Taken (2 page)

All too soon, the bus pulled into the parking lot at Ralph's, a combination restaurant and grocery store on Elgin Street that doubled as the intercity bus station. I checked my watch. We had arrived right on schedule. Allison was the second to last person to get off the bus. I was the last person. A big part of me wanted to hide in the back, a stowaway on the return trip to the city. I wished I still had some friends back there that I could stay with, but I had been up here too long.

“I'd get one of my parents to drive you, except they aren't home,” Allison said. “But I can call Judd. He won't mind giving you a lift.”

Judd was Allison's older brother. Judd and Allison lived three doors down from Ralph's. I lived on the other side of town.

“I'll be fine,” I said. “Besides, after sitting on that bus for the last three hours, I need to stretch my legs. I'll walk.”

“Are you sure?” Allison said. I nodded. But she wouldn't let it go. “Maybe you should at least phone home first so your mom can look out for you,” she said.

“She's not home. She's at her book-club meeting. And Gregg's out on a run.” Thank God. I would have the house to myself, which was exactly how I liked it. “I'm going to go home and have a bubble bath.” Taking a nice long soak in the tub was one of my favorite things to do.

Allison still didn't look happy. “I'll walk with you,” she said. “When we get to your house, I'll call Judd and he can come and get me.”

See what I mean about Allison? She was willing to walk all the way across town with me just to make sure that I'd be safe. She was the best friend ever.

“You sound like my mom,” I said. “You worry too much. I'll be fine. I'll call you tomorrow. I promise.”

I walked down to the end of Elgin Street, turned up Elm Street and made a left on Poplar. I followed Poplar until I came to an open field. It was large and dark and mostly hidden from the view of the houses near it by a border of hedges and mature trees. Before we moved to town, the field had been part of a farm. Then the farmer sold his land to a developer, who built the subdivision where we lived and another subdivision after that. Nothing had been built on this field yet. It had stood empty for as long as I could remember—except for a couple of big For Sale signs. At this time of year, the field consisted mostly of weeds and tall grass. The town mowed it in the summer so it didn't look that bad and so kids could play softball or football. There was a row of trees at one end and some big clumpy bushes dotting it that flowered in spring. There were also a couple of paths cut through the weeds and the grass by all the people who took shortcuts through the field.

For the first time ever, I thought about taking the long way around. But my house was just on the other side. If I cut across the field like I always did, like all the kids on my street did when they went to school or into town, I would be home in less than half the time it would take to go the long way. Besides, I was tired and hungry, and my mom had said she was going to leave supper for me. It seemed like a no-brainer.

Still, I stood for a moment at the edge of the field, scanning it—just to be sure. I didn't see anyone. But one part of my brain said,
Maybe someone is hiding
behind a tree or a For Sale sign or in the bushes
. The other part of my brain said,
Get real, Steph, and get home
.

I thought about the first girl who had been taken and who was the only one they had found so far. I wondered exactly what had happened to her. Had a car pulled up alongside her, the driver maybe asking her for directions and then, when she got close enough, grabbing her and dragging her inside with him? Had she been dumb enough to hitchhike and get into a car with just a guy in it or maybe a couple of guys? Or had she been jumped? Had she been walking home, like I was, thinking about school or her friends or what she was going to do on the weekend, when all of a sudden someone had attacked her or knocked her out or…?

I told myself I was being ridiculous. Just because my mom thought there was some kind of boogeyman out there didn't mean it was true. I mean, seriously, what were the chances?

I started across the field. I admit it, I walked a little faster than usual. I also admit that I couldn't stop glancing back over my shoulder, which was something I didn't ordinarily do. As I walked, I felt a tingle at the back of my neck, like someone was staring at me, but when I turned around, there was no one there. Mom is definitely overreacting, I thought. Worse, her overreacting is contagious.

I was halfway across the field when someone grabbed me from behind.

