Anthony Eglin - The Blue Rose

What Kate saw sent a ripple of panic through her. She almost screamed but at the last second clasped her hand tightly across her mouth.

Not much farther than a stone’s throw away, Kingston was curled up on the ground. Clearly he had been shot and was injured. Alex was bending over him. Twenty feet or so beyond them, a tall man in a windbreaker, holding a gun by his side, appeared agitated and was talking to Marcus. Behind them stood two other men. Petrified, she stood with her hand still raised to her mouth, unable to move or speak.

‘Kate!’

Alex had seen her. ‘Kate,’ he screamed. ‘Get out of here. Run!’

She hesitated for a second. Then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw Marcus leap forward. God! He was coming after her. She spun round and started running down the path past the barn.

Then she heard the gunman’s voice bark out. The words echoed in her ears. ‘Go get her, Marcus. Go get the bitch!’

Kate couldn’t run any faster. She knew that her chances of outstripping Marcus were slim. If she stayed out in the open he would soon be breathing down her neck. He probably had a gun, too. Up ahead she saw the opening to the barn. She stopped in her tracks, skidding on the dirt path, almost losing her balance. The entrance: it was her only chance. She knew it was risky, aware that she could easily be cornered in there. She took a quick glance behind – still no Marcus – and stumbled into the barn.

Coming from daylight into the semi-darkness of the cavernous barn, she was running almost blind for the first several yards. She never saw Baldie, strapped to the post. She staggered right by him, part running, part walking, stumbling over debris as her eyes adjusted to the dim light. Her ankle struck something hard and metallic and she fell to the ground. Her eyes filled with tears of pain. Grimacing in agony, she got up, hobbled a few yards and started running again.

She could see better now. Sufficient light was coming into the barn through cracks and knotholes in the siding. She was scrambling through a narrow dirt corridor with stalls on each side, apparently once used for stabling. She stopped and listened. The muffled sound of Marcus’s stumbling feet was getting closer. She leapt forward, running as fast as she could along the path, praying that it wouldn’t lead to a dead end.

Suddenly the path widened and she was in a large rectangular area that looked like a hayloft. Frantically she looked around. She was trapped. Then she spotted a flight of stairs built against the wall. Without hesitating she ran up it into the loft. In the half-light she could see cartons, plastic bags and barrels stored across the width of the shed. Some were stacked high above her head. Nearby, old galvanized irrigation pipes, rolls of wire fencing, tools and lumber were stored along the wall. Gasping for breath, she hesitated on the landing, gripping the railing, uncertain whether to venture farther into the darkness.

Marcus’s words made her spin round.

‘You might as well come out now,’ he taunted. ‘Don’t make me come up and get you.’

She still couldn’t see him but knew he was right below her somewhere.

‘All right, bitch!’ he shouted.

Then she saw him racing for the steps, a gun in his right hand. She catapulted into the darkness of the loft.

Hurtling blindly across the loose planks, banging into objects in her path, Kate encountered a dark looming mass. She had stumbled against a tall stack of plastic bags. By the smell, they contained fertilizer or manure. They were piled on a platform extending the length of the barn. Kate jumped up on the platform and ducked around behind the bags. She was up against the barn’s inner wall. She crouched in the dark, pulse racing, unsure whether to stay put or move farther along the wall. The stench from the manure was starting to make her retch.

There was a sharp crack, then an almost simultaneous thud, as something smacked into one of the bags next to her. Christ! A bullet. She stifled a gasp. A tabby cat, hissing and yowling, leaped from the bags right in front of her and skittered across the shed to safety.

A mixture of tears and sweat was coursing down Kate’s face. The blouse under her jacket was soaked and clinging to her skin.

There was the tread of a cautious footstep on the floorboards – and then another. He was now very close.

The footsteps stopped.

‘You’d better come out. That bullet was not meant to hit you.’ A pause followed. ‘The next will – believe me.’

His words raised the fine hairs on her arms. Her heart was thumping.

A floorboard creaked as he shifted his weight from one foot to the other, edging toward her. Then the creaking stopped.

She had to move. With her back flattened against the rough timbers of the wall, Kate crab-walked along the narrow gap between the stacks of plastic bags and the wall, praying that the floorboards wouldn’t give her away. Splinters of wood pulled at her jacket.

She heard a shuffling noise.

Then stillness again.

She stopped and held her breath. The cat meowed plaintively in the distance.

Inch by inch, she edged along the wall. In front of her, the bags were now stacked much higher – almost up to the crossbeams of the roof. At last, she reached the end of the loft. It had dead-ended. She was trapped.

A crashing sound made her recoil.

Another crash followed.

Then another.

Oh, God! He was heaving the bags off the platform. In only seconds, he would reach her. ‘Come on, lady.’

‘Jesus,’ she breathed.

‘You wanna play games? Fine by me.’

Her stomach convulsed.

‘Come on,’ he taunted.

He was standing directly below her, she reckoned. This was it. It was her only chance. And she would only get one shot at it. She braced her back against the pile of heavy plastic bags, and then put one foot up on the plank wall in front of her. She took a deep breath, then pushed off with all the force she could summon. The bags didn’t budge. She grimaced. She needed more leverage. Manoeuvring her spine as high up as possible on the bags, she was about to push, when he spoke again. This time his tone was deliberate and mocking. ‘Last chance, babe. Come out or start saying your prayers.’

That did it. Kate shoved, taxing every muscle in her straining body, every inch of nerve and sinew, mobilized in one superhuman effort. Suddenly the bags gave way. Unable to check her momentum, Kate went over with the bags, tumbling helplessly off the platform.

Shaken but unhurt, she managed to stand up on the slippery bags. There was no sign of Marcus. She looked down at the lumpy pile. My God, she realized, he could be right underneath her. She had to move fast. She’d hardly taken a step when his hand lunged out from under the heavy bags and grabbed her ankle.

‘Gotcha! You bitch!’ he shouted.

Kate screamed. He was gripping the ankle she had bloodied earlier. Looking down, she saw that he was still partially buried under bags but his hold on her ankle was giving him the anchorage he needed to pull himself out from underneath.

He jerked hard. She tottered awkwardly, then lost her balance, falling, face down, shielding her head with her crossed arms and hit the floor hard. She winced as needle-like slivers of wood pierced her palms.

His relentless grip on her injured ankle was making it numb. In a matter of seconds he would be free.

Kate dug her fingernails into the floorboards and pulled. She couldn’t break his hold. She screamed, redoubling her effort, but it was no use. She had nothing to hold on to and simply hadn’t the strength to break free of his grip. She began to cry tears of pain and frustration. Trying to blink them away, her eyes came to rest on a broken posthole digger and a garden fork. They were among a jumble of old implements stacked against the wall. Close to her, less than an arm’s length away, was a shovel. The long wooden handle was weathered and grey. Despite age and rusting, it looked sturdy. She reached for it, fingertips barely touching.