“Imogene!” Barton’s sudden bellow makes Sarah yell, a single frightened shout. I stay where I am, reading and working on my essay.
He barges into my room and glares. “I know you’ve been in the den.”
I look up at him calmly. There’s no more terror in my eyes, and he looks startled, then angry. “The den? No, Father. Ask Sarah. She’s been here all the time.”
Barton storms off. I hear him shouting at Sarah, and Sarah’s feeble yips of replies.
“You left her alone! Don’t you know what kind of trouble she could cause?”
“I didn’t, Barton. Only the one day, a couple of hours, to the store and back.”
Lies. But good for her. In an unlikely way, we have covered for each other.
“Next time you have to go, leave her outside.”
“Outside! Barton, it’s forty below with the wind chill.”
His voice drops, low and vile, but I can hear it.
How can I hear it?
It occurs to me now that I’ve always been able to hear so much of what was said—even things I wasn’t supposed to, and that curiosity has caused him to hate me.
Well, to hate me more.
“She won’t die from it. I tried. Left her out there for hours when the bitch left. She wouldn’t stop breathing. She’s the devil’sown. Could burn her, and she’d just change colors. Don’t you think I’ve tried?”
My breathing is shallow and shaky now. Breaths are taken with fear in each one.
“I could... I could bring her with me. In a scarf, hood, all bundled up, in the back... Barton, she could stay in the car.”
Barton calls Sarah names that I’ve never heard, shouting until she cries. Tells her that she’s so stupid that she ought to be the one left out in the cold to freeze. That no one would ever know what happened.
But I would.
I start to stand, then sit still. When I leave, there will be no reason for Barton to yell, and Sarah’s already started lying. Started staying out for hours on several days when he’s gone. Sarah must have friends—or a plan.
Good for her.
Men like Barton deserve to be punished.
My skin suddenly tingles, and I can feel something in my soul. A confusing sort of peace that knows righteousness from wickedness.
I might be shaped like the devil, or at least his daughter, but Barton is the evil one.
THAT NIGHT, HE’S DRUNKand snoring. Sarah’s voice is tight and frightened, whispering into her hand as she paces in the dark Alaskan night, risking life and frostbite of limb to talk to someone. If she sees me in the kitchen after I’m supposed to be in my room, she ignores me.
Just like I ignore that she’s making a phone call, one she obviously doesn’t want her husband to know about.
I take some jerky and a few canned items, not enough for anyone to notice or miss—I hope.
I add it to the bag under my bed, the bag with different clothes, my mother’s wallet, and most importantly, what’s inside it. A passport. Something I can use for ID.
And tonight... Tonight, I’m going to start looking for those sites Lesha mentioned. It would be smarter to wait until Barton leaves in seven days, but I don’t think I can. The urgency gnaws at me.
Looking at the book on careers that’s free from the college online collection, I start to type as softly as I can.
A resume for Imogene Sommer, nanny, caregiver, maid, and more. Will travel.
