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  She hoped Caleb's lie was to protect Sarah. "The call came when I was still asleep. Why wouldn't he tell me?" She drifted off with her thoughts. "Maybe it was because he was headed to the Psychic Fair. He wouldn't have wanted me to know he was going there because of how much he despised the place. We've argued over the past week about that fair."

  "What did you argue about?" the detective asked.

  "I wanted to take my daughter there and he didn't. Caleb doesn't believe in psychics of any kind. He probably went to see who was involved with Sarah's kidnapping because of the warning Esmerelda gave her."

  "What warning?"

  "When Sarah attended the fair, a psychic named Esmerelda warned her that she was in danger. That's why the police took him away. He was probably pissed off after the ransom call and headed there straight away thinking they had something to do with this."

  The possibility of never seeing Sarah alive again hit her. She bent at the waist, feeling physically wounded. On the table beside the couch was a Kleenex box which she fumbled with until one came loose. She blew her nose and tried to compose herself. It wouldn't do Sarah any good to fall apart.

  "Mrs. Roberts, when you said the police took him away, what were you referring to?"

  She looked at the cop. He was standing by the phone.

  How did her life come to this?

  She hugged herself when the thought came to her that she may have to bury another child. She knew she'd lose her mind if Sarah was killed.

  It wouldn't just be Sarah dying.

  Chapter 29

  "I've done all that I'm going to do," Dolan said as he walked away from Esmerelda.

  "Which is not nearly enough," Esmerelda said as she hurried to keep up. "We've known each other a long time. I've never seen you shrug off a kidnapping like this. Why, Dolan? Just tell me why?"

  "I already did. Too many lives are at risk. I feel my involvement adds to the level of danger."

  "That sounds ridiculous. You don't really believe that, do you?"

  She wanted his attention so she decided a good way to get under his skin was to question his psychic power. They were walking through the back corridor, heading to the employee parking lot. When Dolan got to his car he would be leaving. That gave her a minute to convince him to help Sarah.

  "Look me in the eye," she stopped to catch her breath, "and tell me you are absolutely certain your helping Sarah does more harm than good."

  He stopped and turned to face her. The pause gave her a chance to breathe. She leaned against the hallway wall, panting with a hand on her chest.

  "Esmerelda, why do you question me like this? You've seen me help people for over twenty years. I'm not a hero. But you know as well as I do that, number one, I can't save everybody, and number two, I shouldn't save everybody."

  He stopped talking for a moment to let other employees pass. He looked back at Esmerelda. "What I mean is, there are people who should live the path they're on without interference. Changing fate is a dangerous game. You of all people know that."

  "I don't believe philosophy is the reason behind this. I think there's a personal reason. And I think you're being selfish." She stood to her full height, all four feet, eleven inches. "How popular you are with the public won't change whether you help Sarah or not. People will continue to treat you like a celebrity until you move to a remote cabin in the mountains and become a recluse. One more teenage girl won't change your life. But it'll change hers."

  He turned and started walking to the parking lot again. She followed close behind as they stepped out onto the asphalt. A recent sun shower coated the cement, which emitted a wet burning smell.

  "Dolan, listen to me. I don't want to say this, but if you don't at least try to help Sarah, I will leave this fair. Do you hear me, I will quit."

  He stopped again and turned around. The sun bounced off something shiny on the pavement causing her to squint. The heat didn't help with her rapid breathing.

  "Esmerelda, you are being most difficult. Trust me, my interference isn't personal. It's just..."

  "What? What's stopping you?"

  "I feel someone close to me is either directly or indirectly involved with this case. I don't know how or why, or who this individual is. All I do know is if I don't help, this mystery person will live. On the other hand, this person dies if I get involved. By my actions, whether it's inadvertent or not, I will be killing him or her. I can't aid in Sarah's kidnapping case because I refuse to be a murderer."

  Chapter 30

  Sarah crouched low.

  She knew he would have seen her if she had gone for the highway. It was too wide open. The woods on either side would have given ample shelter, but getting to them posed the same problem; too far to get unseen.

  So she had run in the open back door of the motel. Maybe she could find a way to get to the front and then run for the highway. She even tried the dusty pay phone by the front counter, but it was dead.

  When the motel inhabitants had abandoned the building years ago, they'd taken everything with them but a number of fixed pieces of furniture. Sarah couldn't find anything to use as a weapon.

  She stayed low, hiding under a window that looked out to the back of the motel where the police car had gone over the edge of the hill. She had watched as the guy realized he was standing on the brown grass alone. He turned and ran to the edge of the building where he disappeared from her sight.

  She decided to count to ten and then venture outside. If the guy stayed in the front of the building, searching for her near the highway or in the woods, maybe she could get below the edge of the hill and be gone.

  She counted up to eight before she heard him. The noise he made revealed his anger. He was in the building somewhere to her left, banging things around.

  Nine. Glass broke in a room next to the one she was in. She wondered why she had waited to ten. Why not count to five?

  Ten. Just to be obsessive about it, she said the number in a whisper to herself and then got to her feet. Her back hunched, head bobbing, she ran for the opening that led outside.

