Torn Apart (6 page)

She shouted until her voice was hoarse and her vision was so blurred she couldn’t see. Her heart was beating fast—too fast. It was difficult to breathe, but she couldn’t stop searching. She kept muttering to herself and walking in circles with the bear hugged beneath her chin.

On the chief’s instructions, all the available deputies, both volunteer and official, had been dispatched to survey the damage done to Bordelaise.

Deputy Lee Tullius had just radioed in about the church being hit when he saw a woman running down the street and recognized her as Katie Earle. After what had just happened, anyone running in such a frantic manner had to mean trouble.

He’d hit the brakes and backed up, then turned the corner to follow her. Within moments, he realized all the houses on both sides of this block were gone, including the one where Katie lived. His heart sank.

“Oh, Lord,” Lee said, then stomped the brakes and shoved the cruiser in Park.

Just as he opened the door, he heard her crying and screaming out a name. When he heard the word
Bobby,
his stomach turned at the thought that she might have lost her son.

Bordelaise had been hit hard, and they were just beginning to realize the depth of devastation. They already knew the nursing home had been damaged, and the jail had been hit bad, the storm taking the roof and the four prisoners who had been incarcerated. Many homes had been damaged, and many others, like the ones on this block, were simply gone. But a missing kid was far worse than losing prisoners or buildings. He slammed the door shut and started after her, shouting.

“Katie! Katie Earle!”

By the time Lee got to her, she was walking in circles and mumbling. He reached for her arm.

At the touch, she flinched, then stared at him with a vacant expression.

“Bobby?”

Lee took her by her shoulders. “No, it’s me, Lee.”

Recognition flickered across her face. “Lee. I found Oliver, but I can’t find Bobby.”

“Who’s Oliver?” he asked.

She held up the bear.

Shit. Lee’s stomach flipped.

“Talk to me, Katie. Where were you when it hit?”

“We were at church and…” She shook her head, unable to finish the sentence that would give life to the awful truth.

“Talk to me, Katie. What’s wrong? Did he run away from you? Did the tornado siren scare him? What?”

Katie shuddered. She meant to explain, but when she opened her mouth, nothing came out but a moan.

In her mind, she was seeing her precious little boy, in his red-and-blue-striped shirt, being sucked up into the storm, picturing his tiny, lifeless body buried somewhere in the citywide debris. And for the first time accepting the horror that had been in the back of her mind all along—the knowledge that if she’d just moved to New Orleans when J.R. wanted her to, this wouldn’t be happening.

“Help me, Katie. I can’t help you until I know what’s wrong.”

Again she started to explain, but the sound morphed into a gut-wrenching sob, and once the floodgates of despair had been opened, there was no holding back. Suddenly she arched her back, lifted her face to the heavens and screamed, and once she started screaming, she couldn’t stop.

Lee reacted instinctively, grabbing her to keep her from falling. He wrapped his arms around her and held on, pressing her face against his chest, afraid that if he let her go she would be torn apart—as torn and broken as Bordelaise.

The sounds of her screams carried up and down the streets, mingling with faint cries for help and the sirens blasting from every direction, and masking the thud of footsteps as Penny Bates came hurrying toward them.

“Oh, Lord, help us, Lee,” Penny gasped, as she threw her arms around them both.

She hadn’t moved so fast in years. Her lungs were burning, and there was a stitch in her side that might never go away. Then she saw the look on Lee’s face and reached for Katie. “Here, give her to me,” she said, and took Katie, who was still holding the wet, bedraggled bear, into her arms.

Penny’s jaw clenched as she clutched Katie’s trembling body. Not until Katie’s screams had dissolved into deep, gut-wrenching sobs, did Lee ask the question.

“Penny. My God…what happened?”

Penny’s lips were trembling, but she wouldn’t cry. Not again. The horror of her guilt was upon her.

“We were at church. The children were outside playing, and I…I was with them when the siren began to blow. We immediately ran inside. I thought Bobby was with the others, but then we couldn’t find him. I looked behind me before I went in. No one was left on the playground, I swear.” Her voice broke, then she took a deep breath. “I don’t… I didn’t…I…” She closed her eyes. When she opened them again, the sympathy on Lee’s face was too painful to bear.

