Hannah
“I hate to ask this,” Hannah said as she pulled her hair down from the big bun on the top of her head. “But could you just…make sure he doesn’t touch any of the guns while I shower really quick?”
Evan looked up from the week-old newspaper. He liked to play the Sudoku and crossword puzzles. They helped organize his thoughts, and God knows he needed clarity if he was going to carry out his plan. He just nodded and smiled at Hannah, who quickly ran to the bathroom to shower. The baby was asleep in a pile of blankets on the floor, breathing loudly but evenly.
He heard the sound of the shower turning on, and his mind involuntarily conjured up an image of Hannah out of her clothes. Evan immediately berated himself inwardly for the mental transgression. She’s been through enough without you being sleazy and gross, he told himself. But still, it was hard not to think about it. Her tight, young body under the water, getting wet…
Okay, clearly he needed to focus on other things. He couldn’t exactly innocently explain away a boner if Hannah suddenly walked back into the room without warning. Evan got up and started walking around, careful not to make too much noise and wake the baby. But inside, his thoughts were running a marathon, going ninety miles per hour. He needed to make a decision. Do I tell Hannah about my plan, or do I just keep it to myself until it’s done?
He needed to stay with Hannah until she left the country with the baby, that much was obvious. Was there a way he could sneak off with an excuse while she and Alex stayed here? Maybe they could remain safe, without anybody knowing where they were, while Evan went back to Salvatore’s and killed him. Then they could all make for South America and…
And then part ways, he thought. The notion made him feel a sinking sensation deep in his stomach, but it was what was going to happen, right? That was probably what Hannah wanted, to be free of any and all reminders of her time with Salvatore. It was what she deserved.
In any case, Evan figured, he needed to kill Salvatore as soon as possible. It was the best thing to do to make sure Hannah and Alex were safe. As long as he’s alive, he’ll never stop hunting them, Evan thought. But inside he was aware that it wasn’t just a matter of expediency. He wanted to do it. That was a new feeling for him. In the past, whenever he carried out a hit, it was strictly business. Get in, get out, finish the job as best you can. He’d never enjoyed it, not really. But with Salvatore, he knew it would bring him a level of satisfaction that he’d never known, to wipe at least one piece of disgusting scum off the planet.
“Can you teach me to shoot today?” Hannah asked as she reentered the living room, squeezing her hair with a towel to get the moisture out.
Evan jumped a little, surprised that she’d finished her shower so quickly. “That was fast,” he commented.
“Mothers do everything faster than normal people,” Hannah said by way of explanation. She stepped closer to Evan before shaking her head like a dog, hitting him in the face with water. “Sorry,” she said, but the grin on her face told him that she wasn’t feeling particularly apologetic.
He smiled back at her, and he could feel his mood changing from serious to light-hearted again. Somehow, despite everything Hannah had been through, she had a way of doing that, making him feel lighter. “You want to practice shooting?” he asked.
Hannah nodded. “In case something happens, you know. It’d be useful if I knew what I was doing. If I tried to shoot anybody right now I’d probably just end up hurting myself.”
“We don’t want that,” Evan said without thinking. “Okay. Um. Maybe we’ll do it on the back patio. That way we can watch the baby while we’re practicing.”
Hannah nodded and picked Alex up, swaddling him more securely in the blankets that cushioned his small body. They crossed the length of the house, passing through the kitchen to get through the back door. Evan undid all of the locks and chains before grabbing the kitchen gun, a long, thin rifle with a layer of dust on it. He really needed to clean up around the cabin more often.
Evan gestured at one of the deck chairs, and Hannah put Alex down, making sure the chair was far enough away for the noise not to harm the baby, and that it was secure and wouldn’t rock or fall over. “Okay,” Hannah said. “What first?”
“First, you just watch me,” Evan said.
Hannah’s nose scrunched up in frustration. “I’ve seen people shoot before.”
He almost laughed at how eager she seemed to shoot, but he held himself back, not wanting to offend her. “Just watch me do it once, and then we’ll give you a shot.”
Hannah sighed and nodded, a serious look spreading over her face as Evan lifted the gun and pointed it at a tree near the house. Evan slowly placed his finger on the trigger, pausing in between each step so that Hannah could get a good look at what he was doing. Then, he fired, knocking a branch off the tree with a loud bang.
Evan was sure the noise was going to wake the baby, but he merely shifted in his blankets and smacked his lips. He wondered whether Alex was used to loud noises at this point in his life, and he felt waves of sadness crash over him at the thought. Over the next few minutes, Evan went over basic gun fundamentals with Hannah before handing her the weapon. Safety was first. He taught her how to pick out a target space that wasn’t likely to bounce the bullet back off and ricochet in her direction.
After a half hour or so of lecturing and demonstration, Hannah was beginning to get impatient. “Is it my turn yet?” she asked.
Evan smiled at that. He couldn’t help himself. “Yes, it’s your turn. You ready for it?”
“Oh, yeah. Born ready,” Hannah said. “Well, maybe not born ready. But, I’ve been ready for a really long time.”
“Okay, next rule of shooting,” Evan said as he handed the gun off to her carefully. “Don’t overthink things. Just act.”
Hannah blew out her breath and pointed the gun at the nearest tree. “That’s a bit difficult for me, man.”
“I know,” Evan said, as if he’d known her forever. “But you can do it. Just exhale and pull the trigger.”
