“This isn’t your fault, Rayna. I came willingly.”
A sigh, and then, “Well, Rob warned us.”
“And I’m sure he’ll make it a point to remind us of that, too.”
“If I ever see him again.”
“Listen, if there’s anything I learned from my last similar experience, it’s don’t give up. Panic is acceptable. Surrender is not.”
She laughed softly. “No, neither one of us is the kind to give up.”
“Right.” I took a deep breath. “So, after you tell me how we got in here, maybe we can figure a way to get out of here.”
“I wish I knew.” I felt her shrug. “One minute I was walking down the side of the barn looking for a way in, and the next thing I know, something hit me between my shoulder blades, my body started to twitch, and I passed out. I’m thinking it might have been some kind of stun gun.”
I nodded, realized she couldn’t see me in the dark, and said, “That sounds logical. If hitting people with stun guns can be considered logical. Of course, whoever did this only had to wait a couple of minutes and I’m sure I’d have obligingly knocked myself out and saved them the trouble. There are a lot of unexpected things on barn floors.”
“Any idea who is behind this?”
“Most likely the same person who shot Race, strangled Naomi, put Miranda into a coma, and tried to run us off the road. I don’t suppose you caught a glimpse of who stunned you, or heard him speak?”
“No. I can’t even tell you if it was man or a woman.” Rayna paused, then added, “but if it was a woman, it must be a fairly strong woman.”
“You know, I thought I had it figured out. I was sure Heather was the one who’s gone on a homicidal marathon.”
“Heather?”
“Brandon Caldwell’s girlfriend from Ole Miss. She’s Miss Tri-athlete and goes to the gym to train. I saw her jogging last night and gave her a ride.”
“Why would she want to kill Race and Naomi? Did she even know them?”
“I have no idea. But remember at the wake, when Ronny said someone had been leaving notes on Race’s truck, and she’d followed him from Biloxi, to Oxford, and to Holly Springs? Heather fits that description pretty well. Better even than Rose Allgood.”
“My money was on Rose,” said Rayna.
“And Bitty’s money is on Trina Madewell. Which brings us to the fact we’re on the Madewell property where we found the black truck that tried to run us off the road, and now we’ve been attacked and stuck in a cellar. That doesn’t look good for either of the Madewell sisters.”
“What I’m wondering now is, why are we still alive?”
That question put a knot in my knickers, and I thought about it for a minute. Why indeed? So far the killer or killers had been successful in murder and near-murder. Why leave us alive?
Finally I said slowly, “Well, there are a couple of explanations I can come up with for us still being here. None of them are especially pleasant. Which do you want first?”
“Surprise me.”
“Okay. Here are my theories. The best situation would be if the killer has no intention of finishing us off, but intends to leave us here while she gets out of town. That’s the best because it means we aren’t facing sudden death, but the downside is, what if no one finds us?”
“A cheery thought,” Rayna said glumly. “Next?”
“Next. . . maybe the killer intends to come back and finish us off.”
After a deep silence, she said, “Well, that’s pretty brutal.”
“Yes. We can hope for the first theory to be correct.”
“Why leave us alive, though? If the killer meant to do us in, wouldn’t she have just done it already?”
“Not necessarily,” I said. “What if the killer ran out of time? Even Trina or Trisha Madewell wouldn’t want anyone up at the house or in one of the cottages to hear a gun.”
“In other words, we need to find a way out of here pretty damn quick.”
“Yep. No point in waiting around to find out what our killer has in mind. Any idea how deep we are?”
“I’d say about ten feet down. I think there must have been a ladder at one time, but all I’ve been able to feel are rotting pieces of wood. And slugs.”
“Eww.” I thought about it, and then asked, “How tall are you?”
“About five seven. That’s what’s on my driver’s license. Why?”
“I’m five nine. You can stand on my shoulders and see if you’re able to reach the trapdoor or whatever’s up there.”
“I don’t know . . . you think that will work?”
“I think we have to try something, whether it works or not. If it doesn’t work, we can think of something else. I thought about hollering, but—”
“That may bring the killer back to finish the job,” Rayna finished my thought. “I get it. Okay. This would be a lot easier if we could see each other.”
