Page 104 of Fighting Conviction
No.
Fuck. That.
Ellie forced her eyes open against the flashback, against the burning air, and against her fear.
“I’m getting us outta here,” Ellie told herself as much as she told her dying friend. Now to find an escape route.
Ellie lifted and looked outside, only to see a scene nothing short of hell. There was no way out of the pantry. She screeched and looked around but it was practically empty. Nothing but rice and cans from what she could see.
“Somebody help me!” she screamed at the top of her lungs, careful not to breathe in any more toxic air. She didn’t know how far away the Russian was, or if he’d even left the premises. But if the Russian grew a conscience in the next five minutes and was the one to save her, then so be it. She’d cross that bridge later.
“Somebody, please! Help me! Help us!” In an anguished yell, Ellie reached out to her best friend. “Sasha, please help me. What do I do?”
Ellie held her breath to listen, but there was nothing but the billowing flame outside the thin doors.
“Sasha! Help me, please! I don’t know what to do! Help me!” Crackling wood and plastic answered back. “Come on!Nowyou’re silent? When I need you?” she screamed again and threw herself down on the ground.
“Ow! Son of a—” Something hard poked Ellie’s butt and she leaned to the side but her body was in the way of the firelight. She leaned back to feel with her hands until her fingertips grazed over a metal loop.
“This house looks just like mine did, doesn’t it? Same layout and everything…”
“Except for the kitchen…” She reached back to her childhood and recalled the root cellar she and Sasha used to be obsessed with when they played manhunt. No one ever found them there because the entrance was a small trapdoor hidden in the corner of the kitchen.
“Holy crap, Sasha, you did it. Oh my God, thank you, thank you, thank you.”
Ellie wriggled to her knees and whispered, “I can do this,” before crawling to Virginia.
“V, V. We gotta get outta here, and I have an idea. Please, can you help me? Does your right arm still work?”
The only sign of life Virginia gave was a nod downward. But awareness was all Ellie needed.
As gently as she could, Ellie pushed Virginia to her back. A low moan pierced Ellie’s chest with guilt, but she couldn’t stop to comfort her friend. Ellie bent her head low and into Virginia’s limp—but working—hand.
“Grab my bobby pin, V! Hurry!” Ellie shoved her head where she knew her bobby pin was against Virginia’s hand. Featherlight fingertips touched her hair and Ellie pushed her head farther into her friend’s hand. “Come on, V, grab it with your fingers. That’s all you gotta do and I’ve got the rest.”
There was a small tug at her hair and Ellie pulled away slowly, hoping her friend could keep a hold of the metal pin. When Ellie sat up, the blood rushed out of her head and she felt faint from the angle. But there it was, the small shiny piece of metal that would get them out of there.
Ellie swiveled around on her duct-taped legs and stretched her arms back to the point of pain until she finally felt Virginia’s hands. She found the bobby pin in her friend’s grasp and yelped with excitement. Careful not to drop the pin, she unbent it and hooked it between the arm of the handcuffs and its metal teeth to separate the mechanism from the ratchet.
“Remember… just… one…”click.
There was blessed relief in her left wrist before pins and needles shot up her arms. But she wasfree. Ellie laughed into a groan as she stretched her arms in front of her. Her groan turned into a cough as the heat burned her lungs.
“Gotta keep goin’.”
She helped herself up and stood tall, knowing this was about to hurt. The investigator had wrapped tons of tape on her bare legs. It would require all her strength and gravity to rip it.
“Okay, one. Two….” Ellie shook her hands and breathed, only to pull in more heat. “Three,” she coughed and collapsed cross-legged onto the ground, landing hard on her butt. She looked down at her free legs and pumped her fist in the air. They were red and the skin was abraded but she couldn’t feel it yet.
“Adrenaline. Gotta keep goin’.”
Something crashed outside the pantry door and the heat felt close to blistering her skin. Virginia coughed.
“Gotta go, gotta go.”
She got up and felt for the loop again she’d landed so hard on before. Her fingers searched and searched until finally, the cool metal was in her hands. She tugged, but it refused to lift.
“Oh, hell no.” Ellie bent her knees and leaned forward so she could fall back and pull with her entire weight. “One. Two…” She heaved and stumbled backward. The door was still in her hand and off its hinges.
