The Madison Jennings Series Box Set

by Kiara Ashanti

  Satisfied, she walked over to the dollhouse castle she had built with Uncle Z when she was five. The girlie colors of the castle did not jibe with Maddie’s personality any longer, but like all the things Zavier had given her, she kept it close and would not discard it. She reached her hand under one of the turrets and pulled out the phone.

  On any other day, Tommy would have been good for a comment about being in her room or about the pink castle that dominated one side of it. Today and all the days forward would no longer count as normal. His only comment was straight to the point.

  “Will he help?”

  “Yes,” said Maddie.

  She dialed Rhee.

  The phone rang ten times before she disconnected and tried again. Still, he did not pick up. “Dammit! George always picks up on the first ring.” She disconnected again, then sent a text message telling him to call her ASAP. Tommy stared in defeat.

  “We have to find out what happened. We have to—”

  “We will. George will call me back. He’s probably in a restricted area or in a meeting. He’ll call, and we’ll find out the truth.”

  “Then what?”

  It was a good question. Maddie had not even considered what she planned on doing with the information. Suddenly, she felt foolish. She slumped down on her bed, and for the third time that day, her tears flowed.

  A sharp double rap sounded against her door.

  Maddie looked at Tommy, then slid the phone under some trash in the can by her bed. Her parents were standing in the doorway when she opened it. To the side of them stood Aden’s father. Maddie leaned out of her room and looked farther down the hall.

  “Aden is in the car. He didn’t want to come up,” said Mr. Kent.

  Mr. Kent’s tone told the tale. Maddie knew the jig was up. She stepped backward, then turned her music off.

  “Where is it?” asked her mother.

  “No,” said Maddie flatly.

  As the adults walked into the bedroom, her mother’s eyes scanned every inch of it. “What do you mean no? No, you don’t have another phone in here?”

  “No, I’m not giving it to you until George calls me back.”

  She may as well have slapped her mother in the face. Surprise followed by rage sparked in Tina’s eyes. Her father put his face into his hands.

  “George? As in Gyeong Rhee!” Tina roared. “You have been talking to him? That, that cybercriminal who broadcast your face and the deaths of hundreds of people to the whole damn world?” Her mother rushed to Maddie’s dresser, ripped a drawer open, and started flinging clothes out of it in a maniacal search for the phone.

  Mr. Kent stood rock still, shock glowing on his face. It was clear to Maddie that Aden had told his father about the call in the library. She did not know why he would do that. Mr. Kent looked at her father, who stood frozen in place. It was Tommy who finally spoke.

  “Stop! I don’t care who this Gyeong or Rhee is or why you don’t like him. He can tell us what really happened. We have to know what happened to our friends!” Tommy’s voice cracked at the end. A surge of gut-wrenching crying came next. Maddie had known Lilly, Allie, and Zara for two months. Tommy had grown up with them. The pain was breaking him.

  Maddie’s father moved to her mother, who had a death grip on the second drawer she had pulled open. “How long? How long have you been talking to him?”

  “Years. Through the computer. He only sent the phone a few weeks ago after Dorete splashed my face across the web. Mom . . . he’s the reason we’ve been able to stay out of the news all these years.”

  Confusion dominated her mother’s face. “How . . . how could he do that?”

  “He’s a hacker, Mom. And he works for the government—for the NSA. He can do all sorts of things on the Internet. You know that.”

  Tommy wiped his tear-stained face with the back of his hand. “He erased the videos?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  It was a simple question given the added weight due to the events of the last twenty-four hours. No one said a word in answer. Mr. Kent moved into the breach.

  “Madison, Tina, Derek, I’m sorry. I had no idea I was stepping into a . . . private family matter when I called and told your parents I needed to speak with you immediately. I only just told them I’m an FBI agent when I got here, which you already knew, because this . . . Rhee told you. I need to know if he has told you anything else about the missing girls. That’s all I’m here to find out.”

