Hello my wonderful readers! I'm sorry for taking so long to update, my Internet has been broken. I think it's all better now, though!

Shawn writhed about, trying to get free. He was pretty sure that at least one of his ribs had cracked upon impact. "A little help here?"

"Is he dead?" Asked the mysterious man with the gun.

"I don't know, he's still on me and not moving."

"Is he dead?!" The man yelled.

Shawn blinked in surprise. "Yea. He is."

"Good." The man easily moved the dead kidnapper off of Shawn. He picked the lock on Shawn's handcuffs, and roughly dragged him to his feet.

"Ow, ow!" Shawn complained. "You accidentally shot me in that arm. Oh, it's okay, I forgive you. You saved me."

"Don't talk or I will shoot again."

"Hah! That's almost as funny as when Lassiter threatens to shoot me. Speaking of detectives, do you happen to know how a Juliet O'Hara is doing?"

"I'm not a cop and I'm not your friend. I have every intention of killing you later, so please, keep your big mouth shut. Now walk." The man shoved Shawn toward the warehouse door and the two made their way outside.


"I got a hit!" Juliet exclaimed. She and Gus had run the license plates of the car that had hit them.

"Really?" Gus abandoned the files he had been poring over and dashed to Juliet's side.

"Yeah, it's registered to a Thomas McDermott. Clean record, just a couple tickets."

"McDermott, McDermott. I know I've heard that name before." Gus tried to remember.

"An old case, maybe?" Juliet asked.

"Yea, maybe."

"Well, anyway, a security camera at a convenience store caught it sitting out by an old warehouse. Here's the footage, it looks like it's still there."

"Wow, did we find Shawn already?"

"Maybe. The car might have just been ditched, but we're still gonna check it out. Let's go!"


Juliet and Gus quietly stepped out of their car. The SUV was still sitting in the exact same spot.

"We'll check out the warehouse first, then come back to the car." Juliet whispered. Gus swallowed nervously, then nodded in agreement.
As they snuck up to the warehouse, Juliet tried not to think about what would happen if they were too late. She honestly didn't know what she would do if Shawn was dead. While she was extremely angry with the faux psychic, she couldn't deny that the feelings were still there. She didn't want to be with him, but she certainly didn't want him dead either.

Stop it, O'Hara. Just focus on the task at hand. You can think about your feelings all you want when lives aren't on the line.

With that, she kicked the door open and stepped in, gun in hand. A quick glance revealed that there only was one person in the room, a man who was laying on the ground. He didn't appear to be moving.

"McDermott," Juliet confirmed, looking down at the man. She bent down to feel for a pulse. "He's dead."

"Juliet, Shawn's been here!" Gus called out.

"How do you know?"

"There's the letters 'SS' drawn on the ground in blood."

"Are you sure it's Shawn?"

"There's a pineapple drawn next to it."

"Okay, so Shawn was definitely here. But, now that his kidnapper is dead, where did he go?"

"There were two other people in the car," Gus remembered. "Maybe they killed McDermott and took off with Shawn."

"So Shawn is with two dangerous men and we have no idea where they are." Juliet summarized. "Great, just great."


Shawn and his kidnapper were rather deep into the forest by this time. It had taken them a while to get in because they were dragging two dead bodies which had since been dumped in the river. Shawn was exhausted by this point, stumbling often. Anytime he tried to speak, he was punched, kicked and once even pistol-whipped. Good times.

He decided that it was time to try to get some information again. "So, how much further will we be going?"

Shawn's feet were kicked out from under him and he fell flat on his face.
"How many times do I have to tell you not to talk?"

"A few more would be nice. I wouldn't want to forget," Shawn replied from on the ground.

"Just get up. And don't speak anymore."

The pair trudged through the forest in silence for quite some time. Shawn was just about ready to fall asleep on the spot by this time. It had been a long day? Six hours? Forty minutes? The sun was no longer visible in the sky, so it must have been a while.

Something caught Shawn's eyes in the bushes. It looked like a face with sunglasses. But, they were deep in the woods. No one could be there. Shawn must've been hallucinating, yes a hallucination. That had to be it.
A hand materialized and pulled down the sunglasses. The face winked at Shawn with a smile. Now Shawn knew he was hallucinating for sure, the owner of that face simply could not be in Santa Barbara, right? That would be the worst place for him to go!

Shawn's thoughts were interrupted as for the second time he found his feet being swept out from under him. He rolled over, about to complain about being tripped for nothing. The words never left his mouth, however. The head-no the man from the bushes was whacking the kidnapper over the head with a stick. The kidnapper fell to the ground, unconscious.

"Come on, we need to go!" The man from the bushes extended his hand to Shawn.

Shawn took it with his good arm and was hauled to his feet, still staring at his savior in shock. "Despereaux?"

As always, thank you so much to everyone who reads this story. Especially to those actively are involved (reviewing, favoriting)

A special holla to: tbergman92, God, Erin, fantomfaire and AllyMcGee! You all correctly guessed the identity of sunglasses man! (Despereaux)