Hannah did as instructed, but the bullet missed the tree entirely, whipping past it into the woods and hitting something else out of sight. “Shit,” she muttered under her breath.
Evan rushed to reassure her. “No, no, that’s okay. That was really good for a first try.”
Hannah shook her head at him but didn’t say anything in response, lifting her gun again to fire at the tree a second time. This time it hit, but it mostly skimmed the side of the trunk rather than hitting it in the middle. “Fuck!” she cursed, immediately squeezing the trigger again to try to do better. But this time, it missed the tree entirely again. “Shit, shit, shit.”
Evan could see how tense she was, how much pressure she was putting on herself. She carried her tension in her shoulders, which bunched up around her head. It looked uncomfortable. Before he knew what he was doing, he walked up behind her and put his hands on her arms, rubbing lightly to get her to relax. Halfway through the first stroke, he knew he was crossing a boundary, but he’d already made the decision. Or, at least, his body had.
“What are you—” Hannah began to say, but she cut herself off.
“Hey, just…let go, okay?” Evan said softly, almost whispering. “You can do this. Just let go.”
His hands brushed down from her shoulder, to her arms, past her elbows, and finally stopped at her hands, lightly rubbing over the bones of her wrist. “You got this,” he said.
Hannah exhaled deeply and dropped her shoulders, immediately looking about ten times more relaxed and loose. She breathed in and out a few more times before pulling the trigger again. This was the best shot so far, but it still wasn’t perfect, hitting the tree higher than she’d intended. Evan moved her arm with his hand, positioning it at the best possible angle. “Try it now,” he instructed. Hannah did as she was told, squeezing the trigger, this time hitting the tree square in the middle.
She laughed lightly in obvious surprise.
“You did it,” Evan said, feeling himself grin widely in pride.
“Well, you helped me,” Hannah said, waving her hand as if that took away all of her credit. “It doesn’t really count.”
Evan stepped back, taking his hands off her shoulders. “Try it now,” he said confidently.
“Okaaaay, but I’m just going to fuck it up,” Hannah said in a sing-song tone of voice. She pulled the trigger again, hitting the tree at the exact right spot again. “Jesus….wow,” she breathed softly, clearly talking to herself.
“Yeah, wow,” Evan repeated. “You’re the fastest learner I’ve ever seen.”
“You teach lots of people how to shoot?” Hannah asked, a deep shade of pink spreading across her nose and cheeks in response to the compliment.
“I taught myself,” Evan replied. “I was a very slow learner. Really just shit at it for the longest time.”
Hannah laughed, putting the gun down. “It’s hard to imagine that.”
“What, me sucking?”
“Yeah, you just seem…so in control of things,” she said with a shrug. “Except for avoiding frying pans,” she added with a laugh.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Evan said in response, but he couldn’t keep the smile off his face. God, she’s adorable, he thought to himself. Even when she’s mocking me. No, especially then.
Hannah picked the gun back up and shot a few more times, aiming at a different tree each time. It took some effort, but eventually she hit all of her targets square in the middle. Evan could see her relaxing right before his eyes. Maybe all she needed was to let off some steam.
“Time to move on to smaller targets,” Evan said. “Be right back.” He ran into the house and into his bedroom, searching for the little miniature stop signs he’d used for target practice years ago. He found them a minute later and ran back out, placing them in the ground a little further past the trees to make it more difficult.
“Oh, boy,” Hannah said, anxiety seeping back into her voice.
“No, no, it’s okay,” Evan said reassuringly, walking back over to her to put his hand on her shoulder. “You got this.”
Hannah blew out her breath to get some strands of hair out of her face and lifted the gun again, aiming it at the smaller targets this time. It took a few tries, but soon she was hitting them in the middle or at least close to it. Jesus, maybe she’s better than me, Evan thought. But somehow he wasn’t surprised. She was adaptable. She was strong. She’d probably make a better killer than him, too.
After another half-hour, Hannah put the gun down and walked back over to Alex who was awake and fussing now, picking him up so she could sit in the deck chair and hold him in her lap. “My arm was getting tired,” she explained.
“You’re a really good student,” Evan said softly. He meant it to sound a little teasing, but it was the truth after all.
“You’re a good teacher,” Hannah responded, tilting her face up to smile at him, her eyes lit up like a Christmas tree.
For the first time since he was six years old, that image didn’t fill him with dread and anger. This was a Christmas tree he could learn to love.
***
Hannah
For the rest of the day, they passed the time shooting Evan’s guns and catching up on sleep. God knows Hannah needed it after being awake for so long. Even after two or three naps, she was still so tired that she would often forget what she was saying mid-sentence, trailing off instead into a series of “um”s and “nevermind”s.
But Hannah soon realized that her forgetfulness was a bigger problem than just an embarrassing verbal tic. Late that night, she reached into her bag to heat up some formula for Alex and realized that she was on the last bottle. How did I not manage to buy more before coming here? Hannah asked herself. She had planned everything out so meticulously, taking only what was necessary from Salvatore’s place before going on the run. But the baby’s food? How could she forget something so crucial?
She groaned low and slapped her own forehead out of frustration. This was bad. This was very bad. This meant she’d have to go to the nearest town to buy some, all while remaining low-profile enough to avoid attracting anyone’s attention. For all she knew, Salvatore had put out a crime bulletin to get the tristate area hunting for her. It wasn’t like there was a TV in Evan’s cabin to check.
