Harper is missing.
Shaker is missing.
Hilarie is missing.
Harper’s house exploded.
Hilarie’s house is empty.
Harper’s car is missing.
Valarie Vine owns the building.
Valarie Vine owns Hilarie Thaxton’s house.
Valarie Vine is dead.
“No fucking way!” Byte shouted.
“What?” we all asked in unison.
Byte turned his computer screen around to face us. “The picture on the left is Valarie Vine’s driver’s license photo from years ago. The picture on the right is Hilarie Thaxton’s mugshot from last month.”
I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Valarie’s picture looked like a young Harper. They could be, well, twins. Hilarie’s picture, however, looked completely different.
Before I could ask, Byte enlarged the pictures and continued, “The eye color is different, probably contacts, but the size and shape of the eyes are the same. Also, note the mole on the upper left cheek as well as the faint scar along the right jawline. The preliminary result from my facial recognition software is a 77.58% chance of these two photos being a match.”
“Other than those three things you pointed out, they look completely different,” Phoenix stated the obvious.
Byte nodded in agreement. “They do, but everything else could be surgical, such as the cheekbones, nose, and chin, or cosmetic, like eye color and hair color. Moles can be removed, but I don’t believe anyone adds them…same thing with scars.”
Suddenly, a horrible thought came to mind as a rock settled in my gut. “How did she try to kill herself as a child?”
Duke’s face paled, and I assumed he was following my line of thoughts. “She jumped off the roof of her aunt’s house…and landed face down on the walkway.”
Fuck me. I rasped, “Hilarie Thaxton is Valarie Vine.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Harper
I froze in fear as the footsteps came closer to the bed. I felt a pinch as something pierced the skin of my arm. The footsteps retreated, and I faded into the darkness.
When I woke the next time, my head felt groggy, and I was extremely thirsty. For a brief moment, I wasn’t sure why I felt so bad, but the reality of my situation came flooding back to me the very next second.
My breathing increased, and my heart beat frantically in my chest as sheer terror tried to consume me once again. With an inner strength I didn’t know I possessed, I forced myself to calm down, and I opened my eyes. To my surprise, the lights were on. I moved my hand to shield my eyes from the bright lights and realized my hands and legs were free.
A shot of adrenaline coursed through me as I got to my feet and started exploring my surroundings. I was in a small room with concrete walls, no windows, and two doors, one open and one closed. I immediately went to the closed door to find it locked. The open door led to a bathroom, also with concrete walls and no windows.
I made use of the facilities and rinsed my mouth out with some water. I stood there for a moment, braced on the sink, and tried to gather myself. I could have a meltdown later, after I found a way out. Taking in a deep breath, I slowly released it and returned to the room to see if I could find anything useful.
The room held no furniture, other than the bed, which was somehow affixed to the floor. On the floor beside the bed, I found a few stacks of folded clothes, a loaf of bread, a jar of peanut butter, packets of jelly, a large bag of chips, and several bottles of water. What I didn’t find was something I could use as a weapon.
I took a seat on the bed, pulled my knees to my chest, and cried. It wasn’t my intention to fall asleep, but I had, and I blamed the drugs that were obviously still in my system. It was a fitful sleep with dreams filled with voices and sounds instead of images.
“Sister dearest, my plans are coming together perfectly. Soon, it will be just you and me, together again in our new home. No one will bother us, and no one will be able to find us. I wish it could be like that now, but I haven’t finished getting everything ready. It won’t be much longer. Until then, you’ll stay here, where you’re safe. I love you so much, Vanessa.”
Vanessa.