Georgina's Story Read online

  Unfortunately, she saw nothing.

  With a deep breath, she exhaled through her nose and then put on her best smile as she stepped out of the shadow of the employee hut and into the sunlight.

  To her left, she spotted Mayor Lupo walking in the opposite direction, adjusting the pants of his white suit as he went.

  A small smile crept onto her pretty face.

  The affair had been going on for the better part of three months now, and while Kerry Adams didn’t find the man particularly attractive — to be honest, she preferred the rugged looks of her husband, Keith Adams — but there was just something about him, something about the way he held himself that was irresistible.

  The affair had started off innocently enough; the mayor had come by her house one day when Keith had been out. He’d offered her a smile, ran a hand through his black hair, and asked her who she was voting for. Truth be told, Kerry Adams hadn’t really put much, if any, thought into it. Her main concern at the time had been getting Chase to school and making sure that Georgina, the pickiest of eaters, finished her cereal. The girl’s hair had been a mess, and she had a smear of yogurt on her cheek.

  But none of this seemed to faze the man. He was the incumbent, after all, and Kerry knew that, more than likely, he’d be re-elected. In places like rural Franklin, Tennessee, mayoral terms weren’t typically two- or four-year blocks but almost seemed like lifetime appointments. Barring any sort of catastrophic event or serious indiscretion—minor affairs didn’t qualify, it seemed—that is.

  She’d explained that she was busy and that he’d have to come back later. Kerry had expected the man to give her some sort of excuse and say something that equated to, simply, Vote Team Lupo, but he’d surprised her.

  “Oh, I’ll come back all right,” he’d said, offering a sly grin that she’d grown to know and like.

  And David Lupo had returned.

  It wasn’t that she didn’t love her husband — she did. She loved him very much. And she wasn’t looking for anything long-term, either. In fact, it was only meant to be a one-time thing. But the way Mayor Lupo fucked her, the way he lusted after her hungrily, the way he pinched and squeezed and groped her… it was all so very different from Keith’s loving caresses.

  Kerry hadn’t known that that was what she wanted until the mayor had come along.

  That it was what she needed.

  Now, as the affair extended beyond simple casual encounters, Kerry was finding it exceedingly difficult to give up the cake that she’d grown fond of eating.

  A one-time thing, Kerry? Really? Then why are you sneaking off at the fair… the fair that you’d come to with your husband and kids?

  She looked around nervously and then smoothed her dress again.

  Thankfully, the fair was busy, as it always was. There were plenty of eyes here, but they were all wide with excitement and joy. And while some people invariably saw Kerry Adams as she stepped out into the open, they didn’t see her.

  Breathing more easily now, Kerry glanced over at the last place she’d seen her husband. The man in the straw hat was still there, manning the carnival game, but Keith was gone. She looked toward the snow cone truck next, and her brow immediately furrowed.

  It was closed.

  A quick glance at her wrist revealed that it wasn’t even five o’clock yet.

  “That’s strange,” she muttered. Mr. Robin-Graff never closed the snow cone truck early. His auto bodyshop on the other hand, well… he’d been known to flip the sign in the window to ‘closed’ if a specific customer came by. One with long, tanned legs and—

  A hand suddenly slipped around her waist and Kerry jumped.

  “Sorry,” a male voice whispered in her ear. “Didn’t mean to spook you.”

  Kerry gently pushed her husband away.

  “I’m looking for the girls,” she said with a weak smile.

  Her husband’s eyebrows knitted in concern. When he reached for her, she drew back.

  “Relax, Kerry. Just wanted to check your temperature. I know it’s hot out, but you’re more flushed than usual.”

  “I’m just hot, Keith. Don’t be all clinging on me, now. Have you seen the girls?”

  He took a sip from the red cup in his hand.

  “I thought they were with you. You check out by the teacups?”

  Kerry raised a hand and gestured at the spinning plastic dishes adorned with crudely painted red and blue lines, a lame attempt to make them look like ceramic.

  “I can see the teacups from here — they aren’t there.”

  “Then they’re probably just playing Skee-Ball or one of the other games. Chase is always trying to win something, even though I told her a dozen times that they’re all rigged.”

  As he spoke, Keith craned his neck over his shoulder, looking in the direction of the games room.

  Kerry, on the other hand, had her eyes locked on the snow cone truck.

  “I told them not to wander off,” she said under her breath. “I told them to stay close.”

  Then, despite the thin layer of sweat that coated her face, which Keith had been so keen to point out, a chill suddenly ran up her spine.

  Chapter 3

  Whether it was the anxiety, the fear, the heat, or a combination of all three, Georgina had actually fallen asleep.

  After being carried down a flight of dirt stairs, she’d been laid on the ground and the zip ties on her wrists had been cut and the bag removed from her head.

  Instincts drove her into the corner of the earthen room, and she’d curled up in a ball, squeezing her eyes together to block out the nightmare. And then, she must have fallen asleep. Now, as she slowly opened her eyes again, she could feel her face stiffen with dried dirt.

  No, I didn’t fall asleep, Georgina realized, I cried myself to sleep.

  But eyes open or closed or teary didn’t seem to make any difference; the nightmare persisted.