She sat like that, her head cradled in her hands, for several minutes. After a while she felt Evan come up behind her, but for a minute he didn’t say anything, just watched her before finally placing a hand on her shoulder. “Are you okay?” he whispered.
“Um, yeah, yeah, I’m fine,” she said back, getting to her feet and turning to face him directly. “It’s just…” She trailed off into a sigh.
Evan just stared silently at her, his eyes filled with worry. Hannah was a little surprised, seeing anxiety written clearly on his face like that, but she decided not to ask about it. “I just…I just fucked up, that’s all,” she said with another drawn-out sigh.
“How?” Evan asked softly.
“I didn’t pack enough formula for Alex, and now…I’m gonna run out soon if I don’t go get some. That’s all.”
Evan exhaled heavily, and Hannah could see relief coming off of him in waves. “That’s it? That’s okay. I can go get some.”
Hannah shook her head. “You don’t know what to get. I’m assuming you’ve never fed a baby before, right?”
Evan shook his head. “But it doesn’t matter. You can tell me what to get and I’ll get it. No big deal.”
Hannah immediately felt her muscles tense up in anxiety. Something about that proposition just didn’t sit right with her, but she couldn’t immediately put her finger on why. She just knew that she didn’t want Evan to go into town alone. He might…he might do something, she argued to herself. He might take the opportunity when I’m not watching him to call Salvatore and bring the other men here to overwhelm me.
“I can go by myself,” Hannah said, trying to keep her voice light and casual so her worries weren’t obvious. “It’ll just be an hour.” She immediately walked past Evan towards Alex, picking him up off the floor where he had been playing with his own shoe.
“You’re taking him with you?” Evan asked, his tone a little sharp and accusatory. “Isn’t that…dangerous?”
You’re dangerous, Hannah wanted to say back to him, but she held it in. “He’s safest with me,” she argued.
“Then stay here and I’ll go,” Evan said back, heading towards the door. Hannah had to physically step in front of him to stop him from leaving.
“Wait. No. Okay, cards on the table,” she said, exhaling heavily to steady herself for what she was about to say. “I don’t trust that you won’t betray me. Okay? I just don’t.”
Evan was quiet for a moment, chewing on his bottom lip. “So you still think…you still think I want to hurt you?”
Hannah shrugged. She felt a pang of guilt hit her right in the chest at the sight of Evan’s face falling. Why should I feel guilty? Hannah tried to argue with herself. He’s the murderer. He’s the one who attacked me and started this whole thing. He’s probably known Salvatore longer than I have for God’s sake.
“I just…it’s a hard thing to get over. I don’t mean it in a bad way,” she said a second later.
“There’s a good way?” Evan said sarcastically, but then shook his head and offered a weak smile. “Sorry. I’m sorry. You’re right. Why should you trust me?”
Hannah just stared at him, watching his eyes move back and forth between her own eyes and her mouth, probably waiting for her to say something else. But she couldn’t think of anything else to say. Evan sighed heavily and gestured to Alex. “Look at it this way. One of us should stay here with him, where it’s safe,” he said. “They’ll be looking for you, not me. I should go.”
She looked down at Alex, wiggling in her arms. “I can’t let you go alone,” Hannah said in a low voice, barely above a whisper. “I’m sorry. I just can’t. Please understand.” She knew she was probably hurting Evan by telling the truth, but Alex’s safety had to come first. He was her entire world. She’d do anything for him. So, being a bitch to the guy that tried to hurt them both? Not a big deal in the grand scheme of things.
Evan blew out his breath and nodded. “Okay, so then we both go,” he suggested. “All of us.”
“Shouldn’t…shouldn’t one of us hold down the fort?” Hannah asked, gesturing to the cabin around them.
“The cabin will be safe,” Evan replied. “I’ll lock up before we go out. Look, I just think…if you’re going out there where someone might recognize you, you’ll both be safer if I come with. I can help you in case you get into any trouble.”
“It’ll just be a little while,” Hannah argued, shifting closer towards the door. She was honestly considering bolting at this point, if only to prove a point to Evan. It was a bad habit she had, trying to prove people wrong whenever they suggested her competence was limited. She knew it was just her insecurity talking, but still, it was a difficult impulse to overcome.
“Please,” Evan said, stepping closer to close the gap between their bodies. “Please let’s all go. I promise I won’t try anything. You have my full permission to kill me if I do, or if I prove anything less than useful. Please.”
Hannah wasn’t sure what to say, but then Alex started pulling at her hair, and she had to refocus her attention on the baby instead. “Stop that, silly monkey,” she murmured down to him, rubbing the back of his head.
But Alex was filled with energy, squirming until his body turned to face the other direction, and he reached his little hand out…toward Evan.
Both Hannah and Evan were silent and still for a long moment, watching as the baby struggled to reach out and touch Evan’s chest with his tiny hand. He trusts him, Hannah realized. The baby trusts him.
“Okay,” she whispered, hitching Alex up higher in her arms. “Okay, you can come.”
Evan smiled then, and it was full and genuine, lighting up his whole face and making him look about ten years younger. Hannah couldn’t help but smile back.
They left the cabin, and Hannah went ahead to secure Alex in the car seat while Evan locked up, going around to the back of the house to make sure the back door was equally secure. When he reappeared, he walked to the driver’s side and got in.
Hannah, still in the backseat with Alex, immediately felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand at attention, ready for a fight. “What are you doing?” she asked in a hard tone of voice.
“I’m driving,” Evan said, as if that required no explanation.
