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“When?” Never in his life had Travis felt so impotent, so totally worthless. Not even when his wife had died three years earlier. That had been painful. Unfair. Wrong. But this…“Hell!” he ground out before Carter answered his question. Because the sheriff couldn’t respond. No one knew when…or, oh, God, if, she’d be located. No one knew a damned thing! They’d used tracking dogs. They’d used the Explorer Scouts along with the police and all the neighbors to search the town and surrounding wooded hillsides of Falls Crossing. They’d put up posters, called in the media, begging the public for help. And the police and FBI had questioned the students and staff of the school.

Still they’d found nothing. Not a damned thing.

And he was going out of his mind.

The police had gone over her room, inch by inch. They’d even taken his computer, hoping to find some indication that Dani had been surfing the Web, logging onto the Web sites where pedophiles trolled for unsuspecting prey.

Travis’s guts squeezed so hard they ached. If some perverted bastard so much as touched one hair on her head…He couldn’t go there—wouldn’t. The authorities hadn’t found any evidence on the hard drive that Dani had been searching for anything other than the humane society and related dog sites, always looking for another pet to rescue and bring home. As if three cats, a dog, two horses and even a box turtle weren’t enough.

He glanced over at the box turtle’s cage, an elaborate terrarium that he and Dani had created together. It now sat beneath the laundry room window, the turtle hidden inside his “house,” a cutout plastic tub. His striped head, feet and tail were all tucked inside his shell. Travis could relate. At times he wanted to hide away; others, like now, he was so anxious and keyed up, he needed to do something, anything!

Rage and fear, his constant companions since learning that his daughter was missing, were eating at him, getting to him, and he couldn’t stand another minute—make that second—of sitting around and waiting. As the clock ticked loudly and the empty refrigerator hummed, Travis Settler thought he would surely go out of his mind.

“No one has any idea where my girl is,” he said, his voice rough. “Except for the son of a bitch who grabbed her.” For a minute he couldn’t breathe. He thought of Dani, his only child, with her untamed brown hair, smattering of freckles across her nose and wise-beyond-her-years eyes. She was tough—he’d raised her tough—but, Jesus, she was a kid, just a kid. Alone. With some kind of psycho.

Maybe she’s ju

st run away, as the police have suggested. Maybe her disappearance has nothing to do with Blanche Johnson’s murder.

God, he only wished he believed for even a heartbeat that Dani had gotten a wild hair and set off for parts unknown, that she was safe, just rebellious.

But that was all hogwash. He knew it. Probably the police did, too.

His teeth gnashed in frustration and dread wormed its way through his soul. What was she going through now? Where the hell was she? Was she hurt? Or…or worse? A lump filled his throat. His eyes burned. But he wouldn’t think the worst. Not yet. What was it his aunt had always said during trying times? “Where there’s life, there’s hope.” Well, damn it all to hell, there had better be life…Oh, fuck…A hole the size of Wyoming filled the space where his heart had been.

He glanced at the corner of the table where he was sitting, to the phone, the one that the FBI had installed with a separate headset. It sat silent. Mocking him. Daring him to believe that his daughter was safe.

Dear God, Dani, where are you?

He unclenched one fist to shove it through his hair.

For the first time since leaving his special forces unit in the army nearly eighteen years earlier, Travis felt the need for quick action, a decisive plan, a no-holds-barred attack on whoever the hell it was who had stolen his child. His jaw grew so tight it hurt and his hands clenched into fists, only to open and curl up, open and curl, over and over again.

Finally he said the words that he’d been afraid to say earlier. “Whoever’s got her isn’t going to call. There won’t be any ransom demand.”

“It’s still early,” Carter began, then, with a cutting glare from Travis, didn’t finish his thought. Carter wasn’t a man who could lie easily. That much Travis understood; the sheriff just wasn’t any good at platitudes. Thank God.

“It’s not early.” Travis shoved back his chair, the legs scraping on the scarred hardwood floor of the small cabin where he’d made his home for over a decade. “You know it. I know it. Lieutenant Sparks—” Travis hitched his chin to Sparks who sipped from a chipped brown mug. “He knows it, too—don’t you, Sparks?”

The lieutenant didn’t answer. He slid a look at Travis, then glanced away, then glowered into his cup. Sparks was another man who wasn’t going to lie.

His gut churning, Travis walked barefoot to the window where he’d stood so many mornings, drinking coffee, half-listening to the morning news from the television in the living room while Dani, upstairs in her room under the eaves, roused. He would wait here, gazing outside, occasionally spying a black-tailed deer wander across the yard or a raccoon peering through the branches of the trees as dawn streaked over the hills. All the while Dani, never particularly happy to wake up, reluctantly got ready for school. It didn’t take long. At thirteen, unlike a lot of girls her age, she wasn’t into boys yet. She still eschewed makeup and hair coloring and those idiot teen magazines, which, he understood, would all come crashing into his life before he was ready…or at least he’d always expected they would.

If he thought hard right now, he could almost hear the distinctive thump of her feet hitting the floorboards as she hopped out of bed, the sound of water running through the old pipes as she brushed her teeth and then groggily stepped into the shower, the trip of her sneakers as she hurried down the wooden stairs. Invariably her backpack would be slung over one shoulder, her hair still damp, eyes bright and eager for whatever the new day would bring. She’d be wearing worn-out jeans and a hooded sweatshirt, an outfit her mother would have forbidden, had she still been alive. Then Dani would grab a granola bar and a box of juice on the run—another practice Ella would have railed against.

Pausing only to pet the dog, Dani would pile into the pickup behind the steering wheel and he’d let her drive the length of the lane before they’d exchange places and he’d haul her into town and deposit her beneath the wide awning of Harrington Junior High.

Jesus, would he ever hear those sounds again? Those simple, mundane, everyday noises that announced his daughter was alive and well and happy…even carefree.

He glanced toward the bottom of the stairs as if expecting her to appear, to end this nightmare he was living. Then he gave himself a swift mental kick. Stop it! She’s not here! Someone nabbed her and it’s your fault for not being vigilant enough!

“Quit blaming yourself,” Shane advised as if he’d read Travis’s mind.

Travis cut the sheriff an icy glare.

Carter had the luxury of handing out advice. He didn’t have a kid, couldn’t understand. No matter how close Carter had gotten to Jenna Hughes’s daughters, it wasn’t the same as actually being a father.

“It won’t help,” Carter said.


Tags: Lisa Jackson West Coast Mystery