“Where are you?” he calls out.

Still crouching, I sidle along the edge of the wall, feeling the fine, tingling tendrils of spider webs on the back of my neck, trying to visualize where I am. I reach up above me, feeling along the wall until I find a shelf. There are no candles on it, my mother having taken them all to her reading room, and now the locked room, of course, not that a candle would do me any good without a match, but—there!—my hand falls on the familiar shape of a flashlight, which rolls away at my touch, clattering to the concrete floor somewhere to my left.

“I know you’re down here.” Donovan’s voice comes hauntingly through the dark. “I can hear you.”

And I can hear him, moving around, his arms likely outstretched, knocking into shelving and crates, his hands fumbling around for me, following in the direction of Julian’s cries.

I cannot feel around for the flashlight while holding the child, so, bundling the towel carefully under his head, I lay him on the floor, which seems to calm him some; his cries become soft coos, quieting in the dark, and I mentally thank him for making it harder for Donovan to find us.

Now I crawl across the floor, seeking the light, and for long, terrible minutes it seems a fruitless endeavor. I am lost, abandoned. Yet as soon as I find it and the flashlight is in my hand, and I rise to my feet, grateful to be off the cold floor that still reeks faintly of water rot, two realizations come to me at once.

The first is that, with Julian now quieted, I no longer know where he is. I turn around in the dark, lose my bearings.

The second is that if I switch on this flashlight, Donovan will see exactly where I am.

For a moment I stand, paralyzed by indecision, the flashlight clutched to my chest the way I was holding Julian tightly to me only moments ago.

“This is ridiculous, Sam,” Donovan’s voice hisses through the dark. His footsteps move slowly around the other side of the room and then stop. A crash of forgotten objects spilling to the floor makes me flinch, the sound of metal against the old shelving unit there, and I imagine him swinging the crowbar blindly. When next his footfalls come to me, they are crunching over the glass of broken lightbulbs or shattered china.

Don gives an aggravated growl, a throat-tearing sound of frustration. “Don’t make me do this, Sam.”

“Is that what you said to Liz before you hit her?” I cannot help but verbalize, and I can almost feel him turning toward the sound of my voice, ready to pound across the basement and strike, and I think that now, if ever, is my chance; I switch on the flashlight and quickly scan the room, finding his form coming toward me, and I shine the light directly into his face. He stops, lifts his hand to shield his eyes, and turns away, disoriented, giving me enough time to find Julian, pick him up, and look toward my only escape.