Chapter Forty-One
Forty-One
Sean rolled to a stop beside a huge boulder. He shoved the truck into park, killed the headlights, and jumped out.
Leanne checked her phone, but no word from anyone. She jumped out, too, and slammed the door.
“Where are we?”
Sean was already tromping off into the darkness.
“Hey!” She jogged after him. “Where are we?”
“He took her out here.”
“Where? What is this?”
Sean grabbed her arm and dropped into a crouch, pulling her along with him. “Keep your voice down,” he said.
She rested her knee on the ground, and the cold seeped through the fabric of her jeans. “How do you know about this place?” she whispered.
“It’s the only thing out here. We used to come here and smoke weed.”
“Who did?”
“Me and Justin and my brother. This is where he’d take her, trust me.”
The interior light of the truck went off, plunging them into total darkness. She couldn’t see a damn thing. She crouched there beside him, squinting into the gloom and letting her eyes adjust.
“You were friends with Justin?” she asked quietly.
He grunted. “Liam was. This was back in high school. Justin had a thing for Hannah then, too. Everyone did.”
“You think he—”
“Shh!”
They fell silent. Leanne couldn’t hear anything, not even traffic on the distant highway. As her eyes acclimated, she became aware of a tall black canyon wall rising to their west, sheltering them from sounds and lights of the surrounding area.
“Where the hell are we?” she whispered.
“The mine entrance.”
The mercury mine. The cinnabar ore that made these canyons red contained mercury, also known as quicksilver, and the remnants of mining operations were scattered around the area. This mine had been abandoned for half a century.
Leanne’s chest hurt as she thought about why Justin might bring Izzy out here, either alive or dead. She gripped Sean’s arm in the darkness.
“Where is it?”
He leaned closer, and she felt his warm breath on her ear. “The entrance is about ten yards that way.”
Leanne got to her feet and squinted into the blackness. She couldn’t see anything at all.
Sean stood up.
“Show me,” she whispered. “We have to get to her!”
Instead of answering, he grabbed her sleeve and pulled her forward. She rested her hand on his back, following him through the darkness that he was somehow able to navigate fine. Meanwhile, she may as well have been blindfolded.
He came to a stop, and she bumped into him.
Snick.
His hand lit up with the flame of a Zippo lighter. Using it as a torch, he crept around a massive boulder that Leanne hadn’t even realized was there.
He stopped.
“There,” he whispered.
“Where?”
Peering around his wide shoulders, she saw nothing. Then the earthy smell of bat guano reached her. Squinting into the shadows, she made out a black-on-black rectangle.
“Is that—”
“The mine entrance.”
Her stomach clenched. “You think they’re in there?”
“Definitely. I saw his truck parked back behind that tree.”
“What tree?”
“Come on,” he said, tugging her forward.
Sliding her weapon from its holster, Leanne followed him from what now seemed like semidarkness into a tunnel of complete and utter black. Even the glow of his lighter barely penetrated.
The temperature dropped as they crept through what felt like a spacious tunnel. The guano smell wafted around them, and she heard a faint, faraway squeak.
Bats.
How many thousands or millions might be in here? She stifled a shudder as she crept along, listening to their distant squeals.
And something else. Something human.
She grabbed Sean’s arm. “Hear that?”
“Yeah.”
He quickened his pace as they moved through the cold blackness, closing in on the sound. It was a low voice. A woman. And the tone was unmistakable.
Leanne’s heart convulsed. It was Izzy, and she was pleading for her life.
The Zippo lighter disappeared, and they were in total blackness, but still moving forward. They seemed to veer right, and Leanne made out the texture of wood planks along the walls as the tunnel curved, getting brighter and brighter, until there they were.
Justin. And Izzy, kneeling before him, hands in the air, pleading tearfully as he pointed a gun at her chest. Beside Izzy on the ground was a flashlight that cast both of them in a ghostly white light.
Sean yanked Leanne back, out of view, but it was too late, and Izzy stopped pleading midsentence.
“Hey!” Justin called. “Who’s there?”
Silence.
Then a scream pierced the air. Leanne ducked around Sean and lifted her gun.
“Police! Drop your weapon!”
Justin had Izzy in front of him, holding a gun to her throat.
“Don’t do it. Don’t fucking do it or I’ll blow her head off!”
Izzy whimpered and closed her eyes.
Leanne’s heart squeezed. How had she let this happen? She stepped closer, keeping her arms steady as she took aim at the edge of Justin’s head.
Which was right behind Izzy’s. He was ducking behind her, using her as a shield. Meanwhile, his left hand pressed the gun to Izzy’s neck.
“Justin, man,” Sean said. “Don’t be stupid.”
“Hey.” Leanne didn’t take her eyes off Justin as she spoke to Sean. “You stay out of it.”
Justin’s eyes jumped from Leanne to Sean. “What the fuck are you doing here? Why’d you bring her?”
“She’s looking for her friend.”
“Hey.” Leanne shot Sean a glare. “Not another word.”
