Free Double Bind by Kathryn Michaela Page A

before she knew what hit her.

Chapter 7

                Sarah woke up to the sound of her phone ringing.   Groggily she fell off the couch as she scrambled toward it.   As always, she reached it just as it stopped ringing.   Groaning and laying back down with the phone on her chest she closed her eyes for a moment.
                Which was of course when it started to ring again.   “Hello?”   She said, her voice slurred and heavy.
                “Thank heavens you answered!” It was Angela on the line.   “They are about to tow your car at David’s.   Detective Snyder just called to tell me.   You need to get over there in the next 20 minutes or it’s going to the impound lot.”
                Sarah cursed as she struggled up.   To her horror, she found herself in the same dowdy clothes as the day before.   Not only that, but there were stains all down the side, probably from her getting sick from the alcohol.   Cursing again she reassured Angela, hung up the phone and darted for the front door.   There was no time to change.   She had to get a taxi and get to David’s right away.
                She was lucky that Angela had already dialed a taxi service.   They were pulling up to the curb just as Sarah came out the front door.   She darted in, and practically shouted the directions at the driver.   He rolled his eyes, saying “I know already,” and drove off.
                She bounced up and down nervously on the seat.   She couldn’t lose her car.   She just couldn’t handle one more single thing going wrong.   Not just now.   Hopefully not ever.
                The tow truck was already hooked up to her car when the taxi pulled up.   She didn’t waste time, but ignored the taxi driver’s protests as she jumped out of the car to shout with the tow driver.
                Reluctantly he agreed to let Sarah unhook her car, but only after she’d given him the tongue lashing of his life.   Scowling, and glancing back at her a little nervously, he unhooked her car and drove off.   The taxi driver wasn’t so easy to dissuade.   She had forgotten her wallet and everything at home, so she was forced to dig through her glove compartment, looking for her emergency cash.   Of course, once she finally found the cash he refused to give her change, but drove off with almost a whole extra 20.
                Sarah sighed, collapsing onto the seat of her car and pressed her hands to her face.   Her head pounded, her adrenaline was fading and she was not in a good mood.   Gritting her teeth she turned on the car and started to drive home.
                Unfortunately her windows were still open, and the wind blew her loose papers all over her car.   Cursing and shouting at the universe in general, she pulled over to roll up the window and put everything back.   There were all sorts of papers strewn through the car.   Old receipts, work files, even a few old parking tickets.   She started to shove everything together back into the glove compartment when a name on one of the pieces of paper caught her eye.   Valerie Kinkade .
                Sarah peered at the paper, a little confused.   This was one of the spare pieces of paper from the weird file that she had found at her office.   It was a notice of intent from one of their competitors.   When things had been going particularly well with the Espry project, they had gotten involved in a long law suit from the competitor, claiming that they had been stealing formulas.   Of course it was nothing other than a long-winded attempt to slow them down.    When everything had turned out to be in the clear, the lawsuit had gone away and they had resumed research.
                That wasn’t what was interesting about the paper.   What was odd was that the person from the other company who had filed the lawsuit had been named Valerie