Tessa
Thechairismetaland the room smells musty.I’m in a broken-down cabin that we arrived at after traveling down a remote, single-access road.Without my watch, time is difficult to gauge, but I’m guessing it took us at least three hours if not more to get this deep into the Cascades.They chose this place for its isolation.
I also know that there’s no way they would have let me see where they were taking me if they hadn’t intended on me never leaving.The knowledge sits inside me hollowly, but I refuse to let sorrow creep in.Sadness for what I might be losing… life, experiences… Cole.
Instead, I keep reminding myself to keep my wits, because if anyone can find me, it’s Cole, and I know he won’t ever stop trying.
I was surprised Jason Pelham greeted us when we arrived.I wouldn’t have thought the head of SAPG would dirty his hands with this, but apparently I was wrong.Maybe it’s just because he has too much riding on this to entrust it to his underlings.Regardless, Schwartz left as soon as he handed me over, because men like him don’t stay for what comes after.They write the checks, look the other way, and let people like Pelham handle the rest.
My wrists are zip-tied in my lap, legs and feet left free.Right now there’s just the chair in the room and the single overhead light with nothing but a bulb and a chain pull.I can only see what’s in front of me and to the sides—a door, rough unfinished timbered walls, a window with blackout curtains.
Jason Pelham sits before me.
Despite his broad facial features and pockmarked skin from what looks like a horrible bout of acne as a teen, he’s actually handsome in a very unconventional way.He reminds me of Tommy Lee Jones inThe Fugitive, and I have to wonder why I’m thinking such foolishness.
It’s so you don’t think about your impending death, Tessa.
Pelham’s wearing a dark fleece and tactical pants.He looks completely at ease, which is the most frightening thing about him.
He has a folding chair of his own that he’s turned backward, straddling it with his forearms resting on the top rail, watching me with the patient expression of someone who has done this before and found that the quiet before the storm is more frightening than the actual storm.
Two men stand behind him in the shadows.I gave them more than a cursory glance to memorize as many details as I could.Both large, both armed, both with deadened expressions that tell me they’re killers before they’re anything.
“Tessa.”Pelham says my name like we know each other.“Let’s talk about what Erik gave you.”
I keep my breathing even.“I don’t know what you mean.”
He smiles but it doesn’t extend to anything above his mouth.“The flash drive… the one he handed you in the parking garage approximately four seconds before my people ran him down.”
The matter-of-fact way he saysran him down—like it’s a line item on the invoice he billed to RainVest—sends a cold and clarifying ripple through me.I understand exactly what I’m dealing with, and I also understand that none of the normal rules apply here.
“I don’t have a flash drive,” I say.
“You did,” he says gently, which oddly comes across as threatening.“And you’ve had access to everything on it.So let’s skip the part where you deny that and move to the part where you tell me what you’ve done with it.”
“I’m a journalist,” I say.“I don’t reveal my sources or my methods.”
He tilts his head slightly, like he finds this mildly interesting.“You’re not a journalist right now, Tessa.Right now you’re merely a problem I’ve been tasked with solving, and I have considerable latitude in how I go about that.”He pauses to let my imagination run wild with just what that might mean.“What I need to know is simple… what was on the drive, who else has seen it and whether your article has already been filed with anyone who would retain a copy of your evidence after publication.”Another pause, a broad smile as he throws his arms wide.“That’s all.Answer those questions honestly and this becomes a much more comfortable conversation.”
The implication of what happens if I don’t answer him hangs in the air between us, so thick it’s almost choking.
I think about Cole and the timing of everything.I try to backtrack in my addled brain when he would have returned to Jameson, how long it would have taken to figure out I’d been abducted.
They’ll figure it out, I reassure myself.Cole will immediately notice I’m gone and then Josie will pull the cameras and they’ll find the rideshare and then—
And then what?They have no tracker signal.They have no phone ping.Possibly a general direction and a woman who walked willingly into a car and disappeared.
Will Josie and BOB be able to come up with some probabilities as to where I’ve been relocated?Will they come bursting through that door?Or will they be wandering around another part of the Cascades looking for me?
He’ll find you, some stubborn part of me insists.He’ll find you because he’s Cole.This is what he does and he will not stop.
I hold on to that with everything I have and use that burst of confidence to hold my ground.“I plead the Fifth.”
His expression shifts.Not anger—no, this is far more menacing, and so cold I suppress a full-body shiver.
“Wrong answer,” he says quietly and stands.
It happens fast after that.
