Backwoods Read online

  Or into that most fecund ditch of all,

  The folly that man does

  Or must suffer, if he woos

  A proud woman not kindred of his soul.

  As he thought about Lila, that passage from the poem recurred to him as well.

  At the top of the stairs, Suzette led him across a small lobby toward a pair of doors. There, she paused by a key pad and punched in a quick series of numbers, unlocking them.

  The entry opened onto an expansive living room with exposed brick and hardwood beams meant to lend a rustic but contemporary architectural feel. The entire far wall was floor-to-ceiling glass, towering window panes with inset doors that opened onto a cedar plank deck, allowing a nearly panoramic view of the forested vista below.

  “Hi, Alice,” Suzette said.

  A young girl sat at a coffee table nestled in the vertex of a coffee-colored leather sectional sofa, a spiral-bound notebook opened in front of her. She seemed completely absorbed in whatever she was writing in the notebook, a pencil clutched in her hand, moving furiously back and forth along the page. If she noticed Suzette’s entrance or heard her greeting, she offered no acknowledgement.

  “This is Mister Braddock,” Suzette said, draping her hand against Andrew’s arm by way of introduction, even though the girl, Alice, didn’t as much as glance up from her work. “Say good morning, Alice.”

  “Good morning, Alice,” the girl mumbled, still scribbling.

  Suzette chuckled. “You’re being rude, Alice.”

  “I’m busy, Suzette,” Alice replied, still not looking up.

  Unfazed, Suzette continued to smile brightly. “Are you ready for breakfast? How about I fix you some eggs?”

  “I want the usual.”

  “How about French toast? Some pancakes? You know your father wants you to try and break some of your routines, do new things.”

  Still not even a sideways glance. “The usual.”

  Suzette sighed. “Alright, then. Suit yourself.” To Andrew, she said, “Make yourself at home. I’ll be right back.”

  “What? Wait.” He caught her arm, wide-eyed with sudden alarm. Flustered, he stammered, “I just…I mean, I’m not very good with kids.”

  Suzette chuckled, offering his hand a gentle pat. “That’s okay. Neither is Alice.” With a wink and a smile, she drew herself loose of his grasp and headed for the kitchen.

  He stood in the entryway for a long moment, feeling awkward and intrusive. Suzette had said the girl was autistic and he struggled to remember what that meant. Wasn’t Forrest Gump autistic? He wondered. Or maybe it was Rainman. Isn’t it the same thing as being retarded?

  “Uh, hi,” he said at last.

  Nothing.

  “I’m Andrew.”

  Still nothing.

  He walked around the side of the couch, trying to see what Alice was writing. It looked like a running series of numbers, although the penmanship was terrible, the crooked, wobbly chicken-scratch of a palsy-ridden old man. “What are you working on?”

  She glanced up long enough for him to recognize her, the doe-eyed child he’d met in the lobby the night before. Then she looked down again, her pencil resuming its fervent movement. “I’m calculating the square root of pi.”

  He didn’t know which surprised him more—what she was doing or that she’d actually spoken aloud to tell him about it. She spoke clearly and articulately, nothing like the movie characters who’d come to his mind.

  “But. . . there is no square root of pi,” he said after a moment. The tip of her pencil fell still, but she didn’t look up. “It’s an irrational number,” Andrew said. “The decimal value goes on and on forever without repeating.”

  “I know that.” Her pencil began moving again. “I just want to make sure.”

  Had he known what pi was at her age? Had he known more than how to add or subtract? Suzette had told him Alice’s father was a molecular biologist and geneticist. World-renowned, she’d told him. Apparently the fruit hadn’t fallen far from the tree in Alice’s case.

  “Breakfast is ready,” Suzette called from the kitchen.

  * * *

  “She’s fixated on numbers,” Suzette said at the dining room table. “It’s typical for her condition, becoming preoccupied with certain things. She’s off the charts in terms of intelligence, but she sometimes lapses into her own little world. She gets obsessed easily, like the thing with numbers.”

