No voice came from the other end.
‘Hello,’ Stacey said again.
No one spoke, but she could tell it wasn’t a dead line. She readied herself to hurl all kinds of abuse to the caller. Now was not the damn time to be trying to sell her life insurance.
‘Hello,’ she said again, an edge to her voice. She was about to hang up when she heard a car in the distance, followed by a sob. Her stomach lurched as she heard the smallest of whispers. ‘Is that you, Ava?’ she hissed as her heart jumped into her mouth.
Another whisper.
‘Shout up, sweetie, I can’t hear you.’
‘Bins.’
‘What bins? Where are you, sweetheart?’
‘Behind the bins. Daddy’s dead.’
Oh Jesus, what the hell was going on? The kid had obviously managed to get away.
‘Which bins, Ava? What can you see?’ Stacey cried urgently as Penn picked up his phone to relay any information they could get.
‘He’s coming, please, help me… no… get off me… leave me alone… no!’
Stacey’s blood ran cold as Ava screamed.
‘Ava, stay with me, talk to me,’ Stacey cried.
She stopped speaking as she heard the phone fall to the ground. Ava was shouting and screaming in the distance.
‘Penn, for God’s sake, get the boss.’
Eighty-Three
‘Okay, Stace, keep the line open to Ava. Bryant is with Daniel, and we’ve got an ambulance and backup on the way.’
‘Boss, Penn just heard from Mitch. The DNA. There’s a link to?—’
‘Gotta go, Stace,’ Kim said, ending the call.
Right now, it didn’t matter who had Ava. The only thing that mattered was that they had her.
The minute Stacey said the word bins she’d started heading away from Bryant and Daniel. The man was in and out of consciousness. Each time he opened his eyes, he simply muttered Ava’s name before blacking out again.
She heard a siren in the distance and prayed it was the ambulance. By the state of Daniel, she wasn’t sure he was going to make it, but she couldn’t think about that now.
Phone in hand, she continued around the exterior of the main building. She stopped to listen, but the sirens were drowning out any noise close to her.
She stopped and listened again. She heard a cry.
She ran towards it and turned the corner, not prepared for the horror that was waiting to greet her.
Eighty-Four
‘Don’t even fucking think about it,’ she growled.
A sensor lamp bathed the scene in eerie light.
Donna Stout held Ava by her shoulders as Eric Hubbard stood poised with the knife three inches away from the child’s chest.
