by Elle Gray
“It’s alright, it’s okay,” Olivia whispered gently, kneeling down beside the girl. She didn’t want to spook her even more, but she couldn’t stay out there on the porch. She needed to get inside to safety. “You’re okay, no one is going to hurt you now. I’m going to get you home, okay? Let’s get you inside…”
The girl seemed unresponsive to her. She had her knees tucked up to her chest and her head pressed to them. Her arms shielded her head and she rocked back and forth, whimpering quietly. A sure sign of shock.
Olivia pulled her phone out, ready to call for an ambulance, her heart pounding in her chest. Dealing with situations like this was all a part of the job, but it never got any easier seeing someone in pain.
“9-1-1, what is your emergency and location?”
Olivia rattled off her name and address to the dispatcher.
“I have a young girl, identity unknown, who just showed up on my porch. She’s in a bad way, she needs medical treatment. I think she was being held as a hostage.”
The dispatcher fell silent. He clearly didn’t know how to respond.
“I—I understand, ma’am. We’re sending an ambulance right away.”
The voice on the other end of the line was young, clearly nervous. Olivia understood how he felt. Not many people can say they have known someone who has been kidnapped, or held hostage, or put in a situation where they were in serious danger. But Olivia knew from experience that situations like those weren’t as uncommon as people might think. It’s unfortunate, but she dealt with cases like this all the time.
As they waited for the ambulance, Olivia ran inside to grab some blankets from inside and wrapped them around the girl’s shoulders. She tried to coax some talk out of her, asking her simple questions, but the girl didn’t respond to a single one. She just kept herself locked in her own embrace, rocking backward and forwards.
Olivia’s heart broke for her. A girl so young shouldn’t know such trauma... no one deserved what she’d been through. She did her best to make the girl feel safe, talking soothingly to her and hoping that someone would show up to help soon.
The downside of living out in the country is that it takes forever for emergency services to arrive. When the lights of the sirens finally lit up the end of the block, it was well past midnight. The medical staff approached slowly, like they were unsure themselves of how to handle the situation. Olivia stood up to let them closer to the girl, though she felt too protective to leave her entirely.
“She’s in shock,” Olivia told them. “She’s had quite the night.”
“Don’t worry,” one of the women said kindly. “She’ll be in good hands. Would you like to ride with her to the hospital? It might help her if you stick around. I imagine she doesn’t want to be taken away with a bunch of strangers.”
“Alright,” Olivia said with a nod. Not just because she felt inclined to take care of the girl, but because she suspected that this wouldn’t be the last she’d hear of the girl’s case. The local police in Belle Grove were nowhere near prepared to deal with kidnapping cases like this. Once they identified who the girl was, they might be able to connect her to a missing persons case. Then, maybe Olivia could help the girl get some justice for what had happened to her.
Maybe.
The girl seemed resistant to get in the ambulance, kicking and moaning as the paramedics tried to get her inside. She looked to Olivia for help, who made soothing noises once again, trying to keep her calm.
“It’s alright, these people want to help you,” she insisted gently, putting a hand on the girl’s shoulders. “They need to make sure you’re not seriously hurt and treat your wounds. You’ll be safe with them... and I’ll be right beside you the whole time. I’m not going to leave you on your own.”
The girl’s eyes softened in relief. Olivia nodded to the paramedics who tried again to help the girl onto her feet. She didn’t resist the second time. Olivia tried as calmly as she could to lock up the house and follow the others into the back of the ambulance. She took the girl’s hand tightly in her own, and as they began the journey back to the hospital, she wondered how a perfectly ordinary night had turned dark so quickly.
Someone sinister was still out there. Someone sick enough to tie up a young girl and keep her somewhere for long enough that she was close to starvation. Who would do something like that? Who would harm such an innocent young person?
A psychopath, she concluded.
Two
After three hours sitting in the uncomfortable chair in the corner of the hospital room, Olivia still hadn’t slept a wink. She felt that she couldn’t, even though the girl was finally in safe hands and was being treated for her injuries. In any other scenario, she’d take charge and start investigating, but there was simply nothing she could do but sit around and wait for the local authorities to do their jobs and come to see the girl. All she could do was try to be patient and be around for whenever she woke up. The least she could do was offer her a familiar face until someone could track down her family. Unless it was her family who’d kept her captive in the first place…
Olivia shuddered at the thought. Even despite everything she’d seen in her career, she didn’t want to imagine that anyone could neglect their child that way. The girl wasn’t just neglected, either. She’d been held captive. Those marks on her wrists proved as much. There was no denying that the girl had been kept in some seriously bad conditions for an extended period of time. She was lucky to have found Olivia when she did. She couldn’t have gone much longer without food and water.
Olivia looked down at the girl for the hundredth time that night. She was attached to a drip that was slowly feeding her fluids. A tray of food lay untouched beside her bed. The girl had been sleeping ever since she arrived. Her injuries were even more obvious now. There was no sign that she’d been physically attacked by a person, or that anything worse had been done to her, but her frail body was enough evidence that she was being abused in other ways.