“Why…I….no!” Hannah said, stuttering in her frustration. “I’m driving.”
“I know this area pretty well. I can take us to a supermarket quicker than you can,” Evan said.
That’s true…Hannah realized. The longer they stayed out of the cabin, the more danger they were in. Maybe it would be better if Evan drove, that way they could get back as quickly as possible.
But he could take you on the highway and back to Salvatore and you wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. You can’t jump out of a moving vehicle with a baby, she argued back.
Then, the solution hit her, all at once.
“I’m taking a gun,” Hannah said. “Give me the house keys, I’m getting a gun. And I’m going to hold onto it the entire time. Get my meaning?” The second you stray off the beaten path and take us into danger, I’m blowing your brains out, she silently vowed.
“Yeah, I get it,” Evan said, handing her the key to the cabin. Hannah quickly ran in and grabbed the first loaded gun she saw, as well as her bag full of supplies, just in case. She slammed the door back behind her as she bolted back to the car. She was a little scared that Evan could pull out of the woods and take off with Alex, but he stayed still the entire time. That was yet another opportunity Evan had to fuck her over, and he didn’t take it. Still, she held onto the gun as tightly as she could as she climbed back inside the vehicle.
“Okay,” she said, breathing hard after her short stint of running back and forth. “Let’s go. Closest supermarket you got.”
Evan nodded and switched the engine on, pulling out of the trees and back onto the rocky road. “I’m glad you…I’m glad you feel comfortable holding a gun,” he said after a short moment of silence.
“Well, I’m a fast learner. And I get over things quick,” Hannah said without thinking, turning to stare out of the window. Alex was fussing a little in his seat, but she couldn’t pick him up with a gun in her hand.
Evan was watching her in the rearview mirror, she realized after a minute on the road. There was a little smile on his face, his eyes shining in the reflection of the mirror. “What?” Hannah finally said after another minute of being watched.
“Nothing, nothing,” Evan replied. “It’s just…you really fucked me up with that frying pan. Imagine what you could do with a real weapon like the one you’re holding.”
Hannah smirked a little, feeling proud of herself. She was good at causing damage. Maybe that wasn’t the best thing to be proud of, but it was a nice change of pace, considering all the damage she’d suffered herself.
“You’re nice to me,” Hannah murmured, just thinking out loud.
“Somebody’s gotta be nice to you,” Evan said in response.
“What does that mea—” Before Hannah could finish her sentence, their car was suddenly rammed from behind, another vehicle appearing out of nowhere on the dirt road.
“Shit!” Evan yelled.
“Keep driving,” Hannah said without thinking. Maybe it was just an accident, just bad luck. Maybe it was just a distracted driver who rear-ended them because he wasn’t paying attention. But they couldn’t afford to take the chance.
“Don’t worry, I am,” Evan said, hitting the accelerator so hard the engine revved as they sped down the road.
“Oh, no,” Hannah whispered as she saw the car give chase. There were at least three men inside, all dressed in black. Salvatore’s men, she realized.
The other car quickly caught up with them, driving up alongside them and lightly ramming their sides together, sending Hannah skittering across the backseat. “Shit!”
Alex wailed next to her, and she was just about to turn and cover him with her body to shield him from the momentum of the other car’s impact when she remembered the gun sitting between her legs. The gun!
“I’m gonna shoot,” Hannah said, turning in her seat to roll her window down.
“Be careful!” Evan shouted, wildly turning the steering wheel left, then right, trying to out maneuver the car next to them.
“Will do,” Hannah vowed before sticking the barrel of the gun out of the window and pulling the trigger, immediately shattering the glass of one of the other car’s windows.
She tried to aim for one of the men inside, but it was hard with the cars moving so quickly back and forth across the road. Next to her, Alex was crying loudly in his seat, but Hannah couldn’t worry about that right now. She had to protect him. She had to fight for him.
Evan sped up, and their car shot past the attackers’ vehicle. “I’m going to slam on the brakes, okay?” Evan said.
“What? Why?” Hannah demanded to know.
“Because they won’t be expecting it. You’ll have a second to aim for their heads and shoot.”
“Their heads?” Hannah asked, her heart pounding in her throat so loud she wasn’t sure if she could even speak over the force of its pumping. “I don’t know if I’m ready for—” For murder, she finished inwardly.
“You are, Hannah, you are, you can do it,” Evan said. “I know you can. On three, okay?”
“Okay, okay,” Hannah said back, tightening her grip on the gun. I can do this. I can do this. I’m a tough motherfucking warrior woman and I can do this.
“One,” Evan said, the car speeding up a little more. It was probably going ninety or ninety-five down the narrow dirt road.
Hannah placed her finger on the trigger.
“Two.”
She pointed the gun upwards, the tip just outside her open window. I can do this. I can be strong, she said to herself, even as her hands started shaking like they were in a blender.
“Three!” Evan hit the brakes, hard. The car skidded to a stop as the other car slowed down but still shot ahead of them.
Hannah had a perfect view of their heads through the back window. At the last second, she made a decision. Yes. I can do this.
She aimed, exhaled deeply, and fired, shooting out one of their back tires before immediately re-focusing the gun and doing the same to the other one. “Go!” she shouted at Evan, who immediately complied.
They shot past the car full of Salvatore’s men and roared down the little road, taking as many turns as possible to throw the men off their trail before finally finding a main road.
“Jesus,” Evan muttered. Hannah wiped the sweat off her forehead and put the gun down on the floor, turning to take stock of Alex. He didn’t look hurt, at least, even if he was crying like he had been.
