“Okay,” Killian began. “This is as good a time as ever. Tell us exactly what happened, from the beginning.”
She shrugged and said, “I left my husband’s home in Texas and drove as far away from him as I could, crossing the Canadian border. I was at the Olympic Peninsula, just walking down the street. I turned the corner and was headed down a side street, looking for a small bookstore. Two men got out of a vehicle and asked me for directions. I told them that I didn’t really know where I was myself, so I wouldn’t be any help. Then I was hurled to the side of a vehicle, and suddenly I was inside it. They hopped in, closed the door, and, next thing I knew, I blacked out. I think they put something over my head and knocked me out. I’m not sure. It just all happened so fast that I really don’t know exactly.”
“And that’s fine,” Killian said in a soothing voice. “When did you wake up again?”
“I woke up in a van a while later. I’d been gagged, tied up, my head covered. I think they thought it would act as a blindfold as well, but I saw through it a little bit. Enough to know there were two men, and I heard a conversation that I thought involved Max—my husband, we’re separated—so, in a way, that made an ugly kind of sense.”
“So the little bit that we’ve heard about Max,” Hatch said, “is that your soon-to-be ex is a nasty piece of work, and, when you decided to leave the marriage, you took something of his along with you?”
“Maybe,” she said. “Anyway I tried to escape from my kidnappers at that point in time, but I couldn’t really see a whole lot. While they were talking, I got the rear door kicked open with my feet on a lever and managed to hop out. One of the ties came loose on my feet, and I started to run. I heard them coming up behind me and knew I wouldn’t get far, but I was hoping that someone would see me. With my hands still tied and that damn hood on, not being able to see that well, I was quickly picked up, hauled back to the van, and knocked out again.
“I don’t know what happened after that. But, when I woke up, my head was killing me. I was alone with one of the men, and he told me that it was my fault and that I would get more of a beating each time I tried to escape again.”
Hatch shook his head, muttering.
Killian said, “Carry on. This is hard for me to hear, so I know it must be worse for you to tell. But we need to know all that you can share.”
She shrugged. “I don’t even know how long I was with them. I’m sure they drugged me. I would wake up, forced to drink this weird shake, and I’d sleep again. Then I’d wake up and get another one and sleep. At one point, I upchucked after one of the drinks, and I didn’t end up falling back asleep again. I felt the vehicle moving and realized I was in the back seat of a big transport rig. We were stopped in a line for a long time. Then we drove over some metal-sounding grates before parking. The two men talked in low tones, but one turned to check on me, saying, She’s still out. Let’s lock her in and go stretch our legs. They got out, slammed the doors, and walked away.
“I finally got my hands around my feet and in front of me again. I reached for the latch with my bound hands. After a few minutes, I managed to get it open, and I slipped out the side of the van but fell to the ground. I pushed the bag off my eyes and pulled down the gag, then I started working on the ropes. I hadn’t been tied up too securely because I was always drugged, and, as soon as I managed to untie my hands and feet, I quickly closed the door to the rig, and I slipped through the vehicles. I was on a ferry.
“What I didn’t realize at the time was that somebody had seen it all and had essentially watched me save myself,” she said bitterly. “As I worked my way through the vehicles, he stepped up and asked me if I was okay. I was taken in by his kind demeanor. I didn’t even really get a look at him, and then, next thing I knew, he’d clipped me hard on the side of the head, and I was out. When I woke up, I was bound again.”
“Wow,” Hatch said. “I wonder if that was just a fluke or if he’d followed you.”
“I don’t know,” she said, “but it’s shitty either way. He said he saw me escaping and grabbed me himself.”
“We also have to consider,” Killian added, “that he might have been the other partner in the initial kidnapping. A scenario where he knew about you and decided to set up a chance for him to make more money for himself.”
She stared at him. “Wow, I didn’t even think of that,” she said. “Maybe?”
“Did his voice sound familiar at all?”
“I honestly don’t remember,” she said. “At the beginning, the voices of the first kidnappers were hard to hear because they were muffled by the bag or whatever was over my head. And this second guy had some sort of band around my eyes, tight on my head. It was wrapped around my ears too, so it was hard to hear anything clearly. So, for all I know, it could have been one of the first two guys. I have no idea. There wasn’t enough difference in what I heard of their voices to know for certain. The second kidnapper did say he’d sold me twice.” And she explained how one buyer wanted proof of life and the other wanted him to take her life.
Killian nodded as he walked over and sat down beside her. “How are you feeling now?”
She looked at the bowl of lasagna that she’d polished off two-thirds of. “I really wanted all of this,” she said, “but I don’t think I can finish it.”
“Then don’t,” he murmured. “Just take it a little bit easy on your stomach.”
“Right,” she said, as she handed it to him. “Can I just sleep here then?”
“You can, but there’s a bed for you here.”
She looked over at him. “But that means moving.”
“Your bladder will have to be emptied at some point anyway,” he said.
She glared at him. “Now why would you even remind me of that?” she said. “That’ll just hurt.”
“It might,” he said, with a big grin. “But you’re fit and strong, and you’ve done incredibly courageous things. So don’t worry about it. You’ll make it through.”
“Says you,” she said, with a grumbling tone. “I don’t feel like I’ve been courageous at all.”
“Did you fight your kidnappers every time?”
“As often as I could. I got smacked more times than I care to remember,” she said slowly, rotating her jaw. “After a while, your face just starts feeling like hamburger.”
“Well, I’d say it looks like it too, but that might freak you out,” he murmured.
She glared at him.
He grinned. “It’s a little swollen, but it’s not too bad.”
She gently touched her face and then nodded. “It feels puffy.”
“It is.”
Killian watched as Stacey sat here, as long as she could. And then he stood, held out his hand, and said, “Let me give you a hand up.” Using his arm, she pulled herself upright, and he noted the color immediately faded from her skin. “I’ll help you walk to the bathroom.”
“I walked just fine before,” she protested. “Why is it so hard now?”