Page 20 of The Pact

“What do we do?” Kevin shouted.

Aaron blinked, looked around. “We gotta get out! Front door! Run!”

They dashed across the living room, reached the door. Kevin saw a white fist on the knob. Aaron yanked hard. Once. Twice. The door didn’t budge. Only then did he remember the door was boarded up.

“Break the window!” Kevin shouted.

Without speaking, Aaron raced to their pile of wood and snatched up a length of two-by-four. Swinging it like a baseball bat, he struck the window. Glass shattered, tinkled onto the floor.

Kevin swatted the curtain aside only to see plywood blocking their way out. “Everything’s boarded up!”

Waves of heat and smoke surged at them, burning his face, stinging his eyes.

“Back door!” Aaron cried.

Kevin stumbled toward the kitchen doorway only to realize the old plank floor had caught fire. A wall of flames and debris and choking black smoke. Heat washed over him like waves of boiling water, hot enough to burn skin. He lunged backward, put up his hands to protect his face.

Kevin choked out a sound of pure terror. “We’re trapped!” he cried.

“No, we’re not.” Aaron grabbed his arm, pulling him back and shoving him toward the stairwell. “Come on!”

Kevin balked. “We won’t be able to get down!”

“We break a window and jump.” Aaron motioned toward the flames, which had engulfed the floor with astounding speed. “It’s the only way. Come on!”

Chased by heat and flames, the boys clambered up the stairs.

The beam of Tomasetti’s Maglite reveals a barely visible path through the trees. A deer trail, I realize.

“What’s the next road to the north of us?” he asks.

“Laurel Creek Road.” Even as I say the words, I hit my lapel mike. “I need a unit dispatched to the bridge at Laurel Creek Road.”

Glock responds instantly. “Ten-seventy-six,” he says, letting me know he’s on the way.

“We think the boys may be headed that way, along the greenbelt,” I tell him.

A beat of silence and then Glock says, “If I’m not mistaken, Chief, the old Leyendecker place is out that way.”

A distant memory stirs. The house is remote and difficult to get to. But I recall when the owner, Erol Leyendecker, passed away, years ago. None of his children wanted the place and the house fell to ruin and was abandoned.

“Eyes open,” I tell him. “I’m ten-seventy-six.”

Aaron had always had a good relationship with God. It was one of the things his parents had instilled at an early age. He said his before-meal and after-meal prayers. He said another prayer at night before he went to sleep. And he never took the Lord’s name in vain. Now, standing at the top of the stairs, watching the black smoke billow toward them, he hoped God had been listening.

Next to him, Kevin was bent at the hip, coughing his head off. “How do we get down?” he choked.

“Let’s find a window.” It was darker up here, away from the flames. Wishing for a flashlight, Aaron felt his way down a narrow hall. The first room was on his right. He darted in, made his way to the rectangle of light that was the window. Using his elbow, he broke the glass and looked out. Even in the dark and flying snow he saw that there was no tree or rooftop or trellis upon which to climb down. Just a fifteen-foot drop without so much as a bush to break the fall.

Kevin choked back tears. “Let’s try the next room.”

In unison, the boys charged the door. Aaron was in the hall, feeling his way through the darkness, when a crash sounded somewhere in the house. Simultaneously, a hot puff of smoke hit his face. The roar he’d been hearing became deafening. Suddenly, he could see. Smoke hovered at the ceiling. He glanced over his shoulder. Panic punched him in the gut when he saw flames creeping up the stairs.

“Come on!” Taking Kevin’s arm, he sprinted down the hall toward the farthest door, hitting it with both hands. It flew open, banged against the wall. The boys stumbled inside.

A blast of heat followed, a hot hand slapping their backs.

“Close the door!” Kevin shouted.