Redemption Lost

by Cindy M. Hogan

  The four of them cleaned up the area and then sat quietly for a while. Slowly, Christy’s mind started to clear. She took deep, cleansing breaths, in through her nose and out through her mouth.

  “You did amazing,” Winifred said. “You must keep that boot on at all times except when I’m checking and cleaning the wound.”

  Christy nodded, still unable to speak because her teeth were clenched shut.

  “We should get her in the shower while she’s still doped up,” Teresa suggested. “Get her cleaned up.”

  Something in the back of Christy’s mind told her she couldn’t let them do that. But why? The black wig. She couldn’t get her voice to speak at first, but as they tried to get her sitting, she finally said, “No. Not now. In the morning. I can’t now.” She’d have to get up before they did to shower on her own, that way her secret would stay safe.

  Tammy started to argue, but Nurse Winifred, who had been collecting all the refuse turned and said, “Ryann can’t be moved until at least the morning.” She brought over a boot brace and fitted it around Christy’s leg. Christy wanted to grab her and kiss her, but she was so tired, and her leg screeched in pain.

  “Let’s wipe down her face and then let her sleep,” Winifred said with a smile.

  Christy thought she said thank you, but it might have been only in her head.

  While they fetched wash cloths, Winifred gave her more pills for infection and took out the IV. Christy’s consciousness started to fade in and out, and soon she was dreaming.

  Her first day on the compound was over.

  Christy popped awake, but it was still dark outside. She knew there was something she needed to do, but her mind felt mushy and heavy. She tried to sit up, but a screaming pain attacked her leg. Biting back a moan, she slowly slid herself up against the headboard, dragging her booted leg as gently as possible.

  According to her clock, it was five in the morning. Somehow, she needed to get to the shower without making a noise and without alerting Matron Mara. The dowel sat on the side table still, so she picked it up and put it in her mouth as she moved her leg over the edge of the bed. A terrible throbbing, accompanied by intense, sharp pain, bellowed at her. She had to escape to the happy place in her mind for a few breaths before she decided this would not get the better of her. Matron Georgia would not get the better of her.

  She crept like a snail out of bed and made her excruciatingly slow way down the hall to the bathroom. Once inside, sweaty and hot, she forced herself to ignore the pain as she pondered the logistics of taking a shower. How was she going to get in the shower and not get her leg or her hair wet? Impossible. She’d have to take a bath.

  She made sure the door was locked before turning on the water and collecting a few supplies: wash cloths and soap. She put her hair up in a high ponytail and got undressed. She limped over to the bath, and her good leg caught on the bath mat. Unable to put weight on her broken leg, she fell to her knees, almost tipping into the bath tub in head first. She winced, tears leaking from her eyes in the effort to keep from crying out. This wasn’t looking like the best decision she’d ever made, but it was a necessary one.

  Carefully, she lowered herself in the water, keeping her booted leg up on the rim of the tub. The blissful heat was welcoming, and the pounding pain inside her leg softened somewhat. After soaking for several minutes, she got the soap and tackled her dirty body. She used a washcloth to wash around her brace and her broken finger. She’d have to tell Winifred about it so she could set it and splint it. With the water now dingy, and the tub slick with soap, she wondered how she was going to get out.

  The only way she could think of was to use her arms and push herself up over the edge, like they do the high jump in track. She pushed with all her strength, and her thigh landed on the edge of the tub. The screaming pain resumed its relentless attack on her lower leg. She growled against the pain and pushed again, her bottom on the tub’s edge now and her right arm straining to hold her up. She bent her elbows one last time and slid over the edge, her upper back hitting hard against the tub and her leg slamming into the wall. A scream escaped, despite all her efforts.

  She clamped her mouth shut, hoping no one had heard her. Moments passed and no one came. She breathed a shaky sigh of relief. Wet, cold, naked, and lying prostrate on the tiled bathroom floor, she had never been in a more humiliating position, but all she could manage to care about was the throbbing pain in her leg. She drew a deep breath and hefted her leg back up on the tub’s edge to give it some relief.

