come with us? What then?”
Tyler
was silent for a moment as he stared at the restaurant. It was kitty-corner
from their motel room, on the other side of the dirt parking lot. “I don’t
know. I don’t want to think about that possibility. We need her. Toby was
insistent that it would take all of us to find him. He also said that his
kidnappers are on their way, here. If she doesn’t come with us, they’re sure to
find her. Then what?
He
stared out across the parking lot for a moment, as though in deep thought and
then shook his head. “No, she has to come with us. I can’t think of any other
option, so let’s go and get this over with.” He headed down the sidewalk,
toward the restaurant, and Liliana and Eddie followed behind.
They had
walked only a few feet when Liliana noticed a blue four-door sedan in the
parking lot. There was nothing particularly unusual about the car, but it
seemed to stand out from the other vehicles. As she neared the car, it suddenly
seemed brighter. She continued to stare and was overcome with a sense of
dizziness. She grabbed on to Eddie’s arm to steady herself. “Stop for a
second,” she said.
Eddie
and Tyler halted mid-step and turned to look at her. As they did so, they
followed her gaze to the car that had attracted her attention.
“What is
it?” Eddie asked.
Tyler
walked back and stopped by her side. “What’s up? I’m still freezing. Is this
something that we can talk about once we get inside?”
“Something’s
wrong. That car…”
Eddie
looked at the vehicle in question. “You have a bad feeling about it?”
“Not
necessarily a feeling. I’m not psychic. It’s just that…Well, remember I said
that I can see auras?”
“Yeah,”
Eddie said, slowly. “Do cars have auras?”
“Well,
sort of…Sometimes they do.
“I
thought it was just people or living things that have auras,” Tyler said.
“Not
really,” Liliana began. “Auras are just a reflection of energy fields, and
everything has an energy field, including inanimate objects. Inanimate objects
give off a different sort of aura though. Their auras are more influenced by
recent human contact. So, sometimes I get visions of auras from things like
cars, or even jackets, or jewelry, and other times I don’t. It just depends how
recently someone has been attached to it and what sort of emotion is connected
to the object.”
“That’s
all fascinating,” Tyler said, “but long story short, what does this have to do
with that car?” His nose and ears had turned bright red from the cold, and he
tapped his foot, impatiently.
Liliana
smiled, amused at his physical discomfort. Tyler came across as strong and
invincible. His intolerance to the cold made him seem vulnerable. She found his
weakness to be cute, in an odd sort of way, and her attraction for him grew.
She
looked back and forth from Eddie to Tyler. “Long story short? Simply put, that
car has a bad aura. It stands out from all of the other cars in the parking
lot. Something is definitely not right. Whoever has been in this car recently
is not a good person.”
Eddie
looked from the car back to her and frowned. “You think it might be the people
who took Tyler’s brother?”
Liliana
met his gaze and shrugged. “Could be. I don’t know. Like I said, I’m not
psychic. I just see energy. And this car has some bad energy around it. If we
walk in there and the kidnappers are already there…”
“We’re
screwed,” Tyler concluded for her. “But, what choice do we have? We’ve come all
this way to find Sarah. We don’t know for sure that the car belongs to the
kidnappers. It could belong to any number of bad people who happen to be here,
right?”
“Yeah,
it could be anyone, but what if it’s not?”
“I’ll
go,” Eddie said.
Tyler
turned to him. “ You’ll go? What about us?”
“You and
Liliana should go back to the room and wait. I’ll find Sarah and talk to her.
Then I can bring some breakfast back to the room