  “If you spoke to Aden, then you know everything.” Maddie paused, then she added, “And you know there’s a pattern everyone is missing or ignoring.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Madison, give me that phone,” said her mother.

  Maddie turned to the woman who had given birth to her, loved her, and to whom she had caused so much stress in the last couple of months. She regretted that she would be the cause of more. “Not until I hear from him.”

  “Please, Mrs. Jennings,” Tommy pleaded.

  “What is it you want to know?”

  “Everything,” Maddie answered flatly to Mr. Kent.

  “I’m not sure all those details would be appropriate for a fourteen-year-old.”

  Maddie could not help herself. “Mr. Kent, do not presume to know what I can handle. You have no idea what I have already handled in my life.”

  She felt a light touch on her hand. Tommy had placed his hand atop hers. Curious need filled his face. “Maddie, what are you talking about? Why is everyone freaking out over this phone? Why do you know someone at the NSA anyway?”

  Maddie looked at her mother. She could see the walls crumbling in her eyes. Her mother knew her desperate, multiyear gambit at hiding from the world was at an end. It was just a matter of time.

  In that moment, Maddie decided to take the decision out of her mother’s control. She turned back to Tommy.

  “Madison,” her mother began.

  “The Christmas Day Massacre. I was there. I’m really Madelynne Collins, one of the last survivors of that day. George is Gyeong Rhee, one of the guys who hacked the theater cameras and broadcast it to the world.”

  “Jesus Christ,” exclaimed Mr. Kent.

  “And you changed your names? Like witness protection?” asked Tommy.

  “Our own, well my mother’s own witness protection. Changed our names, moved out of the country, lived in different places to keep the press away from me and my family.”

  Tommy nodded then hugged Maddie tight. This time, pain and anguish were absent from it. Sympathy poured from Tommy’s being into Maddie’s. No words were spoken, but she knew that’s what it was. If they had not bonded as friends already, they certainly were intertwined now. Maddie knew she had made the correct decision for herself even if her parents disagreed.

  “I still want the phone. Nothing changes that.”

  Maddie simply looked at Mr. Kent, who gave her an affirmative shake of the head then pulled out his phone. He walked out of her bedroom as he started to make good on his promise. Maddie rose from her bed and plucked the phone out of her trash can. She checked it for any texts before handing it over.

  “Computer messages? How is he doing that? We don’t have your computer connected to the Internet.”

  Maddie could not stop a roll of her eyes toward her dad. “What is it about the terms hacker and computer expert you two don’t understand?”

  “Why isn’t he in jail?” Venom laced her mother’s question. It rankled Maddie, but she understood.

  “Why put a talent like that in jail when you can use it for the good of the country is what I imagined happened.”

  Now, it was her mom’s turn at a roll of the eyes. She followed it with a loud sucking of her teeth.

  “Mom, he’s not the reason for what happened. It had nothing to do with him. And he’s been helping us all these years. You’re right—there is still a fatwa against us. Groups still search for us.”

  “What’s a fatwa?” asked Tommy.

  �
��Think of it as an assassination order but backed with the full weight of the Islamic church and their god.”

  “Seriously?”

  Before Maddie could say more, Mr. Kent walked back into the room. He looked at the two teens and hesitated. He turned to Tina and Derek. Tina looked away. Derek nodded, giving Mr. Kent his permission.

  “The shooting happened just outside the area of last night’s game. The bodies of Allie, Zara, and Sean Anderson—”

  “He’s in the band. Played trombone and guitar. The girls liked singing while he played,” said Tommy, interrupting.

  “Well, their wallets and a guitar were missing. They were found inside Anderson’s car in a parking lot. No sign of Lilly, as you already know. The police think it’s a robbery gone bad because of the missing wallets and property.”

  “Forensics?” asked Maddie.

  Mr. Kent raised an eyebrow before continuing. “Too early. Blood in the car. Will take some time to see whose it is. The report doesn’t say, but local police are not . . . hopeful.”

