Chapter 13
Chapter Thirteen
Kenna sat with her head back on the recliner, earbuds in. Not quite asleep but not all the way awake either. It was too early in the morning to be fully awake.
Ellayna’s voice drifted through her earbuds. “I remember it was really cold.”
She sounded young, but not like the child she’d been years ago when Kenna rescued her. This was a preteen who had seen far too much and understood the horror in the world better than most adults—because she’d stared it in the face.
“He told me to call him Ricky. He wasn’t nice, and it was really cold.”
The podcaster said, “And then Kenna Banbury came?”
Steven didn’t cut her off before she began to describe what the Seventh Day Killer had done in the days before he planned to kill her. But it was close. Making Kenna wonder if they’d discussed what they’d be talking about, that Steven didn’t want Ellayna to get too descriptive about her trauma.
At least he had that. This wasn’t about gratuitous information for the sake of downloads and ratings. It seemed this really was about the case.
“I thought she was a ghost,” Ellayna said.
“Or an angel.” There was a moment of quiet, then she continued, “First, I was alone, and then she was there. She told me that Mommy sent her, but I wasn’t supposed to go with strangers.
” She exhaled across the line. “I told my therapist that because it doesn’t make sense.
I went with Ricky, but when Kenna showed up, I didn’t think I could go with her. ”
“How did she convince you?”
“She said to me, ‘Mommy said to tell you that Bubby loves you,’” Ellayna said. “That’s how I knew she was telling the truth.”
Kenna sniffed back the moisture gathering in her sinuses.
She couldn’t let Ellayna’s story get to her, but becoming a mother had messed with her hormones and expanded the capacity of her heart in ways she hadn’t expected.
It seemed like she felt so much that the organ was about to burst out of her chest. Gross analogy, but fitting.
She didn’t want to feel this much. But the alternative would be to live as a robot with no feelings whatsoever.
Still, it was far better right now to focus on working.
She needed to find this Steven guy and shut him down before he did more damage to people she cared about.
But given that they were drawing blanks trying to identify him, she might have to call the president.
Surely, the government had secret spy technology that could find someone who didn’t want to be found.
Especially when the president was an agent of Dominatus.
They definitely crossed lines, undermining people’s privacy, and they’d claim it was all for the greater good.
Meanwhile, so many people who worked for the government in good faith didn’t have a clue they were following a dangerous world power.
No, she would wait and not call in the big guns. Not yet.
Ellayna’s voice cut across her thoughts. “Then he came. While she was standing there. He walked in.”
Steven said, “The Seventh Day Killer—Ricky. He showed up?”
“He came into the room. She fought him like a superhero.”
Kenna smiled to herself, thinking back through the tools she’d used that day.
Ways she worked to account for the injuries she’d sustained to her forearms years ago.
Surgery hadn’t fixed it, but Dominatus did.
She almost wanted that part of her life back.
Without the constant ache, she almost didn’t feel like… herself.
“She took him down?” Steven asked.
“Yeah. Then she carried me out. All the way to the ambulance.”
Kenna remembered the slight weight of the girl and how her arms had ached afterward.
But she’d done it. She’d carried Ellayna to safety because she had to.
God had sent her to rescue Ellayna, the way He sent Jesus to rescue the world.
Thank You. He had given her the ability to sweep that child out of a horrible situation and a hundred others besides that one.
And yet, how much more had God stepped in to save people—whether they thanked Him in return, or not.
“She called my mom, and I went home.”
“And Gerald Rickshire went to prison,” Steven said. “It’s a pretty amazing story. You were very brave.”
“I didn’t feel brave.”
“Bravery might not have anything to do with how you feel. It’s more about what you do.”
“Like Kenna fighting him off?” Ellayna said.
“And you keeping your cool. Knowing you could trust her. And leaving with her. Letting her save you from that. You were very brave to take that chance and trust her, Ellayna. You should be proud of yourself.”
Ellayna was quiet for a long moment. Then, she said, “Thanks.”
“I’m sure it’s been hard. But you have a therapist, right? You mentioned them.”
“I’m supposed to talk about it.” A smidge of teen attitude peeked through in her tone, making the corner of Kenna’s mouth curl up.
Steven said, “We all need someone to talk to about things that have happened to us, so thank you for talking to me today.”
“You’re welcome.” Ellayna sounded in that moment every bit like the little kid in that basement that Kenna had found.
But that wasn’t what gave her pause.
It was what Steven had said—about things that happened. She’d heard it in his voice. Something had happened to him, and maybe this podcast was his way to talk about it.
The ending credits music began to play, but it cut off abruptly. Kenna opened her eyes and looked at her phone screen on the arm of the chair. Amara calling.
She slid a finger across the screen. “Morning.”
“Are you even awake?” Her mother’s smooth alto tone had some cracks in it, but it always made Kenna feel better.
Of course, Amara wasn’t her mother any more than Zeyla was really her sister.
