THE VOW

LENA

She didn't look 30. She looked 19, like the photo in the attic. Soaking wet, white dress clinging to her, shovel in her hand like a weapon, hair matted with black lake mud.

"Are you House One?" she asked again, voice hoarse.

I couldn't speak. I just nodded. My bare feet in the mud, blood from my lip dripping onto my hoodie.

Lena looked past me, to Judge Holt on his knees, to Rollins with the g*n, to Priya holding the laptop like it was a baby.

"Daniel?" she whispered.

Rollins' g*n hand dropped an inch.

"Lena?"

He said her name like he had been saying it every night for six years into a pillow.

Lena dropped the shovel and ran. Not to Rollins. To me. She grabbed my face, her hands freezing cold, smelling like lake water and rot.

"You're 2024. That means you're early. They never do early unless the buyer asks for early. Did they pour you already?"

"What?"

"House One! Did they pour concrete over you yet? In the closet?"

I stared at her. How did she know about the closet?

She pulled me, hard, back toward my house. "We have to see. If they poured, Mae is dead. If they didn't pour all the way, we can still get her."

Inside, the master closet still had wet concrete. But now the handprint was gone. Someone had smoothed it while we were at the lake.

Kevin was standing over it, holding Mae's silver bracelet, crying. "She was breathing. I swear she was breathing when they put her in. Eleanor said it was just to scare her. Then Simone said pour more."

Priya kicked him. Hard. "You helped them bury Mae alive?"

"I didn't know!" Kevin screamed. "They said it was punishment! Eleanor said if I didn't help, I'd be next! They said husbands who don't comply get poured too!"

Rollins came in, dragging Judge Holt, hands zip-tied with his own hospital zip ties. He threw him onto my kitchen floor.

Lena didn't even look at the judge. She knelt by the concrete, started digging with the shovel she brought from the lake. Rollins knelt with her. Together, they dug.

Two inches down.

Four inches.

Six inches.

Cloth. White.

Mae. Her face, eyes closed, mouth open, concrete in her hair.

Lena put two fingers on her neck. Paused.

Then: "Pulse. Weak. Get her out!"

We all dug. Even Kevin. Even Priya. Hands in wet cement, pulling. The concrete was heavy, like pulling a car.

We got Mae out. She coughed, black water and concrete dust coming out of her mouth. She was alive. Barely.

She opened her eyes, saw me, and whispered, "House One, you came back."

Then she looked at Lena and started crying. Real crying.

"Lena. You lived."

Lena held her. "You hid me. Under the lake. For 14 months."

What?

Rollins looked up from Mae. "What do you mean under the lake?"

Lena stood, dripping on my bedroom floor.

"I didn't escape The Vow. I escaped the van. June 10th, 2018. Judge Holt came early, like tonight. Eleanor tried to give me. I fought. I ran to the laundry house. Mae was there. She didn't push me into the tunnel. She pushed me into washer one. Said it wasn't a washer. It was a hatch. It dropped me into a tunnel that went under the lake."

She pointed at the black lake.

"The Vow isn't six houses. It's seven. House Zero is under the lake. Built in 2012, before any of us. Concrete bunker. Air. Food. Water. Eleanor built it for herself when the FBI first came. Mae stocked it. For years, Mae hid girls there when Eleanor got too greedy. She hid me there 14 months. Then I swam out. I lived in the woods. I watched."

She looked at Judge Holt on the floor.

"He comes every June 14th. White van. Takes one. Sometimes two if they're early. Takes them to Marfa, Texas. Desert. His wife has a doll house. Life-size. She dresses them. Brushes hair. They can't leave because desert, no water, 40 miles to road."

Judge Holt laughed, blood coming from his lip where Rollins hit him.

"My wife has dementia," he said, almost proudly. "She thinks they're her daughters. She keeps them pretty. Size 6, June 14th, because our daughter died June 14th, size 6. Eleanor knows. Eleanor supplies. It's love, not trafficking."

Rollins kicked him so hard he stopped talking.

Lena pulled a waterproof bag from under her dress. Inside: a phone. Old. But charged.

"I have video," she said. "Six years of video. Every delivery. Every husband signing. Every concrete pour. Mae helped me charge it with the laundry house solar panel."

She handed it to Rollins.

"And I have one more thing."

She walked to my kitchen island, where Kevin was sitting, broken.

She pulled out a folded paper from the bag. A contract.

"Kevin Williams, House One, 2024. You signed twice. Once for money. Once for life insurance. $500k policy on Zuri, with Eleanor as beneficiary if Zuri is returned in bad condition."

Kevin went white.

"I didn't... I didn't read the second page..."

Priya looked at the paper, then at me.

"Zuri, if you opened that door tonight and he took you, and you died in that desert doll house, Kevin and Eleanor would split half a million."

Sirens now. Far away. Priya's 911 call worked. Atlanta PD and Cobb County, both coming, red lights flashing through the trees, reflecting on the black lake.

Judge Holt heard them and smiled, blood on his teeth.

"Too late," he whispered to Rollins. "My wife already has this year's doll. She picked early. House Three."

House Three.

Priya.

Priya's phone buzzed.

Text from SIMONE: _Thanks for the USB, babe. See you at the desert. - S_

Priya checked her thigh.

The USB was gone.

Simone had picked her pocket at the lake.

The white van tires were popped, but Simone's black Range Rover was gone from House Two.

She was already driving to Marfa with the evidence.

And Priya's contract had an early return clause too.

For tonight.