The Odds, page 10
He knelt down and began to dig with his hands.
The ground was soft and it went quickly. He was careful to make sure he didn’t toss aside any clumps of dirt big enough to conceal an envelope.
About two feet down, the same distance as before, his fingers scraped against cardboard.
He scooped away more dirt. It was the same type of box as before.
He got enough dirt out of the way that he could open the lid.
Ethan gasped and recoiled. Another woman was inside. She was bound and gagged, her eyes wide with terror.
He lifted her up. The gag was difficult to untie, and he didn’t have anything to cut it with, but he finally got it off. She leaned forward and violently coughed for a few moments while he untied her hands and feet.
He helped her out of the grave, which was difficult because she could barely move. He tried to get her to her feet, but she turned into dead weight and he almost dropped her.
“Are your legs numb?” he asked.
She nodded. “It’s all numb.”
“Do you want me to carry you?”
She nodded again, then she began to cry.
Ethan shined the flashlight beam around the inside of the thick cardboard box to make sure there wasn’t an envelope in there. He saw nothing. He assumed that the woman either knew the clue or had it on her.
He hoisted her into his arms and carried her to the paved road. She wasn’t as emaciated as the first woman who’d been buried alive, but she still didn’t look like she had three hot meals a day very often.
Now she was sobbing.
He set her down. He didn’t want to leave the park until he knew she had the clue.
She’d had a deeply traumatic experience, so he could give her a few minutes to compose herself. He’d be sobbing, too.
A few minutes later, she hadn’t stopped. He gently helped her to her feet.
Ethan didn’t want to make this awkward, but he did kind of need the clue. He didn’t know how many more parts there were to this scavenger hunt or how long he had to complete them.
He wasn’t good at consoling people. He tried to give her a comforting hug, but she flinched and pulled away.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
She said something back that he couldn’t understand.
“Do you know who did this to you?” he asked.
She shook her head.
“Do you know anything about a clue?”
“What clue?”
“I’m looking for a clue.”
“What clue?”
She had to have the clue, right? The “don’t tell anybody about the game” couldn’t apply to a woman who he’d just dug up in order to obtain a clue. “I’m on a scavenger hunt,” he said.
The woman gave him a blank stare.
“What’s your name?” Ethan asked.
“Tammy.”
“Hi, Tammy. I’m Ethan. I wish we could’ve met under different circumstances. I’m on a scavenger hunt. The reason I found you is because my next clue was in that spot. So I need to know if you have the clue.”
She dropped back onto the pavement and began to sob again. Then she started tearing at her hair.
What was he supposed to do? In any other situation, the interrogation could wait, but he desperately needed the clue.
Ethan sat down next to her. “I’ll get you to a hospital,” he said. “I’ll get you some help. I just need to know if anybody said anything to you about a clue.”
“What clue?”
“Any clue.”
The next obvious location was the house where the old lady had been murdered, but that was pretty far to travel without knowing for sure, and he didn’t want to have to search an entire two-story home. The clue had to be here. Maybe he needed to pull the cardboard coffin entirely out of the ground and check the entire thing.
“Is there anything in your pocket?” he asked.
She shoved her hands into each pocket. “No.”
“Nothing in your...bra or anything?”
“Address?” Tammy asked.
“What?”
“Address?”
“Do you have an address for me?”
Tammy just stared at him.
“What do you mean by address?” Ethan asked.
“I got an address. I think.” She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. “I’m sorry.”
“No, no, don’t apologize. You’re doing fine. You’ve been through a lot. Are you saying that somebody gave you an address?”
“Yeah,” she said. “Yeah, I think. Yeah, yeah. He did. An address.”
“Do you remember it?”
Tammy closed her eyes.
“Do you remember the address?”
“I’m thinking!” she screamed.
“All right, that’s fine, take your time.”
“One,” Tammy said. “One two? One three? One something.”
“One something. That’s a start.”
“One two one. One two one one? No. One two one. I think.”
“One twenty-one. That’s good.”
“One two one, not one twenty-one.”
“One two one. Do you remember the street?”
Tammy shook her head.
“It’s really important that you remember the street,” said Ethan. “Do you remember the first letter?”
“No.”
“Just try to think. Relax. We’ve got all the time in the world.”
“Maybe an H.”
“An H. Excellent. We’re making a lot of progress.”
“Or an R.”
“Okay, those are two very different letters, but that’s fine, we’ve still narrowed it down.”
“I can’t remember,” said Tammy. “I just can’t remember.”
“But they told you something, right?”
“I guess.”
“It’ll come to you. You’re really stressed out right now. Do you want to take some deep breaths with me?”
“No, I don’t want to take any fucking deep breaths! I want to go home!”
“I’ll take you home,” said Ethan. “Where’s home?”
“My arm hurts.”
He looked at her arm. She was bleeding through her long-sleeve shirt.
“Let me take a look,” said Ethan.
“Don’t touch my arm.”
“Let’s see how bad it is.”
