Kennedy Stern Christian Suspense Complete Box Set (Books 1-9)

CHAPTER 17

CHAPTER 17

Kennedy forced a deep breath into her lungs even though her diaphragm threatened to spasm. Her head felt light. Whatever energy she still had left seeped out of her body and dissipated into the air.

Ignoring the spinning in the center of her brain, Kennedy balled her hands into fists and glowered at Vinny. “What did you do?” She recognized a hint of hysteria sneaking into her tone but couldn’t control it.

Vinny was still frozen, his angry scowl cemented in place. Kennedy couldn’t stomach the sight of him, but she met his glare with open hostility. That was another difference between her and the Secret Seminary students. Hannah and the others might be able to love their enemies. But if she ever broke free, Kennedy wouldn’t sleep until Vinny was either dead or rotting away in a general population prison, where she hoped the inmates’ sense of vigilante justice would only prolong his suffering.

She narrowed her eyes and thought about the big pit bull terrier that lived next door when she was a little girl. If he meets your stare, don’t be the first to look away. She didn’t know how long her face-off with Vinny would have lasted because after a few seconds, Jodie sunk back on the couch with a moan. “My stomach hurts.”

At the sound of the tiny whine, Kennedy and Vinny both turned to the couch. Jodie’s hands were clasped around her midsection. The wet spot of blood on her lap was even larger than before.

Contempt heated up Kennedy’s whole body. Stay calm, she told herself. Remember, you’re still their prisoner. She took another breath and swallowed down her disgust. “Would it be all right if I took her into the bathroom?” She remembered the men credited her with some degree of medical knowledge. “She might have gotten injured when you fell on her.”

Vinny looked aside. “You have five minutes,” he growled without changing his facial expression. A jerk of the head sent Dustin fumbling with the handcuff key.

When Kennedy was free, she put her arm around Jodie. “Do you think you can walk?”

Jodie grimaced. “It hurts.”

“I’m going to stand up first, and then I’ll help you, ok?” Kennedy blinked over her dry contacts. She pulled Jodie to her feet, and the child let out another whimper.

Kennedy was so weak she could hardly stand up straight, but she managed to shuffle toward the bathroom, half dragging, half carrying Jodie. A few steps away from the door, she lost her footing and nearly stumbled. She clenched her jaw shut to ward off the frustrated scream that threatened to jump from her throat. Why were they here? Why was any of this happening? And if Jodie needed real medical intervention, what in the world could Kennedy do about it in this cold, musty basement?

Please God, we need a miracle. We need to be rescued. Kennedy grew up learning God had amazing plans for her. When she heard stories of believers who went through incredible suffering or persecution, she figured that they were the unlucky ones like Job, but in the end they too would have their reward. She assumed her own life would continue on as always, paved with blessings, filled with abundance, sheltered from tragedy, free from fear. Could it really be that last week the biggest stress was the calculus test she was now missing?

She thought about Crime and Punishment. What would Dostoevsky say about her situation? Probably not much. Her case was one more petty injustice in a world teeming with suffering and evil. Kennedy had never felt so insignificant, so invisible. She bit her lip, repositioned her weight, and helped Jodie take the last few steps to the bathroom.

“Five minutes,” Vinny repeated behind them.

Kennedy shut the door. A whole day, a whole week of prayer wouldn’t have prepared her for any of this. What was she supposed to do now? How was she supposed to help Jodie? Kennedy wanted to find the man who came up with the catchphrase, God wouldn’t give you more than you could handle, and laugh in his face. Or maybe shake him by the shoulders.

Jodie dropped to the ground when the door closed. Kennedy cringed when she thought about how many bacterial colonies were thriving down there. “Do you want to sit on the toilet or something?” Not that it was any cleaner.

Jodie stared into her lap. “I’m bleeding.”

“I know, sweetie. I think something ...” Kennedy stopped herself. She didn’t know what was going on. Had Vinny hurt her when he fell on her? Or was it something else? “I think we just need to see about getting you cleaned up. Can you come up here?” She patted the back of the toilet bowl and immediately wished she hadn’t.

Jodie glanced at the toilet the same way Kennedy might have stared at the Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea after someone told her she should race across it. But she couldn’t leave the girl on the floor, could she?

“I think I wet my pants,” Jodie finally confessed.

“Don’t worry about that. Let’s get you up here, and we’ll see if we can clean you up some.” Kennedy doubted the men had a change of clothes here.

After she helped Jodie onto the toilet, she opened the bathroom door a small crack. Dustin was standing outside, but his gun was still concealed. “She’s bleeding pretty heavy.” Kennedy’s face warmed with humiliation, and she kept her eyes low. She didn’t want Jodie to think she was embarrassed, and she forced her voice to sound natural. “Can we have some pads?”

Dustin looked over his shoulder at Vinny, who was tinkering again at the work table. “What do they need?” he grumbled.

“Pads.” A small hint of pink dusted the tips of Dustin’s ears.

“Pads what?” Vinny yelled back. “Pads of paper?”

