“What if she’s already in the house?”

“With that alarm going off? Now listen to me, will you? You keep her from going into that entryway by any means necessary. You get her into that van and meet me at the rendezvous point. We’ll hand her off to Roy there.”

“You’re leaving me alone here?”

“For now, yes. You can handle one little girl, can’t you?”

“Perhaps you-”

“I’m a stranger,” she reminded him.

“Yes, of course.”

“And Giles? If you harm one hair on that kid’s head, I’ll saw your balls off with a dull knife. For starters.”

“I’d never hurt Carrie!” he said indignantly, but she didn’t miss seeing his hand flinch protectively toward his crotch.

“Follow instructions. That’s all I ask.” She reached into her jacket and tossed him a set of keys. “I’m getting out of here. Hit the garage-door opener.”

He did, looking forlorn as she pulled out of the garage and sped down the street.

CHAPTER 44

Tuesday, May 2

10:36 A.M.

HUNTINGTON BEACH

I CAUGHT up to her in a few strides, grabbing hold of her arm.

“Let go of me! Let go of me!” she screeched, pulling hard against me.

“Carrie, wait! If someone has broken into your house, it could be dangerous for you to go back there!”

“My mom’s in there! He might hurt her!”

“You can’t help her by getting hurt, too,” I said.

She relented a bit.

“I’ve got a cell phone,” I said. “Let me-”

Before I could finish the sentence, the noise of the alarm abruptly cut off. Carrie looked up at me.

“Maybe my mom set it off by accident,” she said. “Don’t call the police.”

“I won’t, not if you don’t want me to. Did I hurt your arm?”

She shook her head. Her face creased with worry as she looked back at the house. “If my mom comes out of the house and she sees me out here talking to you, I’m going to be in so much trouble.”

“I know your mom. I think I might be able to talk to her about all this,” I said, hoping that wasn’t a huge lie.

“Is it true she used to be a newspaper reporter?”

“Yes. We worked together on the Express.”

“That seems…impossible. I mean, that she was a reporter. She’s a good teacher. I could see her being a teacher in a school.”

“Earlier you mentioned a couple of things I’d like to know more about. You mentioned someone named Mason?”

“I told you my brothers and sister are adopted, right?”

“Yes. Genie is nine, right?”

“Yes.”

Jenny Fletcher would be nine, if she still lived. Could it be the same girl? I realized that deep down I had believed she was dead. Maybe that was a result of having just read a lot of material on child abductions. Or reading about the violent circumstances under which she disappeared. No matter what Caleb’s faith in his brother might have been, I hadn’t thought it was likely that his sister survived.

Until now. What the hell was going on? I silently lectured myself about not jumping to conclusions based on next to no evidence, even as I felt hope begin to soar. “Could Mason be a much older brother?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe. I just know that my sister, Genie, has rememberings of someone by that name.”

“Rememberings?”

She blushed. “I know that’s not a real word. But I couldn’t find a real word that worked. Do you know what I mean?”

“Boy, do I.”

“You’ve made up words?”

She was starting to relax some, to not look as if she might run off again. “I can’t use them in the newspaper,” I said, “but sometimes one made-up word seems better than two or three real ones.”

“Name one.”

A term Lydia and I used for the publisher of the Express came to mind. “Pagusting. That’s when something or someone is both pathetic and disgusting.”

She smiled. “It’s a good one, if you mean pathetic in a sardonic way.”

“Uh, yes. So tell me about rememberings.”

“They aren’t quite memories. They’re just…little pieces of memories. Feelings. Impressions. Sometimes…I think mine have been about my…about the man you wrote about.”

“Blake Ives? Like what?”

“He used to sing this song to me, when I was scared.” She hummed a few notes of a familiar tune.

I sang a line of the lyrics to go with it-“Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head.”

“Yes! That’s the one!” She frowned. “Was that in the article?”

“No, that’s a detail that didn’t appear in the story. But he told me about singing it to you when thunderstorms scared you.”

She gave a big sigh of relief. “Sometimes I thought I was crazy.”

“Do you want to meet him?”

“I think so…”

“Do you want me to go to your house with you and talk to your mom about it?” I had a great many things I wanted to discuss with Bonnie Creci.

She thought it over and said, “I guess it’s worth a try.”

She stood still, though. We were well down the block from her place.

Her brows drew together. “Maybe instead…do you have his phone number?”

“Yes,” I said.

We heard a car engine. A moment later the garage door began to rise.

“Wait a minute,” she said. “That was open when I left the house.”

A black Beemer quickly backed out and immediately headed down the street, away from us. The windows were tinted, and between that and the angle of the sun, I didn’t get a look at the driver. We were too far away to read the license plate.

“Know anyone who drives a car like that?” I asked.

“Uncle Dexter,” she said quietly.

“Could he be the one who set the alarm off?”

She nodded. Tears started rolling down her face.

The garage door closed again. The tears fell faster.

“Carrie?”

“I hate her. I hate her!” She started running toward the house again.

I followed, not trying to catch her this time. She sped up the front walk and into the house. I wasn’t sure exactly what was going on, or even what I could do, let alone what legalities might be involved. Could I legally take a minor back to the custodial parent? Should I just call the Orange County Sheriff’s Department or the Department of Child Protective Services and let them handle all the details? Call Blake Ives? Maybe Frank would know.

No matter what else happened, I didn’t want to lose track of Carla Ives. Blake Ives would be so happy and relieved to know she was alive and well, but he’d never forgive me if she disappeared again.

I also didn’t want her to have to face Bonnie alone.

I moved faster, running up the front walkway and pushing the unlatched door open.

I came to a halt in the entryway and let the door close behind me. There was blood on the beige marble of the foyer, and as I looked up the stairs, I could see blood and bits of scalp and hair marking the wall and railings. Someone had come downstairs the hard way. Who? And where was he or she now?

To my left, I heard a little sound of distress.

“Carrie?”

I turned to see her being held tightly by a man who had a gun lodged against the underside of her chin.

“Lock the door!” he shouted at me.

I did as he said.

“Drop your purse on the floor and kick it away!”

I obeyed again, doing my best to avoid the blood spatter. Praying none of Carrie’s blood or my own would be added to it.

“All right.” He drew a harsh breath. “You have a choice, Ms. Kelly. You can die knowing that you caused Blake Ives’s daughter to be delivered to him in a body bag, or you can do exactly as I say.”