But I just smiled and nodded. "Yes. I'll see you soon."

I walked slowly across the room, pausing in the doorway to look back at her. She was laughing at something that had happened on the television. "Goodbye," I whispered.

The tears waited until I was outside, until I doubled up as I pressed my back to the side of the stone wall. And then it all came, the pain of leaving my grandmother, the grief of leaving a city that I had built a life inside of-again-and the hurt and anger and frustration that came with having found a man like Conrad so soon to the moment my bizarre life decided to turn on its axis again and force me to leave.

It all came out with hot, heavy tears that had been sitting in my chest for days now. My time with Conrad had pushed it aside, but it never really left. And now it was taking over, destroying what little control I might have had over it.

Sobs shook my body, a physical pain that made me horribly sick to my stomach. Maybe that was why I didn't hear her.

"Look at the little baby cry."

I didn't even understand what she said at first. And then she grabbed my arm and pulled me to a standing position.

"Are you sad, baby?" she asked. "You should be."

"What are you doing here?"

"Looking for you. I thought, this time, I'll do it myself instead of trusting those morons to grab the right girl."

"You? You were behind Madison's kidnapping?"

"It was supposed to be you. I figured, two birds, one stone...it would have been the perfect plan if those idiots hadn't grabbed the wrong girl."

"But why?"

Janet, Einstein's latest assistant, narrowed her eyes as she stared at me.

"Your uncle is the reason my brother is dead. So I'm going to be the reason you're fucking dead."

My heart stuttered as I suddenly realized what was happening here. I jerked my arm from her grip and turned, intent on running into the alley, but pain suddenly flared in my back. My nervous system went into overload, and I began to convulse uncontrollably. I went down, the world going gray around me. The last thing I remembered hearing was her laughter from somewhere above me.

Chapter Thirteen.

Madison My hands were shaking so hard that I couldn't hold on to the water bottle someone had thrust into my fist a minute ago. It slipped and slammed into the floor, miraculously refusing to break despite the impressive dent that appeared in its ribbed bottom.

Rawn reached over and took my hand. I smiled gratefully at him.

"You're sure, Miss Miller."

"Positive."

The detective nodded as he scribbled something into the notebook he seemed to always have in his arms. Like a caricature of a television detective. Had he never heard of an iPad?

"Well, Janet French is not her real name," the other detective said. "But we've got a picture, which will make it easier to put out an APB on her."

"How quickly do you think you can take her into custody?" Rawn asked.

"We already have uniform cops searching the building. But it looks like she left shortly after Miss Miller here spotted her."

"But she didn't see me."

"Perhaps it was just the knowledge that you were in the building that scared her off," the first detective suggested. "In the meantime, I'd like to leave a uniform here to watch over you, Miss Miller."

"We have a security team that can keep an eye on her," Rawn informed the cop.

The detective nodded. "We'll call you once she's in custody."

As Rawn walked the detectives out of the office, I got up and went to the window behind his desk, my hands still shaking as I pressed them against the cool glass. Just when I was getting to a place where I could leave the house without looking over my shoulder every few minutes, and this had to happen.

How did she manage to get a job here?

"They'll find her," Rawn said, laying his hands on my shoulders as he moved up behind me.

"I hope so."

"In the meantime, I think you should stay at the apartment with me."

I forced a smile as I turned into him and buried myself in his arms. "Any excuse to get me in bed, huh?"

"Exactly."

He lifted my chin and kissed me, a soft promise of more to come. But then someone cleared their throat, causing Rawn to stiffen with irritation.

"Did you forget something, detective?"

"I just got here, actually."

Rawn turned, pulling me against his side as he did. Conrad was standing just inside the door, a charming smile on his handsome face.

"Sorry, didn't mean to interrupt. But I was wondering if we could have a conversation."

Rawn gestured for him to come into the room. Conrad did, closing the door behind him.

"I'm sorry about the whole misunderstanding with the sticky note," Rawn said, letting go of me so that he could cross the room and shake Conrad's hand. "But we had to check out every lead."

"I would have done the same thing in your position." Then, he smiled a little sheepishly. "Sorry about the punch."

"No harm done."

"What punch?" I asked.

Conrad rolled back on his heels, gesturing for Rawn to explain. But Rawn just shrugged it off with a simple gesture.

There was something going on...must have been a man thing.

Rawn gestured to the couch, reaching back for my hand as he settled on the loveseat across from Conrad.

"So, what can we do for you?"

Conrad sat forward and ran his fingers through his hair. "I was meeting with Aurora downstairs and realized there are some things that we should talk about."

