Tuesday 4 August, 7.25 P.M.

Drake Connor was tired, hot and hungry. He made his feet walk the last twenty yards to the gas station, which was the first place he'd come to that would have cold drinks and air conditioning. He'd walked miles, sticking to back roads. Lots of grass. Tons of countryside.

He'd stayed off the highway because he wasn't sure who was looking for him, and he was becoming more cautious by the moment. You mean paranoid? No, because it's not paranoia when people are actually looking for you. Considering his sister had reported her credit card stolen, she'd be sure to have reported her car stolen too. All he needed was for a local lawman to recognize him from a BOLO.

He was thirsty and starving. He still had the issue of no food or money, but he'd already planned how he'd get around that.

Glad that he'd had the presence of mind to go back to Belle's car for his ball cap, he pulled the brim down and leaned against the pole holding the gas station sign a good seventy-five feet in the air. He'd seen the sign long before he'd seen the station. Stood to reason it would have a decent amount of traffic, even though it was getting late. He just had to wait for the right vehicle with the right driver.

A few minutes later, a possible combination pulled up to one of the pumps. A black SUV with tinted glass. A middle-aged woman got out. She wore a business suit with a skinny black skirt that ended below her knees, which would hamper her ability to run from him or fight him. That works. Her shoulders heaved in a weary sigh as she stretched her back. She was tired after her long day. Excellent.

Now if she'd only go into the station's convenience store after she finished filling her tank, it would be the perfect setup. Drake slid his hand back under his shirt, making sure the handle of his gun was in the optimal position for a quick draw, pulled the brim of his cap low and waited impatiently.

'Yes,' he whispered when she put the gas pump away, got her purse and started walking inside. If she'd only left her car unlocked, it would have been an A-plus combo, but she pointed the key fob over her shoulder and locked the doors with a beep before slipping the fob in the pocket of her skirt.

Drake followed her into the station and up to the cashier, grabbing her around the neck when she reached the counter. He pressed the barrel of the Ruger against her throat, yanking her back against him when she tried to struggle.

'Hands where I can see them,' he said calmly to the cashier. 'One false move and I'll blow a hole in her neck. Open the cash register and put the money in the nice lady's purse.' He nudged the gun against the woman's neck. 'Open your purse for him, nice lady, and put it on the counter.'

Glaring balefully, the man behind the counter did as he was told, filling the purse with small bills. Drake had timed this well. The lotto numbers were about to be drawn and the Powerball was over fifty million bucks, so everyone had bought tickets on their way home.

'You little punk,' the cashier spat, which was funny considering the man was only five-three or so. He was the little one. Not me.

From the corner of his eye, Drake caught a movement in the back hallway where the restrooms were. He didn't think, he just acted, pointing the gun at the cashier and pulling the trigger. He heard a scream as the man went down.

A crazy lady with a shotgun ran from the back toward him. Panic closed Drake's throat when he saw her aiming the shotgun at him. He tightened his hold on the hostage, grabbing her purse and backing out of the store, dragging her with him.

'Put the gun down!' he yelled at the lady with the rifle. 'Don't you fucking move!'

'Please!' his hostage cried. 'Don't shoot! He'll kill me.'

'My husband!' the shotgun lady screamed. She ran behind the counter and dropped from sight, probably to check on the cashier.

'Give me your keys and I won't hurt you,' Drake said to his hostage. 'Unlock your car first, then give me the damn keys.' With any luck it was a smart key and he wouldn't have to put it in the ignition. The woman in the business suit obeyed, and Drake swallowed his panic, dragging his hostage around the SUV to the driver's side. He planned to release her and leave her behind when he got in the car, but she began to struggle.

'No! You're not taking me!' She thrashed her body, leaving Drake with no choice. He pushed her to the ground and put a bullet in her head, then jumped in the SUV. He flung the purse with the money on the passenger seat, then started the engine and- Shit. His gut turned to liquid when he looked in his rear view. The cashier's wife was running out of the convenience store, aiming the shotgun at the SUV. He floored it, the SUV's tires squealing as he burned rubber, fishtailing as he sped toward the station's exit.

Cincinnati, Ohio

Tuesday 4 August, 7.30 P.M.

Scarlett drove a block away from the Ledger building and pulled over again, her heart pounding in her throat. She'd been shaken to the core by her own admission, filled with feelings of guilt and despair as well as grim acceptance of what she'd done, but seeing the panic in Marcus's eyes . . . He'd been experiencing true fear. For a moment there she thought he was going to be sick.

