Freaking Off the Grid

by L. L. Muir

  Positive thoughts. Stick with positive thoughts.

  She pulled out her blanket and pillow. She didn’t feel quite safe enough to sleep in the back seat as she usually did, however. If someone approached the car, she was going to be behind the wheel with the keys in the ignition, ready to get the heck out of there.

  One thing left.

  She said her prayers, like she’d done all her life. Like her parents had taught her. She was especially thankful that she wasn’t in some Child Welfare Services detention, or being dragged back to the Blairs’. She was grateful she had at least a small paycheck’s worth of cash in her pocket, a functioning car, and sturdy locks on the doors.

  She didn’t know for sure if Jamison had truly been sent by the old ghost— whether he had come to protect her or to get his hands on her—but since she was possibly responsible for his predicament, she prayed Jamison would be all right, wherever he was. She prayed for inspiration for the next day. And she prayed for help—for someone who could identify the bad guys, or if it was all just a joke she didn’t understand.

  She prayed that the old ghost, wherever he was, wouldn’t be in trouble for trying to help her. It was silly, but he was the closest thing to a guardian angel she’d ever known, even though she dreaded the days when he’d show up. But if he knew anything that might help her now, she wouldn’t mind a brief visit.

  With her prayers over, she glanced at the passenger seat. There were no boney knees sticking out from under a blue and green plaid kilt. No wiry red hairs on the backs of large age-cracked hands. Whatever detention he was in, she figured old Mr. Jamison hadn’t yet made bail.

  Her hand fumbled down at her side until she felt the catch and released it. She might have been asleep before her seat leaned all the way back.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Jamison woke and groaned, hoping the sound could somehow dislodge the pain in his head.

  “Medieval idiots! Why do you have to use chloroform?”

  His voice bounced back at him and he popped open his eyes to see where he was.

  Well, at least it’s not a van.

  He sat up on a gurney that was much more comfortable than the ridged floor that had cut into his butt during the ride up the mountain. He couldn’t tell if the room was supposed to be an exam room or a cell, but the smell of chloroform was still strong and two goons in dirty robes stood beside him. One put a hand on Jamison’s chest.

  “You can either lie back and be patient while we do this, or we can put the rag on your face again. Your call.”

  Jamison nodded and eased back. “Mind telling me what you’re doing?”

  “It’s just a tracking device,” the second one said, lifting and shaking a wide metal bracelet with a red button on the side. Then he set it down again. “But we’ve got to shave your hairy ankle, so hold nice and still or we might cut something important.”

  Jamison didn’t know what to think about being left in the care of Dumb and Dumber. Did Gabriella not worry about him getting loose in her stone maze? Or did that Pilot dude have the power of suggestion too, like Skye used to have? But then again, he’d been able to tell when Skye had been using it on him. And he didn’t have that same feeling now. There was no strong impression that he should submit to these two. In fact, they didn’t seem too confident, and Jamison was tempted to ask for the razor and let him shave himself.

  He decided to try it, more for amusement than anything. Surely they weren’t stupid enough…

  “Hey. Why don’t you let me do that for you?” He sat up again and leaned over the ankle Dumber had covered with shaving cream. The guy kept changing angles, unsure where to start.

  Jamison held out his hand for the blade. “Both sides? Or just one?”

  “Both.” Dumber handed him the straight edge and pointed a few inches above the ankle. Then he picked up the tracking device and waited.

  Jamison turned to the side and dropped his free leg off the gurney next to Dumb, like it was necessary. He swiped the blade through the foam. “Have you got a towel or something?”

  Dumb reached behind him. When he turned back, Jamison had the edge of the blade against his throat.

  “By the dullness of your robes, I’d say you guys are human, right?”

  Dumb started to nod, then stopped and gulped very carefully. “What do you want?” he whispered.

  “I want your friend here to put the tracker on your leg.”

  Dumber stepped carefully around and snapped the band on Dumb’s ankle.

  “Tell me how it works,” Jamison said.

  Dumber stood up and pointed to a metal band running along the wall about a foot off the floor. “The signal from the tracker is picked up by those. If you happen to get out of your cell, they can tell where you’ve gone. And when they summon you, the tracker will be pulled along the track in the walkway. Magnets, I think.”

  “So now that the tracker is on him?”

  “It’s activated.” He shrugged. “He wasn’t nearly as hairy as you.”

  “Where were you supposed to take me?”

  “Nowhere.”

  “Good.” He grinned at Dumber. “Now, since you don’t want your friend here to die, you’re going to put more chloroform on that rag.”

  Dumber did it, but the look in his eye told Jamison he wasn’t quite as dumb as he seemed.

  “Nice and wet,” Jamison warned.

  The stuff dripped on the floor.

  Jamison pulled up his shoulder to block the smell. He stepped down off the gurney and walked around behind Dumb, still holding the blade against his neck. He told Dumber to lie down so he wouldn’t fall, then to put the rag over his nose and take a long drag.

  Dumber looked a little woozy already and fumbled his way onto the bed. He shook his head, though, and tossed the cloth away.