  There was a knock on the door. Slight and light. She froze. Silence. Someone tried the knob. Christy listened, horrified, to the all-too familiar sound of a pick sliding into the lock.

  Chapter 21

  MARYBETH

  There was no relief to be had in opening the door of the safe house. Marybeth knew Alvarez had defeated them. He was too smart to leave a trail. She and Jeremy made their way inside, setting their go bags down and taking off their coats.

  Ace and Halluis stormed into the entryway.

  “What did you find?” Halluis asked.

  Jeremy shook his head.

  “Merde.”

  Whatever the word meant, Marybeth knew it wasn’t nice and left it at that. They all moved into the living room, faces drawn with a mix of disappointment and determination. She was set on changing the morose mood.

  “Yes, Alvarez has covered his tracks too well. He’s a smart man,” she said. “But we know someone else who is involved, someone who’s less dedicated to their little scheme whatever it is. Miller. If we can get him to trust Jeremy, he can force Miller into a position where he will reveal the location of where they are taking the girls.”

  “We’re going to have to do something that makes him trust me. We can’t do this organically.” Jeremy sat up straight.

  “Like luring him in for a bowl of Frosted Flakes,” Halluis said.

  “What could we do?” Jeremy said, ignoring Halluis’ absurd statement. He started to pace.

  “There’s no better way to cause someone to trust someone else than to save them or a loved one from danger,” Marybeth said.

  “That would do it for me,” Ace said. “If someone threatened my family, the person who protected them would go to number one on my trusted list.”

  “Marybeth, you’re a genius,” Jeremy said.

  She blushed from the praise. “Don’t say that yet. I have no idea how to orchestrate it.”

  “We need a threat. Then I volunteer to help him. Easy.”

  “It needs to be a threat that no one else can help him with,” Halluis said. “Face it, he’s surrounded by guards all the time. This will not be easy.”

  Jeremy closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “You’re right. We need to think this through carefully and execute masterfully.”

  From there, the team brainstormed, ideas flying out of everyone’s mouths.

  “We couldn’t do it during the time he’s actually here at work because that would put his regular crew on it,” Ace said.

  “We need to do it right after work and have you standing there to be the one he turns to,” Halluis said.

  “We need to make sure he can’t contact his personal guard,” Ace said.

  “We’ll commandeer his phone and make using it impossible,” Jeremy said. “And make his guards unavailable, just in case.”

  “We can take over their phones too,” Ace said. “And send all calls to a fake voicemail or something.”

  “You’ll have to set yourself up earlier in the day as the expert on the threat,” Halluis said.

  “From what I’ve seen,” Jeremy said. “His family seems to be his Achilles heel.”

  “We target the family,” Marybeth said. “Make him believe we are targeting them, at least.” She couldn’t believe she was suggesting something so mean.

  Ace grinned. “A bomb. That’s it.”

  Everyone stared at him, their minds most assuredly checking the idea to see if it would work with what
they knew.

  “He lives about an hour out of D.C. while he’s working,” Halluis said, looking at his computer screen.

  “He has two boys that he’s crazy about,” Marybeth said. “Alvarez and he often vacation in the same places, and I see Miller with his kids. If they were threatened, he would do anything to save them.”

  “We won’t need to place the bomb in the house beforehand,” Ace said. “You can take it with you when you go. It will never be live, but we’ll make it look live.”

  “If we could tie the bomb threat in to this human trafficking problem, we’d kill two birds with one stone,” Halluis said.

  “What do you mean?” Marybeth said.

  “When this all started, Christy overheard Alvarez threaten Miller. He said Miller had to comply because there were two things that would bring Miller down if Alvarez spilled the beans.”

  “That’s right,” Marybeth said. “She told me about that, too.”