She looked down at Katie, and at that moment, if God had offered, she would gladly have traded her life for that of Katie’s son. Bobby had been left in her care, and she’d failed. And because she’d failed, a precious little boy was gone. She didn’t know how she was going to live with this guilt and not go mad.

“Get her in the patrol car,” Lee ordered. “I’ll take her to the hospital.”

“I’m coming with her,” Penny said.

By the time they drove up to the emergency entrance, Katie was eerily silent. Penny found the blank expression on her face more chilling than her grief had been. She feared life had dealt Katie Earle one blow too many. Tears were drying on Katie’s face, but mentally she appeared to have checked out. When they began working on her in the E.R., cutting the clothes from her body to make sure she had no internal injuries, getting an X-ray to check the wounds on her head, they tried to take the bear. But no matter how hard they attempted to remove the toy from her arms, Katie would not let go.

Finally Penny leaned down and whispered in Katie’s ear.

“Give him to me, Katie. Give him to me. I’ll take care of him. I promise.”

The blank look was still on Katie’s face, but her grip loosened. Penny took the bear, then turned and walked out into the hallway, leaving the doctors and nurses to their task. She had her own job to do, and while she’d failed the first time in keeping Bobby Earle safe, she would not fail again.

She found an empty chair and sat down, the muddy little bear now sitting in her lap. It was missing one black button eye, and one ear was hanging on by only a few soggy threads.

“I’ll fix you,” she said softly, then closed her eyes and began to pray.

While Katie’s world had unraveled, Newt Collins was riding a high. He’d still been across the street from the church when the tornado sirens had gone off. Despite his fixation with the children, his first reaction had been a kick of panic. Tornadoes. Damn, but he hated storms.

When the kids began screaming and running toward the church, he tossed his Pepsi can and candy wrapper out the window and started his truck. All he could think of was to get home, back to his trailer and the community storm cellar at the park.

He was about to drive away when he saw Bobby Earle come crawling out of the long red tunnel. There was a look of confusion his face as he stood. At that point, everything Newt was thinking ground to a halt.

The kid was alone on the playground and seemed uncertain as to what he was supposed to do. The first thought in Newt’s mind was to warn him. He slammed the truck in Park and jumped out. He started to call out to Mrs. Bates, to alert her that the kid had been left behind.

But when he slammed the door, Bobby turned and looked him square in the face. Newt felt the boy’s panic before he even opened his mouth, and then he realized the kid was afraid, but not of the storm—of him.

Bobby and Holly had been playing in the tunnel, crawling through it on their hands and knees. The noise of their giggles echoed inside the metal tube, along with the thumps and bumps of their shoes as they crawled. So when the siren first began to blow, Bobby hadn’t even heard it. All he knew was that Holly turned a corner in front of him and disappeared. By the time he got closer to the opening, he could hear the noise the siren was making. It was so startling that at first he was afraid to come out. Then, when he finally crawled out and saw everyone running toward the church, he realized he was supposed to go in.

Then he heard the familiar sound of a car door slam and turned around. He felt a moment of confusion, and then panicked recognition.

It was the monster from his nightmares come to life.

He started to run, but he tripped and fell, landing belly first and so hard that he lost his breath. At that point he couldn’t get up and he couldn’t run, and the monster was almost upon him.

Newt saw the panic sweep across the kid’s face and knew he’d been made. Before he thought about the consequences, he raced over and swept Bobby up in his arms, then began running back toward his truck.

“It’s okay, Bobby! It’s okay! You know me,” he kept saying as he sprinted across the grass toward the street.

Just as he shoved the boy into the front seat, Bobby caught his first breath.

“Mama! Mama! I want my mama!” Bobby cried, and started trying to climb out of the truck.

Newt slammed the door shut, then grabbed Bobby’s arm and yanked him flat.

“Be still! Don’t you hear that siren? We have to get to shelter or we’re gonna blow away!” he yelled, then put the truck in gear and stomped on the accelerator.