  Jamison pushed the first guy aside and put the blade to Dumber’s throat. Then told his friend, “Get it. Knock him out.”

  Dumb nodded and did what he was told, including lying down on the floor and knocking himself out. It wasn’t going to last long, but it was enough to get Jamison out the door without anyone sounding an alarm. He folded the razor and slid it into his back pocket, then checked the clothes of Dumb and Dumber.

  A key card with no markings went into his left back pocket. A flash of light caught his eye and he found an earpiece on Dumber. Jamison wiped it against his jeans a couple of times, then hung it around his own ear. It was still warm.

  He hit a light switch and pulled the door closed as he stepped into the bright hall. When he realized a robe might fool others from a distance, he turned back, but a little red light glowed next to the doorknob. And since a swipe of that key card might alert anyone monitoring the place, he decided not to try it.

  He chose the left passage for no good reason other than he didn’t have a clue which direction to go, and tried not to think about how many square miles of rock were dangling above his head.

  Once again, he thanked God that Skye wasn’t down there with him, and that he only had his own butt to save.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Skye woke to the sound of a car door slamming and sat up before she pried open her eyes. The sun was up. The parking lot was half full of cars. She must have slept pretty hard to have missed all those heavy doors shutting.

  A few people made their way to the church doors while darting looks over their shoulders. But none of them noticed her. Their attention was on something in the field behind her car.

  She saw nothing in her rear view mirror, but she hadn’t removed the sun visor from her back window. Her side mirror showed only a green field.

  With the back of her seat still lowered, she only had to stretch to pull the visor off. Then she sat up again, flipped her seat upright, and checked the rear view again.

  Three Somerleds stood about ten feet back from her bumper, staring at her car. Waiting.

  She ignored the fact that her body was shaking and fumbled for the ignition where she’d left the keys.


  Please be there.

  They were there. The car started.

  She put her foot on the brake and reached for the gear shift while she looked in the mirror again. One of them held up a hand to get her to stop, but their feet never moved. It was the woman from the fruit stand, the one who had warned her she was in danger. But she’d also held her people back when they might have wanted to help her. If this woman hadn’t restrained them, Jamison might not have been kidnapped.

  Skye’s hand paused on the shift. Hadn’t she planned to go looking for Somerleds? Hadn’t she prayed for help? And there they were, standing at the ready. Had they been waiting for her to wake up?

  But more importantly, how did they know where to find her? And if they could find her, who else might?

  She looked around the parking lot for the black car she’d seen at the park. There were three cars that could be it, but she couldn’t be sure. And from where she sat, she couldn’t see the driver’s seats. But she was past doubting herself and resigned herself to the fact that she’d been found again.

  She was fully awake and alert to the fact that yesterday’s nightmares hadn’t just been in her dreams. And they weren’t over yet. But she immediately calmed. She could only do what she could do.

  She turned off the car but left the keys in the ignition. Then she rolled down the window and waved at the woman to come talk to her. No way would she get out of the car.

  The woman came forward. The two men followed close behind.

  “Uh, thanks for the warning yesterday,” Skye told her, squinting at the bright morning sunshine and the brilliant white of their robes.

  “I’m sorry we couldn’t have done more.” The woman didn’t bother smiling.

  “Well, uh, it looks like you’ve got some Somerled rogues, huh?”

  All three of them frowned, but they didn’t deny it.

  “Look.” Skye dropped the cheerful routine. “If that guy was kidnapped because he was trying to help me…”

  “He was.” One of the woman’s escorts was even more blunt than she was.

  “Well, then, I guess it’s my fault he was taken. I can’t just do nothing. Can I?”

  “You must do nothing, Skye.” The woman put her hand on Skye’s forearm like they knew each other or something. And she’d called her by name the day before too. “Please trust me. The people who took the boy are much more of a danger to you than to him. Don’t let his willing sacrifice be in vain.”

  Skye gasped. “Willing sacrifice? You think he chose to be taken instead of me? I was there, too, remember? He didn’t do any volunteering, believe me. And I’m not about to let anybody be sacrificed on my account anyway. So please. Help me find him.”

  The woman shook her head and pulled her hand back. “We cannot interfere.”

  “Then tell me where to look for him.”

  She shook her head again. “I do not know.”

  Skye groaned. “Come on! You have to know something.” She closed her eyes briefly to try to come up with a better argument. But instead, she thought of a better question. “How did you know where to find me?”

  The woman shook her head and bit her lip.

  “Come on. You can at least tell me that. Was it my phone? Were you able to track my cell, even though I took the battery out?”

  The woman shook her head once again.

  “If you won’t tell me how you found me, at least tell me… Can others find me the same way?”

  The woman lifted her head, narrowed her eyes for a moment, then reluctantly, she nodded. Her eyes darted to the right, then back at Skye.

  “Someone else is here, aren’t they?” Skye dropped her hand down on the ignition switch, ready to run.

  The woman nodded.

  Skye waited, but the woman added nothing. So she asked her what she needed to know. “Are they dangerous?”

  The woman frowned again, then shook her head.

