“Why?”
“Don’t know. I guess Ed thought he should have stopped him but he never told me for sure.”
“Do you know when this happened?”
Rita shook her head.
“Just that Ed was a teenager. About ten or twelve years ago, I figure.”
Nina spoke up.
“Do you know how the friend died?”
“Shot himself.”
“And you mentioned you didn’t know before your marriage, are you suggesting that the friend’s suicide was responsible for your divorce?”
“Oh, I’m not suggesting, I’m saying. Look, there’s a lot of things that go into a failed marriage but that particular cloud never seemed to lift. It was like he felt he didn’t deserve anything good to happen to him.”
“Do you have any idea where he might have gone?”
“Not a clue. Like I said, we don’t talk much, but he was a home-body. I can’t imagine anywhere he would want to take off to.”
Her words were getting more slurred and the glass was empty. The two detectives got up to leave.
“Mrs. Garland, thank you for your time. We won’t trouble you any longer.”
Rita Garland got up as well, but not to see them to the door. She walked over to a cabinet and took out a bottle. She was pouring a refill as Nina and Jason let themselves out.
Chapter 7
Donnie stopped behind the house and turned off the van. Getting out and sliding the side door open, he forced Chelsea to sit up and get out of the van.
She had stopped sobbing on the way to the farm and Donnie was relieved, he never liked hearing girls cry. He steered her up the back steps and into the house.
“Where are we? Where are you taking me?!”
“Where we are isn’t important.”
Donnie opened the door to the basement and removed the hood. He watched as she blinked repeatedly, trying adjust to the light.
“We’re going down some steps. Just take your time and I won’t let you fall.”
Her hands still cuffed behind her, the girl didn’t speak as she focused on taking one step at a time. Donnie held the gun to her back. When they made it to the bottom, he motioned towards the open door of the second cell and watched as the girls eyes grew wide with horror.
****
Chelsea tried to keep it together. It was all so unreal, being taken, walked down into this man’s basement and now he was motioning her towards a small door. When she didn’t move, he pushed her from behind with the butt of the gun and she stumbled into a small room. There was some sort of a blanket on the floor that had some chain coiled on it. Her blood ran cold and she spun around to face him, trying to get back out of the cell.
“Please don’t do this! Please let me go.”
He blocked her way.
“Sit down on the blanket.”
“No, please no.”
“NOW!”
She collapsed on the blanket. Her captor took the chain and wrapped it twice around her leg tightly. He ran a padlock through the end link and the one of links leading to the wall. It snapped shut and after testing it, he took her cuffs off.
Chelsea rubbed her wrists and tried not to cry as the door shut. She heard another padlock snap shut and then footsteps going upstairs. Everything went quiet.
Chelsea had to let her eyes adjust again, this time to darkness and realized she could hear breathing.
“Hello? Is someone there?”
“Hi.”
The voice startled her, she hadn’t even considered that someone else might be down there, and her heart pounded. She wasn’t alone.
“Who are you?”
“My name is Ed. You?”
“Chelsea.”
There was a brief moment of silence before he spoke again.
“What’s your last name?”
“Morris.”
“Oh.”
Chelsea scooted as close to the wall where the voice came from as she could manage.
“How long have you been here?”
“Two days, I think.”
“Why are we here? Do you know?”
“I asked him. He just said I would know soon enough.”
Chelsea heard the man scoot closer to the wall, his chain dragging on the floor, before he spoke.
“Do you know who he is?”
“Not a clue. I don’t remember ever seeing him before. Do you know him?”
The man on the other side of the wall sounded tired.
“No. I don’t know him either.”
The room returned to quiet. She scooted back to her blanket and tried to look for a weakness in the walls of the room. Everything looked solid. She tested the chain. She wasn’t going anywhere.
She resumed the praying she had started in the van.
****
Trudi had an uneasy feeling. It wasn’t like Chelsea to be late and her friend hadn’t answered her calls in two days.
Sitting at the counter was Mr. Perkins. He had asked, about every ten minutes, when Chelsea would be in.
“Miss Trudi, have you heard from Miss Chelsea?”
“Not yet, Mr. Perkins. I’m sure she’ll be along any time now. Do you need a refill?”
“Please, just a half cup.”
Trudi knew the drill just as well as Chelsea but for Mr. Perkins, only his favorite really made him happy. And truth was she wasn’t sure her friend would be along any minute. Something wasn’t right. She tried calling again.
“This is Chelsea; you know what to do….”
Trudi hung up. Her shift ended in a half hour and she had decided to go over to her friend’s house if she hadn’t shown up by then.
The manager, Mr. Chambers, came out of the back and signaled Trudi over.
“Where’s Chelsea? She’s over an hour late.”
“I don’t know, boss. I’m going over to her house after work. I’ll call and let you know what I find.”
“A ‘No call, No show’ is supposed to be instant termination. I don’t want to do that to one of my best girls. She better have a good reason.”
“I’m sure she does. I’ll have her call you when I get over there. I’m going right after my shift.”
****
Trudi got to her friend’s house around noon. Chelsea’s vehicle wasn’t there and mail was sticking out of the mailbox.
Trudi parked on the driveway and entered through the side door to the garage. When she got to the utility room door, she found it locked.
Chelsea had shown her where the spare key was and she opened the door to find the house dark. Something felt very wrong.
“Chelsea?!”
There was no answer, no sound at all. Mugsy, Chelsea’s cat, came around the corner.
“Hi, Mugsy.” She reached down and scratched him on the head. “Chelsea?!”
She stuck her head in the door, looking towards the kitchen. Nothing. She went in and walked through the house. The litter box in the kitchen was full and hadn’t been cleaned in days. The cat’s water was empty.
“Chelsea?!”
Convinced her friend wasn’t there; she took out her phone and called 911.
****
Jason and Nina had started first thing in the morning on the task of finding out everything they could on Ed Garland. They went to where he worked and to the golf club where he was to meet Jerry Baker. No one had seen the missing man.
Nina had managed to get a check on his debit card and credit card activity. Neither had been used in three days.
They arrived back at the station around 3:30 in the afternoon. Jason had one stop he wanted to make before briefing Lieutenant Banks.
“I’m going to see Doc Josie.”
Nina didn’t want to face Sarah Banks alone.
“Mind if I tag along?”