“Dougie,” she said carefully now, “I’m going to reach forward and see if I can untie your wrists. I can’t see anything either, so just hold still for a sec while I figure it out.”

The boy didn’t reply, nor did he move away. Progress, she supposed. Leaning over him, she could feel him shiver, then stiffen his body against the tremors. His sweatshirt was still damp, stealing precious heat from him. Rainie swore if she ever got out of this basement, she was never going out in the rain again.

Her fingers finally found his bound arms. She explored his wrists, then swore softly. The man had used hard plastic ties. The only way to get them off would be with something sharp, such as scissors. Son of a bitch.

“I can’t do it,” she said at last. “I’m sorry, Dougie. We need a special tool.”

Dougie just sniffed.

“Let me check out the blindfold. Maybe I can do that.”

Dougie turned his head; Rainie found the knot. The blindfold had more potential; it was a simple strip of cotton fabric. The knot was tight, however, and Rainie’s fingers stiff. She had to pick at it again and again, occasionally pulling Dougie’s hair and making him yelp.

In the end, she never mastered the knot. But her constant pulling stretched the worn fabric. Dougie surprised them both by sliding the blindfold off his head.

“It’s still dark!” he said with surprise.

“I think we’re in a basement. Can you see any windows?”

The boy was silent a moment. “Up,” he said at last. “Two of them. I’m not that tall.”

Rainie thought she knew what he meant. Two high portals, probably set above the foundation. At least that allowed in some natural light. Anything had to be better than the endless dark. “Dougie, do you think you could work on my blindfold now?”

The boy didn’t answer right away. Resentful, angry? Still thinking of all the ways Rainie failed him? She couldn’t turn back time. That much she knew to be true.

Finally, she felt his fingers. They moved up her arm to her neck, then the boy stilled.

“Where’s your hair?”

Rainie didn’t want to scare a young child, but at the same time, she needed him as an ally, which meant she needed his hatred of their abductor to be greater than his anger with her.

She answered truthfully. “He cut it off. Sawed it off, actually, with a knife.”

The boy hesitated. She wondered if he was now processing the rest of the information his fingers must have given him. The sticky feeling of her skin, where crisscrossing cuts still bled and oozed. The warm swollen area around her elbow where something had gone dreadfully askew.

“Work on the blindfold, Dougie,” she ordered quietly. “We’ll start by gaining our eyes, then see what we can do about our feet.”

He went to work on her blindfold. His fingers were smaller, nimbler. Even with his bound wrists, he had her blindfold off in no time at all. Dutifully, they both checked out their ankles. Thankfully, not a zip tie, but old-fashioned strips of cotton. As Dougie had already proved himself more adept, he went first.

The minute the ties came off and Rainie’s legs sprang apart, she felt an explosion of electrical impulses up and down her legs. Her toes shook, her left leg quivered. For thirty seconds, she gritted her teeth in agony as nerve ending after nerve ending filled with blood and fired to life. She wanted to scream, bang her hand in open-fisted frustration. Mostly, she wanted to kill the son of a bitch upstairs.

Then the worst of it passed, leaving her shaky and rubber-limbed, as if she’d just climbed Mount Everest instead of enduring a round of muscle spasms.

She tried for a deep, steadying breath, realizing for the first time how much her head hurt, the low ringing filling her ears. She had missed at least one dose of medication. She had no illusions about what would happen next.

She went to work on Dougie’s bindings, moving to the bottom step. Her eyes were still adjusting to the gloom; the two high portals let in a distant glow, probably from an overhead patio light. It was enough to allow their prison landscape to transform from pitch black to shades of gray. Dougie’s shoes became a darker silhouette against a lighter backdrop. She fumbled around with her heavy fingers until she found the knot, picking and tugging away.

“You’re not very good at this,” Dougie said.

“I know.”

“I’m hungry.”

“Did you bring any food?” she asked him.

She could feel him scowl in the dark. “No.”

“Then we have nothing to eat.”

“He took my beetle,” Dougie said, and for the first time, sounded angry. “He stole my pet!”

“Dougie, you know how adults are always telling you not to hit? No biting, no scratching, you have to play nice?”

“Yeah.”

“This man is the exception. You get the chance, go after him with everything you’ve got.” The knot finally loosened. The cloth fell down and Dougie kicked his legs in triumph.

They had use of their feet, their eyes, their mouths. Not bad for a day’s work.

Rainie picked up the loose strips of cloth. She didn’t know how she would use them yet, but waste not, want not.

Now, in the dark, she could see Dougie bring his wrists to his mouth and start chewing at the zip ties. Theoretically speaking, it should be difficult to chew through the tough, plastic strap, but she didn’t want to dampen his enthusiasm. She got up on her own, trying to walk off the strange sensations still ping-ponging up and down her side.

It felt good to take a real solid step. She felt strong, almost human. Aching head, ribs, and arms aside. Then her teeth started chattering again, reminding her of the numbing cold.

She gazed up the flight of stairs. She could see a glow of light underneath the door. So he was still awake, still moving, still doing whatever it was abductors did.

“Hey, buddy,” she told Dougie, “I have a plan.”