  Immediately, Tommy’s face scrunched up.

  “There was one other thing—two actually. There was no blood on the ground where the car was, so they think the shooting happened elsewhere, which can make sense. But another body was found miles away at an abandoned quarry. A ranger found blood in the grass at the edge of the water. A quick dive into the water yielded the body. It’s the daughter of a Denver businessman.”

  Maddie and Tommy sprang to their feet.

  Before anyone could react, Maddie snatched the phone from her mother and refreshed it to pull up the picture that Rhee had sent her. “Where is the quarry?” she demanded. “Where?” she repeated, this time yelling.

  “Near Rock Creek,” answered Mr. Kent.

  “Let me,” said Tommy.

  Maddie handed him the phone. His fingers danced along the screen as he brought up a map, then he continued checking back at the photo of the map Rhee had sent them. Finally, he nodded.

  “It’s just outside the circle, but she was last seen around an area that’s just within it but close to the quarry.”

  “Fucking hell.”

  “Madison!”

  She ignored her mother and looked at Mr. Kent instead. “It’s the same guy.”

  “The police think so too—”

  “But it’s no robbery. That’s bull-cockney. This is connected to the missing girls, I know it. Lilly was taken, and she’s alive.”

  Chapter Sixty-Eight

  “Taking her was foolish. She does not fit the profile.”

  The statement drew a hard, stinging slap to the side of Ihtisham’s face. Ihtisham shrugged it off and continued. “Striking me does not change the situation. Killing the teens was rash. Taking her is dangerous. She is not like the others. She will be missed. Her father will force action.”

  “The one you killed—ya sharmouta—said the same. Perhaps if you had quelled your Western-inspired lust and confusion, our plans would remain as they were,” said Rashad.

  Ihtisham could not deny the point. Losing control had cost them time and personal pain. Maleek had beaten Ihtisham severely. Now, he observed placidly, a cat watching a mouse, saving the kill for a later date. Maleek had not been thrilled when Rashad had shown up with a new captive and a story of killing three others to obtain her. It was messy, and Ihtisham was sure it would get out.

  “It is no matter. We took two in a night,” said Maleek. In addition to Lilly, they had managed to kidnap another female on the same evening. “Desperate, yes, but we are close to our number,” said Maleek. “Ihtisham, see to the girls. I want no more delays or loss of control.”

  “But, zaeim,” Ihtisham protested, “she will recognize me. It is better for Rashad or that someone else sees to them all until the end.”

  Maleek slowly rose from his seat. Cold eyes bored into Ihtisham’s being like a drill into wood. Taller than Ihtisham by more than a foot, he breached Ihtisham’s personal space and brought up a hand to take hold of the chin in front of him. He moved Ihtisham’s face from side to side to examine it. Menace floated from him like mist rising in the early morning air. It covered Ihtisham like a wet blanket.

  “Is that your concern, young one? That you will be seen for what you are by infidels you have fooled through al-Taqiyya and other means? Or is it something else? A weakness perhaps for the unbelievers?”

  The heat from Maleek’s glowering eyes was too much to take. Ihtisham took a step backward. “I, I was just adhering to the plan,” he stammered. “You said we were to choose targets whose absence could be explained away. You told us to not be recognized. This changes things.”

  “And who is responsible for this change?”

  Ihtisham turned away, shame flushing his face red.

  “Yes, the fault is yours. Leave us!” Maleek snapped to the other men in the room. “See about the rest of the preparations. Rashad, I want the timers and locks set and ready to go.”

  Surprise unfolded on the large man’s face.

  “Ihtisham is a disappointment before family and Allah, may he be merciful, but not incorrect,” said Maleek. “Our secondary option must be put into place, in case we are discovered before the broadcast. Worry not. Either event will strike fear into the heart of the infidels.”

  The men scurried away to their assigned tasks, leaving Ihtisham to face Maleek alone. It had become a habit as of late. He began circling around him, slow step after slow step.