Hannah stared at the back of Evan’s head. If he hadn’t been driving…me and Alex would probably be dead, if not worse.
“Next time, steal a faster car,” Evan said from the front, and the entire situation was so ridiculous Hannah couldn’t help but laugh through her hoarse throat.
Evan joined her, and together they giggled hysterically, partly out of relief, partly out of plain exhaustion. And fear. Hannah had never felt so afraid in her entire life. Salvatore was still coming after her, and he knew where she was. He must have traced the location of the cabin somehow, maybe through Evan’s credit cards or bank statements.
Hannah leaned forward and pressed her head between her knees, trying to get the nausea in her stomach to dissipate.
“You didn’t shoot them,” Evan commented from the front seat.
Hannah had to suppress a groan. She was hoping they weren’t going to talk about it. “I just couldn’t…I couldn’t do it, okay? I’m weak. I’m a pussy,” she said, feeling just about as defeated as she ever had. Her stomach was calming down, but she stayed bent over, hiding her face from Evan.
“No, no, I…it was good. It was a good thing that you did.”
“Not shooting the fuckers that are hunting me and my son?” she said, feeling beads of sweat course down her neck and disappear under the collar of her shirt.
“Not taking life if you don’t have to,” Evan said, and for a second she thought he was mocking her, but when she leaned up to look at his face in the mirror, she could tell he was serious. “It’s easy to kill. It’s so fucking easy. Humans are so fragile.”
“Yeah,” Hannah said, her brain taking a long minute to process his words.
“It’s so easy to fuck that up. You made the hard choice. That’s all…that’s all I wanted to say,” Evan said, clearing his throat as he finished speaking.
“Well, thank you,” Hannah murmured in response. “That’s…that’s nice to hear.” She wanted to say something bigger, something stronger. It was so much more than just “nice.” She wanted to thank him for making her feel brave, for turning a moment of weakness into a moment of strength. But she was too scared to focus. Salvatore’s coming. Old Salvatore’s coming. He’s coming and he’s going to kill us now. He’s going to kill us all.
***
Evan
“We’ll stop for formula later, okay?” Evan said, turning his head to check to make sure Hannah was still awake. She nodded back at him, chewing on her lower lip. Her entire face looked grey as a tombstone. It was like the last of her energy had been sapped away by the attack. “Hey, it’s going to be okay,” he said, trying to sound as reassuring as possible and probably failing.
“Yeah,” Hannah murmured back, but he could tell by the distant, dead way her voice sounded that she hadn’t even really heard him. Evan couldn’t really blame her for finally losing it. The woman had been through so much over the past several days, not even taking into account the years of abuse and mistreatment from Salvatore. Everybody had their breaking point and Hannah seemed to have reached hers. That was okay, though, Evan thought, tightening his grip on the steering wheel. He’d have to be strong enough for all of them.
“We’re just going to keep driving, keep going for a while, and then I know another place, a place that I don’t own, that they can’t trace back to me. Okay? It’s going to be all right.” This time Hannah said nothing, so Evan let silence fall in the car. He just hoped the car would hold together well enough to get them to the next hiding place. They’d been hit pretty hard and they hadn’t had a chance yet to stop and take stock of the damage.
How did they find me? Evan wondered. It must have been the cabin. The men had probably been on their way to storm the place and coincidentally ran into them on their way out. Did Salvatore know that he’d betrayed him? Or did he think that Evan had simply failed and run off to his cabin to lick his wounds? Or...had Salvatore planned on sending guys after him no matter what, just to get out of paying the bill?
Evil sonofabitch, Evan thought. This only strengthened his resolve to get rid of him somehow. Hannah might be too good, too pure to kill something, but Evan sure as hell wasn’t, especially when it came to Salvatore.
They drove farther and farther away from the cabin, into the bright twinkling lights of the nearby town. Christmas lights were strung up on every available surface, red and green and white and gold surrounding them on all sides.
“Where are we going?” Hannah finally asked several minutes later.
“Opposite side of the woods,” Evan replied.
Hannah made a little noise of distress, somewhere between a groan and a whimper.
“They won’t find us there, I promise,” Evan said. “There are old hunting cabins that people don’t use in the winter. We’ll pick one and break in. They won’t be able to find us out of all the cabins. It’d take them weeks or even months to search them all.”
“That won’t stop Salvatore,” Hannah said sadly. “He’ll never give up.”
She was right, but Evan didn’t want to say that just now. He figured he’d wait to tell her his plan until she’d calmed down a bit more.
“It was a good thing that you brought the gun,” he said, trying to get her to cheer up a little. But she just grunted in response, and he couldn’t tell if she agreed or not.
Honestly, she was scaring him a little. She was practically catatonic, giving one or two word answers and grunting or groaning instead of talking. He wondered if Salvatore had finally broken her. No, no, she’s stronger than that, his inner voice argued, and it sounded so confident, so secure in its knowledge of Hannah’s strength.
It surprised Evan to hear how powerfully he believed that Hannah was tough, that she was resilient, that she would bounce back from this just as she’d bounced back from all the other terrible shit in her life. It lit a fire in his belly, thinking about how tough she was. I wish I were that tough, he thought.
Even though he’d killed countless people, he felt almost amputated emotionally, like he was walking around with a huge internal wound that bled and bled and bled until there was nothing good or pure or strong left in Evan. But Hannah was different. Hannah had kept her identity. She’d stayed kind. Evan couldn’t say the same thing about himself.
