Chapter 4

The exhaust fan reached full speed, its rusted bearings howling over the sleet outside.

Through the office window, the clock read 9:17.

Twenty-three minutes before Wes’s deadline.

"Jonah," I whispered, leaning close enough that my lips brushed his temple. "Look at my hands."

My wrists were still bound in front of me, the thick plastic tie biting into raw skin, but my fingers could bend.

I reached down and tugged the velcro strap of his right sneaker loose, sliding the foam insert forward. Beneath it sat his black safety watch.

The screen blinked once in the dim light.

Still alive.

If the watch found a signal outside, someone might be able to trace it.

I shoved the watch back into place, smoothed the lining, and strapped the sneaker tight.

"What about the chain, Mom?" Jonah whispered.

The short tow chain ran between us, looped around the forklift axle. My ankle cuff was solid steel, secured with a keyed padlock.

Jonah’s link was different.

Wes had run out of padlocks, so he had closed Jonah’s chain with a long bolt and a hardware wing nut. He had cinched my wrists so tightly he must have assumed my fingers were useless.

I knelt in the dirty runoff, trapped the lower wing of the nut between my thumbs, and forced it counterclockwise.

Rust bit deep beneath my fingernails.

The first turn took everything I had, my shoulders burning, but the threads gave a dry, stubborn screech. The second turn was looser. On the fifth turn, the nut spun off the end of the bolt and dropped into the puddle with a dull splash.

The link slipped open.

Jonah’s leg was free.

I pulled the blue inhaler from my fleece pocket and slid it into the zippered pouch of his yellow jacket.

"Keep your hood up so the rain doesn't get inside," I said. "You follow the chain-link fence toward the lights. Stay off the road. Find a gas station, a truck stop, or any counter with lights. Tell them your mother is trapped in the old cold-storage plant."

Jonah’s fingers closed around the hem of my sweater.

"I'm not leaving you," he said, his voice trembling, small and stubborn.

Fear tore through me at the thought of sending him into a black metal shaft alone. Keeping him beside me felt like love.

It would also kill him.

"You're not leaving me," I said, catching his chin with my bound hands and making him look straight into my eyes. "You're getting help. You're the only one who can."

"What if he hurts you?"

The question tore through my chest, but my voice stayed level.

"Then you make sure somebody comes back."

Jonah looked at me for one second. Then he nodded once, wiping his sleeve across his running nose.

The fire extinguisher hung from the forklift post within arm's reach.

I eased it out of the metal bracket, braced the heavy cylinder between my knees, and hooked my bound thumbs through the ring pin. I yanked back with my body weight until the plastic seal snapped.

The pin fell away.

I laid the short hose across my bound palms, the nozzle aimed toward the floor.

Then I turned to the wall, jammed my fingers beneath the bent corner of the return-air grille, and wrenched it back.

The screws tore loose from the soft mortar with a wet screech. The galvanized sheet metal folded outward, leaving an opening barely sixteen inches wide—too narrow for my hips, but wide enough for his shoulders.

Across the dark room, the supervisor's office door slammed open.

Wes burst through the doorway, the tire iron low in his right hand.

"Crawl, Jonah!" I shouted. "Go!"

Jonah threw himself forward onto his stomach, pushing his head and shoulders into the dark metal shaft.

"Hey!" Wes roared, his boots pounding across the wet concrete, twenty feet away and closing fast.

I shoved Jonah’s left sneaker forward until his heels cleared the lip.

Jonah was inside.

I threw my back flat against the opening, sealing the hole with my shoulders to block the draft behind me.

Wes lunged through the puddles, swinging the tire iron up to clear me from the wall.

I lifted the extinguisher into my lap, aimed the nozzle straight down the central aisle, and mashed both bound palms down on the handle.

A short, violent burst of pale powder exploded into the air.

The cloud hit Wes full in the face and chest.

He stumbled sideways, tucking his chin into his collar, gagging on the dry chemical dust. The powder caught in my own throat, burning my tongue and making my eyes stream, but my back stayed locked against the vent.

"You crazy bitch!" Wes wheezed, swinging blindly through the white fog. "Where does that duct come out?!"

The iron struck.

The heavy steel caught me across the left collarbone.

Something cracked.

My breath vanished. My left arm dropped against my ribs, useless.

Wes’s fingers plunged through the settling dust, twisting into my hair and yanking my head away from the wall. He dragged me face-first onto the wet concrete.

"Where does it go?!" he snarled, coughing through his sleeve, his eyes red and tearing.

Behind my back, through the damp metal pipe, came the faint, wet slap of rubber soles hitting the drainage ditch outside.

Jonah was through.

I lay on my side in the freezing black runoff, blood hot against my teeth, my shoulder throbbing with every heartbeat.

I looked up through the powder at Wes’s ruined face.

"He's outside, Wes," I whispered. "And he's going to tell them what you did."