Free Chasing Second Chances by Shelly Logan Page B

dead or alive?
    “Kate.” Bryan squeezed her shoulder. “Don’t mind her, all right?”
    Kate said nothing.
    Bryan sighed. “I knew we shouldn’t have come.”
    He glanced at Lloyd, who still seemed to be deep in thought and in his own anguish, and gave another sigh.
    “Let’s go home, Kate,” he said. “There’s no point in staying here.”
    Kate still said nothing, but allowed him to lead her away from the edge of the woods, towards the road where his car was waiting. Lloyd followed them, also saying nothing.
    As they approached the road, she realized that a small crowd had formed around Mr. and Mrs. Morrow, a crowd of reporters, and she was about to turn back when one of the reporters saw her. Within seconds, the crowd had moved, swarming around her.
    “Do you think your children are alive, Ms. Evans?” one reporter asked, thrusting her recorder right in front of Kate’s face.
    “Do you still think Charlene Morrow had something to do with the kidnapping?” another asked just as aggressively.
    “Are you going to provide the Morrows with financial assistance on Charlene’s burial?”
    “Do you think the same person who killed Charlene still has your children?”
    “How do you feel, Ms. Evans?”
    Kate didn’t answer any of the questions, huddling closer against Bryan and lowering her head as she clenched her locket more tightly. She wished she didn’t hear them too, though, and she tried not to listen so she wouldn’t feel uncomfortable.
    “Please leave her alone,” Bryan pleaded with them. “She is going through a tough time right now and…”
    “Ms. Evans has nothing to say,” Lloyd spoke all of a sudden, his voice louder and firmer, his expression meaning business, all trace of sorrow gone from it. “If you wish to have good stories, then I suggest you get the facts from the police.”
    At once, the crowd fell silent. The silence, however, lasted only a moment before one of the reporters spoke again.
    “Mr. Marrick, what…?”
    “I have nothing to say, as well,” Lloyd said. “Nothing except that we are sorry for the Morrow’s loss and we will do everything we can to help them. We are also hopeful that the police will find our children alive.”
    With those words, he stepped forward, parting the crowd, grabbing Kate’s arm so that she could follow right behind him. Bryan held her other hand as he tried to ward the reporters off, which was easier to do now that Lloyd had fed them a morsel of information that they could chew on.
    Lloyd led Kate to Bryan’s car before going to his own, not saying another word.
    Kate slid into the passenger seat and closed the door. She closed her eyes and tried to relax, tried to keep away all the scary thoughts that had stemmed from this afternoon’s incident, like a child willing the monsters to stay hidden in the closet, tried to forget the most chilling words she had ever heard in her entire life.
    I hope you will never find your children again.
    * * * *
    “Do you think the Evans children are still alive?” Nick asked Agent Wilkins a few minutes after Kate Evans had left. He could not help but feel sorry for her, especially after what Irene Morrow had said.
    “Didn’t you say there was no evidence found indicating that the children were with Charlene Morrow when she was killed?” Agent Wilkins replied with a question of his own. “Or are you asking for my personal opinion like Mr. Marrick?”
    Nick held back a frown. He did not like the federal agent, and not just because he was resentful of the fact that the fed had taken over his turf, a feeling many of his colleagues had spoken of but which he was experiencing for the first time. Rather, it was more of the simple fact that Agent Wilkins made him feel uneasy. There was something about the man, something in his eyes that told you he was always a step ahead, that he was in on everyone’s secret, that he knew much more than everyone else did but had no intention of sharing it, and that