Chapter Twenty-Six

C onsidering that everyone in town knew Alasdair Crosby or knew of his shipping company, it wasn’t hard to find his warehouse at all. Olivia caught the sheriff on their way out of the sheriff’s office.

“Hey, Carter.” She paused long enough to fill him in. “We’re headed over there to check it out.”

“I’ll gather some backup,” he said, and was off like a bullet somewhere else in the building.

Olivia pushed her way outside, followed by Brock and made a beeline for her car. “I hope she’s still there.” Her desperate voice was barely a whisper.

What felt like an eternity later, Brock pulled the car into the parking lot of the warehouse. Sure enough, just like Josh had said, there was a dirt road that led to the back. Followed by the host of backup provided by Carter, Brock threw the car into park and jumped out at the same time that Olivia did. She threw a glance at the clock that read six forty-five, groaning inwardly at the time. How long had it been since Susanna was taken? The chance of her still being here was unlikely, but still, they had to try.

Olivia started for the door, but a rustling near the bushes out back by the dirt road magnetized her gaze to where a person took off running, relying on the darkness to shield her. She wasn’t clever enough to stay out of the streetlights lining the warehouse and Olivia caught a full glimpse of her face as she looked back at the gathering crowd.

“That’s Alana Fleming!” Olivia jolted.

Alana bolted a full-blown sprint out of sight.

“Don’t let her get away!” Olivia ran after her, quickly picking up her trail and hurrying around the other side of the warehouse. The lights did a good job of lighting her path and she assured herself that Brock was right behind her through his hurried footsteps that squished into the soggy ground behind hers. All those hours of running on the sand certainly paid off at this moment, especially since the ground was drunk with the rain that had soaked it an hour earlier.

Alana didn’t stop. With the ease and athleticism of an Olympian runner, she practically glided away from them. Olivia prided herself on keeping her body fit, using it for moments like this. All her senses narrowed in on chasing the teacher from the warehouse.

When Alana reached the end of the warehouse, she banked right and tore through the brush, where it seemed like a small trail had split the bushes that shrouded the back of the warehouse.

“She went right!” Olivia called to Brock, trusting that he saw her, too. She hurried her pace, ready for anything. She half expected Alana to be hiding out on the other side of the brush with a weapon ready to take her down, but she quickly caught sight of her hurrying left. She burst from the bushes, feeling a few small cuts slashing at her arms from the branches and didn’t give up. Alana was still several paces ahead and threw a look behind her now and again, but kept going.

The teacher obviously cared nothing for trespassing as she climbed one of the chain link fences that surrounded someone’s backyard and sailed over it with ease. Olivia was on it in seconds, feeling the cool of the metal against the palm of her hand and the tiny chain links digging into her palm as she used her hand to balance and hoisted herself up. It took her toes several digs to climb up the fence, especially considering how the moisture from earlier made it slippery, but she found her footing and sailed over it. The porch light flipped on and a Doberman snarled and barked from inside.

“FBI, freeze!” she yelled, both as a way to desperately try to get Alana to slow down, but also to let the owners know that she wasn’t just some random trespasser. It seemed to work. No one poked their heads out of the door, but she did see a face peering out of the corner of a shaded window before she jumped to the other side of the fence.

Alana didn’t slow down for any of the obstacles in her way. Her evasive tactics were nothing short of annoying as she tipped over a trash can for Olivia to jump over here, darted behind another grove of trees there. It was the grove of trees that got Olivia and she had to pause to look around before she spotted her on the other side, running through someone else’s backyard.

“FBI!” She yelled again, removing all excuse for the woman to say she’d never heard her. Alana plowed through the front yards of the residential houses that didn’t have a fence to keep unwanted guests out of their yards and kept running full speed ahead. Olivia panted to even out her breathing, focused only on the retreating teacher. If she wasn’t guilty of something, she wouldn’t be running .

Alana took a turn when she bolted across the street, resulting in several angry honks from the driver she ran out in front of. Olivia wasted no time plunging in after her, holding up her hand to apologize to the driver who waited for her like it was a crosswalk. Trusting Brock could hold his own across the road, she only cast a look behind her to see he’d done just that, and he was closer than she’d thought he was.

“Right behind you,” came his hurried assurance.

And they were right behind Alana. She led them on a merry chase through more back alleys until they spilled onto the narrow sidewalks that snaked through the historic downtown. Alana carved her way through the street that led between one large, towering brick building to her left and a white one with red gables and what looked like a bell tower to her right. “ Hey! ” and “ Watch it! ” followed after her as she danced around the people coming out of the buildings. She had to move in a little do-si-do around a few of them, nearly hitting them as she regained her footing and continued her sprint.

“Don’t let her out of our sight!” If only she’d stop running. How much energy did she have left after running this far? When Olivia zipped around the corner after her, there was another tipped-over trash can there to greet her. Her foot collided with it and she stumbled a bit, losing her balance but finding it just before she hit the pavement. “Watch out!”

“Are you all right?” Brock slowed, but Olivia waved him off. “Don’t worry, go after Alana!”

He wasted no time, breaking into a sprint as if seeing Olivia almost go down renewed his adrenaline. All around, people stopped to stare as he quickly regained the ground he’d lost. When Alana plowed into a man who had desperately tried to dodge her, she, too, lost her footing. She tumbled to the ground and Brock was on her in seconds. “FBI, hands where I can see them!”

Alana huffed a sigh and raised her hands. “Okay, okay, whatever.” She kept her eyes lowered to the sidewalk as Brock reached for her .