  Skye sighed. “Well, that clears everything up, doesn’t it? Thanks a lot for your help. I’ll see you around.” She turned on her engine.

  The woman stepped forward again and laid her hand on the open window. “Yes. Go. But go far away from here, Skye Somerled. The boy may survive whereas you will be destroyed. Please. Go.”

  Skye didn’t bother correcting the woman’s obvious slip. After all, the woman in white probably didn’t talk to many people who weren’t Somerleds.

  Skye Somerled? The woman was nuts.

  She stepped away from the car and Skye knew she’d get nothing more out of her. And she had a feeling that no other Somerleds were going to help her even if she found some.

  She wasn’t going to complain. Her prayers had been answered.

  First of all, help had arrived even if the only help they’d given was to let her know that in the skirmish yesterday, it had been Jamison on her side, not the rogue Somerleds with the van. And secondly, she’d found the inspiration she was looking for.

  She now knew exactly what she needed to do in order to find her would-be hero.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Skye gave the Somerleds a nod and pulled out of the parking place. She passed three black cars as she wound her way through the lot. Only one of them followed.

  Pretending to be carefree and oblivious, she turned left and started the long drive back to town. For two long minutes, she forced herself to be patient. Then she slowed quickly, stopped, and jumped out of the car.

  The black car stopped too. There were four car lengths between them, and Skye hurried to close the space.

  The driver was a large man who looked about forty-ish. At first, he was surprised, then alarmed. She was nearly to him before he decided to act, throwing his car into reverse and gunning it. A woman in a minivan pulled into the road and he had to slam on the breaks and turn the wheel. Skye ran toward him again, but the man shifted and drove off back toward the church. At the next road, he turned west.

  The woman stared at her, waiting for her to get out of the road before she dared continue.

  Skye brushed her hands together and smiled all the way back to her car, amazed that her heart could beat so hard and so fast and it didn’t kill her. At least one of her problems was gone—for the moment.

  She still didn't know how the guy had found her. But she knew two things about her stalker. First, he wasn't a danger to her—if she chose to believe the Somerled woman, which she did.

  And second...

  He wore all white.

  ~ ~ ~

  Wandering down the brightly lit hallway, Jamison felt like a mouse caught in the open with an unknown number of hungry birds of prey circling above his head. He had to get out of sight. Fast.

  There were three more cells like the one he’d locked Dumb and Dumber inside, but they were open and empty. There were no doors on the opposite side of the corridor, just rough, cut stone. The ceiling was the same but with black power cables and lights running down the center.

  Jamison followed the hallway to the right, then took the first turn. It led him straight to an elevator. He pulled out the key card and waved it everywhere he could think of, but nothing happened. Since the stairwell beside the elevator only led down, he decided he had to go back past his cell and try the other direction. He wasn’t about to put more distance between himself and fresh air.

  He went back to the bend and pressed himself against the wall and listened. There were voices, but he couldn’t believe Dumb and Dumber had shaken off the drug already. Calm conversation. No one alarmed. But the voices were getting closer.

  He glanced back at the elevator and willed the doors to open, but they didn’t.

  The voices still moved his way. He had no choice. He booked it back to the stairwell and hurried out of sight. Then he listened, ready to move further down the winding stairs, but not unless he had to.

  The murmurs morphed into conversation. They were betting on how long something was going to take. The hum of the elevator interrupted their banter, then the humming stopped too. After a few second
s of silence, the elevator rumbled away, hopefully with the guys inside.

  Jamison counted to twenty, then figured the coast was clear. He hated to go back into the bright light after the dark sanctuary of the stairs, but he couldn’t just stay there and wait to be found either.

  While he huddled on the steps deliberating, his curiosity grew. What would the angel collector keep even lower than her jail cells?

  Supplies?

  Laundry?

  Would he be able to find a bunch of white robes in his size? Or maybe an entire Somerled outfit, like the one he’d been given to wear at Lanny’s ranch? Even better, would he be able to find a service entrance?

  He moved slowly, one step at a time, clutching at the grooves in the wall, prepared to pivot and run if necessary. And he tried to keep his mind clear of horror movies where the characters went into dangerously dark basements when they didn’t have to.

  But it wasn’t dark.

  After a few more steps, he saw the opening. It wasn’t lit up like the floor above, but it wasn’t completely dark either—more like morning, just before the sun comes up. There was a low hum. Not like the elevator. Something more…alive.

  Jamison edged toward the archway and listened to what had to be a very large crowd. Their voices were hushed, like they were waiting for something to start…or trying not to be heard.

  He peeked around the edge of the rock and took a quick look, then pulled back and tried to make sense of what he’d seen. But he couldn’t. So he took a little longer look, hoping the shadows of the stairwell would hide him for the most part.

  The landing was much like the last one had been. The hallway turned left after about twenty feet. But along that short bit, before the turn, there were bars—a jail cell like a cage instead of a walled room. And this one wasn’t empty.

  Someone whistled like a bird and the hum of conversation stopped. Jamison could sense attention turning toward him and his heart jumped.