Chapter 27—Raine

I'm hiking. To no place in particular. Just far enough away so I can think. Jade scared me to death when I saw her in the Jeep shaking like a leaf. Then she blames herself for this. I can’t let her think that. She didn’t know the video would end up on the internet. All I can think right now is that I will have to leave her. I can’t. I need her. Now that I know how good life can be, I can’t let it go that easy. Something needs to change. I don’t want to run anymore. I want to fight for Mom and me. I'm not letting this destroy my relationship with Jade. And I'm not taking her away from Jonah either. I have had enough. That man has ruined 18 years of our lives. He won’t get any more. This is the end.

I head back to the house with purpose. I will not let him ruin our lives ever again. When I get there, Jade is asleep on the couch. Her face is still streaked with tears. I sit down on the couch and put her head on my lap instead of the pillow. She wakes up and looks at me. She reaches her hand up and touches my face. “I'm so sorry.” She tells me sadly. “Jade, this isn’t your fault. Please don’t blame yourself. I just needed to think.” She tears up again. “I thought you hated me and didn’t want to look at me.” She confesses. That hits me right in the heart. “Baby, I will never hate you. I just had to make some decisions.” I take her hand and we just stay that way for a little while. She is waiting for me to tell her what I'm thinking. “I'm not running any more Jade. It’s over.” She sits up immediately. “But Raine, you don’t know what could happen. He could kill you.” She says fearfully. “I'm not going to let him do that. I'm taking our lives back.” She clenches my hand. “Raine, he saw the video. Someone sent it to him.”

I help her off the couch and we go into the kitchen to talk to Mom and Jonah. They seem to be deep in conversation when we come in. Mom hops up and wraps me in a big hug. I hold her close. I kiss her on the top of her head. “Let’s sit down, I want to talk to you guys.” We all take a seat and I tell them what I just decided. Mom looks stunned. But Jonah is really pleased with my decision. “I agree Raine, you can’t let him win. You have to put an end to all of this. I think you could save all those kids too. We just have to make a plan and be careful. Maybe even get the authorities involved. I have a couple of friends I trust who can help. Mom starts to protest about this. But I cover her hand in mine. “Mom, I think he’s right. We need help. We can’t do this on our own.”

We spend the next few hours running through ideas. Jade wants to get the lawyer at the shelter involved. I agree that the more people who know the story, the more likely we are to get a conviction in the end. We need as much proof as we can get. We didn’t take anything with us when we left. So, I don’t know how we can get any. Maybe we can use the original ransom information. Mom remembers the original last names of the other women. And she knows what cities they were from. Maybe we can try and contact their families. We don’t know exactly where we were in Tennessee. But we can tell the police how long we walked and in which direction. We can also tell them the town we first arrived in. That should give them a starting point for a search.

We can also give them the copies we printed of Ezekiel’s chats searching for us. Mom sent it all to the cloud. I know Grandpa will help. He can show them the money trail from the ransom. I know enough about the property to draw a detailed map. He must have some sort of internet out there in the middle of nowhere. Maybe they can track that. We know that all the women were taken from the same bus station. If he has taken any more women, there could possibly be camera footage.

I'm feeling excitement and a sense of relief too. I can’t imagine that we will actually be free of him one day. Whatever we do, it needs to be soon. He could already have figured out where we are. The next thing we do is contact grandpa and ask him for any information he has from 18 years ago. He tells us he kept everything. Every lead that ever came in. Phone records, emails, all of it. He says he can’t wait to see this guy behind bars.

Jonah says he doesn’t feel comfortable leaving us here until this is over. We take everything we will need for the next few days and head over to Jades house. They have a guest room and an office. I take the couch in the office and Mom settles into the guest room. I'm fidgety all night. I'm thinking about all of the possibilities. I'm also thinking about Jade sleeping in the next room. I can’t think about her right now. She’s way too distracting. I took a shower after her and I could smell that strawberry shampoo she uses and her body wash. It was killing me. I had to take the fastest shower ever known to man.

The next morning Jade and I don’t go to school. Mom checks Ezekiel’s chat. He asked a few questions trying to pinpoint our location. No one seems to know much. Someone suggested he look for the artist who created the paintings in the background of the video. That was a good idea. I don’t like it. I watch the video again to see things that stand out to me. I see one of Jades pieces from the art auction. Those paintings are all shown on the charity’s website with a picture of Jade. That’s not good at all. I scroll through the article that they posted about the event. It has lots of pictures from that evening. And sure enough, there is the one of us from outside.

Jade immediately gets on the phone with one of the supervisors. She explains that a woman who is hiding from an abusive man could be in danger because of these photos. They take that very seriously. In about an hour, the article remains, but the photos are taken down. Hopefully it was soon enough. She also spoke to her lawyer friend, and she has agreed to meet with us this afternoon at her office. Jonah has contacted his detective friend and explained the basics of the situation. We are meeting with him back here tonight.

Mom says Ezekiel just responded to that last post. He is asking if anyone could help him search for the paintings. We pulled those photos just in time. That was way too close. At least we know that he’s not aware we are in California. Jade is sitting next to me at her kitchen table holding my hand. At this point, I don’t even care anymore if our parents notice. I'm ready to tell them I’m in love with her anyway.

We head over to see the lawyer. She makes some recommendations. She thinks we can get a restraining order or, Emergency order of protection, issued against him based on the information we give her. If he does come to Big Sur, he will get arrested just for being within 100 feet of us. Jonah calls the detective again and sets up an appointment for us to do that.

Grandpa had all of his paperwork sent via FedEx over night to us. So, we have all of that when we go to the police station, as well as a copy of the most recent chats. The detective cuts through some red tape and the order of protection is granted pretty quickly. Grandpa had pictures of us from the day he picked us up at that hotel. I don’t even remember him taking them. They are pretty bad. Jade is visibly shaken. She takes my hand again when she sees them. I have no photos of myself as a child. Not a single one. And this is the first picture she sees of me. All battered and bruised. A gun shot in my leg.

Back at Jades, Jonah’s friend, Detective Bennett sits down with us, and we tell him the pertinent details of the situation. Mom gives him the info about the other women, and he promises to try to find their families. He says there should be open missing person cases on them. He also says that he did some research today and found the case on Hope. They have all the information about the team who searched for her after the ransom drop. He brought us an aerial map they had of the territory they covered in their search. I spend about an hour searching it for landmarks that I remember. I think I can pinpoint where the compound is. He does a search of that general area and checks the distance from the town we came to first. He says based on how far someone can travel on foot under our circumstances, that the location I chose is very promising.

Mom tells him everything about the day he took her from the bus station. They drove for hours. She has no idea if they just drove around in circles to confuse her or if they drove straight there. Detective Bennett said he got a warrant for the video cameras at the bus station Mom told him about earlier today. They said they only keep the tapes for a year. It doesn’t look good. But if he went there and took another girl in the last year, they just may have him. Mom and I are going to the station tomorrow and have a sketch artist try and draw Ezekiel. They haven’t found him in any of their data bases yet. Progress is being made though, and it feels good.