“Did you go down there?”
“No.”
“Then how do you know about it?”
She had kept her responses to a minimum. Now she was forced to explain. “I saw the entrance. And Angela told me about it. There’s a room at the end of the tunnel—maybe like a bomb shelter. It was damp and dirty.”
“I’d like to see.”
She grabbed his arm. “No. Stay out of there.”
“Why?”
She gulped. “That’s where Angela woke up—after, you know.”
“Okay.”
“Please, can’t we leave? You’re not going to find anything after ten years.”
***
Max could see the tension in Olivia’s features and knew she wanted to get out of this place, but now that they were here, he needed to spend a few more minutes checking it out. “Maybe not.”
Or should he just give it up? He was torn. He wanted to see the scene of the crime for himself, but he could tell that Olivia loathed the idea of going inside, particularly into an underground space. And he couldn’t leave her out here, not in this isolated location where he wouldn’t be able to get to her quickly if something happened.
He decided on a compromise.
“We’ll go inside, and you can wait for me in the main room.”
“Max, please.”
“I need to understand this place to understand the dynamics of what happened back then.”
“Coming here scares me.”
“Why?”
“Okay, maybe it’s just a reaction to the past.”
“Then let’s get this over with and get out of here.”
He held the piece of siding up, and she got down on her knees and crawled inside. He switched on the small but powerful flashlight he carried with him and followed her in. She had moved to one wall, pressing her back against the rough siding as he shone his light around the room, which was about fourteen by fourteen. The floor was made of rough planks, and as he shone the light over it, he saw where a section of the wood had been cut. Striding over, he lifted it up and saw a ladder leading down and a passageway leading away from the house.
“Satisfied?” she asked.
“Not until I go down.”
She put a hand on his arm. “Don’t.”
“Why not?”
“It’s an old tunnel. It could collapse.”
“If I think so, I’ll get out. And I’ll be quick.”
He climbed down the ladder and found himself in a passage with a dirt floor and walls—probably not safe. But at least he could stand up if he bent over slightly. He felt like the walls were closing in around him, but now that he was down here, he wasn’t going back without seeing what there was to see.
He shined his light down the passageway and saw an open space. Following the light, he stepped into a small room, no bigger than six by eight, he estimated. Someone had floored it with strips of plywood and also laid the same material over the presumably dirt walls. The ceiling was just dirt, and the room exuded a moldy smell, since it was underground and lacked ventilation. In one corner was a bare mattress with a blanket. There were no other furnishings and no sign that anyone had been here recently.
He picked up the mattress and looked under, seeing nothing but the plywood floor. But when he moved it away from the wall, he found a wrapper from a package of peanut butter and cheese crackers. Was it ten years old, or had someone been down here more recently? The place gave him the creeps. You could use it for a cell, if you put something heavy over the trapdoor. Or maybe there was a way to block off this end of the tunnel. And then what? You’d have to give your captive a portable potty and some food. He was thinking about that when the sound of his name reached him from above.
“Max! Are you okay?”
“Yes,” he answered.
“Come up.”
Olivia was calling him in a voice that bordered on panic, which gave him an excuse to get out of a confined space he didn’t much like. He turned and made his way back down the tunnel, then up the ladder.
Olivia was standing as she had outside, her body rigid and her arms folded across her chest, her hands gripping her shoulders—a statue carved in misery.
Hoping to jar her out of it, he said, “Let’s go get a pizza.”
“What?”
“After taking me up here, you deserve a treat.”
She snorted, then asked, “What did you find?”
“Not much. I’ll tell you when we get outside.”
He stepped through the opening into the sunshine, then turned to help Olivia out. When he straightened and turned again, he went stock-still.
A man had apparently been waiting for them to come out of the cabin. As he stepped from behind a tree, Max saw that he was holding a gun pointed at them.