Chapter 4: The Hunt on Blackwater Creek
Chapter 4: The Hunt on Blackwater Creek
"They're here," Elena said, her voice dropping into a flat, survivalist register. She didn't panic. She moved with the speed of a woman who had spent five years preparing for a siege.
She ran to the loft stairs, scooping a sleepy Leo into her arms before he could even cry out. "Clara, can you move?"
Clara looked at her legs. The spasms were intense, the muscles clenching like iron bands around her bones. But as she looked at her sister and her nephew, she realized that sitting down was no longer an option. If she went back to that chair, they would all die in this cabin.
"I can move," Clara said, her voice turning to pure steel. She stood up, her balance precarious, but her feet held. She grabbed a heavy iron poker from the hearth, using it as a crude cane.
"Through the floor hatches," Elena whispered, pointing to a small brass ring set into the cedar planks near the kitchen table. "The cabin is built on stilts over the creek. There’s an old fishing skiff tied to the center piling. The water is high because of the storm—the current will carry us down to the main river highway before they can get their cars around the ridge."
The heavy wooden door of the cabin rattled violently.
"Clara! Open the door!" Julian’s voice boomed from the porch, stripped of all upper-class civility, raw and frantic. "I know you're in there with her! Don't make this more difficult than it already is! We’ve brought a medical team to assist you!"
A medical team, Clara thought bitterly. A team with sedatives to make sure I never speak again.
"Miller, take the hinges off," Julian ordered outside.
Elena yanked open the floor hatch. The black, rushing waters of Blackwater Creek roared below them, the cold spray hitting Clara’s face. A small, wooden flat-bottomed skiff danced violently on the current, held by a single thick hemp rope tied to the timber foundation.
Elena lowered Leo into the boat first, the boy clinging to the wooden seat without a sound. "Clara, go next. Don't look at the water. Look at me."
Clara lowered herself into the hatch, her legs screaming in protest as she swung her body into the cold air. She dropped into the center of the skiff, the small boat rocking precariously under her weight. Elena slid down a second later, a small aluminum paddle clutched in her hand.
CRASH!
The front door of the cabin splintered inward above them. The heavy boots of Julian’s security team thudded across the floorboards.
"They went through the floor!" a voice shouted from above. A flashlight beam sliced through the hatch, illuminating Elena’s silver-blonde hair in the darkness.
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"Stop them!" Julian roared from the cabin.
Elena raised a sharp hunting knife, slicing through the hemp mooring rope with a single, violent stroke. The current caught the skiff instantly, throwing them backward into the pitch-black, roaring heart of Blackwater Creek just as a gunshot echoed through the floorboards, the bullet hissing into the dark water inches from the boat's stern.
