Craig did as he was told. Deni stepped into her room and bumped the table that held her pillared candle. The candle toppled over onto the glass top, and she quickly snatched it back up. The flame went out, leaving them in darkness. Maybe it was good that the thief wouldn’t see the light.
She kept the door cracked enough to watch Jeff as he crept down the stairs. Craig came back and saw Deni standing in the doorway.
“Come on, Deni.” He pushed her into the room and closed himself in with her. “Let’s lock the door like he said.”
“Craig, you’ve got to go out there and help Jeff. He could get killed!”
“I don’t have a gun,” he said through his teeth. “What am I going to do? I think it’s better if I stay here and protect you.”
She heard the covers rumpling. “What’s going on?” Beth whispered.
“Shh. There’s someone in the house. Be quiet. Don’t wake up Sarah.”
Beth got up and hurried across the carpet. “Call Dad!”
“We can’t. But Jeff’s going down with his gun.”
Her heart hammered as she opened the door again and peered out. She heard Jeff’s slow footsteps creak on the steps.
God, please protect him!
Craig tried to pull her back from the door, but she resisted.
Suddenly a gun went off, followed quickly by another shot. Deni jumped back and screamed. Downstairs, she heard her mother screaming. Deni started to run out, but Craig held her back.
The front door slammed.
“Dad, are you all right?” It was Jeff’s voice, loud and frantic.
The only answer she heard was her mother’s screams.
D
ENI BURST OUT OF THE ROOM AND STUMBLED DOWN THE
stairs. Her father was on the floor, and in the light of her mother’s flashlight beam, she saw blood soaking his shirt.
“Daddy!” she screamed.
“He’s shot!” Kay dropped the flashlight and pressed her fist against his wound. “Jeff, run to get Dr. Morton. Hurry!”
Her brother took off into the night.
“Mom, is it — is it bad?” Deni asked.
“Light the lamp.” Her mother’s voice was shaking.
Deni heard the others coming down the stairs, Luke crying at the top. Her hands trembled as she tried to light a match.
She heard Beth sobbing. “Daddy?”
“I’m okay,” her father rasped.
But Deni didn’t know if that was true.
D
EREK
’
S EXAMINATION OF
D
OUG CONFIRMED THAT HE WAS
, indeed, okay. “The bullet grazed his ribs. I can’t X-ray them, but I can feel that at least two are broken.”
Deni finally took a full breath.
Thank you, Lord.
Doug sat up. “I can feel it too.”
“This wound is going to need a lot of TLC,” he said. “I’ll bandage it up, but we’ll have to watch it to make sure it doesn’t get infected. Doug, you’ll have to favor that side for the next little while. Let the pain guide you.”
Doug winced as Derek began cleaning the wound.
“Can’t you give him something for pain?” Kay asked.
Derek shook his head. “Normally I’d say yes, but my house was just broken into. Whoever did it broke the lock on my drug closet and stole the drugs.”
Doug gaped at the doctor. “Are you serious? How long ago?”
“Just before your break-in. Cathy heard something that woke her up. She thought it was our cat, but when she got to the living room, she heard the front door close. She got me up and we found the closet door open. I was getting ready to go for the sheriff when Jeff came over.”
“Do you think it was the same person?” Kay asked.
“If not, it’s a huge coincidence. Did you see him, Doug?”
He shook his head. “It was dark, and he was shining the flash-light beam in my eyes. But I think I shot him. I heard him grunt when he got hit.”
“You hit him?” Kay asked. “Are you sure?”
“I can’t be positive, but there would be blood. He went out the front door.”
Deni followed Jeff as he took the flashlight and shone it on the floor in front of the door. Sure enough, there were blood drops.
“You got him, Dad,” Jeff said.
“Well, I couldn’t have gotten him too bad, because he got away.”
Kay came to look. “Well, he’ll be easy to identify. He won’t be able to hide a gunshot wound for long.”
“I need to go after the sheriff,” Jeff said.
Kay stopped him. “I’m afraid for you to go out there. What if he’s still there? He has a gun, Jeff.”
“Well, somebody has to go.” Jeff looked up at Craig, standing on the stairs. “Craig, you can go with me.”
Deni looked up at Craig, half-expecting him to find a way out.
Suddenly, Aaron ran down the stairs, almost knocking Craig down. “Is Sarah down here?”