  A large shadow filled the door. Sarah came to an abrupt stop and stood up. Sweat broke out on her neck and back, a lone strip of moisture glided gently down her spine. The man in the doorway wasn't her captor, but that wasn't a relief.

  He had some kind of automatic weapon in his hand. She heard more glass breaking behind her, followed by screaming.

  "He kidnapped me. Are you here to help?"

  The brute of a man reached in and grabbed her. He spun Sarah into him, almost enveloping her with his size. Her small struggle was futile, her verbal protests quieted by his large hand.

  He pulled her outside with him. Half dragging, half lifting, he guided her to the construction trailer. Seconds later they were inside, the door locked behind them.

  She wondered who he was and why he would be carrying a gun out in the open. At least this was an improvement. She wasn't with her captor anymore and this guy was huge. Maybe this was the end of her ordeal.

  "Can I use your phone?"

  He was on her with speed she didn't know someone his size could have. His hand was clamped so hard on her mouth that it covered her nose too. Breathing wasn't an option.

  Her eyes watched his free hand. He yanked gray duct tape from a drawer. With his teeth, he pulled off a small strip.

  He angled her head down where she watched her chest heaving as much as felt it. Air rushed to her lungs when his hand left her face. The man took the strip of duct tape and covered her mouth. He laid her down and worked on her ankles and wrists until she was secured with the tape.

  He nudged her hips with his foot to get her against a wall. Eyes wide, breathing rapidly from her nostrils, she lifted her head and watched him grab a blanket. He came back and covered her with it.

  The world turned a soft green. She struggled and twisted, but the blanket remained. It lifted and dropped with her breathing. She couldn't hear much of what he was doing. Her pulse was pounding in her
head.

  She was thinking about dumb luck and how much of it she had. How could someone go from being kidnapped, to being rescued by a kidnapper? It was insane.

  A dark urge grew inside her; the need to pull. It blossomed into something uncontrollable, making her moan and writhe. The need to pull was always there; sometimes soft, delicate, other times desirable, a pleasure. But this urge was a demand.

  One that she couldn't answer.

  With the muscles in her arms straining, she wrapped her fingers around, testing the bonds of tape on her wrists. It was no use. She would not get to pull any hair until someone undid her.

  Her mind started to slip. She felt a subtle kind of letting go. There was freedom in the pain. There were also tears. One rolled down her cheek and fell into the recess of her ear, cooling as it settled.

  She started to pinch a small piece of skin on the back of her hand, imaging it was hair she was removing. She pinched harder, hoping to calm herself.

  Her moans increased.

  Something hard hit her in the side of the head, which knocked her into the wall of the trailer.

  Consciousness swam away.

  Chapter 31

  Denise flipped off the news; nothing worth listening to. She hadn't been paying attention anyway. Thoughts about tomorrow kept running around in her head. Was everything worked out? Did they have all the precautions in place? Would Mr. Ward be a problem?

  She hated dealing with people like Mr. Ward. So self important, living life as if he's on stage. A drama fixed for the audience of his employees. But he was the man with the money. And she wanted this deal, seeing as it was going to be one of her last, if not the last deal she made in this business.

  She swiveled in her office chair and opened the bottom desk drawer. In it, a dated photo of her mother sat face up. It had been taken a year before her father died. The same year they stopped talking.

  Her mother had been quite upset with Denise's decision to sell off the family heirlooms. A couple generations of artwork left to Denise in her father's will. Various collectors snooped around after Denise's father passed away, looking to find out who would be in control of the small fortune.

  Denise sold it piecemeal, living off the smaller, less expensive items for the first five years. Then she met Mr. Ward. He paid her top dollar for some of her father's collection. In the last fifteen years, Denise had sold almost everything.

  The painting called 'White Center' by a guy named Rothko was rumored to fetch millions at Sotheby's in New York if she wanted to auction it. It was completed in 1950, and by the late fifties her father had bought it for under a hundred thousand dollars.

  A large seven foot canvas wasn't easy to transport without damages. She wasn't in the art business, she was only a seller. But they'd done it. Now it sat in the secured and renovated shell of the Sky Blue motel, guarded twenty four hours a day by armed security. Some of the best money could buy. There was a reason for it; the recent break-ins at Sotheby's and two serious art dealers who had sent men to threaten and intimidate Denise to secure this painting for their collections.

  Denise had her storage facilities broken into too. She wasn't good at being discreet, or security conscious. It was better for her to keep the higher priced stuff in warehouses and storage units, than just keeping it at home.

  This was her last piece that held notoriety, her ticket back to normalcy. Once it was gone, she'd have nothing left for collector's to hound her for. Museums could take the rest. What did she care? Mr. Ward had made her a generous offer; one that would keep the painting out of an auction house.

  Staring at her mother's picture brought back a lot of memories. Maybe when this was all over, she'd give her a call.

  "Esmerelda."

  She said her mother's name out loud, digesting the sound of it in her ears.

  She jumped when the phone rang.

  "Yeah."

  "We got a problem."

