Iris Johansen - Chasing the Night

“We’ll have to see if he’s right. How do we get to the house after we land?”

“I’ll have a car and men waiting at the closest airport to Savrin House, which is in the town of Sergriev. We’ll go there and see what we can find out.” He added somberly, “And damn carefully.”

He was a strange boy, Eve thought as she studied Luke’s intent face while he listened to Kelly. He had fired questions at her for the last twenty minutes, some of them random, some of them searingly personal. All the while the flitting expressions on his face had been a mixture of curiosity, distrust, and a kind of insatiable thirst. There were so many things he didn’t know about people and the world around him. How could he, kept in this remote house and only allowed limited access to the outside world?

Yet melded with that strangely spotty ignorance was an overlay of wariness and cynicism that could have belonged to a man in his thirties. It was evident Luke had never had a childhood. He’d mentioned being cared for by a village woman as a tiny child but had been immediately turned over to Czadas when he’d left babyhood. She wanted to feel sorry for him, but it would be like pitying a wild animal. He was so much on the defensive that she doubted he would ever allow anyone close enough to pity him.

Or to love him.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” Luke’s gaze had suddenly narrowed on her face. Those intense dark eyes were probing, weighing, judging. “What are you thinking?”

“I was thinking that Catherine is going to have a very hard time with you.”

He shrugged. “I don’t care about her. She’s not here. You’re the ones I have to worry about.”

She suddenly realized something about him. “You live totally in the present, don’t you?”

He stared at her in bewilderment. “What else is there?”

No, his past, except for a dim memory of his mother, was a nightmare fight for survival, his future, uncertain and lacking in hope.

“A great deal.” But this was not the time to try to explain that to him. She had listened intently to the exchange between Luke and Kelly. Kelly had not only answered questions; she had asked them. Luke had not replied to all of them, but Eve had heard enough to start to piece together the enigma that was Catherine’s son.

The violence, the beatings, the cruelty that extended far beyond the physical.

The loneliness.

Even when Czadas had taken him out into the world, he had not permitted him to socialize with anyone. It was a wonder he had not withdrawn entirely within himself.

But then there had been the library of books. They had probably been his salvation. Feeding that quick, agile mind and giving him refuge.

“You’re looking at me again. I don’t like it.” He was frowning. “Is it because you’ve got that funny kind of job Kelly was talking about?”

“You think she’s seeing you as a skeleton?” Kelly scoffed. “Don’t be dumb. Eve wouldn’t waste her time on you.”

“According to what you said, she’s already wasted a lot of time on me,” Luke said. “So I’m not the one who’s dumb.”

“I was wondering if you think you knew enough about us by now,” Eve interceded quickly. These two young people, who were ordinarily mature far beyond their years, were striking sparks off each other and reacting in a way that was out of character. Hell, maybe that was healthy. It was just getting in the way right now. She glanced at the stream of light that was now pale and fading. “The sun is going down. Czadas said Rakovac was coming tonight. He didn’t say what time.”

Luke gazed at her without speaking.

“Do something,” Kelly said. “We’re both here because of you. Now get us out of here.” She paused. “If you can do it. I don’t know whether to believe you or not. Maybe you’re just full of bull.”

He gazed at her without expression. “You’re trying to make me show you that I can do it.”

“Yes.”

“It wouldn’t be smart of me to do what you want just to prove I can.”

Kelly threw up her hands. “Oh, for goodness’ sake, then just do whatever you want.”

“I will.” Luke suddenly rose to his feet. “But not because I want to help you. I just won’t let them kill me.” He was moving toward the chest across the room. “But I guess you can come along.”

“Thank you,” Eve said dryly. “Kelly was only guessing that you might know a way out of here. Is it-”

“It wasn’t a guess,” Kelly corrected. “It was a natural progression of his pattern.”

Eve ignored her. “You said you could do it, Luke. You led Natalie out of the house. But I can’t imagine that route wouldn’t have been sealed after they discovered how she had gotten out.”

“They didn’t ‘discover,’ she told them. She told them everything.” He nodded. “And they put double locks on that door.”

And Luke had been brutally punished because she had told them he had been involved. It was no wonder he didn’t trust strangers.

“Chateau d’If.” He opened the lid and fumbled at the bottom of the chest. He drew out a wooden panel that had obviously been the floor of the chest.

“Chateau d’If?” Kelly repeated, bewildered.

He glanced at her impatiently. “ The Count of Monte Cristo . Only he had it harder. These floors are wood, not stone. And I was able to cut them with the metal leg of that chair at the table over there. I bent the leg once, but Mikhal didn’t notice. No one thought I’d try to get away when I didn’t go with that Natalie woman.”

“ Count of Monte Cristo. ” Then Kelly’s frown cleared. “A book. Alexandre Dumas.”

Kelly was of the generation of Harry Potter, and it wasn’t surprising she hadn’t made an instant connection, Eve thought. “Chateau d’If was a prison, and the hero took years to dig his way out to freedom, Kelly.”

“Is that where you got the idea, Luke?” Kelly asked.

“It worked for him,” Luke said as he climbed into the chest. “Or it would have if the other prisoner hadn’t died, and he found a better-” He broke off. “I’ll go first. This floor is above the basement. It’s a ten-foot drop. Hold on by your arms, then jump. It’s a dirt basement, and there’s a high window that leads outside. I’ve piled lots of boxes so that I could get up and down without anyone hearing me.”

“Where does the window lead?” Eve asked.

“A stretch of grass at the back of the house that leads down to the lake. Mikhal keeps a rowboat three miles down the bank.”

“Guards?”

“They aren’t usually at the back. There’s one at the front and another at the side by the garage. One of them usually goes down to the bank and patrols the lakefront once or twice a night.”

“You’ve evidently studied the situation,” Eve said. “Just like the Count of Monte Cristo.”

“But he managed to gather lots of money together,” Luke said. “I didn’t do so good.” He was gazing at Eve critically. “Kelly will fit. But you’re kind of big. Oh, you’re skinny enough, but I’m not sure you’ll fit through this hole.”

“Then make it bigger,” Kelly said curtly.

“You go on.” Luke got out of the chest. “And don’t knock over the boxes.”

“I’ll wait for Eve.”

“Stop arguing, Kelly,” Eve said quietly. “Get out of here. I’ll be right behind you.”

Kelly hesitated, then stepped into the chest and levered herself through the hole. The next instant, Eve heard a soft thud as Kelly hit the dirt floor of the basement.

“You go on, too, Luke,” Eve said. “There’s not much time. I’ll find a way to make that opening big enough for me.”

He was gazing at her with a strange expression on his face. “You’re not afraid, are you? If you stay here, you could die.”