Authors: Terri Blackstock
“No, it has to be me. He’s so fascinated with the sound of bodies dropping. I want to be the one to drop him into the pit of hell.”
The moment Joe came back to his car in the Flagstaff parking lot, he knew that Sheila had taken the address on his notepad. His heart sank. Cade was coming toward him as he got out of his car. “I know where she is.”
“Sheila? Where?”
“She took that address I got for Nate out of my car. I guarantee you she’s headed to Hinesville, if she isn’t there already.”
Cade closed his eyes. “Surely she wouldn’t just go barreling up in there without waiting for us. She’s not crazy.”
“She’s desperate. Who knows what she might do? I don’t even know how long she’s been gone.”
Cade looked back at the second floor, where the room was being searched. The GBI agents had shown up and taken over. Their men had spread out and were talking to the residents from room to room.
Cade found Yeager and filled him in on what was happening. “I’m going to head to Hinesville.”
“Yeah, I’ll get some of my men out there too,” Yeager said.
McCormick was already in his car, starting to pull out of the glutted parking lot. Cade opened his passenger door and got in. “Yeager’s sending people.”
“We can’t wait for them. Sheila’s in trouble. We have to hurry.”
“Hey, I’m sold, buddy. Let’s go. Maybe we’ll make it before she does anything stupid.”
C
ade’s distinctive ring startled Blair out of her prayer, and she clicked her cell phone on. “Hello?”
“Blair, it’s me.” He was out of breath, and she could hear the siren in the background. “We think we know where Sheila is. She took some notes out of McCormick’s car, with our suspect’s address in Hinesville.”
“The suspect? You think she went to his house?”
“We’re headed that way now.”
“Cade, who is it?”
“A man named Nate Morris. He and a buddy were next door to Amelia and Jamie at the Flagstaff. We have reason to believe Sadie figured it out and confronted him. That’s the last anyone’s seen her.”
She got up, wishing she could run out of there and follow them, but she couldn’t leave the hospital. “Please be careful.”
He didn’t answer. “Has Morgan had the baby yet?”
“Not yet.”
“Miss Owens?”
Blair swung around and saw a nurse standing by the swinging double doors, a mask around her chin. “The nurse is here, Cade. I have to go.”
“I love you.”
“I love you too.”
She clicked off the phone and hurried to the nurse. “Has she had the baby yet?”
The nurse grinned. “She sure has. Why don’t you go in and let her tell you if you have a niece or nephew? She’s in Delivery Room B.”
The grin was a good sign, Blair thought as she pushed through the doors. Surely the nurse wouldn’t be grinning if something had gone wrong.
She found Delivery Room B and saw Jonathan bent over Morgan. “Morgan!” Blair almost couldn’t get her sister’s name out.
Jonathan rose up, and Morgan reached for her. She had a smile on her face, and her cheeks were covered with tears and sweat.
“Is it—?”
“It’s a boy! Oh, Blair, he’s a beautiful, healthy little boy.”
“Healthy? Are you sure?”
“He came out screaming bloody murder,” Jonathan said with a grin. “The doctor said his lungs sounded fine. They’re testing him to make sure.”
Blair started to cry and bent down to hug her sister. “Oh, Morgan, I was so scared.”
“Me too.”
“He’s a little small,” Jonathan said, “only five pounds, but they think he’s perfect.”
Blair clapped her hands together and brought her fingertips to her mouth. She looked at her sister. “How are you?”
Morgan laughed. “I’ve never been better.”
Jonathan wiped the hair back from his wife’s face. “She was a trooper. Just like she’s done it before.”
“So did you talk to Sheila?” Morgan asked.
Blair looked at Jonathan, not certain what to say. Should she bring her sister down in her moment of her greatest joy? No, she couldn’t do it. Morgan didn’t have to know that Sheila was missing.
“I talked to almost everybody.” She forced herself to laugh. “Everyone was praying, Morgan. They’re all so anxious to hear.”
“What about Sadie? Did they find her yet?”
Again, she felt caught in the headlights, and she looked helplessly at Jonathan. She thought of lying, but she wouldn’t get away with it. She started to speak, when she heard a baby crying.
She turned and saw the nurse bringing her tiny little nephew in. She covered her mouth at the sight of the screaming infant. “Oh, he’s so beautiful.”
