Deep Hurt - Eva Hudson Page 0,99

clear to everyone Kyle Foster had nothing to do with it.”

Gurley reluctantly shoved the gun back into his waistband. “You said yourself he sounded like a desperate man. You can’t go in there unarmed.”

“That’s exactly what I intend to do. Foster’s instructions are quite clear. I have every intention of following them to the letter. If I can’t convince him of Carrie’s confession, that we finally believe his version of events, I can at least go along with his plan. That way no one has to get hurt.”

Her phone beeped again. The message contained just one word: now.

Gurley started to open his door.

“Where the hell do you think you’re going?”

“Let me at least walk you to the outside of the building, for God’s sake.”

“I go alone.”

She climbed out the car and hurried to the second building on the right-hand side of the street, as per Foster’s instructions. The darkness seemed to be falling more quickly now. She checked her watch: it was a little after eight-thirty. A distant street light was doing nothing to illuminate her path. She stumbled awkwardly over a brick or lump of masonry as she reached the curb. She glanced back towards the car. Much to her relief, Gurley hadn’t decided to rush to her aid.

She reached the entrance of the dilapidated building, one of the rotten wooden doors was hanging off its hinges. She shoved it a few inches to one side and squeezed through the gap. As soon as she was through the other side, the light disappeared almost completely. Standing still for a moment in the dark, she hoped her eyes would adjust to the gloom, but apart from a pale glimmer from a distant window, somewhere way over to her left, which cast the faintest of glows onto the uneven, litter strewn floor, she couldn’t really make out any detail. Even though she was reluctant to use her precious phone battery, she flipped on the flashlight app and quickly swept it in an arc in front of her. She spotted a doorway on the other side of the high-ceilinged, hundred-square-foot space, switched off the flashlight and slowly made her way towards it, each footfall landing on broken glass or rubble. After a few dozen more steps she reached out her arms, ready to touch the wall she’d been heading for. When she got to it she was surprised the doorway she’d seen wasn’t immediately in front of her. She must have deviated from a straight line. She felt along the wall and edged sideways, frustrated progress was so slow.

Her phone beeped.

Another text message from Foster:

whr the fck ru?

Instead of wasting time fumbling with the phone to text a reply, she located the doorway and moved through it as fast as she dared. She hollered loudly, “I’ve just crossed the first big room. Can you hear me?”

“Hello?” a distant child’s voice answered. “Who are you? Have you—” The child let out a muffled yelp, as if someone had put a hand over his mouth.

“Tommy? Is that you?” Ingrid shouted. “Are you all right?” She stared into a deeper darkness, relieved that Tommy was still alive, but worried now that someone was hurting him. “Tommy?”

As she stood perfectly still, trying to hear his reply, a loud noise, a shuffling, scraping sound, came from somewhere ahead of her. She switched on her phone flashlight again, but there was no one with her in the twenty-foot square room. In the far corner she saw another doorway. With the flashlight trained on the floor, she quickly picked her way over the debris. She reached the door. Through the other side she was relieved to discover a narrow corridor, just as Foster’s instructions had described. She called out again, “Kyle? Tommy? I’ve reached the corridor now. Where are you?” She waited a moment for a reply, but didn’t really expect one.

The corridor would be much faster than the previous two rooms to navigate in the dark. All she had to do was reach out both her hands to touch the walls on either side to guide her. She was pretty sure, according to Foster’s instructions, her final destination was the room beyond this passageway.

She turned off the flashlight.

After a dozen or so steps another noise, much closer this time, forced her to stop in her tracks.

She felt something scurry over her feet. It was heavy. It had to be a rat.

She continued down the corridor, even faster than she had before. She reached the doorway at the far