Page 65 of Five Survive

Red tried, grabbing his shirt again. “Oliver, please don’t—”

Oliver turned, angry puppet strings up his neck again. His free hand darted out to Red’s throat. He shoved her and she fell back onto the sofa.

“You shut up,” he hissed, bending over her. “You’re going to get us all killed.”

But he was going to get them killed, those innocent people outside, and he didn’t care, he didn’t care because they weren’t him.

“Forty-seven, forty-six,” the walkie-talkie crackled.

Arthur reached out a hand and Red took it, pulling her to her feet, but it was too late, Oliver was in the doorway, pushing past Reyna to walk down the steps.

“We have a landline at our place,” Joyce was saying. “We can give some of y’all a ride and you can call for help from our house.”

They walked over to the door, Red’s hand in Arthur’s and she couldn’t remember now, how it had got there.

“Oh, don’t worry about it,” Oliver said, voice loud and cheery. “We’re fine here. We were actually just going to get some rest now; we have a long day ahead of us tomorrow. You said the service should be back in the morning, we’ll call Triple-A when we wake up, no problem.”

“Are you sure?” Don asked. “It’s no trouble.”

“Very sure,” Oliver’s voice boomed. “Think we all just want a good night’s sleep and then we’ll worry about getting this RV fixed in the morning. Right, gang?” Oliver turned back to look at them, all six of them gathered by the door, Maddy’s breath on the back of Red’s neck.

“Right,” Reyna said with a smile, but she didn’t know what was about to happen.

“If you’re sure?” Don returned the smile, dipping his head. Could he tell something was wrong? “Come on then, Joyce-bug, let’s get you home.”

“Before you go,” Oliver said with a flourish, “I wanted to say thank you so much for stopping, and a huge congratulations on becoming grandparents.” Red watched as Oliver stepped to the left, reangling Don, putting his back to the sniper’s position.

Where was the red dot?

“Congrats, sir.” Oliver offered his hand to Don in the darkness. Note tucked under his thumb.

“Bless your heart, aren’t you sweet?” Joyce said, as Don reached out and took Oliver’s hand, shaking it up and down just once.

Oliver’s hand withdrew, empty.

Don’s face darkened, his eyebrows drawing low as he looked down at the piece of paper in his hand.

Reyna noticed it too, head shifting sideways on her neck.

“Well, it’s been nice chatting with you all anyway. Don says I can talk until the cows come home.” Joyce laughed, her face up to the sky, and it was too much, this was too much.

Should Red scream at them to get in the RV, or tell them to run? Like she should have before, if she’d only listened to her gut and not Oliver.

Don hadn’t moved. His eyes shifted across the note and up, a muscle twitching, pulling at the lines around his mouth. He looked at the broken window again.

“Thank you,” he said, nodding at Oliver, closing his fingers around the note. Another nod. Now he must know that something wasn’t right here. But he wouldn’t know what until he unfolded the note scrunched up in his hand. “That’s very kind of you,” Don laughed nervously.

Oliver laughed with him. “Well,” he said, “you must be tired after such a busy day. We’ll let you get to it.”

“Sure.” Don gritted his teeth as his boots pivoted on the road, keys jangling in his grip. He turned to his wife, straightening out his face before she saw it. He didn’t want her to know. “Come on then, honey, we better get out of here.”

Maybe it would be okay. Maybe they’d get back in their truck and be out of here before the sniper knew anything was wrong.

Red wasn’t breathing, staring as Joyce gave her a final smile, a final wave. The only one who didn’t know, eyes kind and crinkled, blue polish peeling off her nails. She turned to go, walking alongside her husband. Red didn’t blink, she couldn’t, she had to protect them with her eyes.

She could hear Arthur’s breath stuttering in his chest, beside her. His hand wasn’t holding hers anymore, small movements in his shoulders, disturbing the air around her. Was he shaking?

“You have a safe trip home,” Oliver said cheerfully, raising one hand in goodbye as they approached their truck.

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