Virginia didn’t reply to that. She filled a pot of water from the outdoor hand pump, letting the rusty water seep into the ground until it ran clear. A squirrel scolded her from a nearby jack pine. In other circumstances, this could be quite pleasant.
The soup was good and filling, especially simmered with a handful of the jerky. Something new, she thought, almost smiling—cream of jerky soup. The crackers were stale, but she felt better after she’d eaten. Johnny was drinking too much and mumbling to himself. She ignored him. All she could hope was that he’d pass out.
When she’d cleaned up the dishes and pot she’d used for the soup, Virginia pawed through a stack of magazines and newspapers she’d discovered in a corner of the bedroom. She found an old Reader’s Digest magazine and curled up on the rickety armchair to read and pass the time. He was definitely incapable of driving anywhere now. Johnny had progressed from mumbling to singing to himself on the sofa, a third—or was it a fourth?—tumbler of whiskey in his hand.
Oddly, she didn’t feel threatened. She knew her captor too well. He was the same old Johnny. Impulsive, headstrong, a joker... He was too badly organized to carry off anything complicated or serious. Virginia had no doubt he’d be back in jail within days. And not for the last time either.
A sudden groan and then snoring from the direction of the sofa alerted Virginia to the fact that she’d finally had some luck. He’d fallen asleep. Or passed out. Now she could sneak out and find her way back to the main road—there was still an hour or two of daylight—hitch a ride to town and put as many miles between herself and her captor as possible. If she could avoid it, she wouldn’t go to the cops. Let them catch him themselves; it wasn’t as though anyone had been hurt in the robbery, including her.
Virginia got to her feet and walked quietly to the door, one eye on the snoring Johnny Gagnon. He’d knocked over his glass when he’d fallen asleep and the pungent fumes of twelve-year-old whiskey filled the room.
The key! It was missing. Virginia clenched her jaw in surprise and shock. Damn him. He wasn’t as disorganized as she’d assumed. There’d only been an old-fashioned latch on the outside when they’d arrived, but she’d noticed an ancient skeleton key stuck in the rusted lock from the inside when she’d gone out to get the firewood earlier. That skeleton key was gone. She glanced toward Johnny, her lips compressed in annoyance. No doubt the missing key was in his pocket.
Then she realized he hadn’t taken the gun out of his jacket pocket and his jacket was hanging over the back of the sofa. She tiptoed toward it Shuddering, she touched the icy-cold steel of the gun. She withdrew it, then panicked. It was a lot heavier than she’d thought it would be. What was she going to do with it? She didn’t know; she just didn’t want a weapon like that available to a man as drunk as Johnny. She looked around the small cabin. There weren’t many hiding places. In the end she put it in the crisper of the old icebox, which hadn’t been used for months. Johnny wasn’t the type to rummage around for vegetables, anyway.
After that she searched through the cupboard and found a couple of packages of noodles and mix, which she decided to make for an evening meal. The discovery that Johnny had locked her in was a shock. She was stuck until tomorrow now. It would be dark soon, and even if she got out, she didn’t think she’d be able to find her way to the road at night It wasn’t as though the Powderface Trail got a lot of traffic even in the daytime.
Johnny woke up for supper, cheerful but still very drunk. He ate two huge platefuls of the concoction she’d made, complimenting her on her cooking. Then he dug the key out of his jeans pocket with a sly grin at her and swaggered onto the stoop outside, where she could hear him relieving himself. When he came in, she went out with the same object in mind, finding some privacy behind a bush to one side of the cabin. There was no outhouse that she could see, but there was probably one a few yards . down a nearby trail. She wasn’t about to hunt for it, though. Johnny was waiting for her on the stoop when she returned.
“Thought I’d let you sneak off on me, eh?” he said with a snort of laughter. “Not a chance, babe.”
“When are you taking me home?” she demanded. None of this struck her as being the slightest bit humorous.
“Whoa, don’t get your shorts in a knot, babe. I’ll drop you off tomorrow somewhere. Canmore, Calgary, wherever you wanna go. No sweat.” He followed her back into the cabin and locked the door again.
“Why are you locking up?” she asked. She didn’t like the idea of a locked door with a fire in the stove. Or Johnny. He was drunk. What if he upset an oil lamp or something?
“Keep out the bad guys,” he joked, winking at her. “You can’t be too careful these days. There’s a lotta riffraff out there runnin’ around.” He gave her a significant look and dropped the key back in his pocket. Virginia went into the bedroom to return the magazine and surreptitiously tried the small window there. It was either nailed or painted shut. There was no way she could get out without breaking the glass. Well, if she had to, she would. Maybe when he passed out again.
Half an hour later it was too dark to read. Luckily her captor had shown no interest in lighting the lamps that were lined up on the kitchen counter. Johnny fell asleep sprawled out on the sofa, with only an inch or two left in the whiskey bottle. Virginia hoped that was the only booze the cupboards would yield.
She tried the bedroom window again. It wouldn’t budge. Then she went back into the main room and tried the window he’d opened earlier. It was stuck, too. She looked for some kind of tool in the kitchen drawer, but didn’t come up with anything more lethal than a dull knife, which she took into the bedroom. She began chipping at the paint that covered the window frame.
“Whatcha doin’, babe?”
Damn. Virginia put down the knife and cleared her throat. “Nothing,” she called back. She froze for a few moments, then heard snoring again.
She was trapped here. But did she really want to get out now and try to make her way through the dark forest? She could get seriously lost. For tonight, anyway, things seemed pretty hopeless.
She might as well go to bed. She picked up an afghan that lay on the end of the bed and carried it into the main room. Johnny was stretched out on the sofa. She unfolded the afghan and draped it lightly over his snoring form. With any luck he wouldn’t wake up until morning.
Then, just in case, she jammed the kitchen knife between the door frame and the door itself of the bedroom as a temporary lock and studied the sagging double bed. When had the sheets last been changed? Did she want know? For extra security, she lodged a rickety chan under the latch, then took off her jeans and sneakers, leaving her socks, shirt and underwear on, and climbed between the fairly clean-looking quilt and blanket that covered the bed. She could only hope that morning would come soon. And that Johnny would be sober enough to drive her to the nearest town.
It was so quiet. Except for the soughing of the wind in the trees and Johnny snoring in the living room, there wasn’t a sound. And it was getting so dark. There wasn’t even a moon.
Despite her certainty that, exhausted or not, she wouldn’t sleep, she did, only to awaken suddenly in a horrible fright, the room pitch-dark, and with the stinking, whiskey-laden breath of her captor in her face. He obviously had broken into the room somehow and fallen across the bed. He was trying to kiss her.
“Johnny!” She wrenched her face away. “Stay away from me!”
“Whassamatter? Doc’s daughter too good for me now? Eh?” He persisted, rubbing his whiskery face over hers. She wanted to gag when his damp mustache swept across her mouth.
“Get off me!”
“Shut up, you stuck-up bitch,” he growled, grabbing her hair. “Kiss me. The way you used to.” Real fear stabbed Virginia’s heart. This wasn’t the Johnny Gagnon she knew. She realized at the same time that he’d taken off his clothes. He was stark naked on top of her on the bed, only the tattered quilt between them.
He plunged his tongue into her mouth and she gagged. He