But she wanted to claim them as such anyway, because Dominatus had taken plenty from her.
She was keeping this for herself and for her baby.
“Mostly.” She explained about Ellayna on the podcast.
“A child? That’s unconscionable.”
“And we’re surprised by that now?” Kenna figured they’d seen enough in this world that what should be unthinkable had happened right in front of their faces in a way they couldn’t deny.
“Careful you don’t hit a point where you aren’t surprised by anything. It’s a rough place to be.”
Kenna asked, “Are you finally returning my calls?”
“I can dispense wisdom.”
“You can also help us work cases. But you pretty much disappeared.”
Amara didn’t respond right away. When she did, she said, “I needed to figure something out with Bruce.”
“And?”
“We’re good. We got it settled.”
Kenna asked, “Should I know what that means?”
She spotted movement out of the corner of her eye and saw Jax wander out from the hallway and go into the living room. Hair mussed all over the place, looking like he’d been asleep for days.
She smiled as he approached, pointing to her right earbud and mouthing Amara.
He braced his hands on the arms of the chair and leaned down to touch his lips to hers.
Amara said, “Bruce and I found a small chapel and got married.”
“Congratulations!”
Jax glanced at her.
“But aren’t you supposed to have witnesses at a wedding?”
“We found some locals. There wasn’t time to call you all down to Mexico once we settled it and decided to find a preacher.”
Kenna said, “Good, because I’m going to need some time before I go to Mexico.”
“Plus, I don’t think they let you fly as pregnant as you are.”
“Hmm. True.” Kenna sighed. “I appreciate the distraction from thinking about Ellayna and what possessed her mother to allow her to go on a podcast and talk about what happened to her—”
“Assuming she knew,” Amara said.
“Or wondering when those guys in the SUV are going to show up looking for the flash drive.”
“I thought you were safe there. Didn’t the police follow them from the scene?”
“They couldn’t catch them. The kidnappers got away.
” She should have called them killers. They’d murdered multiple people while trying to get what they wanted, with no regard for innocent lives.
“Who knows what will happen next.” She tried to sound nonchalant when she said, “What are you and Bruce working on now that you’ve gotten your deal resolved? ”
“Nice try.” Amara paused. “But…there is something I haven’t been able to tell you. I wasn’t sure if it would cause a problem. Bruce said I should’ve told you months ago, but I didn’t want you to think I was a terrible person.”
“You’re a person who has lived their whole life in a war, and war makes you do things you never thought you’d have done.” She wanted her mother to have lived a different life, not one fighting constantly against Dominatus. Playing both sides—sometimes simultaneously. “What did you do?”
Amara fell silent.
Kenna wondered if she even should’ve asked. There might be a better time to have this conversation or a better place both of them could be in. But the question was out now, and it was up to Amara whether she shared.
An alarm blared through the house, coming from speakers high on the wall that Kenna had noticed but didn’t know what they were for.
“What is that?”
“I’ve got to go.” She hung up on Amara and tugged out her earbuds as Jax raced back into the room. He caught her hand and helped her out of the chair quicker than she’d be able to manage. “What’s going on?”
“Incoming. Two black SUVs coming down the lane.” He was already walking toward the hall.
She rushed after him, heading to where they had stashed go bags for just in case. “Where’s the third?”
“I don’t plan to stay here long enough to find out.”
Zeyla rushed in the front door. “Maizie!”
The young woman stumbled out of one of the bedroom doors a second before Preston emerged at the end of the hall, wiggling his feet into a pair of running shoes as he walked. He grabbed the strap of Maizie’s backpack and righted it for her where she was struggling to get it on her shoulder.
Jax grabbed his duffel and Kenna’s, and Preston tossed him the keys to their armored car.
Preston said, “Rendezvous point?”
Maizie, at the door with Zeyla now, glanced back. Fear on her face. Kenna said, “Go!” The two women would take the RV and use a fire road to escape the property. Kenna prayed the work Preston had done filling in potholes and smoothing out the rough dirt track had held.
“Yes.” Jax grabbed Kenna’s hand, and they headed for the kitchen, out the side door to the covered car port that kept the car out of sight. It was far too heavily armored to be towed by the RV, so they had to drive separately, taking a different route Preston had mapped out.
But would they meet the third SUV on their way? Or would Maizie and Zeyla?
Preston ran out the door. “Get going! I’m going to check with the team, then I’ll be gone, too.”
Across the back lawn, the chopper engine whirred to life.
“Sure you don’t want to fly?” Jax asked her over the roof of their car.
“No, I don’t.” She slid in the passenger’s side. “Sure you feel okay to drive?”
“Adrenaline is a good pain reliever.” He shoved the lever to drive and hit the gas.
“Until it dissipates, and you can’t move because you hurt so bad.”
“We’ll burn that bridge when we come to it.” He gripped the wheel with both hands, bumping over the grass toward a track that skirted the cornfield.
Kenna grabbed the door handle and held on.