The tires spun on the pavement, then caught, and within seconds the blue truck was gone.

Newt was breaking every speed limit, taking the corners on two wheels. His heart was hammering. Adrenaline rushed through his body at such a rate he was almost floating on the high. He hadn’t intended to snatch the kid, but now that he had, he was going to make the most of it. As soon as this storm passed, they would be out of here, and no one would be the wiser.

A strong gust of wind broadsided the truck, and for a moment Newt thought they were going to roll. But when he turned another corner, the wind was suddenly behind him. All the while he was driving, the kid continued to fight him, crying and kicking and hitting at him as hard as he could hit.

Finally the driveway to the trailer park came into view. Newt skidded around the turn and screeched to a stop in front of his trailer just as a limb broke off from the tree across the drive and came flying toward him. It hit the back end of his truck with a solid thump. The back glass cracked.

Bobby grabbed the other door and tried to get out, still screaming, “Mama! Mama!”

“Mama’s not here,” Newt said, and grabbed Bobby’s waist and yanked him back inside, then out the driver’s door.

The wind was up to a roar and blowing so hard Newt could barely walk as he pulled the boy along.

“Mama! I want my mama!” Bobby cried.

“Shut the fuck up!” Newt shouted, but his voice was carried away by the wind.

Now that he had the kid, taking shelter in the community cellar was out of the question. Newt tightened his grip and started running for the trailer, up the steps and then across the small porch to the front door. Something slammed against the side of the trailer, and it occurred to him that he shouldn’t be going inside something so flimsy in such a storm. But his actions had limited his choices. He reached for the doorknob, then found the wind pushing against the storm door was so strong that he couldn’t open it with just one hand, no matter how many times he tried. If he turned the kid loose, he would run, and if they stayed out here, they were both likely to die from flying debris.

No sooner had he thought it than there was a loud ripping sound. He spun just as a live oak was torn free from its roots and fell toward them, completely blocking in his truck.

At that moment Bobby realized he had more to fear from the storm than the monster. When he dropped to his knees and rolled up in a ball, it was all the break Newt needed. He grabbed the doorknob with both hands and gave it a yank. The wind caught the door as it was opening and slammed it against the side of the trailer, shattering the Plexiglas windows on impact.

“Son of a bitch!” Newt cried, and then reached for the knob of the inner door.

Going inside was far easier. Once he’d turned the key in the lock, releasing the catch, and grabbed the knob, the force of the wind slammed the door inward. Newt snatched up the kid and all but rolled him inside, then followed just as a neighbor’s plastic lawn chair came sailing through the air. It took every ounce of strength he had to push the door shut.

Once again, man and child locked gazes.

Newt wondering if they would live long enough to play his little games.

Bobby wondering if the monster was going to hurt him.

Then something slammed against the door, and the staring match ended. Newt spun toward the sound, expecting at any moment to see the door caving in. The wind outside had morphed into a roar that sounded like a train coming through a tunnel. The trailer house was shuddering, and it occurred to Newt that they might not live through this.

Then he turned around and realized the kid was nowhere in sight. His pulse rocketed. He began running down the little hallway toward the back door, thinking the boy had gotten out through the back. But the door was still locked from the inside, so though the kid was nowhere to be seen, he had to be inside somewhere.

Newt ducked into the bedroom long enough to assure himself the boy wasn’t in there, either, than ran back toward the living room. As he did, he noticed one end of the sofa had been angled toward the middle of the room. Then he saw the kid’s shoes and realized Bobby Earle had already taken cover. He dropped to his hands and knees and was crawling behind the sofa as a long, earsplitting shriek of wind filled the room. He threw himself on top of the kid just as the world exploded.

The tornado had passed. The trailer house was still standing, due only to the number of trees that had fallen down around it. It was quite literally still upright only because of fallen debris.

Bobby’s heart was pounding. He would have cried out, but the weight on his back was so heavy there was no air left in his lungs. Just as spots began dancing before his eyes and his view of the floor was turning black, the weight lifted.