Victor Methos - Pestilence

She pounded the button for the top floor, her injured arm aching beneath the cast, and the doors slowly closed as the man leapt to get his hand in between them. The pull of gravity made her stomach roil as the elevator lifted her higher into the building.

With no streetlights and a moon that seemed to be hiding from them, Howie had no means to see anything other than the headlights on the jeep. He felt surrounded by a great black nothingness, but the headlights made it appear as though they were barreling through a light tunnel. Jessica was asleep, and he reached over and moved a strand of hair out of her face that was whipping her skin.

“She told me about you,” Mike said, leaning behind his ear from the backseat.

“What’d she say?”

“She said you cheated on her mom and got divorced after.”

Howie glanced into the rearview mirror. “It was… I don’t know. I don’t even know. I put myself in a spot I shouldn’t have, and I couldn’t resist. The only way to avoid it is to not even be in a place where you can fumble.”

“We’re weak when it comes to that stuff,” Mike said. “You still with the woman you cheated with?”

“No. It was a one-time thing. My wife only found out about it because she saw a package of condoms in my car. I tried to cover for it, but she could tell I was lying.” He paused. “She sat in her room from sunup to sundown and cried. Didn’t eat, didn’t drink. She cried the entire day.”

“That’s fucked up.”

“Yeah.”

“Maybe it was for the best?”

“No, it wasn’t. I screwed up the best thing in my life real good. And you don’t even realize it until later. I saw it tonight when she hugged my leg. I felt a glimpse of what I was missing out on. No amount of pussy is worth that.”

The state line wasn’t far. Excitement tingled Howie’s belly, and the stars were even beginning to sparkle above them, providing a dim light. A tinge of morning was in the warm air, which wasn’t as warm as it had been a couple of hours before.

“Daddy?”

“What is it, sweetheart?”

“Your nose is bleeding.”

He checked his nose in the mirror. Sweat glistened on his face, and underneath his nostrils a thread of blood was pooling at his upper lip. He wiped it with the back of his sleeve.

“It’s nothing, sweetheart. Just the dry air.”

She didn’t move for a time, though he could tell she wanted to hug him. But her anger wouldn’t let her. She had so much of it that she was blinded to everything else. He put his hand over her shoulders, careful to touch only her clothing. But that made him uncomfortable, and he withdrew his hand and put them both on the steering wheel.

“Go back to sleep, Jess. We’ll be in Las Vegas soon, and we’ll get a hotel room there and a big breakfast.”

“Can I have coffee and a waffle?”

“Whatever you want.”

He glanced over at her, and she smiled as an explosion rang in his ears and the jeep spun nearly upside down, gliding through the air like a monstrous bird.

Howie put his arm against Jessica to prevent her from flying out, but her seat belt held her in place. Mike wasn’t wearing one. He flew out of the jeep and rolled on the ground, narrowly missing the ton of steel that came crashing into the earth.

The jeep rolled once, groaning to an upright position. The motion jarred Howie’s neck, and a wave of pain shot into his head.

When it had straightened out, he turned to Jessica, who was crying. He put his arms around her and told her that it was all right, that they must have hit a batch of rocks. A trail of blood dribbled onto his sleeve and into her hair. He frantically wiped it out of her hair with his hands and then the sleeves of his shirt.

“What’re you doing, Dad?”

He didn’t respond. Terror gripped him, and he wiped at her face and hands until she pushed him away.

“Stop it. Stop!”

He sat back, breathing heavily. His acute anxiety was causing his chest to tighten like a walnut about to be cracked. They sat staring at each other for a moment before he realized that an acrid smell was filling the air. He glanced at the engine and saw flames.

Howie tugged at Jessica’s seat belt, but it wouldn’t loosen. He reached down and tried to unclip it, but the metal clip was jammed and the button wouldn’t depress. He felt the hilt of the knife he’d stolen earlier pushing into his abdomen. He pulled it out and cut through the belt. But before he could pull her out, a noise startled him.

The flames blew the hood off the jeep and reached into the front seats.

Samantha leapt out of the elevator, unsure of what floor she was on. A flood of memories of the past month overtook her senses so profoundly that she thought she might faint. But she kept running. Not until she was standing at the windows, staring down at the parking lot, did she know she had arrived at the top floor.

She ran into one of the rooms and shut the door behind her. Then she ran to the bathroom and shut that door. Samantha stared at it as though it would explode off its hinges at any moment. She backed away and sat on the toilet, nearly falling off. Putting her hands to her face, she sobbed.

After a few moments, the emotions passed. She took a deep breath and thought about what to do next.

Duncan and Jane were downstairs, and Samantha couldn’t be certain that man didn’t know about them. She didn’t know how to help either of them. Robert Greyjoy had known everything about her before they had even met.

She stood up and walked to the door. The shooter had come for her. She didn’t understand why she knew that, but she could read the unspoken understanding between them, like a crackling energy. He was the hunter, and she was the hunted. Maybe if he killed her, he would leave Jane and Duncan alone.

She opened the door, stood there a moment with her eyes closed, and stepped out into the room.

A woman was in the bed. Her closed eyes were turned toward the window, and a beeping monitor echoed in the small space. Samantha walked to the bed. The woman’s face was wrinkled and gray.

Samantha wasn’t sure how long she stood there, but eventually, she sat down in a chair against the wall. The woman’s hair was thin and missing in spots. She seemed so weak and fragile that death couldn’t have been far off. Tears swirled in Samantha’s eyes, but she didn’t wipe them away. Instead, she put her hand over the woman’s and sat quietly, listening to the rhythmic beep of the machine and the deep, grainy breaths that the woman pulled into her thin body.

Finally, Sam rose and walked out into the corridor. She shut the door softly, then glanced down both directions before walking to the front desk. She wasn’t going to run anymore. She didn’t see a point to running. If he was like Greyjoy, he would catch up with her.

She quickly jumped on the elevator and went down to her floor.

When she got off, the floor was empty and quiet. She went into Jane’s room, and there, standing next to the canopy, was the shooter. His weapon hung at his side between relaxed fingers.

“I knew you’d come here,” he said.

“What do you want?”

“I want you to die.”

She shivered and averted her eyes, turning them to Jane. “What about her?”

“Make it easy, and she lives.”

Samantha nodded. Ian raised his weapon, aiming for her heart.

He didn’t have much sensation at first, just a general numbness and anxiety. As Howie Burke took his daughter in his arms, he grasped that he shouldn’t be holding her and withdrew. The jeep was upright but severely damaged. He sat up, ignoring the pain in his back and arms, and he thought about trying to start the vehicle but decided against it.