49.

~ "A little hair of the dog." Dylan said handing a Bloody Mary to his step father.

Alex winced at the sunlight streaming through the windows and the pounding of his head from the massive hangover her was experiencing.

"Where's Norma?" he asked weakly when Dylan sat down an extra glass of water and a bottle of aspirin.

"She and Emma went for a drive. They're gonna do the talk therapy thing instead of getting black out drunk." Dylan told him.

Alex deserved that last comment.

"I know." he sighed in defeat.

Dylan shook his head and sighed.

"You had me worried, Romero." he said at last. "Mom was in Lucy's room refolding all her clothes. You were passed out on the bathroom floor."
"It's been a while since I drank that much." Alex admitted.

"I know it's hard right now. I know I don't have any idea how hard it is for you." Dylan told him. "But you can't do that again. Lucy is still out there and she needs you. You need to think. You need to think about who could have done this."

"I don't know." Alex sighed. "I'm a sheriff I have people who hate me."

"Who knows about Lucy?" Dylan asked. "Knows her schedule and gained her trust?"

"I don't know." Alex said again.
"That's not good enough, Romero." Dylan said. "It's your daughter we're taking about right now. I don't know isn't an answer."

"What do you want me to do?" Alex asked angrily. "They still have roadblocks and the state police are searching houses of known sex offenders. I can't do anything because I'm on a mandatory leave. I have to trust everyone else to find my daughter without me."

"What would you do if you were still at work and a child went missing? It's still less than 24 hours. What would you do?" Dylan asked.

Alex shook his head.
"Most of the times when a child goes missing it's a custody issue. It's a family member that has taken the kid and it's a family court or visitation violation." he said.

"Alright." Dylan said hopefully. "Any chance of that? Any family members we don't know about?"

Alex shook his head.
"My dad died in prison last year." he said sourly. "I didn't tell Norma because I hated the bastard and I haven't spoken to him eight years. He didn't even know I got married. That… that he had a granddaughter."

"Okay." Dylan said gently. "Any other family members? Any close friends of yours who might have had an interest in Lucy?"

"No, Norma and I don't have a circle of friends. We've always just had each other." Alex explained.

"What about neighbors? You told me about that guy who was walking the streets naked." Dylan prompted.

"No." Alex shook his head and sipped the Bloody Mary. His headache was worse now that he was having to think. "No. Mr. Dumas is senile and he's mostly harmless when he's medicated. Whoever took Lucy had knowledge enough to take her shoes off. To eliminate any tracker that I put in."

"So, we're looking for someone who knows you. Who knows the precautions you would take." Dylan said eagerly. "Someone who could be around Lucy and gain her confidence with those gifts. Someone who would go unnoticed here."

"Maybe." Alex sighed.
"They dusted for prints. Any word on that?" Dylan asked.

Alex shook his head in defeat.

"Come on, Romero." Dylan ordered. "I need you to think. What would be your next step in finding a lost child? If there is no family for a custody dispute and you're looking for someone who knows Lucy well enough to gain her trust. What do you do next?"

"I would ask her stupid little friend Tommy is he saw anything." Alex said.
"Who's Tommy?" Dylan asked.
"Lucy's friend." Alex said angrily. "She's always at his little tree house."

"Let's go pay Tommy a visit." Dylan said brightly.

~ School had been cancelled that Friday in the wake of Lucy Romero's disappearance. Parents keeping a fearful eye on their children with some psycho running around snatching up little girls from school.

Luckily, Mrs. Brennan had raised a pack of children in her day and she didn't scare easily. She'd allowed her son to spend his day off in his tree house.

"Tommy!" Mrs. Brennan called up to him. "The Sheriff is here to talk to you about Lucy! Come down!"

"Thanks, Mrs. Brennan. Tommy isn't in any trouble we just wanted to know if Lucy had ever said anything about a new friend." Dylan said politely.

He glanced at Romero who hadn't bothered to shower or shave and wore dark sunglasses.

Tommy Brennan was a scrawny kid who was no doubt picked last for teams. He reminded Dylan of Elliot in that way. Elliot was small for his age and was always scared of his own shadow.

"The police already talked to him." Mrs. Brennan said.
"We just wanted to ask him if he'd seen anything." Dylan smiled.

Tommy dropped to the ground and looked nervously at Sheriff Romero and Dylan. No doubt the two men looked imposing to the little boy.

"I'll be inside. Tommy, you tell these men the truth and don't you embellish anything. Remember your friend Lucy is missing." his mother warned.

