But she could not give up.
She craned her head left, looking for something that could help her. From what she could make out in the dim light, there was nothing of use. She then twisted her head as far right as she could, spying the outline of what appeared to be an old, cast-iron potbelly stove. A long flue rose from its rotund furnace, heading up toward the roof. She could make out a small crack of light around the seam where the flue collar penetrated the ceiling.
Mustering all her remaining strength, she pushed down on the balls of her feet and rocked the chair slightly. Although it was only a small movement, it was a victory of sorts for her. It was a sign that she had control over something in this seemingly hopeless situation. She pushed and pulled her body backward, tilting the chair a couple of inches onto its hind legs before it leaned forward again, slapping back down to the ground.
If she could only generate enough momentum to create a fulcrum with the rear legs, she could smash the brittle wood against the stove. She lifted the seat again with the balls of her feet and forcefully threw her torso back. The chair tilted and she felt the center of gravity shift.
With the air just about gone from her lungs, she was heading backward, bracing as best she could for the impact.
26
Hung Jin walked into the Cybercafé wearing medium-size, metal-rimmed glasses, a short black beard, and a nondescript navy blue Nike ball cap. He sat down at one of the computer terminals, ordered a double espresso, and logged on to the Internet.
When he had first received word that Harper Payne was in Colorado, all efforts were diverted to the grand snow-covered state. Now, as his anxious fingers played across the keyboard, he hoped to find messages of success from his colleagues. He entered the private chat room he had set up months ago as a means of secure communication and read through the posted messages. He gulped a mouthful of steaming liquid and resisted the overwhelming urge to smash the monitor in front of him.
His men had thus far turned up nothing.
It was now their appointed time to make contact and talk live amongst themselves — in code, of course. After identifying himself using predetermined phrases and receiving the proper counter responses, Hung Jin relayed the information Lauren Chambers had provided a short time ago. His comrades’ replies took time to decode, further testing his patience.
But encrypted messages or not, their conclusion was clear: Lauren Chambers’s story was not valid. Excluding the possibility that Harper Payne had been buried by an avalanche — and there were no reports over the past several days of one having occurred — they insisted they had covered the most likely areas anyone could go cross-country skiing. No one they had visited had seen a male matching the photo they had shown around. None of the resorts or lodges had any record of him having checked in. There was no evidence of a male matching Payne’s description in any of the local hospitals. No cars had been rented in the name of Michael Chambers. And, perhaps the most telling fact of all, Harper Payne had never been a member of a fraternity while attending MIT.
Regardless of what Lauren Chambers had told her captor under duress, Hung Jin’s men could not confirm that any of the information she had given him was true. He directed them to continue their search for Payne. He would provide further instructions shortly.
In Hung Jin’s court of law — which was governed by his own warped sense of justice — the sentence for lying or withholding key information was death. Lauren Chambers was doing just that. Either one, it didn’t matter. As soon as he returned to the cabin, he would extract the truth from her. If Payne did not go to Colorado to go skiing, then he went there to hide. If Lauren Chambers knew where he was, she would’ve been smart to give it up sooner, rather than later. It would have been less painful for her that way.
Hung Jin swallowed the remainder of the hot espresso in two gulps, then crushed the cardboard cup in his hand. He logged off and left an average tip for the waitress. Above all else, he did not want to stand out in any manner. On the slight chance law enforcement came snooping, he had covered his fingertips with an invisible polyurethane coating. He wanted no record, either physical or otherwise, that he was ever there.
He left the cafe and marched through the snow toward his Lincoln Navigator, thinking of Lauren Chambers, tied up in the cabin, weak and out of her mind with fear.
He couldn’t wait to see her again.
27
In Lauren’s mind, the chair was moving backward with all the acceleration of a tortoise leaving the starting line. In reality, it tipped over quite rapidly. With a thud, everything seemed to impact with the potbelly stove simultaneously: her head smashed against the flue and the seat back struck the main compartment.
The chair’s spindly wooden slats split with a loud snap.
In a heap, Lauren fell to the ground on her left side, momentarily stunned from the blow to her head. Aware of the noise her fall must have made, she immediately tried to free her hands, which were still securely fastened to the chair’s individual slats. Finding this more difficult than she had anticipated, Lauren refocused her efforts on the ropes binding her legs.
She grimaced in pain as she slid her bloody right ankle along the shaft of the chair leg until it slipped off the end. She dropped her head back to the floor for a second, savoring the rare moment of triumph while she rested and gathered her strength. But she knew she did not have much time. She went back to work, quickly freeing her left ankle with her right foot.
With both feet free, she rolled onto her knees and tried to lift her torso. But the center of gravity was all wrong, and with her hands still bound behind her, she was unable to gain the necessary leverage to pull her body up off the ground.
Just then, the unmistakable thump of a car door slamming pounded against her ears.
“Shit!”
Still struggling to lift her body, she remembered the stories she had heard as a teenager of the frantic woman who had lifted a car to save her child trapped beneath the wreck. Lauren needed to summon such strength within herself. Lying on her left side, she pressed her head into the sand-covered wood floor and pulled with everything she had left.
“Ahhh!” she yelled, a deep, guttural groan that helped focus her mind. She pried and yanked until suddenly her right arm popped free of the chair’s splintered back. Although her wrist was still fastened to one of the broken slats, she was able to use her hand to push against the floor as she pivoted on her head.
She lifted her torso and sat upright, then brought her left hand to the front of her body. Seconds later, she maneuvered the wrist bindings off the slats, completely freeing herself of the encumbrance of the wood chair.
She jumped to her feet — and almost ended up flat on her back. Her low blood pressure, combined with the lack of food, sent her head spinning. She threw her arms out to balance herself. As the dizziness cleared, she heard crunching in the snow outside the cabin. She darted toward the front door, where Hung Jin had left her Colt. She grabbed the weapon and brought the gun up, only to remember it was empty. But Hung Jin had only used one of the rounds; the rest he had dumped onto the ground. She scampered across the floor, her numb fingertips frantically coursing over the rough wood, searching for just one bullet.