CHAPTER 67
Dan collapsed against the Suburban’s snow-covered hood, panting and wheezing. He couldn’t catch his breath. His chest ached and his lungs felt like they were about to explode, like he was suffocating. His face, hands, and feet burned from the cold. He could not feel his fingers or his toes. His legs and arms were leaden.
He had plowed back through the snow as fast as he could, using the trail he and Calloway had carved while getting to the property. He had not allowed himself to stop. He thought only of getting to the Suburban, radioing for help—if the radio even worked in the storm—and getting back to help find Tracy. A part of him still believed that Calloway had sent Dan away just to get rid of him, not wanting to put him even further in harm’s way.
Stumbling along the side of the car, he nearly fell, but gripped a door handle to keep himself upright. When he tugged open the door, snow tumbled from the roof onto the floorboard and seat. He gripped the steering wheel and used it to pull himself up, laying his flashlight across the bench seat. Inside, he took only a moment to catch his breath, which marked the air inside the car with white bursts. Dan removed his gloves, blew into his fists, and tried to rub life back into his fingers, which felt swollen. He flipped the power switch on the radio. It lit up—the first good sign. He unclipped the microphone, took a deep breath, and spoke in gasps. “Hello? Hello, hello.”
Static.
“This is Dan O’Leary. Is anyone there? Finlay?” He paused to catch his breath. “We are in need of any available backup at the Parker House property. Bring chainsaws. Trees across the road.”
He threw his head back against the seat, waiting, hearing only static. Swearing at the lack of response, he turned the dials as he’d watched Calloway do before, and tried again. “Repeat. In immediate need of any available backup. Send ambulance. Chainsaws. Parker House property. Finlay, are you there. Finlay? Dammit!”
Again, the response was static. Dan repeated the message a third time, got no answer, and put the microphone back in place. He hoped someone had heard him, but he couldn’t wait any longer. He could feel his body already wanting to shut down, his limbs becoming heavier. His mind and his instinct for self-preservation were fighting against his need to go back into the freezing wind and blinding snow.
He flexed his hands, blew on them a final time, and fit the gloves back on. Then he grabbed the flashlight from the seat and pushed open the door.
The radio crackled. “Chief?”
Tracy studied the white concrete dust and efflorescence leaching from the cracks. She brought her fingers to the tip of her tongue. The paste tasted bitter and acidic. She smelled it and detected the faint odor of sulfur.
She sat back and looked up at the scarred dirt ceiling. Above it grew a forest of ferns, shrubs, and moss—an entire ecosystem that had bloomed and died with the four seasons for millions of years. The decaying plants and decomposing animals had trickled back into the soil, where the persistent rain and melting snow forced the chemicals they created to seep through the rock and earth. Concrete was not meant for such damp conditions. The sulfates caused chemical changes in the cement, weakening the cement binder.
She got to her knees and picked at the concrete. It had become pitted and came away in small flakes. Tracy tugged on the chain and felt the plate attached to the wall give just a fraction. The bolts embedded in the concrete had likely rusted and expanded, causing the concrete behind the plate to crack further and allow for water intrusion. She pulled again. The plate pulled half an inch from the wall. Tracy felt behind it and her fingertips traced etchings where someone had chipped at it—Sarah. She’d been working the plate free of the wall, but twenty years ago, that would have been a more difficult task.
“How? How did you do it?”
Tracy stood and stepped as far away from the wall as the chain allowed, defining the area Sarah also could have reached. She walked in an arc. The light overhead continued to fade. Shadows crept down the concrete wall, shading Sarah’s message.
I am not
I am not afraid
I am not afraid
Tracy considered the square patches of carpet and dropped to her knees, lifting them, feeling for imperfections in the ground. She began digging with her hands.
“Where is it? What did you use?”
The filament inside the bulb grew weaker, now a faint orange. As the circumference of light shrunk, the shadows crept farther down the wall.
I am not afraid
Tracy dug faster. Her fingertips touched something solid. She increased her pace and uncovered a small, round rock. She swore and looked to the door in the wall. She had no idea when House would return, but she could never dig up the entire area she could reach. It was simply too big, and Tracy had a sense that House did not intend to stay in the cave long, as he had with Sarah. She sensed he was on some kind of mission, settling scores. She continued to feel, now almost in blind darkness, and had the strange sensation that someone took her hand and guided it to just a few inches from the hole where she’d uncovered the rock. Tracy felt an imperfection in the ground, a mound of dirt. She ran her hand over it and felt a slight depression beside it. She dug. Just an inch below the surface she hit something solid. Tracy worked her fingers along the object’s surface, scraping the soil away, no longer able to see. Whatever the object was, it was not round. It was straight, rectangular. She dug around the object, trying to find a defined edge. When she found it, she worked her fingers deeper and felt the bottom of it. Tracy secured a fingerhold and tugged at the end, feeling the earth reluctantly give it up. She worked another finger beneath it, then a third. She gripped it and, with a final effort, yanked it free.
A metal spike.