Dylan looked back at Mrs. Brennan. He understood why his mother and step father liked her enough to let Tommy and Lucy be friends. She was sensible, fearless and had no tolerance for people who didn't think like she did.

"Tommy." Dylan said with a gentle voice. It was the same tone he used when Elliot had misbehaved. Emma didn't believe in punishments and there was no yelling in their home. Instead, when Elliot had done something wrong, which was rare, Dylan gave him a talk.

"Tommy, we need to know if Lucy has made any new friends lately. Any grown up friends. Did she tell you about any friends that gave her presents?"

Tommy looked uncomfortable.

"I don't know." he said.

"Did Lucy mention anything at all about a stranger?" Dylan asked.

Tommy looked at his feet and Dylan could tell he was hiding something.

Romero must have sensed it to because he pulled off his sunglasses and knelt down to Tommy's eye level.
"What is it?" he asked. "What happened?"

"Lucy will get in trouble." Tommy said.
"Lucy isn't in trouble with me." Romero said commandingly. "Tommy, you tell me right now what you saw."

"She…" Tommy said with some difficulty. "She said she had a brother. That I didn't know about a brother she had. I never saw a brother leave her house. She's lying about having a grown up brothers."

"Brothers?" Dylan repeated and he exchanged confused looks with Romero. "She told you she had brothers?"

Tommy nodded.
"She said he had a present for her. The man in the old green car. She was sad because she said she couldn't live at home anymore and that she wasn't wanted anymore. I thought maybe she was going off with her brother to live with him. She told me not to tell anyone." Tommy said.

"Did Lucy tell you his name?" Alex asked in a horse voice.

Dylan felt his breathing change. Felt the hairs on the back of his neck rise up.
"No." Tommy said sadly. "But he had brown hair. He drove an old car and she ran out to meet him and got in the car."

"You saw Lucy get in the car?" Romero asked. "Why didn't you tell anyone till now?"

"Lucy would get into trouble. I knew she didn't have brothers." Tommy said defensively.

"Tommy, did Lucy say where she and her brother were going?" Dylan asked.
"No. Just that he had a present for her." Tommy said.

"Lucy was asking about Norma's first husbands just yesterday." Alex said to Dylan. "She knew that you weren't her uncle but her half brother. She even knew about Norman being her half brother. We assumed some kid told her."

"When was the last time anyone heard from Norman?" Dylan asked. His pulse speeding up. He knew, just as Romero knew, Norman was dangerous.

"Over three years now." Romero said. "I hired a detective to check up on him. He was in Kentucky."

The two men left Tommy in the back yard. Both of them walking quickly to the Sheriff's SUV.

"Why go after Lucy? Why not come after Norma? Better yet, why not come after me? He's always hated me." Romero demanded.
"Think about." Dylan sighed. "What's the best way to hurt a man?"

"Take away something he loves." Alex sighed with a nod to the SUV. "Get in."

"You going to call Chambers?" Dylan asked.

"No, we don't have time." Alex said starting the engine and pulling out of the driveway. "It's been almost twenty-four hours."

"We don't even know where Norman took her." Dylan said quickly.
"Yes, we do." Romero nodded. "Where's the one place Norman Bates always felt safe? The one place in this whole town where he has the advantage?"

"You can't be serious." Dylan shook his head. "The old house is a mess. No one bought it after mom put it on the market eight years ago. It's been left to rot. No water or power, boards on the windows and everything."

"Perfect hiding place." Romero said. "Norman knows every inch of that house and no one would even think to look for him at all, much less in the old house."
"Romero." Dylan said feeling he had to tell his step father something. "Listen, if we get there and it is Norman. I mean if he has taken her, you need to know something."

"What?" Romero asked speeding down towards the lonely road that would take them to the old Bates Motel.

"Before you married mom. Right before you married her… I think… Emma's mother was staying at the motel. She never checked out and we never heard from her again." Dylan blurted out.

Romero gave him a concerned look but wasn't shocked.
"I found a letter to Emma from her mom in Norman's room. Along with a stuffed animal that I know wasn't Norman's. I think Norman killed Emma's mother." Dylan said.
"Does Emma know this?" Romero asked.

"No. I couldn't tell her. She thinks her mother just ran off again." Dylan said. "I didn't want her to hate me. If she knew the truth, she would hate Norman and she would hate me because he's my brother."

He felt helpless now that the truth was out.
"I couldn't stand it if Emma hated me." he admitted. "If Norman did kill Emma's mother, he might have already…"

"No." Romero said soberly. "No, Lucy's still with us."

