After diving into the car, the only thing Catherine was able to comprehend was that her children were terrified. She looked back over her shoulder to see if they were being followed, but the street seemed deserted. In her arms Sunni and Ethan were shaking uncontrollably and sobbing.
"Mommy, mommy, mommy," Sunni cried. "Someone wants to kill us."
"Is anyone hurt?" Gil asked, snapping Catherine back into reality.
She pulled her children back and checked them over. She felt their small arms and legs, feeling for wounds. As she searched Ethan, she noticed that he had wet himself. When she was satisfied that they were alright, she pulled them to her again and planted kisses on their heads.
"Mommy isn't going to let anyone get us," she said as she tried to relax them.
She leaned back in the passenger seat and smoothed the hair back for what seemed like hours. Their cries of fear broke her heart and she wished she had the power to erase the last twenty-four hours from their minds. Finally, their sobbing stopped and she saw that they had cried themselves to sleep.
"Here," she heard Gil say, handing her a blanket.
Catherine looked up at him and finally her thoughts became clear. She had been so confused and delirious from all the action that she hadn't been able to process the fact that Gil was sitting beside her. She took the blanket that he had extended to her and bundled the children in it. He reached over and fumbled with a few knobs on the dashboard.
"I'll try and get some heat going," he said as he checked his rear-view mirror.
"Gil?" She asked in disbelief.
Gil looked over at her. "It's me," he said in his familiar soothing voice.
Catherine did not know how to respond. Her heart was overwhelmed to see him again. She never thought she would, even though she had hoped and even prayed. There was a part of her that was angry that he had left her and the kids; even though deep down she knew why.
"You're alive," she stated. "Where…. how…. Where have you been?"
Gil licked his lips. "I didn't know what else to do," he said. "They said they would kill you if I didn't die. I wasn't ready to, so I went into hiding until I could figure this entire situation out," he paused and looked over at her." I didn't think it would be so long."
Catherine felt a twinge of anger. "It doesn't look like it worked," she said. "So it turns out you just abandoned us for a year."
As the words left her mouth, she felt sorry she said them. Gil kept his eyes focused on the road. He anticipated that Catherine would have some resentment towards him and justly so. She had been raising their kids in the midst of tragedy … alone.
"Do you have any idea what I have been struggling with?" Catherine whispered harshly, keeping her voice low. "Do you know how devastated your children were? How heartbroken I was? Do you know how hard I struggled to keep food on the table?"
"I kept an eye on you," he said. "I made sure you always had money."
Catherine was confused. "How?" she asked. "How could you know?"
Gil looked over at her. "I had Brass keep an eye on your finances," he explained. "If you had any problems I made sure you got money."
Catherine rolled her eyes. "Brass," she said. "I should have known. That man came to the house after I told him you were missing and comforted me. He knew the whole time?"
Gil was quiet, but his silence told her what she needed to know; he didn't trust her to keep the secret. Would she have been able to? If she knew Gil was alive and away, would she have been able to resist going to him?
Catherine looked out the window. "Should I say 'thank you'?" she asked.
"I love you," he said. "I love the kids. I never wanted to put any of you through this, but I couldn't see you killed. I refused to risk it."
Catherine was quiet. "Tell me what happened," she said.
~o~
Gil woke up and saw only red. He had a splitting headache and could not remember what he had done to cause it. Had he fallen? Had he been drinking?
He reached over to Catherine's side of the bed. "Cath," he said. "My head is killing me."
"Catherine is at home," a strange voice said to him. "If you want it to stay like that then I suggest that you cooperate."
Gil snapped his eyes open and his last memories flooded back into his mind. He had been checking the breaker box when he was hit repeatedly from behind. He recalled the warm flow of blood that ran down his back before he blacked out.
"Where…what…" he stuttered, trying to move.
His hands were bound behind his back. He wriggled his legs, only to discover that they too were bound. He looked up at his kidnappers, but could only see shapes in black stockings. He did not need anyone to tell him who they were associated with. From the angle that he was looking, it appeared as if he were in the trunk of a car. The red light that flooded in around him came from the taillights.
"You can't do this," he said. "You have no righ-"
"We are being lenient and giving you a choice. You can either die here and we'll leave your family alone or you can live and we'll bring them here and kill them in front of you. You'll have to live with that memory for the rest of your life and we'll be around to make sure that that is a long time."
Gil grew silent. "Leave them out of this," he said, and then finally added. "I don't care what you do to me. Just leave them alone."
"Good man," he said. "I didn't want to have to hurt any children tonight."
The trunk closed and Gil heard the car start up. He wriggled in his bindings, but he was tied tightly He didn't know where he was being taken, but he knew he wouldn't be alive long enough to wait for help. He could either die here, or fight and find a way out. Gil strained his eyes to see and finally his sight fell on the compartments that held the taillights in place. They looked as if someone had not replaced them properly and he knew that that was his only hope. He brought his bound feet forward and gave it a kick. After a few kicks it popped open slightly and he held his feet up to it to saw at the tape.
Soon the car stopped and Gil returned to his earlier position. He had told them that he was willing to die, but he was not ready to give up seeing his family. His children needed him as they grew up and his heart wasn't ready to be separated from Catherine. He had to survive for them.
