CHAPTER 40
Rebecca
JJ was waiting outside Aunt Lissa’s when they arrived, his neon-green rain jacket a pop of color against the gray outside.
“Be careful,” Lissa called from the front door, two of her four kids peeking from behind her legs.
“We will,” Josh said as JJ climbed in, buckled up. “Let me know if you hear anything. And maybe call the station, let them know where we’re headed.”
“You got it.”
They roared off, and JJ leaned forward.
”Is Dev okay, Dad? I mean, Aunt Liss said he’s missing, and they showed us that video at school last year, about strangers and kidnapping and stuff, and …”
“We think he’s hiding out, buddy,” Josh said, eyes trained on the road as they made a sharp left and then a right, headed toward the Wahca River.
“In all this rain?” JJ eyed the sky through the windshield. “Isn’t there a hurricane coming? Aunt Lissa wouldn’t even let us go to the tree house.”
“That’s why we have to hurry.” Josh gripped the wheel, turned into the small gravel parking area near the trailhead. He picked up the walkie-talkie, explained where they were headed.
“We’ll send a crew over to help,” came a crackly voice in reply. “Over.”
“Thanks for helping, JJ,” Rebecca turned to the boy, gave what she hoped was a reassuring smile. “No one’s seen him since last Thursday, and we’re hoping maybe he’s taking cover in that fort of yours.”
“Since Thursday?” JJ looked surprised. “Like, all alone at night and everything?”
Rebecca shivered, picturing Devon in the woods alone, in the rain, with only his Bible for comfort. Did he have food? Was he scared?
“We’ll find him,” Josh said, glancing over, and she shook away the tears, balled her hands into fists. She hoped he was right. If they didn’t find … no. She couldn’t think about that.
Then they were parked and heading down the path, rain falling in patches through the canopy of trees overhead. Thunder rumbled, and she ducked instinctively as they raced through the forest, feet kicking up clumps of mud, half-pulled along by JJ.
“It’s not really a fort, Dad. I mean, we call it a fort, but it’s more like a tunnel,” JJ shouted breathlessly as they ran.
“A tunnel?”
“I don’t know what you call it. Like a pipe thing, only bigger.”
They could see the river ahead now. She recognized her usual spot, the big rocks they sometimes used for seats or a picnic. Big splatters of rain pounded against the river surface, churning up the water, and they pressed on, past the rocks, under a large tree branch and left into a clearing.
The rain began to fall in earnest now, and the bitter taste of her morning coffee swam in her throat.
Ahead and above, the green trees turned darker, and she had to duck to keep the water from her eyes.
Months of early morning jogging didn’t make her any less out of breath.
JJ veered this way and that, and once a bush smacked her full-on in the face, but she kept going.
She could hear Josh’s heavy footsteps behind her, and once she slipped as they rounded a curve, turned back toward the river.
The crackle of static on the walkie-talkie startled her.
“Flash flood warning, careful,” someone was saying, and then they were at the riverbank again, and JJ was pointing, and she could barely see it.
“There! By the riverbank!”
She gaped, not sure she was seeing correctly. It looked like JJ was pointing to a huge metal grate and a massive concrete pipe, like a water tunnel or cavern. It sloped downward, and water poured out of the huge opening into the river.
She stopped mid-stride, grabbed his arm. “That’s your fort?”
JJ nodded, eyes wide. “Yeah.”
“That’s a storm drain.” Josh’s face was pale as they watched the water churn. “Lord, I hope he’s not in there.”
Rebecca turned to JJ. “You guys enter through the bottom part, there? By the river?”
JJ looked from her to his dad, and Josh nodded for him to answer.
JJ stared at the ground, swallowed. “Yes, ma’am. They have signs, but there’s never any water in it when we’re there. It’s dry, and it echoes, and there’s a part so narrow you can touch the edge and flip yourself around, like a hamster wheel.”
Rebecca let out a breath, eyed the drain.
Everything she’d ever heard about storm drains and storms said to steer clear.
She’d even done a story about an old man in New York who’d fallen down a drain chasing his dog, gotten trapped in a sudden rainstorm, and died.
There was that big national story maybe a year ago, too, about the teenager out West who got swept away and drowned. Surely Devon knew better.
Only it hadn’t been raining Thursday, or Friday. Hadn’t started till Sunday night, in fact.