The scratches and bruises on her body that she got from the forest would heal soon enough, but the mental abuse she’d survived? That was likely something she’d be dealing with for the rest of her life. For the short time she’d been awake, she’d been too in shock to speak at all and explain what had happened to her. They might never be able to find out.
Olivia couldn’t imagine what she’d been through. The girl looked even younger now that she was asleep, and when Olivia thought about her own life at the girl’s age, she knew she would never have been able to comprehend this. She lived in a safe little bubble with a happy family and good memories. At that age, she didn’t have to worry about kidnappings and murders and all of the awful things the world had to offer. She knew a little more about those things by then, though.
For the second time that night, Olivia’s thoughts returned to her sister. She squeezed her eyes shut, but this time, her efforts did nothing to rid her mind of Veronica. Sweet, innocent Veronica. She hadn’t deserved what happened to her. No one deserved a fate like hers, Veronica least of all.
Olivia’s enigmatic older sister had her whole life laid out in front of her. She had attended college in Seattle to study journalism and then dived straight into a promising career for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. She wasn’t afraid to chase down a story, no matter how controversial it was, and she was even starting to make a name for herself as a true-crime podcaster, bringing attention to long-forgotten cases. She was unstoppable. And when she wasn’t working, she was building a beautiful home and marriage with the man of her dreams: none other than the wealthy billionaire Paxton Arrington, heir to the Archton Media empire.
Olivia let out a soft chuckle despite herself. When Veronica had first started dating Paxton, Olivia had come down hard against him. She just couldn’t see what her sister saw in that arrogant, egotistical jerk. But the years softened his edges. Thanks to Veronica, Paxton gave up his life of wealth and privilege to instead dedicate himself to serving his community. That was the kind of person
Veronica was. Her fire and drive truly changed people. She always had the ability to look deep into someone’s soul and change them for the better.
Those years she’d spent with Paxton were spent in perfect domestic bliss. Until…
Olivia tried to take a calming breath, but once that train of thought started, it became nearly impossible to keep her emotions from getting out of control. How could she ever stay calm when such a horrific tragedy had happened to her only sister, seemingly out of the blue?
Tears stung Olivia’s eyes; she wiped them away. She couldn’t stand the thought of her incredible sister lying crumpled at the wheel of the car, unable to cry out for help, knowing she was about to lose her life. Did she feel her dreams slipping away from her as the blood left her body? Did she have regrets, things she wished she’d done? Olivia knew from her line of work how long it could take someone to bleed out. It was a humiliating, horrifying way to go. There would be so much pain, so much blood…
Paxton never believed the official story that she hit a patch of black ice while driving one night and careened into a ditch. He’d spent the last several years trying to prove that there was some foul play or conspiracy. But as far as Olivia was aware, the Seattle Police Department closed the case as simply an accident.
Olivia’s eyes snapped open. She felt calmer: even though Veronica was always on her mind, it was easier when her eyes were open. Her sister didn’t haunt her quite the same when she was alert and awake. It had been five long years without her. To tell the truth, Olivia and Veronica were never truly that close. They’d been on friendly terms, and they’d always get along well at family events, but they weren’t best pals like some siblings often are. They didn’t call each other once a week for a catch up or feel the need to tell each other all their deepest, darkest secrets. They just never had that kind of relationship
In some ways, that made it even harder that she was gone. If Olivia had known that she’d lose Veronica someday, maybe she would have made more time for her. Because now that she was gone, Olivia could see how much light her sister had brought to the world. After what happened, life would never be the same for her, or for her family, ever again. But then again, things fell apart pretty quickly after Veronica died. Especially when it came to their mother…
The door to the hospital room opened and a heavyset nurse entered the room with a clipboard, giving Olivia a kind smile.
“You don’t need to stay, you know,” he said politely, not looking at her as he checked over the girl. “She’s going to be fine. She’s in good hands here.”
“I don’t doubt it,” Olivia replied. “You’ve all been wonderful. I just... it doesn’t feel right leaving her until someone she knows arrives. I want there to be a familiar face around when she wakes up.”
“I’m sure she’ll appreciate that. Has anyone checked up on you? What you saw must have been pretty scary. Has anyone made sure you’re doing okay?”
Olivia offered the nurse a tight smile. “I’m okay. It sounds awful, but I’m kind of used to it. I work in the FBI. Horror is kind of a part of the job.”
The nurses’ eyes widened. Olivia was used to that kind of response when she told people about her job. “FBI, huh? You must have seen some stuff.”
“You can say that again,” Olivia muttered with a weary sigh. Her sister flashed through her thoughts again, but she blinked hard and Veronica disappeared once more. “Do you guys have a coffee machine? I get the feeling this is going to be a long night.”
“Sure thing. It’s just down the hall. I’ll be here for a few more minutes so you don’t have to worry about her being on her own.”
“Thank you.”
