“I’ll make an early defense system at the main entry points. The driveway and the lake.”
“The lake?” Parker frowned. “How could they come that way?”
Her daughter made the point Shaw had been about to. “We passed a Walmart. They sell boats.”
Shaw asked the two of them, “Can you cover the windows? Sheets, towels, whatever you can find.” He was nodding at the rusticlandscape posters mounted on the walls. “There’ll probably be a toolbox somewhere, with a hammer and nails. It has to be dark. Use two or three layers if you have to.”
Hannah looked around. “How long’re we going to be here?”
“No way of knowing,” Shaw said. “I’ve got food and water in the camper. That’ll last us a week.”
Hannah said enthusiastically, “Oh, there’s a fire pit. We can cook out.”
Shaw said, “No. Too telltale.”
“How about now? Sun’s out.”
“You can smell smoke miles away. We’ll microwave.”
“There could still be smoke.” Hannah was looking at her mother, who confessed to Shaw, “I’m not much of a cook.”
She and her daughter both laughed.
Parker stepped away and began going through closets and kitchen cabinets. She found a small yellow plastic toolbox. She carried it to the dining room table, removed a hammer and a box of picture-hanging brads. The woman set off in search of blankets.
Shaw eyed the contemporary structure. To Hannah he said, “My father was a survivalist.”
Frowning, she seemed to be debating. Then finally asked, “But aren’t they weird? Like... Well, you know, racists?”
“Some, yes, but he wasn’t like that.” Shaw explained briefly about Ashton and the Compound. He then said, “The two fundamental rules of survival are never be without a means of escape, and never be without access to a weapon. So. The first. Escape? What do you think?”
Looking around. “Back door—to the deck. The front door, front windows. Side windows.”
“What’s best?”
She seemed to sense she was being tested but didn’t mind. In fact, she seemed to enjoy the challenge.
“Side,” she said firmly. “You could jump out and run there.” She pointed to the tall yellow and green brush, which was close to the house. “Good place to hide.”
“That’s right.”
“But the windows don’t open.” She glanced around and her eyes settled on the fireplace. “We have to break them out with that thing, the poker.”
“No. It’s too thin. That’d leave shards on the bottom.” Shaw was nodding to the kitchen. “See those cast-iron skillets?” They were hanging from a rack above the island. He walked into the kitchen and returned with two large iron frying pans. These he set under the windows Hannah had indicated. “We can break the glass with them and pound the bottom of the frame to crush the spikes.”
“The guy owns this place?” the girl said with a frown. “He’s not going to be, like, totally happy. You know, breaking his windows, nailing up his blankets.”
“We’ll pay him back.”
Allison Parker walked into the dining room bearing an armful of linens. She dumped them on a couch and surveyed the windows, then opened the packet of brads.
Shaw said, “I’m going to get our security system up outside.”
“Can I help you, Mr. Shaw?”
He glanced at Parker, who nodded.
Shaw asked her for the remote for the rental. She handed it to him.