On her way down the hill to the farmhouse, she called Brunswick Hospital to check on Holt’s condition, but was told no information was being released.
Damned privacy laws.
She thought about calling Pete, but shook off the idea. He would’ve called her if they’d found Maddie.
Wouldn’t he?
Stuffing the phone in her pocket, she stepped onto the back porch and crossed to the door at the far left. She wanted to make sure Mrs. Kroll was all right after yesterday’s fiasco.
Zoe pounded on the door. No answer. No sound of movement inside. She knocked again. Still nothing. Odd. Mrs. Kroll was an early riser and shouldn’t have left to visit her husband at rehab yet. Zoe tried the knob. Locked.
She stepped over to the window to the dining room and peered in. The room was dark. And empty.
It didn’t feel right. But perhaps Mrs. Kroll’s son, Alexander, had stopped by and taken his mother out to breakfast.
Still not convinced, Zoe went to her own door, unlocked it, and stepped inside. Jade and Merlin sat side-by-side waiting expectantly. At least that much of her morning was normal.
“Good morning, kittens.” She deposited her keys and her phone on the table by the door. “You hungry?”
Jade meowed.
“Silly question, huh?” Zoe headed for the kitchen with both cats trotting along behind.
As she filled the cat food bowls, she ran her plans for the morning through her mind. Feed cats. Make coffee. Go to the barn to clean stalls. Shower. Sleep. Blessed sleep.
Oh, and try again to check on Mrs. Kroll.
With the cats happily chowing down, Zoe filled the Mr. Coffee’s basket with her favorite blend. The one Pete hated. She shook her head. Stop thinking about Pete.
She filled the pot with water. Odd. The pressure seemed low. Great. One more thing going bad. Not that it mattered anymore. She wouldn’t be living here much longer. The house—her beautiful, venerable mid-nineteenth century house—was going to fall to a bulldozer.
The thought soured her stomach.
She poured the water into the machine’s reservoir and clicked the power button. The light didn’t come on. What the heck? Zoe reached over and flipped the kitchen’s light switch. Nothing. Crap. Was the power out all over the area? Or had the main breaker tripped again?
Grumbling to herself, she pressed through the swinging door, crossed her living room to the basement door. She stepped onto the landing at the top of the stairs. Without thinking, she tugged the pull-cord for the light and growled when nothing happened. “Idiot,” she muttered into the darkness.
She turned to go back for her flashlight. But something—some sound—stopped her. A tiny whimper. From somewhere below.
Maddie?
Heart racing, Zoe started down into the total darkness of the basement.
There it was again. Weeping.
Putting aside her trepidation, she pounded down the next two steps.
But suddenly her foot found only air. She scrambled. Clawed for the railing.
And plunged into the black oblivion.
Thirty
A check of the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation revealed Dave Evans owned a dark blue Ford F-250 pickup. Ryan Mancinelli confirmed Evans had his business name and phone number stenciled on the doors. Pete called in the updated information including license number to the Amber Alert and checked his watch. Evans had snatched Maddie over twelve hours ago. Twelve long hours.
Pete walked Ryan Mancinelli out of his house. Not even nine o’clock and the temperature was already sultry. Pete thought of those construction trailers Mancinelli had mentioned. A little girl locked in one of those wouldn’t last long on a day like this.
Baronick jogged up to them. “The search warrant will be ready by the time we get there. One of my guys will meet us at Evans’ office with it.”
“Good.” Pete crooked a finger at Kevin who hurried over to them. “Take Mr. Mancinelli down to the station and get him settled in our finest holding cell.”
“Aw, Chief,” Mancinelli started to complain.
Pete put up a hand to silence him. “You did threaten several police officers, myself included, with a firearm. But the bigger issue is Evans is still out there. He’s trying to take out everyone he considers a threat of exposing him. You definitely fit the bill.”
“What about Ashley?” Mancinelli said. “Evans threatened to go after her, too.”
