That's when I heard voices in the kitchen and my heart jumped into my throat.
It wasn't my father's voice, it was a couple of voices I'd never heard before in my life. My heart was thundering, and my mind was telling me to get the hell out of there, so I backed up toward the doorway, keeping my eyes in the direction of the kitchen.
I moved as quietly as I could, hoping and praying that nobody came out of the kitchen as I made my way to the ruins of the front door, doing my best not to make a noise. That's when a figure appeared from the kitchen. He was a short, skinny man with a ponytail. His eyes met mine and I squealed, preparing to run for it when I noticed the gun in his hand.
“Get your ass back in here” he said, not even bothering to raise the gun he was holding
“Rory, what the fuck, man?” another voice called from the kitchen. “Is he back?”
The second figure came out of the kitchen and my eyes grew wide. He was larger than the first man, much larger. He was at least several inches taller and built like a football player. He was wearing a black t-shirt that hugged his chest tightly, the sleeves were short enough to reveal the scars and tattoos that lined his arms. So many scars.
His body and those scars made me think he was a dangerous man, but when I met his eyes, I didn't see anything frightening in them. It's hard to understand, let alone explain, about a man so large and rough looking, but he had a certain softness in his eyes. A kindness. A sense of compassion, maybe.
His eyes were sapphire blue, and he seemed as shocked to be staring at me as I was to be staring back at him. His face was all chiseled lines and hard edges, his beard covered most of the lower half , while his reddish-brown hair hung loose, almost to his shoulders.
“Please, I think you have the wrong place,” I said, holding my hands up.
“Kick the door closed behind you,” the man named Rory said.
I hesitated, but the look in his eyes and the gun in his hand gave me second thoughts about trying to run. Instead, I did as he said and kicked it closed.
“Obviously, this isn't him,” the second man said.
I realized they both had the same reddish-brown hair and blue eyes. They were obviously brothers – and neither of them looked familiar to me.
“No, but I bet she knows where we can find him,” Rory said.
“Jesus, Rory, put the fucking gun away, man,” his brother said. “No one said anything about pulling a gun. I said – ”
“You said you wouldn't kill anybody,” he snapped back. “I never made that promise.”
Rory's eyes twitched in his brother's direction, but his hand never wavered as he raised the gun. The gun was pointed right at me and my heart raced. As I looked at the big black barrel of that gun, everything seemed to slow down around me.
This was it. This was how I was going to die. Unless I did something about it, I was going to be lying on the living room floor among all of the cans and bottles in a pool of my own blood. I knew that I could either stand there and let them shoot me, or I could make a break for it and take my chances.
“If she answers my questions, we'll let her go,” Rory said. “Fair enough?”
The larger man looked at Rory for a long moment and then shrugged. “Yeah. Fine.”
Rory licked his lips, looking me up and down with a creepy smirk. I'd worked in a bar with grabby, perverted men long enough to know what that look and that smirk meant. He was imagining me naked. Worse than that, he was probably picturing doing all sorts of vile things to me.
“Where's Michael Boyer?” he asked.
“Michael Boyer?” My voice cracked, hearing him speak my father's name. “I – I don't know.”
“Bullshit,” Rory said, taking a step closer.
His brother grabbed his shoulder and held him back – and given that he was the larger of the two men, I was thankful for that. At least one of them wasn't crazy. If I played my cards right, I might just get out of there alive and in once piece after all.
“Listen, man,” the bigger guy said. “If she doesn't know, maybe we have the wrong house.”
“Nah, this is the right place,” Rory said.
He nodded his head toward the photos on the wall – my dad was pictured prominently in one of them. It was a younger version of himself from before he became the drunk, broken man he was now, but it was clearly him – and I was pictured with him. Younger too, of course, but it still looked like me.
“This must be his daughter,” Rory said.
“Still, if it's not Michael – ” the other man said.