Willing her hands to be steady, she Googled Matthias Gargano, Lexington, and 1989. She frowned when the top result was an article from a Lexington newspaper. About a funeral.

Oh my God. It was a child's funeral. 'Who were you, Matthias Gargano?' she murmured. But she was afraid she already knew.

She kept reading and found her guess had been right on the mark.

Mourners said their final goodbyes to Matthias Gargano, three-year-old son of George Gargano and Della Yarborough-Gargano, at Trinity Episcopal Church. The victim was survived by his parents, grandparents, and his two brothers, Marcus, age 8, and Montgomery, age 6. The tragic victim of a kidnapping gone wrong will be interred in the Yarborough family crypt in Spring Grove Cemetery, Cincinnati, Ohio.

Scarlett had to steady her breathing. How had she not known about this brother?

'Oh my God,' she whispered. Mikhail was not the first child Marcus's mother had lost to violence. She'd lost Matthias nearly twenty-five years before. 'That poor woman.'

The next article, from the same Lexington paper, was dated a few days earlier, its headline making her racing heart stop short. 'GARGANO BOYS HOME SAFE'.

'Oh no. No, no, no.' Her stomach twisting into a vicious knot, she read on. The three boys had been kidnapped in a well-orchestrated operation, taken from different places but at the same time. Marcus and Montgomery had been grabbed on their way home from prep school.

Montgomery? That must be Stone, she thought.

The family's chauffeur had been overpowered, drugged, then ejected from the car. The two boys had been drugged and carried to an abandoned warehouse. Three-year-old Matthias had been taken from his bed during his nap by someone posing as one of a construction crew that had been hired to do repairs on the family's penthouse.

A ransom of five million dollars had been demanded. Scarlett's mind spun both at the amount and that Marcus's parents had been able to produce it in less than twenty-four hours. Disaster had struck, though, when the kidnappers realized the FBI and Lexington PD were on to them. The family had been warned not to involve the authorities, but the boys' mother had done so. The furious and panicked kidnappers shot at all the boys, hitting two, but their third shot missed the oldest.

Marcus. He'd been kidnapped and shot at. Shot at. My God. How many times have people tried to kill him? she wondered, horrified. And he'd only been eight years old.

Eight. That was how old he'd been when his mother was hospitalized after overdosing on pills. Scarlett hated suicide because she was left with the unpleasant task of informing the next of kin and she never had answers for their gut-wrenching questions. But that didn't mean she didn't understand it. She'd even contemplated it herself once or twice after Michelle's death. But Della Yarborough had had two boys left, one of whom had been critically injured. Her boys had needed her. Marcus had needed his mother.

'Oh,' she breathed. That was why Gayle was so special to Marcus. She'd been his nanny during this time. So much made sense now, all the way down to Marcus's protection of Stone.

A car horn blared outside her window and Scarlett suddenly became aware of the time. She was now well and truly late. Pulling back into traffic, she fought to clear her mind.

Whatever Marcus was holding inside had to do with this kidnapping, although nothing she'd read seemed like it would have involved a sin on his part. He'd only been eight, after all. How bad a thing could an eight-year-old do?

None of this had to do with Tala, either, she told herself sternly.

But it had everything to do with Marcus, so while it wasn't the most important thing on her plate, it was important to her. She wanted to understand. Desperately wanted to help. She rolled her eyes at herself. She wanted to fix him.

She'd get that chance if she had to tie him to a chair and make him talk to her.

But for now she had to focus on her job, which was to find Tala's killer.

Twenty-one.

Cincinnati, Ohio

Tuesday 4 August, 7.30 P.M.

'You had twenty-eight callers while you were gone,' Gayle informed him archly as he tore past her desk, practically running to his office. 'Marcus!' she snapped. 'Stop.'

He slowed his pace, stopping with his hand on the handle of his office door. 'I heard you, Gayle. Twenty-eight calls.'

'No. Twenty-eight callers. Half of them called more than once. Most were not polite. Most called to comment on the story Stone uploaded this morning. You remember,' she said sarcastically, 'the one where you were unable to save a seventeen-year-old girl you met in an alley. Some of the callers were our advertisers, many of whom wanted to know what the hell you were doing in an alley to begin with. Some threatened to pull their ads. I had to grovel, Marcus.' She sat back, arms folded across her chest. 'You do not pay me enough for this.'

He managed to smile at her. 'You're right. Give yourself a raise.'

'Do not smile at me. Do not try to charm me. You always sucked at it.'

He lost the fake smile, staring at her numbly. 'Then what do you want?'

Gayle stood up, frowning. 'What did that woman do to you?'

