Racing Against Time by Marie Ferrarella Page A

Delia by turning the car around and aiming it at her.
    Which meant they were dealing with someone who was cold-blooded and calculating. And he had the little girl. The task force was getting a list of all the known pedophiles in the area and bringing them in for questioning, but she didn’t want to entertain that possibility, not yet. Despite herself and all her police training and background, Callie shivered.
    “It’s not cold in here.”
    She looked up and saw that Brent was approaching her desk. She’d only left him a few hours ago, but he’d become more gaunt, more haunted in that space of time. Not that either looked bad on him.
    His ex-wife was an idiot, giving him up. The thought came to her out of nowhere.
    Maybe it hadn’t been the woman’s choice, Callie thought.
    She closed her notepad, sticking it back into her right front pocket. “What are you doing here?”
    He’d seen her shiver and his thoughts had immediately flown to Rachel. Was that a reaction to something Callie had learned about his daughter? But she would have said something, he was certain. He’d heard that Callie was like her father, she didn’t go in for drama or playing things out for attention. She was honest. That meant not keeping things back.
    He held his hands in a gesture of servitude. “I’m here to help.”
    They’d already gone through this. She knew how he felt, but she couldn’t have him just hanging around, getting in the way. “You can do that by staying home by the telephone in case there’s a ransom call.”
    He didn’t want her treating him as if he was some kind of novice, as if he didn’t know how this went. They were both familiar with procedure. “It’s been almost seven hours since Delia was killed and Rachel went missing. Since Rachel was abducted,” he corrected. “There’s been no call. The kidnapper usually calls to start things moving once the discovery is made.”
    He was right, but there were always exceptions. “Maybe this one doesn’t have a handbook.” She rose from her desk, ready to gently prod the man toward the door. “The only pattern you can count on is that there is no pattern.”
    He looked at her, wondering if she was patronizing him or giving him her philosophy. “You don’t believe in profiling?”
    “I believe in the unpredictable, Your Honor.” Callie took his arm. The look he gave her was one of authority, meant to freeze her in her tracks. There was never any confusion who was in charge in his courtroom. But they weren’t in his courtroom. They were on her turf and she got to make the calls. “Now, if you don’t mind, Judge, I really have to get back to work.”
    With one precise gesture, Brent moved his elbow out of her range. He wasn’t about to be ushered out the door like some guest who had overstayed his welcome.
    “I have my sister and brother-in-law staying at the house just in case something falls through the cracks.” He held up his cell phone for her benefit. “All my calls are being rerouted to my cell.”
    They’d bugged the telephones in his house, but not this one. If the call was rerouted, they’d miss their opportunity to hopefully trace it back to its source. She reached for the cell.
    “We’ll have to put a device in your cell—”
    Her fingers brushed against his before he pulled the cell phone back and deposited it into his pocket. He had an ancestor who came from the old country, Brianne MacKenzie. Her village had thought of her as a witch. Legend had it they’d almost burned her at the stake before her future husband had whisked her away. She had what they called “The gift.” She was a seer. Touching someone at times allowed her to make a connection, to see into that person’s future or see something about them in a hazy flash.
    Something seemed to crackle between them as Callie’s fingers brushed against his, and he thought of his great-great-great-grandmother, wishing he had her abilities, just for a moment. So he could unlock doors