“Is Jack okay?” Latham, from the living room.
“She’s a bloodthirsty demon!” Harry moans. “Draining me dry!”
“I’m okay,” I call to him. “How are you doing?”
“Getting drowsy.”
“Maybe he needs a transfusion,” I say to Harry.
“Don’t worry.” Mom yanks out the needle and pats his thigh. “Harry’s a universal donor.”
“Harry needs some pain reliever,” he says, “because he feels like he just doggy-styled a cactus.”
Harry reaches into the vanity over the sink and finds the Tylenol bottle. He pries off the cap with his teeth, pours a bunch in his mouth, then washes them down with a beer he liberated from my fridge.
“This might hurt,” Mom says to me.
She sticks the needle into my arm, next to dozens of other marks. I look like a junkie after a bender from hell. There isn’t much pain, though. My throbbing head is too much competition.
I drink more water, Harry tosses me the Tylenol, and I swallow three. Mom finishes shooting me up, and then takes a few pills herself. We help each other up. I’m still a little dizzy, but I can function. I give Harry a pat on the shoulder and he shouts.
“Sore! Very sore!”
I consider myself a kind person, but showing kindness to Harry McGlade takes Herculean effort.
“Thanks for the blood, Harry.”
His eyes soften. “Hey, that’s what family is for. We already share the same blood, right?” Then he adds, “And if you develop any kind of itchy rash in the feminine area, I’ve got some cream left over from my last doctor visit.”
I don’t want to think about that.
“What next?” Mom asks.
I finish the water, toss the empty bottle in the trash can. Sort of a silly gesture, worrying about being tidy when there’s a shot-up refrigerator sticking out of the door.
“I’m going back to the bedroom, to get my gun. Then I’m going to find a way outside.”
“They can see in the dark,” Mom says. “They have those scopes.”
That makes sense. The lights were out and they still managed to hit me.
“I’ll move fast. They can’t shoot what they can’t hit.”
Mom hugs me. I hug her back. She’s trembling.
“I thought…” Her voice cracks. “I thought I lost you.”
I want to say something meaningful, something poignant, but I’m getting pretty choked up too. So I settle for kissing her on the forehead and telling her I love her. Then I disengage, heading for the door.
Harry blocks my way.
“Gotta go,” I say.
He holds open his arm.
Oh God. He wants a hug.
I brace for it, stiffening as he encircles my waist. But rather than the sleazy feeling I normally get when Harry touches me, this time it isn’t too bad.
“Be careful, sis.”
I give him a perfunctory pat on the back, and he whimpers in pain.
“Your back too?”
“She stuck me everywhere I had skin.”
I pull away, saying, “Keep an eye on Mom.”
He doesn’t say anything glib or smart-ass. He simply nods.
I slip past him, switch off the flashlight, and duck into the hall.
10:13 P.M.
KORK
I OPEN MY EYES and wonder where I am. I try to lift my hands, and see I’m chained under a sink. My body hurts all over.
I must have been a bad girl. Father punishes us when we’re bad. He calls it Penance. I’m afraid of Father, afraid of his punishments. I feel like crying.
Then my mind clears. I’m not ten years old anymore. I’m all grown up. And this isn’t our house. It’s Jack’s.
I’m in the kitchen, all alone.
Anger replaces fear.
My eyes sting. I rub my face on my shoulder, wipe away some blood. My forehead is cut. My head aches. My right hand still stings from when the gun was shot from my grip. None of the damage is serious.
I test the pipe I’m chained to. It’s cold, metal, two inches thick. A drain trap, under the sink. I give it a hard yank. Then another. It’s solid.
I scoot up closer, rest my head on the bottom of the cabinet. It smells like dish soap and moldy sponges. I can’t see very well – so I work by feel, palpating the U pipe, seeking the joint. I think righty tighty, lefty-loosey, and lock both fists around the octagonal coupling. It isn’t a pipe wrench, but it’s all I have.
I twist. My hands are strong, from thousands of fingertip pushups while in Heathrow. My arms are bigger than most guys’. But the pipe doesn’t want to cooperate. It refuses to turn, preferring instead to dig a nice trench of skin out of my palm.
I twist and twist until it feels like my veins are going to burst out of my temples. The joint won’t budge.
I stop, then spend a few minutes trying to use my handcuff chain as a tool, levering and turning and pulling.
My efforts leave me with sore wrists, but no closer to escape.
I close my eyes, let the solution come to me. I broke out of a maximum security prison for the criminally insane. I should be able to get out from under a stupid sink.
Voices, elsewhere in the house. I make out a few words, but they don’t interest me. I’m not the only one trying to kill Jack and her family. But I don’t believe those jokers outside pose much of a threat to my plans. If they had any skills, everyone would already be dead. They’re jackals. I’m a lion. Lions don’t fear jackals.
I feel the pipe, higher up, where it meets the sink. The joint here is plastic, bigger, the size of a peanut butter jar. And it has nubs on it, to grip when attaching the drain to the pipe. I form my fingers around them and twist.
Red and yellow spots form in my vision, and my head begins to shake. I strain and strain until my entire world is reduced to five square inches of force and pain.
I release it and forcibly exhale. My hands are trembling.
But it moved a fraction of an inch.
I crack my knuckles, then go at it again, a smile enveloping half my face.
10:15 P.M.
JACK
I’M GRATEFUL I CAN’T REMEMBER being shot, because that might have made me reconsider my actions. Though I’ve never used a night-vision scope, never even saw one in real life, I’m familiar with how they work, thanks to Tom Clancy movies. The hallway is pitch-black to me, but to the snipers I am an easy target, glowing bright green.
Thanks to Mr. Clancy, I also have an idea how to mess with their aim.
I stick out my left hand, reaching for the wall. When my fingers graze it I run forward four steps. I lift the flashlight up to chest level, switching it on and pointing it through my bedroom door, out the window. Then I immediately dodge right.
The light will temporarily blind anyone peering through a night-enhanced scope, causing a bright flash. If someone has a bead on me, they might reflexively shoot when the light goes on. Hence the change of direction.
The shot doesn’t come.
I toss the flashlight into the bedroom, toward the far corner, and jog toward the window in a crouch. I duck down, beneath the pane, safe. Then I feel around the floor. I find my dropped Kimber.
Hurt isn’t strong enough a word for the feeling in my head, and my stomach isn’t happy with the bottle of water I chugged. I rest for a minute, slowing down my breathing, picturing what I need to do next.
Unlike my Colt, the Kimber is bigger, badder, and more accurate. This is the gun I use in marksman competitions. I need to get outside, locate the bastards, and get within a hundred feet of them. Once they’re within range, my handgun is more effective than their long guns. They’re using bolt action, single fire, and it takes a few seconds to load each bullet. My.45 holds seven rounds, and it shoots as fast as I can pull the trigger.