  “Ihtisham, I grow weary of beating you. I worry that Rashad will one day strike you hard enough to leave a visible mark. However,” he said, stopping directly in front of Ihtisham and moving to within an inch of his face, “I am most concerned that you will force me to dishonor your deceased father’s dying wish. He begged me, begged, to save you from the evils of Western thought and bring you into the eternal light of Allah. I have told you the story. And you promised to do what was necessary to bring honor back to your family. Did you not?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then why do you tremble like a girl over being recognized by one who will soon be killed for the glory of jihad?”

  Ihtisham did not dare speak the answer that came most naturally. The words would guarantee death before being able to win back honor to the family. That could not be allowed.

  “As you say, zaeim, I am young. I do not want more complications to our plan as a result of further weakness on my part.”

  “That is good to hear. It is past time you erased that unholy stink from our family’s name. Now, see to the captives. Be sure to reexamine the belongings they had. Rashad was smart enough to not bring their phones, but there could be other things in their possession that could be a clue to others.”

  Ihtisham nodded tightly. Maleek’s words, “It is past time you erased that unholy stink from our family’s name,” burned inside. A portion of his mind scoffed at them, declaring them false and untrue. But a greater portion inside, made up of his new self, quashed that sentiment. He knew the teachings of the Holy Quran and Muhammad. Maleek was correctly following the holy words as had his father.

  Ihtisham was a solider now, dedicated to jihad and al-Taqiyya. He would do as told . . . but still, bitterness swirled in the back of his throat as he descended the stairs to the basement.

  Lilly tried to open her eyes, but a stabbing pain forced them shut again. Her tongue felt thick and pasty. Grimacing, she tried to move her tongue around to generate some moisture and dislodge the metallic taste coating her mouth.

  As she rolled onto her side, confusion rolled across her face. She had no idea where she was or what had happened to her. When her outstretched hand touched the metal bars, her eyes snapped open. It was a short-lived action. Even the dim lighting in the basement poured into her eyes like molten needles. Lilly scrambled backward, blindly trying to stand. She fell back to the hard floor, adding to the pains she felt reverberating through her body.

  “Don’t try to stand. You probably have a concussion. You were unconscious when they brought
you in.”

  Unconscious? Did I pass out? Lilly did not remember drinking. She did not drink, but she could not remember anything. Her mind was a black hole with only flashes of memory appearing, then disappearing, into a mental void.

  “Did we get arrested, Allie?”

  The name and the question came to her unbidden, without a clear picture of who this Allie was to her. A part of her knew the hopeless voice that told her not to stand did not sound like Allie’s. She shook her head and immediately brought her hands up to clutch it. Trying to clear her head was a mistake. Now, Lilly felt shards of glass migrating through her brain. She uttered an extended groan.

  “I don’t know who Allie is. If she’s the friend who was with you, she’s dead.”

  The pronouncement was flat and frigid as the Artic plain. It shocked Lilly into cognition like being thrown overboard into a cold sea. The terrible truth escaped the black void in her mind and assaulted her with remembrance: the soft woof sound she perceived a millisecond before a wet mist hit the side of her face; Allie and Zara yelping, then slumping backward on the hood of the car; the sight of a large, dark man pointing a gun at her; a keening whimper hissed through the bottom of her throat; the surprised then stunned faces of her friends as they took their last breath. She wanted these images to go away, to sink back into the recesses of her mind, where they were a moment before.

  The truth refused.

  “Where am I?” she finally asked.

  “We don’t know.”

  This voice was different. Lilly forced her eyes back open a sliver at a time. When they fully opened, she raised herself to her knees and looked around. She was in a jail cell, but there were several others beside and across from her. Almost every cell was occupied, each holding women and girls. They were all dressed in medical scrubs, except for herself and one other woman who was older than Lilly. Her confused counterpart looked as frantic as Lilly felt.