“No, she’s still asleep in my bed,” Deni said. “She missed the whole thing, thank goodness.”
“No, she’s not! She’s not there.”
“
What
?” Deni asked.
“She’s gone!” he shouted.
Kay sucked in a breath. “No, she’s not!” She started up the stairs. Deni followed her. When she got to the room, her mother shone the flashlight on the bed. It was empty.
Deni grabbed the flashlight and began calling for her as she shone it under the bed. “Sarah? Honey, where are you? It’s okay. You can come out.” She checked under the bed, in the closet, the bathroom.
“Sarah?”
“She’s not here!” Aaron cried.
Immediately, the family sprang into action, searching every nook and cranny of the house for the child. When they were sure Sarah was gone, Kay uttered the words they had all begun thinking.
“That’s what he wanted! He came to get Sarah!”
T
HE TREES HAD ARMS AND HAIR THAT BLEW WILDLY AS THEY
hunkered over, coming for Sarah, reaching for her, grabbing her. She screamed and fought off those groping arms, the thorny fingers, the stinging hair that ripped across her skin. She saw the face of her mother, demonlike, with slime dripping from her teeth and poison words flying from her mouth. And just as she thought that one of them would slam her down, something stopped it all. Her mother fell backward and the trees vanished, leaving her in darkness. And the darkness smelled like sweat.
S
ARAH WOKE SUDDENLY
. I
T HAD BEEN ANOTHER NIGHTMARE,
only this time she wasn’t in Deni’s bed but in the arms of a man she almost recognized, a man with bad breath and rough hands that covered her mouth and kept her quiet.
He was carrying her as he ran through the trees. She felt the wind blowing across the leaves and saw the branches reaching down just like in the dream. She tried to scream, but something was wrapped around her face, tight over her mouth. She tried to call out for Aaron, for Joey or Luke or Deni, or Mr. Doug or Miss Kay, but she couldn’t get the words out.
No one could hear her. And he was taking her farther and farther away from help.
I
T WAS ALMOST THREE A.M. WHEN
D
OUG HEARD
S
CARBROUGH
’
S
van rumbling into the neighborhood. Brad, had gone with another neighbor to wake the sheriff after hearing the gunshots.
Scarbrough came in with three deputies and did a perimeter search for anything the perpetrator had left behind. They took samples of the blood from the floor, dusted for prints, and tried to trace his steps up the stairs to Deni’s room, where he’d gotten Sarah.
“It wasn’t hard to find Sarah, since that was the only room with a night-light burning,” he said, coming back down the stairs. “He probably gagged her so she couldn’t scream.”
“But was he holding her when he shot me, then?” Doug asked, panicked. “Is it possible I shot Sarah instead of him?”
Aaron almost exploded. “No! She wasn’t shot! You didn’t shoot her, okay? She’s all right. She probably got away and right now she’s trying to find her way back to us. We have to go look for her!”
Jeff stopped the boy from heading out the door. “Aaron, there are people out with flashlights looking. The other deputies are out in their cars. But you have to stay here, because we don’t want anyone else to get hurt.”
“I won’t get hurt!” he cried. “I’ll kill whoever has her! I bet Edith broke out of jail. She’s trying to get even!”
“She didn’t break out, son,” Scarbrough said. “She’s still there.”
“Besides, I don’t think it was a woman,” Doug said. “I couldn’t see the person very clearly, but whoever it was was bigger than me.”
“What about Moe Jenkins?” Scarbrough asked. “He’s already threatened to take Sarah.”
Kay muffled a sob. “Yes, it probably was him. But why? What good would it do him to take Sarah now, when there’s not another disbursement for three months?”
Scarbrough looked at the boy. “He probably wants a ransom. If it’s him, we’ll know soon enough. He’ll get a demand to you. And there may be a blood trail.” He stroked the boy’s rumpled hair. “Don’t worry, son, I’m gonna round up as many men as I can find to help us look. If I have anything to say about it, we’ll have her back by morning.”
Doug didn’t like his helpless feeling. “Isn’t there something we can do in the meantime?”
Scarbrough turned back at the door. “Yeah, there’s something you can do, all right. You can pray for that little girl.”
“I
T WON
’
T DO NO GOOD TO PRAY.
