“I know she’s afraid, but we need to bring her in to be questioned. We can’t wait much longer.”
She knew he was right. Days had passed and Missy hadn’t budged on the topic of talking to the police. Rebecca had thought she was doing the right thing by trying to keep Missy safe on her own, but the threat was getting too high to keep this secret any longer.
She nodded and pushed away her work. “Okay. Let’s go over there now and talk to her.”
He looked surprised that she’d agreed with him but didn’t question her change of heart. They got into Collin’s car and headed across town.
Rebecca was afraid pushing the girl would make her close up, but hiding out at the motel wasn’t a long-term solution for Missy’s protection, or for Rebecca’s. They needed to discover who was behind this ring and bring them down, and they needed what Missy knew to do it.
Her cell phone rang and Rebecca saw the number of the motel on her screen. She answered it, her heart jumping as Missy’s panicked voice cried out to her.
“They’re here, Rebecca! They’re here!”
“Who is it?” she asked, trying to remain cool while calming down the girl so she could find out what was happening.
Collin must have heard the panic in her voice because his face registered shock as he listened to her.
“Missy, talk to me. Tell me what’s happening.”
“The van. I saw the van pull into the parking lot. They’re coming for me.”
She spotted Collin on his phone and heard him mention Kent’s name. He was calling to tell him about Missy. Bless this man for knowing just what she needed him to do. She couldn’t get off the phone with Missy to call the police.
She heard the fear in Missy’s voice as she whispered, “They’re here. They’re at the door.”
Rebecca thought she heard someone in the background urging Missy on as she and Collin hopped into the car and headed that way. It sounded like a male voice, but she couldn’t make out the words.
“Lock yourself in the bathroom,” Rebecca told her. “We’re on our way and so are the police.”
A loud banging noise came over the phone and Missy screamed at the top of her lungs. It sounded like she dropped the phone, then Rebecca heard her cries for help. “No! Stop! Don’t! Leave me alone!”
Rebecca turned to Collin. They were trying to bust down the door. Missy was being abducted again and they could do nothing to stop it. She’d never felt so helpless before.
“Hold on,” Collin said, gripping the steering wheel even tighter and speeding up.
All Rebecca could do was listen to the screams of a frightened girl on the other end of the line and pray that they reached her in time.
* * *
The call from Missy had Rebecca rattled and with good reason. If someone had tracked down Missy, she was in real trouble. Collin had phoned Kent and relayed the news about the phone call they’d just received and given him the location of the motel. All worries about not involving the police had to be put aside now.
He drove like a madman across town and was glad they had been on their way, but he was still surprised to see a white van parked in front of Missy’s door and a large man dragging her kicking and screaming from the room. Collin recognized him as the same man who had attacked Rebecca the night they’d first reunited.
He screeched the car to a halt and grabbed his weapon. “Stay inside,” he ordered Rebecca as he slammed the car door and called out to the men. “Put the girl down,” he shouted, raising his gun as he moved toward them.
Another man jumped from the van and shot at them. Collin jerked behind the door as he fired back at them. He heard Rebecca scream from inside. “Get down,” he told her.
He didn’t want to shoot at the van again because Missy might get hurt, but he knew if these men got away with her, she might be dead regardless. He returned fire, praying she wouldn’t be harmed by his bullets. As one man fired, the other dragged her into the waiting van and hopped inside. The other man jumped into the van’s passenger seat as the first drove. The van roared away and Collin chased after them, shooting. Behind him, he heard Rebecca screaming. He spun around. She was about to run past him and chase after the van, but he grabbed her and scooped her up into his arms to prevent her from running after them. It was too late. There was nothing either of them could do.
Rebecca fell to the ground sobbing and all he could do was put his arms around her and hold her.
The police sirens announced Kent was on his way. He pulled out his phone.
“We’re nearly there,” Kent said when he answered.
“Missy is gone. Two men in a white van took her. The license plate was obscured. No logo info on the van but they were headed north on Lexington Avenue. One of the men who grabbed her was the same man who attacked Rebecca at the grocery store.”
“We’re here.”
Several cruisers rolled into the parking lot and screeched to a stop. Five deputies poured out. Kent hurried toward them.
“I’ve got a BOLO out on the van. I also sent a car heading that way to search for it. Tell me what happened.”
“Like I told you on the phone, Rebecca got a call from Missy. She said someone was trying to get into the room. She recognized the men as part of the baby-selling ring.”
They walked over to Rebecca and Kent glared down at her. “This is your fault,” he told her. “I could have protected her if you had just trusted me.” He stormed off and Rebecca put her hands over her face.
“I promised her she would be safe. I promised I would keep her safe.”
“We’ll find her,” Collin said, squatting beside her. “We won’t stop until we find her.”
He knew what it was like to let someone down and he hated to think Rebecca would ever have to feel that kind of guilt. He made himself a promise that that wouldn’t happen.