“It’s bad.”
“Did you cut yourself when I pulled you out of there?”
“I think they did it.”
“The people who buried you alive cut your arm?”
Tammy nodded.
“Can I see?”
“No.”
“Please?”
Tammy pulled up her sleeve. Letters had been carved into her arm.
121 Roberts Lane.
“Oh,” she said.
“I need you to come with me,” Ethan told her. “I don’t think you’re safe.” Nobody had said he had to leave Tammy behind, and if he didn’t bring her along, he assumed she’d meet a similar fate to the old woman.
“None of us are safe.”
“No, but you’ll be safer with me.” He didn’t even know if that was true. “Let’s go. We need to move fast.”
He took Tammy by the hand and they hurried out of the park. She stood in front of his car as if she’d never seen a motor vehicle before, but when he opened the door for her she got inside.
He put “121 Roberts Lane” into his GPS. Fourteen minutes away. Not bad.
As they drove away, Tammy leaned against the door and just stared out the front windshield, looking comatose. Ethan was too busy with his own thoughts to try to make conversation, so they drove in silence.
He made it to the house in eleven minutes.
This was most definitely not the kind of place he’d normally visit, even in the daytime, even with a couple of friends. There were several cars in the driveway and loud music coming from inside. Ethan had never personally been to a crack house, and perhaps he was wrong because he was the furthest thing from an expert in such matters, but this place had an extremely strong “crack house” vibe.
Or maybe it was a meth den. Either way, no sane person would knock on that door in the middle of the night.
Ethan did not have the option of being sane.
13
“Stay in the car,” he told Tammy.
“Can you leave the keys so I can listen to music?” she asked.
“Sorry, no,” he said. He didn’t want to be a jerk, but he also didn’t want to come back out and discover that she’d stolen his car. He wasn’t thinking, “There’s no way this night could get any worse!” There were plenty of ways this night could get worse, and having his car get stolen would be a big one.
“What if they come after me?”
“If you speed off in my car, then I’m screwed. You can come with me if you want, but I don’t know what’s going to happen in there.”
“I’ll wait,” Tammy said.
Ethan got out of the car. The last thing he wanted to do was go up and knock on that door. In fact, he considered that this might be more dangerous than having drug dealers think he had a suitcase of their goods.
But right now it was just him in danger. If he failed, Jenny and the kids might be in danger. Or not. There was a lot of unexplained stuff in the rules of this game. Either way, he thought his best course of action was to try to successfully complete his 20% chance of finishing this round of the game.
He walked up to the front door.
He could not believe he was going to do this.
He knocked on the door.
Waited.
Nobody answered. Maybe they couldn’t hear him above the music.
He knocked again, louder.
The door swung open. A young skinny guy with hair that stuck up on the left side answered. He blinked a few times as if unused to the light, even though it was dark outside. “Yeah?”
“Hi,” Ethan said. “This is going to sound weird—”
“You a cop?”
“No.”
“Prove it. Say ‘I’m not a cop.’”
“I’m not a cop.”
“You look too scared to be a cop anyway. You buyin’?”
“No. I’m looking for a clue.”
The skinny guy laughed. “You’re in the wrong place, dude. I don’t know anybody who’s got a clue about anything.”
“I was told to come here to get a clue. You may not be the right person to talk to.”
“Do you mean get a clue as in expand your mind? I could get you some shrooms, maybe. Not sure if I have some or not. I could look.”
“No, I’m not here to buy any drugs.”
“Shrooms aren’t drugs. They’re all natural. God makes them.”
“I just want the clue. Is there anybody else in there I can talk to?”
“Yeah, it’s party time in here. C’mon in.”
Ethan followed him into the house. There were at least a dozen people inside, and a thin but pungent cloud of smoke. Beer cans were everywhere. The kitchenette counter was piled high with garbage and dirty dishes. One wall was lined with multiple plastic tubs of kitty litter that didn’t look like they’d been scooped out in weeks.
There was absolutely nothing about this house to dissuade him of the notion that it was a crack house.
“Hey!” the skinny guy shouted. “Hey! Hey!” When nobody heard him, he walked over to the stereo and turned off the music, eliciting several angry reactions. He pointed to Ethan. “This dude is looking for a clue!”
“You a private eye?” asked a man who sat on the armrest of a couch.
“No. And I’m not a cop. I’m on a scavenger hunt, and I was given this address for my next clue.”
“Scavenger hunt? That sounds fun as shit. Can I play?”
“Does anybody know what I’m talking about?” Ethan asked. His heart was racing and he was having a little bit of trouble catching his breath, but he tried not to show how scared he was.
Everybody looked around at each other and shook their heads.
“Nobody knows? Somebody here is supposed to have a clue for me.”
“Nah, dude, nobody has your clue,” said the skinny guy. He pulled over a chair. “But have a seat. Party with us.”
“I really shouldn’t.”
“Have a seat. Party with us.” He wasn’t quite threatening, but nor was he suggesting that this was completely optional.