My instinct was to spin around to see who it was, but an iron-like arm closed around my throat and a steely hand clamped itself over my mouth and nose. I felt cold all over, like the temperature around me had dropped to subarctic levels. I thought, This can't be happening to me. I struggled. I kicked.

I couldn't breathe. The hand over my mouth and nose was cutting off my air supply. My head started to spin. I had to get free before I passed out.

Suddenly the hand let go. I opened my mouth to scream, but the arm around my throat squeezed tighter. I reached behind me to claw at my assailant, desperate to get his arm off me. I tried to scratch his face or his neck or anything else I could reach. Then I felt a jab in my arm. The pain was short and sharp, like a bee sting. I felt numb all over.

TWO

M
y mom always said that some people wake up fast and some people wake up slowly. She said my dad's eyes used to pop open at the first sound of the alarm every morning, and he would immediately leap out of bed, ready to tackle the day. Not me. I always took my time. My mom said I was like that even when I was a baby. She said I would lie in my crib with my eyes closed, but she knew I was awake. She said I was gathering myself. She said she did the same thing. She liked to lie quietly in bed and gradually let the day seep into her bones.

That's what I did when I woke up. I lay in my bed with my eyes closed and let the day seep into my bones.

I thought about my dream. It had been so crazy. Allison was going to have a good laugh when I told her about it. She would probably say something like, “You make fun of everyone for overreacting, but if you ask me, your subconscious is as worried as everyone else is.” Allison was very big on the subconscious.

I took a deep breath and started to stretch.

That's when I realized something was wrong.

Very wrong.

I couldn't move my arms or legs.

I opened my eyes and peered blearily around. Instantly I felt sick to my stomach. No, I thought. No,
no
,
NO
!

I wasn't on my nice soft mattress between the crisp sheets on my bed. Instead, I was on the floor, and the carpet was missing. I tugged on my arms, but they still wouldn't move. At first I couldn't figure out what was wrong. My brain wasn't working properly. It felt heavy and wooly. My head ached. I had trouble focusing, and once I did, I couldn't think straight enough to absorb my surroundings. It took a few moments for it to sink in that not only was I not in my room, I wasn't even in my house. My heart started to race. All of a sudden I was gasping in air so fast that I felt faint. I was sure I was going to pass out. I squeezed my eyes shut—maybe I was in the middle of one of those dreams, you know, the ones where you dream that you wake up but really you're still asleep. I drew in a few breaths and lay quietly until I was sure I was wide awake.

I opened my eyes again, blinked and looked around. An icy feeling spread through my body, just like it had when Clark Adderly, the chief of police, came to our house and spoke to my mom in a soft voice while she sobbed on the sofa. I hadn't wanted to believe what had happened then, just like I didn't want to believe what I was seeing now. That same iciness that I had felt the night before crept into every part of my body, freezing me solid so that I could barely breathe.

I was in some kind of a cabin. It was small and grimy. The wood floor was bare and cold. So were the walls. They hadn't been painted. The only thing on them was a calendar hanging on a nail. It was from a hardware store. The edges were curled. It was ten years out of date.

Whose cabin was this? Where was it? What was I doing here?

And why couldn't I move?

Because I was tied up.

My wrists were bound tightly behind my back. My ankles were tied too and had been pulled back behind me. When I tried to move my legs, the rope around my wrists tightened. I realized that my wrists and ankles had been tied with the same rope, the way you'd tie up an animal so that it wouldn't be able to move. I couldn't stand. I couldn't even sit up.

Thought after thought exploded in my brain,
bang, bang, bang
, like a series of gunshots.

Thought: My mom had been right.

Thought: I hoped she had called the cops. I hoped they were looking for me.

Thought: I hoped she didn't think I ran away again. If she did, she'd have the cops looking in all the wrong places. They wouldn't find me until it was too late—assuming they ever found me.

Thought: Someone grabbed me and brought me here.

Thought: The two girls who disappeared must have felt the same panic that had gripped me and was squeezing me so hard I thought it would crush my heart.

