Part 7 (1/2)

And then she does does spring. Maybe a whole six inches before the cable clamps on her wrists stop her dead. He thinks, that's gotta hurt. spring. Maybe a whole six inches before the cable clamps on her wrists stop her dead. He thinks, that's gotta hurt.

He slips the Springfield .45 pistol into the front of his jeans and takes the Peltor hunting earm.u.f.fs out of his back pocket. When he puts them on his voice is coming at him from a distance. He likes the sound of it. His voice like in a dream.

”I've got kids to raise around here, lady, and disobedience is not something I want them to witness. They're very good kids and I would very much like to introduce them to you. But if you're not going to be nice, if you're going to be disobedient, well, I can't do that, now can I.”

All he gets is that cold stare. Those scary eyes. But he's not afraid of her now. He's seen what she can do and from where he's standing, it ain't much.

”Plus,” he says, ”I need to feel better about losing my finger.”

He takes out the .45 and shows it to her. Puts it right up in her face. Clicks off the safety.

”Ever see one of these?”

She has. Those hard eyes widen for a moment. Her head rolls away to the side.

”Makes a loud sound, right?”

He jumps at her.

”Boom!”

She doesn't react. Just stares again.

”Makes an even louder sound in a tight s.p.a.ce. I'll show you. But first I need a backstop. No ricochets.”

There's a three-foot length of 6x6 raw lumber leaning against the wall. He puts the gun to her cheek so she won't get any more biting ideas and sets the block on the shelf behind her, standing it up lengthwise so that now there's about eight inches of wood in back of her shoulder just next to her left ear.

He takes two steps back, aims, and as the woman closes her eyes against what she thinks is coming, he s.h.i.+fts his aim left to the wood and fires.

Even with the earm.u.f.fs on it's a huge sound in that cellar. Wood splinters and flies. The woman screams. The scream turns into a roar. Her head trembles from the concussion then rocks from side to side. He pulls off the earm.u.f.fs and stuffs them in his pocket.

She's moaning. She opens and closes her mouth over and over like a fish gasping for breath on dry land. Blood seeps over her jaw and trickles down her neck.

He's blown out her eardrum.

And that'll teach you to bite, now won't it, he thinks. he thinks.

The eyes open. He reads both pain and anger there. But mostly pain.

”I feel better about my finger now,” he tells her.

He smiles. Actually the pain is not too bad by now. Seven hundred fifty milligrams of Vicodin has helped a lot.

”I'll be back in little a while. With the wife and kids. And you be nice, or...”

He raises the gun, points it at her other ear, meaning to tell her that he can blow out that eardrum too but she misreads him, begins to struggle violently against the clamps and she's howling again, throwing herself back against the shelving and forward against the clamps. All h.e.l.l is breaking loose down here.

He lowers the weapon.

She quiets immediately.

Good girl, he thinks. he thinks. See? You can learn. See? You can learn.

He heads for the stairs but something stops him. The quiet. It seems suddenly unnatural after all that commotion. He glances back over his shoulder. The woman is as still as a statue.

Watching him.

In the dark she tilts her head to let the blood drain out of her ear. The dark is roaring at her like storm-waves against the sh.o.r.e and she thinks of those waves and that sh.o.r.e and wonders how far away they are from where she stands now and if she will ever see them again or if she will simply die trying.

It will be one or the other.

And soon.

TEN.

Sometimes Chris thinks that it's all about food - home and family are.

He works in order to put food on the table. In the mornings Belle will have breakfast ready when the kids get up and an hour after that, their lunches packed for school. When he comes home from work there'll be food by six o'clock. The house always smells of food. Or baking. Belle hasn't inherited much from her parents' freak accident - her father sober, always sober, but the highway slick with icy rain her father sober, always sober, but the highway slick with icy rain - but she's inherited her mother's talent for baking. Cornbread. Banana bread. Cakes and pies. - but she's inherited her mother's talent for baking. Cornbread. Banana bread. Cakes and pies.

She'd come in third in last year's county fair with the blueberry.

Today it's the cornbread. He can smell it riding high over the pot roast as soon as he walks in the door. He loves Belle's cornbread.

Brian is sprawled on the sofa watching some old Clint Eastwood movie on the 42” flat screen. Chris pops the clip in the Springfield and hands it to him.

”One shy,” he says.

”I heard. Whatcha shootin' at, Pop?”

”You'll see.”

He watches the movie for a minute. Eastwood is preparing a prison break. Brian goes to the cabinet, pulls out the box of sh.e.l.ls and puts a fresh sh.e.l.l in the clip, then hands it back to him. He inserts the clip, safeties the weapon and stuffs it back into his jeans. He walks into the kitchen. And there on the table is the cornbread. He doesn't know how Peggy and Darlin' have resisted it, sitting right there in front of them. Peg is helping her sister with some sort of puzzle. He isn't even about to try to resist. He lifts up a square and bites.

Warm, delicious.

”You'll spoil your dinner,” Belle says. She's stirring the gravy in the pot roast.

”Not a chance,” he says.

”You say that now.”

”I certainly do.”