She put a hand on JJ’s shoulder. “Is that the only entrance?”
“Uh-uh.” He pointed. “There’s an opening up there, too. I mean, it’s a harder climb, and it’s way better down here, but you can get in from the top. I’ve done it once or twice. Do you think he … ?”
Josh and Rebecca exchanged glances.
“I hope not,” she finally said.
Josh motioned. “Why don’t you two climb up and see about the top? I’ll check over there, at the bottom.”
Rebecca’s mouth went dry as she glanced at the pipe’s opening, the torrent of water gushing out. “You’re not going in there, are you?”
“No, but I’ll scoot close enough to see if I can peer in, call his name.”
She looked at him a long moment. “Be safe.”
He nodded. “I will.” And then he was off, stepping over the river rocks, and JJ was tugging her arm and pushing her up the slope.
“Devon!” she called.
She could hear Josh shouting, too, from below them. No answer.
At the first level spot she grabbed for her walkie-talkie.
“This is Rebecca Chastain,” she said, pressing the button. “We’re at the Wahca River, by this big storm drain Devon knew about. We’re looking to see if he’s here.”
“This is Deputy Zane. Do not go in,” a voice crackled from the other end. “I repeat, do not enter the storm drain. It’s dangerous. Over.”
“We won’t. Over and out.”
“Miss Becca, I can’t find it!” She watched as JJ scaled the riverbank, higher and higher, looked frantically around.
The mud and rain was making everything a soppy mess. She could barely see enough to get a good foothold. A moment later she was at his side, slipping in the muck as the rain continued to pour.
“Devon!” She cupped her hands over her mouth to make it louder, scanned the line of concrete sloping up from the river, looking for what she’d only seen in pictures—some sort of metal grate or opening in the ground, some cement block or cavern that had been there so long it probably blended into the scenery.
“Devon, where are you?” JJ yelled. “Devon!”
“It’s Becca and JJ! Devon, you’re safe! We’re here to help!” she called, listening into the wind and rain for something, anything. “Devon, are you out here?”
“Becks!” she heard, peered down to see Josh waving something at them. She couldn’t see very well, and he shouted something else that got drowned out.
“What’s that?” JJ asked her.
“I don’t know.” She fiddled with the walkie-talkie again. “Josh, what do you have?”
Crackles, then silence.
“Josh, you okay? Over!”
“…. backpack … Dev … pack.”
Her heart thudded as she peered down, realized what he held in his hands. Devon’s blue backpack. Oh, God. She squeezed her eyes shut a moment. Please, please, please let him be okay. Please, God, I’m begging you.
She turned then, blocking everything else out, and began to search with fresh eyes.
Show me the opening. Show me how to find Devon. Please, God.
Water poured off the hood down her back, and then she saw it—a dull gray metal beneath what looked like a mound of forest brush, trees and leaves and moss and who knew what else.
An entrance.
“JJ, here! Help me!”
They tugged at the leaves and brush, then yanked at the metal grate. Once, twice. It wouldn’t budge.
“Devon!” she yelled into the grate. “Devon, are you down there?”
The walkie-talkie crackled again, and she grabbed at it, pressed the button. “Josh, I found an entrance. Come help us!”
A sound came from inside the grate, and she listened, then hollered again. “Devon!”
“Devon, are you there?” JJ yelled with her. “Devon!”
And then they heard it. Faint, but there nonetheless.
“Here!” His voice sounded very far off. “Help me!”
Josh was there then, and two other men were suddenly at his side, volunteers from fire-rescue, and they were tugging and pulling at the grate, which barely moved even with their weight.
“Here, grab this,” someone shouted, and they were all grabbing at a tree limb, ripping open the grate. Water poured out, and above them, she could hear sirens, heard Josh shouting for her and JJ to stay back.
“Hold on tight, Devon!” she called. “We’re coming!”
A rope. Pulling. Slipping. A burly man in a muddy uniform was in the tunnel now.
“He’s got him!” Josh murmured at her side.
And then there was Devon. Soaking wet and in her arms, sobbing and shaking and safe.
A cheer went up from the crowd of rescuers now gathered below and above.
Holding him, as someone wrapped them both in a huge gray blanket, she sank to her knees in the wet mud above the river and cried with relief.
Thank you, God. Oh, thank you, thank you, God.