Page 36 of The Killer She Knew

She stepped into the blackness.

Water churned against her calves and continued to seep through the cinderblock walls as though they were sobbing.Drip, drip, drip. Every cell in her body focused on that consistent rhythm. A combination of comfort and terror rippled through her veins at the sound. They wouldn’t know how deep the flood went until they worked their way back to the room. Her toes were already aching at the cold assault. The muscles in her legs ached with every push forward. Damn, she needed to get back into the gym if she was already losing her breath.

Ford shone his light ahead, scanning the walls and the ceilings. She imagined he hadn’t gotten a great view of the tunnels in his rush to get to her last time. Then again, they didn’t really have all the time in the world. “I guess I should’ve asked if you knew where we were going before I agreed to come back here.”

His voice echoed off the long stretch of corridor and exposed pipes overhead and settled into her body.

“I remember.” Leigh tried to tamp down the shivers tensing the rest of her body. Expending too much energy. Burning calories she didn’t have in the first place. She cut her flashlight beam to the first corner. “Here.”

Taking the first left, they confronted another corridor. The water slid around her waist here. Taking her breath in an instant. She bit the fleshy inside of her bottom lip to distract herself. Her heart rate ticked up every inch they gained.

“You okay?” Ford’s beam crested over her shoulder as though he could read the tension along her spine through her blouse.

“If you define ‘okay’ as still having a pulse.” The pattern of dripping water she’d relied on to keep her focused changed. Becoming more of a steady stream this far into the maze. “Yeah. I’m doing great.”

“Oh, good. Because for a minute there I thought you could hear my brain screaming at me to get the hell out of here,” he said.

A near-hysterical laugh escaped her chest. He was trying to distract her. Doing a good job of it, too. Leigh angled her flashlight to the next corner. “So that’s what that was. I was worried an animal had gotten trapped down here with us.”

They approached the final turn, putting the ultimate dead end in their beams.

“Shit.” Ford grabbed for a pipe over her shoulder to keep his balance. His flashlight beam confirmed the sickening feeling in her gut. “We’re too late.”

He was right. Water climbed to her chest at the start of the hallway but one more step would sweep her off her feet if she wasn’t careful. The hallway itself sloped as a pool would leading unsuspecting victims into the deep end. Collecting at least eight feet of water between her and the kill room. Leigh sucked in a breath to counter the cold jerk of air leaving her chest, but it was no use. She kicked off her shoes and pulled her socks free. It was a risk exposing even a single inch of skin in water so black they couldn’t pick out debris, but they’d already come this far. There was no turning back. Not for her. “We’re going to have to swim it.”

“No, Leigh.” Ford reached out, faster than she thought possible, and pulled her back into his chest. “That entire room could be underwater.”

“There’s a reason he led me here, and I don’t think it’s for cleansers and a syringe we couldn’t pull prints from or Alice Dietz’s dead devices.” Whoever had lured her here—killer or not—may have been willing to sacrifice evidence he knew would lead nowhere in exchange for protecting the answers they needed. “Don’t follow me. You’re the lead on the investigation. You know this killer better than anyone, and they’re going to need your help to catch him.”

He didn’t answer.

“I can do this,” she said. “In and out.”

“This is a bad idea, and you know it.” Ford released his hold, but let his touch linger at her shoulder. “You’re risking your life for this case.”

Ignoring him, Leigh tightened her hold on the flashlight in her hand and grabbed for an exposed pipe above with the other. She could use the network to pull herself closer to the doorwithout expending too much energy. “If I’m not back in five minutes?—”

“Just get your ass back here as fast as you can.” His hand threaded through the hair at the back of her neck. Ford crushed his mouth to hers. The kiss wasn’t anything like their first, full of punishment and unbridled anger. He was the one to pull away. “We have a date, remember?”

Leigh nodded, more out of breath than ever. Her initial weight strained the joint in her shoulder, but she used the water—now to her shoulders—to her advantage. “This is nothing likeTarzan.”

Within a few feet, the water lapped at her chin, then crested her mouth. She pinched her lips together to avoid swallowing it down. She was going to need a hepatitis shot after this. Leigh blew a strong breath as cold invaded her nostrils. This was as far as she could go keeping her head above water, yet she still had at least five feet to the door to the kill room. There were no guarantees she’d find air pockets in that room. Plan for the worst. Hope for the best. As good a motto as any.

The flashlight beam warped under the watery surface in her grip. With one last glance back to Ford, Leigh took a deep breath.

And slipped beneath the surface.

It took too long for her vision to adjust. Clouded water assaulted her eyes as she waved a hand forward. Not like a chlorine burn. More like a stabbing ice pick sensation. She could make out the doorframe. She kicked with everything she had, propelling her as far as possible before kicking again. Every thrust burned through her oxygen a little faster. She had to stay calm. Use her head. That was what would get her out alive.

Sliding her hand along the doorframe, she pulled herself over the threshold. The water changed. Murkier. Disturbed. As though the walls were closing in and squeezing her insides.Leigh mentally mapped the shelves immediately to her right and kicked past them.

What had they missed?

The corkboard once holding her entire life’s story was gone, swaying directly above her. Sweeping the flashlight overhead, she tried to identify pockets of air, but the entire room had been consumed. The realization pressurized the oxygen in her lungs. She’d ever been able to hold her breath for long. She had two minutes—maximum—before her lungs spasmed for relief, and she had to turn back.

Leigh kicked into the farthest section of room from the door. A dark bump-out housed another hand-built shelf measured precisely behind the tub where they assumed Alice Dietz had been bleached and washed before her remains turned up in front of Thompson Hall. Except the wall was darker here than in the rest of the room.

A door. She didn’t remember that from her and Ford’s initial search. The shelf stood as sentinel, blocking off access. A maintenance closet? Bubbles escaped her nose and mouth as she kicked closer. Her heart rate climbed every second she forced herself to stay in this room.

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