When I wake up, once again I’m not sure whether I took a nap or slept through the night, because I can’t tell the difference between day and night anymore. I haven’t seen the sky for what seems like years. But at least I’m warmer now, thanks to the big, cozy sweatshirt. I reach for a bottle of water, and the details of my dream start to come back. The big important ideas. After a few sips of water, I grab an apple. With each crunchy bite, I add another step to the plan. Soon my brilliant scheme is full grown and ready to go. I’m dying to try it out on Gabriel soon. But the timing needs to be exactly right, because, if I fail, I’ll never get another chance.
Chapter 30
Gabriel
His Best-Laid Plan
He couldn’t believe how easy it had been to take Harper. He’d walked straight up to her front door and knocked. If someone else had answered his knock, he would’ve asked for an update on the investigation. Have the police made any more progress? Are there any new clues or evidence?
As it turned out, though, Gabriel didn’t need to use his backup plan. He had simply rapped on the door and then immediately heard her fast, light footsteps. When she disabled the alarm, swung open the door, and greeted him, a giant smile had spread across his face.
He offered her a ride in the Challenger, but she said no. Smart girl. But not smart enough. The rest was easy.
Before she had even finished uttering the words “I’d love to but . . .” he had grabbed her and stabbed her in the neck with the hypodermic. Then he half carried, half dragged her limp body out to his car, slapped an old baseball hat onto her head to cover her blonde hair, and drove away with her propped up in the passenger seat. The most fun he’d had in years. Much more fun than his most recent adventure with Nora Hazel and her mother. That had been pathetically easy. And he preferred a challenge. Harper was a challenge. But stealing her hadn’t been very challenging. All he had needed was to perfect his plan, wait patiently, and then boom. She was his in less than three minutes.
The challenging part started as soon as he got her set up in the root cellar. It had been easy to imprison her body. Next he needed to work on her spirit. Winning her over. Getting her to trust him. That was going to be tough. She had demonstrated her strong will, and he could still feel the result of it in his jaw whenever he chewed crunchy food, like raw carrots or almonds. Absently, he stroked the left side of his face with an open palm.
He would never cause her the kind of pain she had caused him unless he absolutely had to, in self-defense. Even then he’d hesitate. He knew it, too. Harper Flagg was his soft spot. Now that he had her hidden away in his own private cave, he hated seeing her so disheveled and unhappy, but he couldn’t be too kind to her yet. He needed to wait until he saw despair instead of hostility in those beautiful brown eyes. She had to feel hopeless and miserable before he showed her any kindness. During his childhood, he had felt that way often, so he should be able to recognize it in Harper’s eyes when she finally succumbed. Gabriel didn’t want to push it too far, though. He didn’t want to break her brave spirit, but he didn’t want to turn her into a scheming monster like himself, either. Deciding exactly when to ease up on her and how much to ease up, in increments, would be the tricky part. He wanted to lead her to the edge of the abyss but not push her into it.
She definitely wasn’t at that point yet. Harper was still behaving defiantly even though it had been three days. The cops were searching in all the wrong places, too. Detective Flagg had actually called him just hours after Harper had disappeared. Thomas’s voice had sounded so frantic. Grinning, Gabriel relived the triumphant moment in his imagination.
“Gabriel, he took Harper. We need your help!” As if the killer were a close friend and Detective Flagg trusted him.
He had raced straight over to the MacGregors’—in the same car he’d used to abduct Flagg’s precious daughter! He’d presented himself at the front door, ready to help. The four of them had spent almost two hours going over the specifics of the three murders Gabriel had committed sixteen years ago. While they were striving to remember as many details as possible about the killer’s past crimes, tons of friends, neighbors, and even strangers were busy knocking on every door within a one-mile radius of the Flaggs’ home. No one had seen anything. Good to know. No one had “made” the Challenger. That’s what they said in the crime shows he watched on TV, shows like Criminal Minds and CSI. You didn’t recognize a vehicle. You “made” it. And no one had. Evidently there weren’t any nosy neighbors on the Flaggs’ street. Either that or, like some people seemed to believe, the killer was invisible. This thought made him smile.
