Stolen(16)

Please let Dr. Duncan be right.

Maybe if she explored the area around the cabin, she’d recognize a landmark, or a sign on the trail.

But first, she had to get warm.

She shook out her hands, closed her eyes, then opened them again. With sharp vision, no longer tunneled from fear, she prowled systematically around the cabin, though there was little to take stock of. Perhaps cabin was too generous a term. This was really more of a hut.

All one room.

A charred, stone fireplace.

No indoor plumbing.

A bunk bed.

Table and chair . . . and, this was weird . . . a throw rug. What was a rug doing in a bare bones place like this?

Bending forward, she peeked beneath the table and saw little bottles scattered across the frayed rug. After collecting them, she placed them on the table for inspection. There were four amber pill bottles. All of them empty. All of them prescribed to Laura Chaucer. She recognized the names of the medicines—antidepressants and sleeping pills she hadn’t taken in years.

The same ones that, in the past, had caused her hallucinations.

The same ones prescribed by, and then discontinued by, Dr. Webber.

Her hands began to shake. If she’d taken all these pills, or if they’d been fed to her, then she should be dead.

That had to have been a lethal dose.

It didn’t add up until her gaze travelled to the dried puke on the floor. As she’d lain unconscious, she’d purged her stomach contents, and in all likelihood that had saved her life. And now that her body was free of the poison, she was growing stronger by the minute.

But . . . she could easily have choked on her vomit.

She shuddered.

He’d given her a lethal dose of pills and left her in the wilderness to die.

But why not finish her off with the knife?

Had he wanted it to seem like she’d done this to herself?

A sob welled in her chest.

It did seem like she’d done it to herself.

Maybe she had.

Maybe she was the monster.

No!

She lifted her hand and then, quite deliberately, slapped herself hard on the cheek. Feeling sorry for herself was useless . . . and letting him get in her head was dangerous.

You didn’t do this.

And you didn’t die.

You survived.

Now get over it!

Turning her attention back to the rug, she jerked it away and drew in a quick breath. The rug that didn’t make sense suddenly did.

It’d been used to cover a trap door!

She dragged the table out of the way and heaved the trap door open, releasing a flood of dust into the room. A ladder, on which she counted seven rungs, led down to a small cellar. More of a storage closet really. She crept down, her heart climbing higher in her throat with each step. The space was small and dim. Once her eyes accommodated to the low light, she paced off the area. Six feet wide. Another six feet long. Shoved against one end of the cellar, stood a trunk.

Just the right size to hide a body.

The thought made her skin crawl, and she retreated to the opposite wall.

Don’t be a ninny.

Of course there could be a corpse concealed inside, but far more likely, this trunk would contain supplies. And the benefit of finding supplies was well worth the risk, no matter how terrifying, of discovering a dead body.

With tiny, reluctant steps, she approached the trunk, then on a deep inhale reached out and touched the lid. Squeezing her eyes closed, she tugged it up. The hinges creaked. The space, already musty, now reeked of mothballs.

On three.

One . . . two . . . she opened her eyes.

And her jaw fell open.

She crouched down, and like a dog frantically burrowing under a fence to make his break for freedom, dug into the trunk, sending the contents flying over her shoulder.

Snow pants. A hooded jacket. Blankets. More clothes.

She came across waterproof matches, and her heart thudded in her chest. Once the trunk was finally empty, she rocked back on her knees and began sorting through all the loot: pots and pans, packets of freeze-dried food, a camel pack, and more bottles she could use to store water. She checked the expiration on the food packets. They were several years past, but she didn’t care. She needed nourishment.

What more could she possibly ask for?

And then, tears began to stream down her face. Behind the trunk, she spied a pair of hiking boots—a bounty worth more than gold. She could hardly contain her gratitude. She pulled her knees to her chest, basking in the realization that she had everything she needed to prepare herself for the dangerous journey home. And home was where she longed to go. To a mother and father whose only crime was loving her too much, trying too hard keep her safe from the evil in the world.

And there was evil.

All around her.

It’d always been with her.

The strangest idea occurred to her, then.

That she was safer here.

Alone in the woods.