Harriet watched James on Lauren’s laptop.
“I wish we could talk to him.”
His lips would move, then one or more of the women would move her lips. It was clear they were talking to each other, but no communication was taking place. He looked like he was trying to explain the camera and that help was coming. Their eyes got wide, and they squeezed together and away from him whenever he gestured. Clearly, they were terrified.
“Has anyone called his family?”
Harriet gasped.
“I didn’t even think about his family. And I don’t have his mother’s number.”
Lauren opened a new search window on top of the camera view.
“Got it,” she said and turned the screen more squarely to Harriet.
Harriet dialed his parents’ house. No one answered. She left a brief message requesting a call back.
“Don’t you think you should have given them a little more than ‘call me please’?” Lauren asked.
“I don’t think this is the sort of thing that should be left in a message.”
“Whatever.”
Lauren turned away from the screen.
“Are we going to sit here and watch and wait to see if Morse finds him?”
“I’d like to go look for him, but the police and the dogs are already searching the foundation area.”
Max held his right elbow in his left hand, resting his chin on his right fist. His brow furrowed as he thought.
“What is it, Max?” Joyce asked him.
“I was thinking.” He paused and then started again. “I was thinking…I’ve not measured it with a device, but I don’t think the amount of cable you let into that little tunnel is enough to reach that foundation.”
Harriet and Lauren spun around at the same time to look at him.
“What?” Harriet said.
Lauren turned back to her computer and started furiously typing.
“I’m still working on this part of the software, but I think I have enough…”
The view of James in the underground room disappeared and was replaced by a white screen with blue grid lines on it and a curvy red line superimposed on the grid. The grid was marked in feet.
“Eventually, this will show the actually terrain,” she said. “He’s right. This is the route the camera took.”
Max leaned over and pointed.
“See where it turns left and then right? That’s where it had to go between two boulders that are just beyond the park.”
“Max,” Harriet asked, “do you think you could follow this line and lead us to where the camera is?”
“Sure.”
Joyce held out her big spotlight.
“You’ll be needing this,” she said and handed it to Harriet. She turned to Lauren. “I’ll stand watch over your computer if you want to go with them.”
Lauren stood up.
“Guard it with your life.”
“Nothing less,” Joyce said and smiled.
Max led the way out of the park, stopping occasionally and studying the ground around them. The moon had come out, and while not full, it was sufficient to make the spotlight unnecessary once they got out of the trees.
“We’re about halfway—” Max stopped abruptly, holding his hand out to block Harriet and Lauren. “Down!” he ordered, and they all crouched below the weeds and berry vines. “Someone’s coming,” he whispered.
Lauren leaned around him.
“I don’t see anyone.”
“Hush,” he scolded and pointed to his ear.
When the trio was perfectly still, Harriet could hear what Max had heard. He was right—something or someone was coming toward them from the green space direction. She held her breath as the rustling got louder. She sneaked a look and saw a smallish figure in dark clothing approaching. The figure stopped and squatted.
“That should be right where the camera is,” Max whispered.
The figure picked up a bundle of something and moved it to the side, then repeated the motion. Lauren stretched up to look.
“He’s clearing a hatch cover,” she whispered. “He’s about to go down.”
Harriet stood, turned the spotlight on the figure, and hurried through the brush. Max and Lauren followed.
“What are we doing here?” Lauren gasped as they went.
“Stopping whoever that is from getting to James. Stop!” she shouted.
The figure held an arm up to block the light but kept reaching down to the ground with its other hand.
“Stewart?” Harriet asked in a loud voice. “What are you doing?”
“Get that light out of my eyes,” he shouted back.
Harriet lowered the light slightly, and Stewart took the opportunity to pull an ugly-looking black gun from the small of his back.
“Turn the light off and walk this way slowly, and no one will get hurt.”
Lauren pressed a couple of keys on her cell phone and hit enter. The phone chirped when she hit send.
“Toss your phones on the ground,” he directed. Harriet and Lauren complied. “And the light.”
Stewart motioned the two women to the small clearing he was standing in. Harriet noticed Max had disappeared. He must have faded into the background before she lowered the light.
“Why are you holding James prisoner?” Harriet pressed. “He’s a chef. What did he ever do to you?”
“He got in the way, that’s what he did.” He pushed the two women together. “This is all your fault, you know. You couldn’t leave things alone, could you? I’m supposed to be reading poetry tonight at a new club, and instead, I’m out here with you two.”
“Nothing’s happened yet. You could let us go, and we wouldn’t tell anyone,” Harriet said.
“And if you hadn’t mentioned the chef, I might have considered it. If you know about the chef, you know about the women, and we can’t have that.”
Lauren glared at him.
“Who is ‘we’?”
Stewart spread his hands, palms up, gun dangling from the right one. He started laughing and then said in a singsong voice.