Morgan raised up to take him. “How is he?”
“He’s wonderful. Lungs are fully developed. Except for his low birth weight, you wouldn’t know he was a preemie. The doctor wondered if you might have even gotten your due date wrong.”
Morgan kissed her son’s little cheek. “It’s okay, little Wayne, Mama’s here.”
Blair caught her breath. “Wayne. You named him after Pop.” She looked down at the tiny bundle, nestled in Morgan’s arms, and tears came to her eyes.
The baby kept screaming, and Morgan pulled him gently up to her shoulder and kissed his cheek as she rubbed his back. His crying settled as his mother whispered and cooed to him, and finally he was silent.
Morgan brought him back down and cradled him in her arm, and he looked up at her with clear, round eyes. “You look like you know everything,” Morgan whispered. “Like you’re wiser than I am. You came here straight from God. What do you know, little one? What could you tell us?”
Blair watched, awed, as her sister—the proverbial Earth Mother—settled into the role she’d prepared for all her life. The most important role she would ever play.
“Thank You, God.” Morgan’s prayer was tearful. “Thank You so much. We don’t deserve such a precious gift. Make us worthy. Please make us worthy of him.”
Jonathan leaned over and kissed the top of Morgan’s head, then touched his son’s round cheek. “God will equip us. This child’s too precious for Him to leave to chance. He has a plan for our boy, and He’ll tell us what it is.”
Emotions so overwhelmed Blair that she could hardly stand. Would she love a baby of her own even more than this? Could she?
She watched the young family, basking in the glow of the newness of such a gift, and for a moment, she could have sworn she saw her mother and father standing there behind them, bent over this little bundle, proud grandparent smiles on their faces, tears of joy in their eyes.
Her heart ached to reach out for them, to throw herself into their arms, to touch their faces one more time, to take a deep breath of their scents—a breath that would get her through the next year. Just one breath, she thought. Just one touch.
But then she realized her eyes hadn’t really seen them. Her heart just felt them near. She squeezed her mouth tight as the tears rolled down her face.
“Look at him, Mama,” Morgan whispered. “See how beautiful he is, Pop?” She sucked in a sob and looked up at Blair. For a moment their tearful gazes locked …
And Blair knew.
Their parents were here, somewhere, somehow … Maybe just the history, and all the years of their watching over their daughters, had brought them to Morgan’s and Blair’s minds at the same time. Maybe it was the longing. Maybe it was just wishful thinking.
Or maybe they really were here, watching the event and rooting them on. Maybe God let them have glimpses like this that would make them rejoice, and show them that things were turning out fine.
“Want to hold him, Blair?” Jonathan asked softly.
She nodded, hoping she didn’t get the baby wet. She watched, amazed, as Jonathan lifted him carefully from Morgan’s arms and put him into her own. She held him, squirming in her arms, and he opened his eyes and squinted up at her. “Hey there,
little fella” She barely managed the words through the emotion in her throat. “You know, you’ve got a pretty big name to live up to. I hope you’re up for it.”
He wiggled, indicating he was, and then he kicked his foot and brought his fists up in the air, and groaned irritably. Not sure what to do, she gave him to his father. Jonathan sat down with him and spoke to him softly until he settled down.
“You’ll have to have a girl now,” Blair whispered, “so you can name one after Mama.”
“Or
you
could.” Morgan smiled.
Blair looked down at her, realizing for the first time that she really
could
be next. She looked down at the diamond on her finger. It was real. She was going to marry Cade and have his children.
Unless something terrible happened tonight …
When Morgan started to nurse her son, Jonathan pulled Blair out into the hall. “Wanna tell me now what’s going on with Sadie?”
Blair tried to find an answer that wouldn’t destroy his joy, but he spoke first.
“She’s still missing, isn’t she?”
Blair swallowed. “Yes, but Cade says they think they know where she is. They’re on their way there now.”
“What about Sheila?”
Blair moaned. “I’m sorry, Jonathan, but nobody knows for sure where she is.”
He looked past her, his eyes vacant as he stared at the air. Then he shook out of it. “Don’t tell Morgan. Keep evading.”
“I will. But hopefully it’ll all be over soon.”
M
om! Mom, open your eyes.”
