stayed behind in the hallway still stood within arm’s reach. The guy with the lasso—a small, heavily bearded man, probably in his twenties, with beady eyes and a snarl—kept glancing between her and Butler. The other two were calmer, hands lingering near their weapons, but displaying no obvious fury. More of Butler’s lieutenants?
She squinted at them, trying to remember where they’d been during the mob, although she hadn’t been able to see much around Rolfe. She had no idea if they’d swarmed her or if they’d been among the few who’d stood back and watched, ready to jump in or break it up, depending on Butler’s orders.
“...question me!” Butler’s furious voice caught her attention. Evelyn shifted her head toward him again, straining to hear, but he quieted down as Rolfe, his back to her, gestured with his hands. He seemed to be arguing aggressively.
New worry rushed into her mind. What would Butler do—or have his followers do—to Rolfe if he didn’t obey orders? And what would happen to her without Rolfe?
How the hell had she let herself get mixed up in this mess? Would she have recklessly accompanied Jen if she hadn’t been looking for a way to decide whether she still belonged in BAU? Or would she have done what Dan wanted and headed home on schedule?
Was this just one more sign that it was time to move on? To leave profiling behind for good? To leave the FBI?
To start over somehow? Of course, that meant she’d have to figure out what she wanted to do—who she even was—without the mission that had been driving her since she was twelve years old.
The very idea made her uneasy. The need to find out what had happened to Cassie had pushed her through college, through her advanced degrees, through the FBI Academy. It had motivated her to work impossible hours, striving for a perfect record, until she’d been accepted into BAU.
Now, her desperate need to solve Cassie’s case was gone, because she’d done it. What was left?
She’d never know unless she could make it out of here alive, Evelyn reminded herself as she tried to hear what Rolfe was saying.
“...need her! Don’t forget why you’re here,” Rolfe’s voice carried toward her.
“This isn’t how it was supposed to go,” Butler boomed. “Not here! This place was supposed to stay invisible.” Then he seemed to realize how loud he was being, and glanced around as Evelyn wondered what exactly his words meant.
Ward caught her eye and Evelyn lowered her head, but not before she saw him look back at Rolfe and give him a toothy, insincere smile.
“I never would’ve let them kill her,” Butler said, clearly intending for her to overhear as he added, “Not yet.”
Rolfe said something in response, but all Evelyn caught was an ominous-sounding, “Don’t forget what we agreed,” before he stalked away from Butler and toward her.
“Let’s go,” he barked, grabbing her arm and dragging her along with him back the way they’d come.
She stumbled, trying to catch her footing. “Where?”
“You want to stay with me or them?” Rolfe replied, the fury in his tone telling her now wasn’t the time to test his determination to keep her alive.
“You,” she whispered, as if she had a choice.
“That’s what I thought,” he said, still pulling her along so fast she had trouble keeping up.
The beady-eyed guy with the lasso spat at her, but kept quiet as Rolfe dragged her back the way they’d come.
He slowed down just long enough to let her step carefully over the trip wire, and the way he glanced at her gave her the impression that his anger was directed more at Butler than at her. It was hard to tell how far they’d walked in the semidarkness, but Evelyn thought they’d passed the closet where he’d brought her earlier to change.
How big was this place? And where were they going?
She could sense Rolfe’s mood in his painful grip, so she didn’t ask, just let him push her through another door and shut her inside. She heard him storm off, and as soon as he left, she reached out blindly and tested the handle. It was locked. A second later, footsteps approached again and she listened as something scraped the floor as it was wedged under the handle from outside.
She stood in the darkness, waiting for her eyes to adjust. No matter how much she strained, she couldn’t see anything at all, not even shapes. She gave up and stretched out her arms. Her right hand bumped into something wooden, sending another splinter into her arm. She ignored the pain, sliding her hand forward, identifying shelves. They were lined with plastic containers, but she couldn’t guess what might be in them.
Carefully, she took a step to the left, and immediately bumped into another shelf. So she was probably in a different closet, like the one they’d originally shut her in with Jen.
What had they done with the other agent? Evelyn sucked in a deep breath, suddenly afraid to move backward. What if Jen’s body was in here with her?
As a profiler, she’d seen a lot of death. Usually in crime scene photos, as she consulted from her office in Aquia, but up close and in person plenty of times, too.
In her job, getting called in on a case meant the death was probably gruesome. During her year at BAU, she’d seen depravity she couldn’t possibly have imagined.
But she’d never had to watch another agent being shot, then been drenched in her blood. She’d never been locked in pitch darkness, hoping not to stretch out her arm and encounter a body.
Panic threatened, and Evelyn tried to ignore it, to think. Her best chance of getting out alive was to profile the people inside the compound, to understand them well enough to predict what they’d do next.
It was easy to see that Rolfe was her best ally. But why? What kind of lieutenant so openly questioned his leader?
The survivalists who’d chosen to live here did seem united in their hatred of the federal government, in the “prepper” ideology—the idea that they needed to be prepared for the collapse of civilization. Maybe instead of trying to go it alone, they’d banded together to ride out the end times together. They all appeared to be single, without families, so perhaps this was the family unit they’d created instead. Maybe those things formed the basis of the cult structure, instead of a typical religious belief, since they didn’t seem to share a religion.
Was it enough? Preppers who’d put their faith in Butler as a leader? Except the conversation she’d overheard between Butler and Rolfe went through her mind as she absently tried to yank the splinter out of her arm. Butler had talked about the compound as though it wasn’t the only place he controlled.
Could Jen be right? Could they be more than a cult? Could there be a terrorist connection?
Evelyn sighed, sinking slowly to the ground, feeling her way before she sat. She wrapped her arms around herself for warmth as she considered.
The mob of cultists who’d come after her had been disorganized, abrupt. Could a group consisting of members who didn’t share a religious connection band together effectively enough to fuel a terrorist ideology? Could they really follow orders and act on their leader’s plan?
Images
