Chapter 7 - The Escape Through the Briars
-7-
The freezing mud of the backyard sucked at Audrey’s boots as she hit the ground, the impact driving the wind from her lungs in a sharp, painful gasp. The cold November rain had started up again, turning the freshly fallen leaves into a slick, treacherous carpet beneath the shadow of the back deck.
Above her, the heavy wood frame of the house muffled the sound of muffled shouts and splintering wood.
They had broken into the office.
Audrey didn't hesitate. Adrenaline surged through her veins, masking the cold and the sharp sting of thorns tearing through her sweater as she scrambled on her hands and knees through the dense, overgrown briar patch that bordered the property line. Her primary objective wasn't saving the house anymore. It wasn't even protecting the financial records.
It was Poppy.
Poppy was still locked upstairs in her bedroom. If Arthur Vance’s men searched the house and found the child alone, they wouldn't hesitate to use her as leverage against Audrey. The polite, upper-class cruelty of Margaret Bennett had just graduated into full-scale, corporate-sponsored thuggery.
Audrey hauled herself up from the mud, coughing as the cold air hit her raw throat. She darted around the side of the house, keeping low beneath the line of rhododendron bushes, her eyes fixed on the kitchen window. The back door was deadbolted from the inside, but the sliding glass door leading from the sunroom had a notoriously loose latch that Audrey had been meaning to fix for months.
She reached the sunroom patio, her fingers wet and numb. She grabbed the aluminum handle of the sliding door and yanked upward with all her weight.
With a metallic clack, the faulty latch gave way.
Audrey slipped inside the sunroom, her breathing ragged and loud in the quiet house. She kicked off her mud-soaked boots by the threshold, wincing as her stockinged feet hit the cold tile floor.
She crept down the hallway toward the central staircase, straining her ears to catch any sound of the intruders.
“...check the upper landing,” a gruff voice echoed from the direction of the front foyer. “If the kid is up there, secure her. Vance wants all loose ends tied up before the local precinct shift change.”
Audrey’s heart hammered against her ribs like a sledgehammer. They were already heading upstairs.
She didn't take the main staircase. Instead, she bolted toward the narrow, hidden service stairs tucked behind the pantry—the old servants' stairway that led directly up to the second-floor linen closet near Poppy’s room.
She took the steps three at a time, her hands gripping the wooden railing, her muscles screaming with exhaustion. She reached the top of the service stairs and silently slid the wooden door open just an inch.
The upstairs hallway was dim, illuminated only by the gray light filtering through the stained-glass window at the end of the hall.
Two men in dark, nondescript overcoats stood outside Poppy’s bedroom door. One of them—a thick-necked brute with a jagged scar running down his jawline—was twisting the brass doorknob with aggressive impatience.
“It’s locked,” the brute muttered to his partner, a lean, sharp-faced man holding a heavy crowbar. “Pick it.”
“Wait,” the lean man hissed, holding up a hand. “Listen.”
From inside the bedroom, a tiny, terrified sound reached Audrey’s ears. It wasn't crying. It was the brave, trembling whisper of a seven-year-old trying to stay invisible.
“Mom... please come home...”
Audrey’s vision went red. All fear evaporated, replaced by a primal, terrifying maternal fury that transcended self-preservation. She didn't think about the odds. She didn't think about Arthur Vance, or the default notices, or the digital voice recorder in her pocket.
She thought only of her daughter.
Audrey pushed the linen closet door all the way open, stepping out into the hallway behind the two men just as the lean man raised the crowbar to smash the lock on Poppy’s door.
“Hey!” Audrey screamed, her voice echoing off the vaulted ceiling like a gunshot.
Both men whipped around in shock.
Before the thick-necked brute could react, Audrey lunged forward, grabbing a heavy brass vase off the hallway console table and hurling it with every ounce of strength she possessed straight at his face.
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The vase caught him square in the temple with a sickening thud, sending him staggering backward against the wall, sliding down to the floor in a dazed heap.
The lean man stared at his unconscious partner in sheer disbelief, then turned his gaze slowly back to Audrey—just as Audrey reached into her pocket, pulled out the heavy brass fireplace poker she must have grabbed from the downstairs umbrella stand on her way up, and swung it with the force of an executioner.
