“You hear that?” Trevor asked Stella.
Stella nodded. Beside her, David stared at the door with his large, dark eyes, his ballpoint pen poised in his hand over his notebook page that he’d been drawing on. Something out there scared David.
“Sounds like someone’s yelling out there,” Stella said in a low voice.
Trevor crossed the room in a blur of movement. He pulled his gun out of the waistband of his pants and cocked it. He opened the front door and rushed outside.
Stella turned to David. “Stay right here,” she told him. She was about to get up, but he clutched on to her hand, his eyes pleaded with her not to go. “I’m just going out on the front porch,” she told him. “That’s as far as I’m going to go.”
David let her hand go. She got up and hurried to the front door. She slipped out through the doorway, and then pulled the door almost all the way closed. David stared at the door for a few seconds, but then he looked at Needles.
Needles wasn’t looking at the door anymore – he was looking right at David. “I know what you are,” Needles whispered at David.
On the front porch Stella stepped to the edge of the steps that descended down into the snow. She watched Trevor jump from the porch down into the snow and run across the field towards the woods, his gun out, ready to shoot if he needed to.
In the woods Cole stood in front of Jose. “You saw Frank?”
“Yeah,” Jose answered with a shudder. “He was up here in the woods. Watching us.” Jose’s eyes darted away from Cole to the trees. “Just … watching us.”
Cole glanced at the trees. “You’re sure it was Frank?”
“Yes, I’m sure,” Jose snapped. “He had on that blue flannel shirt he was wearing before. No coat. No hat. It was him.”
Cole looked at Jose. “Did Frank say anything? Did he wave at you?”
“No. He just stood in the woods, and he was staring at me. No expression. Nothing.”
“Did he have his gun?”
“I don’t think so. I didn’t see it.” Jose wiped at his nose with the sleeve of his jacket. “I don’t know.”
Cole looked down at the snow all around them. Then he looked at Jose. “You’re absolutely sure you saw Frank.”
“I know what I saw.”
“There aren’t any tracks in the snow.”
Jose looked down at the snow. His eyes widened in surprise. He shook his head no in disbelief. “He was here. Standing right here in these trees. I’m sure of it.” Jose looked at Cole with wide eyes that were now confused and a little frightened. “I saw him. I swear I did.”
“Cole!”
Cole turned towards the sound of Trevor’s voice.
“What’s going on?” Trevor asked as he ran into the woods.
“Nothing,” Cole answered. “We’re coming back inside.” Cole looked at Jose. “Come on, Jose. Let’s get back inside.”
Trevor stood at the edge of the woods, his gun ready in his hand. He looked around. “What were you guys yelling about out here?”
Cole knew that Trevor wasn’t going to let this go. “Jose thought he saw Frank.”
Trevor stiffened. “Frank?”
“Yeah. He thought he saw him up here in the woods.”
“I saw him,” Jose muttered.
Trevor stepped deeper into the woods, joining Cole and Jose. He scanned the trees, the low-hanging branches, and then the blanket of snow on the ground all around them. “But I don’t see – ”
“I know,” Cole finished quickly. “There aren’t any tracks in the snow.”
“I saw him!” Jose snapped.
“Come on, Jose,” Cole said in a calm voice. “Another snowstorm is coming. We need to get back inside the cabin.”
Jose lowered his gun and turned back to the field. He walked through the trees to the edge of the field. Cole and Trevor glanced at each other, and then they followed Jose out of the woods. Cole could read his brother’s thoughts – Jose is losing it now, just like Needles.
Jose stopped at the edge of the clearing and stared at the cabin which sat in the middle of the field over a hundred yards away. He could see Stella standing on the front porch watching them. Jose wondered why Stella was on the front porch watching them.
She has something to do with all of this, his mind whispered to him.
Jose looked up at the sky which was dark gray with clouds. It looked like a wall of gray snow was heading right for them.
“Come on,” Cole urged Jose on. The wind from the coming storm was already picking up; a wave of even colder and nastier weather was coming, if that was possible. “We need to get back into the cabin. We’ve got other problems to discuss.”
“What other problems?” Trevor asked.
Cole glanced at Trevor, but then he nodded at the snowstorm that was moving in fast. “We need to hurry,” he told Trevor.
The three ran across the front field as the whitewash of a blizzard swept across the back field behind the cabin.
By the time they reached the front porch, the snowstorm was right on top of them. They hurried inside the cabin.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
“Destroyed?” Trevor asked, his face slack with shock. “What do you mean, destroyed?”
“The engines in both vehicles are destroyed,” Cole told him. He looked at Stella and David but they didn’t seem too surprised to hear the news. He looked at Needles who didn’t seem so surprised either. He looked back at Trevor. “Like someone took an ax to the motors.”
Trevor stared at Cole. His mouth moved, like he was trying to say something, but his voice wasn’t working for a moment. He turned and paced into the kitchen. Then he turned back to Cole. “An ax? Like the ax that’s missing from the fireplace?”
Cole didn’t say anything. He didn’t have to.
Cole looked at Stella and David. David had a spiral notebook on his lap and a ballpoint pen in his hand. Cole wondered for a split second where David had gotten the notebook and pen, but then he dismissed the thought. He didn’t really care right now. Cole watched David draw something in his notebook for a few moments; David was really concentrating on his drawing, his dark eyes focused like laser beams on the page.
“Is there any way the engines can be fixed?” Trevor asked, breaking Cole’s hypnosis. The tone of Trevor’s voice didn’t sound hopeful.
“No,” Cole answered as he walked into the kitchen to fix himself a cup of coffee. He poured the coffee into his mug and then held his hands around the cup for a second, letting the heat warm his hands up.
Outside, the blizzard was over top of the cabin like a smothering blanket. The wind howled around the eaves and battered the log walls.
“So, Frank takes the ax with him in the middle of the night and destroys our vehicles with it,” Trevor says.
“Frank wouldn’t do that,” Jose grumbled.
“You said you saw him out there in the woods,” Trevor said.
Needles perked up at this news. “Frank’s out there?”
Cole watched Stella when she heard that Jose saw Frank. Something about the way she looked. It was only for a split second, but he saw something in her eyes. A fear. But not a fear of Frank, a fear of something else. She knew something about this, Cole was sure. But what?
“No,” Trevor spat out the word towards Needles. “Frank isn’t out there.”
“I saw him in the woods.”
“You saw a figment of your imagination. There were no tracks in the snow. No sign of him anywhere. You’re tired and scared and your mind’s playing tricks on you.”
“Don’t call me scared, you motherfucker.”
“Come on, you two,” Cole said.
“If Frank’s out there, then why?” Trevor continued on, ignoring Cole’s warning.