Having lost all sense of direction, she didn’t know if she was going back the way she’d first entered or farther into the building. She came to some crates, which impeded her progress until she felt her way around them, and continued until she reached a corner.
“Rose,” Finn’s voice came out of the blackness, comforting her.
“Yes?”
“I’m nearly free,” he said.
“I haven’t found a door nor window yet,” she told him.
After another few minutes of silence, she felt the wall change from brick to plaster and surmised that she was touching an interior wall. In another moment, she felt a doorframe and then a handle.
“A door! I think it goes farther into the building though, not outside.”
“Keep talking or humming or something,” Finn ordered
Rose began to hum. In the darkness, with her senses heightened, she heard him approaching. Yet when his hand suddenly brushed her shoulder, she cried out before she could stop herself. When he took firm hold of her upper arm, she wanted to sag against his warm and comforting form. Instead, she gritted her teeth. She would be strong, courageous even, and help get them out of the mess they were in.
Rose heard Finn rattle the door handle. Then all was silent, except for a brushing sound above her head.
“What are you doing?” she asked, keeping her voice low.
He seemed to pause in his endeavors. “Why are you whispering?”
And she felt him give her arm a squeeze.
“I don’t know,” she admitted, her voice still soft. “Maybe because I’m barely breathing.”
Against all reason, he chuckled softly. “Well, keep breathing. I don’t want to have to carry you out of here.”
She couldn’t help smiling into the darkness.
“Aha,” he exclaimed.
“What?” she asked, and then felt his hand drop from her arm.
“There’s a key above the frame.” Finn paused, scrabbling at the handle. “In case anyone gets locked in, I expect. Or maybe the key’s been here since the place was built and no one remembered it. First place I always look,” he added. “Maybe it’s a Maine notion.”
There were more noises as he fumbled to get the key into the lock. Then, as lovely as her sister Sophie’s music to her ears, Rose heard the click of the tumblers as they turned.
Finn eased the door open, and what seemed to be blinding light shone through the opening.
As she blinked and looked past him, she realized the bright light was merely the last rays of the sun disappearing over the western part of the city and coming in through the side of ill-fitting window shades in the next room.
“I’d rather go back than farther inside,” Rose said, still keeping her voice quiet.
Finn didn’t speak at first, then he looked behind him, with the sunlight illuminating the confines of their makeshift prison.
Rose turned back, too. Another door was in the opposite wall, obviously the way she’d come in. Finn’s ropes lay discarded in the middle of the small chamber. More ropes hung from beams and a few storage crates lined one wall.
“Which way?” she asked.
At that precise moment, they heard footsteps and the unmistakable sound of a key in the outer door.
Without a word, Finn grabbed her hand and hauled her into the next chamber. As he closed the door swiftly behind them and locked it, she heard the other door into their prison slam open.
“Finn,” she exclaimed as a bolt of fear slashed through her.
Again, he took her hand securely in his, and in the next instant, they were running across the floor of a small store room and out the other side into a narrow alley between two buildings. Those in pursuit would have to go back the way they came and around the structure, buying their prey a little time.
