“The challenge is,” an FBI agent explained, “our suspect has masked and encrypted the signal. It’s bouncing off satellites and towers all over Canada, Mexico and everywhere in the US. He’s even using Russian and Chinese-based IP addresses. It’s complex and it’s a fast-moving target.”
“So what do you do?” Lerner asked.
“We keep working, exercising different strategies.”
“We’ve got a little over two hours left.”
In a far corner, Reeka was lobbying Dianne and Chuck for Newslead to put out its own story.
“I don’t know,” Watson said, “there’s some ambiguity here.”
“The case is already public,” Reeka said. “We’ve already issued a statement. It’s news. We owe it to subscribers to cover it.”
Watson turned to Chuck. “What do you think?”
“All valid points. We’ll get someone other than Kate to do a straight-up news piece.”
At her desk, Kate stared at Vanessa’s image, her heart breaking again and again with each second that passed.
This can’t be real. It can’t be happening all over again.
First underwater, now underground, Vanessa was slipping away before her eyes.
Please, don’t let this happen again.
Kate pressed her hand tenderly to her monitor, aching to hold her little sister one last time.
Where are you?
A commotion rose across the newsroom among several FBI agents.
“New Jersey! Central New Jersey, north of Trenton!” someone shouted.
Kate stood and searched the crowd for meaning, her heart rising.
“They’ve isolated it to a location just outside of Hopewell, New Jersey!” someone else shouted to cheers.
Ellie Ridder, a Newslead reporter and Sal Perez, a photographer, rushed to Kate.
“That’s a ninety-minute drive, Kate,” Sal said. “Let’s go!”
CHAPTER 66
New Jersey
Darkness.
Vanessa had been devoured by absolute darkness.
The air was heavy. The suffocating stillness overwhelmed her. The only sound of life was the thumping blood rush in her ears from her beating heart.
Buried alive! I’ve been buried alive like Brittany!
Screaming sobs exploded from her.
Don’t let me die! Please, God, I don’t want to die here!
She kicked her feet and pounded her bound hands against her coffin’s lid before she realized it and stopped.
Stay calm! You’re using up air!
It took several jagged breaths before she got a semblance of control, sniffling and brushing at her tears. The air was hotter. She was sweating as she gradually slowed her breathing.
She didn’t know how much time had passed, how long she’d been entombed. She flinched when a light came on.
Blinking her eyes to adjust, she saw soft, blue-tinted LED lights directed at her and from behind her overhead. She gasped as the illumination defined her horrible claustrophobic space.
Midway down above her waist, suspended from the lid, she saw the line of small glowing screens with active level bars and numbers. Cables meandered from the monitors to the clips Carl had attached to her fingers. Farther down, at her feet, she saw the cylinder shape of the oxygen tank. In the row of screens, the one to the extreme right was the largest.
It came to life with text scrolling slowly.
“I hope you’re comfortable. The world is watching you, thousands of people, as each second ticks down. It’ll grow to millions around the planet, for this is a global death and viewers will be riveted. Especially since I’ve installed the meters to monitor your vital signs, the amount of oxygen remaining, and the clock, which is calibrated to my precise calculation on how much time you’ll have to live. Each one is identified for you. Remember, the more you panic, struggle or flutter, the more you’ll deplete your oxygen. You’re six feet down. The casket is steel, but it’s cheap steel and it’s possible it could be defeated by the tonnage of earth above you. It’s pointless to struggle against it. No one can hear you and no one will ever find you. I hope you’ll forgive me because I wanted to take you with me to my new base of operation to be part of my new collection. It’s going to be glorious. But you interfered and betrayed me and must suffer the penalty. I’ll miss you terribly. Of all my specimens, you were my favorite. Goodbye.”
Vanessa’s heart slammed against her rib cage. Her scream sent the level bars on the monitors soaring as tears blurred her eyes.
No, please no! Oh, God, somebody help me!
At that moment she detected a light sensation—something moving—atop her midsection, a gentle pressure. What’s that? She raised her head, then her hands to block the light directed at her, so she could better see. A curtain of fine dirt was leaking from the coffin lid at the seam between the upper and lower doors.
No! No, no, no!
Vanessa gasped and tried not to think but was suddenly haunted by the screams—the horrible screams—of all the girls Carl had killed before her.
Now it’s my turn! Now it’s me!
Her panicked mind reeled, pulled her back to another life, to a moment of absolute joy as she was enveloped by brilliant sunlight. She was floating and floating. She saw her mother—her real mother’s smiling face, then her father’s. Then she heard their laughter as she ran in the park with her big sister—Kate!
Yes, her name was Kate!
Suddenly, the sunlight is gone, her parents are gone, and now Vanessa is underwater, cold, black rushing water, and Kate’s hand is pulling her…saving her…please save me, Kate!
A sharp metallic, crackling sound filled the casket.
Vanessa felt the vibration as a corner buckled.
More dirt was now trickling in at her feet and midsection.
The clock was showing that she had one hour and fifty minutes to live.
CHAPTER 67
Hopewell, New Jersey
The gleaming white walls of the Lincoln Tunnel rushed by Kate’s front passenger window.
Sal Perez guided his Dodge Journey SUV under the Hudson River and into New Jersey. After passing through the tollgate and barreling south on I-95, he tossed a worn notebook to Ellie Ridder in the backseat.
He’d already passed her his two
