Page 73 of The Sweet Spot
“Chris, look at this!” Ricky says.
I join him where he’s staring down at the dirty barn floor. There are spots of oil on the ground, and a tan canvas tarp is lying in a heap a couple of feet away. There’s a toolkit on a wooden bench, and next to that is a flat tire propped against the barn wall.
“That’s an all-terrain vehicle tire,” Jace says. He crouches down beside it and runs his fingers between the treads. “See how thick the treads are? How chunky the tire is? See these deep grooves and the wide spacing? What if he moved her onto an ATV and took off with her?”
“Where? Into the woods?”
“I bet if the ground is soft enough, we’ll find tracks on a nearby trail.”
“But this property is huge,” I say. “It would take days or weeks to search all of it. We need more boots on the ground.” I call Hannah McIntyre and catch her up to speed. “I need the SAR team out here ASAP.”
“You got it,” Hannah says. “I’ll put out a call.”
“Make sure you bring Scout. He found Rosie. He can find Jennie, too.”
Chapter 28 – Jennie
My wrists and ankles are hurting me, feeling like they’re rubbed raw. My mouth is dry like a desert, and my throat feels raw. It hurts to swallow. I can barely move. There’s a sleeping mask on my face, and I can’t see anything. It’s pitch black.
I turn my head to the side, and suddenly I can see a thin strip of light. I move my aching head from side to side, knocking the mask askew, until I can see enough to determine where I am.
Log walls. A stone hearth. A woodstove.A cabin!
A sofa and two chairs face the fireplace. There’s a small kitchen in one corner of the room, and I’m lying on a large four-poster bed, my limbs secured to the posts with ropes. There’s a large head of a buck hanging like a trophy over the fireplace mantel.
I know this place. I’ve been here before. But my mind is spinning, and I can’t think.
My left wrist is rubbed raw where the rope is tied too tight. There’s dried blood on my wrist and on the rope. The same is true for my other wrist.
I take stock of the fact my clothes are still on—blue jeans and my pinkJennie’s DinerT-shirt. I’ve still got my white socks on. The only things missing are my sneakers. At least I can be grateful I’m still dressed.
Suddenly, the wooden door swings inward, and a man walks inside carrying an armload of split wood. “Oh, good,” he says. “You’re awake.”
David.
“Where am I?”
“You don’t remember this place? We spent some nights out here, babe. Surely you remember that bed.” He smirks like it’s an inside joke.
I think back to when we were married. His family has an old hunting cabin out in the woods, at least a good twenty-minute hike from the house.
“David, what have you done?” I’m horrified that he’d do something this crazy. “Kidnapping—is—a felony. You’re going—to jail—for a long time.” My throat feels like it’s filled with glass shards.
He drops his armload of wood beside an iron rack, squats down, and starts adding the logs neatly to the existing stack. “I did what I had to do, Jennie-bean.”
“Don’t—call me—that.”
“Come on, Jennie. What did you expect me to do? You wouldn’t talk to me. You wouldn’t listen. Then you went and got that asinine restraining order. It was the cop’s idea, wasn’t it? That smug bastard! Did you really think a restraining order could keep us apart?”
“Yes. That’s what they’re intended for.”
He calmly finishes adding the new wood to the rack. Then he stands, brushes his hands off on his blue jeans, and then walks toward me.
I try to move away when he sits on the side of the bed, but the ropes don’t have much give.
He reaches out, moving slowly, and lays his hand on my belly. “Don’t be afraid of me, baby. You know I’d never hurt you.”
“What do you call this?” I ask, my voice rising. “You drugged me, kidnapped me, and dragged me out here to the middle of nowhere. How is this not hurting me?”