'Which woman?'

'That damn detective. She drops you off here and drives away with you looking like you saw a ghost. And . . .' Her eyes widened. 'Is that a bandage on your head? What happened?'

He shook his head. 'I'm tired, Gayle. I don't want to go over it again. I've written the story already.' He'd done so while sitting with Isenberg. It wasn't long, and he'd need Stone to punch it up, but it had all the relevant facts. 'I'll email it to you. Where is Stone?'

'Your brother's in his office.' Gayle frowned in disapproval. 'Drinking heavily.'

Marcus wasn't sure if her disapproval was directed at him or at Stone. 'Why?'

'He says you've turned him into a babysitter. He dropped Jill off at the university, then came back here, took a bottle of Lagavulin from your desk drawer and went to his own office.'

'Wonderful,' Marcus muttered. 'First Mom, now Stone.'

Gayle's expression instantly softened. 'Whoa,' she said. 'Your brother and your mother . . . two different things. You don't need to worry about him so much, Marcus.'

'I should save it all for Mom?' he asked darkly, then shook his head. 'I'm sorry. I shouldn't take my bad temper out on you. I'll talk to you later.'

He went into his office and shut his door. A glance at the security monitor showed an empty space where Scarlett's car had been. She was gone, off to the FBI field office to meet with her partner, a good man who'd probably never killed anyone. Outside the line of duty anyway.

His chair groaned when he dropped into it. What the fuck am I going to tell her?

The truth. He had to tell her the truth. And hope for the best.

Wearily he picked up the phone and called Stone's office, relieved when his brother didn't sound drunk. 'Can you come see me?' Marcus asked. 'It's important.'

'You're not going to need another Kevlar vest, are you?' Stone asked ominously.

'No. The spare is still good.' He hung up, started his computer and Googled 'Michelle', 'murder' and 'Trent Bracken'.

He sighed as hit after hit was returned. Michelle Schmidt's brutalized body found in an alley behind a dumpster, just as Scarlett had said. Trent Bracken, Michelle's ex-boyfriend, was arrested for the crime when it was shown that the victim had identified him as her abuser in her last text, sent to her best friend.

'Criminal justice major Scarlett Bishop,' Marcus read aloud. There were no photos of Scarlett in the articles he found, although one report described her as 'in shock' at the scene.

'I wonder why,' he muttered. Because it was easier to dwell on Scarlett's trauma than his own, he picked up the phone and dialed Cal. As the editor-in-chief, Cal would know exactly where to find the information in the archives, although most of that information was also tucked away in his brain. 'Who was covering the city's crime beat ten years ago?'

'Jeb was. Why?'

'Shit.' Jeb had died a year ago. 'I wanted to find some articles in the archives.'

'I can search for them, or ask Jill to do it.'

'No,' Marcus said firmly. He didn't want Jill in his business until he was sure she wasn't planning to do something stupid like turn his team in because of the laws they routinely bent investigating child abusers and wife beaters. He especially didn't want her in Scarlett's business. 'Do you remember a murder that happened at the university, a woman named Michelle Schmidt?'

'I remember that one all too well. I'm surprised you don't oh, wait. You were over in the Gulf then. What do you want to know, specifically?'

'Everything we've got on the guy who did it. Name was Trent Bracken.'

'Okay,' Cal said slowly. 'Although he was acquitted by a jury, you know.'

Marcus didn't care that he'd been acquitted. He was more concerned about Scarlett at the moment. 'Just get me whatever we have on file. This one is personal.'

'A new case?' Cal asked, unable to hide his excitement.

'No. Like I said this morning, we need to lie low for a little while, until this morning's case is solved. Speaking of which, save room in the printed edition for another article about the possible perpetrators. I was out at the house where this morning's victim was being held. Starting in an hour or so, I'll be embedded in the MCES task force.'

Cal whistled. 'How'd you swing that?'

'Kissed the lieutenant's ass.'

'You're sure you didn't kiss that pretty detective's ass? Because if you didn't, I'll give it the old college try.'

Marcus rolled his eyes. 'You're an old horn dog, Cal.'

Cal chortled. 'And you didn't deny kissing the detective's ass. Anything else I should dig up while I'm in the archives?'

'Yeah. Actually, this is something Jill can do. Have her search for anything on human trafficking in the tri-state area any cases, victim profiles, arrests of perpetrators. I want a wide-net search. If she gets a hit from our archives, I want pictures and any original documentation. She'll likely get a lot of hits, but most will be anecdotal in nature. I want her to separate out anything that includes hard data or an account of trafficker convictions.'