No Regrets

employing the same arguments and sentences that she had used in her dream only last night.
    It was eerie that her dream was keeping her alive—at least for the moment.
    Even now, the California Highway Patrol troopers and sheriff’s deputies from several counties were spreading out looking for the Ford Granada. But they weren’t likely to find it; it was tucked away back in the brush near the broken-down farmhouse near the Sacramento River. Kari and her captors were in the sporty Thunderbird heading east once more—toward Reno.
    Kari’s husband knew that the last time she was seen, she was captive, driving off with two strange and violent men, a knife held against her neck. Ben Lindholm knew that
anything
might have happened to his wife in the hours since 5:30 A.M . She could be hundreds of miles away, she could be injured, or—and he tried not to think about it—she could be dead. Ben called a close friend, a man who worked at the Solano County Probation Office, and asked him to check for any prior arrests of the man who had given his name as John Martin when he came into Sancho Panza. Ben now knew that Kari was with a sexual predator. Shelly had heard John threaten to kill Kari several times before they drove off with her.
    As the morning passed with no word of Kari, it was very difficult to keep hoping for a happy outcome. Ben Lindholm could only sit by his phone waiting for it to ring. He had faith in Kari’s ability to handle emergencies, but this was one in which she was outnumbered and outweighed.
    Detective Ray Van Eck of Solano County told him that the entire California police network was now alerted to watch for the Lindholms’ car and for Kari and her abductors. That only reminded Ben of how far away Kari might be by now.
    “I knew I had to find some money for them,” Kari said. “John kept asking if there was a highway patrolman behind us. I had to do a considerable amount of reassuring with them, and tell them that, ‘No, there aren’t any highway patrolmen behind us, and we’re not going to see any. We’re in a whole different car now—we look just like anybody else on the freeway.’
    “That seemed to relax them, and that was exactly what I was aiming for. I knew if I could get them to feel relaxed around me—and trust me—that I could make my escape when they least expected it.”
    Kari planned her words very carefully, determined to make her captors believe that she was very much like them. She created a life story for herself as someone who had also had a rough childhood who was just trying to get by in an uncaring world.
    “I had to make them think that I came from a background similar to theirs in order to develop bonds of trust. It made them nervous when I got upset, so I tried to display a positive air—assuring them that I would find a way to get them their three hundred dollars.”
    Clearly, Mike and John didn’t draw much strength from one another. Kari realized she was succeeding in bolstering their egos. She could at least put temporary Band-Aids on them by telling them how she had risen above her miserable childhood.
    “If I can do it,” she said, “you can, too!”
    She wanted to seem very strong to them and still maintain her image as someone who had suffered, too.
    She didn’t feel strong. It hadn’t yet been three hours since they left Sancho Panza, but it seemed like days had passed. Every nerve in her body was standing on end; she had believed she was on the edge of death many times as they stumbled around Sacramento, and that wasn’t a feeling that went away easily.
    It was close to 9:00 A.M ., and the thick commuter traffic was beginning to slack off. Now they planned to get off the freeway at Elkhorn Drive in the North Highlands section. She knew where there was an Albertson’s store, but she pointed out a Safeway, the first supermarket they came to. Once more, John, his knife tucked into his sleeve, walked Kari into a building. This time, she tried to cash her paycheck.
    The clerk shook her head. They could not cash checks for any more than the amount of purchases. John turned on the charm while Kari darted her eyes around, looking for someplace she might run, but again, she found no shelter nearby. It would be foolhardy of her to try to run.
    Finally, John picked up a twelve-pack of beer and some cigarettes. The clerk, responding to his compliments, grudgingly allowed Kari to write a check for twenty dollars over the amount on the sales slip.
    Kari