  She found herself in some sort of cell, with walls of dirt and metal bars in front. There was a string of bare bulbs running the length of a hallway that was flanked by more cells, but the light they emitted was too weak to make out much more of her surroundings. There was also a window high above and behind her, Georgina realized, but the blueish light that leaked through only served to generate long, frightening shadows.

  And then there was the scratching: a persistent, grating sound that reminded Georgina of the time when a family of rats had somehow made their way through the dryer duct and had taken up residence in the walls of their home.

  Worried that these rats were burrowing through the dirt wall, Georgina crawled forward. When she reached the metal bars, she pressed her face between, relishing the coolness of the metal in the otherwise warm cell.

  “Chase?” she asked in a tiny voice. “Chase? Are you down here?”

  A reply came in the form of harsh hush, and Georgina pulled away from the bars. Her sister had told her to be quiet so many times during her short five years, that she knew that this wasn’t her. It also sounded too high-pitched to have come from either of the men in the van.

  The scratching sound, which had paused momentarily, returned, but this time when Georgina listened closely, she could also hear heavy breathing.

  Confused, she scooted backward until her spine butted up against the earth wall.

  Then she closed her eyes.

  Her dad had told her that breathing deeply three times — in through your nose and out through your mouth — could help calm you down, help you focus.

  This time, Georgina didn’t stop at three breaths; she went all the way to ten.

  When she was finally done, to her surprise, it had worked… somewhat. Her heart was still racing, but she found that she could think more clearly now.

  She slowly made her way back to the front of her cell.

  It wasn’t rats; it was too rhythmic, too persistent to be rats.

  If she turned her head all the way to one side, squishing her face against the metal bars, she found that she
could see the adjacent cell. Well, not the whole cell, but a flurry of movement near the bottom.

  “Chase, is that you?” she asked.

  This time, the hush didn’t deter Georgina.

  “Chase? Chase, I’m scared.”

  The scraping, scratching noise ceased.

  “Keep your voice down,” someone spat back. It wasn’t Chase, and even though Georgina had expected as much, the realization caused her heart to sink.

  It wasn’t Chase, but it did sound like a young girl of about her sister’s age.

  Was there another kid in the van with us? Georgina wondered.

  She didn’t think so. Chase and her sister had been together in the van, clutching hands, and despite being hooded, Georgina was fairly confident that they were alone back there.

  Aside from the two men who had thrown them inside, of course.

  But there was someone with them here, wherever here was.

  Georgina pushed her face so hard into the bars to get a better look that her cheeks started to ache.

  Mom and dad will come, she thought desperately, her anxiety returning. Mom and dad will come and get us out of here. Or Chase will do something…

  She whimpered, but instead of getting shushed, this time, she heard a grunt from the adjacent cell.

  Pulling back and wiping the tears from her eyes, Georgina realized that she could see something else now. The top of a girl’s head, a mess of matted and filthy black hair, suddenly appeared beneath the bars.

  Georgina’s mouth went slack as she tried to figure out what was happening. The head was followed by shoulders, and then a pale arm snaked out into the hallway.

  She’s crawling out! The girl is crawling out! her mind screamed.

  The girl almost made it; she got all the way to her waist before getting stuck.

  But even though from her angle, Georgina could see that the hole the girl had dug wasn’t deep enough, the stranger seemed undeterred.

  She grunted and twisted, twisted and grunted.

  The girl’s hands dug deep into the dirt, and when she raised her head, Georgina saw that her face was red with the effort.

  There was an audible pop, and then the girl gasped.

  “You okay?” Georgina asked.

  The girl didn’t answer, but she didn’t tell her to be quiet, either. Whatever had happened, whatever had caused the pop, it was suddenly easier for her to crawl out.

  Once completely free of the bars, the girl slowly pulled herself to her feet. She looked around then, her eyes wide, and Georgina realized that the girl wasn’t much older than Chase. But, judging by the dirt that covered nearly every inch of her body, it was clear that she’d been here for longer—much longer.

  The girl twitched, and then seemed to come to her senses. She started to limp down the hallway but stopped after just a couple of labored steps. With considerable effort, she returned to her cell and reached inside. When she pulled her hand back, she was clutching something round between dirt-caked fingers.

  A plate? Why does she have a plate?

  As Georgina watched, the girl limped to a cell across and two down from her own. She paused for a moment, and then tossed the plate through the bars.

  “You have to hurry,” she whispered to the cell’s occupant as she started to limp down the hallway again. “They’ll be back soon.”

  Georgina watched in horror as the girl passed her cell without so much as a glance.

  “Please…” she whimpered, but the stranger had already disappeared out of sight.

  Chapter 4

  “Chase! Georgina!” Kerry shouted. “Georgina!”

  Keith laid a hand on his wife’s shoulder, but she pulled away from him.

  “Chase!”

  She was shouting at nobody. The fair had closed about a half hour ago and the only people left were a handful of carnies who were doing their best to look busy, as if the ancient-looking rides were actually maintained. Keith was doing his best to keep calm, but Kerry had pretty much lost it.