* * *
Rebecca and Collin stayed at the motel well into the night as Kent and his team pored over the scene. It looked like Missy had tried locking herself in the bathroom as Rebecca had suggested because the attackers had busted down two doors, the front entrance and the bathroom, to get to her.
Finally, Collin drove them back to the mansion. Rebecca stretched out on the sofa instead of heading upstairs to her room. The sun was already dawning on a new day, a day where Missy was once again a prisoner. She knew she wouldn’t be able to sleep and she had no more tears, no more anger or bitterness to spew at Kent or anyone. She was spent.
Collin brought her a glass of water and sat beside her. He looked like he was about to apologize to her again, but she didn’t want to hear it.
Instead of apologizing, he held her hand and made her a promise. “I won’t stop until we bring these people down.”
Despite the fact that they still had no more information about the ring than before, his assurances made her feel better. Missy was not alone in this...and neither was she. One question still ran through her mind. How had they found Missy?
Her father walked into the room carrying an accordion folder. “May I speak with you, Rebecca?”
She sighed. She was too worn out to listen to another of his angry lectures about Collin. Couldn’t he look at them and tell they’d been up all night? “What is it, Dad?”
“In the spirit of being transparent, I have something for you.” He held out the folder to her. “As you know, Mason Industries owns many commercial properties, including some that are no longer in use. I asked my secretary to make a list. I’ve also asked her to list the current statuses of each property and if they’re being rented out and to whom.”
Rebecca sat up and took the folder. She flipped through the papers then looked up at her father. He’d just handed them another avenue to finding Missy. She was unable to come up with words powerful enough to express her gratitude besides a simple thank-you.
“If one of my properties
is being used to intentionally cause harm, I want to know it.”
“This means a lot to me.”
“I hope it helps.”
It did help. He looked so anxious to win her over. That he’d taken this step made her believe him when he said he wasn’t involved. She stood and hugged him, something she hadn’t done in a long while, and he hugged her back and smiled.
“Well, good night.”
“Good night, sir,” Collin said.
Rebecca pulled out the papers and started looking through them and Collin took the spot beside her.
“What should we do with these?” she asked him. “Should we check out every building?”
“Missy couldn’t have come very far. I say we start with the ones in a hundred-mile radius and work our way out from there. That’s a lot of driving and I don’t like you being out in the open so much.”
His brow crinkled and she thought he was about to say they couldn’t go. Or worse, that he would take care of it alone. She had to follow up on this lead.
“I know it’s a risk, but I think we have to try.”
“And if you were right and your father is involved—”
“If he is then the place we’re looking for probably won’t even be in this stack.” She stopped and looked at him. “But I believe him, Collin. Or at least, I believe he’s trying to help us.” She realized how long it had been since she’d believed in anything or anyone. She’d spent so many years hiding, protecting herself from pain, that she was struggling to even trust her own father. But she wanted to and it felt right.
“I believe him, too,” Collin told her and she breathed a sigh of relief. She’d grown out of practice with her trust muscle so she was glad to have the second opinion of someone she seemed to have no trouble in trusting. That should worry her, but it didn’t. She’d fallen into accepting Collin’s help as simply as she’d fallen in love with him all those years ago. He made it easy to engender trust. One of his strengths had always been that his charm and easy smile made him likable, but his conviction and integrity had made him truly trustworthy.
Until that night when his integrity had failed and he’d abandoned her.
She hated the way her devious heart kept tossing that back in her face. He’d apologized for his actions multiple times. Didn’t people sometimes deserve second chances? Didn’t she deserve a second chance at happiness?
“Looks like we’ll be doing some driving today,” he said as he mapped out twelve commercial buildings within a hundred-mile radius of the city.” He stopped and looked at her. “We’re only doing reconnaissance, Rebecca. If we do find something suspicious, we can’t rush in alone. Promise me, we’ll call Kent or the local PD if we find what we’re looking for.”
“I promise,” she told him. It felt good to not be alone in this any longer.
* * *
Despite having no sleep the previous night, they spent the day driving and located all twelve buildings. Four sat empty, while the rest were occupied with what seemed like normal business operations. Missy hadn’t said anything about other people being around. In fact, she’d made it seem like the place she’d been held was abandoned. Rebecca marked each off her list one by one as they drove.
They found the last building on the list two hours outside of Moss Creek. “It’s close to the highway,” Rebecca noted, feeling optimistic for the first time all day.
The old warehouse was set back off the road and trees and bushes had grown wild around it. The parking lot was empty so Collin pulled close to the building. As Rebecca got out of the car, she noticed the words Mason Industries printed across the side of the building facing the highway. Several of the other abandoned factories had had the name printed on the side, but with the inclusion of the highway, this had to be the spot where Missy had been held.
She hurried toward the front of the building with Collin at her heels. She heard no noises from inside, and when she looked through a window, the building seemed empty.
“Rebecca, look.”