Pete spotted Mancinelli’s wife and her parents standing on their porch next door. “I’ll make sure an officer sticks around to keep an eye on her.”
“Thanks, Chief.”
Pete slapped Baronick on the back. “Let’s go.”
Within fifteen minutes, Pete, Baronick, Nate, Seth, and a couple dozen other law enforcement officers descended on the offices of Dave Evans Land Developing.
As promised, a county detective sat at the entrance gate, search warrant in hand.
The grounds were hauntingly quiet for a weekday morning. A dozen or so pieces of heavy machinery—bulldozers, backhoes, mammoth dump trucks, and the like—sat idle on the gravel lot. A gray Toyota Camry was parked in front of a construction trailer, which bore a sign labeling it as the office.
Pete and Baronick climbed the portable metal steps to the door, knocked, and entered without waiting for an invitation.
A wide-eyed woman in her late twenties wearing jeans and a short-sleeved plaid shirt was already on her feet, obviously having seen the cavalry coming through the gate. “Can I help you?” she chirped.
Baronick presented her with the warrant.
“Is your boss here?” Pete asked.
The woman’s eyes flitted from the paper in her hand to Pete and Baronick. “Uh, no.”
“Any idea where we can find him?”
“N-no. He called a little while ago and said he wouldn’t be in. He said he was giving everyone the day off, but I had some paperwork to catch up on.”
“Are those trailers in the back locked?”
“Um, yeah.” She glanced toward a pegboard loaded with keys next to the office door. “But I can’t let you into them.”
Baronick pointed to the paper in her hand. “Warrant, ma’am. We need to search everything.”
“Oh.” She bit her lip. Then nodded toward the board. “The keys for the heavy equipment are all labeled. The trailer keys are the ones on the bottom row.”
Pete scooped up the entire row of keys with one hand. “Come on.” He paused at the door to point at the secretary. “You stay here.”
He and Baronick charged out of the trailer.
“Seth, you search the office,” Pete shouted to the waiting officers. “Everyone else, with us.”
He doled out keys as they approached the eight trailers parked near the rear of the lot, and the officers split up. Numbered tabs on the key rings matched numbered plaques riveted onto each trailer.
Pete inserted the key for number three and climbed inside.
It only took a sweeping glance to see Maddie wasn’t there. A couple of ladders hung on brackets next to coils of heavy duty extension cords and hoses. An eight-foot table and several folding chairs were secured to one wall. Shelves of tools lined another. Two large steel trunks sat at one end. Pete opened both to find them filled with tarps, ropes, and other assorted supplies. Exactly what you’d expect to find in a construction trailer.
He went back to the door and called out, “Clear!”
Six more calls of clear rang out up and down the row. He waited for the report from the last trailer. And waited.
After what felt like hours, Baronick’s voice rang out. “Pete. You’re gonna want to see this.”
Zoe tried to push up from the cold, hard-packed dirt floor. She’d hit hard. Landed on her left side. E
verything hurt like hell. As she maneuvered onto her hands and knees, pain tore through her left shoulder forcing her back on her knees. Only something sharp as a dagger cut into one of them.
She rolled to one hip, but that wasn’t any better. Finally she staggered to her feet, swaying.
Her eyes acclimated to the low light enough to see the mess she’d fallen into. Except for the top treads, the entire staircase had been destroyed. Bashed. With what? The splintered remains of the heavy planks littered the basement floor. And she’d landed smack in the middle of it.
At least she could stand. Her legs weren’t broken. But her left shoulder? She wasn’t so sure. Any movement of that arm was met with searing pain. She undid one button of her uniform shirt just above her belt and tucked her hand and forearm inside to immobilize the shoulder a bit.
With her pain momentarily in check, she again became aware of the whimper she’d heard from the top of the stairs. The muted cries had escalated into full-blown sobbing along with what sounded like shushing sounds.
“Who’s down here?” she called out while swiping cobwebs from her face with her functional right hand.
“Zoe?” That was Mrs. Kroll. Her voice sounded…odd.
