Something moved in the backyard, in the darkness, and she thought, Apollo!, but when she looked over, she saw that it was just one of Dan’s mercenaries standing guard between the house and the surrounding woods. The man was wearing night-vision goggles, the device like an elongated third eye jutting from his forehead.
She pulled back from the window and saw Womack eyeing her carefully. “Where else could she be hiding?”
“You checked every room?”
“My men did.”
“Maybe they missed something.”
“Anything’s possible,” he said, shrugging. He obviously didn’t believe it. “Try calling her.”
“I don’t have to.”
“Why not?”
“Because I know exactly where she is.”
He cocked his head slightly to one side, not quite understanding. “You know where she is exactly? Why didn’t you say that earlier?”
“Because you won’t like the answer.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Come again?”
“Now.”
She was afraid of a loud pinging! sound as the baseball bat connected with the back of Womack’s head, but that would have happened only if the bat clutched in Lucy’s hands was aluminum. But it was solid oak, and there was just a dull thump as it made contact against flesh and the skull underneath it.
The strike dropped Womack like a sack of meat. The girl stood over him, shaking, both hands still choking up on the bat that was now stained with blood and patches of hair.
“Oh God, did I kill him?” Lucy whispered.
Allie didn’t answer her. Instead, she glanced out the back window again, at the mercenary. He was facing the woods, oblivious to what had just happened in the master bedroom behind him.
“Allie?” Lucy said, her voice still barely rising above a whisper.
“You did good,” she said, and pulled the curtains closed.
She crouched next to Womack and drew his 1911 from its holster and slipped the Kalashnikov off him. The man was heavier than he looked, and a part of the strap was trapped under his body. Allie had to grunt to get it free. She opened the pouches around his waist and grabbed two spare magazines, shoving them into one back pocket each. She took a moment to feel Womack’s pulse. He was alive, if just barely, the bloody patch on the back of his head staring at her.
She glanced up at Lucy, the bat looking heavy as it hung from her hand. She’d seen the girl sliding out from under the large king-size bed while she was at the window and Womack was talking. His back was turned to the teenager, and she had been amazingly quiet as she crept up on him, even if Allie could see her trembling with every step. It had been all Allie could do to keep Womack’s attention, to keep those eyes of his focused entirely on her.
Allie put both hands on the girl’s shoulders now and smiled. “You did really good.”
Lucy smiled back. Or tried to. She was shaking too badly to fully commit. “Where’s Dad? He went to find you.”
“I don’t know; I didn’t see him on my way back,” Allie said, hoping there wasn’t still blood on her face to give away the lie.
She hurried past the teenager before Lucy could ask something else, maybe more questions about Walter. Right now, the less the girl knew, the better. Allie drew the 1911 from her waistband and looked through the open bedroom door at the devastated second-floor hallway beyond.
Lucy followed her, almost stepping into Jerry’s blood, then onto Jerry himself, before leaning against the wall next to Allie. Every so often, the girl’s eyes would find their way back to the blood and hair clinging to the end of the baseball bat still clutched in her hand.
“How did you hide from them?” Allie asked.
“I was already on the second floor in one of the other bedrooms when they shot Barnes, so I ran into this one.” She glanced over at Jerry’s body on the floor. “I don’t know when that happened to him, or who did it…”
Barnes did that, she thought, but asked, “Where were you hiding?”
“There’s a small hidden compartment inside the closet, behind the safe. I found it while I was looking around waiting for you earlier. It’s small, and I had to squeeze in like a pretzel. I hid when they were searching the house, then I snuck out to see what was happening when you and…the other one showed up. I couldn’t get back to the closet in time, so I slid under the bed.”
“And the bat?”
“It was in the closet. Some golf clubs, too, but the bat was heavier.”
“Good choice.”
The teenager gave Allie another failed attempt at a smile. “Thanks.” Then she looked back at Womack’s body on the other side of the bed. “Did I kill him?”
“No, he’s still alive.” Just barely, she thought, but decided the girl didn’t need to know that part.
“Oh,” Lucy said, and Allie detected more than just a little bit of relief in that one simple word. Then, “How are we going to get out of here, Allie? They’re everywhere.”
“We’ll improvise.” She looked around the room before settling on the back window. It was the most obvious route of escape. “Ten feet,” she said, mostly to herself.
“Ten feet?” Lucy repeated.
“From the second floor to the ground below.”
“Oh.”
Allie smiled at her. “You can do it.”
Lucy didn’t look convinced, but she walked over to the window, hiding against the wall on the other side from Allie so the lone dark figure walking out there couldn’t spot them. But the man hadn’t looked in their direction once; he seemed preoccupied with something in the woods, and she wondered what he was seeing that she couldn’t from the window with the naked eye.
“I opened the window so they’d think I jumped out,” Lucy said.
“Smart.”
“I heard what the man said. I guess they didn’t buy it.”
“No, but it was still a smart thing to do.”
She took a moment to peek out at the back of the mercenary about fifty (sixty?) yards from them. The problem wasn’t taking the man out; she could do it, if she had to. The problem was how long before the others responded to the gunshots. The thought of shooting it out with the rest of Dan’s men, with Lucy in the middle, made her queasy. She didn’t just worry for the girl’s safety, but her own, too. Allie had training — a lot of it — but none of it covered how to survive a firefight with a half dozen mercenaries.
“It’s really far down,” Lucy was saying while peering through the curtains at the ground below. “Are you sure it’s only ten feet?”
More like twelve, or thirteen, Allie thought, but said, “About ten feet.”
“It looks higher…”
“See those bushes?” she asked, pointing at the shrubbery below them.
Lucy nodded hesitantly.
“They’ll cushion your fall,” Allie said. “Trust me.”
The girl’s face paled.
“Trust me, Lucy,” Allie said.
Lucy flashed her another forced smile. This one, like the others, had no chance of being even semi-believable. “What about you?”
“Once I’m sure you’re safe, I’ll be right behind you.”
“Allie, where’s Dad?”
“We’ll find him together, later.” She gave the girl another reassuring smile. “But we have to get out of here first in order to do that, right?”
The teenager nodded, and Allie looked out the window again to make sure the dark figure still had his back to them. He did. What the hell was he looking at, anyway? Whatever it was, she hoped it would keep his attention for the next few minutes, or else this was going to be a very short escape attempt.