Evan sighed deeply and drove faster, trying to escape the Christmas lights and return to the wilderness. They still made him feel a little sick to his stomach to see. They reminded him of the day he’d lost himself, the day he’d decided he’d rather be the one hurting someone than the person getting hurt. They day he lost his strength.
He stopped at a tiny grocery store on the outskirts of town. Somehow, through her haze, Hannah was able to find the formula Alex needed.
“You saved us,” Hannah murmured once they were back in the car. They drove back into the woods, albeit far away from his own cabin.
Evan shook his head. “No, Hannah. You saved us.”
She didn’t seem capable of arguing, but he could see her purse her lips and furrow her brow in the rearview mirror. “It’s okay. You’re tougher than me,” Evan said softly. But Hannah didn’t say anything. He wished he could hold her tight and squeeze life back into her, or otherwise absorb her fear and her pain until everything was okay again.
Alex started crying again, pitifully sniffling and sobbing quietly rather than giving off the huge wails he emitted when he wanted attention. Hannah turned to him. Evan saw her kiss the top of his head and felt a burning pain in his heart. I have to protect them, he thought. I have to keep them safe.
They rolled to a stop in front of an anonymous-looking hunting cabin with all the lights switched off. Evan got out of the car and took his lock-pick from his pocket, immediately working on the front door with ease.
“Where’d you learn to do that?” Hannah said behind him. She must have gotten out of the car right after he did. Evan looked over his shoulder to get a look at her holding Alex. She was bouncing him quickly in her arms and chewing on her entire bottom lip. It was clear that she was too anxious to stay still at the moment.
“Tool of the trade,” he answered her. The lock clicked and Evan pushed on the knob, slowly sticking his head in to look around for anybody waiting just inside the door. He’d learned his lesson from the last time he broke into a locked room, that was for sure. After a second, when he was sure the room was empty, he nodded at Hannah and gestured for her to follow him inside. Evan found a light switch and flicked it on.
“Shouldn’t we wait in the dark?” Hannah suggested as she closed the door behind them. “That way if someone comes back we have time to get out before they realize we’re here?”
Evan hadn’t really thought of that, but before answering her he ran a finger over the coffee table, removing a thick layer of dust. “They’d see our car first anyway. But we can if you want, if it’ll make you feel better,” he replied. “But I don’t think anyone’s been here for a really long time.”
Hannah nodded and adjusted Alex in her arms, walking around to look at the mantel above the fireplace. “They’re rich, whoever they are.”
“How can you tell?” Evan asked.
“They’ve got this urn up here,” Hannah said. “It looks like it’s got, like, jewels embedded in the side. Very fancy.”
“You’ve got a thief’s eye,” Evan said with a smile. “Got your eyes on the goods.”
Hannah gave a half shrug. “I used to think that way, anyway, as a kid.” Before Evan had an opportunity to ask what she meant, Hannah turned and walked up to him, holding Alex out towards Evan. “I’m gonna go get the gun and formula from the car. Can you…hold him for a second?”
Evan immediately felt a wave of anxiety crash over him. He didn’t know why he felt so weird holding the kid. It wasn’t like he had never held a baby before, but Alex was just so sweet, so accepting of his touch. It felt gross, touching a sweet innocent little kid with his murderous hands. But still, he nodded and took the baby into his arms as Hannah walked back out to the car. He stared down into Alex’s eyes, still a little wet from his earlier crying. “You’ve been through so much already,” Evan murmured out loud, even though he knew Alex couldn’t possibly understand him.
Alex’s tiny hand reached up and brushed against Evan’s chin, playfully batting him on one side of his face and then the other. Evan felt himself smiling again, the baby’s eyes twinkling as he laughed at him. Evan couldn’t help himself. He had to lean in and kiss the top of his head. He’d never done that to anyone before in his life. Evan was almost afraid that he was going to mess it up, but Alex just giggled and squirmed happily in his arms.
Hannah had walked back into the room, and now she was standing just inside the threshold of the door, staring at him holding Alex. Evan felt a flash of heat go over his face and neck and shoulders, flushing with embarrassment. He wanted to ask her how much she’d seen, like he was caught doing something terrible, but instead he just cleared his throat and walked back toward Hannah, offering Alex back.
But Hannah just shook her head. “No, no, you can hold him. It’s okay. It’ll give me a chance to get his bottle ready.”
Evan didn’t know what to do for a second, but he found himself tightening his arms around Alex, holding him closer. “Um, thank you,” he murmured to Hannah.
She just nodded and shut the door behind her, turning around to set all the locks in place. “Are you sure nobody’s going to walk in on us?”
Evan nodded. “Yeah, nobody’s going to come up hunting on Christmas. Everybody’s out shopping and doing all that bullshit.” Despite reassuring her, Evan could understand why she was so terrified. She’d just seen proof that Salvatore had sent even more men after her. It wasn’t realistic to expect her to calm down that easily, but he hoped he could help quell her nerves.
“Christmas. I almost forgot,” Hannah whispered. She was still holding the gun, and Evan saw her hand tighten its grip around the shaft, her knuckles going incredibly white, like she was holding on to a lifeline. He wondered if he could convince her to put it down. “It’s weird. Just a few days ago I was buying a Christmas tree for me and Alex.”
“You like Christmas?” Evan asked. He didn’t know why he felt surprised. Almost everybody did, except for him.
