Page 10 of DOG Part 2
“Her funeral.”
“Right.”
“Would it mean something to you if we had a memorial here for her?”
“Really? What would we do?”
“Say a prayer and burn something in the fire in her honor.”
“I didn’t know that was a thing.”
He looked sad as he gazed at me. “I’m not sure it is. But we have to make do with what we have.”
“Yeah I guess so,” I whispered as I looked back down at the paper. The lump in my throat was making it hard to talk.
“I know what’s going on inside of you,” he said, his voice gruff. “I lost someone close to me once as well.”
I glanced up sharply, and crouched there by the fire was a new Kane. His eyes were soft and glazed over, and every part of him seemed to sag with the weight of a burden I couldn’t see.
I swallowed hard, wanting to ask who he was talking about but being afraid to intrude on what had suddenly become his personal moment.
Suddenly, his head whipped to the window and he stared at the curtains as if he could see past them and into the darkness outside. Slowly he stood, his eyes trained on the curtains the entire time.
“What?” I asked, an icy feeling seeping through my veins. The look on his face was not a good one. It was intensely frozen, almost fearful.
“Shhh,” he whispered, putting a hand out to silence me.
Every muscle in my body froze while my heart rate doubled. I strained to listen, the silence ringing alongside the sparking of the fire.
A yell from outside made me flinch. I stared at Kane, waiting for an answer, but he was shuffling over to the gun holster he’d put on the ground and picking it up to put it back on. There was another yell, this one accompanied by some muffled words.
“Kane,” I whispered, standing up.
“The traps,” he answered, low.
“That’swhat you were doing out there?”
He’d spent several hours outside earlier in the day while I’d been inside reading one of the only three books to be found in the place.
“Spears. Ropes to catch legs,” he whispered, reaching out and taking my hand. “Stay away from the window. The traps may be enough to take care of all of them, but we need to stay away from entrances.”
The shattering of glass meant he was wrong. Obviouslysomeonehad evaded the traps, and they were now in the house.
Kane pushed me behind him, against the wall between the entrance to the hallway and the fireplace. Moving fluidly in front of me, he crept up till he was inches away from the dark doorway. There was more glass breaking and then a heavy thud.
I was still as a stone with my back pressed against the wall, waiting for the next sound, the next surprise. There was more creaking as someone came down the hall, and then just as someone shuffled through the doorway Kane stepped forward and grabbed the stranger. There was a sharp cracking as he flipped the intruder over and pinned him on the floor. I pressed a palm against my mouth, stifling the scream that was threatening to fly out. The man lay unmoving, his open eyes staring out at nothing.
A banging at the back door sounded and Kane grabbed my hand, dragging me down the hallway and into the bathroom. He kept the door open as the noises from the other side of the house became louder. There was more breaking and shouting as well, the echoing of the sounds filling up the empty ranch.
“What are we going to do?” I whispered.
Clearly his traps hadn’t been enough. Not for however many men there were. Somehow I was shaking and frozen stiff with fear at the same time, my body desperately trying to decide between fight or flight.
“Get behind the door,” he whispered back.
I did as he said, going quickly as footsteps thudded down the hall. Moving so fast he was a blur, Kane grabbed the empty shower curtain holder from above the tub and tore it from the wall. The man who walked through the doorway was met with a knock across the face. Drawing back before the intruder even went down, Kane knocked him again for good measure, and the man crumpled to the ground without a sound. Pulling the body fully into the bathroom, Kane closed the door softly and locked it.
Already there was blood pooling on the floor, pushing up against the line of the bathtub, the sight of it making my stomach roll.
I bit my tongue and did everything I could not to stare at the body covering up most of the bathroom linoleum, instead keeping my eyes focused on Kane as he stepped into the tub and opened the window above it.
“We have to go,” he said simply as he extended his hand.
Stepping over the body, I let him pull me into the tub. He paused while he listened to the silence outside of the house. Meanwhile, more noises and shouts came from down the hall, and my heart thudded even harder.
Kane nodded, deeming it safe, and then heaved himself through the window before reaching over and pulling me through. The trees rimming the side of the house provided a dense coverage, and we pressed ourselves against the exterior wall and ran, moving through the darkness in a desperate attempt to save our lives.
