The Fort (Aric Davis)

will get better, do you understand?”
    She nodded and said quietly, “Yes.”
    “Good. Now I’m going to go back upstairs, so give me your hands and then sit against the pole.” She did as instructed, and as a reward, he cuffed them behind her, but not around the pole. She was plenty well secured to it without that, anyway. Next, he replaced the ball gag in her mouth and then tightened the straps. When she looked at him now, all defiance, all hope even, was gone from her face. Hooper smiled at her and then shuffled up the steps, returning her to darkness and locking the door behind him.
    The business with Amy taken care of, Hooper walked to his room. He’d decided that there was something else that needed doing, regardless of his injured state. He went to his closet and pulled out a set of olive drab fatigues, pants, and a long-sleeved shirt. He put the pants on slowly, then pulled on and buttoned the shirt, before taking a matching flat-brimmed hat down from the top of the closet and mashing it onto his head. If someone saw him, he might think Hooper was being a little nutty, but if pressed on the matter, Hooper planned to ask if that guy could still fit into his clothes from twenty years ago. His neighbors were good folks; they’d just think he was screwing around. He tucked the small revolver into a pocket and headed for the sliding door.
    It was odd being in the backyard again. The last time, leading Amy with the gun, still seemed surreal. He walked to the gate, opened it, and walked into the woods. Someone had been hunting him yesterday, and he wanted to know who. There was a bullet in his calf, and Hooper deserved to know who had put it there. He backtracked his steps as well as he could remember, following the broken path of popples back to where he’d been shot. There was no blood to show him where it had happened, the rain would have seen to that, but somehow Hooper just knew when he was in the spot.
    The moment had been frozen into his memory, and he could picture the day before with astonishing clarity. This was where he’d forced Amy into the thick trees, his calf burning with pain. Turning slowly, he oriented himself both to where he had been and to where his back would have been facing. Hooper almost jumped when he saw the fort through the trees. How did I not see it before? The stress of the day must have dulled his normally excellent situational awareness.
    The fort was made of weathered lumber and was attached to three trees, one much larger than the others. On the side closest to him, Hooper could see a window cut into a plywood wall. It made him nervous. That was undoubtedly where the shot had come from.
    He advanced on the fort as though approaching an enemy emplacement, for that was just what it was. Carl had mentioned something about helping his son with a fort back in the woods, Hooper recalled as he crept up on it. This was probably the same one. And I bet Carl’s fucking kid was one of the ones who shot me. The thought set off a burst of black rage in his head, tempered only slightly by relief that the boy clearly hadn’t recognized him.
    When he reached the fort, Hooper peered up at its floor and listened. Hearing nothing, he put the foot of his good leg on the bottom rung of one of the ladders leading up to the fort and began to climb. When he put weight onto his injured leg, though, his body shut down, his calf betraying him, and Hooper fell a few feet to the forest floor, landing on his ass.
    He was OK, but his dignity had taken a beating. It was for the best, he decided as he brushed himself off, feeling ridiculous in the old, musty-smelling clothes. He couldn’t hear the kids up there, but for all he knew, they could be there, armed and waiting on him. Though if they were holed up there as silently as this and were still armed with what he assumed was something stolen from Carl’s ridiculous gun collection—a .22, judging from the hole in his calf—they would have heard his tumble from the ladder and already taken a shot at him. Still, as he walked away from the fort the same way he’d come, he was cautious, even more nervous with his back facing the maw of the window. He might not see to them today, but he would teach those kids respect, and soon.

34
    Van Endel was sitting at his desk, contemplating another cup of coffee, when the phone rang. “Van Endel,” he said. There was a moment of silence, then a clicking sound, and Tracy was on the line.
    “What’s shaking,