Gabriel hadn’t joined in the search because he was part of the elite team that met at the MacGregors’ house. The families of the original three victims. Lucky for him, they didn’t come up with any new information that might lead to the capture of the infamous Bad Guy. Even though MacGregor had finally come clean about his wife’s abusive behavior, it hadn’t helped. Shane’s father even credited his wife’s killer with saving his son’s life, but the details of her child abuse hadn’t provided any useful clues.
Then they’d tried having Shane hypnotized, but thankfully, neither the four-year-old Shane nor the more grown-up Shane had ever gotten a good look at his face.
Thanks to careful planning and a healthy dose of good fortune (along with the right-size dose of propofol), he had Harper now. He’d successfully kidnapped her, and nobody knew who had taken her or where she was.
The next step was to convince her to trust him. He had a good feeling it might not take as long as he’d anticipated. She had actually smiled today.
He’d been backing out of the root cellar, pointing the gun at her. After he dropped the beam of the flashlight so it wasn’t blinding her anymore, she fell to her knees on the dirt floor in front of the box, lifted the lid, and smiled. Only a small, close-lipped smile, and it wasn’t directed at him. Nonetheless, for the first time since he’d kidnapped her, she had smiled.
Chapter 31
Harper
The Dark Before the Light
I spend all day every day rereading whatever I can remember from poems, stories, and books inside my head. Sometimes I recite stuff out loud, just to hear something besides the silence that hammers at my sanity whenever I’m awake. To pass the time and keep my mind sharp, I’ve started to play imaginary Scrabble games against an imaginary Gabriel. I wish he existed only in my imagination, but unfortunately he’s an all-too-real, three-dimensional, living, breathing, soulless threat. When I face off with my imaginary Scrabble opponent (who’s as equally soulless as the real one), I divide the letters up evenly, seven at a time, according to how many points they’re worth. There are twelve Es, so we each get six, distributed evenly one turn at a time over the course of six not-necessarily consecutive turns. Two Ls each, two Ns each, and so on. If there’s an odd number of one letter, I add it to another letter with an odd amount and then divide them up evenly. There is an even number of letters altogether—one hundred—but not an even number of total possible points: 187. To be fair, I have to remember who got the extra point and give it to the other player the next time.
Every game I give myself the Q, for Queen, which is worth ten points, and he gets the J for Joker, which is only worth eight. But I make up for the difference by giving him the Z, worth ten points, every game and myself the X, worth eight. When he wins, it reminds me that I underestimated the Joker and can’t afford to ever do that again. It requires all of my concentration to keep track of everything: the letters, the points, whose turn it is to receive the extra point out of the total possible 187. And it passes the time, but I can’t decide if this strange mind game is keeping me sane or driving me crazy. A little of both, I suppose.
Today I’m nearing the end of a Scrabble match and winning when the real Gabriel arrives. A weak ray of sunlight shines through the open door and into the main chamber of my prison, so it must be early in the day. He doesn’t appear to have the flashlight with him. Instead, he
leaves the door open. This is different. A gesture of trust, perhaps?
After standing still for a moment, he steps toward me, gives me a clean blanket, another box of food, and says, “Wait ’til you see what else I’ve brought you!”
He grins a close-lipped grin, then his face cracks open into a huge, broad, white-toothed smile, like the wolf in Little Red Riding Hood. How could I ever have thought he was good-looking? His smile chills me, but I have to hide my feelings of revulsion. I smile back, hoping it reaches my eyes. That’s how you can really tell if someone’s sincere: if their eyes shine, not just their teeth. His teeth are brutally white, but his eyes never shine. His gaze is frosty and opaque, like a thick layer of ice on a frozen pond during a long cold spell. I remember the day I met Gabriel. His smile never melted the ice in his eyes. I should have known then. I think my dad felt at least a little suspicious. But even my father, who has always doubted everyone’s motives for everything, couldn’t imagine the killer simply walking up to our front door on a sunny day and knocking. And me running to open the door and stepping outside. Then disappearing.
