Chapter 2 - The Rescue in the Dark
"Mommy!" Oliver shrieked, lunging forward to climb the rusted side of the dumpster.
Benjamin caught the boy by the waist, pulling him back. "Oliver, stay here. Let me get her. Stay on the ground."
Benjamin didn't hesitate. He hoisted himself over the high metal rim, dropping into the foul-smelling interior. He began throwing the heavy black bags aside, his hands scratching against rough cardboard and broken glass. Beneath the third layer of garbage lay a woman in her early thirties, her face bruised, her clothes torn, and her skin dangerously cold to the touch.
Benjamin pressed two fingers against the side of her neck.
A pulse. Faint, erratic, but there.
"She’s alive, Oliver," Benjamin called out, his heart hammering against his ribs.
He hooked his arms beneath her armpits, hauling her up toward the rim of the dumpster. She was remarkably light, her body limp like a rag doll. Benjamin managed to balance her on the edge before climbing out himself, gently lowering her onto the concrete lane.
Oliver threw himself over her, weeping uncontrollably. "Mommy! Mommy, wake up! The man helped me! Wake up!"
Benjamin was already on his phone, dialing his personal physician and the emergency services. "I need an ambulance at the Riverfront Market service lane behind the old grain warehouse. Female patient, early thirties, severe hypothermia, signs of physical trauma, prolonged confinement. Move."
He stripped off his heavy leather jacket and wrapped it around the woman. Rachel Hale opened her eyes halfway, the pupils dilated and unfocused in the glare of the flashlight. She groaned, her lips blue, her chest heaving as she tried to draw in the cold morning air.
"Oliver..." she breathed, her voice barely a rattle in her throat. "Oliver... run..."
"I'm here, Mom! I didn't leave!" Oliver cried, pressing the stuffed dog against her cheek.
Rachel's hand lifted weakly, her fingers curling around the plush ear of the toy dog. "The... the dog... hide the dog, Oliver... Derek wants..."
Before she could finish the sentence, her eyes rolled back into her head, and her body went completely rigid before going entirely slack.
"She's crashing," Benjamin muttered, stepping in to check her airway.
The distant wail of sirens began to echo through the city streets, growing louder as the red and blue lights bounced off the brick walls of the warehouse district. Within minutes, a paramedic team swarmed the lane, pushing Benjamin and Oliver back as they placed an oxygen mask over Rachel’s face and secured her onto a gurney.
A police officer, a gruff man named Detective Vance, stepped into Benjamin’s path, his notepad out. "Mr. Cross? What the hell are you doing down here at four in the morning breaking open commercial dumpsters?"
"I was doing your job, Detective," Benjamin said, his voice dripping with venom as he wiped the dirt from his hands. "The boy told you last night. You ignored him. If I hadn't come back, that woman would be dead before the vendors set up their fruit stands today."
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Vance flushed, looking down at Oliver, who was being wrapped in a blanket by a female paramedic. "We get dozens of runaways and displaced kids every week making up stories, Cross. We didn't have probable cause."
"You had a child screaming for his mother," Benjamin snapped. "Now, I'm going to the hospital with them. And you're going to find a man named Derek."