Ethan sat down.
“You sure you don’t want anything?” the skinny guy asked. “You sure don’t need any uppers, but you’re definitely a dude who could use some weed.”
“No, thank you. I appreciate it, though.”
A woman plopped right onto his lap. Her hair was unwashed and stringy, and if she’d had any breasts to speak of, they would’ve popped out of the tiny top she wore. “Hey, sexy.”
The skinny guy laughed. “Don’t go getting any ideas. She’s not free.”
“I’m free,” she said. “Just not free, if you know what I mean.”
“He knew what I meant.”
“I didn’t even know what you meant.”
“I’m really not in the market for that,” said Ethan. “I swear, I’m just here for the clue.”
“You sure?” the skinny guy asked. “I’d tap that ass. She’s pretty much clean.”
She took a swing at him. “Shut up, dickhead.”
“I’m kidding, I’m kidding. I mean, you’d wear a rubber, obviously, and you’d run out and get a shot of penicillin as soon as you can, but other than that, she’s clean. We’ll give you a good rate. We’ll pretend you have a Groupon.”
Everybody around them laughed.
Ethan tried to stand up, but the girl wouldn’t get off his lap.
“Again, I’m not here for anything like that. I guess I have the wrong address.”
“Naw, dude, you’ve got the right address. Look at her! She’ll do anything you tell her to!”
“Not anything,” she protested.
“Anything that don’t leave marks.”
“That’s true.”
“You might catch some of the smaller diseases, but it won’t be anything that kills you. She’s worth getting a shot for. Trust me.”
The girl licked the side of Ethan’s face. He immediately got up, almost causing her to fall onto the floor. “I have to go.”
A bearded guy sitting on the couch sniffed something off the back of his hand. “You like games, huh?”
“I used to. Not anymore.”
“You like Russian Roulette?”
“No.”
He held up a revolver. “I’ll play you some Russian Roulette right now.”
“That won’t be necessary.”
“Who’s in for some Russian Roulette?” he asked everybody in the room.
Nobody indicated that they were, though several of them laughed.
“I’m trying not to die tonight,” said Ethan.
“That’s fair.” The bearded guy pressed his palm against the barrel of the gun. “What about hands? We see who gets a hole shot in his hand first?”
“You can shoot off your hand if you want,” said the skinny guy, “but I ain’t taking you to the hospital, and you’re cleaning the blood off my couch.”
“This little gun couldn’t shoot my hand off. It would go all the way through, yeah, but I’d still have a hand attached to my wrist.”
“I don’t want to see anybody’s hand come off,” said the woman who’d been sitting on Ethan’s lap.
Ethan needed to get the hell out of here. He didn’t even want the clue anymore. He couldn’t imagine that they would’ve taken the time to carve an address onto Tammy’s arm and get it wrong, but this was going nowhere.
“I’m sorry to have disturbed you,” he said, taking a step toward the door.
“No, don’t go,” said the skinny guy. “I’m intrigued. You’re an intriguing guy. Am I using that word right? Intriguing. I think I’m right. I didn’t even know how to pronounce it until a couple of years ago. I thought it was in-tree-gyoo-ing. What a dumbass, huh? You need to party with us. You don’t have to go all wild and stuff. Let’s have some fun.”
“Russian Roulette!” said the bearded man.
“Put the damn gun away.”
“Who’s gonna make me? I’ve got a gun.”
Ethan tried to move closer to the door, but the skinny guy stepped in his way. Ethan was confident that one punch would solve this problem, yet while he was sure he could kick this guy’s ass, he could not kick the asses of everybody in the house, especially when at least one of them had a gun.
Should he lay him out and run?
He wasn’t sure he could make it to the car before the others got him.
And if the address was correct after all, this would make it a lot more difficult to get the clue out of them. He just needed to leave the house, call Rick, and beg for some kind of guidance.
“I need to go out and make a call,” said Ethan.
“Make the call here. None of us will listen.”
“Let me leave, okay?”
“Don’t you like us? Don’t you think we’re friendly? I offered you the chance to tap some ass. That’s pretty friendly. You would have had an enjoyable time. I don’t even know you, and here I am trying to make sure you have a pleasant night, and yet you’re being anti-social. I don’t appreciate it.”
It was obvious that Ethan needed to try a different approach. He needed to pretend to have infinitely more courage than he was actually feeling right now. He had to assume that these people were just messing with him, that they didn’t actually intend to keep him here against his will, so if he got stern with them they might let him through.
“Look, asshole,” he said, immediately wondering if “asshole” was taking it too far. “I’m here for the clue, and nothing else. If you don’t have it, then there’s no reason for me to stick around, so I’d like you to get the hell out of my way so I can keep searching.” He could see on the skinny guy’s face that “asshole” had definitely been too far, but it was too late now. If he apologized, he’d never get to leave.
The skinny guy stepped out of his way. “You were bringing the party down anyway. And you don’t smell good.”