  “I think we can safely assume that one of those things is this shipping business. It would be something that would incriminate him, and Alvarez would use that against him.

  “So we run with that thought.” Ace’s eyes were bright with excitement. “We have Miller’s phone, and maybe by alluding to those two things with this bomb threat it will make him call Senator Alvarez and say some things that he typically wouldn’t say.”

  “I like this,” Jeremy said. “We might, if we’re lucky, be able to kill two birds with one stone.” He brushed his hands up and down his tired face. “Could we be so lucky?”

  “Yes,” Marybeth said. “Most definitely, yes.”

  “You think she’s still alive?” Halluis asked.

  “Yes!” Jeremy’s fists slammed into the table.

  “Then why hasn’t she found a way to contact us?” Halluis narrowed his eyes. “She’s so resourceful. It’s unlike her.”

  “Perhaps she’s stuck in a container,” Ace said, frowning.

  “It won’t do us any good to speculate on that,” Halluis said.

  “We have to go forward believing in her,” Marybeth added, “that she’s alive and simply unable to contact us. Otherwise, I’ll lose my mind.”

  Jeremy scrubbed his face again. “Logically, I know what you’re saying is true, but my heart needs answers.”

  “Then hope,” Marybeth said. “It’s all we have.”

  “Hope.”

  * * *

  CHRISTY

  Christy grabbed the nearest approximation to a weapon she could find in House Seven’s bathroom: a bottle of shampoo. Her mind ran through ways she could use it to catch her assailant off guard—spray the soap in her eyes? Hit her with it? In the knees probably was the best bet—

  “Ryann? Is that you?” It was Tammy.

  “Yes.” Christy held her breath, hoping she’d go away.

  “Do you need help?”

  Her head lay on the ground, her leg up. “No. I’m fine,” she lied.

  “Did you fall?”

  “No.”

  “I’m coming in.”

  She heard the sound of a lock being picked. She reached quickly for a towel and covered herself as the door swung open, hitting lightly into her head.

  “Shoot. I’m sorry.” Tammy came inside and relocked the door.

  “I was fine,” Christy huffed.

  “Yeah. You look it.” She put her hands on her hips as she looked down at her. “I’m assuming you have your leg up because it eases the pain?”

  “Yes.” Christy looked at her with new eyes. “You know how to pick locks?”

  “I was a junkie. I did everything I could, collected every skill I could, to steal money, jewels—anything and everything to help me get my next fix.”

  Christy nodded.

  Without a pause, she helped her get dressed. “Now we wash your hair.”

  “No,” Christy said, a bit too sharply.

  Like she hadn’t heard, Tammy started to turn her around to put her leg on the toilet and have her hair drape over into the tub.

  Christy pushed her away.

  “Look,” she said. “There are leaves and sticks and all kinds of stuff in your hair. We have to wash it.”

  Christy shook her head. It was hard to think. “No.”

  Tammy looked at her with a puzzled expression, then determination crossed her face. “You are not thinking straight. Coming in here, bathing on your own. Mega stupid. I’m going to prevent you from making an even bigger mistake by not washing your hair. Matron Mara will definitely notice. I’m going to wash it.” She reached to turn on the water. Christy had no way of escaping or preventing her from doing what she was about to do. She was basically helpless. But she did have the truth on her side. Just as Tammy took her hair to put it in the water, Christy reached up and grabbed her wrist. “Wait. You can’t. It’s fake. It’s fake.” Her eyes went wide. “It’s sewed in,” Christy continued.

  “Your hair’s fake? You mean they don’t…” Her mouth dropped, and she let go of the hair and turned off the water, serious contemplation sat on her face. She leaned an elbow on the edge of the sink. “They don’t know?”

  Christy shook her head.

  “Well, your hair has to be cleaned. There’s all kinds of stuff in it.”

  “I’ll pick it out.” She touched her hair, searching for foreign objects.

