Chapter 5
Esther
I no longer woke up and wondered where I was. The warm green sleeping bag and brown plaid couch had become as familiar to me as my childhood bed ever was. The little kitchen with my freeze-dried meals, and the fireplace, and even the outhouse bathroom had become my normal.
So, it was frustrating to realize that I was jumpy again.
I thought I’d finally gotten past my fear of the dark and things that went bump in the night, but after a night of restless sleep, waking up covered in sweat from bad dreams, I knew that wasn’t the case.
Every little noise startled me. Finally, just after dawn, I decided to get out of bed. The fire needed more wood anyway.
I hated waking up early. I’d never been an early riser to begin with, but living in the cabin had made it even worse. The earlier I got up, the longer the already long days were. As I rolled up my sleeping bag, I eyed the trap door.
Since I wasn’t even supposed to know it was there, I tried to forget the little room beneath my feet. For a few minutes at a time, it actually worked. Then, I’d remember with a shudder that I was living on top of some kind of arsenal and hadn’t even known it.
Had the guns already been there when I’d moved in?
There was no way to know. I told myself that they’d been there the whole time without me knowing, so it shouldn’t be such a big deal now that I knew they were there.
Unfortunately, that didn’t help my peace of mind.
The cabin just felt different now. Someone had been in my space.
I got dressed and in a small show of defiance, rolled the dress and tights Aunt Lacy had given me into the fireplace. The thought of ever putting them on again, even if I was freezing, made me feel sick. I wanted to forget the day before had ever happened.
Shoving my boots on, I trudged outside. It was cold and getting colder but oddly, we hadn’t had any snow yet.
I dreaded the thought of it, not knowing if the roads would be passable if the weather got worse.
Pulling up the hood on my jacket, I ignored the rain and made three trips outside to gather more firewood.
The thought of staying inside all day with those guns right beneath my feet sounded horrible, but going outside every few hours for more wood sounded worse.
I’d just brought in the last load, pulling the door closed behind me when I thought I caught the sound of a vehicle on the gravel outside. Every once in a while, if things were very quiet, I could catch the sound of cars on the road—but this was different. It was closer. Slower.
Fighting the urge to panic, I dropped the firewood and took off my jacket before walking over to the window. The rain was letting up but I still couldn’t see anyone. The sound seemed to be getting louder though. As I watched, two motorcycles came around the curve and everything inside me froze.
Then, a truck came into view and an SUV after that.
My hands shook as I strode toward the kitchen, wondering for a split second what to do. The phone and pistol were both sitting on the table.
How would a phone help you, Esther? Whoever those people are, they’re already here.
With a deep breath, I picked the pistol up from the table and checked the cylinder.
Fully loaded. I’d never been so grateful for the one time my dad had paid attention to me, years ago showing me the different parts of the new revolver he’d bought, explaining how everything worked.
Cocking the hammer back, I carried it with me as I threw open the door.
There were so many of them that I wasn’t sure where to point the pistol. A couple of men my dad’s age seemed to be leading the group so I pointed it at the one closest to me.
“Drop it,” the other older man ordered.
“What the fuck?” The man I was aiming at yelped, raising his hands in the air.
“Whoa,” one of the younger guys further away said in surprise, coming into view from the side of the cabin.
“Who the hell are you?” a huge guy only a few years older than me barked. He looked kind of familiar.
“Who the heck are you?” I snapped back, my bravado completely obliterated by the way my voice shook.
My stomach was churning with fear. There were too many of them.
Even if I shot one, I wouldn’t have time to shoot again before they reached me.
They were all carrying guns. There was a good chance that if I started shooting, they would too. I couldn’t take the chance.
“Esther?”
For a split second, I thought I was seeing things as a man in the driveway rose to his feet and turned toward me, his familiar face coming into view. As soon as he’d said my name, though, my entire body started to shake.
I stared at him, wide-eyed. What in the world was happening?
The gun was surprisingly heavy, and my arms wobbled.
“Otto?” I croaked. “What are you doing here?”
“Honey, you wanna drop that?” the man closest to me said, startling me. I swung the pistol in his direction.
The big guy that looked familiar yelled, “Whoa!”
“A little help here?” someone else bellowed, making me jerk in fear. God, I wished they’d all just stop talking.