She turned to find Collin crouched near two long black lines. “Skid marks, and they haven’t faded so they must be recent.” He stood and pulled his gun from its holster. “Let me go inside first.”
Collin tried the door and found it unlocked.
“It’s probably nothing,” he told her, trying not to get her hopes up, but she had a feeling in her gut that this was the place.
He scanned the area for anyone hiding. She followed and let him take the lead. She wasn’t looking to get killed and respected Collin’s ability to keep her safe.
He finally put his gun back into its holster. “The place is empty.”
She glanced around. The warehouse showed no evidence of anyone being around, but it was missing one thing an empty building would have collected—dust. Where were the spiderwebs in the corners or the dust on the floor? Someone had been here recently and cleaned. They must have cleared out after Missy had escaped as Collin had feared, but Rebecca was convinced someone had been here.
“What do you think?” Collin asked her.
“I think this is the place they were holding her.”
He moved toward a door on the opposite side of the building and opened it. It led down a flight of steep stairs to an underground storage room. Again, Rebecca noticed the lack of dust and spiderwebs.
She glanced at a spot on the floor and called Collin over. “I think it’s blood.”
He straightened. “We should call Kent. He can arrange to have this place given a good forensic sweep.”
She nodded her agreement. They would find nothing else here that would lead them to where the kidnappers were going.
They walked back to the car, but once she had buckled up, she stared at the building and felt Missy slipping away. They’d found the place she’d been held only to be too late to help her. “We missed her,” Rebecca said. “If they moved their operation, they could be anywhere by now.”
Collin reached for her hand and she curled it around his, loving the warmth of his eyes and the strength of his hand. “We’ll find her,” he assured her. “We found this place, didn’t we? We won’t give up.”
She was thankful he was with her on this journey and he was a constant stream of support for her. But she was also aware how dependent she was becoming upon him and that frightened her. Collin had broken her heart years ago. Was she really ready to risk it on him again?
* * *
The warehouse was in the neighboring county but Kent was able to get permission from that sheriff’s office to bring in his own people to give the abandoned building a thorough once-over. He told Collin and Rebecca the local sheriff wasn’t interested in pouring his resources into an abandoned property.
“Maybe if they’d cared enough, they might have noticed girls being held hostage right under their noses.” Rebecca’s tone was unforgiving and rightly so, Collin thought, but this ring was apparently operating under everyone’s noses. If she hadn’t pressed to find Missy, who knew how long it might have gone unnoticed. She was the real hero here.
Collin waited while Kent and his team finished their sweep. He finally approached them. “We did find traces of blood inside, but it’s not substantial. It looks like the place has been cleaned. They were covering their tracks. We were able to talk with people along the route here that saw vans like the one you described at the motel coming and going from here constantly.”
Collin sighed. So this place had been used for trafficking women. He stared at the big, painted letters on the side of the building that read Mason Industries and knew this was where a young girl had been kept. Terrible things had been done to her here and no one had been the wiser. She’d been invisible, another foster care kid who might have slipped through the cracks if not for Rebecca.
“So what do we do now?” he asked Kent.
“I’ve still got a BOLO out on the van and we’re stil
l processing evidence from the scene at the motel.”
Collin’s phone rang and he glanced at the screen. The number that appeared wasn’t familiar to him but he answered it, anyway, and he was glad he did. It was the FBI agent he’d left a message for two days ago.
“I’m glad you called,” Collin told her and she listened while he explained what was happening. When he was done, he handed the phone to Kent, who also answered questions then put her on speaker.
“We’re wrapping up a sting operation now,” she told both men once she’d gathered all the facts. “Once we’re done here, I’ll head that way and I’ll have someone in the office gathering intel in the meantime. You can expect me and my team in the next few days.”
Collin thanked her then ended the call. Rebecca would be glad to know the FBI was also getting involved in the case as they’d originally planned. But that was before Missy had been found and taken again. His hope was that they would find her alive once this was all said and done, but at the very least he would settle for the justice of taking down the ring once and for all.
He walked to Rebecca and shared the good news with her. She gave him a smile, but the dark circles around her eyes told him this ordeal was taking its toll on her. She needed to rest and recuperate, but he knew she wouldn’t be able to truly rest until she knew what had happened to Missy. Perhaps once the FBI was here, she would find the rest she needed.
“There’s nothing more we can do here,” he told her. “Kent will call us when he finds something.” He saw the despondency on her face and felt the need to reassure her. “We will find her,” he promised.
He saw a moment’s hesitation in her eyes. He’d let her down before but that wasn’t going to happen again. He held her hand. “I’m here for you, Rebecca, and I’m not going anywhere. I won’t let them hurt you. We’ll figure out who is behind this.”
“I hope you’re right.” She leaned into him and he soaked in her presence before recalling how a moment’s weakness, a moment of taking her in, had distracted him and nearly cost her life when that car had tried to run her over yesterday. Her welfare had become so important to him in only a few short days. He couldn’t allow his judgment to be clouded that way again.
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