Page 126 of The Last Time I Lied

I remember what Detective Flynn said about tracking someone’s location using the GPS on their phones. I can’t help but wonder if that still applies when the missing person is underground. I doubt it. Even if it’s possible, such a thing could take hours, maybe even days to pinpoint my location.

If I want to get out of here, I’ll have to do it myself.

I aim the flashlight to the stretch of cave wall rising to the hole above me. It’s steep. Not quite a ninety-degree angle, but mighty close. Before trying to climb it, I scan the rest of the cavern, looking for another way out. I aim the flashlight into every corner and dark cranny I can find, seeing nothing but more water, more rock, more dead ends.

Scaling that wall is my only option.

In desperation, I run to it, not pausing to look for places to grip. Instead, I leap onto the wall, clawing at rock, scrambling for outcroppings. I get about three feet before I lose my grip and fly backward, landing hard on the cave floor.

I try again, this time making it four feet off the ground before getting bucked off. This time I land directly on my tailbone. Sharp pain shoots up my back, momentarily paralyzing me.

Yet I make a third attempt, slowing down a bit, puzzling together the best places to grip and the right direction in which to climb. It works. I find myself rising higher. Six feet. Seven.

When I’m about a foot from the tunnel that leads back outside, I realize there’s nothing left to grasp. I reach up with my right arm, my palm smacking smooth rock that’s cold and slippery. My left arm and shoulder, bearing all that weight, start to give out.

My body droops.

For a second, I dangle against the cave wall. Then I plummet back to earth, landing feetfirst, my right ankle twisting beneath me before buckling. I think I hear something snap. Or maybe it’s my imagination as I collapse into a pained heap.

I scream, hoping it will take the edge off. It doesn’t. The pain continues. So does the screaming. I look at my ankle and my foot, bent in a way it shouldn’t ever be. There’ll be no more climbing for me.

That’s when reality sets in.

I’m trapped here.

No one knows where I am.

I’m now as lost as Vivian, Natalie, and Allison.

40

The flashlight dies shortly after 4:00 a.m. I know the time because I check my phone as soon as the dying beam flickers into nothingness. I regret looking, even as I’m comforted by the blue-white glow of the screen. Time continues to pass at an agonizing pace. It’s as if the minutes last longer down here, stretching themselves until a single hour feels like three.

Wanting to preserve as much battery as possible, I shut off the phone and return it to my pocket. Then I sit in darkness so complete it feels like death. Nothing but black emptiness.

I start to shiver, realizing how alarmingly cold it is down here. The pool of frigid water doesn’t help. Ditto my wet clothes, which cling to my clammy skin. My body trembles. My teeth chatter.

Yet none of that keeps me from dozing off as I huddle against the side of the cave, my knees pulled to my chest. Each blink in the darkness somehow ends with me falling asleep only to bolt awake with a spasm of pain and a startled yelp.

I’m beyond exhausted, if such a thing exists. I can’t remember the last time I slept. I guess it was this morning, when I woke up inside Dogwood. I turn on my phone and do another time check.

Four thirty.

Fuck.

I then look for a signal, once again finding none.

Double fuck.

I turn off the phone and count the passing seconds, saying them aloud in the echo chamber of the cavern.

“One. Two. Three.”

When I blink, my eyes stay closed.

“Four. Five. Six.”

I’m suddenly too tired to speak. But the counting continues, now in my thoughts.

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