Hannah shrugged. “I used to. As a kid, my family and I—” She cut herself off and shook her head. “Never mind.”
“No, I want to know,” Evan said softly, trying not to sound too persistent or demanding. She’d been through enough without him dragging her kicking and screaming through a conversation she didn’t want to have. But maybe talking about something else would distract her from the matter at hand. “You liked Christmas as a kid?”
Hannah nodded slowly and walked back over to the fancy fireplace, squatting down on the floor to sit next to it. She set down the gun and started to rummage through her stuff, mixing Alex’s formula with some bottled water from her bag. “I mean, all kids do, right?”
Evan’s mouth moved to respond without his brain’s permission. “I didn’t.”
She handed Alex’s bottle to Evan, her mouth open in wordless question for a minute before she spoke again. “I assumed you loved Christmas,” Hannah said. “That’s why…the Christmas lights, right? I found them on you when you broke in.”
Evan shook his head. “No, no, I hate it.” He didn’t say anything else by way of explanation. He rearranged Alex in his grip to help him drink from his bottle. He felt tiny beads of sweat appear under his arms. He tried to tell himself that it was just because he was holding Alex too tightly and the contact was making him overheated, but he knew it was because of nervousness instead.
“Why?” Hannah asked, turning to sit facing him instead of the fireplace.
Evan blew out his breath and started pacing back and forth across the room. He knew he looked weird as hell, just walking around pointlessly while feeding a baby, but he needed to move if he was going to tell this story. He needed to trick himself into thinking that there was a chance he could run away from it entirely.
A part of him was screaming internally, yelling at him to stop, utterly terrified of what he was about to do. But another part of him couldn’t think of anything else but the look on Hannah’s face. For the first time in hours, she didn’t look scared. She wasn’t calm, exactly. But her eyes were laser focused on him, staring at him with an intensity he’d never seen in her before. She was burning with curiosity, that much was obvious. Maybe it was just a temporary distraction, but Evan was willing to jump on it if it meant making Hannah feel something other than fear.
“I, um, I was six years old. I guess I liked Christmas before then, but it’s hard to remember, you know. My family didn’t have a whole lot, so maybe it was just like any other day of the year.” Evan cleared his throat again, feeling his heart pound up around his Adam’s apple. If he was going to do this, he had to tell the truth, the whole truth. Otherwise, what was the point? “Actually, that’s not true. I remember…I remember being excited. I was looking forward to it. Not because of the presents or whatever, but because…my dad was going to be off work. And we’d get to spend time with him, my mom and me and my sisters. We’d get to…” He trailed off, uncertain of where the sentence was going to end up.
“Be a family?” Hannah suggested from her position on the floor.
The words hit Evan like daggers to the heart. Just that phrase: a family. For some reason, there was nothing that could hurt him more than that, even now that he was practically middle-aged. Why are you such a little baby? Evan berated himself. Why does this still hurt so much? Why do you still give a fuck? He didn’t say that out loud, though. At the very least he had a tiny bit of restraint left that kept his voice steady as he simply answered, “Yeah. Yeah, I guess so.”
He lifted Alex up over his shoulder, patting his back gently. “Anyway, my dad came home on Christmas Eve, you know, and everything was fun. It was nice, hanging around him. But he was…he was weird. He was quiet. I remember thinking, oh, he might be coming down with something, because I had had a cold the week before, but no. That wasn’t it. It was…um….” He trailed off again, but this time Hannah was silent. He could see in his peripheral vision that she was still staring at him, just waiting for him to finish the thought himself. “The next morning, Christmas morning, I woke up and there was a note on the kitchen table. And I thought, Santa! You know how kids are. Dumb. I ran over as fast as I could to read it, but… It was my dad, instead. He was leaving the family, he said. He wrote, ‘don’t try to look for me.’” Evan paused to swallow thickly. “And then there were no more Christmases.” Not for me, Evan added silently.
“Jesus,” Hannah murmured.
Evan stared down at Alex, who was starting to nod off over his shoulder. “Yeah,” Evan replied.
“You win the shitty childhood award,” Hannah said a minute later, and Evan couldn’t help himself. He had to smile at that and tear his gaze away from Alex to look at her, a mischievous grin spreading across her face in slow motion.
“Well, what about you?” Evan asked, walking over to sit down next to Hannah by the fireplace. “Why’d you stop liking Christmas?”
Hannah shifted next to him, bending and unbending her legs over and over again, clearly trying to get comfortable. “It wasn’t…when I was a kid, it was fine, you know. We were poor as shit and we always stole stuff to get each other presents. My parents had way too many fucking kids. I was the only girl, and I think they kind of spoiled me, giving me lots of stolen stuff each year. But it was nice. I got to have good Christmases as a kid. It’s just…”
Evan wondered if he should say something to prod her to continue, but he decided to just wait, looking at her as her brow furrowed and her eyes closed in concentration. “It’s our anniversary. Christmas.”
It took a few seconds for realization to dawn on Evan. “You…you and Salvatore?”
“Yeah,” Hannah whispered, her voice hoarse and rough sounding, as if it had to punch its way out of her throat. “Me and good old Sal.”
“How many years?” Evan asked. He wondered if he’d known Salvatore longer than Hannah had.
“Seven,” she said. So, they’d each known him for roughly the same amount of time. How the hell did she survive seven full years with that asshole? Evan wondered.
