Chapter 11: Rescued

Six officers came down the stairs with their flashlights up.

Behind them came a man with a camera on his shoulder, and a woman holding a microphone, and my father.

He saw me and stopped on the bottom step.

His face did something extraordinary.

Joy, horror, relief and grief all crossed it in the space of one breath, and every one of them looked real.

"Thora!" he cried. "Oh, my God. My baby!"

He ran across the cellar with his arms out.

I did not move.

The camera followed him all the way to the cage.

"She's hurt," he said, to the lens, and cupped my face in both hands. "Look at her cheek. Look at what they did to her."

My cheekbone throbbed under his palms.

I could still taste Perry's punch.

I opened my mouth, and my father's thumb pressed hard against my jaw, right on the bruise, where the camera could not see.

"Smile," he breathed. "Or the old man pays for it."

I shut my mouth.

"Officers," my father said, with his voice breaking, "this is the place. This is where they kept her. She has been held in this cellar for years."

"I wasn't held," I said. "I lived here."

"She's confused," my father told the officer beside him. "She has been brainwashed. Please, be gentle with her."

A cop took my arm, and I let him.

Another one opened the office door with his shoulder.

Dutch came out between two of them with his hands cuffed behind his back.

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