With the most sinister smirk she’d ever seen, Josiah leaned down and put the knife to Eden’s throat. With his lips positioned right next to her ear, he whispered, “Who says I just started?”
****
Chapter Fourteen
“Please tell me this will work.” Alex stared anxiously at the petite, blonde woman sitting in the chair across the table from him.
Upon her request, the lights in the room had been turned off and the small lamp from Sergeant Murphy’s desk had been brought in, instead. A blank pad of paper and a pencil were resting on the table, well within her reach, and everyone else in the room had positioned themselves on the opposite side to give her the space she apparently needed.
“It’ll work,” Dan assured him quietly from the seat beside his.
The woman opened one of her emerald eyes and gave Dan a look. “Not if the two of you don’t stop talking.”
“Sorry, Kat. Alex is just scared for Eden.” Dan glanced over at him. “We all are.”
“I understand.” She opened her other eye. “I promise, I’ll do everything I can to help you find her.”
Alex slowly filled his lungs to help tamper down the terror he felt. Eden was out there somewhere, and if this didn’t work…
“We’re going to find her, brother,” Garrett said with a confidence Alex didn’t share. “This is going to work. I can feel it.”
Looking to his right, Alex gave his partner a nod but kept silent. God, he hoped the man was right.
After realizing they had zero leads from the club, Dan had made one phone call and Katherine D’Antoni, or Kat, had dropped everything to fly here. Dan’s wife, Mia, had accompanied her, and was sitting on the other side of her husband with Dan’s hand held tightly in hers.
The scenario was so surreal, but with Zoe at the hospital fighting for her life and Eden missing and in the hands of a madman, Alex and the rest of his team were willing to try anything to help find the bastard responsible. Even Sergeant Murphy had joined them and was currently sitting in a chair at the far end of the table.
As Alex understood it, Kat could pick up on current events happening elsewhere and watch them as they unfolded in real time. The details shown in her mind’s eye would often lead to finding those needing to be found.
He just prayed this woman could find Eden before it was too late.
“Go ahead, Kat,” Mia told her friend softly. With a quick glance at Dan and then Alex, she added, “I think everyone’s ready, now.”
With the room darkened and silent, Kat closed her eyes and tried once more to focus. Alex had quickly brought her up to speed the minute she arrived, and now all they had to do was sit quietly and wait for her to work her magic.
It was one of the hardest things Alex had ever done.
He was a man of action. Both while in the Marines and then as a homicide detective, Alex’s first instinct was to pound the pavement until he found what he needed. In this case, what he needed was for Eden to be here with him. Safe and in his arms.
Within minutes, Kat was explaining what she could see while she scribbled on the paper in front of her. The whole thing looked like something out of a paranormal movie, but if it meant finding Eden, Alex was one hundred percent invested.
“I see a door. It’s under a stone archway, like an old root cellar that was built into the side of a small hill.” Kat continued drawing. “About twenty yards east of the hill is a pile of old wood and ash. I think it used to be a house, but it looks as though it burned down a long time ago.”
The pencil flew over the paper.
“To the west is another pile similar to that one only much larger. Like, maybe it used to be a barn or an outbuilding.”
Alex listened, taking meticulous notes as Kat spoke, but his faith in finding Eden was beginning to waver. The image she described could be anywhere.
“The area is completely secluded and surrounded by trees.”
She squeezed her eyes a little tighter, and though she didn’t verbally acknowledge it, Alex could tell she was concentrating even harder.
“There’s a small road to the south. It runs along the edge of a large lake.”
Garrett leaned over to him and whispered, “Could be Saganashkee Slough.”
Alex nodded, having thought the same thing. Saganashkee was a lake located about an hour southwest of the city. It made up almost the entire southern border of a large, wooded area that was home to a couple historical sites.
