He closed his eyes again, but only for a second. Then he got up off the floor. She was glad that he, too, was still fully dressed; it would save time and lower the risk that they’d be caught. She headed for the back door, because it was closer and might not disturb the others.
It was, however, hard to tiptoe when one was using crutches.
Then Rex lifted his head. Luckily, Maddie was out of his view. But Rafe was not.
“You okay?” Rex whispered to Rafe in a sleepy baritone.
Rafe paused long enough for Maddie’s heart to beat a little louder.
“Yeah,” he finally said. “I just need to use the bathroom.”
Maddie stopped from exhaling a bucket of gratitude. Rex pointed toward the bathroom door, closed his eyes, and went back to sleep.
With her hand on the doorknob, Maddie suddenly remembered they’d need the car keys. Resting the crutches under her arms, she mimed two-hands-on-a-steering-wheel, then gestured as if she were starting an ignition, while raising her casted leg as if she were stepping on the gas.
Despite the cobwebs of sleep, her boy was smart. As he moved stealthily toward her, he patted the front pocket of his jeans: the keys must still be there from when he’d gone to the cottage for their suitcases. Yes, he was a smart boy. She made a mental note to thank Owen for the money he’d spent at both Deerfield and Amherst.
Then Maddie turned the doorknob; there was a smallclick. Without further hesitation, they made it out to the back porch and down the steps without any floodlights going on or alarms to stop them.
And without Maddie falling on her face.
They walked around the side of the cabin, then quietly opened the doors to the old Volvo. They did not latch them shut. Then, because the driveway was pitched up a slight hill to the cabin, Rafe put the gearshift into neutral and they coasted out toward the road. Once out of sight and hopefully sound, he started the engine, and they escaped.
“Well,” Maddie said once she no longer feared they’d be exposed, “we never would have made it without nature’s night-lights.” She gave a nod to the softly glimmering sky.
Rafe gave her a side-glance. “Care to tell me where we’re going?”
“Back to Menemsha. To the cottage.”
“Let’s hope I remember how to get there from here.”
“You’ll be fine. You just did it a few hours ago. If you forget, I’ll remember.” There was no reason to mention she’d been on this road only four times recently—twice when she’d gone to the cliffs with her father, then Brandon; once when Rex brought her to the cabin; the other time in the back of an ambulance, when they’d gone straight to the hospital without a side trip to Menemsha, so that didn’t count. The bottom line was, Maddie didn’t really know where they were, either.
“Meanwhile,” Rafe said, “feel free to tell me why we snuck out at”—he checked his phone—“two thirty in the morning.”
“Is it that late?”
He snickered. “Mom. Why are we going there? I was already there. Joe was there. For crying out loud, your grandmother’s not there.”
“Humor me, honey, okay? I won’t sleep until we do this.”
“Right,” he said.
As State Road appeared, she directed him to go left. The rest of the hilly, windy route—lit only by the moon and stars and very few streetlamps—came back to Maddie so easily she might have been guided by her mother’s spirit. Or her grandmother’s, if she’d been dead.
They parked in the back where Rex had showed her. It was kind of secluded, so they wouldn’t disturb the neighbors or the policeman on guard at the front door. As they got out of the car, they quietly closed the doors; Maddie said a quick prayer that no dogs were around to let out a howling alert. For one thing, it would scare her half to death and she might drop her crutches and try to race back to the car, forgetting about the cast. And she would fall. Again.
But Rafe was right behind her to stop her from all that.
By another miracle, they made it without incident to the path that led through the cluster of scrub oaks. But the trees were thick; they blotted out the light from the sky. Maddie hesitated; she thought of her mother on the dark road not far from where they were now. Then she cleared her throat and her mind and stepped gingerly. Which was when her very smart son held up his phone with the flashlight app turned on.
They maneuvered between the trees and down the path; she was glad she’d taken the pain pill earlier. They moved cautiously, stopping only when either of them stepped on a twig and it snapped like in those goofy old movies. Each time it happened, they waited and listened, but there were no sounds, no visible lights snapping on. The island was quiet at night: she remembered that from years ago.
Once they crossed the boundary into the backyard, Maddie allowed herself to stop and breathe again.
“Okay,” she whispered. “There’s a strip of tape across the back door, right?”
“Right.”
