On Tenterhooks (49 page)

It seemed like ages ago when they had been sitting
,
eating, talking and listening to Biker at that seaside fajita grill in Cozumel
.
Now
,
here they were,
24
hours later
,
isolated and making themselves out to be sitting ducks, just waiting for the hungry wolf to come calling.

Chapter
4
1

Steve finished
walking
the perimeter and went back into the house through the back door
, locking it
behind
him
.
He walked back into the den and was
surprised
to see Martin on the couch.

“I thought you we
re heading to bed
.
”

“I decided to
remain here
and
converse
with you,” Martin replied, watching Steve enter the room
.
He
sat on the edge of the threadbare couch, his back arched and shoulders out.

Steve shrugged.
“Is your back hurting?
” he asked. “
My legs are a little sore, from the hike I guess
.
Don’t tell
Veronica
though
.
I think she could run circles around us.”

He
sank into the side chair
,
leaning
his axe up against the wall. Martin turned his
head
to follow
his
movements.

“Tell me Steve,
why are you here?”

Steve rubbed his eyes
.
He chuckled.
“M
ore of the deep questions, eh?
I guess the same reason you are
—
a search for closure, faith, a need to see this through.”
He traced the pattern of the chair’s fabric as he spoke.

“Do you think something as gossamer as faith will save you?”

“Gossamer?” asked Steve
.
“I think
our
faith is stronger than that.
You
,
of all people
,
should know that. Why would you ask a question like that,
anyway
?” 
He
was annoyed at the tone Martin was using. It reminded him of a haughty grade-school teacher.

Martin smiled a toothy grin.
“
I ask it,
because I am cur
ious to know what leads you so readily to the end of your existence.”

“
What is your problem, Martin
—”
Steve started
.

“What the hell?” he heard from behind
.
When he
turned
, he
saw Martin
standing
in the hallway in his boxer shorts and tank top undershirt
.
He looked tired and confused by what he saw.

“Martin?” Steve said.
Martin wasn’t looking at Steve
.
He
was staring across the room to the couch where he watched himself sitting and smiling back. Steve turned back to the couch where the sitting Martin began to laugh.

rut rut rut rut

“It’s him!
”
Steve yelled. He grabbed his axe and
bounced
out of the chair.

“L
ETITGO
,” said the doppelganger-Martin
,
still smiling as Steve
lunged across
the room. Steve raised the axe and swung it down onto the impostor
’
s head, but the axe dropped
and
lodged deep in the center cushion of the couch. The apparition had vanished into wisps of white smoke. Steve stood back from the couch and watched as the white smoke tendrils
drifted up and then shot to the chimney and up out of the house.

“Martin
—
get the girls!”

Steve
ran through the kitchen and out the back door.
Outside
,
it was
now
pitch black
.
Moments
earlier there had still been faint signs of dusk
.
Steve ran around the corner of the house to the front
, then
backed away until he could see the top of the chimney
.
He couldn’t see anything against the starry night sky.
He heard Martin shouting to wake
Veronica
and Abby.
He looked around the clearing but there was no sign of the doppelganger.
He searched the porch and the other side of the house. He ran back to the shed and circled it once
, but
the
darkness surrounding him seemed infinite
.
The moon was low on the horizon
.
The only light came from small windows of the cabin
.
Steve felt vulnerable
.
He ran back to the cabin and in through the kitchen door
.
He slammed the door shut.

“Steve?” he heard
Veronica
call from the den
.
She sounded scared.

“It’s me.”

He locked the door behind him
and
returned to the den
.
Martin stood at the window, peering out into the inky blackness
.
H
e
still had his boxers and undershirt on
,
but now he had his
machete
.

Veronica
and Abby stood together in the middle of the floor
.
They each had a blanket wrapped around them, yet
Steve
could see that they both were trembling
.

“What happ
ened?”
Veronica
asked.

“He was here
.”

“Here
? You mean in the house?”

“Yes,” said Steve. He gestured with the axe. “Right there on the couch.”

“How?” asked Abby.

“I don’t know.
He was disguised as Martin
.
I thought
he
was
Martin
.
Just before
I
wen
t outside to check the house, Martin had made like he was going to bed. W
hen I came back in,
he
was on the couch
.
He looked like Martin
.
He was dressed like Martin
.
He even had Martin’s voice
.
But he was different.”

“Different how
?” asked
Veronica
.

“He sat real straight up and down, on the edge of the couch. I thought it was just Martin, with a sore back
or something
.
But then he started challenging me on why we were here.”

“What did you tell him?” asked Martin.

“Nothing really. J
ust that we believed that we could do some good. That was about it. By then Martin showed up
—
the real Martin
—
and that ended the conversation pretty quickly.”

“What did you do?” asked Abby.

“As soon as we figured it out, I tried to axe him, but he disappeared into thin air
.
He turned into smoke and shot up the chimney.”

Veronica
walked to the fireplace and looked into it.

“
I hadn’t even gone to sleep.
I heard you talking to
someone
all the way from the back bedroom,” Martin explained. “The voices were muffled, but I thought maybe Biker had come back to check on us.
”

“What do you think he wanted, Steve?” Abby asked.

“Wanted?
I dunno
.
I guess he could’ve been testing our defenses, trying to find weak points.”

“Seems to me,” said
Veronica
, “that if he can disguise himself like
one of us
and waltz into a locked house without anyone noticing, he doesn’t have much to worry about when it comes to our weak points.”

“Yeah that’s true,” Steve admitted. “I dunno know then.”

“Maybe he’s just playing with us,”
Veronica
replied.

“Yes,” said Martin, “that sounds more like his style
.
We already know he’s a sadistic sonuvabitch, the way he murdered them.”

“And haunts our dreams,” Abby added.

“Change of plans then
,
folks,” said Steve. “From now on, we pair up
.
Sleeping, eating,
on watch
—
regardless
—
two by two at all times.”

No one argued.

Steve sat down in the chair again and rolled his neck
.
He was tired. The adrenaline rush he’d had moments ago was starting to fade
,
and his body was coming down hard
.
He took his glasses
off
and rubbed his eyes
.
They were sore
,
the way they always got when he
didn’t get
enough rest.

“Why don’
t you ladies go back to sleep?
Martin and I can finish this shift off out here.”

“Yeah, well,” said
Veronica
, “if it’s all the same to you, we’ll grab the blankets and bunk out here on the couch.
”

“That’s fine.”

“Good,” said
Veronica
, “but I wasn’t asking for your permission.”  Steve was too tired to squint up
at her
and see if there was a smile behind her sarcasm.

“I
have
a better idea,” said Martin. “Abby, you stay here
with Steve
. Let me help you
,
Veronica
.
We can just drag the whole mattress out here
,
and we’ll all bunk here.”

“Even better.”

She and Martin headed down the hall.

Abby sat down on the corner of the couch
.
Pulling
he
r blanket tighter up around her
, she
looked at the dying embers in the fireplace. Steve
stayed
in the chair, eyes closed.

“Steve?”

“Yeah?”
he answered.

“Are you scared?”

“Yes.”

Abby nodded to herself.
“Yeah, me too. Home seems so far away right now.”

“Yeah,” he replied.

“
Do you
think we can beat him?”
she asked.

“
Being scared is okay, Abby.
The important thing is that you take action even when you’re scared
.
That’s what makes the difference.”
He
moved to the couch and sat down beside her.

“How do you know that you’ll be able to do it though?  When it comes down to it, I mean?”
she asked.