Find Her (Detective D.D. Warren #8)(101)

Light burns, burns, burns. We can’t handle it.

We’ve already spent too long in the dark.

I’m breathing heavily. Behind me, Stacey is too. I wait for the sound of pounding footsteps, alerted by Stacey’s shriek. The animals are out, have escaped from their cages! Get them!

But the house remains still. Eerily so.

It makes me anxious. No house is this quiet. Just like no room should be that dark. What is this place? And what has happened here?

I’m starting to panic. My breathing is irregular, my heart pounding in my chest. The room in its own way was comforting. A defined void. And, frankly, a fairly luxurious one for a girl once confined to a coffin-size box.

But a house, an entire house with shuttered rooms and unseen levels and unknown quirks . . .

I fist my hand, force myself to focus. Are you tired, are you hungry, are you cold, are you in pain?

No? Then you are okay.

I am okay.

And I’m going to get out of here.

The light went on. The room lit up. What did I see? I try to recall, but I can’t. Just an impression of blinding brightness, like a blowtorch in front of my retinas. I take a deep breath. If I’m going to figure out what’s in that room, I’m going to have to flash the light again.

“Look away,” I instruct Stacey. I lower my own gaze, then once again work the switch.

I look sideways first, still blinking hard against even the ambient glow. Behind me, Stacey is doing God knows what. She whimpers but at least doesn’t scream this time.

I count to three, then:

I glance up swiftly, register the room, snap the light back off.

Both Stacey and I breathe easier, and now I understand her anxiety about that space. It had contained a thin mattress, plastic bucket, and a length of chain dangling from the ceiling.

I turn to her.

“Was that your room?”

It takes her a moment. She nods. Which makes me glance down the hall, to the two other closed doors.

“And those rooms?” I ask her.

She shrugs, appears more miserable. She is struggling. With evidence of her past captivity, with the hope of new escape, I don’t know. But in the gloom, her face is pale and shiny, like a waxy moon.

Maybe she has an infection. Maybe she’s dying right now while I stand here and interrogate her in the middle of the hall.

I don’t know. I don’t know anything.

I keep my ears attuned for any sign of approaching noise, clutch my mattress coil tighter, and advance to the next door.

There are locks on the outside, but near the top of the door frame. I didn’t notice on the first door because I hadn’t looked up that high. Now I realize all four doors have external latches, placed high. None of them are bolted shut, however.

Why? Why have locks but not use them?

My uneasiness increases again as I approach the next closed door, position myself behind it, and yank it open.

Same pitch black. Some external switch snapped up for a brief, blinding flare of light. Same contents. Bare mattress, heavy chains.

I’m starting to see the theme of this house; it’s not a happy one. And now, for the final piece of the puzzle: the closed door next to my room.

Stacey isn’t talking. Stacey isn’t moving. She simply stands in the hallway, clutching her side, sagging on her feet, as I do the honors.

This is the room with the viewing window. The room where I assumed our abductor liked to hang out, enjoy the show. And now? Is he waiting inside, still one step ahead? I’ll open the door and he’ll . . .

Taze me, drug me? Laugh his head off at our pathetic attempt to escape?

My hand is shaking. It pisses me off. I don’t want to be scared or anxious or intimidated.

I am not hungry. I am not tired. I am not cold, thirsty, hot, or in pain.

I’m okay.

And I’m going to do this.

Door open. Flick light on. Snap light off.

I inhale sharply, exhale fully. Then I shut the door and return to Stacey. No Evil Kidnapper. No bogeyman hiding in the dark. Instead, I saw behind this door exactly what I’d spotted behind the first two. Which brought us to four rooms, counting my own, with four blackout paint jobs, four mattresses, four buckets, and four tethers of chain.

Two of us.

“What aren’t you telling me?” I demand.

Stacey looks at me. She opens her mouth. She closes her mouth.

Then, just like a marionette whose strings have been cut, she collapses soundlessly to the floor.


*

I HEAD STRAIGHT FOR THE DOOR at the end of the corridor. The exit, most likely to the building’s staircase.

I tell myself I’m not running away. I tell myself I’m not abandoning a young girl I’ve already stabbed in the ribs.

I’m getting out. I’m finding help. It’s the sensible thing to do. Come upon an injured person, first thing you do is dial 911. Well, I don’t exactly have a cell phone on me. Hence, I’ll go out and fetch help.

I reach the door, grab the knob. Heavy, metal. Like a fire door. I twist and pull just as I have three times before.

The door doesn’t move.

I pull my gaze up, to where the other doors were latched. But there is no bolt.

At least, not on this side.

How were the doors to the other rooms set up? Locked from the outside. How much do I wanna bet this door is the same? Meaning it opens into the stairwell and is locked inside the stairwell, versus my side of the long, shadowy corridor.