Dustin looked once to Kennedy before answering, “No, pads. You know. For girls.” The last two words came out reluctantly.

Vinny slammed his wrench onto the table. “You go get them, then.”

Dustin didn’t object. Kennedy wouldn’t have either, not when Vinny used that tone of voice. Dustin went up the stairs without saying anything else. Kennedy reminded herself to try to gauge how long he was gone. That might give her some clue how far away they were from real people and real stores. She wasn’t sure exactly how that knowledge could help her, though. What they needed was a real SWAT team with real tactical gear. She thought about Dustin’s gun and wondered what other weapons the men had stashed around here.

With Dustin gone and Vinny tied up with whatever project he was working on, Kennedy and Jodie could have a little privacy. She shut the door the rest of the way. Jodie was still clutching her stomach, and in the artificial light from the bulb hanging overhead, her skin looked a strange shade of grayish green.

“This hasn’t been a very good day for you, has it?” Kennedy was half joking and didn’t really expect a response. She didn’t know what else to say. She had dozens of questions, but any one of them would remind Jodie of their awful situation. Another panic fit was the last thing either of them needed. “How’s your stomach feel?”

“A little better, I guess.” Jodie offered Kennedy a weak smile. “Thanks for being here.”

Kennedy forced herself to chuckle. “I could say the same to you, too. I definitely wouldn’t want to be alone right now.” She didn’t know how late it was but figured it was some time Tuesday afternoon. At school, she would either be cramming for calculus or taking that test. It seemed silly now, all the time and energy Kennedy had spent worrying and stressing over her GPA.

“So, you know what you were saying before?” Jodie began. “About God being with you?”

Kennedy had never had a serious conversation — or a conversation of any kind — in a bathroom with someone who was bleeding on the toilet, but what was it she had told Reuben a few days ago? First time for everything. She waited for Jodie to continue.

“Well, I was wondering. Do you think, I mean, do you think he’s with you even when you do something bad ... like have an abortion or something?”

The question hit Kennedy like a kick to the gut. So did Jodie know the truth about the pills? “Sweetie, what your uncle tried to make you do ... that wasn’t your fault, you know. You didn’t have any control over that.”

“Yeah, but ...” Jodie bit her lip. “I actually told him I would. Have an abortion, I mean.”

Kennedy hoped if she ever got out of here that God would keep Jodie’s uncle in another country, preferably on another continent. Kennedy didn’t want the guilt of murder on her hands, but she sure felt capable of it every time she thought about Anthony Abernathy. She couldn’t let Jodie know though, so she nodded and asked, “When did you tell him that?”

“Well, he said that if I let him take me to this clinic after church that he’d ... well, he’s going to France this Christmas. And he said he’d want me to go and be Charlie’s nanny while he’s there, and I’ve never been to another country, so ...”

Jodie nodded and kept her gaze on the grimy floor.

“And so after church my parents thought I was just going to play with Charlie for a few hours, but we took him to his grandma’s and went to the clinic instead.”

“What happened there?” Kennedy felt like she was reading an overly-violent scene in a novel. Her initial reaction was to skim past it all, but her brain forced her to pay attention to each word so she didn’t miss anything. Instead of speeding up past the gruesomeness of it all, her mind slowed down as if it wanted to absorb the horror in small bits at a time.

“Well, I started crying. It was hard to breathe.”

“Kind of like this morning?” Kennedy asked.

Jodie nodded.

“That’s a panic attack, sweetie. It feels really scary, but you’ve just gone through a whole lot. It’s your body’s way of showing you it’s frightened.” Kennedy realized then she didn’t know half of what Jodie had endured. Almost all of it was still conjecture. “It’s a natural reaction for someone who’s gone through as much as you have.”

“I told them I didn’t want to do it.” Jodie’s voice trembled a little. “I was screaming. My uncle had to hold me down.” She hung her head.

Kennedy’s skin tingled with rage. “Did he force you?” She had been horrified by the video her dad made her watch once about abortions, and that was when she was a senior in high school. She couldn’t imagine what it would be like for a thirteen-year-old girl to have to suffer first-hand through something so traumatic.

Jodie shook her head. “No, he would never do that.”

Apparently Jodie had a higher opinion of her uncle than he deserved, but Kennedy kept the thought to herself.

“He went outside for a minute to talk to the nurse. And then he came back and gave me a pill. He said I had a case of nerves — that’s what the crying was about — and that I should take it to feel calmer. But it didn’t help. I started throwing up really bad. Not just like the morning sickness, either.”

Kennedy still couldn’t get used to the idea that she was standing in a bathroom talking to a junior-higher about things like morning sickness and abortion clinics.

“Is that why you didn’t want to take the pills the guys out there gave you?”

Jodie sniffed and nodded. “I’ve just been feeling so bad lately. I went to this forum online, and it said morning sickness usually goes away after the first twelve weeks, but it didn’t.”