They sat in silence for a while, the wind outside growing louder and louder with each passing minute. After a while, Hannah finally spoke again. “It’s the hardest thing, you know. Like, I grew up rough. My family wasn’t perfect, but at least my siblings and I loved each other. Salvatore…Salvatore never loved me. But I can’t look back on everything as a mistake, because it gave me Alex. You know?”
Evan didn’t know. But with Alex slumbering in his lap, snoring lightly, he could imagine what that felt like. He wished he could go back in time and kill Salvatore before he’d ever met Hannah, before he’d ever hurt her, but at the same time, Alex was this tiny beautiful miracle, this amazing thing that came out of the worst circumstances imaginable. It was hard to know how to feel about that.
“So, um, every Christmas,” Hannah started to say. “Every Christmas I think, that’s another year of my life gone, but this year at least…at least I have something to hold on to. That’s why I was making a tree. I thought, this could me and Alex’s thing. We could have Christmas together. We could be our own family,” she said softly.
Evan felt his stomach sink. That’s what the Christmas tree had meant to her, a beautiful warm memory for her and her son. And he had come in with his Christmas lights and tried to ruin it. He didn’t know if he had ever actually grasped what guilt was before this moment, but now he knew. Now it wrapped around his entire body, binding him together like a mummy. “I’m—I’m sorry,” he whispered, barely audibly.
“It’s okay,” Hannah said, but it was clear from the forced way she said it that it wasn’t okay, not at all. “Anyway, it’s not Christmas yet. Not for another few days.”
“Do you want…do you want to make a tree here?”
Hannah shook her head. “It’s not safe, right? We should just stay here for as long as possible to throw off the trail. We can’t leave and get a tree.”
Evan wanted to argue with her, but he knew she was right. There was no way they could go out to a main road without possibly attracting the attention of another set of hitmen. “There’s another way, you know,” he said a minute later.
“What do you mean?” Hannah asked.
He bit down on his bottom lip, inwardly begging for the courage to say his plan out loud. He didn’t know how she would react, but he realized now that she deserved to know. “Cut the snake off at the head. Salvatore.”
Hannah was quiet a moment, and Evan was afraid that she didn’t understand, but then she whispered, “You mean…?”
“Give him exactly what he deserves,” Evan said. “It’s the only way.”
She shook her head and shifted away from him as if on reflex, creating space between their two bodies. “No.”
Evan felt his entire body flush. He didn’t know whether he felt ashamed or angry. “Why? Why not?” He wondered if she was protecting Salvatore, if some part of Hannah, however small, wanted to keep him safe out of love. His stomach burned at the idea.
“Because it’s a stupid plan, that’s why,” Hannah said. “Because you’ll get yourself killed.”
“Not if I do it smart,” Evan shot back. “I know how the organization works. I know the weak spots, and I know how I can sneak in without anyone noticing. I know who he’s got protecting him. I can handle it. I know I can.”
Hannah reached over and scooped Alex out of Evan’s arms, and Evan felt a pang of loss in his chest. She’s mad at me, he realized. “You’ll get yourself killed,” Hannah said again before shushing Alex as he whined and reached his arms out in Evan’s direction. “You don’t know what he’s capable of.”
“And he doesn’t know what I’m capable of,” Evan said back, feeling himself get more and more frustrated with each passing second.
She sighed deeply and brushed a stray strand of hair back from her forehead. “So what’s the plan, then? You go back to Salvatore’s place, break in, sneak around until you get to Salvatore, kill him, sneak back out?”
“Something like that,” Evan admitted, even though her tone conveyed that she didn’t think it was a good plan.
Hannah shook her head several times and stared down at Alex in her lap. “Even if you can make that work, then what? You think Salvatore’s the only big man in the organization? You think he doesn’t have top lieutenants who are loyal to him? If you kill him, they will never stop hunting you.”
“And they’ll never find me,” Evan shot back.
“They found you, like, one day after you hid out in your cabin!” Hannah half shouted. “How are you going to hide from them forever?”
“How are you?” Evan asked, and he couldn’t keep the note of accusation out of his voice. “How are you going to keep yourself safe on the run from him forever? You’re right. They found us, they found us much easier than I would have guessed. Doesn’t that tell you something? Doesn’t that tell you that you will never be safe while they’re out there?” He paused to let her answer him, but she just stared back at him with her mouth firmly shut. “Please. Hannah, just trust me. Salvatore will never stop hunting you. He’ll never give up. He’ll never let go of Alex, or you. He’ll send everything he’s got after you until he knows you’re dead. It’s the only way.” His eyes fell down to his own two hands, and images flashed through his head, one after another after another after another, freeze-frame shots of all the people he’d killed with those hands over the years. “Please. I can do this. I can do this.”
“It won’t solve anything,” Hannah said softly. “It’ll just make you a murderer.”
“I’m already a murderer,” Evan replied.
He saw Hannah go pale, like she’d forgotten the way they’d met. “Yeah. I guess you are. And if you do this, that’s all you’ll ever be,” she said, getting to her feet and walking away. “I’m going to bed. Goodnight.”
Evan just sat still, listening to her footsteps recede until she found a bedroom, slamming the door behind her. If he strained his ears, he could hear Alex crying, high and sharp. He sat like that for a long moment, balling his hands into fists and staring down at them. Instruments of death, Evan thought. That’s all they are. That’s all they’ll ever be.
She was right, wasn’t she? There was no going back now. But at least he could do what he could to keep her safe, even if he made her hate him in the process.