“I think—” he started, and then had to clear his throat because the words had come out dry and cracked. “That’s Ghost’s computer, I think.”
The closet was a walk-in without a door; other than some shirts and a pair of black lace-up boots, it was empty.
“Where is he?” Tobias asked.
“Come on,” Sullivan replied, darting back out into the hallway. Tobias checked his watch—from the moment they’d entered the backyard to now, seventy seconds had gone by. As he followed Sullivan, Tobias felt the passing of every additional second in increments. Four steps to the door—three seconds. Peeking into an empty, gleaming bathroom—two seconds. Proceeding down the hallway past the stairs and opening a door to find a laundry room with neurotic lack of clutter, but for the laundry basket half-full of clothes in one corner—ten seconds.
Staring at the heavy padlock and thick, stainless steel hasp on the last door in the hallway—fifteen seconds.
Sullivan was already yanking the pack off of Tobias’s shoulder, unzipping it to find the small crowbar they’d packed. He put it to the door frame, concentrating not on breaking the metal but on separating the screws from the wood. He wrenched hard, multiple times, and the wood began to splinter, but it was slow, so slow.
Thirty seconds passed. Sullivan cursed under his breath. Another twenty seconds passed, and the hasp was down to one screw, the wood clinging stubbornly but ineffectually, and finally Sullivan stepped back and kicked hard.
The door gave, and they rushed forward into a completely empty room. No furniture. No blinds on the barred window. No rugs or artwork on the wall. There was a single drowsy cobweb dangling in one corner.
“What the hell?” Sullivan said, but Tobias grabbed his arm.
“Look.”
Unlike the closet in the room Ghost had been occupying, this closet had a door, and Tobias pointed at the padlock on the jamb. He yanked on the knob uselessly, but then Sullivan was there, pulling a small, silver key from a tiny hook that’d been screwed into the wall, hard to see in the shadows of the dim room. His hands weren’t entirely steady as he got the padlock open. Tobias shoved the door wide and there was Ghost, naked and zip tied, a handcuff linking the tie to a D ring in the wall over his head. He was sitting on what looked like a sheepskin dog bed, leaning against the wall, and he was gagged. A bright red rubber ball thing was in his mouth, the black straps going around his head, saliva dripping from the corner of his mouth from how long he’d been wearing it.
And there was nothing else there—no glass of water or pail for urine, no books, no nothing.
Ghost was staring at him from above that gag, his green eyes wide and confused and perhaps even afraid, and Tobias abruptly remembered his mask. He reached up, intending to show Ghost who he was, only to jerk when Sullivan grabbed his wrist.
“Don’t,” he whispered, and jerked his chin upward to direct Tobias’s gaze to the small camera mounted in the upper corner of the closet.
“Okay,” Tobias breathed, and turned back to Ghost. “It’s me, Ghost, you recognize my voice, right? You know who I—”
Ghost frowned, his head shaking once as if he didn’t believe it, and then his eyes closed and his entire body sagged into the corner, boneless and small. For a second, anyway, one second before he straightened again and yanked pointedly at his wrists.
“Get clothes for him,” Sullivan said, angling Tobias out of the way. Ghost tensed as Sullivan loomed over him, and Tobias wanted to say that Sullivan wouldn’t hurt him, but they didn’t have time, so instead he ran back to Ghost’s room and scavenged a pair of jeans, a T-shirt and his boots.
By the time he was back, Sullivan was crouched beside Ghost where he knelt on the carpet, grimacing as he stretched his arms out. The gag was gone, and his lips were red and swollen, the corners cracked and bleeding.
“Here.” Tobias held out the clothes and Ghost stumbled to his feet, clumsy as Bambi for a minute as his body readjusted to standing upright. He yanked his jeans on, his gaze returning to Tobias again and again as if he doubted his vision.
“Come on,” Sullivan snapped, and headed out the door, turning left and starting up the stairs. Tobias thrust the shirt into Ghost’s hands and followed, and he got all the way to the main floor before he realized Ghost wasn’t behind him. He snagged Sullivan’s arm, making him whirl and say, “What?”
“Ghost,” Tobias called back softly, but there was no response.
“Where the hell is he?” Sullivan checked his watch. “We’ve got to go. We’ve got less than a minute, Tobias.”
“I know.” He started to head back down and Sullivan grabbed his wrist.
“Forty-nine seconds. We did our part. We don’t have time to drag him out. Let’s go.”
“You go.” Tobias gave him a nudge toward the window. “I’m serious. Go. I’ll get him.”
“I’m not—are you fucking insane?” Sullivan asked, and Tobias wished he could do or say anything else, because Sullivan clearly didn’t understand—his face was pinched and unhappy. “Tobias. Come with me. Please.”
“I’m not—I can’t.” Tobias twisted his wrist free, shoved him in the direction of the broken window, and ran for the stairs. He called back over his shoulder, “Get out of here. I mean it.”
He thundered back down the stairs cursing Ghost silently and hoping fervently that Sullivan had listened. He would have to address that hurt in Sullivan’s expression later, because this wasn’t a choice, not the way Sullivan seemed to have taken it. It was more that Tobias