  Alice had sat down wordlessly at the table and started on her breakfast, a bowl of Cheerio’s. Andrew watched, curious, as she carefully strained each spoonful of cereal of any hint of milk before eating. Occasionally she’d pause, poke her fingertip into her spoon and knock a Cheerio or two out, as if she’d found them defective somehow.

  “She only eats five pieces at a time,” Suzette explained.

  “Sometimes extras float into the spoon,” Alice further clarified, flicking a wayward Cheerio back into her bowl. Once she’d finished this bite, she’d apparently had enough. Without another word, she pushed her chair back, scooped up her notebook and walked away.

  “She has daily rituals and routines, sort of like an obsessive-compulsive would.” Suzette rose from her seat and began gathering up the dishes, even though her own breakfast remained relatively untouched. “She has a hard time showing her feelings in appropriate ways, so please don’t take it personally if she seems rude. She’s like that with everybody. It’s my understanding she’s better now than she used to be. There was a time, I guess, when she wouldn’t talk to anyone at all, much less strangers. But she didn’t seem to mind talking to you.” Dropping him a wink, she smiled. “She must like you.”

  * * *

  While Suzette tidied after breakfast, Andrew stepped out onto the deck off the living room. The morning air was crisp and cool against his bare arms, and his breath frosted in a light haze, framing his face. Below, he could see the lingering wisps of fog creeping in and among the trees, retreating from the landscaped courtyard. In the distance, beyond the trees, he could see the undulating silhouettes of the Appalachian foothills.

  He’d clipped his iPhone to the waistband of his sweatpants and pulled it out now, wondering if the reception would be better on the deck than it had been in the lobby downstairs. A couple of impotent attempts at dialing Ted McGillis’ number proved it was not, with that tedious beep-beep-beep signaling he remained out of network.

  “Damn it,” he muttered.

  “Hey!” The voice from behind him fell almost as heavily as the hand against his arm, which clamped down hard and spun him smartly about, catching him by surprise. He caught a blur movement out of the corner of his eye, and then a sucker punch caught him high on the cheek, snapping his head toward his opposite shoulder, sending him staggering into the deck railing then crashing to his knees. His phone tumbled from his fingers, falling toward the boxwood shrubs and lava rock landscaping beds below.

  “Edward!” Suzette cried out from inside the apartment.

  “Who are you?” the man who’d punched him demanded, and Andrew gritted his teeth, biting back a cry as he felt the man’s fingers coil in his hair, wrenching his head back. He found himself blinking up at an older man, tall and somewhat stocky, his brows knitted, his mouth twisted in a frown. “How the hell did you get in my apartment?”

  “Edward, stop it,” Suzette exclaimed, rushing out onto the deck.

  “Get Prendick up here now,” the man said at her. “Go call for—”

  Andrew sprang from his crouched posture, plowing his knuckles into the older man’s gut. Whoofing for breath, the man turned him loose and staggered backwards. Andrew scrambled to his feet, fists still clenched, squaring off.

  “Stop it,” Suzette cried, darting between them, hands outstretched. “Both of you.”

  “What the hell’s going on?” Andrew exclaimed to her. “He hit me!”

  “This is Edward Moore,” she told him, wide-eyed, pleading, and why should that name have been familiar to him, he wondered? “Doctor Moore,”
she amended, and he relaxed his fists, opening his hands.

  Shit.

  “This is his facility,” Suzette told him. “His lab. His apartment.”

  Moore glared at him, still choked and flushed, his palm pressed to his gut. Alice had come to stand in the doorway now, curious by the commotion, her dark eyes round and darting between her father and Andrew.

  Shit, Andrew thought again.

  * * *

  “Let’s start at the beginning, Mister Braddock,” Major Prendick said.

  Although they hadn’t cuffed him, his soldiers hadn’t exactly been gentle as they’d escorted Andrew from Moore’s apartment. One of them, Corporal O’Malley, had caught him by the wrist and wrenched his arm behind his back, pinning it at an unnatural and painful angle. They were about equal in height, but O’Malley outweighed Andrew by a good ten pounds at least of nothing but muscle. Although not feeble by any stretch of the imagination, Andrew had nonetheless gone along without protest, harboring no illusions. O’Malley could have, if so inclined, kicked his ass. In a big, hard, stomping, painful sort of way.

