It felt like hours, but it could have been minutes. Finally, they heard sounds at the door. Faint light spilled in the doorway from the emergency lighting in the hallway, and Judah had a flashlight in his hand. It caught Lucas directly in his eyes, causing him to throw up an arm to block the light.
“Turn out that light, Judah,” he called out. He needed to draw him further into the room, hoping that his voice would drown out any noise Ryker might make.
When the flashlight panned the rest of the room, he held his breath. Surely the boy would notice the change in the configuration of the room since there hadn’t been any boxes next to the door earlier. Ryker and Kennedy also wouldn’t be in view, which was something they needed in order to make their plan work, but could also be a weakness in their plan. However, they couldn’t do nothing.
“Come out with your hands up, Ryker,” Judah called out. “I have a gun, and I’ll just start shooting up things until you come out.”
From where Lucas was standing, he couldn’t see Ryker in the darkness, but he looked in the opposite direction and nodded, hoping the teen would understand it was a diversion.
Judah didn’t move from his position in the doorway. “Where’s Kennedy? I want to see her and Ryker in front of me.”
“That’s not going to happen, Judah,” Lucas told him. “Kennedy’s too weak from lack of food and water to move. We have her lying down on the couch back in the furniture area.”
“She hasn’t been up here that long to be weak,” Judah said. “You can’t fool me, Dr. Vaughn. Where’s Ryker? Hiding somewhere, waiting to jump out at me?”
Time to start the performance of a lifetime. Lying was not his strong suit, but he hoped Judah would be too amped up to realize. “He’s watching over Kennedy. He’s not going to jump you, I promise. Let’s talk about this, Judah. What has you so upset that you’ve kidnapped us?”
“Ask Ryker. He knows.”
“I did. He says he doesn’t know. Kennedy said you thought she was seeing him behind your back, but both of them swear they’re not. She said she wouldn’t do that to you. She loves you, Judah.”
“Don’t lie to me, Dr. Vaughn. I saw them. I saw them on the dock late one night. They were kissing. He had no right to do that. You don’t steal someone’s girlfriend. Especially your friend’s girlfriend.”
“No, he shouldn’t have. That breaks the bro code.”
He had to resist the urge to roll his eyes. He never believed in that nonexistent construct, and students constantly dated each other’s exes. It was all part of normal teenage drama.
Judah took a single step into the room, probably not even realizing he’d done it.
“Call them. Get them out here where I can see them.”
“Judah, talk to me. This misunderstanding can’t be all that’s causing you to do this. Let me help you.”
“You can help me by calling them out here.”
The boy had taken another step into the room to where he was even with the boxes Kennedy was behind. There was noway she could sneak around them without drawing attention to herself. He had to get Judah further into the room.
“I’ll call them if you’ll tell me what’s going on. Please, Judah. I can help you with whatever it is. No one even knew you were in distress. We can’t help you if we don’t know what’s going on, and we desperately want to help you. We care about you.”
Judah laughed. “What a joke! If people cared, they would have told me that Kennedy was cheating on me. They would have noticed I was hurting. Instead, everyone just kept going about their daily lives, as if I wasn’t even here. Kept worshipping Ryker as if he were a fucking god. He had everything, and I had nothing!”
His memories of the recent conversation with Elyxandre struck a chord. So much of what they discussed was at the root of Judah’s pain. Perhaps it was a far more common complaint than he ever realized.
The high level of emotion that was building in Judah wasn’t a good sign. The teenager was starting to self-destruct, and if he wasn’t careful, he’d take Lucas with him, then Ryker and Kennedy. While he would protect the two kids with his life if necessary—as a principal, he felt that was his job—he certainly didn’t want it to come to that. He didn’t want to leave Ezra alone. The boy was almost an adult, but he had to admit, he didn’t want to miss out on all the great things his son would accomplish.
And then there was Elyxandre. His heart was breaking that he might not get to see her again. Never get to hold her again. Be unable to support her through this awful transition she was going through to regain her sense of self-worth. While he knew she would—and could—find her way on her own, he didn’t want her to have to do that.
“I’m sorry we didn’t know. Let us help you now. We want to help you.”
“Nobody wants to help me.”
As Lucas’ eyes adjusted to the extra light from the hallway, dim as it was, and the glow around the edges of the flashlight, he saw that Judah had a gun in his hand. Things had just gone from bad to worse. He should have expected it, but he’d been more worried about overpowering the boy than wrestling a weapon out of his hands.
A weapon also raised the stakes on their escape. It meant that Judah was near the end of his rope. Chances were, he already planned to end things here today—if not by his own hand, then by the actions of the police if they showed up.
He weighed his options. The attic space was narrow and clogged with boxes, furniture, and shelving. Since Judah wasn’t doing what he’d hoped he’d do, he was going to have to lure him further into the attic and away from Kennedy and Ryker. It would be nearly impossible to move backward into the space and circle back to safety. That meant that his chances of making it out of here alive decreased dramatically, but if it meant the two kids could get out to safety, then that’s the way it went.
He sent out a mental apology to Ezra for what he was about to do. His son would understand, but it didn’t mean that it wouldn’t hurt.
