Like a simple—what did his wife call it?—a mantra.
I have to get my family out of here.
He gave them a few minutes to get to their places, two men hacking at what was left of Tom Blair, the other at the stove. Possibly all of them looking away when Jack started to move.
Which he did.
Staying low, nearly crawling to the open doors. The blessed outside air hitting his nostrils. Step after awkward step. Not so fast that the footfalls made any sound, not with all the bubbling, and now the hacking, the chopping, the sawing.
Whack, whack, whack.
He finally got outside and moved like some insect, a hunted bug, a wounded cockroach hurrying as fast as he could to the safety of the dark woods, miles away, an eternity away as he sucked in each breath with every step.
Then deeper into the woods, still refusing to stop, though clearly sheltered by the darkness now.
Until, so deep, he felt he could stop and he fell forward.
His face catching a thorny bush, the prickers tearing at his face. He felt so happy, so goddamned happy that he had escaped, that he nearly cried with joy.
He had escaped.
He could get his family out of here.
He gave himself a few minutes to recover.
Such a small rest before he started moving again.
Christie sat on the couch, the throw blanket tight on her lap, when she heard the sound from the back.
She had seen the open bathroom window and realized how Jack had left. She looked in that direction and waited.
She heard a grunt. Then the sound of the window being shut, sluggish from humidity.
Jack’s steps told her he was limping.
Welcome to our vacation, she thought.
He walked into the room. He might have passed right by her.
“Jack,” she said quietly, not wanting to startle him in the darkness.
He stopped.
“You’re awake,” he said.
“I woke up. You were gone.” A pause. Then: “Where were you?”
He tossed the keys onto the coffee table.
Even in the dark room, the keys caught some light.
“I had to know,” he said. “About those keys.”
“I figured that, when I woke up and you were gone. Guess I know you.”
She looked up at him standing there like her young son would if caught doing something he shouldn’t.
“Sit down.”
Jack maneuvered around the coffee table and sat down beside her, falling into the couch. His right arm brushed hers, and she felt the cooling sweat on it. Close now, she saw his face covered with sweat, and then the scratches.
“What happened?”
He looked away.
“Jack?”
When those eyes turned back to her, she knew he’d tell her everything.
The room felt frigid. Christie had her hands locked together.
She looked at Jack as he told her about the car, how the Blairs never left, then described what he saw inside the building with the smoking chimney.
He hesitated then. He couldn’t go on. But then without any prompting, he finally finished his tale.
And when he described going into the freezer and touching Sharon Blair’s body, Christie’s hands untwisted and went to her face.
Did she sob? Or was it merely a gasp that she needed to muffle? Was her heaving all from the fear?
She didn’t know. The feelings overwhelmed her. She felt Jack put his arm around her. Somehow that brought no sense of comfort.
Finally, she brought her hands away from her face. She felt wet trails on her cheeks, drying now. She had been sobbing as quietly as possible. But that was done.
“God, Jack.” Her voice a whisper.
She looked in the direction of the bedroom, the kids. “Jack. What are we going to do?”
Thinking all the time, he has to have some idea. He was her rock. He was someone who faces fear and death and madness every night. Surely he had to have a plan here.
His voice low. “We have to get out of here.”
“Now? Right now?”
He shook his head.
“No. You’ve seen the guards out there. And I can only guess what the roads outside are like at night. No, it’ll have to be in the daytime.”
She looked right at him.
“W-will they let us?”
He took one of her hands. “I wasn’t seen. I got into their cookhouse, whatever the hell that place is, and no one saw me.”
“And the car? The Blairs’ car?”
“No one saw me get the keys. The parking lot was dark.” He took a breath. “I wasn’t seen.”
Which Christie took to mean, I hope I wasn’t seen.
After all, hadn’t Jack shown her all the cameras?
Then the details.
“How will we do it?”
And those details rolled out, showing that Jack had indeed thought about it.
“Leave everything. We split up and—”
“No. We can’t—”
A squeeze to her hand.
“Listen.”
“We can’t split—”
“Christie, please. We have to split up. If we march to the car together, then they’ll know something’s up.”
He didn’t add the obvious.
Then we would never get out of here.
“I’ll take Simon. You, Kate. Maybe you go by the lake. I’ll go near the game room. Then we go right to the car.”
“I’m scared.”
“We get in. We drive toward the gate. If they don’t suspect anything, they won’t have a plan to stop us. We’ll get out.”
She shook her head. “It sounds crazy.”
A harder squeeze. “Listen, Christie. It’s what we have to do. There are things we have to do over the next few hours. Do you understand?”
More words not said.
If we want to get out of here.
If we want our kids to get out of here.
If we want them to stay alive.
Quiet for a few minutes. An old-fashioned wall clock with a luminous dial showed a little after four. Dawn wasn’t far away. Everything that Jack talked about would be happening in the next few hours.
“What do we tell the kids?”
Already she was imagining walking with Kate to the car. Her questions. Her reluctance to go all the way to the parking lot. For… what?
Then getting them both into the car, fast, when every second might count.
He said, “We have to tell them.”
“No.” She shook her head. Almost moaned. “We can’t.”
“We have to. Who knows what they’ll see. What we might face.”
“They’ll be so scared.”
“Yes. But, listen. We get them to the car. We leave.”
She nodded at Jack’s words. Then, as if she had to be part of this plan: “Right. No discussion, no debate. You and I tell them we need to get into the car now. That this is a bad place. And we have to leave now.”
Jack looked right at her, realizing the bridge she had crossed.
Christie thought of her daughter, more obstinate and self-absorbed each week that she got older.
But she also knew that Kate still had one foot in the world of a little girl.
“I know Kate will understand. And Simon will follow her. We just have to do this fast.”
“Yes.” Jack took another deep breath. “We can do this.”
She didn’t say anything. Then:
“Do we wake them early?” she said.
“First light.”
She saw Jack look at the door, the front windows of the cabin.
“Right. First bit of light.” She choked on the words, feeling this close to sobbing.