CASEY CAME TO with a start. She blinked, her gaze unfocused for a few moments. She tried to remember what had happened, why she was lying on the floor, her body aching. As she started to sit up, she remembered. Jason. Falling down the stairs. She blinked again, fighting to clear her head as she started to take in her surroundings. She was still on the back-stairs landing. Her body hurt, but she didn’t think anything was broken.
But as she tried to sit up, she realized with a start that she wasn’t alone. Jason? Her pulse jumped as her earlier fear returned. She tried to sit up again. As she did, she saw him.
Not Jason.
Emery. He came up the stairs from the darkness. He held a finger to his lips as if he was afraid she was going to scream. Over the fire alarm? Even so, a scream was already racing up her throat. But it didn’t reach her mouth before he grabbed her and clamped one massive hand down to forever trap it.
“It’s okay now,” Emery said. “I have you now.” She could feel terror widen her eyes. As she struggled to get Emery’s massive, calloused hand from her mouth, he reached behind him. The smell hit her first. It wafted through the air an instant before he pressed the damp cloth over her nose. She couldn’t breathe.
With all her strength, she wriggled and fought against him, but it was useless. He was too strong, just like the chemical on the rag he was holding over her nose, his big hand over her mouth. She could feel darkness closing in. If he didn’t remove the rag or his hand...
Suddenly both were no longer on her face. She opened her mouth, but nothing came out except for a small, inaudible sigh as she felt some strange drug making her limp as a rag doll.
She tried to get up, terrified, but her large-motor skills didn’t react. Her body was no longer taking her commands. Emery lifted her as if she were no more than a child, and instead of heading down the stairs, he carried her up until he came to a landing. She watched in a dreamlike state as he pushed on a spot on the wood-paneled wall and it opened, revealing another set of narrower stairs.
She knew at once where he was taking her.
To the basement.
FINN CHECKED ONE floor after another. The sky outside was lightening with the promise of a new day. He was on his way down the back stairway when he saw something on the landing that he’d missed in his rush earlier. He lurched to a stop and bent down. Blood. It was only a couple of drops. But the droplets hadn’t been there long. His heart leaped to his throat.
He told himself that the blood might not even be Casey’s. Someone could have been hurt escaping the hotel. But as he took the steps more slowly, looking for more blood, he knew in his soul that the blood was hers. The good news was that so far he’d only seen a few drops, which meant she wasn’t bleeding badly.
That was when he saw it. Not blood, thank God. But something just as telling. He recognized the tiny object right away. Just the sight of it sent his pulse hammering at his temples. Stooping down, he picked up a Scrabble piece. Y.
I have fallen for you.
He tried to tell himself that the piece could have been there at the back of the step for years. But he knew better. Had Casey picked up the Scrabble pieces? She must have. And put them in a pocket?
Finn knew it was a long shot that one had dropped out when she’d fallen. Or been pushed. He glanced down the stairs that ended at a side entrance. If she’d gone out that way, she would have been seen by one of the deputies.
That meant she was either still in the hotel or...
He tried her phone again. He heard it ringing—in the stairwell below him. With a chill running through him, he descended the stairs to find her purse where it had fallen.
He canceled the call and went racing back toward the main stairway with only moments to spare. As he came rushing down the stairs, he saw the marshal waiting for him, looking anxious.
“She’s not here,” the marshal said. “We need to get out now.”
Based on the marshal’s expression, he knew there was a need to get out of the hotel as quickly as possible. Finn had no idea why, just that the lawman looked scared.
“There’s one place we haven’t checked,” Finn said and headed for the door to the basement, but when he reached it, he saw that it had been barred. And not with just crime-scene tape. Several boards had been nailed over it. “What the hell?” he demanded, turning to the marshal. “I need to go down there.”
“No one is going down there.” There was steel in the marshal’s tone and what looked like terror in his eyes. “Casey isn’t down there. It’s been sealed since before I pulled the fire alarm. Let’s check outside and pray that she’s shown up.”
Finn wanted to tear the boards from the door, but if the alarm hadn’t been pulled until after the door had been barred... They rushed out the back. He saw that the deputy had cleared the parking lot of cars and people, so Finn was surprised to see that another deputy was standing at the parking-lot entrance with Jason Underwood. They appeared to be arguing.
When Jason saw Finn and the marshal approaching, he pushed past the deputy and ran toward them. “I saw Casey. In a back hallway. She was acting strange. She took off like someone was chasing her, and then she fell...” Jason’s voice broke. “I was hit