  O’Malley had maintained his light yet painful grip on Andrew’s arm until they’d reached a small office on the building’s first floor. Here, Andrew had been made to sit in an uncomfortable metal chair in the middle of the otherwise empty room, left alone for at least twenty minutes behind what had turned out to be a locked door.

  O’Malley had returned to stand guard at the threshold. To Andrew’s surprise, this time he was accompanied by Specialist Santoro, the young woman who’d rescued Andrew the night before. Slim and petite, she struck a peculiar, somewhat comical contrast to the larger, brawnier O’Malley as they flanked the doorway together at rigid, unwavering attention while Prendick, upon his entrance, proceeded to trace a wide, slow circumference around Andrew. Keeping his hands clasped against the small of his back, his expression neutral, his voice friendly enough, Prendick would glance up and meet Andrew’s gaze each time he’d pass.

  “What are you doing out here?” the Major said. “These lands are all federal property.”

  Andrew sighed, irritated. “I told you last night. She brought me here.” He nodded once to indicate Santoro. “I work for Wells Environmental Management Consultants out of Johnstown, Pennsylvania. We were hired to survey roughly ten-thousand acres southeast of here. I was driving on Highway 460 during the storm, on my way back to meet up with my crew at our hotel in Pikeville when something ran out in front of my truck.”

  Prendick raised a curious brow. “Something?”

  “I don’t know what it was. An animal, maybe, or a man. It stood upright on two legs.” Andrew mimed, using his forefingers in a scissor motion against his opposing palm. “Its arms looked deformed. Its back, too, like it was hunched over.” He sighed, shook his head. “It all happened really fast. I couldn’t get a good look at it, but it didn’t have fur, I’m sure of it.”

  “Specialist Santoro, did you see this thing he described?” Prendick asked, turning to the young woman in the corner.

  Keeping her eyes pinned ahead, her shouldered thrust back at rigid attention, Santoro barked in reply, “No, sir.”

  Prendick turned his stern gaze back to Andrew. “Do you have any documentation to prove who you are?” he asked. “Your work assignment? Any sort of company identification? A driver’s license?”

  “Of course I do,” Andrew shifted his weight, raising his hips to reach for his back pocket, his wallet. Then he bit back a groan as he remembered. I always lock it inside the glove compartment whenever I’m out in the field.

  “It’s in my Jeep,” he told Prendick, sheepish.

  “Which is currently sitting top-down at the bottom of a flooded gulley,” Prendick said. “How convenient.”

  Andrew frowned. “Am I under arrest or something?”

  “That’s what I’m trying to determine,” the Major replied.

  “What the hell for?” Andrew demanded.

  Prendick raised the corner of his mouth in tandem with his brow, as if amused by the antics of a petulant toddler. “For starters, violating Title Eighteen, Part One, Chapter Sixty-seven, Subsection Thirteen-eighty-two of the United States Penal Code, wherein the first paragraph stipulates that entry to any restricted portion of a military base or facility for any purposes prohibited by law will result criminal trespass charges punishable by imprisonment of six months in jail and a fine of up to five thousand dollars.”

  What? Andrew shook his head. He glanced between the Major and Santoro, hoping she’s say something—anything—to back up his story, to clear him.

  “You’re kidding,” he said, more to her than Prendick when she remained tight-lipped, eyes averted from him. “You can’t keep me here if you don’t arrest me. I know my rights. And you can’t arrest me because I didn’t do anything wrong, and you know it.”

  The corner of Prendick’s mouth flicked in a quick smirk. “What I know, Mister Braddock, is that if it was up to me, you would be out of here even as we speak. Dr. Moore is conducting experiments of an extremely sensitive nature that are of vital importance to national security. This facility contains classified materials and information to which you or the general tax-paying public may not, under any circumstances, be made privy.”

  “Then let me go,” Andrew said, exasperated. “Put me in a truck and drive me to the nearest payphone so I can call my guys to come pick me up.”

