Page 45

Without warning, Baxter pitches with all his weight to the left. “Mommy,there.” He stabs a finger into the darkness, at the spot where a bulky HVAC unit cloaks the concrete in ragged shadow.
The man whips his gun to the unit, and I stumble in that direction, too, mostly to hold on to Baxter. It’s like last summer biking on Hilton Head, when he leaned so far out of his seat I almost steered us into the bushes. Now he comes close to tumbling out of my arms, his weight dragging me with him.
“Good job, Baxter,” the man says, grinning. He keeps his eyes and the gun trained on the spot. “We got you, Beatrix. You can come out now. Tag, you’re it.”
“Not Beatrix. My bouncy ball with the stars on it and the dinosaurs. I thought I lost it.”
I let out a hoarse laugh, then swallow it when the gun swings back our way.
But now that Baxter’s seen the ball, there’s no ignoring it. I crouch down and pick it up, my gaze sweeping the concrete for a box cutter, a nail, something sharp and deadly. A weapon would be a game changer. But my hand comes away with nothing but rubber and dust.
I push to a stand, brush the ball off on my shirt and place it in Baxter’s sticky palm.
“Keep moving,” the man says, glaring because I’m taking too long. “You better hope she shows up soon.”
What I really hope is that Beatrix is upstairs right now, throwing open the front door and sprinting down the driveway, arms flailing at whoever happens to be jogging past, hollering for them to call the police. With us deep in the bowels of the basement, now would be her chance. We wouldn’t hear the alarm pad’s warning beep from where we’re standing, not until the sixty seconds were up and the sirens started wailing. By then she’d be far from the house. I might die here in this dusty basement, but at least Beatrix wouldn’t. With any luck, she’ll live to be a hundred.
The man shoves me in the shoulder, pressing me forward. “Let’s go.”
The thought of Beatrix growing up like I did, without a mother, punches the air from my chest, a dagger twisting in my heart. No waving to me from the first chair of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. No scolding me to stop bawling in the front pew when she gets married. No handing me my first grandchild. These are the things both of us will miss if I die here today.
But Beatrix can still finish school. She can still fall in love, get her heart broken, celebrate birthdays and weddings and Christmases. It won’t be long before she forgets my face, my voice and smile and smell, the way I tug on her ringlets or tickle that spot behind her ear, but she’s still so young. Her grief will turn wooly and imprecise, a general malaise for the loss of a mother she barely knew and can no longer remember.
I know because it happened to me.
That’s why I gave up the career I loved, why I’m room mom and snack mom and library reading-time mom, why I cart them all over town, to soccer and music lessons and trips to the library and zoo, why I swallow my impatience at having to ask them three times to clean their room and sweetly ask them a fourth. I tried my best to fill the gap my mother left with all the love I have for my children. If nothing else, Beatrix will remember that her mother bent over backward to care for her, that I filled the house with happiness and love.
I just won’t be here to see it.
“Move it.”
With the man on my heels, we search the rest of the basement. I sweep the space from back to front, calling for Beatrix until my throat is sore. Every move is a calculated risk, every box I peek behind a potential land mine. Because as soon as I find Beatrix, she will be punished. And if we don’t, Baxter and I will be. Maybe not with a bullet to our heads—not yet, not until Cam gets here—but in the meantime, his switchblade can do a lot of damage.
By the time we come into the last room, the one with Cam’s workbench, I’m ready. I cling to the shadows by the shelves and keep up the pretense, calling for Beatrix as I move deeper down the line. I’m just waiting for the right moment.
I find it at the wine shelves, where I shriek and jump back, jiggling Baxter from my hip. The relief is instant—my throbbing back loosens, and my deadened fingers go tingly. Baxter’s feet hit the floor and instantly bounce back up. He leaps onto my leg and latches on, climbing me like a playground slide. I shake him off and stomp on the floor with a shoe.
Baxter skitters backward. “What? What is it?”
I stomp again, moving closer to the shelving. “A cockroach just crawled over my foot. A big one.”
The cockroach ruse is lame, I know, and it’s a good thing it’s dark down here because my cheeks have got to be an ugly purple. I am stomping empty air, everything about me visibly rattled, but at least it fits the ridiculous scene. And at least my lie does exactly what I needed it to: it got Bax off my arm and gave me room to move, while also sticking the man’s gaze to the floor.
I eye the distance between me and Cam’s workbench. Six, maybe seven feet.
“It went under there.” I gesture to the row of hard-shell suitcases, lined up under a bottom shelf by color and size.
The man makes a disgusted sound. “Leave it.”
I whip the suitcases one by one away from the wall, wheeling them into a messy spin behind me. They crash into the room like bumper cars, backing up Baxter and the man even farther. Bugs have never been Baxter’s favorite, but bees and cockroaches are the stuff of nightmares. He shoves his thumb into his mouth and starts sucking.
The man leans a shoulder against a wall stud. “What the hell are you doing?”
“I’m looking for the cockroach.”
“Why?”
“Why else? So I can kill it.”