Chapter 6
It was almost too easy. When she had called him, she didn't know Charlie was with him. That was a bonus she found after she shot out the tire, watched the accident, climbed down to "help". She had expected to find some way to get to him later. She shuddered. Good thing she hadn't told Don that Charlie needed his help, good thing she had picked Alan instead…The shudder turned into a smile. Daddy would have been so proud. All those years she spent hunting with him, he was such a taskmaster. Insisting on hours at the range every season before he would even take her out…she was a good student. An 8th degree marksman, she had placed at a competition, and he had rewarded her with the rifle she still had. It was a beautiful firearm…well-balanced, with a first class sight.
Yes, the fact that Daddy had wanted a boy was serving her well, now. Not just with her shooting skills. Otherwise, she might not have picked the right truck, equipped the bed with hydraulics. She never could have gotten them out of there…but it was easy, just tipping the bed enough for them to slide out, into the room. If not for the skills her father taught her, she wouldn't have been able to build that room. Well, most of that room. Some of the electronics, although the configuration was designed by her, were beyond her skills. She had to hire someone to install the camera, the bank of monitors in the main house. Someone else made the sliding wall that she had insisted on, like one huge closet door on a track. He had looked at her like she was crazy, but her check had cleared, so he had done the work. He probably wouldn't have leaked, but the risk was just too great. At least now she knew that her beautiful rifle worked just as well at close range…and she was growing some great tomatoes out back in the greenhouse.
She watched the monitors. The youngest was sleeping, again. Don, the highly trained FBI agent that she had reduced to inadequacy simply by threatening his family, he was at the west wall again, still trying to find a door. It was a shame, really. Soon, they would all understand that she was doing this for them.
Don approached the camera, then, stood directly in front of the lens, looked up. He held up the bottle of pain reliever she had sent in. "Thank you," he said, and she was touched. Maybe he was starting to understand already. "He needs food, to take this," Don was continuing. It was interesting that he knew someone could hear him. "I know that you have a heart," he continued, "thank you for what you sent in. We need food, more water, now." He glanced over his shoulder at Charlie, then back at the camera. "Maybe more medical supplies?" He waited for a moment as if he expected the camera to speak, then finally wandered away. He pushed his own mattress across the room to be closer to his brother. That was sweet, she thought. He's a good boy. Wearily, he grabbed one of the bottles of water, drained it, dropped it neatly in the small bucket with the other trash. Finally he stood over his brother's mattress, looked at him a while. Then he crossed behind it to his own, sat down on the edge.
She really liked him, had liked both the boys when they had met, and it hurt her to see his despair. She tried to make him feel her thoughts. "Soon, Don," she communicated to him. "Soon we will all be together."