For a long moment they looked at each other. "There's still the guards outside," she reminded him.

"Let's worry about that when we get there," Roger said. "How do we start?"

"Go see if there's anything we can use to pull nails," she said, straightening up again. "Don't forget to check the kitchen drawers. I'll look for a place to—"

She gave a strained chuckle. "What?" he demanded.

"I almost said I'd look for a place to dig," she said. "Like we were on Treasure Island or something."

"More like a prisoner-of-war camp," he pointed out, heading for the kitchen. "I'll see what I can find."

By the time he returned, she'd located their best bet. "The previous occupants did a good job of cleaning it out," he told her, dumping a double handful of junk onto the couch. "But this potato peeler might get a couple of the nails started before it gives out."

"Maybe even more than a couple," Caroline agreed, looking over the rest of his loot. Half a hinge, a bent drill bit, a piece of an egg beater, and a power cord like the one on her mother's old waffle iron.

"And for actually prying up the boards once the nails are out, I thought we could use that sparkblocking thingy," he added.

"It's called a fender," Caroline identified it, eyeing the low metal barrier in front of the fireplace.

"Yes, that might work."

"So that's our tool kit," he concluded. "Where's our spot?"

"Right here," Caroline said, pointing to the corner she was standing in. "You see the stains on the ceiling? That's from rain or snow leakage. It's partially rotted the boards here—you can feel how soft it is compared to the rest of the floor."

He pressed a foot down onto the spot. "Looks good," he agreed. Picking up the potato peeler, he knelt down and got to work.

Caroline picked up the broken hinge, her stomach twisting inside her. They could certainly get out of the cabin—she was sure of that now. But after they did...

She stepped to the other end of the board he was working on. Clearly, Roger hadn't thought it all the way through yet. Better not to distract him.

Getting down on her knees, she started digging into the softened wood.

"What do you mean, the car's gone?" Powell demanded into the phone. "I left orders for it to be watched."

"There was a glitch in the stakeout schedule," Smith said, sounding as frustrated as Powell felt. "By the time I realized that, it was too late. But I found a newsstand guy who saw them get in and drive off."

"But it was Fierenzo?" Powell asked, some of the tension in his chest easing a little. Whatever else was going on, his partner was still alive.

"The news guy identified his photo," Smith confirmed. "The others were two males: one mid-teens, who got in back, the other mid-twenties, who got into the front passenger seat. He described them as both being dark-haired and kind of squat." He paused. "He also said that as the car pulled away, he saw the older one holding a gun."

The decreasing pressure in Powell's chest reversed itself. So instead of a murder, they now had a kidnapping. "Get your guy to the station," he ordered. "And get Carstairs and his sketch pad down there."

"Carstairs won't be happy about being pulled in on a Sunday," Smith warned. "Especially not after coming in on Saturday, too."

"Tell him I'll buy him dinner," Powell growled. "Then put out an APB on Fierenzo's car and get a canvass going to see if you can find someone in the neighborhood who can fill in more of the picture. And don't let your witness walk until I get there."

"I won't," Smith promised. "See you."

Powell hung up the handset, and for a couple of seconds he glared blackly down at it. What the hell was happening out there, anyway?

"Jon?"

Powell looked up to see his wife Sandy standing in the doorway. "Sorry, honey, but I've got to go back in," he said with a sigh, reaching down and retrieving his shoes.

"Tommy?"

He nodded. "At least now it sounds like he's alive. Kidnapped, but alive."

"Be careful," Sandy said quietly. "If someone doesn't want him walking around, they might not want his partner doing it, either."

"Hey, don't worry," he assured her, pulling on his coat and turning to give her a quick but serious hug. "We're not on any cases right now that anybody would kill for."

"Sure," she said, clinging to the hug a bit longer than usual. "Just be careful."

"I will," he promised, kissing her. "I'll call if I'm going to be later than midnight."

His last image as he left the apartment was of her standing in the middle of the room watching him go. A cop's wife, with all the pain and hope and determination that came with that job.

The blood of thousands of New Yorkers, the mysterious Cyril had said. Could Fierenzo have been marked to be the first of those thousands?

Was Powell himself marked to be the second?

28

The floorboards were even softer than Caroline had hoped, and it took less than fifteen minutes for them to tear the first one away from the joists beneath it. After that, with the advantage of leverage, the job went quickly. Ten more minutes, and they had a hole big enough to fit through.

"I wish I had a flashlight," Roger said, peering down into the dankness. "On second thought, maybe I'm glad I can't see what's down there. All sorts of creepy crawlies, probably. Any idea how tough the skirting boards will be?"

"It shouldn't be bad," Caroline told him. "They're completely exposed to the weather, and this place obviously hasn't been maintained for decades. I'm guessing a good strong push will knock them right off their nails. Especially the ones by this corner—we know this part of the roof leaks."

"Good enough," Roger said, looking around. "Anything in here we want to take with us?"

This was it. Bracing herself, Caroline took the plunge. "Take anything you think you could use," she said. "You're going alone."

He jerked as if he'd been poked with a live wire. "What? Caroline—"

"Roger, it's the only way," she cut him off quickly, trying to keep her voice from shaking. If she let him argue, she might weaken and give in, and then they'd both be doomed. "No matter how loose the skirting boards are, you're not going to push them off without making at least a little noise. Besides, there are those Warriors on guard. Someone has to create a diversion to get them away from the car."

"So we make a diversion and jump them and just go out the door," he countered stubbornly.

"How?" she asked. "What kind of diversion?"

"I don't know," he snapped. "Maybe—well, maybe we start the rest of the kindling burning in the middle of the room and yell fire."

She shook her head. "It won't work. Even I would know better than to fall for that. They're not going to just charge in blindly and let us jump them."

"Then we yell fire, and when they open the door we charge them," Roger offered. "We leave together, or we don't leave at all."

"Then you condemn the Grays to death," she said. "If Nikolos has Melantha and can make her use her Gift, they won't have a chance."

"Maybe I don't care about the Grays," Roger snarled. "Maybe they deserve whatever they get."

"And the city?"

The muscles in his jaw tightened. "Fine," he growled. "But you go. I'll stay here and make the diversion."

"It won't work," she told him gently. "If they hear me shouting fire and see me jumping around in a panic, they'll assume you're somewhere waiting to jump them. All their attention will be inward, toward the inside of the cabin and the trap they're expecting you to spring. That should give you the chance to get behind them to the car. It won't play with you doing the jumping around and me supposedly in hiding."

"I can't just leave you here, Caroline," he said pleadingly, his voice shaking the way she was trying so hard to keep hers from doing.