  “So, when is the last time you saw your daughters,” a uniformed officer asked. He had a narrow face and pockmarked cheeks that was most likely the result of acne when he was a teenager, which might have been during the last century. The man, who had yet to offer his name, had been taking notes on a flip pad, jotting down descriptions of Chase and Georgina, even though Keith had already given him photographs of both. And he seemed bored as hell doing it, as well.

  “I told you already, they were with my wife at around four-fifteen, while I was having a drink. That’s the last time I saw them. It was—” Keith quickly checked his watch, “—an hour ago.”

  More scribbling on the goddamn pad. Keith was relieved to see two other officers approaching, led by a man who was a detective if he’d ever seen one. Wearing dark slacks and a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up and a loose tie around his neck, the detective had short auburn hair, a pleasant face with a slightly rounded jaw, and an intense stare.

  “Detective Rainsford,” the pock-marked officer said, suddenly straightening. “I didn’t know—”

  The detective waved him away with his hand.

  “Detective Rainsford,” the man repeated with a brisk nod, before fading into the background.

  Keith extended his hand and introduced himself. Then he called for Kerry, who had wandered toward the teacups as she shouted for their daughters.

  “They’re not here,” she almost gasped. “I combed every inch of this goddamn place, and they’re not here.”

  The detective nodded.

  “And when was the last time you saw them?”

  “For fuck’s sake,” Kerry spat. “We already told you guys a dozen times. An hour ago—four-fifteen, four-twenty, maybe.”

  The no-nonsense detective didn’t falter.

  “And you’re sure that they wouldn’t go home on their own? That they wouldn’t walk or catch a ride from a family friend, maybe?”

  Keith was about to answer, to snap reply ‘no, of course not,’ but he paused and chewed his lip.

  Would they go home on their own? Not Georgie, that’s for sure. But if Chase was mad enough, would she just grab her sister’s arm and drag her all the way home?

  It was unlikely, but the girl had a temper on her.

  He realized that his fingers had snaked up to the wooden cross he wore around his neck, and he immediately dropped his hands to his sides.

  “No, they wouldn’t leave,” he concluded.

  “They were told to stay here,” Kerry said, picking up where Keith left off. “I gave them some money to go get a snow cone, and then, when I turned around, they were gone.”

  The detective nodded, his intense stare moving from Keith to Kerry.

  “Still, as a father of two young girls of my own, they can sometimes be prone to wander.” He indicated to Kerry with one hand. “Why don’t you allow the officer here to take you home, drive the most likely route that your girls might have walked. Maybe they’re just waiting for you at home, wondering what’s taking you guys so long.”

  “They wouldn’t leave,” Kerry reiterated with a pout.

  Keith bit his lip and avoided stating the obvious.

  They had left; as Kerry had already said, they’d combed the entire damn Franklin County Fair for them, and they simply weren’t here.

  Again, he felt the urge to squeeze the cross but balled his fists instead.

  “I understand, ma’am. But just in case a neighbor or friend decided to take them home—maybe they weren’t feeling well… it’s best to be there if they show up.”

  Kerry’s face contorted in a half-sneer.

  “I’m going to stay here and look for them. If you—”

  Detective Rainsford glanced over at Keith, and he realized that the detective wanted to share something in private.

  Brow furrowed, he turned to Kerry.

  “I’ll make sure that we look—”

  Anger suddenly flashed over his wife’s face.

  “You, look? Y
ou couldn’t find your fucking socks if I didn’t lay them out for you every morning. And are you sure you can even see straight? After huffing back—what? Six beers? Seven? Maybe if you weren’t drunk, you could’ve kept your eyes on them a little better, huh?”

  The scalding remarks were so unexpected that Keith visibly recoiled.

  “What? Kerry… Kerry, I’m not drunk. I don’t—”

  “Sure, right. I saw you drinking with that half-wit Tom. I saw you drinking when you should have been watching them.”

  And now anger started to build inside Keith. Kerry had been the one looking after them. Shit, she had even been the one to suggest that he could take a break and have a drink with his friend. She was the one who said she’d look after the kids, not him. In fact, if it weren’t for her insisting, he would have been just as happy to stay by their side, maybe even ride the vomit-inducing teacups that Georgina so loved.

  “I understand that you’re angry,” the detective interrupted. “But trust me; it’s better to have one of you wait at home.”

  Kerry glared at Keith for a moment longer, before throwing up her hands.

  “Fine,” she spat as she stomped off, not even bothering to wait for an officer to escort her.

  Detective Rainsford waited for her to move out of earshot before turning to Keith.

  “I wouldn’t take what she said personally. It’s not uncommon for concern to manifest as anger in these high-stress situations.”

  Keith barely heard the man; he was watching his wife’s long legs take her to the first police car she came across.

  “I’m not drunk,” he said, then cursed himself for sounding defensive.

  Even if I was, why would that matter? She told me to enjoy myself. She said she’d look after the girls.

  Before he could mitigate his words, a commotion behind them, in the direction opposite that Kerry had fled, drew his attention.

  A dozen… no, at least twenty police cars suddenly appeared at the mouth of the fair.

  While Keith was grateful for all the support, that the cops were taking this seriously, something didn’t feel right about the situation.