"I'm not a vascular surgeon," Sara said.
"You'll do," Smith told her, taking the bag from Lena.
Sara kept trying. "The axillary artery has been hit. I won't be able to see anything."
"Doesn't bother me," he said, kneeling down beside Jeffrey.
"I can't do a block under these circumstances," she told him. "I'm not an anesthesiologist."
"You keep making excuses, I'm gonna think you don't want to do this." Smith dumped the IV kit onto the floor.
"What are you doing?"
"Might as well give him a fighting chance," Smith said, unbuttoning Jeffrey's shirt cuff.
"I can do that," Sara told him, but Smith waved her off.
Sara demanded, "Why are you doing this?"
"Why not?" he shrugged as he rolled up Jeffery's sleeve. "Nothing better to do." Still, he gave Lena a look over his shoulder, and she wondered again if he was showing off for her benefit or if he just liked playing these games. Maybe it was a little of both.
"You should insert the cannula…" Sara began, but Smith shot her a look of warning.
Lena watched as he wrapped the rubber tourniquet around Jeffrey's upper arm. He was by no means an expert, but he managed to get the needle inserted into the vein on the third try.
Smith laughed at his failed attempts. "Good thing he's passed out."
"You've seen this done before," Sara said. "How often do you need infusions?"
He looked up at her, and Lena could see his crystal blue eyes registering first alarm, then something that looked like joy. They both stared at each other for a few beats, before Smith laughed.
He said, "Took you long enough."
"You've got it wrong," she told him, and Lena wished to God she knew what Sara was talking about. "You've got it all wrong."
"Maybe," he said, glancing at his accomplice. The other man was staring out the front window as if he had no concern about what was going on in the rest of the room. Lena knew that he was watching them, though. Sonny, or whatever his name was, had eyes in the back of his head.
Smith connected the IV, then called Lena over. "Hold this," he said, meaning the drip bag. "Make yourself useful."
Lena sat down, her back against the wall. She kept one hand tucked behind her as the other held the IV. Smith was less than a foot away from her, but Lena had no idea what she could do.
Smith opened the medical case. "Tell me what to give you."
Sara said, "I can't do this."
"Lady," Smith told her, "you don't have a choice."
She sat back, shaking her head. "I refuse."
"I'll kill a kid for every minute that you don't do this," he said. When she did not respond, he took the gun out of his waistband, held it up, and aimed the muzzle toward one of the girls.
Brad moved in front of the child, and Smith said, "I'll shoot you, too."
"And then what?" Sara asked. "You shoot them all, and it's just me left?"
He nodded toward Lena without looking at her. "I can think of some other things to do," he said. "What do you think about that, Doctor? You wanna watch that, too?"
"You wouldn't," Sara said, though surely she knew he would.
He asked her, "You think that kind of thing runs in families?"
Sara looked down, something like shame passing across her face.
Lena could not keep herself from asking, "What are you talking about?"
"Don't you know?" Smith responded. "Of course you don't know. It's not like he's gonna advertise he's a fucking rapist, is it?"
"Who?" Lena said, just as Sara told Smith, "No."
"Don't like that, do you?" Smith asked. He kept the gun pointed toward Brad, saying, "How about you, Skippy? You like hearing that?"
Brad shook his head. "It's not true."
"What's not true?" Lena asked.
Smith looked back at Sara. "Tell them, Doc. Tell them why we're all here."
"No," Sara insisted. "You've got it all wrong."
Smith's lips peeled back in an awful smile as he told Lena, "Your boss? Big Chief Tolliver lying out there with his head blown off? He raped my mother, and I'm the bastard that paid for it."
Chapter Twenty-Two
Tuesday
Sara woke from a hard sleep, no dreams to frighten her this time. She was in Jared's small bed, tooking at a life-size rubber eagle, one of Auburn University's mascots, suspended by piano wire over her head. How the boy managed to sleep with that thing hovering, as if it was going to pounce at any moment, was a mystery. Little boys were strange creatures, as evidenced by the bug-eyed iguana hungrily staring at her from its glass cage.
She sat up, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. The air conditioning was on, but she was hot from the afternoon nap. Sara had never liked sleeping in the middle of the day, and as if to remind her of this, her right temple throbbed with a dull pain.
In the kitchen, she found a Coke and some aspirin. Between the caffeine and the drugs, she hoped to chase away what was beginning to feel like a migraine headache. Maybe the cotton mill or the quarry spat toxic fumes into the air. Sara had been nursing a headache from the moment she got to Sylacauga.
She padded to the back of the house, feeling a bit like the walking dead. Naps were supposed to be replenishing, but she felt like she hadn't slept a wink. Maybe she had dreamed and just could not remember. If it was bad enough to make her body feel this way, Sara was glad she had forgotten whatever nightmare her mind had come up with.
Nell had warned her not to use the children's bathroom, and after a quick glance, Sara saw why. Towels and clothes were strewn about and there was a suspicious number of toys in the bathtub, considering Jen's and Jared's ages.
She walked through the master bedroom, thinking Nell had surprisingly good taste when given a palate that did not include orange and blue. A huge sleigh bed with a homemade quilt was angled out from the corner, giving a great view of the sunny backyard. An antique rocker was in the corner, and a large chest of drawers had a television on top.
Like the bedroom, the bathroom was neat and tidy. The towels matched the quilt on the bed, and the throw rugs on the floor complimented everything. Sara put the Coke bottle on the edge of the tub as she used the toilet, covering a large yawn with the back of her hand. She was trying to peel off a piece of toilet tissue from the roll when she heard someone in the house. Like some sort of barn animal, Sara had left the bathroom door open, and she rushed to wipe and pull up her pants just as a loud crash came from the front room. Without thinking, she opened her mouth to ask if anyone needed help, but stopped when she heard a suspicious-sounding noise.
Carefully, she walked into the bedroom as another loud crash echoed through the house. Whoever it was had made it to the kitchen. Doors slammed closed one after the other as someone searched the cabinets, just as Sara had done in Jessie's kitchen the day before.
She glanced around, realizing she was trapped in the back of the house. The bathroom led to the bedroom, and other than the window, the only way out was through the hall. Footsteps padded down the hallway as she considered this, and Sara ran back to the bathroom and jumped into the tub, hiding behind the curtain just as the intruder walked into the bedroom.
Whoever was here was looking for something – that much was obvious. The closet door was opened and stuff was shoved off the shelves and onto the floor. Sara felt a bead of sweat roll down her back as the intruder entered the bathroom.
She could see the shadow of a large man standing by the toilet, a few inches from where she hid. The light cast him in shadow, and even though Sara knew he could not see her, she felt exposed, as if any minute she would be found. The man reached down and took something off the edge of the tub. The Coke bottle. He would see that there was condensation, feel the refrigerated drink inside.
He said, "Who's there?"
Sara put her hand to the back of the shower, feeling the cool tiles. Her mind flashed back to that bathroom in Atlanta, where her attacker had left her handcuffed to the stall. She could not forget the sensation of the cold tiles pressing into her bare knees. She had stared at those tiles for what seemed like hours as she waited to be found. Her mouth had been taped shut to keep her from screaming, and there was nothing she could do but watch her life bleed out onto the floor.