My first thought was a panicked one: Could it be Bob?
I raised myself up a few more inches, trying to get a better look at the man. No luck. The chair was big and plush. The man sank deep into it, vanishing from view. I moved to the other side of the window, changing my exposed face quadrant to the upper left. Now I could see the hair was salt-and-pepper curly.
Not Bob. Definitely not Bob.
The man was speaking. The two women listened intently, nodding in unison to whatever he was saying. I turned and pressed my ear against the window. The glass was cold. I tried to make out what the man was saying, but it was still too muffled. I glanced back into the room. The man in the chair leaned a little forward, trying to make a point. Then he tilted his chin just enough so I could see his profile.
I may have gasped out loud.
The man had a beard. That was the key. That was how I was able to recognize him—the beard and the curly hair. I flashed back again to that very first time I saw Natalie, sitting in the chair with her sunglasses on. And next to her, seated to her right, had been a man with a beard and curly hair.
This man.
What the . . . ?
The bearded guy rose out of the plush chair. He started to pace, gesturing wildly. Cookie and Denise tensed up. They held hands so tightly I swore that I could see their knuckles whiten. That was when I noticed something else that sent me reeling—something that made me realize with a stunning thud the importance of running this little reconnaissance mission before walking blindly into the situation.
The bearded man had a gun.
I froze in my half squat. My legs started to shake, from fear or exertion, I wasn’t sure which. I lowered myself back down. Now what?
Flee, dopey.
Yep, that seemed the best play. Flee back to my car. Call the cops. Let them handle it. I tried to picture how that scenario would play out. First off, how long would it take the cops to get here? Wait, would they even believe me? Would they call Cookie and Denise first? Would a SWAT team come out? And now that I really thought about it, what was happening here exactly? Did Beardy kidnap Cookie or Denise and make them call me—or were they all in cahoots together? And if they were in cahoots, what would happen after I called? The cops would show up, and Cookie and Denise would deny everything. Beardy would hide his gun and claim ignorance.
Then again, what was the alternative? I had to bring in the cops, right?
Beardy continued to pace. The tension in the room made it pound out like a heart. Beardy checked his watch. He took out his mobile phone and held it in a walkie-talkie manner. He barked something into it.
Who was he talking to?
Whoa, I thought. What if there were others? It was time to go. Call the cops, don’t call the cops, whatever. That guy was armed. I wasn’t.
Hasta luego, mofos.
I was taking one last look through the window when I heard the dog bark come from behind me. I froze at the sound. Beardy did not. His head snapped toward the barking—and by extension, me—as though pulled on a string.
Our eyes locked through the window. I saw his widen in surprise. For the briefest of moments—a hundredth of a second, maybe two of them—neither of us moved. We just stared in shock, unsure of what to make of each other, until Beardy raised the gun, pointed it at me, and pulled the trigger.
I fell backward as the bullet crashed through the window.
I dropped to the ground. Shards of glass rained down on me. The dog kept barking. I rolled over, cutting myself on the glass, and got to my feet.
“Stop!”
It was another man’s voice coming from my left. I didn’t recognize the voice, but the guy was outside. Oh man, I had to get out of there. No time to think or hesitate. I ran full throttle in the other direction. I turned the corner, legs pumping, nearly in the clear.
Or so I thought.
Earlier I had credited my attuned Spidey senses with gifting me the premonition of danger. If that was the case, those same senses had just failed me miserably.
Another man was standing right around the corner. He’d been waiting for me, baseball bat at the ready. I managed to stop my legs, but there was no time for anything else. The meat of the bat came toward me. No chance for me to react. No chance for me to do anything but stand there stupidly. The blow landed flush on my forehead.
I dropped to the ground.
He may have hit me with the bat again. I don’t know. My eyes rolled back, and I was gone.
Chapter 21
First thing when I woke up: pain.
That was all I could think of: massive, all-consuming pain and how to lessen it. It felt as though my skull had been shattered, that tiny fragments of bone were loose, that their jagged edges were ripping through my most sensitive brain tissue.
I moved my head slightly to the side, but that just made those jagged edges angrier. I stopped, blinked my eyes, blinked them again in an attempt to open them, gave up.
“He’s awake.”
The voice belonged to Cookie. I tried once more to pry my eyes open. I almost used my fingers against my eyelids. I swam past the hurt. It took a few seconds, but I finally got there. It took a few more seconds to focus and start to take in my new surroundings.
I wasn’t outside anymore.
That much was for certain. I looked up at the exposed wooden beams of a roof. I also wasn’t in Cookie’s house. She had a one-level ranch. This looked more like a barn or old farmhouse. There was a wooden floor underneath me, not dirt, so I ruled out the barn.
Cookie was there. So was Denise. Beardy came over and looked down at me with pure, unfiltered hatred. I had no idea why. I saw a second man standing by a door to my left. A third man sat in front of a computer screen. I didn’t recognize either of them.
Beardy waited, glaring down at me. He probably thought that I would say something obvious like, “Where am I?” I didn’t. I used the time to calm myself and try to gather my thoughts.
I had no idea what was going on.
I kept my eyes moving, trying to get a sense of the room. I searched for an escape route. I saw one door and three windows, all closed. The door was guarded too. I remembered that at least one of them was armed with a gun.
I needed to be patient.
“Talk,” Beardy said to me.
I didn’t. He kicked me in the ribs. I let out a groan, but I didn’t move.
“Jed,” Cookie said, “don’t.”
Beardy Jed stared down at me. There was rage behind his eyes. “How did you find Todd?”
That threw me. I don’t know what I’d expected him to ask, but it wasn’t that. “What?”
“You heard me,” Jed said. “How did you find Todd?”