Savage Row - Britney King Page 0,63

she can’t help it. She’s already been hardened to the world. She looks at Theo like most everyone does, as something other, a specimen to be handled carefully, something to keep at a distance.

Theo never let that stop him. He tried to be respectful. What he loved most of all were the times she didn’t know he was looking. The times no one noticed he was watching, not even his mother. Out their rear window, which faced the family’s yard, he’d watch the older girl as she played. It was one of the few times she let her guard down. He loved the girls’ giggles, the push and pull of it, the games they played. Sometimes he’d join in, imagining himself with them, showing them how much fun he could be when he let go of the bad thoughts.

He wanted to tell them about the old woman at the hospital with the sour breath and scruffy voice. He wanted to warn them about all the bad things that could happen, and sometimes, even though he wasn’t supposed to, he did.

Now he realizes he should have told them more. He takes each step carefully, pausing halfway up the stairs. The girls are weeping. He can hear it down the hallway. He hears their mother, speaking hurriedly, reasoning, pleading: Whatever you want—whatever—anything — I’ll give it to you. If it’s money you need, I have a little. You can take it all. But please. Please don’t—they’re just children.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

His pistol is trained on me, mine is aimed at him. I’ve flipped the safety and lined up the sight, exactly the way Greg showed me. I plead with him not to hurt the girls, although it’s pointless. I can see in his eyes that very same look I saw in the courtroom all those years ago. He’s challenging me. He knows I won’t pull the trigger, but just for fun, he wants to see.

In the corner of our king-sized bed, Naomi and Blair are huddled up together. They cried on and off at first, but shock kicked in, and now they are simply silent. I’ve made a terrible mistake in not preparing them for this—for not teaching them how to get out, how to run for their lives while I stayed to fight.

I guess I hadn’t expected that Jack Mooney would appear in our bedroom like an apparition, out of thin air. We hadn’t had a chance. The alarm hadn’t sounded. There was nothing other than Greg’s warm hand tapping my thigh. “Wake up,” he said. “Amy, wake up.”

Through half-closed lids, I watched as Mooney forced him out of bed at gunpoint, and down the stairs. Meanwhile, I searched frantically for my cell and then for Greg’s. They were nowhere to be found. By the time I reached for the landline, I realized it was futile. This was not an accident, not some haphazard crime. Jack Mooney had planned this out. The line would surely be dead. And it was.

As I rushed to the girls’ bedroom—it was the first night Blair and I moved back upstairs—I heard the tussle between Greg and Mooney downstairs. I scooped up Blair and practically dragged Naomi, still half asleep, down the hall. When we reached my room, I locked the door and pushed the dresser in front of it. Then I combed through Greg’s drawers in search of the .357. I knew it would be there under his folded sweaters. I hid the pistol downstairs. It had been Greg’s idea to keep one on each floor, just in case, and I prayed that he would get to it.

I checked the clip and then flipped the safety, and I questioned my decision. Maybe I should have left the girls in their beds asleep. I’d thought about going downstairs, taking aim at Mooney, but I was afraid for my children. What if a stray bullet hit them as they slept in their beds? What if Mooney killed Greg and me both? Who would protect them? I was not that sure of a shot, anyhow. I only wanted to get them to safety. I hadn’t considered what a feat this would be, being on the second floor, with Blair in a cast.

It’s then that I remember the ladder Greg had bought in case of a fire. With the gun in one hand, I riffle through our closet and pull out the box. I’ve just gotten the window open and the ladder set up when the lock is blown off our