Page 59 of Once Vanished
She would not let Bill die either.She would get there in time.The GPS coordinates burned in her mind, directing her to the abandoned school three miles away.
As she flung open her car door, Riley pressed Hogue’s number on her phone.She jammed her key into the ignition and started her car.Her only advantage was what Leo hadn’t realized; she knew where he was hiding—and except for his captives, he was there alone.
She would make it.She had to make it.
CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE
Hemp fibers bit into Bill’s skin, rough and unforgiving, as he stood on tiptoe with a hood covering his head.His hands, bound tightly behind his back, had long since gone numb.He knew that if he relaxed his legs now and went flat-footed, the noose around his neck would tighten and take his life.
For a short time, he’d been standing on a footstool that had kept the rope slack, but then he’d heard Leo chuckle and that support had been yanked away.
“She chose her daughter,” Leo’s voice floated through the darkness.“Just as I knew she would.”
Bill’s calves cramped violently as he struggled to maintain his precarious position.How long could he keep this up?Minutes?Seconds?His body, already battered and exhausted, trembled with the effort of postponing the inevitable.
How had it come to this?He remembered driving to the abandoned parking lot behind the old school building, just as Leo had instructed.No backup, no wire, no tracker.The price for disobedience was Jilly’s life.
He’d parked and stepped out into the chill night air, his service weapon holstered at his side—a hollow comfort.The parking lot had seemed empty, shadowy beneath the single functioning light.
“I’m here,” he’d called out, his voice echoing across the empty space.
If Bill hadn’t been so exhausted, Leo would never have been able to ambush him so easily.He’d barely had time to hear the footsteps rushing toward him.He’d spun, drawing his weapon, but the taser had already struck.His body had convulsed as electricity tore through him, his gun clattering to the pavement.
He’d been tasered again, at a setting high enough to put him down hard, then dragged.By the time the pain receded and his mind cleared a bit, he was plopped in a chair in a classroom, disoriented and in pain.Off to one side, Jilly was tied in another chair, still gagged, watching in horror.
Leo was standing there, smiling an infuriating smile, holding Bill’s own gun on him and explaining the rules of his sick game.
So Bill had gotten up onto the stool as he’d been told, accepted the hood over his head, and waited for it all to play out.And now the stool was gone.His calf muscle seized again.His foot slipped, and for a terrifying moment the rope took his full weight.Panic surged through him as his airway closed completely.Desperately, he regained his footing, but the reprieve wouldn’t last.The burn in his lungs intensified, and black spots danced before his covered eyes.
A strange, detached part of his mind recognized the futility of his efforts to stay alive.He wasn’t going to last much longer.Why was he even trying?Yet his body still fought, refusing to surrender.
But he’d heard Riley’s voice as she chose Jilly’s life over his.And he knew she made the right choice.Jilly would live.That knowledge brought a strange peace as his strength finally gave out and his legs buckled beneath him.
As the rope took his full weight, cutting off his final breath, Bill’s last conscious thoughts were of what he wished he could tell Riley: That she’d done the right thing.That he didn’t blame her.That he’d loved her—had loved the life they’d begun to build together.
*
The empty streets gave Riley free rein to push well beyond the speed limit as her car ate up the distance to Westridge Elementary School.ShadowCipher’s revelations about Leo’s location had been a gift, but she knew that Bill’s time was running out.Every second counted now—seconds that might determine whether he lived or died at the end of Leo’s noose.
“You need to wait for backup, Paige.”Hogue’s voice crackled through the phone’s speaker with barely contained urgency.“We can have SWAT there in fifteen minutes.”
“Bill doesn’t have fifteen minutes,” Riley countered, swerving around a corner so sharply her tires squealed in protest.“If Leo has removed that stool, Bill could be strangling to death right now.”
“You’re walking into a trap.You know that, right?”
“Probably.”Riley’s jaw clenched as she caught sight of the abandoned school building looming ahead, its dark silhouette stark against the night sky.“But ShadowCipher confirmed the location.And Leo doesn’t know I’m coming.”
“Riley, I’ve dispatched every available unit to that location.First responders should be there within five minutes.”
Riley pulled up to the curb with a screech of brakes.“I’m going in now.”She ended the call, dropping the phone onto the passenger seat as she reached for her service weapon.
The school building’s windows were dark and vacant, brick walls marred with years of neglect and graffiti.As Riley stepped from the car, the dimly lit parking lot felt oppressive, charged with menace.
Movement caught her eye—the front door of the school swinging open.A slim figure stumbled out, unsteady on her feet.
Jilly.
For a moment Riley stood frozen, unable to believe what she was seeing—her daughter, alive, walking toward her with halting steps.Then her body caught up with her mind and she was running, holstering her weapon as she closed the distance between them.