Dash smiled at his wife. He asked Sara, “If you don’t mind, Dr. Earnshaw, I’d like it if you walked with me.”
He didn’t lead her toward the picnic area. Instead he indicated the direction back toward her cabin prison. If he thought confining her was a punishment, he was wrong.
Dash said, “It’s a lovely evening. I think we’re getting a break in this heat.”
Sara did not respond. The gun in his holster looked different. She recognized the blue slide that retrofitted the gun for Simunition.
Dash said, “I’m sorry to have to bring this up, Doctor, but it appears that you’ve upset my wife.”
Sara chewed her lip. He had never admonished her before.
He said, “I really can’t have discord in the Camp. Especially not tonight. What we’re doing tomorrow is too important.”
Sara turned around to look at him.
She could tell he had no intention of backing down. One side of his smile was higher than the other. This wasn’t the mask slipping. This was a joyful anticipation of cruelty.
He said, “I had hoped that, given Michelle’s rapidly declining help, you would be able to take over her job as our Witness.”
Sara looked away first, chiding herself for playing Russian Roulette. She was a hostage. He was a murderer. She had seen him shoot two men. She knew that he’d set off those bombs at Emory. He was planning something even more spectacularly awful. Confronting him, pushing him, was the quickest way to her death.
Dash told her, “Gwen says I’ve given you too much freedom.”
Sara watched him lift the gun from his holster. The blue slide stood out on the top of the frame. He had no idea that Sara knew the marking rounds were not lethal. He was enjoying the idea of toying with her.
“You’re right.” She tried to talk him down. Dash’s gun wasn’t a threat, but there were three dozen men in the clearing who carried the real thing. “I’ve been frustrated because of the children. I shouldn’t have talked to Gwen that way. Or you.”
“It’s not for my sake I’m doing this.” Dash didn’t point the weapon at her. Instead, he tested the weight in his hand. “Between you and I, it’s not often I meet my intellectual equal. Perhaps I’ve let myself enjoy parrying with you too much.”
“I—”
He pointed the gun at her belly. “Let’s finish this by the river.”
“Wait.” Sara’s eyes desperately scanned over his shoulder, as if anyone would help. The girls were seated at the picnic table. They were surrounded by men dressed in black. Young faces, old. All clean-shaven but one.
Tears flooded into Sara’s eyes. She gasped.
“Dr. Earnshaw?”
She covered her mouth with her hands.
Will?
Standing by the picnic table. Laughing with the girls.
Was it really him?
Dash said, “Doctor—”
“I’m sorry!” Sara blurted out the words. “Please, I’m so sorry.” She clasped together her trembling hands, begging him. “Forgive me, please. I’m sorry. Please.” She couldn’t stop pleading. Had Will seen her? He wasn’t even looking this way. “I’ll be better. I promise. Please. Just let me—you said I’m your Witness. Let me—I’ll tell them that you—that you are a community. A family.”
Dash’s eyes narrowed. Her reaction had been too delayed.
“Please.” Sara’s hands were shaking so hard that she couldn’t hold them together. Will had turned away from her. She saw his back, his broad shoulders. “Dash, please. I’m so sorry. Please don’t—don’t hurt me. Please. I don’t—I don’t want to be hurt. Please.”
“What is this?” he demanded. “You think I’m going to rape you?”
“No—” Sara was so desperate she almost screamed the word. “No, of course not. I was—”
“I assured you that you would remain unmolested.”
“I know you did, but—” A sob rolled out of her mouth. She looked at Will, begging him to turn around. “Please. I saw the gun and I thought—”
“We adhere to the rules of the Geneva Convention.” Dash waved the gun around as he spoke. “I told you. We are not animals. We are soldiers.”
“I know. I know. I just—I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said—I’m upset about the children. They’re so sick. And Michelle—”
Turn around-turn around-turn around . . .
“Dr. Earnshaw, I’m a married man.”
“I know.” Sara gave up trying to wipe her tears. “I’m sorry. I should know you better by now. I realize you would never—that you’re an honest man. You always keep your word.”
“I do.”
“Dash, I’m so sorry. I just—I saw the gun, and I panicked, because my—my husband was shot with a gun like that.” She had no idea where the lie had come from, but Dash seemed to like it.
