Free Old Chaos (9781564747136) by Sheila Simonson

ought to finish it while he waited.
    It hadn’t taken him and Jake long to free Mack’s legs with the jack, but Rob was afraid to move his old friend. The injuries looked too terrible. So they’d rigged a shelter with Jake’s slicker. Mack wasn’t bleeding a lot by then, and Jake claimed he’d found a pulse, but Rob wasn’t optimistic. When they arrived, the medics looked grave.
    Rob tossed his muffin into the darkness and headed back to Mack’s house. Dogs or no dogs, he had to find Beth. He was not surprised that Linda, bereft of Sophy, tagged along.
    “Somebody should stay with the radio,” he said.
    “I told Thayer to do that.” Thayer Jones had driven the SOCO van.
    “Where do you think the women are, Linda?”
    “I don’t know. It was a big place. The bedrooms downstairs? The bathrooms?”
    “The slide hit around five o’clock. Mack was in the upper hall with the baby. It doesn’t make sense.”
    “The baby, I think she has…”
    He glanced at her. It was just light enough to see her face. She touched her stomach.
    “Stomach ache?”
    “Colic!” she said, triumphant. She was proud of her command of English idioms. “When Mickey cried like that, the doctor called it colic.” Mickey was her son, Miguel.
    Rob tried to remember if his daughter had suffered from colic. “I suppose it’s possible.” He turned his ankle on a rock and swore.
    “So the mama’s asleep. She’s been up two nights in a row. The grandpapa is walking the floor with the baby and, um, the abuela is fixing coffee.”
    “In the kitchen?” They hadn’t looked in the kitchen area at all. The Great Room had fallen on it. “You may be right.” He quickened his pace.
    They edged around the ruin of the three-car garage. The roof had collapsed, and the door had sprung. The mashed cars inside reflected glints of light. The ground beyond was not covered with much slide debris, just roof tiles, but it sloped down sharply, treacherous underfoot.
    He couldn’t remember what the basement level of the kitchen wing held, but it didn’t matter, because the floor above had slumped, blocking downstairs entry. There was a door on the southwest side, a safety exit, probably from the kitchen, and the metal stairway that led down from it looked intact. He tested it. It creaked but held.
    “I’m going up. Shine your light for me.” It was getting close to dawn, but overcast and still raining, so it was dark. He made his way slowly, step by step. When he peered in the door, his flashlight shone on chaos.
    Surely no one could live through that. Roof tiles, ripped dry-wall, cross beams, and ceiling fixtures had rained down on burst cabinets and fallen appliances. A big refrigerator lay on its front, cooling cables exposed. And that was just the kitchen. Beyond it, the dining area had taken the brunt when the enormous flagstone chimney fell.
    “Beth!” he called. His voice was swallowed by the darkness. He shouted her name again, and this time he thought he heard something. He cocked his head, listening.
    “Help…” A reedy cry, barely audible.
    Rob rattled the door. It was stuck. He looked down at Linda’s anxious upturned face. “Get Jake and Todd, with a pry bar and the jack. Call for an ambulance.”
    “One is already coming.” She trotted off.
    Rob turned back to the door. “Beth, it’s Rob. Can you hear me?”
    A moan.
    “Hold on, sweetheart. We’ve found Mack and the baby. They’re on the way to the hospital. Are you all right?”
    “I hurt…head…legs.” She whimpered.
    “Where are you?”
    “Under…butcher block.”
    Rob had never gone into the kitchen. He tried to visualize what she was talking about and failed. He decided to distract her. “Do you know where Peggy is?”
    “Sleeping.” She hiccuped on a sob. “She was… downstairs, sleeping. Skip’s not here. Oh God, hurts.”
    He talked soothing nonsense to her. It was hard to keep it up. After what seemed ages but was probably less than five minutes,