“No, I’m just?—”
“Don’t worry, Mom. I’ll wear my seatbelt.”
“Fucking dickhead.” He shakes his head.
“I know you are, but what am I?”
We lock eyes, our smiles fading as it seems both our brains go in the same direction.
“Brian?” I ask.
“His family has been notified. He’ll have a full military funeral when this shit storm is over, and Helms is off the streets.”
I nod, taking a deep breath as I slip my hands into my gloves.
Chase hands me a com, and then I’m limping down the hallway, headed for certain doom.
But one thing’s for sure: I’m getting my fucking girl back.
The house is run down. The interior is dark, the echoes of those who’ve lived here before seeming to cling to the house’s aura like a death shroud.
The porch creaks with my weight on it, and I take a moment to assess the inside through the broken, film-covered windows, unable to see shit because of how dark it is.
An air conditioning unit on the side of the house clicks off, bathing me in silence.
Someone’s inside, because why is the air running?
With my gun poised and ready to go off with even the slightest addition of pressure, I enter the house.
The darkness welcomes me like I belong, engulfing me more with each step.
The air is thick and mottled with the scent of mildew as I move through, clearing each room.
Just as Chase said, I find nothing.
Not until I find a loose panel in the front hall closet.
It doesn’t lead me anywhere, but I now have proof Helms could’ve been sneaky with his hiding spot. I’m not leaving here until I know that Greer isn’t somewhere in this haunted house of horror.
Thoughts of her tied up and hurt plague me as I rip through every closet and tear walls open. Having ripped the house to shreds from top to bottom, I move on to the basement.
I’m about to lose my mind when I find another loose panel in the wall that hides a door behind it.
The door is locked from the inside, and going in guns blazing might not do me any favors, but I stand back and aim my gun anyhow.
She makes me stupid.
Isn’t that the way of love, though?
The sound accompanying my shots is muted by the silencer on the end of my gun.
Three shots, and the door flies open.
Knowing I’ll have alerted Helms, I move past the now blinding pain in my abdomen, my head, and gun on a constant swivel as a young girl sits up in bed, fear screeching out of her through the filthy rag gagging her mouth.
There are handcuffs on the footboard of the bed, but no one is attached to them.
“Are you the only one here?” I ask her, trying not to go into a full-blown panic that I haven’t found Greer, until the slightest flick of the girl’s gaze shifts over my shoulder, and I turn to find Helms behind me.
