Page 5 of Rowe

“Shit, that’s another woman,” said Luke. Rowe leaped from the side of the boat, hurdling toward the slab before the boat even stopped. He kneeled beside the woman and felt for a pulse.

“She’s alive. She’s fucking alive!”

Eric jumped onto the slab and felt a slight shift in the foundation. He held up his hands in the lights warning others to stay back.

“Rowe, reach for the bolt cutters. I don’t think I should move.” Rowe leaned to his left, stretching his arm out for the tool. He felt the shift as well and gasped, unsure of what to do.

Taking the bolt cutter, he wrapped it around the deadbolt lock and put his entire weight into the force of it. The lock snapped and he guided the chain from around the loop, gently laying it across the woman’s lap. He didn’t have time to cut it all off. He just needed to get her into the boat.

Eric backed up slowly, the weight shift causing the slab to visibly tilt to the right.

“Fuck! Move!” yelled Luke.

Eric jumped first, slamming into two of the men as he hit the bottom of the boat. Rowe stood with the woman cradled against his chest, staring at the others. At first, he moved slowly, hoping the weight shift wouldn’t cause any extreme tilt. He was wrong. It was as if the entire thing was balanced on one pole and if you moved, it was all going over.

“Rowe, you gotta move, brother,” said Cam. Rowe nodded, heading straight toward his old commander, Grayson. He practically tossed the woman into Grayson’s arms and then reached out to grab Cam’s forearm.

As he landed on the boat, a loud splash could be heard behind him. The entire concrete block had shifted and was now standing on its side in the water. The cable where the woman had been chained was submerged. She could have died.

“Alvin! Alvin!” yelled Luke.

A pair of eyes surfaced from the water staring at the men in the boats. Alvin acted as if it were just another day. Luke reached out, petting the dinosaur between his glowing eyes.

“Good work, Alvin. As soon as I can get them, two more chickens for you.”

CHAPTER FOUR

Mara had awakened just long enough to point out Voss, Calder, and Lenora. She was weak, still in grave condition, but Rowe had carried her into the room filled with FBI and FEMA agents and watched as she pointed directly at them.

Two days later, Luke, Cam, Hex, and Eric stood in the door to Mara Guillory’s room. She was still pale, still on oxygen and in pain, but she was awake.

“We’ll get a full statement from you later, Mara. Right now, we just need you to get well,” said Luke.

“W-will I have to testify?” she asked.

“Yes. Do you remember everything?” asked Cam. She frowned, rubbing her temples gently as if trying to conjure all the memories forward. Her face looked like milk-glass, fragile and pale.

“I-I think so.” Then her face blanched even further, she tried to sit up but Rowe held her there, not wanting her to move. “Kiera. Where is Kiera?”

“Is she one of the other agents?” asked Luke. “We only found six and none were named Kiera.”

“No. No, Kiera. She’s my niece. I’m her guardian,” she exclaimed. “She was with the daycare center when I was taken.”

Every man in the room swallowed, their guts telling them that they knew where this child might be. In all the destruction only one child had been found dead. One. There were no children alive that were left unclaimed. They just knew what was about to happen.

“How old is she?” asked Hex.

“Five. She’s tiny for five. My sister, my sister was small. She died from ovarian cancer a year after Kiera was born. I-I never dreamed I would be taken. She was at the daycare that morning. What happened to the daycare?”

“We’re not sure,” said Eric. “Honey, we found a child’s body. We have no identification on her. Would you be able to look at a photo of the child and identify her? It won’t be easy, whether she’s your niece or not.”

“God,” she murmured. “It can’t be. I can’t lose them both.” Rowe gripped her hand tighter, trying to quell the erratic shaking of her body. Luke turned to Eric.

“Get Doc or Cruz in here as a precaution. Hex. Bring up the photo.” He turned back to Mara. “I hate to do this, Mara but we want to know who this child belongs to and we haven’t found anything. What daycare was she in?”

“Little Bateau,” she said with a sad smile. “It was just two older women in a house not far from here. It was all I could afford but they took such good care of her. She loved going every day.”

The men looked at one another and knew the answer to their question. Little Bateau had been ripped from its foundation. There was nothing left of it. The two women who lived in the back of the small house did not survive. If Mara had been taken, they might have kept the little girl anticipating that her aunt would show up after the storm subsided.