He said, “Shot by a filthy mongrel, no doubt.”
“I’m scared of guns. They terrify me. And they’re all around. Everywhere. And I’m so scared. All of the time. I’m sorry I’m not—”
Dash gave a dramatically drawn out sigh. He slowly returned the weapon to its holster. He tightened the Velcro strap to make a point. “It is my ardent wish, Dr. Earnshaw, that what we’re doing tomorrow will ensure that good white women such as yourself are no longer afraid.” His hand went to her shoulder. “Once the world is wiped clean of the mongrels and their enablers, we will be free of the kind of crime that took your husband away from you. Police officers will be safe on the streets again. Law and order will be restored. You will be the last widow of your kind.”
Sara nodded. She couldn’t give him more than that. She was shaking uncontrollably. Her eyes went to the ground. Tears slid down her nose and pooled into the dirt.
Dash patted her shoulder. “Straighten yourself up, Doctor. We don’t want the children seeing you like this.”
Sara’s teeth were chattering as she followed him back to the clearing. She could barely lift her feet. Every nerve was exposed. After feeling nothing for so long, she could not stop feeling everything. Sara kept staring at the ground because she was afraid that if she looked at Will, she would collapse.
At the picnic table, Gwen was hectoring the girls about manners. Sara allowed her gaze to skip over Will’s face. His hair was stringy with sweat. Dark circles rimmed his eyes. The beard was patchy and disgusting.
She was suddenly light-headed. The sense memory of the man who had raped her flooded Sara’s body. The rough beard that smelled of cigarettes and fried food. The clamminess of his pale skin when he thrust against her.
Bile surged into her mouth. She swallowed it down, her eyes burning.
“Have a seat, Dr. Earnshaw.” Dash snapped out his cloth napkin and laid it across his lap. “Major Wolfe, this is our resident pediatrician. We’ve had some sick children up here. Thankfully, most of my girls have weathered the storm.”
Will grunted. He was looking down at his steak.
Sara took her usual spot by Grace. Will was across the table at the opposite end. A teenage boy was beside him, arms crossed, spine straight, mimicking Will’s posture.
She dug her fingernails into her palms. She struggled to pull herself back into reality. It was just an ugly beard. Sara was not chained to a bathroom stall. Will would never hurt her. She loved this man. He loved her. He was here because of Sara. To save her.
She looked around the clearing. The guards in the woods. The rifles and Glocks and hunting knives and the children.
How could he save her?
Dash told Sara, “Major Wolfe served in the Airborne forces alongside our friend Beau.”
Sara’s hands were still trembling. She concentrated on the food. She had cheese and crackers again. An apple was by her plate. The other women had bowls of stew. The men had steaks and potatoes, bottles of water and yellow Gatorade.
Dash told Sara, “We were down a few soldiers after our last incursion. I feel confident the major will be instrumental in helping us send the Message.”
Sara couldn’t keep ignoring Will. She made herself look at him—to really see him.
He was cutting into the steak. Blood seeped from the middle. Sara recognized his abject disgust. Will preferred his meat cooked into a rubber puck. She had treated him to one of the best steakhouses in Atlanta for his birthday and watched him pour ketchup onto a ninety-dollar Wagyu New York Strip.
Her breath suddenly came back. She felt dizzy from the sudden rush of oxygen.
This was the memory she needed to hold on to. The first time Sara had worn Will’s favorite black dress was for that dinner. She had read the menu to him in a sexy voice. She hadn’t let him see the prices because he would’ve mathematically quantified the volume of T-bones he could’ve consumed for the same amount at Waffle House.
“Dr. Earnshaw?” Dash was too keyed into her moods. She had to stop this emotional rollercoaster.
“Sorry.” Sara broke off a corner of cheese. She pushed it into her mouth. She could do nothing to stop the tears that formed a river down her cheeks. She had made Will taste her Scotch at the restaurant. He had nearly coughed up a lung. They had held hands all night, made out like teenagers in the car.
Grace asked, “Daddy, can I ask Major Wolfe if he’s married?”
Dash smiled. “I think you just did, sweetpea.”