Chapter 8 - The GPS Signal
The piercing wail of the fire alarm caused absolute chaos throughout the hospital corridors.
Thick gray smoke began pouring through the ventilation shafts, choking the patients and medical staff.
"Gary set a distraction fire in the basement to tie up the police," Detective Miller yelled over the noise.
"We have to evacuate this floor immediately," a nurse shouted, trying to force Mark back into his bed.
I refused to leave the hospital and wait for the police to navigate the burning building.
I reached into my purse and pulled out my smartphone, my fingers flying across the cracked screen.
"I don't need the police to find the cabin," I told Mark, a fierce determination replacing my terror.
I opened a tracking application that showed a blinking green dot moving rapidly away from the city limits.
"Before we left for the hospital this morning, I slipped an electronic tracking tag into the pocket of Lily's pajamas," I revealed.
Mark's eyes widened in sheer amazement, and he painfully swung his legs over the side of the hospital bed.
"I am coming with you," Mark insisted, ripping the remaining IV lines from his arm.
Detective Miller tried to stop us, but he was quickly overwhelmed by the frantic crowd of evacuating patients.
Mark and I slipped down the emergency stairwell, coughing through the thick smoke until we reached the freezing street.
We stole the keys to an idling hospital security vehicle left abandoned near the loading dock.
Mark took the wheel, driving with a reckless, desperate intensity as we followed the blinking green dot on my phone.
We drove for nearly an hour into the deep, isolated woods bordering the frozen lake.
The paved road eventually turned into a treacherous dirt path covered in thick snow.
"We are less than two miles away," I said, watching the GPS dot finally stop moving entirely.
Mark killed the headlights, navigating the dark forest completely blind to avoid being seen.
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We crested a steep hill, and the terrifying glow of bright orange flames illuminated the winter sky.
The old wooden cabin at the edge of the lake was fully engulfed in a raging, unstoppable fire.
