from a certain location, or he made damn sure he was with you when you were going to search close to his safe place. Where is it?”
“No, no, it’s the opposite,” Eddie said, his entire body taut. “He didn’t like going near the old factory. He never said anything, but whenever I said I was searching that area, he never came to help.”
“Then we start there,” Martin said. Immediately, he called the captain and told him to send all available units and anyone willing to search to the Evansbrite plant, then began striding deeper into Tarson woods, committing his entire self to this choice.
“Hold on, Martin. I know how wrong it feels to leave right now, but driving is going to be a whole lot faster,” Eddie called at his back. By the time Martin turned around, Eddie was already hurrying in the direction of the courthouse lawn.
Martin caught up to him before they reached the edge of the grass, and they matched strides all the way to the parking lot.
When they reached the car, Martin tossed Eddie his keys. “You drive. You know where we’re going. I know who to call for help.”
They climbed into their seats and slammed the doors shut. Eddie cranked the engine and floored the gas, the tires spitting out gravel and kicking up dust. Martin braced a hand on the ceiling and began scrolling through his phone until he found the number for Mrs. Walton.
She answered on the third ring.
“Mrs. Walton, this is Detective Martin. I need your help.” He spoke as calmly as he could as he relayed his suspicions, and then he hung up and turned to Eddie. “I know it sounds insane, and I trust your instincts about the factory, but we need to pick up a woman named Janie Walton first.” He gave her address.
Eddie glanced at him, reluctance plain on his face, his fingers clamped around the steering wheel. Eddie didn’t have to say anything for Martin to know he didn’t want to go anywhere but the factory. “Tell me how to get there,” Eddie said at last.
Martin knew it was a gamble, and what the delay of even a minute might cost them all, but he was absolutely sure of one thing: if they found Michael with Ama or Hazel held hostage, his mother was the only person on earth who stood a chance of stopping him.
AMA Chapter 76 | 7:00 PM, December 9, 2006 | Tarson, Georgia
AMA ARRIVED AT MICHAEL’S BUNKER panting and sweaty. She was almost grateful to step inside, if only for the break in movement. But seeing Hazel in the flesh didn’t bring near the flood of relief Ama had anticipated.
Hazel sat in the far corner, barely eight feet away, both hands chained to the brackets on the metal shelving unit bolted to the bunker wall. Her shirt hung on her like it was pinned to a clothesline, and the slope of her face dove off her cheekbones. Her hair was knotted. She was missing several fingernails, and Ama spotted burn scars up both arms. Hazel’s eyes were open but barely tracking Ama’s presence.
In that moment, Ama knew she couldn’t stay here and bide her time until Eddie and Martin found them. Each day she would be weaker. Minutes from now she would probably be chained to the shelves alongside Hazel. If they wanted out, they would need to act now—together—with absolutely zero communication and even less of a plan.
Michael’s footsteps approached from behind, and the door swung shut, trapping them inside. Even though nothing in front of her had changed, the underground bunker felt smaller with the exit closed and Michael’s breath close enough to warm her bare shoulder.
She and Hazel needed something, anything, to gain the upper hand on Michael. Neither of them were as physically strong as he was. Could they outrun him once free, Ama on one good ankle and Hazel half dead?
Michael reached past her and set his walking stick on the table, just out of reach of her and Hazel. Behind her, she heard the click of a lighter igniting.
“I’ve been waiting a long time,” Michael said softly in her ear. “I have learned that the first sounds are the purest. The rest are tainted with fatigue. The pain becomes dulled over time. You’ll get breaks when the tone weakens; then we’ll start again. It’s art, yes. But I have studied how people respond to stimulus, how the notes devolve in a session. I have this down to a science.”
Ama’s limbs tingled with adrenaline. Michael was a planner, methodical, tidy. The way to throw him off, the way to get ahead, was to make a mess. A big, loud fucking mess. And to do it sooner rather than later. S
he couldn’t let herself get locked up; she couldn’t trust that the tracker was transmitting, that Martin and Eddie were on their way here. She had to assume it was her versus Michael. Right here, right now.
Ama felt the presence of heat at her back, intense enough to make her instinctively flinch away. She would be like Hazel—she wouldn’t make a sound. She wouldn’t give him that. She stared at Hazel, desperate to channel her, to not end up like her, a skin-covered skeleton chained to a wall, and mouthed the words circling her mind as she tensed for the first burn: Scream, Hazel. Scream!