“Esther,” Otto called, getting my attention again. “Could you stop pointin’ that at my dad, sugar?”
“Your dad?” I asked in confusion, looking at the man closest to me. There was no way that guy was his dad. Otto was practically twice his size.
In a split second, I realized that I’d been beaten. There was no way I’d be able to protect myself from so many of them and once I realized that, my only option became perfectly clear. I gingerly lowered the gun back down as I shoved the hammer forward again.
My heart was racing as Otto strode toward me and without thought, I put one hand on my stomach, instinctively making sure the person in there was okay.
Someone said something to Otto, but I didn’t pay attention because he was still moving toward me and I couldn’t believe he was actually there.
“Did you come to get me?” I asked in disbelief, the words hoarse and broken. How had he found me? My throat tightened. Finally.
“What are you doin’ here?” he asked at the same time, coming to a stop on the first stair.
My question had been answered before I finished it. I swallowed hard. “I live here.”
“You live here?”
I nodded, raising my chin proudly even though everything inside me shriveled with embarrassment. I’d never been so grateful to have washed my hair.
“You two obviously know each other,” Otto’s dad said, taking a couple steps forward. He glanced at my belly. “Pretty well?”
“This is Esther,” Otto replied, his eyes still on me. “Yeah, we know each other.”
“This is all very entertaining,” the younger guy said. “But we’ve got some other shit goin’ on.”
“Shut the fuck up, Rumi,” Otto snapped, making me flinch.
The older man that wasn’t Rumi’s dad came closer. “We’re lookin’ for somethin’, darlin’,” he said, his voice not unkind. “You got anythin’ in there that we might be searchin’ for?”
I stared at him blankly for a moment before I remembered the guns. Instinctively, I took a step backward, reaching out to grip the door.
“Hey, it’s okay, sugar,” Otto murmured, following me. “No one’s gonna hurt you.”
“Why are you here?” I asked, the words echoing hollowly in my ears. I knew. I didn’t know how it came to be, or why in the world they’d be looking for those crates under my floorboard, but I knew with deep certainty they were there for the guns. What in the world was Otto involved in?
Otto stared at me for a moment before looking over at his dad. Then his eyes came back to mine. “Shipment of wooden crates got stolen yesterday mornin’,” he said, searching my face. “You know anythin’ about that?”
I wanted to tell him no. Disappointment and disillusionment and some kind of odd loyalty to my family made my head spin. If I told him they weren’t there, would he believe me? Would any of the other men who were getting closer and closer to the cabin believe me? I looked around the sea of faces.
No. Even if I told them the guns weren’t there, the men would still search.
Maybe they wouldn’t find them. It was a possibility.
I hadn’t even known about the trap door for months.
But if they did find them and I’d pretended not to know what they were talking about?
I had a feeling things would turn ugly really fast.
“They’re inside,” I replied finally, stepping back into the cabin. “Come in.”
Otto’s eyes widened in disbelief as he followed me inside.
The cabin had become normal for me, but by the looks on the men’s faces, it was far from normal to them.
They were scowling, staring, wide-eyed, frowning.
For the first time, it felt like there wasn’t enough room inside my little haven.
Shame burned through me. Why hadn’t I put the supplies away?
There were still bags of things all over the floor and it made the space look messy.
I brushed the hair out of my face as I strode toward the kitchen area, putting the revolver down on the table. It wasn’t as if I would use it anyway.
“Where?” Otto’s dad asked, looking around.
“Could you take a step back?” I asked one of the men who was standing right on top of the trap door.
“Uh, sure,” he mumbled. He shuffled back, still scanning the room with his gaze.
Trying not to die of shame and embarrassment, I knelt down on the floor and ran my fingers along the board that I was pretty sure was the edge of the door. When my fingers finally felt the catch, I dug them in and jerked upward, pulling the door open.
“Holy fuck,” the man named Rumi muttered. “We would’ve never found it.”
I didn’t have time to feel guilty that I’d given away the hiding place for no reason, because the older man was coming forward, his eyes on me.
“Booby-trapped?” he asked calmly.
“What?”
“Is it booby-trapped?”
“I—” I looked down at the hole. “I don’t know. I don’t think so?”
“You live here?”
“Yeah.”
“Then you should know.”