Page 47 of The Whispering Girls

Katie then kicked open the third bathroom stall.

She gasped in horror.

Before the stall door slowly began to close, they saw a young woman sitting on the toilet who had been propped up leaning backward, her legs positioned like a broken marionette. Barefoot and dressed only in panties, blood trickled from her fingertips from some cuts around her shoulder and arm. Her head tilted forward and her long dark hair spilled down.

There was a message in what looked like blood written in capital lettering on the wall:THREE DOWN…MORE TO GO…

The stall door slowly closed almost on cue.

Katie’s adrenalin pumped into high gear. “We have to secure this hospital now! Call in Officers Clarkand Banning and even Jack…anyone who can help with this crime scene. EMTs, firefighters, security personnel, everyone! This facility needs to be searched and secured—completely. The chief needs to be guarded—even moved to another hospital.”

Katie and McGaven began to carefully back out of the restroom, but not before a loud crash and something heavy jammed the door.

McGaven began to kick at it repeatedly and slammed into the door with his shoulder. It wouldn’t budge.

Then the lights went out.

Three down…more to go…

TWENTY-ONE

Thursday 2330 hours

Katie could hear McGaven’s heavy breathing in the pitch-black. The dark was disorienting and the thought of a dead body in a bathroom stall made her edgier than usual.

“Gav?” she barely whispered as if someone else would hear.

“Yeah.”

“You okay?”

“Yeah,” he said, still breathing hard.

Katie activated her cell phone screen to produce some light. It wasn’t much, but enough. It cast a weird glow on McGaven’s face and the walls.

“No signal,” she said.

“Same here.”

Katie turned around looking for anything that would allow them to send for help or escape. There was nothing.

“What are we going to do?” said McGaven. “We can’t wait until someone finds us.”

“No. We aren’t going to wait.” Katietook her phone and pointed it around the ceiling. To her relief it was made up of panels about two feet square.

“What are you thinking?” he said.

“We have to get out of here.” Katie pushed open the first stall door and illuminated the ceiling corner as far away from the crime scene as she could. “I think I can fit through,” she said.

“I see where you’re going with this...”

Katie stood on the toilet.

“Wait,” said McGaven. “Come back here,” he directed.

Once Katie was away from the stalls, McGaven kicked and broke the toilet seat. He then stood on the rim of the toilet and used the seat to smash two ceiling tiles. The remnants scattered but remained in that stall.

“That’s what I’m talking about,” she said. “Having a strong tall partner comes in handy.”