This shed had a padlock on it. Donatti dropped Talia’s arm and ran to the building and started kicking in the rotted boards, screaming Terry’s name as he attacked the wood with his feet.

Decker walked over to Talia. “Can I have the key, please?”

A strange smile spread across her face. “Golly, I must have forgotten that as well.”

Decker gave the gun to Rina. “Watch her.” Then he ran over and helped, the two of them kicking in the horizontal boards.

Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam!

Within a minute, the wood had splintered sufficiently to create a small hole. With bare hands, Decker and Donatti started pulling off the boards until there was crawl space. But the men were still too big. Rina grabbed Talia’s arm and ran over to the men. She gave Decker the gun and said, “Your turn to watch her.”

Being smaller, she managed to contort her body through the jagged hole, scratching herself on the raw edges. She barely felt the pain even though she knew she was bleeding. It was nearly pitch black inside. With her phone light, she surveyed the area. It was a space of about three hundred square feet. There were animal tracks and loads of scat. There were spiderwebs and wasp nests and lots of creepy-crawlies. She saw an old rusted stove, pots scattered over the floor. There was a cot with bare springs and a shredded mattress. Then, in the corner, there was a lump of something. Could be a dead animal, because there was a definite smell of excrement. Her heart was racing so much that she could barely breathe. She focused the illumination onto the heap and a pair of eyes blinked.

She ran over to the body, repeating over and over, “You’re safe, you’re safe, you’re safe.” Shouting to the men: “She’s in here. She’s alive.”

Terry’s complexion was blue. Her skin was ice. Eyes were vacant. She appeared unresponsive. Her hands and feet were bound with plastic ties. Rina took off her jacket and laid it over her body. At that moment, Chris finally broke through. She said, “I need your jacket. She’s freezing.”

He took off his jacket and scooped Terry up in his arms. “Baby, say something.”

No answer.

Once outside, Donatti was shaking, his face covered in sweat as he held on to his wife. He turned to Talia. “Which way out? And don’t you dare fuck around on me!”

“I told you she was alive.”

“Which … fucking … way?”