Entangled in the Night: Unable to Escape Him-Chapter 84: Chloe Nash Has Disappeared
After Julian finished using the restroom, he stood outside and waited for a long time but didn’t see Chloe Nash.
He started to get anxious and leaned against the door of the women’s restroom, shouting, "Mommy, are you there?"
He called out several times but didn’t get any response.
He immediately sensed that something was wrong.
If Mommy was inside, she definitely wouldn’t ignore him.
He immediately ran toward the direction where Lucy Rhodes was.
He thought maybe Mommy had gone out earlier, but when he didn’t see Chloe at the seats, a bad feeling washed over him.
Tears instantly welled up around his eyes.
He ran to Lucy Rhodes, grabbing her arm and saying, "Mommy’s gone, Mommy’s gone."
Lucy Rhodes was startled and hurried to comfort him, "Julian, don’t cry. Your mommy will be fine. Maybe she went somewhere else. I’ll go check."
She took Julian to the women’s restroom and checked every stall, but still couldn’t find Chloe Nash.
She called Chloe several more times, but nobody answered on the other end either.
It was only then that Lucy Rhodes realized something was really wrong.
Maybe Chloe Nash really was in trouble.
Shaking with fear, she quickly called Silas. Her voice was trembling.
"Silas, Chloe’s gone."
Silas, who was in a meeting, immediately stood up when he heard the news.
He grabbed his phone and rushed straight out of the conference room.
The assistant hurried after him and said, "President Prescott, where are you going? There’s only half an hour left until the contract signing. If we breach the contract again, they’ll go work with someone else."
Silas didn’t hesitate for a second, his voice urgent: "Chloe is in trouble, I need to find her! Bring some men, we’re heading to Elysian Plaza to look for her."
About ten minutes later, Silas saw Julian and Lucy Rhodes crying and hugging each other.
He immediately ran over and asked, "What exactly happened?"
Lucy Rhodes, her voice choked with tears: "Chloe went to the bathroom with Julian. I waited here for them, but Julian came out looking for Chloe and she was gone. Silas, could Chloe have been kidnapped?"
Mr. North’s case involved a lot of people. Last time they’d targeted Silas, so this time targeting Chloe wasn’t out of the question.
Silas’s face turned frighteningly dark.
He immediately ordered his assistant behind him, "Take some men to the surveillance room, check the security footage."
Soon, the security guards brought up the video.
Silas watched it back and forth several times, but only saw Chloe Nash go in—she never came out.
This floor was the sixth floor, so he almost completely ruled out the possibility that she’d been dragged out a window.
Just then, he noticed a cleaning lady pushing out a trash bin.
The trash bin was just the right size to hide a person.
He immediately ordered, "Track that cleaner. Chloe was taken by her."
Silas, usually so calm and reserved, spoke with a trembling voice.
Every single nerve in his body felt like it was being pierced with needles.
Even his breath felt like it was full of broken glass.
He had searched for so many years, and finally had a clue about Sienna Paxton. He simply couldn’t let anything happen to Chloe Nash.
He clenched his fists so tightly that the veins throbbed on his forehead.
It was as if his blood vessels were about to burst at any moment.
Minutes and seconds ticked by, and the only sound in the room was the clattering of keyboards.
If they wanted to find out where Chloe Nash was, they’d have to use technology to hack the transportation network system and track her face.
After several hours, Silas finally found a lead.
The cleaner had shown up at the port not far from there.
Seeing this, Silas immediately stood up, his expression dark: "Lucy Rhodes, take Julian home. Everyone else, come with me to the port."
——
When Chloe Nash woke up, her head ached terribly.
She struggled to sit up, only to realize her hands and feet were tied with rope.
The surrounding environment was pitch black. Not a single ray of light seeped in.
Outside, there were the noisy sounds of machinery.
Chloe Nash had no idea where she was. She just felt freezing cold, her whole heart curling up in fear.
Darkness was especially terrifying for her.
Because she’d almost lost her life to claustrophobia when she was young.
Back then, she’d been very little. Her father and grandfather both went to work, leaving her with her mom who was supposed to be resting.
But her mother wanted to go shopping with friends and didn’t want to take her along.
So she locked her all alone in a closet.
The closet was so dark. Sienna Paxton screamed and begged her mom to let her out, promising to stay at home like a good girl and not cause any trouble.
But her mother acted like she couldn’t hear. She grabbed her bag and left without even turning around.
Sienna Paxton was left alone in that sealed space, feeling more and more short of breath.
But she kept trying to comfort herself: When Mommy comes back, she’ll let me out.
But she waited for what felt like forever, and her mom never showed up.
Eventually exhaustion took over, and she passed out inside the closet.
She stayed in that closet for a whole day and night that time.
Her mom went out and completely forgot her. Her father and grandfather thought she was with her mother.
It wasn’t until the next day, when her mother came home without her, that her grandfather realized something was wrong.
When they finally found Sienna Paxton curled up unconscious in the closet, her usually even-tempered father slapped her mother right in the face.
Since then, Sienna developed claustrophobia.
She became terrified of darkness, of being shut inside small spaces all alone.
Every time it happened, she’d feel like she couldn’t breathe.
Thinking of all this, Chloe Nash anxiously bit down on her lip, trying to use pain to force herself to stay rational.
She kept telling herself: Chloe, don’t be afraid. Someone will definitely come to save you.
But she still couldn’t stop her fear of the darkness from exploding inside.
She crouched in a corner, shaking, her teeth chattering uncontrollably.
To keep from biting her own tongue during her spasms, Chloe bit her arm hard instead.
The stabbing pain gave her a little awareness.
Tears slid silently from the corners of her eyes.
She didn’t want to struggle anymore. She wanted to just give in to her fate.
But then, in her mind, she saw Julian’s little smiling eyes before the accident as he said, "Julian will wait here for Mommy."
His condition had just started getting better; he couldn’t take any emotional shock.
And Mr. and Mrs. Nash had already endured losing a daughter once. She couldn’t let them go through that again.
Thinking of those things, Chloe forced herself to push through the fear, inching herself toward one side, little by little.
She didn’t know how long she moved like that, before finally reaching an edge. She knocked forcefully and heard the dull echo of thick iron.
Only then did Chloe realize she hadn’t been locked in a room, but in a shipping container.
And it was a refrigerated one for frozen food, at that.
This had to be the port, with thousands upon thousands of containers everywhere.
Trying to find her in such a place was almost impossible.
Other than rescuing herself, there was no way out.
Chloe Nash conserved her strength, only banging when she heard sounds outside.
But every time hope flickered, it was snuffed out again and again.
No one discovered her.
Chloe started to feel completely drained. The air in the container got thinner and thinner.
It was harder and harder for her to breathe.
Her hope of staying alive faded by the minute.
Desperate, Chloe took off one of her earrings and felt for a crack along the edge of the container, pushing the earring out through it.
She hoped Silas would see it.
After doing this, her body had no strength left at all.
Even keeping her eyes open felt impossible.
She slowly closed her eyes.
Just when she thought she’d die there, a familiar voice suddenly came from somewhere nearby.
"Chloe."
