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9
Jeff was looking over the report Alex and Logan wrote, carefully reading the information about the missing women. He was surprised the police hadn’t found a body yet. But as they’d mentioned, Virginia had lots of places to secretly bury someone. Sixty-two percent of the state was forestland.
There was a knock on the door. “Come in.”
Alice stepped partway into his office. “Chief Dixon is here. He insists on seeing you.”
Jeff frowned. He didn’t like people just showing up. Why hadn’t Dixon called first? He sighed and closed the file. “Okay, send him in.”
She nodded and closed the door. A few seconds later it swung open again, and the police chief walked in. The muscles in his face looked tight.
“We’ve got another one,” he said flatly. “Just happened earlier today. And there’s more.”
“Tell me.”
“We’ve got eight others, Jeff. This has been going on for almost six years.”
Tracy sat on the edge of her bed for what seemed like hours. There was only silence in the hallway. Where was the man who’d taken her? Finally, she got up and went back to the door. She slid open the small panel and looked out into the hall again. She listened for a moment but couldn’t hear anything. She decided to take a chance and call out.
“Is anyone there?” she said softly. Her voice was raspy. She suspected it had something to do with the drugs she’d been injected with. She tried again, this time a little louder. “Can anyone hear me? My name is Tracy Mendenhall. Is anyone else out there?”
After a few minutes, the small panel on the door across the hall from her slid open.
“Shut up,” a female voice hissed. “They can see you.”
“Who?” Tracy said. “Who are you talking about?”
Again, silence.
“Look,” Tracy said finally. “I want out of here. We need to work together if we’re going to go home.”
“We’ll never escape,” someone else said. Her voice was so soft Tracy could barely hear it.
Tracy was shocked to hear another metal panel slide open farther down the hall. “They’re watching. You need to get away from the door. If they see you we could all be punished.”
Tracy put her hand to her chest and fought to catch her breath. “All? How many of you are there?” She waited for an answer but none came. “Can they hear us?”
“No. The cameras in our rooms don’t have audio, and those of us who have been on dates have checked the hall outside. Nothing. I guess they don’t feel the need to listen to us since there’s no way out of here.”
“How many are here?” she asked again.
“We’re not sure,” the woman across from her said. “At least four. Sometimes they take them out and never come back.”
“Is he... is he killing them?”
No answer. Tracy heard several metal doors slide shut, including the one across from her. Then nothing. What was going on? Did someone mention dates? What did that mean? Something kept pricking at her mind. What did this remind her of?
Then it came to her. A movie she’d seen a long time ago. It was about a man who kidnapped women and held them in some kind of underground prison, keeping them in separate rooms. Even though the title escaped her, she definitely still recalled the fear she felt when it was over.
Her friend Mary Ann had watched it with her. “That could never happen,” she’d said when the movie ended. “What kind of underground place could hold that many people? Someone would know about it.”
They’d argued for an hour about the believability of the plot. Tracy was willing to believe that the bad guy had some special place to put the women he’d kidnapped, but Mary Ann wouldn’t accept it. Tracy had suggested abandoned mines and underground tunnels built to help slaves escape to freedom. Not wide enough, Mary Ann said. Wouldn’t have rooms. Although Tracy was annoyed with her friend’s almost obsessive focus on this one part of the movie, she realized later that it actually helped get her mind off the fear the movie ignited. Even with Mary Ann’s misdirection, Tracy had experienced nightmares for a couple of weeks afterward.
Now she could see that Mary Ann’s argument about abandoned mines was right. Those tunnels were only large enough for the cars they used to move whatever was being excavated from the mine. There certainly wasn’t room for cells on both sides of the passages. Besides, those walls weren’t made of this kind of stone.
So what was this place? Had it been created just for this? That didn’t make sense either.
She sat down on the bed and gazed around the room. Just a few books, and no TV, phone, or computer. Was that on purpose? What was this guy trying to do? What did he want? She was certain she hadn’t been molested. Was that coming next? She wished the woman across the hall would talk to her. She still had no idea what day it was. She was abducted early Sunday morning, and after she came to, she’d slept for a long time. But how long? She couldn’t be certain. Was it Tuesday? Wednesday?