Rawn's eyebrows rose. "Aurora?"

Yeah, Aurora? I thought Conrad and Mellissa...

If he was about to break my friend's heart, I wasn't sure this was something I wanted to hear. I started to stand, when the door suddenly burst open again.

"Thought you would want to know," McFarren said, sticking his head in, "but they spotted Janet French at 34th and Canby."

"Who's Janet French?" Conrad asked.

McFarren turned away as Rawn rushed after him. I started to follow, but Conrad grabbed my arm.

"Who's Janet French?"

"She's the woman who interrogated me during my kidnapping," I said, shuddering as the words, spoken aloud, sent another chill down my spine. "She's apparently been working down in Einstein's office for the past week, trying to get from the source what she couldn't get from me."

I started to pull away, my thoughts only on staying close to Rawn. But there was something about the look on Conrad's face.

"What?" I asked, not really sure I wanted to hear an answer.

"Mellissa," he said. "She's there...she's at Summer Oaks admitting her grandmother."

"Summer Oaks?"

"It's a..." He shook his head. "It's on the corner of 34th and Canby."

Oh, hell. She was going after Mellissa.

Mellissa I came to as Janet tossed me into the backseat of a bright red Toyota Camry, her arms around me like I was drunk and she was just trying to get me home safely. Someone called out to her, but the voice didn't seem concerned. Just curious.

"She's not feeling well. Stomach bug or something," I heard her say.

Yeah, I wished that was all it was.

I reached behind me and touched a place in my back that still burned. There were two sets of raised bumps there, hot and sore like bee stings. But I knew they weren't bee stings. Richard had once shown me how to use a stun gun. For the first three years we were in WITSEC, I carried one everywhere I went. But when nothing more than some newshound recognizing me or Memaw from an old newspaper clipping happened, it seemed like a waste of space in my already overflowing bag.

Now I wished I hadn't stopped carrying it.

The pain flared when I sat up. I turned to the door, intending to try the handle, but it appeared to be gone. I ran my fingers over it, searching for some way to get out, but there was nothing. The same with the other door. I leaned over the front seat, but before I could reach the door handle on the passenger side, Janet was climbing in through the driver's side door.

"Don't think so," she said, slamming her fist against the side of my head.

I fell sideways against the window and slipped backward, slumping into the seat. Right where I had begun.

Janet started the car. It rattled a moment, but the engine caught and we were moving in seconds.

"You won't get away with this. People are expecting me."

She glanced in the rearview mirror. "It looks like I'm getting away with it so far."

"Rawn and the security team at Cepheus are searching for you and your partners. They will find you."

She laughed. "I was right under their noses and they had no idea. They don't threaten me."

I straightened up a little, resigning myself to the fact that I was stuck right where I was for the moment. I glanced out the back window, but I didn't see anything. We were on a fairly busy street, but it was a little early for rush hour traffic. It was also early for Richard to have been waiting for me, unfortunately. He was probably still in his cushy office, wherever that happened to be.

"Why did your people think they were kidnapping me?"

"They didn't kidnap you. They grabbed that other girl."

"Yeah, but they thought they had me. What did they think they were doing?"

She glanced in the mirror again. "They thought you were going to tell them all about Cepheus' planned releases over the next six months and offer insights into some of the things Cepheus released in the past six months."

"I've only been there four months."

"Yeah, well, they believe pretty much everything I tell them."

"Was I the only reason for all this? Was Cepheus just a cover?"

"You know, you ask an awful lot of questions." Janet lifted the stun gun she must have used on me. "If you don't shut up, I'll use it again."

I sat back as she turned a corner and headed toward the interstate. The speed here was a little more than thirty-five, so attacking her was pretty much out of the question, unless I wanted to risk an accident that might take out both us and some innocent bystander. I couldn't jump without door handles. And she would have that stun gun on me before I could get over the passenger seat and get out the front door.

I was stuck.

I turned to look out the back windshield again.

"You can look, but no one's coming to save you."

But she didn't see what I saw.

I didn't notice it the first time because I was distracted. But there was a small, blue car behind us. She probably hadn't noticed because it looked like just any other car. But there was a dent on the front hood that was beginning to rust. I remembered thinking it was a waste of a pretty car to allow it to be exposed to the elements that way. Raw metal needed to be covered in one way or another or it would rust clean through in a matter of months, especially in this moist Pacific weather.

I remembered because the same car had been parked in the lot at Summer Oak.

Someone was following us.