“Yeah.” Zoe took one staggering step toward the voice. Her left leg felt as if it had been torn from the hip, and she nearly ended up back on the cold earthen floor. Gasping, she regained her balance, keeping her weight off the offending leg. Through clenched teeth she said, “Where are you?”
“We’re in here. Hurry.” The tiny weepy voice wasn’t Mrs. Kroll.
“Maddie?”
“Help us!”
“Hang on.” Zoe glanced around, searching for something to use as a crutch or a cane and found nothing. Not even a broom handle. Gritting her teeth, she hobbled through the dark cave of the basement. Without electricity, the only light filtered in through two small windows, protected on the outside by wooden slats and set high in the foundation walls—one on the far side of the basement and the other in the room ahead of her housing the water heater, fuel oil tanks, and electrical panel. “Where are you?” Zoe asked again.
A small familiar figure stepped out of the room. “In here,” Maddie said. “Hurry. Mrs. Kroll is sick.”
Doing her best to ignore the pain in her hip and shoulder, Zoe hopped one-legged to Maddie. “Are you okay?”
“I guess. But Mrs. Kroll isn’t.” The girl looked at Zoe. “And neither are you.”
“Don’t worry about me.”
Maddie slipped an arm around Zoe. “Let me help.”
The kid might be the next generation paramedic. Zoe leaned on her and limped into the room. She found her landlady dressed in a nightgown seated on the cold floor next to the water heater, leaning back against the stone foundation. “What’s wrong? What happened?”
Mrs. Kroll managed a weak smile. “I’ll be fine. I’m just upset. That awful man.”
“Ryan Mancinelli?” Zoe glanced at Maddie.
“No.” Mrs. Kroll groaned. “The man who wants to buy the farm.”
“Dave Evans?”
“Yes. Horrible man. I was a fool to have showed him around the house, including this cellar, on Sunday.”
Zoe eased to her knees beside the older woman. Even in the low light, she recognized there was more wrong with her landlady than she let on. “Tell me what happened.”
Mrs. Kroll massaged her left arm and looked at Maddie.
Zoe gently took her landlady’s hand. A simple act of comfort. Except Zoe’s middle and ring fingers rested lightly on Mrs. Kroll’s radial pulse. Zoe shot a quick look at the girl before resting her gaze on the sweep second hand of her watch. “Go ahead, Maddie.”
The girl hugged herself, her shoulders hiked. “Mr. Evans came by the park last night when I was there with my friends. He said my dad had been hurt and had sent him to get me. I was scared, but he showed me he had Dad’s phone, so I went. I guess I shouldn’t have.”
No, you shouldn’t. But now wasn’t the time for a scolding. “He brought you here?”
“Not at first. We rode around a while. He was acting really weird. I wondered where we were going. Where my dad was. When I asked, he got mean and yelled at me to be quiet. I guess I started crying. Anyway, he brought me here. I thought good. Dad had come back to the farm. But he hadn’t.”
“He brought you here last night?”
“Yes,” Mrs. Kroll said, her voice weaker than usual. “He pounded on my door late. Must have been close to eleven o’clock.”
“You mean you’ve been down here all night?”
“Yes. And it’s none too comfortable, my old bones sitting on this cold floor, I can tell you.”
Zoe slid her hand up to rest on Mrs. Kroll’s forearm. Her skin was clammy even in the coolness of the basement. “How are you feeling?”
“I’m fine.”
“No, she isn’t,” Maddie said. “She was dizzy and said her tummy was upset.”
Zoe raised an eyebrow at her landlady. “Is that true?”
“Well…a little. But that awful man upset me so.”
Zoe looked around. She didn’t want to add to Mrs. Kroll’s anxiety with the news the older woman was very likely having a heart attack.
“We need to get you out of here,” she said, keeping her voice calm.
Mrs. Kroll gave a mildly hysterical laugh. “If only we could.”
Maddie rocked from one foot to the other. “After Mr. Evans brought us down here, he took a sledge hammer to the stairs so we can’t get back up.”
