LITMIR.BIZ

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creature she was to pine after someone who saw only another staff member.

      “Have you called your parents yet?”

      “That’s next on the agenda.”

      “Well, then, I’d better let you get to it. I’m here if you need anything.”

      A picture of him holding her appeared in her mind’s eye, but she squelched it. “Thanks. I appreciate all you’ve done.”

      “You’re welcome. Hang in there.”

      The line went dead, and Laney cradled the receiver in her hand. She dreaded the next conversation as much as she needed it. Her parents would be devastated that the nightmare had returned. Too bad they’d moved away from St. Cloud, Minnesota, a few months ago for Dad to take a high-paying job as a vice president for a big corporation. Laney punched in their Louisville, Kentucky, number.

      The phone had scarcely begun to ring when a familiar voice said hello.

      “Hi, Mom, it’s me.”

      “Oh, sweetie, we were about to call you.”

      The tears in her mother’s voice told Laney she wasn’t first with the news to her parents. “I suppose you’ve heard from Supervisory Special Agent Justin Burns.”

      “We just got off the phone with him.” Her dad’s voice came from another extension. “He said you received a threat.”

      “If you call finding Gracie’s backpack on the school playground after recess a threat, then yes. I took it that way.”

      “Does the little Bree-bee know?” His voice dripped concern.

      “I could hardly keep it from her. The whole town is in an uproar. Principal Ryder put the entire school on alert and sent informative letters home with the kids for their parents.”

      “Sounds like your principal knew what to do,” her mother put in. “How’s Briana taking the news? Maybe we shouldn’t have decided not to tell her about Grace. Look what’s—”

      “Loretta, there’s no use second-guessing ourselves now.” Her father’s voice took command. “We agreed it was best she not be told until she was older. How could we know this maniac would force our hands?”

      “Mom, Dad, don’t worry about it,” Lainie said. “If anything, Bree is calmer than I am. She’s convinced God is guarding us, and Noah Ryder’s his helper. I wish I had half her confidence.” A sour laugh spurted between her lips.

      “Honey, you have more faith than you think,” her mother said. “You wouldn’t be the strong woman, wonderful mom and terrific teacher you are without it.”

      The affirmation tasted like a soothing tonic. “Thanks, Mom. I needed that.”

      “You’re welcome.”

      “Still, it might not be a bad idea for me to hire you a bodyguard,” her dad put in.

      Laney snickered. “Can you see me wandering around this little burg with some goon in my shadow? Briana and I are conspicuous enough as it is. So let’s talk about something else. Did Agent Burns indicate if they have any good leads?”

      Her dad snorted. “Since when does that man indicate anything? He dictates and he interrogates.”

      “Sounds like you talked to the same Burns I did.”

      Laney’s chuckle joined with her parents’, but an ache in her throat followed. “I miss Gracie. I’d forgotten how cute and funny she could be. Then today, all this turmoil dredged up a whole bunch of Grace pictures in my mind. Like the way she’d scrunch up her nose and cross her eyes, Mom, when you served something for supper she didn’t like. Or how she’d sit in your lap, Dad, and kiss your cheek over and over for no reason at all.”

      Her mother sniffled. “Do you remember how she’d follow you around so close, Laney? You’d practically trip over her every time you turned around.”

      Laney’s heart turned to lead. She hated it now that she’d resented it then. “I remember.” The confession scraped against her voice box.

      A half hour of tears and recollections later, the call ended, and Laney flopped her head back against the couch, utterly drained. If only she could go straight to bed. Hibernating until the monster who stole Gracie was caught sounded like a splendid plan. In her dreams. She forced herself off the soft cushions and took a seat in front of the computer desk on the other side of the living room. One more mission to accomplish before she called it a day.

      While the computer booted up, she got a glass of apple juice from the kitchen. The phone rang again, and she picked it up without thought. It was a television news reporter asking for an interview. Laney politely but firmly declined.

      Then she settled in front of the monitor. Her fingers danced across the keys. She’d run a search on Noah Ryder. There had to be something significant to know about him besides the scuttlebutt that he’d attended Southwest Minnesota State University in Marshall, Minnesota, for his teaching degree. Time for a different approach.

      The search engine came up, and Laney typed in Noah Ryder. She discovered he had a Facebook account like she did. Would it be forward of her to submit a friend request to him, so their profile pages were accessible to each other? She decided against it for the moment.

      She continued searching under Noah Ryder, but learned nothing she didn’t already know. A few other Noah Ryders came up that couldn’t possibly be him—wrong age, location, etc. Laney smothered a yawn. She should hit the sack. Yet the innuendos about Noah from Sheriff Lindoll and Agent Burns wouldn’t leave her alone.

      She typed in a search under Ryder. The more general search would generate a vast array of hits, but she was going to check every one until she found something more about her enigmatic boss. This was desperate times.

      A couple of pages of listings were connected to the moving company by that name. Then there were a few hits about a Ryder family tree, but these never mentioned a Noah on one of the branches. Finally, many pages into the search results, an intriguing article caught her eye—Investigator Unites Mother and Son After Dangerous Manhunt.

      Laney clicked on the link and started reading, then slumped. The investigator mentioned in the headline was Franklin Ryder, not Noah. She read on anyway. The article involved a missing child. Not that an abusive husband and father snatching his son from the custodial mother was a new tale these days, but it sounded as if this dad was a devious piece of work who eluded law enforcement time after time…until Franklin Ryder, Private Investigator, took the case. In the photo that accompanied the article, a pretty young woman beamed for the camera as she cuddled a chubby, dark-haired boy.

      “Nuts!” Laney exclaimed. She’d hoped for a picture of this whiz-bang investigator. She peered at the photo. Someone was walking away in the background. It was a side shot too grainy to identify the person, but there was something familiar about the stride and the confident set of the shoulders. And the man was a blond, like Noah.

      Heart trip-hammering, Laney plugged in a search for Franklin Ryder. Page after page of articles came up. She had her confirmation on the first one. The man she knew as Principal Noah Ryder stared back at her from the screen.

      Headache and exhaustion forgotten, Laney spent until the wee hours devouring news articles about Franklin Ryder. There were even videos. But news reports on the man abruptly ceased six years ago. Why had he suddenly given up investigating? And why change his name? Wasn’t he proud of his work that restored the lost to their families, or at least got them justice and closure?

      The media dubbed him a “relentless bloodhound” and “a kidnapper’s worst nightmare.” Excitement squeezed Laney’s chest as she continued reading stories and quotes from people who saw him in action. “It’s downright eerie the way Ryder can put himself inside the skin of a kidnapper and figure out what he’s going to do almost before he does it,” said a law officer involved in one of the cases.

      Why hide from a reputation

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