“You’re going to love these guys!”
Chuck was walking with me and Lauren down to the Baylors’ place. Chuck’s family had built their place before the area had been declared a national forest, and there were only a few cabins on the mountain.
We could see smoke from the Baylors’ chimney curling up out of the woods again that morning, and after a full breakfast, and with all our old clothes washed and hanging out back, it was time to go down and say hello.
“They live here year-round, they’re always here,” continued Chuck. “Randy is retired military, maybe even CIA. If anyone knows what’s going on, he will. They’re so well equipped they probably barely even noticed that the power’s been out.”
It wasn’t far, maybe a half-mile, so we decided to walk. Susie and Tony stayed behind to start diluting the now-super-chlorinated hot tub with creek water so the kids could have a swim. It was a beautiful day. The freezing cold of Christmas had given way to unseasonably warm weather, plus we were farther south.
The undergrowth at the sides of the dirt road winding down the mountain was abuzz with insects and life, its earthy dampness mixing with the smell of dirt baking beneath our feet. With the sun shining, I was sweating in my shirt and jeans. I wish I had some sunscreen for the top of my head, I laughed to myself. It’s never seen the sun before.
Kicking some rocks down the road, Chuck was in high spirits. I felt like a new man, and Lauren and I were holding hands, swinging them as we walked down the path. As we rounded a corner, the Baylors’ house appeared through the bare trees. We walked up their winding driveway, toward two cars parked out front, and then onto their front porch.
Chuck knocked on the door. “Randy!” he called out. “Cindy! It’s me, Charles Mumford!”
There was no answer, but somebody was home. Country music was playing around the back of the house.
“Randy! It’s me, Chuck!” he yelled louder.
I could smell something cooking.
“I’ll check around back. Maybe they’re in the yard, cutting wood or something. You guys stay here.”
He jumped off the porch and disappeared. Lauren squeezed my hand. We wandered over to the other side of the porch, following the smell of whatever was cooking. Peering through the shuttered windows into the kitchen, I could see a large pot—a cauldron—with steam coming out of it. Bones were sticking out the top.
Pain shot up through my hand, and I looked down to see Lauren’s white knuckles, her nails digging into me. Following her gaze to the dining room next to the kitchen, I saw a jumbled mess. I tried to figure out what I was looking at, angling for a better view through the shutters.
“Who the hell are you?” I heard Chuck say in a muted voice. Through the sliding glass doors at the back of the house, I could see him shielding his eyes to look at someone.
“I could ask you the same thing,” I heard another voice reply somewhere on the back deck.
“Let’s get out of here,” urged Lauren.
“We need to wait for Chuck,” I whispered back.
Her nails dug deeper into my hand.
I moved my head to get a clear view of the dining room. It looked like someone was lying on the ground—covered in blood, hacked apart. The smell of the boiling meat enveloped me, and I almost gagged.
“Get the hell out of here!” another voice, a new voice, yelled from the back.
Chuck had his gun out now, one of the .38s, and was pointing it at someone walking up the stairs to the back deck.
That person had a shotgun pointed at him.
“Where are the Baylors?” yelled Chuck, backing away, moving his gun back and forth from one person to the other. “What did you do with them?”
That sense of unreality gripped me again as terror settled into my gut.
“We told you to get out of here, boy!”
“I’m not leaving! You tell me what—”
With a sharp crack and a boom, Chuck’s gun and the shotgun went off at nearly the same time. Chuck was shot at point-blank range, and even from a distance, we could see blood splatter as he was lifted into the air and fell spinning off the deck. Lauren cried out beside me, and we ducked down.
“Run,” I whispered to Lauren, pushing her ahead of me. “RUN!”
Crouching down, we ran past the parked cars and down the driveway, and then straightened up, sprinting back up the road, our arms and legs pumping. My lungs burned. I felt like I was barely connected to what was happening.
I should have brought a gun. Why didn’t I bring a gun? If I had, I’d probably be dead too.
Just run.
Behind me I could hear commotion, yelling. They must have seen us.
Run faster!
After what felt like an eternity, we reached the driveway of Chuck’s cabin. Maroon 5 was playing on the truck’s sound system, its windows down, and Adam Levine was singing “Moves Like Jagger.” In the distance I could hear something else. An engine. They were coming after us.
I stopped at the truck to grab the other .38 from the glove box. “Go around back. They must be in the hot tub!”
We came flying around the corner to find Susie dancing on the deck with Luke, Tony kneeling down as he held up Ellarose’s hands.
“Get down! We need to get out of here!” I screamed.
Tony looked at us in shock. “What happened?”
“Just get down! We need to get in the truck!”
Lauren was already reaching up to grab Luke.
“Where’s Chuck?” asked Susie, her voice rising in fear. She took Ellarose from Tony, and they ran down the deck stairs toward us.
“Come on!” I yelled.
But it was too late. Over the crooning coming from the truck, I could hear a vehicle crunching into the gravel at the front of the house.
What should I do?
“Where’s Chuck?” asked Susie again, pleading.