Mrs. Kroll winced. “And he did something to the breaker box to kill the power. He went out the basement doors and latched them from the outside. We’re trapped in here. When Maddie and I heard you at the top of the steps, we thought it was him coming back. If I’d known it was you, I’d have yelled to you to stay up there and get help.”
Zoe braced one hand against the foundation and struggled to her feet, clamping her mouth shut to keep from crying out. Leaning on the wall for support, she hobbled to the electrical box. If Evans had simply flipped the main switch…but no. An empty hole glared back at her from where the main breaker should be.
“Do you have your cell phone?” Maddie asked.
Zoe put a hand on her pocket. Crap. She’d left her phone and her keys on the table upstairs. “Afraid not.” She balanced precariously on one foot and scanned the room. A worn out broom leaned in one corner, enveloped in dusty spider webs.
She considered asking Maddie to fetch it, but doubted the girl would be willing to wrangle with arachnids to retrieve the makeshift cane. Zoe wasn’t thrilled about the idea herself. She hopped across the room, each jolt sending pain up her spine to her shoulder, her neck, and her brain.
“Where are you going?” Maddie demanded.
Zoe paused, gritting her teeth. She pointed. “I need a crutch, but that will do.”
“I’ll get it.” The ten-year-old scurried to the corner, reached through the web, and grabbed the broom, brushing it off as she brought it to Zoe.
“You’re not afraid of spiders?”
“Nope. I’ve been bugging Dad to get me a pet tarantula.”
Zoe eyed her. “Bugging him?”
Maddie didn’t appear to catch her own pun. “He always said Mom would have a fit, but I think he’s the one who’s scared of them.” The girl turned sullen at the mention of her mom.
“Well, you’re braver than I am,” Zoe said, hoping the praise would encourage continued bravery. She tested the broom handle to make sure it wasn’t going to snap the moment she leaned on it. It held. But the wood surface was rough from age. She’d probably end up with a handful of splinters.
Then again, splinters were the least of her concern at the moment.
“Now where are you going?” Maddie asked as Zoe h
obbled toward the door.
“We may not be as stuck as Mrs. Kroll thinks.” Those outer basement doors, latched only with an old screwdriver through a hasp, were rickety and rotted. “You just stay here and rest,” she told her landlady.
“Zoe?” Maddie’s voice trembled.
“What, baby?”
“My dad? Where is he?”
Zoe swallowed. Put on the best poker face she could manage. “He has been hurt, but he’s in the hospital, and they’re taking really good care of him.” She gave the girl a tight smile, turned, and limped out into the cavernous part of the basement before Maddie could question her further.
The oil furnace sat in a large pit in the center of the dark cave. Apparently when it or an earlier furnace had been installed, the beast had been too tall for the low clearance, and someone had dug out a two-foot deep, ten-foot wide crater to make room. Not keen on the idea of another fall, Zoe picked her way around the hole.
The inner door stood open, either left that way when Evans departed or opened by Maddie or Mrs. Kroll. The sloped bulkhead doors remained closed, rays of sunshine sneaking through the cracks between the boards.
Zoe put her good shoulder against the split where the two doors met, hoping the screws holding the hasp would pop loose with some pressure. She pushed, expecting some jiggle or give. There was none. She turned and braced her back against the doors, her feet on the first stone step, squeezing into the wedge of space.
Her legs—at least one of them—was strong.
She heaved, but the doors didn’t give even a fraction of an inch. She gritted her teeth. Dug in hard as she could. Groaned against the stabbing pain in her hip and her quivering, protesting quads. The wood didn’t so much as creak.
“I don’t think that’s gonna work,” Maddie said.
Zoe hadn’t realized the little girl had tagged along. “I’m not giving up yet. Maybe there’s something here I can use to pry them open.”
“I don’t think so,” Maddie repeated. “Mr. Evans went out that way and I heard him out there hammering. I think he nailed some boards across the outside.”
Annette Dashofy - Zoe Chambers 03 - Bridges Burned Page 27
