Samantha got to her feet. "Run your investigation any way you want, Sheriff. I'm just telling you what I saw." She was expressionless, her voice calm. Still looking at Lucas, she added, "If I'm right, whatever happens to put her in that water terrifies her."
He half nodded. "Thanks."
"Good luck." She left the conference room.
Metcalf said, "What I can't figure out is whether you two are enemies-or something else. It seems to tip back and forth every time you meet."
"I'll let you know when I figure it out." Lucas drained his cup and rose. "In the meantime, I want another look at that map before we go back out."
"Simpson Pond?" The sheriff shook his head. "Not much more than a wide place in a stream dammed up by a beaver. And the so-called property on your list is an old log cabin so remote even the hunters don't like using it."
"If I were a kidnapper holding a victim I needed to keep safely immobile and silent for another fourteen hours or so, remote is just what I'd want."
"I can't believe you're listening to that nut."
Evenly, Lucas said, "It's twelve-thirty. The ransom is due to be delivered tomorrow afternoon at five. Sixteen and a half hours, Wyatt. I say Sam is reliable, and the direction she's indicating makes sense given our kidnapper's M.O. So unless you have a better idea, I plan to continue searching these remote properties- with those on or near water moving to the top of the list."
Metcalf shook his head, the stubborn jut of his jaw mitigated only by the worry and sick dread in his eyes. "I don't have a better idea, goddammit."
"Neither do I. And we didn't need Sam to point out that Lindsay's running out of time."
"I know. I know." Metcalf climbed to his feet, weariness in every line of his body. "So, you're really psychic?"
"I really am."
With the vague understanding that psychic covered a wide range of possibilities, the sheriff said, "What kind of psychic are you? What do you do? Look into crystal balls like Zarina? See the future?"
"I find people who are lost. I feel their fear."
Metcalf blinked. "She was warning you? That's why she said-"
"Yeah. That's why."
"Shit," the sheriff said.
At first, Lindsay thought it was odd that the kidnapper had left her watch on her wrist and untouched. But then, as the minutes ticked away into hours, she began to understand his purpose.
Scaring the shit out of her.
Part of his game.
That dawned on her at about nine o'clock on Friday morning, after she'd made her umpteenth failed attempt to kick a hole through the clear walls surrounding her and into the featureless darkness beyond. The several steel bands wrapping and reinforcing the thick sheets of apparently shatterproof glass provided all the strength necessary to resist her best attempts to break through.
Worse, she had a strong suspicion that she was running out of air. That was when she'd looked at her watch.
Nine o'clock.
Nine o'clock on Friday morning.
He always wanted the ransom delivered by five o'clock on Friday afternoon. And they were positive-almost positive-that he never killed his victims until the ransom had been safely delivered. So she had eight hours, probably.
Eight hours to find a way out of this sealed fish tank.
Eight hours to live.
Assuming he hadn't miscalculated how much air she needed to survive that long.
"Shit," she muttered. "Shit, shit, shit." Swearing usually made her feel better. It didn't this time.
She sat cross-legged on the floor of her tank and studied it, trying to remain calm and rational enough to think clearly, trying to find a weakness. She had thrown her entire weight against various points and corners, only to end up bruised, winded, exhausted, and strongly reminded of a bird flinging itself against the bars of its cage.
Think, Lindsay.
Wyatt's face swam into her mind, and she fiercely shoved it away. She couldn't think about him now. She couldn't think of mistakes or regrets or anything except figuring out a way to come out of this alive.
There would be time for everything else later.
There had to be.
Lindsay tried to concentrate, to study her prison. Then she heard an unfamiliar little sound.
Dripping.
She got to her feet and went to the corner where the pipe protruded through the heavy glass. The pipe that had, until now, been perfectly dry. Now it was dripping water. Not much, and not fast, just water steadily dripping.
She looked around at the cage.
At the tank.
Glass walls. Glass ceiling. Some kind of metal floor. All beautifully sealed. Waterproof.
It wasn't about running out of air, she realized.
As she watched, the dripping water became a trickle.
"Jesus," she whispered.
Most of them had taken another short break around noon, but nobody wanted to waste any time. They had managed to check out less than two-thirds of the properties on their list, and no one on any of the search teams was under any illusions that they'd be able to reach all the remaining properties in time.
Everybody was past tired, nerves on edge both because of the circumstances and all the caffeine. And the terrain wasn't helping; the search was physically demanding, even grueling, and exhaustion was creeping into all of them.
By three, Wyatt Metcalf had left the search parties in order to go to his bank and get the ransom money. His instructions were to deliver the ransom alone. Those were always the instructions. /
Lucas had advised the sheriff to wear a wire or to hide a tracking device in the small bag that was to hold the money, but he'd also been forced to admit that on every previous occasion when they were involved early enough to take such measures, either the kidnapper had found a way to remove or electronically short-circuit the device or else had simply left the money unclaimed.
And his victim dead.
Metcalf wasn't willing to take any chances, not with Lindsay's life. He intended to follow his instructions to the letter. He had refused to be wired, to be accompanied, or to be watched in any way by law-enforcement personnel.
"Hard to be a cop and a lover," Jaylene murmured when the sheriff reported to them via the spotty radio communication that he was going for the money and would deliver it sans any wire or tracking device.
"He's not thinking like a cop," Lucas said, sounding tired.
"Could you?"
Without replying to that, her partner bent once more over the map spread out on the hood of their ATV and frowned. "Six more properties on our list. And two of them on or near some kind of water."
Champion joined him in examining the map and shook his head. "If we're still putting the places with water at the top of our list-"
"We are," Lucas told him.
"Well, okay, then there's no way we can cover both those places by five o'clock. There's just no way. Not only are they miles apart, but this one"-he jabbed a finger at the map-"doesn't have any kind of a road leading to it now. It'll take us at least an hour and a half from here, and that's assuming the summer rains didn't wash the hills and gullies as badly as they usually do. It'd put us there at about four-thirty, if we're really lucky, and five if the area is as bad as I'm afraid it is. And that's not counting the time it'll take to search what's left of the buildings around that old mine shaft."
"What about the other place?" Jaylene asked.
Champion chewed on his lower lip as he stared at the map and considered. "The other place is the hunter's cabin at Simpson Pond. It's remote, but there's a halfway decent service road running partway, where the old train tracks used to be. From here… less than an hour, probably. But that's in a different direction, so even if we're lucky as hell we won't be able to check out both places. Not before five. Not even before six, if you want my opinion."
"So we can only check out one of them." Jaylene was watching her partner. "One of two places only slightly more likely than the other four on our list. Should we flip a coin? Or do you have something to give us better odds?"