KnockOut

“Why are you playing games with me? This is your daughter’s life in the balance here.”
    She leaped to her feet, her fist headed for his jaw. He grabbed her wrist. “Not smart to hit the law, ma’am. We don’t take kindly to it. I strongly suggest you tell me some of the truth now. For your daughter. I want to find her, Mrs. Backman. I want to find her alive.”
    She jerked away from him, crossed her arms over her chest, and rubbed her hands up and down her arms, as if she was freezing. She probably was, from the inside out.
    “Talk to me, Mrs. Backman.”

5
    SHE OPENED HER MOUTH , then she slowly shook her head. She still wouldn’t look at him square in the face.
    He realized she was afraid, not only for her child—there was something else too. Worse, the fear had frozen her. He knew from a good deal of experience that she wasn’t going to tell him anything, probably couldn’t get her brain together enough to figure out her options, at least not tonight.
    Ethan pulled a card out of his shirt pocket, wrote his cell number on the back, and handed it to her. She didn’t want to take it, but he was patient, simply stood there with the card held out. She took it. He said, “You know, as unlikely as it seems to you right now, you can trust me,” and he turned and left her room without another word. As he closed the door behind him, he heard her deep, harsh breathing.
    He paused a moment in the hallway, praying she’d come running out of the room to catch him, but she didn’t.
    He gave a little wave to the dozen people still in the reception area and nodded to Mrs. Daily, who was standing next to the now empty cookie platter.
    He was home in seven minutes. When he walked through the front door, Lula and Mackie raced to him, meowing their heads off, Lula trying to climb his leg. He knelt down and let Big Louie lick him to his heart’s content, then went to the kitchen and fetched treats for all of them.
    “Big Louie, here’s a bone for you. Think of it as your dental floss.” He started tossing kibble, a game they played every night. The cats ran their paws off to grab the treats out of the air, like kibble Frisbee. He tossed the kibble farther and farther, and watched Lula rip across the wood floor, skid, and bat at the treats, then eat them off her paws. Mackie liked to leap into the air to catch his. “Why won’t the woman talk to me, guys? I’m the law. She’s supposed to trust me. Well, I know why, now don’t I? She’s scared out of her wits. I just wish I knew what her problem was.” He sighed, threw out more treats, listened to Louie gnaw and grind down on his bone. He threw the last treat to Lula, high, six feet behind where she was crouched, and she flew to grab it out of the air. “Enough, guys,” he said, dusted his hands on his jeans, and stood up. “Do you know what? I’m going to find Autumn despite her.”
    He heard something, a slight shuffling sound that wasn’t just a house noise in the night. Ethan didn’t move a muscle, then slowly drew his Beretta and fanned it around him, eyes and ears on full alert.
    Nothing.
    He said, his voice soft and calm, “Is anyone here?”
    Nothing for a moment, then a soft, “It’s only me. I was watching you and the cats. They’re wonderful and so fast. Can I play with them?”
    He spun around to see Autumn Backman standing in the doorway, her long brown hair straggling out of a ponytail, her jeans and T-shirt crumpled. She wore orange sneakers on her small feet. In twenty years, he thought, she’d be the picture of her mom.
    “Are you all right?”
    She nodded.
    “How long have you been here?”
    She looked at him, her big blue eyes unblinking. She was afraid of him too? “If you don’t talk to me, how will I find out anything?”
    She stared down at her sneakers, frowned. He saw that one of the laces was coming undone. But she didn’t move. She said, “You’re the sheriff.”
    “Yes, I am, and I’ve been out with about fifty other people looking for you for hours and hours. I’ve been scared for you. Did someone try to take you and you got away?”
    Slowly she shook her head. She still wouldn’t look at him. Just like her mother. But at least the daughter trusted him enough to come to his house to hide out. From whom? From what?
    Ethan walked slowly to the little girl, aware that Big Louie, Mackie, and Lula were hanging back, watching. They’d known she was here and yet they hadn’t been hiding as they usually did from