  “Stop it,” Tammy said. “I’ll do it.”

  “If you help me get in front of the mirror, I can help and it will be faster.”

  She did, making sure Christy’s leg was propped up.

  “When they find out about your hair, and they will find out, you’re going to be in a lot of trouble.”

  “No. They can never know.”

  “If you think you can keep this from them, you’re battier than I am.”

  Christy didn’t know why she did it besides the heat in her chest and the rapid release of her heart, but she confided in her. “Tammy, these people are not good people.”

  “You think I don’t know that?”

  “I’m here to shut this place down.”

  She snorted. “Well, you’re off to a really good start.”

  “Can we try to look for the positive here?”

  “You’re serious?”

  “Yes. I could use your help.” Christy put her hand on hers, her heart still thundering its rapid pace. She could trust. She had to trust.

  “Bringing these bastards down seems like an awesome plan to me,” Tammy said. “I want to be a part of it. However, I’m not just going to get my butt found out because there’s no plan.”

  “Understood.”

  “So, you have a plan?”

  “Actually, not yet. This,” she pointed to her leg, “sort of threw a wrench in things.”

  “I bet.”

  “But I will have a plan by tomorrow, and I’ll be out of here by tomorrow night. In order to do that, I need some questions answered. This is your first time chosen, but you’ve been here how long?”

  “Three years.”

  That blew Cassandra’s claim about disappearing after a year.

  “It took me a long time to get clean and a long time to come around to the idea of getting pregnant or even allowing them to get me pregnant.”

  “What made you come around?”

  “Might have had something to do with girls coming up missing, disappearing when they refused or asked to be taken back home.”

  “Well, didn’t they go home? Isn’t that why they disappeared?”

  “I don’t think so. I saw them take a girl, and she was scared and didn’t know what was going on. It didn’t feel right to me. I think if you’re not useful to them, they do something to you. It’s weird over in the named houses. One day a girl is there and the next she isn’t.”

  “All the more reason to get out of here, before either one of us ends up pregnant.”

  “I just figured there was no payout besides death. At least not at this point.” Her alarm on her watch went off. “We better get to your room,
before Matron Mara wakes up in about ten minutes.”

  “You keep track of her schedule?”

  “Yes. It’s one of the reasons I’ve survived for so long without ending up pregnant. I stay out of everybody’s way. Try to be invisible.” She helped Christy up. “Your hair looks way better.”

  “Thank you.”

  She opened the door and checked the hall before taking Christy into it and down the hall to her room. “We’ve got some planning to do.” Tammy said. She didn’t seem to have any trouble holding Christy up and helping her.

  “You work out?” Christy asked.

  “I get up early to do push-ups and pull-ups. I do every exercise I can think of using my body weight. If they come after me, I want to be strong. I do it early in the morning, in the dark so they can’t see.”

  Before the broken leg, Christy didn’t need any help to get out, but things had changed. Tammy was looking better and better as her escape partner. She thought of Carrie, Bridget now, and wondered if there was any possible way she could help too. She’d have to come with her, of course, but could she play an important role? With the three of them, they could really cause a lot of havoc, but could they escape?

  As they neared Christy’s room, Tammy froze. Had she heard something? She put her finger up to her mouth. It wasn’t needed.

  Tammy pushed carefully on the door to find Winifred changing Christy’s sheets. A look of relief passed between the newly formed allies. Tammy pushed the door open and they walked in. Winifred motioned for them to shut the door behind them, then she whispered “I have your cameras down. They each just show a static picture of the room. I need to get some shots of you in bed to vary the picture Mara will see. I heard you whispering in the bathroom so I came straight in here. Let’s say you have a fever and keep you in bed for two days. On the third day, you’ll have to be up and about. There’s no reason that we can’t artificially inseminate you on that third day. You’ll have to walk to the infirmary on your own, so you can’t just stay in your bed the next two days. You’ve gotta be up exercising and moving.”