The sharp, heated end of a wire buried into Ama’s back, scorching the skin covering her spine. She slammed her teeth together. Her arms shot straight out. She wouldn’t make a sound, she wouldn’t, but there was a scream in her ears, so loud it drowned out every thought—just pure rage and pain and fuck-you.
But it wasn’t Ama’s voice. It was Hazel, her mouth open, her dark eyes blazing like two lit coals. Ama heard the wire hit the ground and Michael began muttering notes. She flattened out her hands, pressing palm to palm, spun on her heel, and struck Michael directly in his Adam’s apple. He gasped and coughed, but his hands came forward. Ama ducked under his reach and stumbled across the room. Michael barreled toward her and suddenly was sprawled face-first on the ground, one foot caught over the twiggy shape of Hazel’s leg.
Ama grabbed the table and flipped it over. His walking stick flew across the room and clattered against the concrete. She slung a chair in the direction of his head. Hazel screamed again, a different pitch, high and shrill.
“No! Wait. Hazel, wait,” Michael sputtered, and began crawling in her direction. Ama let out a roar, and Michael swung his gaze to her, lips opening, eyes bright. Hazel shrieked, notes flying from her mouth like a flute in a centrifuge.
Ama jerked open the other drawer. Sheet music was stacked inside. She snatched the paper out first, tore it down the center, threw it in the air.
“What are you doing?” Michael yelled.
Ama yanked open the cabinets and began flinging everything out of them, hurling canned goods and bottles of water in his direction, and then leaped across the room as he swung out at her. Michael followed, nostrils flaring, head lowered, teeth bared, when Ama saw Hazel climb on a chair, reach up, and slip the length of her chain through a gap in the wall and loose metal. She jumped down, snatched up the wooden stick, and swung.
Ama heard a crunch, and Michael’s legs went out from under him. He struck the side of his head on the corner of the overturned table and slumped to the ground.
AMA Chapter 77 | 7:03 PM, December 9, 2006 | Tarson, Georgia
MICHAEL’S BREATHS CAME SHALLOW AND wet. Blood leaked from his nose, mouth, and ears.
“It’s okay,” Ama said. She reached out for Hazel, who jerked away.
No, it is not okay Not by a long shot.
Ama’s gaze turned to the door. “My name is Ama. Your dad is on his way. Your dad and a detective. They’re coming.”
“They won’t find us. Not down here. Everything is locked. We have to get aboveground.” Hazel’s shoulders shuddered, and her tiny frame began to shake. “If we can get this door open, I can get us all the way out.” She staggered to the door and began pounding it with her fists.
“What kind of lock is it? Combination?”
“Yeah. Bill… Bill said it’s a four-number code, but Michael had changed it.”
“What’s the biggest number on the dial?”
“One hundred,” Hazel answered.
Ama sat quietly, remembering the day she walked out of that courthouse following Michael’s verdict, knowing immediately she was leaving there for the last time. How for years she would do her best to convince herself she didn’t remember the date, didn’t care that Michael was free.
“Try ten, ten, nineteen, eighty-nine,” Ama said quietly. “You’ll need to spin four intervals to the left on the first one, then it’s just like a high school locker.”
“We don’t have time to be wrong,” Hazel cautioned.
“Ten, ten, nineteen, eighty-nine,” Ama repeated.
Hazel heaved a jagged breath, and then spun the dial as directed. The hatch popped open, and she let out a child’s laugh, swinging her gaze at Ama.
“No!” Hazel shouted suddenly. Ama turned in time to see Michael swing the walking stick at her injured leg. The cane cracked the outside of her knee, and she dropped, smacking the side of her face on the floor.
“Run!” Ama sputtered, gasping, nearly blind with pain as starbursts clouded her vision. She kicked out and slapped her hands in the space above her. She was able to flick her eyes briefly to the open door—it was empty. Hazel was gone.
Michael gripped her wrists and dragged her to her feet. Heat and anger rolled off him, and his face was the portrait of rage. She would have one shot to survive the next sixty seconds. One. And it was going to take everything she had.
MICHAEL Chapter 78 | 7:04 PM, December 9, 2006 | Tarson, Georgia
AMA STOPS FIGHTING. I STARE at the back of her head, bewildered and panting, my brain pounding in my skull. She raises her hands to the welt blooming on her face. The door is open, but she isn’t lunging for it, isn’t screaming. She doesn’t want to run with Hazel… she wanted to drive her away.