“He was shot. He’s down at the other house,” I replied, trying to think. “Tony, take the shotgun and take everyone into the cellar, I’m going to talk to them.”
“Talk to who? What the hell happened?”
We could hear car doors slamming out front.
Susie was on the verge of tears. “Take Ellarose,” she said breathlessly to Tony, handing the baby over. She kissed Ellarose, tears streaming down her face. “I need to find Chuck.”
“What are you doing? He’s dead, he’s—”
But she ran off toward the other side of the cabin, away from us.
I pushed Tony and Lauren ahead of me, reaching down to open the cellar doors, urging them down, just as three people came walking around the corner, two of them holding shotguns. Leaving one of the cellar doors open, I stood my ground.
Maybe this is all just an accident. But those bones …
“What do you want?” I yelled, waving my gun. Without a word, one of them fired, and I felt a terrific concussion as the shot roared past me.
Terrified, I jumped down the stairs into the cellar, pulling the doors shut behind me and sliding a wooden beam through the handles in an attempt to keep them shut.
We need something to keep them out.
Next to the stairs was a metal rack stacked with wood. With shaking hands, I started dragging it over so it would block the doors if they were opened.
There must be a back way out of here.
But as I pulled, the rack fell over, crushing me.
Lauren shrieked.
“I’m okay,” I groaned, trying to pull myself out.
“For God’s sake, don’t let them take the children!”
Lauren cradled Ellarose, crouching in one corner, as far from the cellar door as possible. It was dark in here and smelled of sawdust and oil and old tools. Luke was standing next to her, his face streaked with mud, mute with terror. I squirmed to get my jammed leg out from under the pile of logs.
“Don’t worry, Mike, I’m not going to let anyone in here.” Tony was up on the stairs, squinting into the sunlight streaming through cracks in the broken wood of the cellar door. “There are four of them.”
“We killed your friend,” came a whiny voice.
Lauren started to cry, clutching the children closer.
“We didn’t wanna do that, mind you,” the voice continued. “Now this is all messed up.”
“Leave us alone!” I yelled. Tony took a step back down the stairs, pointing his rifle up at the cellar door.
“Send those kids and your lady out.”
I strained again to pull myself from the fallen logs, in bone-cracking, skin-ripping agony. Lauren was shaking her head violently.
And then silence—just my heart pounding in my ears and the sound of shuffling through the leaves outside. I tried to steady myself, blocking out the pain, making sure the safety was off the .38. Tony glanced over, nodding, telling me he was ready.
With a terrific roar, one of the cellar doors shattered. Tony staggered back, dropping to one knee. Another shotgun blast, and he spun sideways but still managed to bring up his rifle and pull the trigger. Squeals of pain erupted outside, followed by another shotgun blast and then another through the cellar door.
Tony grunted and tried to get out of the way, collapsing in front of me. I grabbed his hand and pulled him toward me, but it was too late. His body convulsed. Looking into my eyes, he blinked back tears and then went still.
“Tony!” I grunted, trying to pull him toward me. His eyes stared back at me, unseeing. My God, you can’t be dead, Tony. Wake up! Come on …
“Goddamn it, you blew Henry’s ear right off!” said the voice from outside. “Either you send out your woman and those kids, or we’ll burn the whole goddamn place down!”
Panicking, I tried to yank myself free again, shredding flesh, but I couldn’t. Lauren was sobbing in fear, Luke watching me with wide eyes beside her.
“So what’ll it be, boy?”
Clenching my jaw, I released Tony’s hand and leaned down to the woodpile. This can’t be happening, this can’t be happening—
A gunshot boomed outside, thudding into the earth.
“What the hell?” screamed the whiny voice.
I could hear people running into the woods, confusion and yelling.
“There’s someone in the house!”
More shooting, the sound of shattering glass. And then a sharp crack echoed through the trees, a different gun, farther away, and more shouting and gunfire. After a short silence, I heard a car’s engine fire up and then the throaty rumble of our truck.
With a final excruciating effort, I pulled my leg free of the woodpile and jumped up, limping up the cellar stairs. The growl of the truck’s engine grew louder, and through the cellar door I saw it roar past. It smashed into our deck, destroying it. The house shuddered above us, and then the noises began to fade.
I peered out and then threw the cellar doors open and poked my head out.
Susie was there, gun in hand, looking down the driveway. She glanced back at me. “It’s okay. They’re gone,” she called out to someone ambling up toward the cabin.
He was holding a shotgun.
“He’s got a gun!” I yelled at Susie, ducking my head back down. “Get out of there!”
Silence.
“It’s me, you idiot,” called out Chuck in a hoarse voice.
Relief washed over me, but I was already back down at Tony’s side, ripping open his shirt. Should I do mouth to mouth? His body was a bloody mess. Lauren was still in the corner of the cellar, gripping the children and staring at me and then at Tony.
Does he have a pulse? Hands shaking, I held two fingers, sticky with blood, to his neck and leaned in to see if he was breathing. No pulse. No breathing.
“Get down here!” I yelled.