“I am me and you are she, and she is he, and we are all together… see how you run in front of my gun, you better run…”
Harriet looked at Lauren, not sure if he expected them to try to run away so he could shoot them, or if he was having some sort of breakdown.
Stewart raised the gun and took aim.
They heard a soft whoosh, and Stewart dropped the gun and started screaming. He crumpled to the ground, his left hand clutching his right forearm, dark liquid dripping from between his fingers.
Harriet grabbed the spotlight from where she dropped it and shone it on him. A nasty-looking knife was embedded in his right arm. Judging by the flow of blood oozing from around his hand in spite of the pressure he was applying, if he let go of his arm to pick up the gun, he could bleed to death.
“Don’t just stand there, call me an ambulance. And give me a belt or something.”
Lauren stepped back to the spot where they had first stopped and felt around on the ground for her phone. When she found it, she dialed 911.
“We need an ambulance, and police and probably a firetruck, too. We’re in the green space behind Fogg Meadows and the park.”
Max was standing a few feet away. He waited until the faint sound of sirens was audible and then backed slowly away and faded into the woods.
Harriet crouched down next to Stewart.
“What’s a nice poet like you doing with a bunch of captive women and a chained-up chef?”
“I don’t have to tell you anything.”
“You’re right, but I’m probably your last chance to tell your story to someone who cares even remotely about your side of things.”
Stewart started crying.
“All I ever wanted to be was a poet. I wrote my first poem when I was seven years old. You know what my parents did?”
He looked at Harriet. She shook her head.
“My mother laughed. She laughed, and my dad beat me. When I went to school the next day, my teacher reported my parents to Children’s Services, and I got put in foster care. Sandra had lost Amber a couple of years before and had applied to be a foster parent. She didn’t laugh at my poems.”
Harriet looked over her shoulder at the approaching flashing lights and then turned back to Stewart.
“They’re going to be here in a minute or less, and being Sandra Price’s foster child doesn’t explain why you’re holding four people hostage in a hole in the ground.”
“I’m trying to tell you…”
Harriet glanced at Lauren, who was yanking on a handle she’d pried up from the trapdoor.
“I’m not holding anyone hostage—Sandra is. Or the people she works for. She’s just a step in the process.”
Lauren stopped pulling on the door.
“Whoa!” she said in a stage whisper. “Talk about a big reveal.”
Stewart was crying in earnest.
“Sandra was involved in this business before I even went to live with her. All I did was feed and water them sometimes.”
Lauren came and stood over him.
“I’m no lawyer, but maybe you can turn state’s evidence or something.”
Stewart tipped his head to his shoulder and attempted to wipe his tears.
“Do you really think they’ll let me do that?”
Lauren shrugged.
“Like I said, I’m not a lawyer, but if I were you, I’d hire the best one you can afford and don’t say another word until you do.”
“Lauren!” Harriet shouted. “Why are you helping him?”
“I believe him. He’s not a criminal mastermind. He’s a poet.”
“He tried to shoot us.”
Stewart looked up embarrassed.
“It wasn’t loaded.”
“We didn’t know that,” Harriet yelled at him.
A fireman and two paramedics stormed up with multiple boxes of equipment. Two more people arrived carrying an aluminum tubing basket that replaced the usual gurney when a victim was injured away from a passable roadway.
Detective Morse then joined the group, accompanied by two uniformed officers carrying crowbars.
Harriet bent down and pulled on the door, but it didn’t budge.
“Stand back,” Morse told her.
The two officers wedged their tools on either side of the hatch cover and pried it open. They set their tools down and drew their guns before climbing down into the hole.
“James!” Harriet yelled.
“Down here,” a disembodied voice said from underground.
Less than a minute later, James climbed up the ladder and out into the field. He rushed to Harriet and wrapped his arms around her.
“Hey, I’m fine,” he said softly as she held him and cried.
“I was so worried,” she said into his shoulder.
“I was worried, too,” Lauren said in a dry tone.
Three of the paramedics carried Stewart away on the portable gurney, and the fourth one stepped over to James and handed him a bottle of water.
“Are you hurt anywhere?” he asked.
“Someone whacked me in the head with something.”
The EMT looked at the back of his head.
“You’ve got a nasty lump back there. I’m afraid concussion protocol says we’ve got to take you to the hospital and check you out.”
“I need to check the restaurant. I’ll sign a release or something.”
James continued to plead, but the man had already spoken to the guys in the ambulance, and the fireman was returning already with another carry basket. They loaded James onto the portable stretcher and hauled him away.
“I’ll come find you at the hospital,” Harriet called after them.
“That’ll be after you and this one…” Morse pointed at Lauren. “…do some explaining down at the station.”
The uniformed officers led three bedraggled women from the underground bunker. More uniformed officers arrived, followed by two four-wheeled all-terrain vehicles.
Morse walked Lauren and Harriet to her unmarked car and when everyone was in, headed for the station. The third time Harriet complained about not being able to go to James, Morse turned on the lights and sirens.