The Missing

rose in her throat and tried not to shake as the adrenaline crashed into her.

    Her teeth started to chatter as she looked down and realized she still held the little girl’s picture. Jillian. After nearly fourteen years, the girl had a name. Taige pressed the picture to her heart and whispered, “Come on, honey. Talk to me now. It’s time you and me really talk. Help me out here.”

    For the longest time, there was nothing.

    Absolutely nothing. Just the roaring of the blood as it pulsed inside her head and the pounding of her heart, beating somewhere in the vicinity of her throat. Slowly, the adrenaline surge subsided, and her vital signs dropped down somewhere a little closer to normal. When the gray came rushing up to meet her, she went to it willingly. The gray, it was like a cloud that took her, guiding her until she made a connection with the victims she tried to help.

    Sometimes it showed her things that made her so ill, it was a good thing she had no physical body in that space, because she would become so violently sick, she’d be of no use to anybody. Other times, it showed her things that made her want to cry and things that made her so angry it was a wonder the gray didn’t go bloodred with the strength of her fury.

    She rarely sank so willingly into it, but this time, she knew it wasn’t going to show her something that would destroy another part of her heart. This time, she could help. The gray wrapped around her, guiding her, and she could feel the distance grow as she drifted farther and farther from her physical body. Sometimes distance made no difference, other times, she needed to be closer to the victim before she helped.

    There were times when she had to get closer, following the gray’s trail, and in the part of her still capable of conscious thought, she worried that just might happen this time, and she hated it. Hated to think she might have to go down and tell Cullen it was going to take some time.

    But just when the threads that bound her to her physical body felt stretched tight enough to snap, she stopped drifting. She found herself staring down at a wooden cabin somewhere below her feet, as though the gray was holding her in midair. She drifted down, down, down, through the ceiling, into the dark and there—

    There—she found Jillian.

    The little girl was tied up but relatively unharmed, lying on a hard, narrow bed that had some very disturbing stains on it. Though the vision she had in the gray wasn’t as focused and clear as she’d like, she recognized those stains for what they were: bloodstains.

    The air reeked of violence, and she knew bad, bad things had happened here. Awful things, and it was her responsibility to protect that girl. The girl lay on the bed, shivering and huddled in on herself as though she could warm herself. Her face was smudged and dirty, with pale streaks where tears had washed it clean. She looked absolutely terrified.

    It’s okay, sweetie. I’m going to bring you home. I promise you that.

    Shock arced through her when Jilly opened her eyes, staring upward. Taige had the most disconcerting feeling that Jilly knew she was there. Somebody had gagged the child, tying a pristine white cloth around her mouth so tightly, it seemed to dig into her skin. The little girl sighed, her shoulders rising and falling. Taige started to pull back, but as the gray started to guide her back to her physical body, she heard something that shocked the hell out of her: the little girl’s voice. Echoing inside of Taige.

    I know.

    IT was full daylight by the time she came hurtling back to herself, and judging by the way the light came slanting in through her windows, she figured it was midmorning. Cullen sat on the bed, elbows braced on his knees, staring at the floor.

    He looked utterly dejected and completely hopeless. Taige lay there for a minute, taking stock before she went to sit up. At some point, Cullen must have tried to wake her or something. She lay on the bed instead of the floor, and she knew she hadn’t made it all the way across the room before she collapsed.

    The second she moved, Cullen rolled off the bed and came around the foot of it so he could crouch by her side. He stared at her, his gaze stark. “What in the hell happened? I came in here and found you on the floor. It’s been four hours.”

    Four hours—damn. That was a long time to go under. She licked her lips and shook her head. Couldn’t talk yet. Her mouth was like the