“Sorry, what?”
“We asked you who Christie Smith is.” Jenna asks softly.
“Christie was my sister’s roommate prior to Raven.”
“What does that have to do with Raven? Would she do something like this?” James asks.
“I don’t know. She and I had a little thing and she wanted more from me than I wanted to give. She went crazy when I rejected her advances. I finally did something drastic to make my point that I wasn’t interested. She moved out shortly after. I’m not sure if my sister’s asked her to leave, or if she did it on her own.”
“What do mean she went crazy?”
I can’t lie to them, not after all this. They are going to be my family too and they deserve the truth. So I tell them the whole story, even what I did to persuade her. When I finish, I’m physically ill. I stand there and wait for them to kick me out. But as I look around, no one is passing any judgment on me. After a silent moment, James starts barking out orders and Robbie, Finn, and John start moving.
Within the hour, we discover that Christie has a small house in East Nashville she’s been renting from an older couple. She
’s still registered in school at Belmont. Finn pulls her credit card and banking history to see if there are any odd purchases over the last few months. James calls a friend on the police force and asks him to come over. John and Robbie had Brent call Anna and set up an emergency meeting this afternoon under the pretense something has gone wrong with the project. Once she’s agreed, they’ll put a trace on her cell phone. Brent was given a transmitter and small recorder to drop in her bag so we can hear if Anna says anything that relates to Raven.
Jenna sits next to me and covers my hand with hers. She’s comforting me even though my dumbass probably got her daughter kidnapped. I feel so ashamed.
I can’t take it so I get up and call my dad and sisters to let them know about our new lead. Dad’s staying at my house so he can be closer. As expected, they are all shocked to hear the connection to Christie. Even though we don’t have solid confirmation yet, my instincts tell me she’s involved with this.
The officer that comes over isn’t happy about our plan. He didn’t like that we hadn’t officially reported anything, but he calls backup and tells them to be ready in case we hear something. Our plan is to follow Anna when she leaves the coffee shop and see if she leads us to Raven. If we hear anything over the audio, the police can intervene.
I get into the back of James’s SUV and pray that this will work. Everyone is somber on the drive to the coffee shop. We watch Brent through the windows as he makes up some excuse about needing more information to turn in on Monday. She gives him some of her notes. When he asks her is she’s heard from Raven, she becomes agitated. She shoves the rest of her papers back in her bag and jumps up to leave, making an excuse of being late for a family dinner. Brent must have been able to plant the devices because the recorder picks up her phone ringing. She answers and tells whoever it is that she’s on her way.
We follow her to a house about ten minutes away. She goes in and the sound of someone walking stairs comes over the audio feed. A door squeaks and Anna screams. There’s footsteps running on stairs and she starts yelling at someone.
“What have you done?”
“Nothing yet, why?” That was definitely Christie’s voice and I nod my head to James to confirm it.
“Nothing! Nothing! Have you been downstairs?”
“Not lately, it stinks down there.” Christie answers snidely.
“Have you seen all the blood? What happened to her? This has gone on long enough. You said you wanted to talk to her, not torture her. Raven is a good person. Why would you do this?”
No one hears her reply because Anna just gave us the confirmation we needed. Christie has Raven in this house. The police are already up the steps and in the house calling out to everyone to identify themselves. As soon as I get out of the truck, I run to the nearest bush and throw up as the word torture runs through my head over and over. My beautiful girl is in this house and she’s been tortured.
“We got her James, but we need an ambulance now!” Someone yells through the radio. He runs into the house and sirens are blaring in the distance. Robbie, Finn, and I stand there waiting as the cops hold us back from entering the house.
“Fuck it,” Finn says and runs in after James. I try to go too, but Robbie holds me back.
“Man, you need to stay out here. I heard some shit on the radio and this Christie bitch is whacked. We need to keep her from seeing you.”
“You’re not serious, are you? My fiancé is in that house! She needs me.” I yell at him.
“Well, she’s my sister and I want to get to her more than anything, but I need to keep you away from this psycho.”
“Christie is the least of my worries right now.”
“Bullshit! She’s still the biggest threat we have until we can get Raven out of that house. We need to know what has happened to her. So just stay the fuck back.”
The EMT’s run into the house and it seems like hours before they come back out. Raven is covered in a sheet on the stretcher with an IV attached to her arm. I run over to them, but they push me back and load her in the back of the ambulance. I scream her name, but they keep pushing me back. James jumps in the back with her and they take off. I stand there watching them go, listening to the sirens until Robbie calls for me. I run back to the truck and climb in. There’s blood all over the front of Finn’s shirt and his jaw is ticking.
“Finn, what did they do to her?”
“Don’t know yet, but she has a pulse.”