Page 53 of Ruthless Riches
I decided to keep her talking to stop her from crying again. “How did you get here? Do you remember?” I asked.
She sucked down another deep breath. “It’s kind of blurry. I don’t really know what happened.”
“What’s the last thing you remember?”
“I think I went to the art studio,” she said. “I’ve been going there to paint for the last few days because I couldn’t stand being alone in the apartment anymore. It made me think of you all the time, and I just needed to take my mind off every—”
“It’s okay,” I said gently, lifting a palm. “You don’t need to explain it to me. I get it.”
She sniffed and wiped her face. “I went to the studio in the afternoon, and I stayed there for a few hours,” she said in a shaky voice. “I remember walking out the door when I was finished, but that’s it. After that, everything is a total blank. I don’t remember how I got home, or if I even made it home before he…” She paused and swallowed hard. “Before he took me.”
“You don’t remember seeing anyone?”
“No. I really don’t understand how this happened.” She started sniffling again. “I don’t even know how long I’ve been down here.”
“Neither do I,” I replied. “Can you tell me how long I’ve been gone?”
“You disappeared a week ago,” she said. “So that plus however many hours I’ve been down here.”
I nodded slowly. My estimate was slightly off, but not by much.
“What did you mean earlier when you said Nate was right? Do you mean he’s been looking for these tunnels?” I asked.
Sascha nodded. “Everyone’s looking. After you disappeared, the police started taking him seriously. They’ve been digging in Central Park to look for an entrance.”
“Good.” My shoulders drooped as relief flooded through me. “The Butcher told me there’s definitely an entrance somewhere there, so hopefully they’ll find it soon.”
I didn’t bother telling my sister the part where the Butcher claimed to have hidden the entrance hatch under giant stone plant pots that he dragged over from somewhere else in the garden. It would only make her cry again. Besides, the police might move the pots at some point when they searched in that area. I’d been clinging to that hope for days, and I intended to keep doing so.
“I hope so too,” Sascha replied meekly. “But it’s so slow. They’ve been digging for twelve hours a day and they’ve still only done about five percent of the park.”
“Don’t worry. It’ll happen,” I said soothingly. “They’ll find it. We’ll make it home.”
“You’re just trying to make me feel better,” she said in a low voice. “Face it, Lex. Even if they find an entrance to these tunnels tomorrow… we might be dead by then.”
“Don’t say that,” I said, even though I knew she was right. We could be dead in the next hour, depending on the Butcher’s whims.
I decided to steer the conversation in another direction to distract her from the horrifying thoughts of death. “How’s Mom taking everything? Is she okay?”
“She’s hysterical. She came over from the mainland the other day because she wanted to help with the search, but she’s mostly lain in bed at her hotel and cried,” Sascha replied. “Simon is okay, though. I mean, he’s upset, but he’s coping. He helped me, Nate, Laurel, and Ruby post flyers all over the city the other day.”
“What sort of flyers?”
“Ones with your face and information on them. We thought…” She trailed off and shook her head. “I don’t know. I guess it was pointless in the end. But we thought someone might’ve seen something, so we put them all up just in case. I guess we wanted to feel like we were doing something to help, too. It’s been so hard.”
“I get it.” I took a deep breath as hot, stinging tears welled in my eyes. “How’s Nate?”
“Not great. He’s practically turning the island upside down looking for you, so he’s not sleeping much,” Sascha replied. “None of us have been able to sleep much.”
I wiped my eyes and sniffed. “I’m so sorry this happened. I—”
My voice was cut off by a strange screeching noise coming from my left. It sounded like feedback from a microphone.
A few seconds later, a tinny voice began to play through some sort of speaker that we couldn’t see. “Hello, Alexis. I hope you’re awake to hear this. Have you taken a look in the opposite cell yet?”
Sascha smashed a hand on the bars. “Hey!” she screamed. “Come out here, you fucking coward!”
“He’s not here,” I said. “It’s playing through a speaker. That’s why it sounds weird.”
