Free Back Before Dark by Tim Shoemaker

order something to eat. Keep up the good work with the flyers. I’m going to get more posted myself.”
    Detective Hammer entered the dining area just as Officer Sykes left. He headed for Cooper’s table without hesitation. He held up a monster shake. “You got me hooked on these last fall. Remember?”
    How could he forget? Cooper was standing outside Frank’n Stein’s when Hammer had grilled him about the robbery. He’d asked Cooper if there was anything he wanted to tell him. But that was before Cooper trusted Hammer—so he dodged the question. “Yeah. Try the monster shakes. The chocolate is best.” Cooper smiled.
    “Mind if I join you?”
    Last October, those words from Hammer would have sent Cooper running. Not anymore. “Have a seat,” Cooper said. Maybe Hammer could tell them more.
    “Detective Hammer,” Hiro said. “Do you believe the kidnapper stayed local?”
    Hammer unwrapped the straw, slid it through the lid of his shake, and pumped it up and down a couple times. “I have to keep my options open right now.”
    Hiro seemed to be collecting her thoughts. “But do you have a hunch—a direction you’re leaning?”
    “Maybe.” He slurped his shake. “But I’m not ruling anything out—yet. The guy seems smart.”
    Cooper didn’t want to push so hard that Hammer would stoptalking, but he wasn’t exactly divulging much information anyway. “What makes you so sure he’s smart?”
    “We haven’t found the van. Whether he drove across the state line, or ditched it locally, that van should have turned up by now. And if he wasn’t smart—it would have.”
    “But a silver minivan?” Lunk shook his head. “Way too common to stand out. How can you be sure you haven’t missed it?”
    Hammer smiled. “We’ve got a good team. If it’s local, we’ll find it.”
    “But it couldn’t be far,” Hiro said. “If he assumed someone might see the abduction and ID the vehicle, he’d have had another car hidden nearby so he could make a switch.”
    Hammer nodded. “That certainly is one scenario.”
    Cooper turned that one around in his mind a bit. A new strategy began to form. First, they’d finish posting flyers, then they’d ride and start checking every parking lot around. They could check the parking garages, Northwest Community Hospital, and what about Woodfield Mall? Minutes away by car. Big, open parking lot.
    It seemed pretty obvious Detective Hammer wasn’t going to share real details of the case.
    Cooper glanced outside. Still plenty of daylight left. He stood. They needed to keep moving. He drank the last couple mouthfuls of his monster shake. He thought of Gordy. They always got shakes when they came in. “Thanks, Detective Hammer. I think we’re going to finish posting the flyers.”
    Hammer stood too. “We’ll find him, Cooper.” He put a hand on Cooper’s shoulder. “I’m not going to quit until we find him, one way or another.”
    Cooper’s legs felt weak suddenly. He only wanted to find him one way. Alive. Safe. It was finding him the other way that really had him scared.

CHAPTER 14
    B y 6:00, Cooper had checked in with his Mom a handful of times and posted the last flyer. He’d already folded one up and kept it in his pocket to show neighbors. For a moment, the three friends looked at each other. Hiro fingered the necklace at her throat. The miniature of her dad’s Chicago police star. Probably wishing he was still alive. Believing somehow
he’d
find Gordy. And he probably would.
    Lunk was harder to read. But then, he had plenty of experience hiding his feelings under a tough mask. Maybe it was the result of having had an abusive dad, or the fact that he’d moved so many times that Lunk never really made friends. But even after months of Cooper trying to be a friend to him, Lunk hadn’t fully loosened up. And right now Lunk definitely had a guarded look about him. Whatever he was thinking, he was keeping it to himself.
    “I like it,” Hiro said. “Nobody can