Abduction Read Online Free PDF Page B

in her head before it
actually did. Staring at it, she fought back the dread that always came with
these calls—the helplessness, the hopelessness, the gut-wrenching under standing
that she was their last hope.
    They recalled
her successes.
    She recalled
her failures.
    Taking a deep
breath, she picked up the phone. “Hello?”
    “Miss
Shefford? Zoe Shefford?”
    “Speaking.” But far from willingly. Go ahead.
Get it over with. Tell me about the baby. Tell me how sweet she was. How much
she is loved. I know.
    “This is
Detective Johnson from the Monroe County Sheriff’s Department. I was given your
number.”
    “I just heard
about it on the radio. They said the baby was taken two days ago. What about
the other child?”
    A pause and a
heavy sigh. “Nine days.”
    Zoe curled her
fingers around the cord. Nine days. Too long. If they didn’t have a solid lead
on the child within 48 to 72 hours, the chances were slim to none of ever
seeing the child alive again. “How soon do you need to talk to me?”
    There was another pause on the other end of the
line, and she could almost see this man scratching his head, wondering if he
was doing the right thing. It forced a wistful but fleeting smile out of her.
    “Uh. .
.sometime today? I don’t know how these things work.”
    She did. She
took another deep breath. “I just got home from West Virginia.” The memory shot
through her; a little girl, seven years old with big brown eyes, brown hair,
and two missing front teeth. Kathleen. Buried behind an old hunting lodge some
twenty miles from nowhere in the mountains.
    “Yeah. . .I
heard that you found her.”
    “Too late,”
she reminded him sadly. Two days too late. She shook off the memory. “Anyway, I
just need to unpack, shower, and change, and then I’ll come down to the
station. You know I can’t promise anything?”
    “Yes.”
    Zoe hung up
the phone, dropping her forehead against the wall. Where are you, Jessica?
Talk to me, baby. Tell me where you are.
     
    *
     
    Detective JJ
Johnson stared at the phone, his brow wrinkled, his fingers drumming an erratic
pattern on the desk blotter. He was up to his ears in dead ends and was not at
all happy about calling Zoe Shefford. But the pressure was on from as high up
as the governor. Pressure to give anything a shot. Zoe Shefford was the biggest
“anything shot” he’d heard of.
    A psychic?
    She was the
best, they said. Amazing, they said. Had found more than forty-seven children,
they said.
    He didn’t much
care what they said.
    A psychic? What kind of detective used a psychic?
Not him. Nope. Not JJ Johnson. He relied on his own talent, instincts, and hard
work. Bringing in a psychic was like kicking him while he was down.
    He didn’t like
it. He didn’t like it at all. Calling in some voodoo queen was admitting he
didn’t have a clue what he was doing.
    JJ imagined
her slithering in with black hair, heavy black eyes, a scarf tied around her
forehead, a ton of dime-store beads around her neck, and a crystal ball in her
bag.
    And expecting
him to hang on her every word.
    Not in this
lifetime.
    It was his job
to lead this task force, and he had no intention of handing over the reins to
some decked-out demagogue of deceit.
    But try
telling that to the boss. Harris had narrowed those beady little eyes and
handed him the psychic’s phone number. “I want these kids found and I want
this guy in custody. The governor wants us to call this woman. If you can’t
find them, maybe she can.”
    Right. And
pigs fly with yellow wings.
    Since the boss
ordered it, he didn’t have any choice but to let her do her hocus-pocus routine.
Then he’d get back to what he did best. Good old-fashioned detective work. He
didn’t need tarot cards, crystal balls, and magic wands. His tools were
ballistics, forensics, and DNA.
    JJ’s partner, Matt Casto, stuck his head in the
office. “You call her?”
    Matt was
probably the closest thing to a best friend that JJ had. He had gone