“Then again, if I look like I feel, it’s probably best we can’t see. I’m sure I look quite terrifying.”
Rayna gave a shaky little laugh. “All right. Here goes.”
We both managed to get to our feet, but it took a couple minutes to feel our way around the cellar. It felt more like a shaft of some kind instead of a root cellar or proper cellar. It occurred to me that I’d spent far too much of my time in deep, dark holes since I’d come back to Holly Springs. I should really do something about that. Just as soon as we got out of here, I would turn over a new leaf.
After a few tries at boosting Rayna up toward the top, we figured out it’d be a lot easier if she just climbed me like a tree and stood on my shoulders.
“Boots off first, please,” I said, and Rayna mumbled something about already having lost one of them, but I heard her pulling at the leather laces of the other.
“Ready,” she said, and I turned and braced myself against the damp wall. It was cool to the touch and slightly slimy, and I didn’t even want to guess at what might be on the blasted thing.
Rayna felt her way up my back. Her hands cupped my shoulders, pressed down at the same time as she dug her toes into my braced legs, then she clambered up me like a monkey. She’s heavier than she looks. I think I said something like “Oof!” a couple times, but not loud enough for her to hear.
In my younger years, we girls used to play cheerleader a lot. Some of us actually were cheerleaders, but the rest of us just liked learning the steps of their dances and how to form human pyramids. So my years as a pyramid base helped out in a time of need. Go figure. Who would have thought it?
Once I got my balance pretty good, I held on to Rayna's feet and cautiously took a step away from the wall. I felt her wobble, and once she gasped and jerked, and I think had to brace herself against the wall. We slowly, slowly, got to where she thought the top door should be. My muscles strained, and the weight on my shoulders got heavier by the second, it seemed. I had my knees locked, and hoped they didn’t give way. If they did, she would drop like a sack of wet sand.
“Steady now,” she whispered. “I think I’ve got it . . . right here . . . there’s some kind of latch—wait. I have it . . . I think. Damn! Splinters.”
A crack of light suddenly pierced the darkness. If I hadn’t been holding so tight to Rayna I would have clapped my hands in glee. Then it disappeared.
“Damn . . . thing is . . . heavy,” Rayna panted. I heard her scrabbling at the wooden door again, and again a thin spear of light briefly illuminated the blackness. This time the door stayed open long enough for us to catch a glimpse of barn walls.
“We need to prop it open with something,” I said, and she agreed.
“Let me down. I’ll use some of those ladder pieces.”
That sounded good. My shoulders were really aching.
She half climbed, half jumped down, and we both slid down the wall to sit on the floor for a few minutes, resting and thinking.
“I’ve got some wood pieces here that might be strong enough to prop it open,” she said finally, and we got to our feet.
We repeated the entire thing again, a bit faster this time since we’d had already done it once. I had to hold one of the wood pieces in a hand braced against the wall so she could get up on my shoulders without banging me in the head with it.
This time the light through the cracked opening was a lot dimmer. I had no idea how long we’d been in this hole, but it must be close to dark now. Rayna stuck the first piece of wood into the crack to hold the door open, then took the other from my hand to use it, too.
“See anything?” I asked.
“Walls. Rafters. The undercarriage of a car . . . no, truck. Damn. I think we’re in a hole under that black truck!”
It seemed impossible. How had someone gotten us under the truck without moving it? Or had they moved it after tossing us down here like garbage?
Rayna came down again, and we thought for a few minutes about what to do next. If we were under the truck, getting out would be impossible. I didn’t see how we could manage it without getting the door completely open.
“Didn’t Rob say he knew where the truck was?” I asked. “If he does, then maybe he has an eye on it right now.”
“He didn’t have an eye on it earlier—Trinket! The Jeep! Rob’s Jeep is out on the road, and if someone recognizes it and wonders why it’s there, or if there’s been trouble of some kind, then they’ll call the police. Don’t you think?”
“It’s possible, I guess.” I slumped against the wall, dispirited and out of ideas. “It’s also possible that whoever stuck us in here has moved it somewhere.”
“Oh. Well. At least we have a little bit of light in here,” Rayna said.