There was a slap on the roof of the trunk and he heard muffled voices bid him farewell. Soon the car started to roll down a hill and then he heard a splash as the car met the lake. He started sawing at the tape on his feet again, hoping that soon it would give.
Eventually the tape gave, but the trunk was starting to fill with water. He twisted his body until his hands were in the right position, then he began to work on the tape that held his hands. As the water began to rise, Gil saw the freckled faces of his children. Sunni, who had had just lost a tooth, was smiling at him with her blue eyes. Ethan, who looked just like Sara, was holding his favorite book for his father to read to him.
"I refuse to die here," he thought to himself.
Lastly, he thought of Catherine. He thought of the many times he ran his fingers through her hair. He recalled the moment when she had been in the hospital holding a little pink bundle. Then, three years later, there had been a blue bundle.
These last thoughts gave him the energy and adrenaline he needed to fray the tape enough to where it gave away. Now that he was free, he searched the trunk for an emergency hatch. Hopefully, he assailants were dumb enough to leave it useful. When he located it he tried it. It was broken.
"Fuck," he yelled, giving the lever another yank.
As the water level rose, Gil knew that in moments there would be no room to breathe. Frantically he began to kick the backseat, hoping that it would give. Just as he was about to give up and look for another route, he gave one final kick and the back seat pushed forward. Water rushed in at him, but he did not stop to panic. He swam through the opening and into the car.
He tried the two back doors first, but found that they were both locked. He swam up to the front seat and tried the passenger door, but it was locked as well. Thankfully, it was the driver's side door that wasn't locked. He stopped and waited while the car filled with water so that the pressure would be even.
Once the car was filled, he pushed the door open and slowly began to swim away from the car. He did not head for the surface, even though his body was craving oxygen. Instead he swam further into the lake; hoping that anyone watching the wreckage would not see him. If was spotted, then Catherine and the kids would be killed.
~o~
Catherine hurriedly picked through the bin of children's clothes. They had stopped in a small town outside of Minnesota for gas and supplies. Gil had given her a gun and she had walked with Sunni to a small discount store. The clothing selection wasn't much, but she couldn't afford to be picky. She had one child in soiled clothes and another who needed a shoe.
"Mommy," Sunni said. "Can I get a coloring book?"
Catherine held her hand tightly. "Yes," she said. "We'll get one in a few minutes."
The story that Gil had told her played on loop in her mind and she couldn't imagine how panicked he must have felt. She felt guilty for having blamed him for her pain, but she still thought that something could have been arranged.
"Mommy, where are we going?" Sunni asked, tugging on Catherine's coat.
Catherine shook her head. "I am not sure, honey," she said.
She went back to checking sizes. She had found a few decent pairs of pants for Ethan and one for Sunni. She was about to move on to shirts when Sunni tugged at her coat again. Catherine sighed and looked down at her.
"Is daddy mad at us?" she asked, innocently.
Catherine knelt down and brushed Sunni's hair back. "No," she said. "Daddy loves us very much."
Sunni looked unsure. "Then where did he go?" she asked.
Catherine thought about what to say. When Sunni had woken up and saw Gil, her reaction had been little. She hugged her father and kissed him, but she still seemed reserved about the fact that he had returned. She was her father' daughter; careful and decisive
"Daddy didn't want to leave us," she said. "He wanted to stay, but there were some very bad people that were following him. They told daddy they would hurt us so he hid from them so they would think he had died."
Sunni was young, but she understood. She wasn't a genius, but she was a very intelligent child. As parents, Catherine and Gil wanted Sunni to think for herself and solve her own problems. They wanted to encourage her to be independent.
"Who are they?" Sunni asked.
Catherine pursed her lips. "When daddy was young he helped the police in Chicago," she explained. "He studied bugs and everyone thought he did a very good job. So good in fact, that the police wanted him to help on a big case that included some very bad people."
Sunni thought about her mother's words. "Did they hate daddy?" she asked.
Catherine took a deep breath and nodded. "They all went to jail and they said they would find all the people that helped the police," she explained.
Sunni looked over her mother's shoulder and leaned forward to whisper in her ear. "Was the man at my school a bad man?" she asked.
Catherine nodded. "He was a very bad man," she said.
Sunni leaned in to whisper again. "I see him behind us," she said.
Catherine froze and went rigid. Her quickly slipped her hand into her pocked and felt the cool metal of the automatic in her pocket. Slowly she stood, smoothed Sunni's hair back, and picked up the clothes she had found.
"Let's go get a coloring book," she said, naturally.
~o~
Gil set the gas pump back into its place and glanced in the backseat at his sleeping son. Ethan had grown a lot in the last year and he was sad that he had missed out. The urge to pick him up and hold him close was almost unbearable, but he wanted to handle each child's reactions separately. He still needed to talk to Sunni and he hoped that Catherine been able to soften her up.
He looked in the direction of the store just in time to see Catherine and Sunni speed walking towards him. The expression on his wife's face worried him and he climbed into the driver's seat to start the engine. When his wife and daughter reached the car they climbed in.
"They're in there," Catherine whispered to him.
~0~
Hello, this is Katy. Please leave a review. I could really use any positive feedback. I am trying to update Sara Sidle Out, but I seem to be hung up in a few places. I am hammering out the kinks, I promise. I really enjoy your reviews when I get them. Thank you so much for reading. Have a very good day.