Chapter 28 - Lily's Brave Resistance
Inside the freezing cargo space of the van, six-year-old Lily Vance pressed her small back hard against the metal seat. Her hands were bound with rough zip-ties, and a thick strip of duct tape pulled painfully at the corners of her mouth.
Her cheek throbbed where Victoria had slapped her in the bedroom, but she wasn't crying anymore.
*“Remember what we practiced, Lily,”* Grace’s gentle voice echoed in the little girl's memory from the quiet afternoons they spent painting together in the sunny nursery. *“When bad things happen, or people try to make you feel small, you breathe deep. You are strong. You are smart. You watch everything, and you never give up.”*
Lily swallowed the lump of terror in her throat.
Through the tear in the duct tape, she managed to wiggle her tongue, slowly working the sticky adhesive loose with her saliva. Her wrists burned, but she kept working her fingers toward her coat pocket.
Inside that pocket was the little silver whistle Grace had gifted her—a whistle meant for dog training that made a sound so piercing high it could cut through a thunderclap.
Outside the van, Victoria and Julian were shoving each other. Julian slammed the van door shut, locking it from the outside, his face dark with panic.
"I'm taking the keys, Victoria. You want to wait for a ghost boat? Be my guest. But I’m taking the cash from the safe and disappearing into the mountains."
"You touch that duffel bag and I will empty this revolver into your spine!" Victoria pulled a snub-nosed revolver from her designer trench coat, aiming it directly between Julian’s eyes.
Julian stopped dead, his hands slowly rising. "You're out of your mind. You won't shoot. The whole county will hear it."
"I don't need a boat to bury you, Julian," Victoria whispered, her face twisted into a mask of pure, psychopathic malice. "You were always just a hired dog. And when a dog stops obeying, you put it down."
Inside the van, Lily finally managed to spit the loosened tape from her mouth. She took a deep, shuddering gasp of air, pressed her lips against the collar of her coat where the whistle hung by a cord, and blew with all the breath left in her small lungs.
May you like
A sharp, ear-splitting shriek cut through the storm.
***
