Her Mistletoe Protector(7)

"Are you all right?" he asked.

She tried to speak, but her throat felt frozen. It abruptly hit her how much she was depending on Nick to help find her son. If anything had happened to him, she'd be lost.

As much as she longed to lean against his strength, she forced herself to step back, putting distance between them. "I'm fine, but I was afraid they were going to hurt you," she confessed softly.

"Me, too, and I didn't really want to shoot any of them. Thanks to your quick thinking, I didn't have to. Now let's get going, okay?"

She nodded and went around to the passenger side of his car. "Did you find anything?" she asked, hoping the stop at the apartment building hadn't been in vain.

"Yeah. Morales still has a place there, apartment number 210 according to the mailbox. I spoke to the manager, but he claims he hasn't seen Ricky in weeks."

She tried not to be too discouraged by the lack of information. Truthfully, he'd found out more than she'd hoped. "I guess that means he's not likely keeping Joey there."

"I doubt it. There are too many nosey people around, like those thugs back there."

"I hardly think they'd be the types to turn Ricky in to the police," she said with a sigh.

Nick didn't say anything to the contrary, which only made her more depressed. "Are you still up for heading over to the ex-wife's place?" he asked, changing the subject.

"Yes." Granted she'd been terrified back there at the apartment building, but nothing was going to stop her from searching for Joey.

* * *

Nick glanced over at Rachel, marveling at the depth of her strength. Granted, she'd been scared to death back there at the apartment building, but that hadn't stopped her from doing what needed to be done.

He used his radio to request a search on the Morales apartment related to the hit-and-run case. The dispatcher agreed to send a couple of uniforms over. He didn't really think they'd find anything useful, especially since the manager had been all too willing to talk once he'd seen Nick's badge.

If Morales had been around, the manager would have told him so.

The trip to Margie Caruso's house took about twenty minutes. Her neighborhood was several steps up from where Morales lived. At least the houses were neat and clean for the most part, several decorated with Christmas lights.

The address indicated the house they were looking for was the third one on the right. Nick slowed down as he drove past the modest red brick home with the tan trim and black shutters. The entire place was dark, not a single light on inside the place that he could see.

"What do you think? Is anyone home?" Rachel asked.

"I don't know. It's about nine-fifteen, so I suppose Margie could already be asleep...." But it wasn't likely.

Maybe they were on the wrong track? Could be that Margie Caruso was living a normal peaceful life that had nothing to do with the Mafia or kidnapping Rachel's son.

"What's the plan?" she asked, keeping the house in sight as he drove by.

"Don't have one yet. It's not as if we can simply walk up and demand to search the place, even if someone answers the door."

"Why not? I could try talking to her," Rachel said impulsively. "We're both ex-Carusos and I can use that connection to feel her out."

He wasn't sure he liked the idea, but couldn't come up with anything better so he reluctantly nodded. "All right. I'll park on the street, in front of the neighbor's house. If anything seems off, you need to get out of there right away."

"I will." She hesitated for a moment before reaching for the door handle. Extremely bright lights bloomed in his rearview mirror as a car headed straight for them.

"Wait!" Nick shouted, reaching out to grab her arm. She paused, half in and half out of the car, so he yanked her back inside at the same time gunfire echoed through the night.                       
       
           



       





FOUR

"Get down!" he yelled, stomping on the gas and peeling away from the curb. He kept a hold on Rachel while she managed to get her legs tucked inside the car. He let go long enough to take a sharp right-hand turn, which caused the half-open passenger-side door to slam shut.

"What's going on?" Rachel asked.

"Stay down," he barked. Glancing at the rearview mirror, he could see the vehicle was keeping pace behind them. He could tell by the high yet narrow set to the headlights that it was a Jeep.

He had to figure out a way to lose it and fast.

"Why is he shooting at us?" Rachel gasped, her eyes wide with fear.

He shook his head, unable to answer as he concentrated on losing the gunman. He took several more turns, dodging around various vehicles in his way. Thankfully, traffic was relatively light this far outside the city, or escaping the shooter would have been impossible.

When there was a gap in traffic, he jerked the steering wheel to the left, taking the car up and over the curb, making an illegal U-turn. It wasn't easy keeping his eyes on the road while watching the Jeep behind him. The other car didn't make the turn right away, which was reassuring.

He immediately took another right-hand turn, putting even more distance between them. When he found an on-ramp for the interstate, he took it and pushed the speed limit as hard as he dared until he found the next exit. On that road, he switched directions, heading left.

Fifteen minutes later, he was convinced he'd lost the Jeep. "Are you all right?" he asked, as Rachel eased upright and reached for her seat belt. "He didn't hit you, did he?"

"I don't think so," she said, patting her arms and legs as if she wasn't entirely sure. "Did you get the license plate number? Do you think that was Joey's kidnapper?"

"I didn't get the plate number because I was blinded by his high-beam lights." He tried to figure out what had just happened. The whole event was weird. "Don't you think it's odd that he took a shot at us, but didn't keep firing? And that he didn't target anything important?"

"What do you mean nothing important? He almost hit us!" Rachel protested.

"Not even close," he argued mildly. "We were practically sitting ducks and he didn't hit either of us, or any significant parts of the car, like the gas tank or wheels. It's almost as if he wanted to scare us more than kill us."

"So it must have been Joey's kidnapper!" Rachel's tone had a note of excitement. "He didn't want to kill us, because he still wants the money."

"Maybe," he agreed, although the scenario didn't quite feel right. This entire case wasn't like anything he'd experienced before. He knew crooks, had investigated them for years and they always had a reason for what they did.

Only this time, nothing made sense.

He took the next exit off the freeway, slowing his speed to the posted limit.

"We have to go back there," Rachel said urgently, interrupting his train of thought. "To see if we can find Joey. We must have been close if they were so desperate to scare us away."

"Rachel, calm down for a minute and think this through. How did they find us outside of Margie Caruso's house in the first place? I made sure no one followed us when we left Morales's apartment building."

"I don't know, maybe it was all just a big coincidence? Morales could be working for Margie Caruso, and maybe he just pulled up as we got there."

"I don't think so." Nick hated to burst her bubble, but she wasn't thinking rationally. He pulled off onto the side of the road and turned in his seat to face her. "Even if he saw us there, how could he know we were the ones in the car?"

"Maybe he recognized your car from the crash site?"

"I came in from the south and you said he went north," he reminded her gently. "Rachel, they have your cell phone number. They sent you a text, threatening to kill Joey if you called the police. Don't you see? The only thing that makes sense is that they've tracked us through the GPS in your cell phone."                       
       
           



       

* * *

Rachel swallowed hard as she stared down at her cell phone. Was Nick right? Had they really tracked them through her phone? She wasn't a techno-geek so she had no clue how to even do something like that.

But she knew the possibility existed.

And if Nick's hunch was correct, then Joey's kidnapper already knew she wasn't alone.

Fear swelled in her throat, choking her as tiny red dots swam before her eyes.

"Breathe," Nick commanded, giving her shoulder a shake.

She didn't even realize she was holding her breath. She took a shaky gasp of air and lifted her tortured gaze to his. "They're always going to know where we are, aren't they? We're never going to be able to escape."

"Not unless we ditch your phone," he said grimly.

She clenched the phone so hard she was surprised she didn't break it in half. "No. No way. This is the only connection I have to Joey. This is the number they're going to use in order to contact me for the ransom demand. I'm not giving it up, Nick. I'm not! I can't!"

He stared at her for a long moment before releasing a heavy sigh. "Okay, if you're not getting rid of it, then we need to figure out our next steps. Because the kidnappers are going to be able to find us, no matter what we do or where we go."