Snowbound - Blake Crouch [64]
“Stop moving.”
“I’m not moving. I don’t know—”
“You think I won’t pull the trigger, but I swear to God I will.” The initial shock was waning, making room for the rage. “Why’d you do this, Kalyn?”
Kalyn was crying now. “They caught me. Three hours ago, after I’d killed one of the guards. It wasn’t like I had planned all this. I told them about you, said I could find you. If I did, he was going to let my sister go. Fly me and Lucy out of here tomorrow. If I didn’t, he was gonna let one of the oilmen kill her tonight. You see? I didn’t have a—”
“You were gonna trade me for your sister.”
“I’m sorry,” Kalyn said. “Wouldn’t you trade me for your mother? To get her back?”
“I wouldn’t sell anyone out.”
“Well, congratulations on being a better person. Now come here and put the gun in my hand.”
“Fuck you.”
Devlin noticed Paul inching toward her, the subtlest of movements. He said, “You aren’t gonna hurt anybody. Fact, you’ve got the safety on right now.”
Devlin knew if she averted her eyes even for a second, it would be over. “Guess we’ll find out,” she said.
Kalyn said, “Dev, no—”
Devlin winced as the recoil pushed her back against the wall, her ears ringing, temporarily blinded from the flash.
Paul’s brow furrowed up and he looked down at the black hole in the upper left quadrant of his sweater vest, darkness blossoming below his heart.
The room smelled sweetly bitter, the cordite burning in Devlin’s nose.
Paul said, “You didn’t shoot me. You didn’t.” He sat back down in the chair, paling. Devlin could hear the fading suck of his punctured lung, the man emitting soft, drowning gurgles. She pulled the hammer back once more and aimed at Kalyn.
“If you move,” Devlin said, “I’ll kill you, too.”
FIFTY
Devlin rushed back into the corridor, ran down the stairwell and into the passage. She heard voices in the dining hall, but she kept going, back into the lobby. It was much darker here, now illuminated only by candles and lanterns. As she entered the first-floor corridor, she heard it—rapid footfalls on stone, people running through the lobby, a man yelling. Devlin glanced back, saw a group of shadows appear at the far end. She rushed into the alcove, started up the stairwell, came out onto the second floor. The wolf loped down the corridor toward her, its head low, sniffing the hardwood floor. Devlin fired off three shots, then turned, ran back into the stairwell, sprinting up two more flights, emerging finally onto the last floor.
There were footsteps below her now and more coming up the stairs from the lobby. You have to find a room and hide. She ran through the corridor, trying doorknobs on both sides of the hall—locked, locked. She could hear the wolf running up the stairwell, growling. Locked. Locked. Shouting resounded in the lobby. Locked. Room 403 opened.
She stepped inside, shut the door, out of breath, on the verge of tears. It was completely dark in the room. She ran to the window, looked through it, light from the veranda glittering on the billions of snowflakes loading the fir trees with tons of powder, burying saplings, boulders, swirling madly as the wind blew drifts to the second floor.
She heard doors opening, shutting out in the corridor, the slams getting closer. A wardrobe stood to the left of the door. She set the gun on the bed, got behind the wardrobe, put all her weight against it, straining to shove the enormous piece of furniture across the floor. It inched. They were coming, just a few doors down now.
The wardrobe finally slid. She pushed it behind the door, then went to the desk, pulled it away from the window, braced it against the wardrobe.
Outside, someone said, “I can’t see through this peephole.”
“Unlock it.”
“It is unlocked.”
The door shook. “There’s something blocking it.”
Another man’s voice came very quietly and very evenly through the barricade. “Can you hear me?” Devlin made no response. She picked up the gun. “Open the door right now.” She didn’t move. After a moment, the footsteps trailed away, and she stood trembling