Shelter by Jung Yun Page A

humored her with the possibility. They’d been too careless from the start. She’d seen their faces, knew their names, carried the shame of them on her body. She wondered if Marina had a roommate or boyfriend who might notice she was missing, but she didn’t want to waste what little time she had left wishing for something so unlikely. No one had called in days. No one was going to come looking for them until it was too late. She felt guilty for leading the men to the house. It was her fault that everything had happened as it did. She tried to say the Lord’s Prayer, but she couldn’t remember the words. All she could do was accept the death that she knew was coming. At the very least, she wanted the men to bury her or throw her body off a bridge so that strangers wouldn’t have to find her naked and tied to her bed.
    During the drive to the bank, Jin kept thinking about what they’d done to her, to Mae and Marina both. The trip downtown was his last chance to save them. He just didn’t know how. He thought about slipping the teller a note, but Nat said he’d be standing behind him in line, watching everything he did. Then Jin mentioned the twenty thousand in his checking account. He knew a withdrawal that large would raise a flag, but when he suggested taking out the full amount, Nat just shook his head. Five thousand, he said. Five thousand won’t make anyone blink, not with a rich guy like you. Nat’s thoughts seemed to be in lockstep with his, canceling out every option for escape as soon as he came up with one. His last hope faded when they pulled into the parking lot and Nat handed him a pair of sunglasses from the glove compartment. Keep those on the entire time, he said. Don’t want anyone to start asking about your shiners.
    There were two tellers working at the window when Jin approached—one that he vaguely recognized, and another with the word TRAINEE printed on her name tag. They exchanged a short greeting as Jin slid his card across the counter and asked for five thousand dollars in cash. The older woman guided the younger one through the transaction, pointing at things on the computer. Jin wanted them to look at him and see the panic on his face, but neither of them did. All they cared about was the list of steps on the screen—do this, then that; check off this line and then the other. It took only a few minutes for the trainee to process his request, count out the money in neat stacks of hundred-dollar bills, and send him away with a thick envelope. Jin considered running for it—Nat didn’t have the gun—but he worried what they would do to Mae if he didn’t come back.
    In the car, Nat counted out the money, smiling as he fanned the new bills against his thumb, admiring their crispness, their smell. It occurred to Jin that this was all their lives were worth. Five thousand dollars, money that would probably be gone in a few days, spent on drugs and alcohol and who knew what else. He didn’t remember driving home or walking inside or sitting down in the kitchen so Nat could tie him up again. All of these things happened—they must have happened—but everything after the bank was a blur to him. The only thing Jin remembered for certain was the scream he heard when Nat went upstairs.
    Mae’s memory of the events began to break down at about the same time. She remembered Nat kicking open the bedroom door, smiling as he waved a thick envelope in the air. She remembered him going into the bathroom to look for Dell and screaming when he found him. And she remembered the look on his face when he climbed on top of her, all veins and rage and sweat as he wrapped his hands around her throat and squeezed until she could no longer see. Lentz kept asking questions about what happened afterward, trying to estimate how many hours Nathan Perry had been on the run, but she couldn’t answer any of them. She had no idea how long