“Well, I can see why you maybe thought that having an abortion was the only option.” Kennedy hated saying the words. What kind of life had Jodie led to think there wasn’t anything else she could do? On the other hand, given her age, given her family situation and the media hype over the upcoming election, would carrying the child have been any less horrific and traumatizing? “I’m proud of you, though, for changing your mind. That must have taken a lot of courage.”

Jodie sniffed. “I didn’t do it for the baby or anything, you know.”

“What do you mean?”

“The nurse said they’d have to do an ultrasound. See how old the baby was. And I ...” Jodie sniffed again and turned her face. “I didn’t want my uncle to know. He only thinks I’m six weeks.” Jodie’s voice was so quiet Kennedy had to lean down toward her a little.

“Why did you tell him that?”

“I didn’t want to get Samir in trouble. He was ... he ... we were good friends. But our parents didn’t like us spending time together.” She kept her eyes to the ground. “Last summer his family sent him to a boys’ home in Vermont. I think they just wanted to make sure we couldn’t be around each other. I haven’t talked to him since then.”

“I’m sorry.” Was there anything else for Kennedy to say? None of this made any sense.

Jodie looked up shyly. “If my uncle knew I got pregnant that long ago, he would have thought the baby was ... Well, you know. And he’d be mad at Samir. Really mad.”

Something about Jodie’s tone didn’t fit with the rest of the story. Of course, it was unnaturally bizarre talking to someone so young about boyfriends and abortions and pregnancies, but was that all, or was there more to it? Was Jodie telling her everything?

Jodie sucked in her breath. “That’s why I said I didn’t want the abortion after all. I didn’t want the nurse to do the ultrasound and tell my uncle how old the baby really was.”

Kennedy tried to swallow. Why did she live in a world where girls so young could get pregnant in the first place? “We all make mistakes,” she stammered. She thought about her junior-high crushes. Sure, they felt like real love, but she couldn’t imagine going to bed with someone at that age. “I know if you’re really sorry for what you and Samir did ...”

Jodie scrunched up her face. “But we never did anything.”

Kennedy felt like she had when she first moved to Yanji, trying to understand the new language, knowing she had missed something important but unable to figure out what. “So Samir’s not the dad?” She felt like a bigger dolt than she had when everyone in her calculus study group figured out how to derive differential equations before she did.

Jodie shook her head. “No. We never even kissed. I didn’t want Uncle Anthony to think Samir got me pregnant. But he and I ...” She lowered her eyes again. “We didn’t do anything like that. He’s not even a Christian. We liked each other a lot, but neither of our parents would allow it. Besides, we both knew it would be wrong.”

So she lied to her uncle to protect a boy who couldn’t possibly be the baby’s father?

“Guess you’re surprised.” Jodie let out a mirthless laugh that could have come from somebody much older. “With my dad being so pro-life and all.”

Kennedy thought her next words out very carefully and kept her gaze fixed to discern Jodie’s reaction to each syllable. “Well, if Samir’s not the one who got you pregnant ...” she began tentatively.

Jodie turned her head and sat up a little straighter. Did she know what was coming?

Kennedy’s hands started to sweat, and she wiped them on the sides of her pants. “You don’t have to tell me anything if you don’t want to, but I think it would be helpful if I knew.” Her mouth felt suddenly very dry. She swallowed before she began again. “Sometimes adults don’t know the right way to treat their daughters or their nieces, and they ... What I’m trying to ask you is if your dad or maybe your uncle is the one who ...”

There was a banging on the door. “Times up.”

Jodie let out a loud, choppy sigh. Kennedy was just as ready to end the conversation there, at least for now. She was sure that hadn’t been a full five minutes, but she was in no position to argue. She eyed Jodie’s stained clothes. “What you want to do about your pants?”

Vinny pounded on the door again. If he grew too impatient, nothing could stop him from coming in before Jodie was dressed.

“We’re getting ready right now,” she called out in the least hostile tone she could stomach. She frowned at Jodie. “I’m really sorry, but I think the only choice is to put your old clothes back on for now. At least when the other guy gets back with some pads ...” She let her voice trail off and wondered for the hundredth time that day how she had gone from a volunteer weekend receptionist to a hostage in this huge, impenetrable cell.

Jodie could move more easily now, and she only needed a little help to keep her balance as she dressed. Kennedy helped her roll up some toilet paper to serve as a makeshift pad and tried not to cringe when Jodie put on the bloodstained things. It was better than wearing nothing at all.

A second before Jodie finished pulling her pants up, Vinny barged into the bathroom. “I said time’s up,” he growled. Kennedy avoided his eyes and linked her elbow in Jodie’s. They walked back to the couch, and Vinny’s phone rang. Kennedy hoped she could continue her awkward conversation with Jodie, but he just looked at his screen, swore, and jammed the phone back into his pocket.

“It’s cold.” Jodie sat and hugged her arms around herself. She was shivering. For a minute, Kennedy thought about asking Vinny for a blanket, but she decided to wait. Maybe Dustin would be in a more agreeable mood when he came back with the pads. It seemed nearly impossible for their situation to improve in any way, but she could always hope.