Lynda’s watch showed the date and time in glowing green. So far, she had spent almost three days in this room. She was fed and escorted to the washroom regularly enough to not be uncomfortable. Ray was the one who always escorted her. She had known Ray for a long time just not to the extent that she knew Uncle Greg. Ray would pop in now and then at their house to pick up her dad to go to the local pub or wherever. She knew him to say hi and how’s it going, but nothing further than that. He wasn’t family. Not like Uncle Greg who had been at their house for birthdays and holidays. With Ray, she had no leverage which was why (she guessed) he was the one chosen to feed her and escort her during her washroom breaks. He wouldn’t answer her questions about Bruce. He wouldn’t answer her questions about when she was getting out of here. And he wouldn’t let her call her mom which even though she understood why he wouldn’t, it still hurt. Her mom would be going crazy by now at home. She wondered how her dad was handling it? He had to have gone home, right? When your wife calls to tell you your child hasn’t come home, you get your ass home and try to help right? How the hell was he pulling this off? Then, thinking about how long he had fooled them all, maybe this part of it was a piece of cake. Another lie added to the layers of lies. Lynda moved from anger to tears to fear and eventually fell asleep out of complete exhaustion. Her mom would have the whole town out looking for her and Bruce. She was the type of person who didn’t wait for others to do for her. She’d do it herself and organize an army of people to help. That was all well and good, but no one knew of this place. It was a dark secret of the professional secret keepers. She had a strong suspicion of what happened to Bruce and thinking of him brought more tears. Images of Bruce being yanked from the SUV and getting stomped on made her chest hurt. Believing what happened to him would soon happen to her, and knowing how pissed her mom would be if Lynda for one second gave up, she used the lamp to light every dark corner so she could examine her prison. If there was a way out, she’d find it.