“You remember,” I say, the pieces clicking together. “You remember the day this began. You remember what you said about our paths crossing. It was a test, wasn’t it? You wanted to see how committed I was. Fate used you to test me.” I nearly laugh. “You want this to be your song. And you’re right, Ama. The two of you together, the voices didn’t work; they competed instead of complemented. Hazel was throwing you off. The notes weren’t clear at all. You’ve been a part of this from the beginning, from the very moment it started. I’m the one to blame here. You didn’t have to do that. You didn’t have to make such a mess. I’m not mad, though. A man I once worked for told me the most talented artists are the most volatile, the most difficult to work with. He said you have to admire the fight and passion in them instead of resenting it, that it’s what makes them different, makes them great.”
“I want to be great. Do you want to be great?” she whispers, turning slowly as if asking permission to move, and I loosen my grip to allow her, nodding when she can see my face.
“How can we be sure this is what we’re supposed to do?” she asks. “You never told me. Hazel ruined everything.”
“The river will show you, and we will leave this town, Ama. I know a place. We will have a studio, professional equipment. We can make our music. We have to hurry. Hazel is weak and it is dark, and she was so jealous of you—so jealous she screamed!—but she’ll come for us. The moment she’s discovered, we will be on borrowed time.”
Ama steps closer to me, her lips and her tongue inches from my face. She hesitantly brushes her pinkie up and down my fingers. “I’ve defended you, protected you from the very beginning, when no one else would, Michael. I took on your case, I took on the DA and an unfriendly jury. I took a bullet for you. Didn’t you ever wonder why? It’s because you are great, and greatness always runs on borrowed time.”
I peer in her eyes, gray as the river, and for the first time I wonder if I am staring at Fate herself.
HAZEL Chapter 79 | 7:05 PM, December 9, 2006 | Tarson, Georgia
I CRAWL DOWN A DARK, cramped tube, my hands and knees slipping in what feels like a slick of damp moss. There is a light ahead, faint and small, and with the roar of my breathing echoing in front and chasing me from behind, I feel like I might be hit by a train. I realize I’m waiting for the blare of a whistle, for the sudden, undeniable moment when I am caught with no way out.
The ring of light becomes bigger, grayer, and as I draw closer, I can tell it is covered by some kind of vent. I struggle forth on sore knees, hands slapping, shoulders burning, the chain from my wrists dragging between my legs. The end of the tunnel is finally within reach. I hold my breath and listen, but the factory is silent. I wriggle my feet in front of me,
draw my knees to my chest, and kick. The sound of the bang ricochets on the other side in the lofty room, and the thin metal web is now dented. I kick it again and again, and finally one side gives way and the grate falls open like a door.
I had imagined myself bursting through, tumbling to freedom, but I hang back behind the lip and slowly peer out. Through the darkness, the abandoned factory comes into grainy, two-dimensional focus. The wall ahead of me is lined with full-length metal lockers, covered in a film of dust. Bill’s locker is number 4, I remember, where there will be a spare set of keys to his house and, under a false floor he installed, a revolver. When the alarm went off that day, he and everyone else had to leave everything behind. They never let the employees back in to retrieve their belongings. Each of these lockers is like a time capsule. For many, like a grave. The factory may not have killed them straight out, but over time, it came back to collect one by one. It’s about damn time it helped save a life instead.
I slide out of the hole, jumping as the length of chain connecting the shackles on my wrists strikes the edge of the vent. I’m sure I’ve been discovered, but I am alone. I creep across the floor and pop open his locker. A rough textured jacket is hung on a hook and a knit beanie is on the top shelf. I shake out his hat and pull it on. The air is cold, and I realize I don’t even know what season it is, only that it is night and that I am free. I am not safe, however. I kneel at the foot of his locker and press on the corners of the false floor one by one. The back left corner feels nearly spongy under my finger, and I hear a click. I press harder, and the metal plate lifts, revealing the outline of a short-barreled revolver. When I pick it up, it will be the first time I’ve ever held a gun.
In my mind, I make a list of what Bill taught me: right hand on the handle, left hand supporting underneath, slight bend in your knees, and a bend in the elbow—Don’t straight-arm it, Hazel. Cock the hammer. Bring the gun to your eye, not your eye to the gun. Exhale, steady, trigger.
