Lisa Gardner - Gone

The laundry room was dark, shades drawn, lights off. The door connecting to the kitchen was closed. She had no idea if the man already stood right behind it or was maybe running down the hall, alerted by the noise.

She propped Dougie on top of the washing machine, then tried the third door, shaking it savagely, playing with the lock. Just like last time, it refused to budge. She banged her fists against it, weeping in frustration now. So close, so close. Get me out of this house!

She ended up backed into a corner, waiting for the inevitable. The man to come crashing in. To lash out at her with his hands, his feet, maybe the Taser. She was cold and exhausted and frightened. Her left leg didn’t want to bear her weight. She thought maybe she was losing Dougie.

She cried harder, the feel of her warm tears against her cheeks suddenly pissing her off. They were out of the basement, dammit. By God, she wasn’t going to act like a trapped animal now. She’d had enough.

Rainie hefted Dougie back into her arms and stormed for the connecting door. She kicked it open with her right foot, powered by sheer adrenaline into the kitchen. The space was empty, the house dark. She paused for one second, heard nothing, then came to her senses and rattled through a drawer in search of a weapon. She found a paring knife. It would do.

Water was still pouring in, whirling around her feet, making the linoleum slippery. She abandoned the kitchen, whisking down the carpeted hallway, always aware of her back.

She ducked inside the first door she found. A bedroom. Quickly, she dropped Dougie on the bed. Paused. Listened. No sound of footsteps. Moving fast, she positioned the knife between her thick, frozen fingers and went to work on the binding around her wrists. In the bad-news department, her flesh had swollen around the zip tie. In the good-news department, she could barely feel anything anyway. She hacked through the tough strap and some of her own skin. The minute the band ripped free, she didn’t care anymore. She could wiggle her fingers. She could rub her numb hands against her thighs. A thousand angry nerve endings screamed to life. She welcomed each and every one of them. Pain is life. Life is good!

Now she had work to do. First, Dougie.

She yanked the boy’s unconscious form into a sitting position, jerked his sodden clothes off his body, and rolled him into the thick comforter like a giant burrito.

“Come on, Dougie,” she whispered, briskly rubbing his arms, his legs, his damp hair. “Stay with me.”

Her own teeth were chattering, her body still hemorrhaging precious heat. She left Dougie long enough to rifle the nearby bureau, then the closet. She found an old flannel man’s shirt that smelled like a locker room. Too cold to care, she slid off her soaked T-shirt and drew the flannel around her body. It felt like a warm cup of cocoa, a nap in front of a blazing fire. It was the best shirt she’d ever worn and she found herself weeping again, a mess of emotions and fatigue and fear.

She returned to the bed, rubbing Dougie’s form again and again, desperate to get some heat into him. Just as his eyelids fluttered open, the water started snaking into the bedroom.

She looked at the growing deluge. She studied Dougie’s pale, dazed face.

She would have to carry him. Heft him over her shoulder and run for it.

It sounded good, but the minute she tried to lift him up, her left leg buckled again. As heat reentered her body, so did searing pain. Her busted knee, her bruised ribs, her endless collection of scrapes, cuts, and contusions. She dropped Dougie back onto the mattress and fell beside him.

And that quickly, she was exhausted beyond belief. She couldn’t lift her arms. She couldn’t move her legs. She just wanted to sleep. To curl into a tight little ball, close her eyes, and feel the world slip away.

Just for a minute.

She forced her eyes back open. Felt herself once more start to cry. And through the delirium of pain and fear and exhaustion, she willed herself to do just one last thing: think, Rainie, think.

And then, she saw the phone.

Wednesday, 1:13 p.m. PST

SHELLY WAS ON FIRE. In an abstract sort of way, she understood. That the stench of burnt meat and seared hair was her own. That the white-hot pain she’d always read about was genuinely true. That the air could be so hot, it literally boiled the water inside her mouth, evaporated the moisture from her lungs.

First time she inhaled, she would bring the fire inside her body and it would kill her.

So she held her breath as she dove through the flames licking up the twisting exterior. As she bent down and grabbed Kimberly’s fallen form. As she draped the smaller woman’s body around her broad shoulders. As she headed once more for the door.

Shelly thought of her dreams of a Parisian adventure. Oh, if that Left Bank artist could see her now, as she strode through the fire, hair curling, skin blistering, comrade on her shoulders.

I am woman, hear me roar.

Pity, she thought, as she stumbled through the doorway, collapsed onto the wet ground, and started to lose consciousness.

Because no one was ever going to want to paint her now.

Wednesday, 1:17 p.m. PST

QUINCY AND CANDI WERE JUST PULLING onto the dirt road leading to Stanley Carpenter’s fishing cabin when Quincy’s cell phone rang. It was Abe Sanders from Astoria. He’d sent two men to watch their double-murder suspect, Duncan, as promised. He wanted Quincy to be the first to know that they’d lost him.

“Lost him?” Quincy echoed. “How the hell do you lose someone as slow as Charlie Duncan?”

“Well now, Quincy-”

“Abe, it’s fifteen minutes past the deadline for learning that my wife is still alive. Talk faster.”

Sanders cut to the chase: Duncan went to a local diner for breakfast. Not a big deal, he did that most days as the man couldn’t cook. He walked in the diner. Never walked out. When the detectives finally entered the establishment two hours later, they learned he’d exited through the kitchen. The owner had thought it was odd, but then, Duncan was an odd sort of guy.

“Honest to God,” Sanders said, “my officers swear up and down he didn’t make the tail.”

“Just felt like sneaking out the back door for old times’ sake?”

“Maybe.” Sanders must have heard how defensive he sounded. “Look, we’re tearing apart the town as we speak. Best we can tell, his vehicle is still parked outside the diner, so he’s on foot.”

“Or he had a friend pick him up, or he helped himself to a car,” Quincy argued in exasperation.

“We’re considering all options. Give me some time.”

“Time? What time? It’s one fifteen, Sanders. There’s been no word from the kidnapper. Do you know what that means? It means Rainie is probably dead.”

Quincy threw down his cell phone, already cursing himself for not having pursued Duncan harder or located Andrew Bensen, or done any of the eight thousand other things they had considered but never developed because they just didn’t have the time. From the very beginning, there had never been enough time.

His phone rang again. Kincaid’s number. Quincy glanced at his watch. He wondered if this would be it. Kincaid calling with official news from Danicic or some other reporter. They had been late with the ransom drop, and their punishment would be…

He had set his shoulders and tightened his gut before he ever took the call. It didn’t help him.

It was Kincaid, but he wasn’t calling about Rainie.

He was calling about Kimberly.

Wednesday, 1:18 p.m. PST

“IT MAY NOT BE AS BAD AS IT SOUNDS,” Kincaid was saying urgently. “Your guy Mac managed to rip through a chained gate with a county surveillance van, which opened up access for fire-and-rescue. They are at the scene now.”