“Not for long. People must miss us soon, you know. I was supposed to pick up Brownie at the vet’s, then we were going to dinner at Kit’s, and I know my mother is probably fit to be tied that Brownie got left. She’ll be ringing phones all over Marshall County before long, if she hasn’t already.”
“Who knows when Rob will realize I’m missing,” Rayna said, sounding tired. “I think he went over to Leflore County to check up on a claimant or something. Of course, he could be home by now and irritated that he can’t find me. The animals are probably all over him wanting their dinner.” She sniffled. “And he doesn’t even know that Merlin isn’t eating like he should, and Jinx has to have his pills tonight or his allergies will come back . . .”
Time passed in silence, each of us drowning in self-pity. The light through the crack faded until it was gone and we were in almost total darkness. I figured there had to be a light on in the barn somewhere, or it would be pitch black again. Maybe the killer left it on for later. That would mean he or she meant to return tonight. It was a scary thought. No. It was a
terrifying
thought.
“Rayna?” I said after a while had gone by. “Are you awake?”
“Afraid so.”
“Don’t you think the police should have already checked this barn? I mean, after we were almost run down within minutes of leaving here, they should have at least come out here to look around.”
“Maybe they did. Maybe the truck wasn’t here then. Maybe the driver was clever enough to hide it somewhere else, figuring on bringing it back here after the police had already searched the barn.”
“Yeah. I guess that sounds reasonable. But still . . . that’s taking a terrible chance. I talked to Rob earlier and he was going to tell me about the truck, but we got sidetracked and he never did.”
“Knowing Rob, that was by design and not chance. He’s devious that way. It comes with his job description.” Her feet scuffed across the floor, and I felt her shiver. “I sure do miss his devious little self.”
I scooted closer. As stuffy and close as it was in the hole, at least there were no mosquitoes. “Rayna, I’ve been thinking . . . we need to have a plan when the killer comes back to . . . to get us.”
“Are you kidding? It will be like shooting ducks in a barrel. What can we do?”
“If Trina and Trisha are the killers, and we assume they must be, one or the other or both of them, then they won’t want our bodies to be found here, will they? It doesn’t make sense. They could always claim they were being blamed by someone else, but I don’t think they’d get away with it. So they’ll have to hide our . . . our bodies somewhere else.”
“What are you getting at?”
“Just this—I doubt either or both of them could easily carry around the dead weight of corpses. Hang with me a minute,” I added quickly when she made a distressed sound. “So they’ll probably take us to wherever it is they plan to kill us. I think we can take them.”
“You mean you and me against Trina and Trisha. Hm. I like it. Yes, I think you’re right, Trinket. For one thing, we’re in better shape. Yes, we are. For another thing, we have desperation on our side.”
That was true enough. I nodded, then I realized she couldn’t see me.
“Okay, I’ll take Trina because she’s the biggest and I’m the biggest, and you go for Trisha. Give it everything you’ve got.”
“How do you think they’ll get us out of here? Should we come out fighting or wait?”
“Probably a ladder of some kind. We’ll wait until we’re out of this hole and can move around. We’ll have to distract them somehow.”
“What if it’s not the Madewell sisters?”
“Then it will be Rose Allgood and I
know
we can take her. Or Heather Lightner, and that will be two against one.”
“And if it turns out to be a man?”
“There’s no man on our suspect list.”
“That doesn’t mean there can’t be one.”
I had to admit that was true. “But it’s not very likely,” I added. “And I hope not, because we’d need a weapon, and we don’t have anything but rotting wood scraps.”
“And my camera.”
“Your camera—Rayna, that’s perfect! Does it have a flash?”
“Of course it does.”
“That’s what we’ll do, then. When we get out of this hole and they aren’t expecting it, pop your flash right in one of their eyes. Even if you only startle one of them, it will give us an advantage. Think you can do it?”
“Sure. And if nothing else, they’ll have lovely photos as keepsake souvenirs of their murderous spree.”
Despite the stuffy heat in the hole, I shivered. That might be a bit too close to the truth for my liking.
****
It must have been way past midnight when we heard noises in the barn. Rayna and I had several contingency plans worked out for all possibilities.
Except there were two killers, and one of them was a man. That blew all my theories to the moon, and worse—it made it even more difficult to implement our escape plans.