Ahead, the hallway opened out into a large, open chamber that looked like the lobby of a hotel. It had a ceiling that seemed higher than the roof outside, and the walls seemed more obviously wooden. There was something rustic about it, and Gary was reminded of a log cabin. He wondered if this had been the original structure and if everything around it had been added on later.
Straight across the room was a different hallway. To their right, yet another corridor headed off in a separate direction. Gary was beginning to get worried. They were being drawn deeper and deeper into this compound, and it was starting to feel to him like a trap. Their buddy Isaac or his girlfriend back there could shout out a warning, and he, Brian and Reyn could be instantly surrounded by hordes of militant Homesteaders. They’d taken so many twists and turns through this jerry-rigged building that there was no way he would be able to find his way out again without a guide, and he wasn’t sure how effective threatening to kill Isaac was going to be. He had the feeling that the man would be willing to sacrifice himself for the common good and that his compatriots would be only too happy to let him do it.
Wasn’t that how cults worked?
Gary pushed past Reyn and got in front of Brian and his hostage. “Enough of this bullshit. Where’s Joan?”
Before the man could respond, they heard the sound of smashing dishes. The noise came from nearby, and Gary saw Isaac turn his head to the right. From down the adjacent corridor came another crash, and though their smartest move would be to stay as far away from people as possible, they all moved immediately to the head of that hallway. Something was definitely wrong, and maybe they could turn that to their advantage.
“Where’s Joan?” Gary asked again. He wasn’t about to let this bastard off the hook. “Is she down there?”
“I do not know where Ruth is,” the man said defiantly.
What the hell did that mean?
Brian tightened his grip again, making Isaac cough, but he shot Gary a look of concern, and Gary understood why. The man was bolder than he had been, he felt safer here, and that might mean they were in trouble.
“Look,” Reyn said, pointing.
Down the corridor, two men stumbled slowly out of an open doorway, then leaned against the wall opposite the door, staring upward.
“They’re tripping,” Brian said, recognizing the behavior. He grinned. “I could get into this cult. Just joking,” he added quickly, glancing over at Gary.
Gary had no idea how his friend could joke around at a time like this. Even if they managed to find Joan and get safely out of the Home—which seemed increasingly unlikely—they would probably end up going to jail, thanks to Brian’s irresponsible actions. Gary thought about Father’s high-powered attorneys. He and his friends would be charged with everything the Homesteaders should have been charged with: kidnapping, assault, attempted murder… .
If they ever did get out of here, he was going to kick Brian’s ass.
There were other noises coming from the open doorway through which the two wasted men had stumbled, including voices. One of them, a man’s, said something that sounded like “Joan.”
Gary dashed down the corridor without thinking, leaving Reyn, Brian and their hostage behind. He didn’t know if they were following him and at that moment didn’t care. The only thing he cared about was finding Joan.
The two men were still leaning against the wall, staring upward, frozen. Directly across from them was the entrance to what looked like some sort of mess hall or banquet room, with a doorway wide enough to fit four people abreast. Inside was chaos. Four rows of long tables stretched nearly the length of the huge room, and most of the people at the tables were lying face forward in their food, though some of them had apparently fallen backward and lay in ungainly positions on the floor. Here and there, other men and women were stumbling against each other or walking in circles. Four or five stood like statues, unmoving.
“Gary!”
He froze. Joan! He had no idea where her voice was coming from, but she’d seen him and was calling to him, and he swiveled around crazily, trying to figure out where she was.
And then he saw her.
How long had it been since she’d been taken from him at Burning Man? A week? Two? He had no idea; his brain could not focus. It felt like years. But she was here now, and she looked wonderful, and she was hurrying toward him from the far end of the room, dodging everyone in her way.
“Gary!”
She was wearing the same sort of drab peasant outfit as everyone else, and it didn’t look as though her hair had seen a brush for days, but she was Joan, and like a beautiful painting in an ugly frame, she shone in these surroundings, looking even better than he remembered. He was filled with a complex emotion, at once joyful and sad, angry and relieved, a new emotion that combined all of these feelings into a coherent whole and revolved entirely around her.
He shoved the knife between his belt and his jeans, on his right side, reaching for her as she ran into his open arms. There were a few seconds when it felt strange, when the size and shape of her seemed unfamiliar; then the points where their bodies touched conformed to each other, melded together, and it was as though they had never been apart. Gary kissed her, but it wasn’t a long, lingering movie kiss because she pulled back almost instantly and said, “We have to get out of here!”
“What’s going on?” he asked, looking around.
“I’ll explain later. We have to go.” She glanced over her shoulder, and a man and woman were there. “Mark, Rebekah, come on!”
His hand had dropped immediately to the knife when he saw the couple, but apparently Joan knew them and they wanted to escape as well. Holding Joan’s hand tightly, not willing to let her go for a second, Gary moved back into the corridor, where Reyn and Brian stood, confused.
“What are you doing?” Joan said, shocked.
She was looking at Brian, whose arm was wrapped around their hostage’s neck while he pressed a knife against the man’s back. “He’s our insurance policy,” Brian said.
“Gary?” He could hear the fear and confusion in her voice.
“We’ll talk about it later.”
They were moving back the way they had come. “Does anyone know a quick way out of here?” Reyn asked. He moved next to the couple behind Joan. “Can you lead the way?”
The man—Mark?—nodded. “Follow me.”
“The sheriff should be here any second,” Gary said hopefully. “We left Stacy in the car and she was supposed to call for help.”
But he wasn’t sure that was what had happened. They’d been in here for a while now, and at the very least, the two men Stewart had ordered to watch the Home should have been kicking ass and taking names.
Maybe they’d been captured.
Maybe Stacy had.
No doubt Reyn had had the same thought, but neither of them dared say it aloud. They followed Mark back into the huge rustic room—what Gary thought of as the lobby, as though they were in some resort hotel— and turned left into the nearest hallway. Isaac began to chatter away in that weird language, obviously directing his speech to Mark, but Brian did something that made him cry out and shut up.
They entered a storeroom of some sort and passed through it, exiting through a doorway on the opposite side into another room filled with low cots and cribs. The room was empty, but there was something eerie about it, and Gary was happy that they passed through quickly and entered another corridor.
“Where are we going?” Joan asked.
“The Farm. It’s closest,” Mark said.
The corridor curved—
And there was Father.