Booktree.ng_Forgotten-Witness

CHAPTER 25
Josie couldn’t imagine anything blacker than pitch and yet this
place was. It was blacker than the sea that had embraced Billy
Zuni, darker than the cement outbuilding where she had been a
prisoner, darker than her child’s heart after her mother’s
desertion. This place, Josie was sure, was darker than hell and
it wasn’t because it was buried in the ground, it was because
this place was evil.
They were in a high domed, concrete room. An old, tin light
fixture hung from the ceiling but it looked like it hadn’t been
used in years. Josie pulled the chain. It didn’t work. A sweep
of the place with her flashlight illuminated boxes, tables, and
equipment stacked around the perimeter. Emily Bates sat in a
high backed wooden chair carrying on her conversation with
Ian Francis, long dead and lying on a slab in a morgue,
forgotten by everyone but her. Amelia let go of Josie.
Intrigued by the place, she pirouetted just outside the halo of
Josie’s beam. Suddenly, Emily stopped singing and Josie
swung the phone her way. Her mother’s hands hung limply
over the chair arms as she watched Amelia. That’s when Josie
noticed the restraints. Ian’s carefully drawn picture was now a
reality.
“It’s a storeroom.” Amelia stopped turning and went for a
box. “Mr. Reynolds didn’t lie. They did put everything in
storage.”
“It looks like more than that.” Josie turned from Emily and
held the light up so Amelia could read the labels.
“James. 1967. Sterling. 1972. These are the names on dad’s
list.”
Amelia opened up a box and took out some small vials, a
large jar half filled with white powder, and some ancient
blister packs. She held them up like a handful of treasure for
Josie to see.
“Medication. I guess it’s what was left over from the people
who died.”