THE DOOR OPENED and Jane sprayed the cleanser.
But the man through the door wasn’t Cal—it was the man she’d talked to through the gate. The witness who had called the police after the crash. James Marcolin. He staggered back as the cleanser hit his eyes and he roared. She tried to shove past him, but Cal Hall was there and he punched her in the face. She fell back, Marcolin’s cussing booming in her ears. Then Perri beside her, trying to wrest the Glock from Cal’s hand, Cal overpowering his wife and shoving her hard to the floor.
“Get up,” Cal said, grabbing Jane by the hair. Her whole face hurt. He shoved the gun under her jaw.
“Cal, don’t do this. Don’t.” Marcolin had moved past Perri, clawing at his eyes, gasping, turning on the tap water to rinse his face.
“I’m just taking her to her mother,” Cal said. “It’s going to be OK, Perri. Just shut up and let me handle everything. Stay here. Help him.” Marcolin was still rinsing his eyes, hissing in pain and annoyance.
Cal shoved a cloth from a shelf into Jane’s mouth, wrapped duct tape around her head. “I’ll take her to Laurel and then I’ll be back. And I’ll explain everything to you.”
Jane shot a beseeching look at Perri as Cal hustled her away.
“The spray,” Marcolin gasped, squinting, “how long does it say to wash the eyes?”
She picked up the spray container and read it so he would believe her. “Fifteen minutes,” she said. They saw her as nothing. To Cal she was no risk, no threat, someone who would do whatever he said; to Marcolin what was she—the dense wife or just the dumb mother of the dead boy? She stepped back from him. “I told her not to do it. It would just make Cal mad.” She listened; the house was big and she needed to hear a particular sound.
She heard it. The shutting of the front door. She stepped out of the utility room and slammed the door shut, fumbling for the bolt. She slid it home as Marcolin yelled and threw himself against the door.
Police. Now. Cal had taken her phone, but there had to be one here in the house, a landline. She checked the next room. A spare bedroom, no phone. Next door down was a library. No phone.
She heard the blasts of gunshots from the laundry room. Marcolin must have had a gun under his jacket; he was shooting away the door lock.
Perri ran.