“Where’s Alasdair?” Brock demanded.

Olivia caught up with Alana and Brock, just in time to see a smug smile take over the woman’s face. The pit in Olivia’s stomach grew at the thought that she was proud of what she’d done! “You’ll never know.” Her head rocked from side to side. “You’re too late.”

Brock took her arms, hauling her up to her feet to face him. Alana didn’t make a move to try to run, knowing she’d been apprehended. “ Where ?” Brock thundered.

“Just tell us where Alasdair is,” Olivia tried, knowing that trying to extract the information from her would be worse than getting Josh to talk. Especially if she was in on it.

“You’re too late, I said!” Gone was the confident teacher and replaced with the cocky sidekick. It was clear that she thought of her little pairing with Alasdair as Bonnie and Clyde, and Alana was proud to be considered his partner in crime. Well, one of many, that is. Olivia wondered if she knew about Mila. “Alasdair is long gone. You will never see him or the girl again.”

“You’re under arrest,” Brock responded, done with her antics. Olivia huffed a sigh, trying to regain her breathing and cast a look around the area as if she expected Susanna to walk out of any one of these stores. Where could she be? Alana had led them on a wild goose chase, meanwhile, Alasdair was getting away with Susanna. They had to retrace their steps back to the warehouse.

The warehouse was wide open and filled with floodlights by the time Olivia and Brock were able to return. With Alana finally in custody, they had one suspect down, but the realization clawed at Olivia that there was a chance that Alana was right..: they’d never see Alasdair or Susanna again. Upon their arrival at the warehouse, they were approached by Sheriff Carter, whose face carried the distress of witnessing something deeply disturbing.

“You guys are going to want to see this.” His low voice betrayed how grave the situation was.

Olivia and Brock exchanged a look, each bracing themselves for what they were about to see. They fell into step behind Carter, who led them around the back of the warehouse where the dirt road traveled.

“We followed the trail of where that kid, Josh, said he found the drugs.” He sighed. “There was a hidden room back there that no one knew about. Everyone always thought it was a spare door that no one used because of how old it was. The spare door was boarded up on both sides, so the only way to get in and out was through this door.” He gestured to the outside door. “Padlocked and chained. No one thought to question the padlock and chain, thinking that it was just an empty room that no one needed.”

“But it’s not,” Olivia finished for him.

“Right.”

The door he spoke of was caked with brown around the edges, and screeched a terrible groan when it opened. An odd scent of body odor mixed with some kind of chemical-filled air. Olivia stepped in, reaching for Brock’s hand, and a quick squeeze of his in return assured her that he was behind her. She let him go just as Carter hit the lights. Olivia froze at the sight. How could this be, right under the nose of the small, seemingly innocent town of Cape Fremont?

In a room slightly bigger than an office were rows and rows of beds, white sheets tousled, none of them made. Gray bars made up the headrests, and attached to each were a hanging pair of handcuffs. That wasn’t all. Between the beds were IV tubes, and scattered all over the floor were needles that could only be used for one thing. All of the beds were empty, and the sheets lying strewn across the floor and the scattered needles told Olivia that Josh really had accidentally stumbled across something he wasn’t supposed to. Someone had left in a hurry and left a scattered mess of DNA and drug paraphernalia behind.

Olivia walked up to the bed closest to the door, placing her hand on the pillow. Damp, to the touch. With sweat, maybe?

“She warned him,” she murmured to Brock before turning to set a gaze ablaze with rage on him. “Alana. She warned him that we were onto him, and he got the teens out.”

Brock sighed as he shook his head. Even with the things they saw, cases like this never ceased to strike them both with horror at the thought of what one human being would do to another. Kids. Sweet girls like Susanna. “We searched every inch of that ship. Even looked in the containers. Nothing. Where else would they be?”

“Maybe we crossed paths with them.” Olivia hated the hope in her own voice, even though she clung to it. They couldn’t be too late. They couldn’t be. They were so close. “Or maybe they were moved somewhere else? Another location, perhaps?”

“We can only start looking.” Brock wasn’t giving up hope and started to move out of the room where the captives were obviously kept as slaves. “In the meantime, let’s put out an APB on the red sports car Alasdair drives. It’s a pretty obvious-looking vehicle, so we might get lucky.”

“It’s made to draw the eye.” Olivia agreed, trailing Brock out of the room. Brock was already digging his phone out and making the call. “I’ll take the perimeter.” Maybe she could find some useful tire tracks, maybe some blood drops, maybe a camera? Right. Like Alasdair would be that stupid.

Brock hung up, having put out the BOLO for the red sports car as well as any other car Alasdair owned, and joined her in her search. Olivia spotted all she needed for evidence right away as her eyes caught on a bright color that wasn’t supposed to be there. The warehouse was a dull tan color, and the side that faced this back alley and forestry beyond hadn’t been power washed in decades. So the bright pink and yellow swirl, set against a dark blue, caught her attention right away. Tossed into one of the bushes, the colors screamed “out of place.” Olivia was drawn toward the bright colors, but once she cleared the bushes enough to see, she stopped where she was. “Brock... come here and take a look at this.”

Brock rustled to her side to join her, stopping short at the scene just as Olivia had. The bright blue, pink, and yellow colors were part of a surfboard. Not just any surfboard. The same one that they had seen Susanna clutch under her arm at her side, time and time again. It was discarded, thrown to the side like common trash. Worse than that.

It was broken.