Chapter 11 - The Man Who Caught Emma
Claire's first impulse was to grab a pen. She imagined Mr. Ellis alone in the dark, the water climbing, and knew what terror could make a person promise.
Ortiz caught her wrist. "Signing won't save him. Whoever took him has already shown you what promises mean."
A security guard found the answer to how Mr. Ellis had vanished. At 9:41 he'd received a call claiming the garage fire had started again. He walked out the clinic's side entrance against advice. A dark van picked him up three minutes later.
"He went back for his home," Claire whispered. "They used the fire to pull him out."
Ortiz requested a hostage-rescue team and sent the video to the officers outside the property. Rain began ticking against the hospital windows.
Claire zoomed in on the live image. Beyond Mr. Ellis was a rusted yellow handwheel and a section of brick that Ruth had painted white.
"That's not the cellar," Claire said. "He's in the lower maintenance room. I used to hear water through its door."
"Can your key open it?"
"It opens the outside gate. Mom said there was another way in, through the coal chute."
She drew the backyard on a paper towel. The chute was hidden beneath a loose flagstone near the lilac bushes. She marked it with an X.
Ortiz photographed the sketch and radioed the team. "No heroics," she told the lead officer. "Our witness says the water is rising. Use the lower access, locate him, get him out."
Claire watched Emma sleep and clung to the rail of the crib. At last, the radio crackled.
"We have the chute. Entering now."
There was scraping, a shouted command, and a sharp metallic bang. Then the sound of a man crying for help.
"We've got him!" the officer yelled.
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A second voice cut him off.
"Water's coming from the wrong side of the wall!"