Olivia rose from the chair, feeling the weariness of her body weighing her down. She headed down the hall and found the coffee machine. With each step, her body cried out at her for caffeine. Strangely, she hadn’t really felt tired until she’d started thinking about Veronica. It was almost like her sister could sap all of the energy from her body, even long after she was gone. A shiver rose up Olivia’s spine. She didn’t believe in ghosts or anything like that, but sometimes, she swore her sister somehow kept an eye on her.
With a styrofoam cup of sludgy coffee in hand, she walked back to the girl’s room. The nurse was finishing up his checks and he nodded to Olivia as she came back in.
“She’s doing just fine. She’s underfed and she was pretty dehydrated, but we can handle all of that. She’ll probably be here for a few weeks while she gets her strength back, but she’ll be okay.”
Olivia sighed in relief. “That’s good to know. Thank you for your help.”
“That’s alright. Try to rest. She’ll probably be asleep for quite some time.”
Olivia checked her watch. It was nearly four in the morning. She shrugged with a helpless smile.
“I’ll be alright. I’ll probably need to go down to the station in a few hours anyway. Coffee will get me through.”
The nurse gave her a pitying smile. Olivia guessed that his profession meant he’d seen plenty of insomniacs in denial before. But he left her there without another word. She stood in the middle of the room, holding her coffee in both hands and staring at the young girl. Her gaunt face would probably linger in her mind forever. Another perk of the job: a collection of ghosts haunting her mind.
Except for once, Olivia had managed to save someone. Her job was usually to solve a problem after it had already been caused. She couldn’t stop bodies piling up. It was her job to catch the culprits, not stop them from doing bad things in the first place. She sighed. She loved her job, but sometimes, it overwhelmed her entirely.
But she’d done something good that night. She’d made sure a young girl made it out alive. She might not have been able to save victims before their murders, or save her sister from her fate... but for once, she was responsible for someone getting to live.
It was the silver linings that kept her going.
Three
Olivia must have fallen asleep at some point because her heart jolted her awake harshly. She’d been dreaming about her sister. In the dream, she was alive and well, laughing and joking around with someone like the last four years hadn’t even happened. The details were hazy, but Veronica had come to her clear as day. It felt more real to Olivia than real life. Then she felt a falling sensation and she was suddenly awake, her neck aching from dozing on the rock-hard chair and her mouth dry.
Olivia groaned as she checked her watch. It was almost seven A.M. She rolled her eyes over at the bed and found that the young girl was still asleep. She clearly hadn’t moved at all, which made Olivia feel a little less guilty for falling asleep. She felt like some faithful guard dog, set on protecting the girl when no one else could. She knew that was ridiculous when she was surrounded by a team of medical staff who were keeping her safe and getting her better, but Olivia couldn’t help but feel some responsibility for the girl. Maybe it was her chance to make up for not protecting her sister.
She stretched and got up to get another coffee from down the hall before returning to her perch on the hard chair. With a watchful eye on the girl, she tried to piece together what had happened the previous night. A girl running through the night, away from horrors unknown, was not a usual case. How did the girl escape where she was being held? How long had she been there? Was she taken from her home somewhere to suffer her imprisonment, or did someone in her family do this to her?
And then there was the question of where the girl had come from. In her ill state, she couldn’t have made it too far, and if Olivia’s cabin was the first place she stumbled across to find help, then she must have been traveling alone through the woods. That was significant, Olivia was sure. It might give investigators some clue of where to look for her captor.
But as far as Olivia was aware, those woods stretched on for miles and miles. And for the past few years, the forest had become much more wild, untended by the forest ranger who left town and his cabin behind. Searching the forest would be no picnic.
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Perhaps the person who held the girl captive knew that. Maybe they were dealing with a cold, calculating personality. Olivia knew it would be a much simpler case if the culprit was a random, impulsive type—but she thought that seemed unlikely. Though the girl’s escape seemed like an accident, what if it wasn’t?
What if she’d been let go?
Olivia shook her head of the idea, too sleep-deprived to get her head around it all. She needed someone to bounce some ideas off, at least. She hadn’t expected to deal with such a horrifying case so close to her new home. She moved to Belle Grove to have a quiet life. But this case had already shattered the illusion that hiding out in a small town would keep her hidden; that strange things wouldn’t occur around her. Olivia got the sinking feeling that trouble would always follow her wherever she went... or maybe that the town wasn’t quite as idyllic as she had first thought.
Olivia suddenly wished she had someone she could call. Just to talk. Not even to mention the case, just to feel normal for a moment. She didn’t often feel the need to call people up, but it would be soothing right at that moment. The trouble was, there were precious few people that she was close enough with to call up out of the blue. Her father wouldn’t pick up the call. His life in the military was demanding; he was often unreachable for weeks on end. In fact, in the years since Veronica died and Olivia’s mother went MIA, he’d only gone further off the grid. He was the only person left in Olivia’s family who she could call, and even he was a stretch too far.