“Put the gun down!” Justin hooked an arm around Izzy’s waist and yanked her closer. “Put it down or she’s dead!”
“Let’s calm down, Justin,” Leanne said. “Okay? Let’s all relax.”
“I said put it down!”
Izzy yelped as Justin jabbed the gun at her throat. She squeezed her eyes shut, and the wet tracks of tears glinted on her face. Another whimper as he shoved the gun at her jaw.
Leanne’s thoughts raced. She’d trained for this.
Back at the academy, years and years ago.
But the hostage then had been another cadet playing a role, and nothing about that situation seemed relevant now as she looked into Justin’s frantic eyes and saw the stark terror on Izzy’s face.
Her chest heaved up and down as Justin squeezed her against him.
He lifted the gun to Izzy’s temple. “I said…Put. The fucking. Gun. Down.”
“Do it,” Sean murmured.
Leanne’s throat went dry. She felt the hard press of Sean’s confiscated pistol tucked into the back of her jeans. Slowly, she raised her left hand in the air, keeping her right hand steady as she gripped her weapon.
“Okay, Justin, I hear you. All right? Let’s talk through this.”
“We’ll talk when you put the gun down.”
“Putting it down now, okay?” She slowly bent her knees, lowering her weapon to the ground. How fast could she pull Sean’s pistol out? She couldn’t even remember what kind it was. She didn’t know if it had a safety, or if it was even loaded.
Justin lurched forward, thrusting Izzy ahead of him, still pressing that gun to her head.
“Kick it,” he ordered.
“What?” Izzy squeaked.
“Kick it!”
Bug-eyed with fear, Izzy glanced back at Justin, and then looked down at Leanne’s pistol, lying useless in the dirt. She met Leanne’s gaze for an instant before kicking the gun away. It skittered past Leanne and careened into the tunnel wall, well out of reach.
“Justin, man, you don’t want to do this, trust me.”
“You, shut up!”
“What are you going to do? Kill all of us?” Sean snorted. “You think you’re going to get away with that? Come on, man. They’re onto you.”
“Justin, tell me what you want,” Leanne said.
“Shut up!” He backed away, pulling Izzy with him, and then glanced over his shoulder at something behind him.
For the first time, Leanne noticed the ledge.
A big black…nothing…a few feet behind Justin. Panic spurted through her. Was it the mine shaft? It had to be hundreds of feet deep.
She stared at Justin. Even if she could pull out Sean’s pistol in time, and take aim, she didn’t have a clear shot with Izzy blocking most of his body mass. It would have to be a head shot.
“Man, think this through,” Sean said. He’d inched away from her at some point, creating distance between them. “Let her go, and you can walk right out of here.”
“Fuck you, Moriarty. I know what you’re doing.”
“What?” Sean took another step sideways.
What was he doing? He was moving farther away from both of their guns. Maybe he was trying to create a distraction so that she could whip out his pistol and get a shot off.
Leanne focused on Justin again, but he had Izzy plastered against him so close, it was an impossible angle. She glanced around, grasping for a plan.
And then she saw it. The glint of something in Sean’s back pocket. In a heartbeat, she realized what was about to happen.
Sean darted a glance in her direction, signaling her, and she tried to signal back—Don’t do it!
But Sean reached for the blade, and everything seemed to slow, like moving through water.
Light caught the blade as it cartwheeled through the air with a swoosh.
Leanne lunged forward.
An ear-piercing shriek echoed around them as Justin fell.
Leanne grabbed Izzy’s wrist, yanking her to the ground.
And then Sean leaped on Justin, and everything became a tangle of arms and legs and dust.
“Hey!” Leanne lurched into the fray. “Sean! Get off him!”
Blood streamed down Justin’s face as he twisted on the ground, dodging Sean’s blows, the knife handle protruding from his cheek.
“Stop!”
Leanne flipped Justin onto his front and dropped a knee onto his back.
“I got him,” Sean said, pinning Justin’s arms.
Leanne whipped out a pair of handcuffs and reached for his wrist.
Sean did a double take. “What the fuck? Shoot him!”
She glared at him. “No.” She reached for Justin’s other hand and wrestled it behind his back as he bucked beneath her, bellowing like a stuck pig.
Sean leaned down and yanked the knife from Justin’s cheek. Blood gushed from the wound.
Amid the chaos, a fleece-covered arm reached in, and Leanne glanced up to see Izzy digging something from Justin’s back pocket. A cell phone.
“Are you okay?” Leanne asked her.
Izzy looked shell-shocked as she backed away from the howling, bleeding man, clutching the phone in her hand.
“Go outside,” Leanne ordered. “Call 911.”
Izzy blinked at her, as though the words didn’t compute.
“Izzy, listen to me! Call 911.”
She turned and ran.
Searing pain flashed across Leanne’s face as she took a blow to the eye.
“Hey!” she yelled. She grabbed Justin’s flailing elbow and pinned it to the ground with her knee.
“Fucking cunt! Get off me!”
She pressed his bleeding face into the dirt. “You’re under arrest.”