Chapter 15 #2
Highway 73 was frost and dark and Scout’s taillights; here was snow on glass. The clock said 11:37. The hands said morning. They could have said anything. She had no way to know if they were telling her the truth.
Training fought its way through her fear. Assess, catalog, conserve. She forced her gaze to move—not as a woman waking inside a nightmare, but as a deputy building a report. Burke will be tearing the mountains apart.
Door: fitted tight, hinges internal. Vents: small, high.
No cameras obvious; that didn’t mean there weren’t any.
Skylights: angled glass set in white framing; screws visible, unreachable.
Furniture: chair (light), ottoman (hollow), desk (solid antique), lamps (weighted), typewriter (dense metal).
Food: designed to keep her steady and compliant.
Comforts: chosen to make refusal feel childish.
Sound: the room’s own hush; the clock’s tick. Under it, a town’s ghost—so faint she almost missed it. A long, far-off note that could have been wind—until a train whistle.
She crossed to the radio and turned the dial.
Static lifted like a curtain and settled into a newsreader’s even tone: winter storm warnings for the Blue Ridge; closures up near the higher passes.
The signal cracked and then cleared into a wash of classical strings.
She turned again, slow. A third station—local—the easy patter of a morning host talking biscuits and basketball.
At least she was still in the Blue Ridge.
Three stations. No more.
Not much, but live. Proof that somewhere beyond these walls time still moved.
“All right,” she whispered, steadier now. Look hard, then move.
The bookcase drew her like a door. She scanned the craft titles—The Art of Subtext, Voice jeans/sweater pressed; bra and panties on rod).
Door locked; hinges internal; no handle inside.
No windows except twin skylights at vault—white beams, angled glass; snow slides; light shifts.
Hidden speaker—male voice, calm, rehearsed: Eat. Rest. Write. The story is your freedom.
Room: Curated writing suite—desk/typewriter; white chair/ottoman; antique radio (three stations); analog clock (ticking, steady).
Assessment: Not ransom. He’s holding me on principle.
Comfort arranged as compliance. Prior contact with subject via abduction: Highway 73, pre-dawn.
Radio failure targeted. Chemical agent used via cloth over mouth/nose.
Time gap: unknown. Bruises/tenderness, upper arm—evidence of physical restraint during loss of consciousness.
Evidence of post-abduction handling: clothing removed, body washed, dressed in provided garments.
Actions: Conserve strength. Map light across rug by hour; map whistle times. Log voice intervals. Read Lauren.
She paused and listened.
Nothing.
She drank half a bottle of water, then set it down because obedience and survival weren’t always the same thing. The voice returned so quietly she almost missed it—sliding in beneath the tick of the clock.
“Good.”
Not praise. Confirmation.
She didn’t look up. She kept her eyes on the page, pen resting but unmoving.
“You’re following instructions,” he said. “That matters.”
“You’re drugging me,” she said. Flat. “You’re holding me against my will. You think writing changes that?”
A pause. Longer this time.
“I think resistance costs you energy you’ll need later.”
Her grip tightened on the pen.
“You sleep restlessly,” he went on, conversational now, as if discussing weather. “You grind your teeth.” Her control slipped. She hated that he knew.
“You stopped shaking after the third hour,” he added. “That’s when you finally settled.”
She swallowed.
“Where is Lauren?” she asked.
“You’re asking the wrong question.”
Her pulse jumped, sharp and hot.
“What did you do to her?” she demanded.
A softer tone now. Almost patient.
“Lauren wrote beautifully when she stopped trying to leave.”
Sara’s hand trembled once. She pressed it flat to the page.
“You’re lying,” she said.
“I’m precise.”
The word settled in the room like weight.
“She was here,” Sara said. “What have you done with her?”
“You’re projecting,” he said gently. “Fear does that. It makes you rush to conclusions.”
Her throat burned.
“You’re not in danger,” he continued. “Not if you listen. Not if you work.”
“And if I don’t?”
Another pause. Shorter this time.
“Then the room becomes less comfortable.”
“No chair,” he said mildly. “No light. No sound except the clock. You read her words—you know how it works.”
Sara closed her eyes for half a second. When she opened them, the page was still there. Lauren’s handwriting still real. Still proof.
“You can leave this room,” he said. “Just not yet.”
She lifted her chin, eyes on the blank page.
“You made a mistake,” she said. “You took a deputy. You put me where I can document you. Every habit. Every pattern.”
A sigh.
“That’s exactly why you’re here.”
Static whispered. The sound cut clean.
Silence returned.
Sara exhaled. Her hands were shaking now. She let them. Then she steadied them against the desk.
“All right,” she said quietly, to the room, to the journals, to the absence that watched her. “We’ll start here.”
She positioned Lauren’s early journal to her left. The latter one to her right. Her own, opened near the back, between them.
The clock ticked.
Sara lowered the pen.
And began.