I passed Weatherford and jogged down the stairs, slightly off-kilter as I tried to keep pressure off my ankle, then proceeded through a door that read “Authorized Service Personnel Only” and entered a dim hallway with rooms on either side.
“Which room?”
Weatherford produced a key card and approached the second door on the left.
Secure the scene, Pat. Then assist the victim.
I motioned for Lien-hua to take the key, and as soon as she’d unlocked the door I flung it open and swept inside, leading with my Glock.
Kayla Tatum lay tied up on the king-sized bed and appeared only semi-conscious. Lien-hua rushed to her side while I quickly scanned the room for Alexei or any accomplices.
Saw no one.
Weatherford gasped when he saw Kayla. I didn’t want to take any chances; I pointed to the floor. “Get down. On your knees.”
“I didn’t know-”
“Down.”
He knelt, and I holstered my gun and quickly patted him down, found no weapons.
Protocol called for me to handcuff him to something in the room. I chose one of the sturdy chairs near the wall.
I doubted I would get cell reception this far underground, but I pulled out my phone and was surprised to see two bars. Good enough. My initial thought was to call 911, but then I remembered that Alexei had taken out the EMS dispatch line.
Try anyway!
Flicking open my knife, I slit the ropes that bound Kayla’s ankles while Lien-hua bent over her wrists. I dialed 911 but got nothing but dead air, so I put a call through to Tait. “When are your officers going to be here?”
Lien-hua finished freeing Kayla, helped her sit up.
“Julianne’s on her way; should be there shortly. Jake said he’d come over too, but that’ll take longer. He’s on the other side of Woodborough.”
“What about an ambulance? How long till you can get one here?”
A pause. “All of ’em are on call. After the dispatch line went down, people started phoning the hospital directly, asking for help. It’s been a nightmare trying to sort out what the real emergencies are.”
Natasha’s close; she’s in the cabin Alexei used. She could No. She needs to stay there in case he returns to retrieve or destroy evidence.
“All right,” I said, my thoughts swirling. “Maybe Julianne can take Kayla to the hospital to get her checked over. Any news on Alexei?”
“No. Nothing. Burlman and Marty Lane-he’s the dispatcher-they’re on their way to the hospital. They’ll both survive. But 911’s gonna be out for a while. Chekov fried the system.”
The conversation ended, and I saw that Lien-hua had an arm around Kayla’s shoulder, supporting her, comforting her.
Kayla had a slim build, light brown hair, delicate features. She was in her late twenties and wore black jeans and a blue long-sleeved sweater, but the sleeves weren’t long enough to cover the bruises on her wrists where she’d evidently struggled against the ropes that had bound her.
I felt a renewed sense of anger rising against Alexei Chekov.
But he called you, Pat. He wanted you to find her. He didn’t want to hurt her Maybe, maybe not. Right now I was caught in a thick coil of lies, and I thought it best to work from worst-case scenarios.
I put a call through to Natasha, and when she didn’t answer I left an urgent message for her to get in touch with me immediately. “We found Kayla at the Schoenberg. She’s all right. Be on your guard. Alexei might return to the house.”
End call.
Lien-hua was talking softly, reassuringly, to Kayla. “My name is Lien-hua Jiang.” She gestured toward me. “This is Patrick Bowers. We’re FBI agents. You’re safe now.”
Kayla didn’t reply. Just nodded, wide-eyed.
“How are you feeling, physically?” Lien-hua asked her.
Kayla’s eyes were red, and obviously she’d been crying, but she appeared to be regrouping, gathering her senses. “I’m okay.” Her voice was delicate. Words of glass.
“The man who took you,” Lien-hua said, “did he hurt you?” The slight pause that she added before the word hurt lent a deeper meaning to the sentence, and I took it to mean “Did he assault you?” or perhaps “Did he rape you?”
Kayla shook her head. “He actually seemed… I don’t know. It was almost like he didn’t want me to be afraid.” She looked around distractedly. “I didn’t know what to do.”
“Do you know where you are now?”
Kayla shook her head.
“We’re in a hotel. The Schoenberg Inn. Does that ring a bell?”
“No.”
“Okay. Do you have any idea where he might have gone? The man who abducted you?”
She shook her head.
“Can you remember,” I asked, “did he bring you here right away or stop someplace first?”
Kayla thought about it. “We were in a cabin. I remember that. I don’t know exactly where. The walls were these really thick logs. He gave me something that made me sleepy. Some kind of shot. I don’t really remember anything else.”
Lien-hua placed a gentle hand on her arm. “You’re going to be all right.”
Considering what she’d been through, Kayla seemed to be doing remarkably well, and I was thankful, but this conversation didn’t look like it was going to lead us any closer to Alexei or the Eco-Tech team he’d told me about.
My thoughts shifted to the ELF station.
See if those schematics have arrived.
I had my phone with me, and although I could access my email with it, my laptop would be better for analyzing data. It was still in the cruiser.
“Lien-hua, are you good here?”
“Yes.”
“I’m gonna grab my computer. I’ll be right back.”
“We’ll find the man who took you,” Lien-hua said to Kayla. “I promise.”
Kayla gave a weak smile. “Thank you.”
I freed Weatherford, hauled him to his feet. “You, come with me.”
Even though I was walking with a hitch because of my ankle, I was in a hurry and he struggled to keep up. As we returned up the stairs, I asked him, “The man who bribed you, did he give you any indication where he might be going?”
“No.”
“What about the other people who paid you to use the basement? The Eco-Tech members? Where are they?”
“They were in the other part of the basement. But they’re gone.”
“Don’t lie to me.”
“I swear they’re not here. I don’t know where they might be.”
“How many of them were there?”
“Ten. Maybe eleven.”
We passed through the paneled lounge containing the hidden doorway, and I thought of the ELF station, of how we might get there.
The Navy would need to staff it, transfer people into and out of the base, deliver supplies, remove waste.
Forest service roads?
