by Janean Worth
Chapter Ten
The atmosphere in the room changed again immediately, and Bella no longer felt the strange press of evil that had sought to envelop her. To Bella’s shock, the men responded to her song as if someone had stunned them with a shock grenade.
They covered their ears, wincing, groaning as if in pain. The burly man’s eyes widened as she dashed past him and out the open door, but not a single one of them seemed to be able to do anything to stop her.
The door to her short‑term cell led out into a colorless gray hallway, and Bella broke into a run as she fled down it, still singing.
The men did not give chase until she was nearly at the end of the hallway, some sixty feet away from them. She kept singing and running, running and singing. The words flowed from her lips easily—“Amazing Grace” was her favorite hymn—and seemed almost to take on a strange kind of power. She didn’t understand it, but it seemed as if her love for the Lord poured out of her through her song, creating a pocket of protection around her.
There was a door at the end of the hallway, but it wasn’t locked. She flung herself through it and then up the flight of steps just beyond, starting to pant with effort. Her song suffered, becoming choppy as she struggled for breath, but she sang on, gasping out the words.
When she reached the top of the stairs, there was another door. She hurried through it and discovered what looked to be a very large office area. It was filled with desks and chairs and tables and people. Lots and lots of people. And they all turned to stare at her as she entered the room, panting and singing loudly.
Seeing them all, Bella faltered, then stopped singing. She stood near the door for a moment, panting, unsure of what to do. There were so many people. And they looked fairly normal, dressed in office attire, some drinking coffee from Styrofoam cups, some chatting around desks, others typing or writing, or talking on the phone.
How could such a normal‑looking office sit on top of a kidnapper’s lair? It made no sense.
And then she felt it. The place was not as normal as it had seemed at first glance. What she’d felt in the basement was here too, in this seemingly normal office. A creeping sense of pervasive evil cast an invisible pall over the room.
Bella shivered and edged carefully away from the door at her back, feeling like a deer caught unexpectedly among a very large pack of wolves.
A man detached himself from the group of people nearest to her, heading in her direction, his clothes and the embroidered insignia upon his arm designating him as security.
He smiled at her, and when he neared, he reached out a solicitous hand.
“May I help you?” he asked. His voice was calm and reassuring, yet lightly oiled with a strange, hidden malevolence.
Bella felt an odd burning inside her mind, and then a paralyzing fear began to creep into her emotions. Powerful, irresistible, all‑encompassing fear . . . It seized hold of her mind in a vice‑tight grip, and she nearly cried out at the intensity of the emotion.
Sing, Bella! Sing!
The thought blasted through her mind with such force that it almost seemed to ring in her ears. It dislodged the fear, sweeping it aside with such power that for a moment, Bella’s mind felt like a blank slate, wiped clean of everything except a desire to follow the instruction implanted there.
She didn’t hesitate a moment longer. She began to sing just as the security officer’s fake, oily smile morphed into a snarl and he lunged for her. Singing loudly, she dodged him and headed for the outside entrance to the office area, where she could see dusk staining the sky a deep orange through the double glass doors.
As she passed amongst them, people covered their ears and turned away, almost as if her voice, her song, hurt them.
The strange malevolence that filled the large room seemed to part before her, like water under the prow of an enormous ship, leaving a wake of silent, eddying wickedness behind her.
The paralyzing fear seemed to snap at her heels, chasing her out of the office space, a weakened distortion of what it had felt like moments before. Her voice, the song, the words of praise seemed to hold it at bay while she ran as if her life depended upon her reaching the doors as soon as possible.
She burst outside into the setting sun just as the four men from the basement, and Lucien, entered the office from the stairwell door.
Lucien shouted at her, but she paid him no mind.
To her never‑ending gratitude and utter surprise, not a single one of them gave chase. They just stood near the doors, frowning ferociously at her as she escaped, as if rooted to the spot by some invisible force.
A very large parking lot spread out before her as she exited the glass doors. Waning sunlight limned the shiny blacktop with an orange tint, making her squint against its bright reflection. Panting, sweating, singing, Bella ran a few steps along the sidewalk. Confusion inundated her thoughts. She wasn’t sure what had just happened in the building behind her, but she felt lucky to have escaped it.
She stopped singing, and cautiously slowed to a walk, trying to catch her breath, expecting someone to give chase at any moment.
She cast a nervous glance over her shoulder, but her kidnappers were still not pursuing her. She could see them well enough as she passed by the full‑length glass windows surrounding the exit doors. If looks could kill, she’d be dead, but all they did was glare at her, their eyes promising painful retribution if they ever ran across her path again.
Bella didn’t know what to make of it. She felt as if perhaps she had fallen down the rabbit hole too.
Need a ride, Bella?
Bella started, hearing the thought in her mind. It had the same flavor as the other thoughts that urged her so strongly to sing, though this one was more of a suggestion than a command. She looked around, trying to find the source and spotted the man easily.
To her left, leaning against a sleek, red sports car, stood her stalker.
She was close enough that she could see him roll his eyes in what appeared to be exasperation.
“For the last time, Bella,” he said aloud, sighing heavily, “I am not a stalker!”