“I never saw him, but Allie did.”
Shane turned his attention on the young girl, who stared at him with wide, traumatized eyes. Her head was still moving up and down, not so much in confirmation, but because she couldn’t stop it, an involuntary twitch that somehow soothed her. “Can you tell me what happened here?” he asked, and her lower lip began to quiver. “Allie, please.” He touched her on her shoulder. “I won’t be able to help your mother until you tell me what happened. Did you see the man who did this?”
She nodded. Tears filled her eyes.
“Did you recognize him?”
She hesitated. Shook her head.
“Think, Allie,” he said, gently. “Do you know who he is?”
“No…but…but…” She bit her lip. “He knew my name. And his voice…” She swallowed hard. “I think I should know him.”
“Can you describe him?”
Her chin wobbled and she glanced at Rinda. “Come on, honey, try.”
“He was big.”
“As tall as me?”
“But bigger…he wore a ski mask. Camouflage…It was dark and I was far away when he got Cassie and—” She was talking faster now, her voice pitching higher, nearly hyperventilating. “—and I ran back and I ran into the barn and that’s when…that’s when I saw Jake and I was so scared and I didn’t know what to do, so I stayed in the barn, away…away from Jake, and Critter was with me and then my mom finally came.” Sobbing hysterically, her face twisted in despair, she added, “And now she’s gone!” Sniffing and swiping at her eyes with the back of her hand, she stared into his eyes. “You have to find them, Sheriff. You have to.”
“I know. I will,” he promised, his gaze flicking to Rinda’s. What were the chances that Cassie was still alive? Or Jenna? Through the window, he saw flashing lights, strobing red and blue through the ever-falling snow. His backup had arrived.
But it was too damned late.
Cassie shivered, the cold permeating her skin. She ached all over and tried to move. Couldn’t. Her eyes flew open and she panicked. Where the hell was she? Suspended in the air, six or eight feet above a huge vat of some clear liquid. What the hell?
Worse yet, she was naked. Completely nude…and what the hell had happened to her hair? The bastard had removed her clothes and then…what? Shaved her head. Strapped her onto this tiny little platform and tied her wrists over her head? To what end? Oh, God, this was crazy! Everything about it was so goddamned frightening. Through the thickness in her mind, she remembered seeing Josh in his truck, the lifeblood trickling out of him, and Allie running through the woods and that horrid jolt of electricity by the madman, a man she swore she knew, though she hadn’t seen his face.
Quaking with a fear unlike any she’d ever known, she began to breathe in short, shallow breaths. She wanted to pass out, to close her eyes and fall into some deep sleep and wake up in her own bed, with Josh alive, her mother in the next room, her little sister bugging her…She let out a sob, then bit her tongue. She couldn’t give in to the sheer panic overriding all of her rational thought.
No. She had to think. To find a way out of this ungodly terror. Calm down, Cass. Figure this out. Don’t panic. Do NOT panic. She took a deep breath and surveyed her surroundings. The psycho wasn’t around right now; at least she couldn’t see him.
She had to get out of this spaced-out nightmare. So where was she?
Nearly immobile, she forced her gaze downward.
Dim lights glowed and she made out statues in various poses on a stage below, to one side, and a long recliner nearby with some kind of steel arm angled above it.
She squinted, tried to clear her head. The statues weren’t random, nor were they just women, she realized, and a new weird fear skittered down her spine. All the statues looked like her mom. Or her mother dressed and made up for some of her most famous roles.
No, that couldn’t be right, didn’t make any sense.
What about this does make sense?
She had to be tripping or something…That was it. She tried hard to focus, and even though her brain was thick as mud, the lighting subdued, she recognized the characters…Paris Knowlton from Beneath the Shadows, Faye Tyler from Bystander, Zoey Trammel from A Silent Snow, Marnie Sylvane from Summer’s End, all dressed as they had appeared in the movies, complete with jewelry and props, their hairstyles perfect replicas of each character’s.
Weird.
And scary as hell.
Forcing back the fear, she angled her head and craned her neck to look upward. Above the beam supporting her, tacked onto the high ceiling, were posters, dozens and dozens of blown-up pictures of her mother in her most famous roles. The same characters that were posed on the stage below, except there were pictures of Jenna as Katrina Petrova from Innocence Lost and shots of her as Anne Parks in Resurrection.
This was all so eerie…She looked down again. Two statues…no, mannequins, that’s what they were, life-sized dolls. Two were faceless, though one had a wig, long black curls reminiscent of Katrina…oh, shit, whoever this freak was, he hadn’t finished his artwork…
Cassie’s heart stood still. She remembered the women who had been abducted…Were they a part of this macabre scene?