‘Stay where you are,’ a voice says behind him.
Rex turns and sees James aiming his hunting rifle at him.
‘No sudden movements now,’ he says. ‘Put your hands where I can see them, slowly.’
‘What are you—’
‘I’ll shoot, I’ll shoot you right in the face,’ James yells.
Rex shows his empty hands and tries to figure out what’s going on.
‘Kill him,’ Lawrence whispers from the corner behind the lamp.
‘Where’s your rifle?’ James asks, waving the barrel at him.
‘I left it in some trees,’ Rex replies, trying to sound as calm as possible.
‘And your knife?’ Lawrence hisses. ‘Where’s your knife?’
‘In my belt.’
James takes a step closer and stares at him with a fevered look in his eyes.
‘Loosen your belt and let the knife drop to the floor.’
‘Shoot him instead,’ the other man says, shuffling his feet impatiently.
‘I’m unbuckling it now,’ Rex says gently.
‘If you do anything stupid you’re dead,’ James warns, resting the rifle against his shoulder. ‘I promise you. I’d be only too happy to shoot you.’
‘He killed Kent,’ Lawrence says, in a louder voice.
‘Don’t do anything stupid,’ Rex pleads.
‘Shut up,’ James shouts.
Rex unbuckles his belt and the weight of the hunting knife pulls it onto the floor beside his leg.
‘Kick the knife over here,’ James commands.
Rex kicks the knife, but it rolls only a metre across the carpet before coming to a stop.
‘Kick it again!’ James says impatiently.
Rex moves forward and kicks it harder, sending it over to the armchair.
‘Now back away and get down on your knees,’ James says.
Rex takes a few steps back and kneels down.
‘Shoot him,’ Lawrence repeats. ‘Right in the forehead.’
‘So you seem to think I had something to do with Kent’s death?’ Rex says tentatively.
James marches over and strikes him in the face with the butt of the rifle.
It hits his right eyebrow, his neck jerks and his vision fades for a few seconds. Rex slumps sideways. The pain throbs and burns.
‘You were in our zone!’ James shrieks, holding the barrel to his temple. ‘I’ll shoot. I don’t care what happens …’
‘Shoot him!’ Lawrence calls in a gruff voice.
‘I was looking for Sammy,’ Rex gasps.
‘Where the hell are our phones?’ James asks, pressing the barrel harder against his head.
‘I don’t know. I haven’t touched them,’ Rex replies quickly. ‘But I have an iPad in the suitcase on my bed. We can call for help on that.’
‘Shut up,’ James snorts. ‘You know perfectly well that there’s no fucking Wi-Fi …’
The door opens and someone comes into the room.
‘Dad?’ Sammy calls into the dimly lit suite.
‘Get DJ!’ Rex shouts to his son before the next blow hits him.
He falls onto his back, raises his head and sees that Lawrence has already reached the hallway.
‘Sammy!’ Rex gasps.
Lawrence grabs his son by the hair, drags him across the floor and hits him across the face with the handle of his hunting knife. He forces Sammy down onto his stomach, sits astride him, pulls his head back by the hair and puts the knife to his throat.
James is breathing faster now, and closes his mouth and moistens his lips before standing over Rex, and pressing the rifle to his forehead.
‘This ends here,’ he says. ‘Understand? This ends here. You’re done. Getting your revenge doesn’t change anything. It doesn’t make anything better.’
The barrel is shaking and James steadies it by pushing it harder into Rex’s face.
‘We didn’t know what we were doing,’ James goes on. ‘It just happened. We knew it was wrong, but we’re not bad people, we were just young and stupid.’
‘You don’t have to apologise,’ Lawrence shouts at James.
‘What did you do?’ Rex gasps.
‘I’d never rape anyone. It wasn’t me, it was Wille … and the whole fucking school looked the other way. We all knew that, because no one cared what we did in the Rabbit Hole.’
‘You’re talking about Grace?’ Rex says.
‘Shoot him! Now!’ Lawrence pants.
James turns the gun around and hits Rex in the face with the butt several times. The room vanishes with each blow, only to reappear hazily before fading again.
‘Dad!’
Rex hears Sammy scream as more blows strike his face. It’s like something from a different world. His mouth hurts, and one eye. He’s tumbling into darkness. He tries to resist, but loses consciousness.
His head is throbbing when he comes to. His face is sticky with blood, and his wounds are stinging. He can vaguely tell that the men are tearing strips of cloth and tying his arms behind his back. He hears them hunting through his things, and realises that they’re looking for the phones.
‘I’ll go and check the boy’s room,’ he hears Lawrence say.
Rex tries to turn his head to look at Sammy, but he can’t move. He tries to shout, but he can’t get any words out. The only sound that emerges is the bubbling of blood in his throat.
104
Four security guards from Timberline Knolls Residential Treatment Centre led Saga to the gates where they waited for the police to arrive. They gave an account of the intrusion and handed her over to the two police officers.
Saga dozed off on a bench in the police station’s holding cell. She wasn’t allowed to talk to anyone.
The following afternoon she was moved to a windowless interview room. She still wasn’t allowed to make any calls, but a female officer took down all the names and contact numbers Saga gave her.
Towards evening, when they began to realise she might actually be telling the truth, the FBI were called in. But because their offices had closed for the day she was taken back to the holding cell, where she slept on a hard rubber bunk.
It’s nine o’clock in the morning when Special Agent Jocelyn López arrives at the custody unit. She already seems over-caffeinated, and she somehow looks even more unhappy than last time.
‘Did you like the hotel?’ she asks once she’s signed Saga out.
‘Not much.’
They leave the police station in silence and get into López’s silver Pontiac.
‘I need to borrow a phone,’ Saga says.
‘To call your boss?’ López asks as she starts the car.
‘Yes.’
‘I’ve already spoken to him, several times.’
‘Then you know that I need to make a call,’ Saga says.
‘Forget it.’
‘It’s important.’
‘Bauer, you Swedes might be good-looking, but you’re not very smart, are you?’
Saga doesn’t know exactly how the incident has been resolved between the various authorities, but it seems clear that the Swedish side has guaranteed she’ll go back home without causing any more problems.
López leads Saga Bauer into Terminal 1 of O’Hare International Airport, thanks her for her cooperation and pins a large badge of a smiling onion with the words ‘My Kind of Town’ on her jacket.
A transport officer assumes responsibility for her departure. He seems very good-humoured, and as he takes her to check in he says he’s been watching a television show about Vikings.
The lines at security are long. After forty-five minutes they’ve reached only halfway. The police officer gets a call on his radio, replies, then looks over towards the escalators before turning to Saga.
‘I have to go, but you’ll be all right, won’t you? Your plane leaves in four hours. Grab a hamburger and keep an eye on the boards for your gate number.’
He forces his way back through the crowd and hurries off, talking into his radio.
Saga moves slowly forward in line.
Her phone has been destroyed, so she has no idea what Joona has found out about Rex and Oscar.
It’s possible that more people have died because she got stopped before she had time to talk to Grace.
She’s not going to cause any more problems. She’ll head home, but first she just needs to get out to the rehab centre one last time, and then somehow call Joona.
Something happened during the rape that Grace hasn’t told her.
There was someone else in the Rabbit Hole.