” A
ARON
’
S TEARS STUNG HIS
eyes, and he smeared them with the heel of his trembling hand. “God won’t listen to me.”
Doug sat on the couch in the lamplight, clutching his bandaged side, and trying to stay strong for the distraught boys. “Come here, son. Sit down.”
“No!” Aaron cried. “We’re just wasting time. I have to go find her.”
“Aaron, it is useful to pray,” Kay cried. “Prayer is all we’ve got. God knows where Sarah is, and he has lots of angels who can protect her. The Bible says that the angels of children always see the face of God. That means he gives them special attention.”
“He never gave
us
special attention,” Aaron bit out. “And there’s no reason he’d give it to us now. He probably hates me. He’d never do anything I say.”
He started for the door, but Doug called, “Aaron, you can’t leave! Sit down!”
“I can’t!” he screamed. “You people think you’re in charge of her, but you’re not, okay? I am! I’m the one who’s always took care of her! I’m the one who promised her I wouldn’t let nothing happen to her! But I did — ” His voice cracked off, and he wilted against the door. “I did let something happen. I never shoulda let her sleep with Deni. I never shoulda let her out of my sight. We were better off in our apartment. At least nobody kidnapped us there!”
Doug came and stooped in front of him. “Son, I’m as upset as you are — ”
“No, you’re not! If you were, you’d have stopped him! You’d at least be out there looking for her, not expecting nobody else to do it! If she was yours you wouldn’t be just sitting here.”
Doug realized Aaron was right. He’d hesitated too long already. He thought back to a few weeks ago, when Deni vanished. He had left that very night to go after her. Nothing could have stopped him.
Only a bullet was stopping him this time, but aside from losing a little blood and breaking some ribs, he would be all right. But Sarah might not.
“Okay, Aaron. You and I will go look for her.”
Kay threw herself in front of him. “Doug, can I speak to you in private, please?”
He recognized the panic in her tone. He told the boy to wait, then went into the study and closed the door. It was dark — but they didn’t take the time to light a lamp. He could see her dimly through the moonlight coming through the window.
“Doug, you cannot go out there!” Her voice wobbled. “You’ve been shot. You’ve lost blood. You need to be at home. Please, don’t go!”
He sighed. “Kay, I know we can’t go chasing Moe Jenkins through the dark woods, but Aaron needs to feel that he’s doing something. I know the sheriff and his deputies are doing a lot more than we can do. But let me take him out just for his own state of mind.”
“Where will you go?”
“I don’t know. But Jeff can stay here and guard the house in case Moe comes back.”
She finally backed down, but not without more tears. “All right, but so help me, if you get hurt again, I’ll kill you!”
He pulled her into a one-armed hug and kissed her forehead. “It’ll be okay, honey. You guys just cover us with prayer. Maybe we’ll find Sarah before they get too far.”
D
OUG AND
A
ARON WALKED OUTSIDE AND TRIED TO DECIDE WHERE
to start. The air was cool, and the moonlight was bright enough for them to see where they were going. Aaron stood in the middle of the street, looking up and down, as if trying to think like the kidnapper.
“I used to go through there,” Aaron said, pointing into the woods next to Eloise’s house. “There’s kind of a path. We used to hide our empty boxes there.”
Doug followed him between the houses to the woods. Shining his flashlight, he tried to find a path. If there was one, it was small and hard to see at night. He imagined Moe Jenkins running through here wounded, with a bag full of drugs, a gun, and a fighting little girl in his arms. Didn’t seem likely. “If he had a bike,” Doug said, “he probably didn’t have to cut through the woods.”
“But Jeff got out there pretty quick,” Aaron said. “He woulda saw him if he rode off on a bike.”
“Not necessarily. Jeff came to me first. That gave the kidnapper time to get away. He very well could have ridden off on a bike.”
“But holding Sarah? She woulda been fighting, unless she was hurt.”
Aaron stood there for a moment, staring at the woods. He was sweating and his face was tight, every muscle rigid, as he turned that over in his mind.
A light emerged from the woods, a flashlight beam between the trees.
“Doug, is that you?” It was Brad’s voice.
“Yeah,” he said. “Have you guys found anything?”
Brad came out of the woods. “Not yet. If he was here, he got away before we started looking.” He eyed Doug. “You okay, man? Shouldn’t you be taking it easy?”