  “Unfortunately, that’s no longer possible,” Prendick said. “The storms last night triggered landslides up in the hills. The roads coming and going are buried under at least fifteen feet of mud and rocks, at least three hundred yards wide in either direction. It’s going to take earth moving equipment to get them cleared out.”

  Beautiful, Andrew thought, biting back the urge to laugh. That’s just fucking great.

  “Give me a couple of canteens, let me hike out of here on foot,” he said. “I can cut through the woods to get back down to the highway, then follow it from there to—”

  “Mister Braddock, it’s more than seventy miles to the nearest town,” Prendick interjected. “That’s one way. Even if you average walking a mile in twenty minutes, that would make it an almost twenty-four hike. And that would be non-stop on a flat surface, not cutting through the bush out here in the backwoods.”

  “I think I can manage,” Andrew replied, even though this was a lofty statement made more out of hubris than any real confidence. He was a proficient and experienced hiker, but it required a significant amount of gear and supplies to make the sort of trek he was proposing—none of which he had on hand, and none of which he was willing to bet Prendick would loan him. At best, he was looking at least at a three-day miserable hike through the wilderness. At worst, he was looking at winding up hopelessly lost and dying of starvation, thirst or overexposure.

  Prendick met his gaze evenly. “I think I would be remiss if I were to let you try.” Cutting a glance and a crooked smile at Santoro and Corporal O’Malley, he added, “Besides, I wouldn’t want you to run into any trouble out there. Say, like this hairless, hunchbacked bear or something you say you saw.”

  Santoro didn’t respond, but O’Malley uttered a quick snort of laughter that left Andrew bristling.

  “Later today, I’ll send a squad out with shovels, the Bobcat front-end loader we have on site,” Prendick continued. “We can probably clear a way through the road in a week or two.”

  “A week or two?” Andrew shook his head. “I can’t stay here that long. My crew has no idea where I am, what’s happened to me. I’ve got to get word to them.”

  “Let me put it to you another way, Mister Braddock.” Prendick motioned with his hand demonstratively, indicating the cramped, empty office. “You can either remain in here as a prisoner of the United States Army or you can join us as a guest until such time as we can extricate you from this facility. But either way, you’re not leaving.”

  The two stared at each other, Prendick’s eyes like glittering pieces of flint, brittle and ha
rd-edged. Sighing, Andrew threw up his hands in disgusted resignation. “Fine. Whatever.”

  Prendick nodded. “Good. You are to remain in this building at all times during the course of your stay here, and are free to make use of any and all of the public areas and amenities provided. If you feel the need for a spot of air, you can step out onto the parking lot or courtyard, but may go no further than the paved perimeter of this compound. You may not under any circumstances enter Dr. Moore’s apartment or laboratory. Failure to comply with these instructions will result in your being arrested and charged with felony trespass on government property as per our discussion a few moments ago. Do you understand?”

  Again, Andrew glared. “Fine.”

  Glancing over his shoulder at O’Malley, he said, “Corporal, escort Mister Braddock to the barracks wing. Take him to Lieutenant Carter’s room.” With a slight frown, he added, “He won’t be needing it anymore.”

  “Yes, sir,” O’Malley said.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “I know what you’re thinking.”

  Andrew remembered when he’d brought Lila home to meet his parents for the first time, for dinner on a snowy Sunday afternoon in the middle of February. They’d been sleeping together for a little over three months at that point, and he’d fallen more than head over heels in love with her. He’d been nineteen years old—going on thirty in terms of maturity, if you’d asked him—and he’d been a college freshman longer than his sister, Beth, had been in her grave.

  “Oh, so you’re a mind reader now?” his mother, Katherine, had replied as they’d stood together in the kitchen while he helped her clear the dishes from the dining room table. His father, Eric, had retired with Lila to the living room for coffee.

  Katherine had said this with a smile, a gentle and playful sort, slipping stacked plates from his hands, her own fingers wet and sudsy from the sink in which she had been setting a roasting pan to soak. She’d fixed prime rib roast for dinner, sparing no expense for their guest. If she hadn’t agreed with Andrew’s choice of women or shared his enthusiasm for Lila, then at least, she had gone along with it well.