Chapter 5 - The Service TunnelCole moved like a man made of fire.
He swept the girls behind an old furnace and pulled a rusted shelf away from the stone wall. Behind it was a narrow iron door Maya had never seen before.
“Dad,” she whispered, “how many secrets does this house have?”
“Too many,” he said.
The door groaned open onto a tunnel blacker than the cellar.
Sophie began crying again. “I don’t want to go in there.”
Maya knelt in front of her. “Look at me. You don’t have to be brave forever. Just for the next ten steps.”
Sophie sniffed. “Then what?”
“Then ten more.”
The little girl nodded.
Above them, heavy footsteps crossed the kitchen. Men were inside the house now. Daniels was no longer shouting.
Maya forced herself not to think about what that meant.
Cole led them into the tunnel and pulled the iron door shut behind them. Darkness swallowed everything until he clicked on the flashlight from his phone.
The tunnel sloped downward, its brick walls sweating moisture. The air tasted metallic. Maya walked with one hand on Nora’s shoulder and the other holding Sophie’s.
Behind them, something scraped.
Everyone stopped.
Cole turned off the flashlight.
Pitch black.
Maya heard breathing.
Not theirs.
A male voice echoed faintly from the cellar side of the tunnel.
“They went this way.”
Ethan’s voice answered, farther away. “Careful. Cole knows tunnels.”
Maya’s blood went cold.
Ethan was free.
Cole’s hand found Maya’s arm in the dark and guided her forward. No one spoke. They moved by touch, slow and silent, while footsteps entered the tunnel behind them.
After thirty feet, the passage split.
Cole hesitated.
Maya remembered something.
When she was eight, her mother had brought her to this property in autumn. They had played hide-and-seek near the old shed. Maya had found a small red cardinal painted on a stone behind the house.
Red bird.
She grabbed Cole’s sleeve and pointed left, though he could barely see her.
He trusted her.
They turned left.
The footsteps behind them chose right.
Maya exhaled silently.
The tunnel ended at a wooden ladder beneath a trapdoor. Cole climbed first and lifted it slowly.
Cold rain fell through the opening.
They emerged in the old carriage shed behind the property line, hidden by trees and years of neglect.
For one brief second, Maya thought they were safe.
Then headlights swept across the shed.
Cole shoved everyone behind a stack of rotting crates.
A black SUV rolled past slowly.
Inside, Maya saw a woman in a county coat holding a tablet.
On the tablet were photos of Nora and Sophie.
Emergency placement order.
Legal kidnapping.
The SUV stopped.
The woman’s phone rang.
She answered. “They found the tunnel split. Arden wants the girl alive.”
Maya’s breath caught.
Which girl?
Nora?
Sophie?
Her?
The woman listened, then said, “Yes. Maya Cole too. He says she has her mother’s eyes.”
Cole’s face changed.
The SUV drove on.
For a moment, nobody moved.
Then Cole whispered, “We’re leaving on foot.”
“Where?” Maya asked.
He looked at the woods beyond the shed.
“To someone I should have trusted years ago.”
They ran through the rain.
Branches slapped Maya’s face. Mud grabbed at her shoes. Sophie stumbled twice, and Cole carried her the second time without slowing. Nora stayed close, silent except for her harsh breathing.
After almost twenty minutes, they reached an old road.
A pickup truck sat beneath a dead streetlight.
A tall woman in a dark coat leaned against it, holding an umbrella.
Maya recognized her immediately from old photographs.
Rachel Voss.
Her mother’s former law partner.
Rachel opened the rear door. “Get in.”
Cole stared at her. “How did you know?”
Rachel’s eyes moved to Maya.
“Rebecca told me I would get a call one day,” she said. “She said if it came from the old house, I should bring a car with no GPS and ask no questions.”
Maya climbed in with the girls.
Cole got in front.
Rachel started the truck.
As they pulled away, Maya looked back through the rain.
Far behind them, the old house glowed with blue and red police lights.
Then an explosion of orange fire burst through the windows.
Sophie screamed.
Cole twisted around.
Maya pressed her hand against the glass.
Inside that burning house were the red wire, the recorder, the hidden room, the red evidence folder, and possibly Daniels.
Rachel did not slow down.
Cole shouted, “Stop the truck!”
Rachel kept driving.
May you like
Her voice was shaking, but firm.
“If we stop, Rebecca died for nothing.”
