“So, no risk of running into anybody as he descended,” Knox said. “Shit.”
Stan hit play, and we saw nothing. It went without saying, but for prosperity’s sake, I asked him, “Don’t suppose you had a guard on duty last night.”
With great reluctance, Stan shook his head. “We’re an outside company. One of us is here part-time, usually only when space is rented. Owner doesn’t want to pay for much else.”
I crossed my arms. “Damn it.”
“He knew the layout of this place and how to get out of shot. He canvassed,” Knox said, but wasn’t enlightening anyone in particular. His scribbles matched his mutters. “I’ll contact the owner. He’s got to have records of who rents what and when. Maybe this guy had access to the calendar somehow…”
I rubbed a hand down my face, my palm coming to rest against my chin. “Go back to the elevator.”
The air in the small room became thick, no one occupying it eager to watch the next film.
And it stayed that way. Emme’s struggle was witnessed in silence. She rolled out of her kidnapper’s arms, but was caught by the wrist and brought back. She blurred in and out of focus as her movements were both quick and slow, bites and kicks, her lips torn open with a constant, unheard scream. He lifted her once, her hair covering his face, then he slammed her to the ground. Disoriented, stunned, she heaved onto her arms but was felled with a punch. He lifted her slack body and threw her over his shoulder, which must have shocked her awake because she came alive again, limbs diving and spearing for any piece of him. As she was forcibly dragged off camera, my last image was her expression.
Sheer, total terror.
We stared at the monitor, time ticking on, even though each one of us knew she wouldn’t be appearing again.
“Outside,” I croaked. Stan came out of his horrified fugue enough to switch cameras, and there was Emme, her pale legs being dragged through slush. She escaped at one point, bolted to the right and for a few seconds we didn’t see her. But she was chased, pulled back and thrown to the left, out of view again. The next thing we saw were headlights of the dark van flashing on, sludge spewing from the moving tires as the van reversed, then came into full side-view as he drove down the street.
No one said anything after that. Knox’s notebook had fallen to his side and I understood that he’d be going through this footage multiple times, nonstop, until every detail was fashioned behind his eyelids in such a way that he wouldn’t sleep without dreaming of her.
“White or Latino male, around six-two, two-hundred and forty pounds,” I began, my words a rough cut of air into the fogged room. “Thick shoulders, heavy down jacket either navy blue or black, dark denim jeans. Hood obscuring the top half of face, a… scarf?...covering his chin. Gloves, but there’s enough space between those and his sleeve to catch a glimpse of skin, hence the likelihood of being Caucasian or Latino or Asian. Fuck. No visible scars or tattoos. Violent, aggressive enough to incapacitate someone even when there is no likelihood of them being able to fight back.”
Knox met my gaze, his mouth formed in a tight, grim line.
“Play it again,” I said to Stan, ignoring the warning.
The walls around me went stark white. Stan’s bland uniform blended with his skin, turning into a spotty grey. Knox’s color paled, too, until everyone—everything—around me was in various stages of black and white. I stepped into the footage, my hands in front of me in colorless movement, until I stood next to the kidnapper, his arms frozen into a chokehold around Emme. Emme’s mouth was stretched wide, her mouth a black hole of a scream.
The ghost of Spencer past roiled within until it was writhing in my throat. It would be so easy to grab this guy by the neck and catapult him into the elevator walls. To punch and pummel until his brains leaked out and his face was grey pulp.
Yeah, old Spence, had he been there, would’ve done just that.
Now, all I could do was stand and picture myself within grainy security tape, fantasizing about saving a woman who’d already been abducted.
What Knox may not yet understand but would come to soon, was that I was going to dream of Emme, too.