~ Lucy could feel herself slipping away. Her body becoming a shell as whatever made her Lucy was leaving that shell. Her arm still hurt, but if she concentrated on leaving her body, the pain stopped.

The creature wearing Norman's painted face had pulled her by the arm down the basement steps. She felt her shoulder separate and cried in pain at seeing it hang uselessly at her side. The monster her brother had become berating her for becoming injured.

She had stopped crying by now because something wonderful had happened when the pain became too much. She could see mommy and daddy. She could see them, only not them. See them in this house, only everything was different. Everything was warm and safe and comfortable. Daddy was smiling when he was with mommy and she was playing the piano. They were holding hands and she was talking about a window. She saw them as though her spirit had slipped into the other side of this world and she was a ghost in her parent's past.

Saw mommy and daddy talking about something serious and then they were kissing. She'd seen them kiss hundreds of times in her short life, but never like this. She'd never seen the way her father kissed her mother's hands before kissing her lips.

She was brought back to reality, ripped back, when the creature pulled her into a dark room that smelled funny.
"You dirty little girl!" it snarled turning on a light that bathed the room in pink light. "Mother bought you that dress and you went and soiled it with your filth!"

Lucy didn't fight back as 'mother' pulled the boxy blue dress off her. She no longer felt shame at having peed herself. The pain in her dislocated shoulder was radiating through her body and she found it easy not to care about anything anymore. She hardly noticed 'Mother' redressing her like a doll. Even roughly brushing her hair like a doll.

She cried out when the creature carelessly pulled her bad arm through the sleeve. 'Mother' slapping her across the face again till she was quite.

While 'Mother' redressed her in a frilly pink party dress, Lucy could see her parents in the house again. She saw them kissing again. Always there was kissing. Once mommy was crying and daddy was hugging her. Lucy felt happy at seeing them like this and wanted to join them. The pain and fear didn't bother her anymore and if she joined her parents, she'd be free of the monster forever.

That foul creature picked her up again and had placed her neatly on a bed at the center of the room. The covers were a sickly bubblegum pink and Lucy blinked at the horror that would be her prison cell.

Norman, before he became this thing, had done all this. Built a room in the basement just for her. Painted the walls pink and added girlish furniture and lights with pink lamp shades. There were stuffed animals, things that used to be alive but were now grotesque playthings, sitting on a white bookcase. Norman had dressed taxidermy birds, squirrels, raccoons and even a few cats in amusing little bowties waistcoats and hats. An owl even had on a dinner jacket and a monocle.

Lucy felt the fear rising in her body and she couldn't see the ghosts of her parents anymore. Couldn't see them in the house back when it was alive anymore. Back when this was a happy place. Before that night when everything was dark and neon blue.

'Mother' was glaring at her.

"Filthy girl." it snarled. Norman's red lipstick was smeared and he looked more grotesque than normal. "You're going to stay here forever. No one will find you."

Lucy felt herself fall back into another trance. She couldn't see daddy now, but she saw Norman like he once was. Before he'd done the awful thing. She saw mommy sleeping in the bed upstairs and the darkness was a neon blue.

"Mister Sandman…" she sang weakly. "Bring… me a dream…. Make him the cutest… that I've… Ever seen… give him to lips…

The monster's eyes grew wide. Black eyes and not her brother's eyes anymore. Whatever Norman was now, it wasn't human. His second face was his only face now.

"No one will find you!" it screamed and pointed a menacing finger at her.

Lucy heard the door to her little room, her little cell slam shut. Heard 'Mother' lock her inside. Felt the air in the room change from being sealed in. She was alone now. Alone in a morbidly pink bedroom where even the lights glowed a hurtful electric pink and dead animals stared at her with glass eyes.

Lucy saw none of it. Her body staying there and her mind with mommy and daddy again. She could smell the bacon her mother had cooked in the kitchen upstairs. She saw daddy coming to eat in his Sheriff's uniform. Saw him pull her to him and kiss her by the stove, they were always kissing, and she made him eat before his food was cold. She felt happy at seeing them talk. Seeing daddy try to hold mommy's hand and smile at her.

"I'm so alone…" Lucy sang to herself. "Don't have nobody to call my own."

She didn't realize tears were running down her face. Her body laying limp and helpless on her pink bed in the middle of the room. She had made no attempt to flee or find a way out. Her arm hurt too much and it was too pleasant to just give herself over to the daydream.

"Please turn on your magic beam… Mister Sandman bring me a dream." she sang.

Sorry for such a late post. Busy day for me. I'm glad there was such a positive response to the last chapter. I was worried it was too dark.