My captor leaves and then reenters, carrying a stack of books against one hip, like a high-school boy on his way to class. “I have a surprise for you, Harper. Just to prove I’m not such a bad guy.”
He glances down at the books, held in place by his right hand. In his left hand he’s holding the gun, which is, like always, pointed straight at my heart. His aim wavers for a second as he places the books on the ground at his feet. Then he straightens up and reaches behind his back. He’s going to pull something out from the waistband of his jeans. Is there another gun, tucked into the back of his pants? Will I be looking down the barrels of two pistols? Will he fire one?
“Ta daa!” He whips out a small flashlight, flicks it on, and shines it into my eyes. My heart starts beating again. I flinch and raise my hand to block the brightest light I’ve seen in hours or days or however long I’ve been down here.
“Sorry. I keep forgetting what it’s like to see the light after you’ve been in the dark for so long. Too bright, huh?” He clicks the flashlight off and rolls it toward me. “Now, Harper, don’t get any ideas about clocking me over the head with it. Remember, I’m the one with the gun. I don’t want to hurt you, but if it comes down to you or me, I’ll choose myself.”
I don’t doubt his warning. Maybe because he’s killed at least six people that I know of. I pick up the flashlight, and the tears start to flow. They’re real, and I can’t stop them. Hallelujah! I won’t have to fumble around in the dark anymore. And I can read with my actual eyes, not just inside my head!
When I look over at his self-satisfied smile, I want to tell him to shove his flashlight up his sociopathic ass. Instead, I use the moment, hide my anger and frustration, and go with the tears. They began as tears of relief, and I need him to think they’re tears of gratitude. Plus, I don’t have to fake these feelings of extreme thankfulness, because I’m grateful to have actual, physical light in the darkness. I let my tears spring up and over in a fountain of thankfulness, blubbering away like a tool.
Aiming my face toward the ceiling of this god-forsaken hellhole, I whisper, “Thank you.” And then force myself to say it again, louder, and to say his name. “Thank you, Gabriel.” I manage not to choke on the words and not to add, you shit-bag.
Ugh. He loves playing god so much he laps my performance up like melted ice cream dripping down the side of a cone. Smiling, he gets down on one knee and picks up the book on the top of the pile he’s brought me.
“Smart girl like you, I figured you’d like to read some classics. But I brought you some popular fiction, too. And a couple of biographies.” Great, a serial killer who’s Santa Claus and a librarian combined. Lucky me. Once again, I smother the impulse to speak my honest thoughts out loud.
He reads off each title as he hands the books to me, one by one. “Dickens’s Great Expectations; Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson; Gone, Baby, Gone by Dennis Lehane; The Godwulf Manuscript; and a few other Robert Parker mysteries. I always liked Spenser. Terrific detective. Fun reading. Lehane and Parker are both local guys, you know. Their stories are mostly set in and around Boston.”
I stifle the urge to say, No shit, you pompous dickhead. Instead I sniffle and thank him again. Poor, weak, humble me. He’s big and strong and smart, and I need him.
This is working. He’s very pleased with himself. So pleased he smiles and nods at me, as if to say, See, I’m not such a Bad Guy after all. Then he scurries back to the mouth of the abyss and grabs some more gifts, just to prove he’s the most thoughtful and generous serial killer on the planet.
When he comes back, he’s carrying two more blankets and a pillow, a quart-size carton of milk, and a box of granola bars. The kind they sell in health food stores, not the sweet, chewy kind with tons of chocolate chips in them. Wisely, I decide not to ask for Oreos instead. Judging from the food he’s given me so far, he sticks to some kind of organic-type vegetarian diet that he expects me to follow, too. Note to self: Remember not to ask for a Whopper and fries. Hold the onion.
“Cookies and milk? You read my mind.”
“I’m trying to, Harper. I’ll leave you alone for a little while, to enjoy your books and your snacks.”
