Free Eye of the Abductor by Elaine Meece Page A

live with?”
    “His grandparents. His grandmother
is lethal. Never cross that lady. She goes for the throat.”
    Allison remembered.
    Later after the church service had
ended, she recognized Bill Wilson standing at the nursery door. Her adrenaline
pushed her pulse straight into the red zone for a moment, but she forced the
panic down.
    “Nathan, let’s go, sport. Memaw’s
waiting in the car.”
    Nathan looked up and smiled before
hurrying across the room.
    Allison turned facing another
child with her back to the door. Bill didn’t even notice her. This might be
easier to pull off than she’d first thought. Thank goodness it hadn’t been
Dorothy, because she never missed anything.
    Allison had to be careful, but if
things went as planned, she’d have her son soon.
    ***
    Thursday, she couldn't concentrate
at work. All she'd been able to think about was Nathan. She considered skipping
class that night. But until she pulled away from the church with Nathan, she
had to keep the same routine. Anything out of the ordinary would draw
attention.
    The difficult part would be
changing her name. She had two choices. Either take a dead person’s name or get
a foreign birth certificate. She decided to find a woman about her age who’d
died and get her birth certificate. Then obtaining the social security number wouldn't
be a problem.
    That afternoon, she visited a
nearby cemetery. She strolled down a path through the flat headstones secured
in the ground. Finally, she stumbled across a woman who’d been born her same
year—Laura Marsh. If Memphis politicians had dead people voting in their
elections, she could pull this off.
    Getting the documents turned out
to be easy. None of the county clerks questioned her.
    Sunday morning, she deliberately
entered the nursery fifteen minutes late, hoping the Wilsons had already
dropped Nathan off.
    “I’m so sorry," she told Jo
Anne. "I got stopped by a train. I didn’t think it would ever end.”
    “That’s all right. It happens to
me sometimes.”
    “Thanks. I’ll try to leave earlier
next Sunday.”
    A moment of relief swept through
her when she recognized Nathan in one corner already playing cops and robbers.
She spoke to several of the children not wanting to appear overly interested in
Nathan. Finally, she made her way over to him. “Hi, Nathan. Remember me?”
    He shook his head and continued
playing with the cars, making little engine sounds.
    “I’m Miss Allison, remember me
now?”
    He nodded but didn’t look up as he
moved the cars around with his hands. “They just robbed a bank, and my daddy’s
gonna arrest them.”
    Perhaps this made him feel closer
to the dad he never knew. Poor little fellow had no idea his dad had been the
bad guy.
    The first week after the abduction
would be the roughest until Nathan settled down from being separated from the
only family he’d ever known. She hated putting him through the trauma.
    But one thing she knew about
children, they were resilient and quickly forgot and just as quickly learned to
love someone new. Six months under her care, Nathan would forget the Wilsons
and be dependent on her. Maybe even love her.
    She forced herself away from him
and joined Mona in the kitchenette.
    “Snack time.” Mona entered the
main room, carrying a tray of cookies. Allison followed with a tub of small
milk cartons. All the children but one hurried to the tables and sat down. Mona
frowned. “Nathan, you gonna join us, sweetheart?”
    He finally glanced up from the toy
cars, stood, and walked to the table. When he couldn’t open the carton of milk,
Allison helped him.
    She had a difficult time keeping
her expression unreadable, not revealing the deep degree of love she had for
Nathan. Her son gobbled up a cookie and swigged his milk down. Amazing how
viewing something so simple brought her so much joy.
    “Hey, kiddo. You’ve got a mustache
now.” Allison knelt beside him and blotted the napkin over his mouth. In
response, Nathan wrapped