Just Let Me Die
Vex
As the tarp lifts, a little voice says, “Please, just let me die.”
Payne freezes, and his gaze turns to me.
At least she’s alive still. There’s a chance we’ll find one more.
“Please. Please, just let me die.”
Her voice sounds a little stronger.
“Let’s get her out of there.” Payne yanks the tarp off and shouts through the metal screen covering the dark hole, “We’re here to save you.”
“Please, just let me die.”
“Do you think she heard me?” Payne’s hands shake.
“Don’t know. Trauma does weird things to people.” Not to mention adding dehydration and starvation into the mix. “We need to get her out and some medical care as quickly as possible. I’ll get the lid off. You go get the equipment from the car and the first aid kit.”
Payne rushes off and I squat down to figure out how to get the lid off. It’s a fine enough mesh to keep most bugs and snakes out of the hole. The edge of my pocket knife slips into the gap between the edge of the mesh top and the top of the pipe that lines the entire hole. It pops up easily and I slide it away.
“Please. Please, just let me die.” The desperation in her voice has given way to acceptance of her fate.
“Not here. You can’t die here.”
“Why not?” she replies with a bit of irritation.
“If you die down there, you let the filth win. Let my friend and I get you out of here. Then if you still want to die, I’ll take you somewhere beautiful.” This wouldn’t be the first time one of the women I’ve rescued decided to take her life. Their memory keeps me out hunting men that traffic and abuse them.
“You’re really here? You aren’t a dream? You’re going to save me?”
How many times has she thought someone was here to save her? “We’re real.” She needs something tangible to believe we aren’t a hallucination. I slip my watch off. “Here. You can hold onto my watch until we get you out of here safely.” Anything else she could use to hurt herself. “Heads up. I’m dropping it down now.”
There’s barely a thunk when it hits the bottom.
“You’re real. You’re really here to rescue me.” She starts sobbing.
This part I don’t do well with. Tears pull me out of the zone I need to be in to get the job done.
The sobbing stops as fast as it started. “Joan. I haven’t heard from her since last night.”
Joan? There’s another woman? He said ‘save them’. There’s another hole! “Is she nearby?” How could I have forgotten in the moment?
“Within shouting distance. I don’t know exactly where. He never lets us see him take another woman out.”
The other woman… Joan has to be nearby. “Is there anyone else?” Why did I stop once we found this one woman?
“Jane was our third… I don’t… I don’t think she’s alive. There’s never more than three… and we heard him digging a new hole. ”
Jane was the body in the bedroom. “I’m going to look for Joan now.” It doesn’t take long for me to find another tarp. The edge is barely an inch from the ground when the scent of death hits me. There’s no saving her. If I had arrived… Don’t go there. You can’t change the past and there’s no point in second-guessing your choices.
I took care of Dahlia yesterday. And that’s something I’ll never regret.
“Got it.” Payne rushes over. “Is there another—”
I sharply shake my head at him. “Let’s get set up for me to repel down.”
“I’m going to do it.”
“You?” Payne knows how to do it, but I’m more experienced.
“It only makes sense. You outweigh me by more than fifty pounds. If need be, you can pull me out. There’s no way I’m pulling you out of there.”
He’s right. “Fine. But can you handle what you may see down there?”
“Whatever happened to that woman, she’s alive. And we’re going to do whatever we can to save her.”
Payne’s solid. “Get out of there as fast as you can. I’m ready to leave this place.”
“It should be burned to the ground.”
He’s not wrong. But it won’t be. In a few days, this is going to be the biggest crime scene of the decade.
Together we set up the equipment, and Payne steps over the edge of the pit. “Watch out below.” He starts to rappel down. A few seconds later, his boots hit the dirt with a soft thud. “Throw me down a blanket!”
“It’s not safe with the ropes.” Payne should know that. He’s flustered.
“All right. We’ll figure it out.” His voice gets whisper soft.
If I leaned down and focused hard, I could probably hear what he’s saying, but whatever it is he either doesn’t want me to hear or he’s trying to comfort her before he pulls her up. Either way, I don’t need to know the details.
Dahlia was going to be in one of these pits…
STOP! You can’t lose focus. You can’t let rage rule. Now isn’t the time .
Later, you can let your mind process what almost happened, but now it’s all about the task at hand. I surveil the area and wait for Payne’s cue to pull her, or them, up depending on her condition.
Graveyards don’t bother me. I’ve hidden a body or two in them when other options weren’t available. But this place is eerie. In any other situation, a person would just see the lush grass, tall trees surrounding us, and the mountain in the distance and think how beautiful it is here.
“Pull us up!” Payne gives the rope a single tug, which we chose as a code for no issues down here.
Not that we expected any, but you never know how someone who has been confined and tortured is going to react.
“Next time we go out, you’re getting a salad.” The woman with him has to be pretty light.
“Complain. Complain. Complain. You know you’re just going to add another weight onto the bar.”
“Can’t add many more without it bending.” Hand over hand, I hoist them out of the bleakness into the light. The request for the blanket makes sense when a shirtless Payne comes into view.
Maybe an exception can be made to the rule. Killing the filth that hurt this woman would be too kind.
“That’s what you keep saying.”
Payne locks the rope, so they won’t drop back, and I tie off my end.
Slowly, so as not to startle her, I reach out. “I’m going to wrap my arms around you and lift you out of the harness.”
“Go slow. Her back is sore.” There’s a hard note in Payne’s soft voice.
“Noted.”
“Can’t Payne do it?” She tries to back away but doesn’t get anywhere.
“Imogene, this is my best friend, Vex. I’ve known him since we were kids. He won’t hurt you.” Payne’s voice stays low and calm. “He’s the one that threw you his watch.”
She touches the gold band that’s too big for her wrist. It’s almost big enough to fit on her neck, as emaciated as she is.
“Please let me help you.” Sometimes manners can help get through to a person.
Imogene turns to look at Payne.
He nods with a reassuring smile.
“Okay.”
Gently, I lift her…skin and bones…there’s nothing to her but skin and bones.
Emotion tries to bubble up.
There’s no time to feel anything now. I take one deep breath and push them away. I try to set Imogene on her feet, but she wobbles and almost collapses.
Payne practically hops out of the hole and unhooks himself.
With a burst of energy that shouldn’t be possible, Imogene shoves herself away from me and stumbles over to him. She wraps her arms around him as he lifts her into his arms.
Payne hates to be touched. He’s laid total strangers on the floor for accidentally knocking into him, yet he’s holding this woman like he never wants to let go.
This doesn’t bode well. Not well at all. “She needs to drink.” I pull a bottle of water out of the bag and hand it to her.
Imogene greedily pours the water down her throat.
“Slowly. Drink slowly or you’ll—”
All the water comes back up. Thanks to Payne’s quick reflexes, it lands on the grass instead of her.
“You’re okay.” Payne stands up again. “Hand us another bottle. We’ll try again on the way to the car.”
I hand them another bottle. “She needs to go to a hospital.”
“No. No. No, hospital. I don’t want to go to the hospital.” The trembling from vomiting amplifies into the full-on shakes you see right before a person has a seizure .
We should have brought a doctor, but risking Barb’s life wasn’t an option and there aren’t any other doctors that I trust enough to bring on one of these types of excursions. “Payne?”
“Don’t worry. I’ve got her.”
That’s what I’m afraid of.