My plan’s working. For the first time, he lowers the gun and turns his back on me when he walks out. Next time he does it, maybe I’ll be ready to spring. This time I wasn’t expecting it. And I’m too far away. I’d have to shuffle all the way over to the hallway’s entrance before I’d be close enough to attack. He’d hear me, turn around and fend me off. Maybe he’d even shoot me. So I give up on escaping for now. The moment needs to be right. I need a carefully thought-out plan, like the one Gabriel followed when he killed all those women. Like the plan he had when he took me.
As soon as I hear the padlock rasp back into place, I snuggle up with my blankets and my pillows and turn on the flashlight. My captor really does have good taste in books. The last one in the pile, though, is an obvious but frightening choice. It makes me feel like he knows much more about me than I want him to know. The book is, of course, To Kill a Mockingbird.
Inside the front cover there’s a handwritten note.
Dear Harper,
If your parents named you after the author of this book, they made a wise choice. It’s a great story, and the name suits you. There aren’t very many Harpers in the world, and you are certainly unique. In my mind, you’re one of a kind. Maybe we can be of the same mind one day. I truly believe if you get to know me better, you’ll understand me and choose to stay with me.
In one of my favorite scenes, Atticus gives Scout some valuable advice about how to get along with her first-grade teacher. He tells her to try and view the situation from the teacher’s point of view. He wants her to walk a mile in the teacher’s shoes, except he calls it wearing her skin. I think Atticus’s advice would help you, right now, Harper. When you get to that scene, think about it.
Sincerely yours,
Gabriel Stone
Gabriel wants me to try walking around in a serial killer’s skin. I suppose I’d better follow his advice if I ever want to get out of here. I need to wear the skin of the man who killed my mother. Even if the very thought of doing so makes my own skin crawl.
Chapter 32
Harper
Wearing Gabriel’s Skin
During his next few visits, Gabriel doesn’t point the gun at me. But I can see the outline of its shape in his right pants pocket. Why does he keep it in his right pocket if he’s left-handed? There’s a smaller bulge in his left pocket. What could it be? Keys? Maybe something more nefarious. I don’t want to think about it, but I have to face reality if I want to escape. It’s probably the knife, the infamous blade that killed all those people, one of them my mother. If I can get my hands on the knife, I might be able to use it to escape. But the thought of touching it sickens me. I’d rather go for the gun.
Today, as my captor walks through the d
oorway and down the hall that leads to the main chamber of the root cellar, he’s not shining the flashlight in front of him. Instead, he’s left the door open again. Good.
With the weak and distant sunlight framing his dark figure, Gabriel looms over me from a few feet away. “How’re your ankles?”
“They’ve been better.”
“Chafing?”
“The plasticuffs are too tight. If I pull my socks up, the chafing’s not too bad. But they keep slipping back down because they’re too short.”
“I’ll bring you some long ones. It’s not my intention to make you suffer physical pain, Harper. I’m not a sadist. I regret that throughout your life my actions have caused you a lot of emotional pain.”
“More than you can imagine.”
“Oh no. Not only can I imagine it; I’ve lived it.”
He sits down on the floor, a safe distance away from me, out of arms’ reach, and folds his legs crisscross style, like we’re sitting around a campfire and he’s about to tell a ghost story.
“My mother used to hit me and shake me. Hard. Sometimes she locked me up in here. Those claw marks on the door are mine. I made them with my fingernails, when I was a child, before I learned that I’d be punished further if I didn’t stay inside that box, over there, on the shelf.” He points at it, then lets his hand flop down onto one thigh and hangs his handsome head.
I hold out one of my precious bottles of water. He doesn’t rise to take it, so I struggle to my feet and hobble over. He’s so affected by the beginning of his own story that he forgets to be cautious. He doesn’t take the gun out of his pocket and aim it at me.
I think about attacking now, but the timing isn’t right. I’m not ready. I would most likely fail. My ankles are tied together and his aren’t. Besides, I want to hear more about his life, his childhood, and, maybe, he’ll tell me about the murders. If he’s alive and well enough to stand trial after I’m finished with him, it would be good to accumulate some details that will hold up in court when I’m a key witness.
Hidden in the Dark (Harper Flagg Book 1) Page 21