  "What problem?"

  "A cop was just here."

  "A cop? What are the police doing there? No one knows where the painting is."

  "He pulled in and dumped the car. I've got the girl."

  She wondered where these guys got their smarts. Half explanations were frustrating. She stood up and turned to look out her window. It opened to a garden surrounded by trees. Calm, she thought. Stay calm.

  "What do you mean by 'I've got the girl'? And why would a cop dump his car?"

  "The girl he was traveling with. She ran into the motel. Jenkins and I scanned the perimeter, but the cop is gone. He just disappeared."

  "Disappeared? Cops don't dump cars and disappear. Could it be he wasn't a cop?" She put a hand on her forehead. This was not good. Mr. Ward wouldn't do business with her if he knew the police were snooping around. Whether it was a real cop or not, this could be bad.

  "He disappeared. I would know if he was still here. I've tracked people before."

  "Then ask the girl who he was and why they came to the motel."

  "I can't."

  Frustration hit new levels.

  "Why can't you?"

  "She's unconscious."

  "Why is she unconscious?"

  "I knocked her out to keep her quiet."

  Great, thought Denise. This had horrible written all over it.

  "Look, I can't be there until the transaction happens tomorrow morning. Keep the girl safe, but keep her out of the way until this is done. Can you do that?" A beep came through the line. Someone was calling her. "Hold for a second. Someone's calling me on the other line."

  She pulled the phone from her ear, pressed the button and said hello in too gruff a voice.

  "Is something wrong?"

  She collected herself immediately. "Not at all, Mr. Ward. What can I do for you?"

  "I was calling to make sure our meeting is still on for tomorrow morning."

  "It is. Everything's set. I'll have the account numbers for the wire transfers. The package will be ready for transport."

  "Good. I'll see you in the morning," he said, and hung up.

  She went back to the other line.

  It was dead.

  Chapter 32

  The edge of town was near. He checked the signal on his cell phone; one bar. There had better be a good signal soon.

  He needed direction. He needed purpose. He needed to know what to do. Better yet, he wanted someone to tell him. Something his late brother would offer. Since he was dead, the boss would have to take his place.

  He checked his phone again. Two bars.

  He dialed the boss's cell number. He got a machine after five rings. He hit redial and waited. It was answered on the third ring.

  "What's up? It's like, two in the morning. Why are you calling now?"

  "I got trouble." He heard his boss moving, like he was getting out of bed.

  "You're fuckin' right you do, Gert. What the hell were you guys thinking? I still can't get over the fact that you two didn't take the girl we'd planned on."

  "Because this girl fucked that up. She got in the way. It was the second time she'd been at a planned kidnapping in six months. Too coincidental. She was trying to steal our car."

  Gert heard his boss swear under his breath.

  "I figured something was weird with her when I saw her at the Psychic Fair the other day. I thought it was the same girl you spoke about on the Bennett kidnapping. She looked as outlandish as you described her with all that hair missing in clumps. I called her house and tried to set up a meeting with her, but she hung up on me in mid sentence."

  Gert stopped walking and turned from the shoulder of the highway. An SUV passing him made it difficult to hear well.

  "I want the money for the kidnapping we were supposed to do."

  "You're kidding, right?"

  "No. My brother was killed and I won't let him die for nothing."

  "Can you hear yourself? Do you know what you're saying? We can't do the ransom gig. You don't have the right girl. We know nothing about her parent's financia
l status. Kill this girl and dump the body in a swamp before every cop in the country is after you."

  He shook his head even though he knew the boss couldn't see him. "No way. Put the money in the account or I tell the parents who you are."

  There was a pause before his boss spoke. "You don't want to threaten me. I could give the police your name and location and they'd hunt you down. They wouldn't even ask me how I knew. They'd assume it was my psychic abilities."

  He slowed his breathing. Better not lose control. He needed help here, not an enemy.

  "She's gone."

  "What?"

  "She's gone. She escaped. I couldn't find her. I looked for an hour and then hunkered down in one of the rooms to wait in this abandoned motel. I fell asleep until after midnight. I've been walking back towards town ever since. I need a car."

  "You're lying. What motel? Where're you?"

  Gert didn't know what to say. What if the boss wanted him dead? He couldn't tell him where he was. Too risky.

  His boss continued, "So go back and get her. She can identify you. Once you have her, get her to write something for you."

  "What're you talking about, write something?"

  "When I saw her at the Psychic Fair, she dropped to the ground and started writing in her notebook. I've worked with a lot of psychic's over the years and I know she's an Automatic Writer. I think she's aware of the kidnappings because someone's telling her about them through her pen."

  "Are you for real?" Gert asked.

  "We need her off the street for good. She can identify us."

  "Now I know you're fucking with me, because there's no way she could have that kind of information. Listen to you. I don't believe in psychics."

  "I saw it. Believe me. That's why she has to die."

  "Are you sure you don't want this one found safe like the other girls we've taken?"

  "She told Esmerelda something important. I may have to remove her too. Everything is getting out of hand. Why did you have to take Sarah in the first place?"