Sheila floated down a long black tunnel, groping for something to grab onto, reaching for anything that would give her footing. But she kept floating, unable to land, and the blackness got blacker, deeper, until the darkness came into her, its lethal edges cutting through her flesh, snapping her bones, crushing her skull.
Her brain was exploding, and electric shocks volted through her arm and leg.
Help me.
The plea was half-formed, with no destination, gonging in her head.
Help me.
“Mom! Please, Mom. Wake up.”
Sadie. It
was
her voice, yet it couldn’t be. Sadie was lost, hurt somewhere, and she couldn’t get to her.
The voltage pulsed through her, and she heard herself moan.
“She’s waking up. Mom!”
Dim light slitted through her eyelids, and she tried to lift them. She wasn’t in a black tunnel. She was in a black pit.
Her eyes came open, and she tried to focus.
“Mom! Oh, thank God! Mom, can you hear me?”
“Sadie?” She heard the word rip from her throat, yet she didn’t believe it.
“It’s me, Mom. He hit you, and you fell.”
She tried to focus, to make some order of her random thoughts. Sadie was here. She was alive.
“Mom, Amelia’s here too. Look at her, Mom. She’s right here.”
Amelia. My baby.
She forced her mind to function, despite the pain assaulting her. She settled her eyes on the faces above her, willed her eyes to focus. She saw Sadie sitting there, whole, weeping over her. And she saw another girl.
Amelia!
Her daughter was beautiful, just as she’d always imagined her. Petite and delicate, though her face was marred with dirt, sweat, and tears.
“Amelia. Oh, baby.” She tried to lift her arms to hug her, but excruciating pain shot through one of them.
“Be still, Mom,” Sadie said. “You broke your arm and leg, and you have a really bad head wound. But they’re coming to help you. I know they are.”
Now she remembered. Joe’s notes. The old man. That greasy Nate coming into the house.
“No one knows I’m here. No one knows.”
She saw Sadie and Amelia look at each other, helpless, defeated. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I wanted to save you.”
“You did, Mom.” Sadie lifted something above her. “You brought this.”
The gun! “Yes. It’s loaded. I made sure.”
She looked at Amelia again, reached up with her good arm, and touched her face. “Oh, baby, you’re so pretty. Look at you, my beautiful baby.”
Amelia touched her hand. “I’ve wanted to find you all these years. Not like this, though. I’m so sorry.”
“No, no. Don’t be sorry,” Sheila said. “You did right. It just went wrong.”
“My parents … do they know I’m missing?”
“Yes, baby. They’re on Tybee Island, sick with worry.”
Amelia wilted as tears filled her eyes. “Dear God, I hope I see them again.”
“Mom, how do you feel?” Sadie cut in. “Are you in pain?”
“Only a little,” she lied, “but we’re gonna be all right, girls. We’re gonna get through this. Your mama’s here now. I may be in bad shape, but I’ll be all right. God is with us, and I know He’s gonna take care of us. Look what He’s already done. You’re both alive, and He helped me find you. Now He’ll help somebody else find us.”
F
rom the bottom of the pit that held them prisoner, Sadie heard the sound of feet scrambling above them, the trap door being opened.
Sadie backed against the dirt wall and raised the gun above her head.
“Wait for him,” Amelia whispered. “He has to put the ladder down, or we’ll never get out.”
Sadie was shaking as she kept the gun trained on that hole.
“She dead yet?” Nate’s voice sang out above them, then he let out a blood-curdling laugh.
Sadie knew she had to bait him. “I think she’s still alive. You’ve got to help her. Please. We’ll do anything you say.”
“Like you have a choice.” He laughed again. The rope ladder fell in, swinging above her head.
She watched as he stepped onto it.
“Not yet,” Amelia whispered.
Sadie was shaking so hard that she thought she would drop the gun. Sweat trickled down her temples into her
eyes. Slowly, quietly, she cocked the pistol and put her finger over the trigger.
Nate took one step down, then a second, a third.
“Wait,” Amelia whispered again.
Sweat ran down Sadie’s forehead and into her eyes, and her heart threatened to beat right through her chest. He stopped on the fourth step, swinging on the ladder, and turned to look down at her.
“Now
, baby!” Sheila cried out.
Sadie squeezed her finger over the trigger, and the gun went off, its percussion so loud that it almost deafened her.