Thought: Whoever took me and brought me to this place must be around here somewhere.

Thought: Maybe he—it's always a he when a girl is missing—was outside right now. Maybe he was reaching out with one hand to push the door open. Maybe he was about to step inside.

Thought: When he did, he was going to do to me what he did to those two girls.

Thought:
I'm going to die.

THREE

I
lay on the gritty wooden floor of the filthy shack, frozen with terror. For weeks I had been hearing about the two girls who had disappeared, but I had never in a million years thought that anything like that would ever happen to me.

But here I was, tied up, groggy, panic-stricken— and waiting. Waiting for whoever had taken me to return. Waiting for whatever had happened to the girl who had been found “not alive” to happen to me. Waiting for whatever had happened to the other girl to happen to me. And the whole time my brain kept screaming,
This can't be real! It just
can't be
.

But it was real.

I lay still, holding my breath and listening for any sound of movement outside the shack. But all I could hear was the hammering of my heart in my chest. What if he was on the other side of the door? What if his hand was on the knob and he was about to turn it?

I fought back tears. I told myself that this was no time to cry. It was the time to do something. I don't know what those other girls did when they were taken, but I knew what I was going to do: I was going to fight back. What choice did I have? What did I have to lose?

I forced myself to breathe. Breathe and think.

I listened again—and heard nothing except for the occasional call of a bird. Minutes ticked by. Maybe he wasn't out there after all. Maybe he had left me tied up here and had gone…to do what? To get supplies? I tried not to think what kind of supplies a man like that would want or need. Or maybe he had left because he had to cover his tracks. Maybe there were people who would notice if he disappeared all of a sudden. Maybe he was making preparations to get away from whatever his regular life was and to come back here, probably at nighttime. Bad things always happened at night, when it was dark.

I suddenly realized that I had no idea what time it was. Allison and I had gotten off the bus just after dark on Saturday, and I had been grabbed right after that. Sunlight filtered faintly through one of the shack's filthy windows. It was daytime, which meant that it had to be at least Sunday. But when on Sunday? Please let it be morning. Please.

Bit by bit it got dimmer inside the shack. It got colder too, and I started to shiver. It wasn't morning after all. It must be Sunday afternoon—probably late Sunday afternoon. Oh my god. If he was waiting until nightfall to return, he would be here soon.

Don't panic. Think. Panicking gets you nowhere.
If you think, you have a chance.

If it was Sunday night, my mom had definitely missed me. She definitely knew that something was wrong. And she had definitely called the police. That was all good. But then what? Had the police recruited volunteers to look for me? If they had, where were they looking? Where was I?

Minutes crept by, and still the man didn't return. It got gloomier inside the shack. I had to do something before it was too late.

I struggled with the ropes around my wrists and ankles, but they were too tight. My mouth was dry. My stomach rumbled. My head still felt like it was stuffed with cotton. But I couldn't let any of that distract me. I had to focus on one thing and one thing only—escape.

I looked around the shack. Judging from the layer of dust on the small cast-iron stove that stood against one wall, no one had been here recently. Cobwebs filled the corners below the ceiling and hung like lace from the two rickety shelves on the wall. Mouse droppings speckled the torn, stained mattress that lay crooked on top of a wooden sleeping platform behind me. There were more mouse droppings on the floor below.

My eyes went back to the shelves. One held a metal bowl, a cracked and grimy glass, and a couple of plates. I wondered if there was some cutlery somewhere. I wondered if there was a knife.

I didn't see one.

I studied every inch of the inside of the shack. It had been roughly built out of six-inch planks nailed to two-by-four uprights. It didn't appear to be insulated, which told me that whoever it belonged to used it primarily in the summer, although the stove might keep it warm enough in the spring and fall. Maybe it was a hunting cabin. I shuddered at the thought. Hunters have guns. Hunters like to kill.

Don't think about that
, I told myself sternly.
Think
about how to get out of here. Stay calm. Concentrate.