My many thanks for all the reviews – they give me a nice warm glow!
Special thanks to Alaidh as always for her extremely thorough beta – it's very much appreciated as always.
Chapter 20
True to her word, Genevieve was ready at the front door in five minutes. She'd managed an amazing transformation with Monique, who was now totally Nutella free. Her clothes had been changed, hair brushed, and face and hands washed.
Logan grabbed his keys from the hall table and dumped them on his lap with his phone and jacket.
"Nice," he complimented Genevieve as he wheeled up to the two girls and saw the now sparkling clean Monique. "Okay, let's go," he started to say, but then stopped and looked at Genevieve with a frown. "Where are your jackets?"
"You're not wearing one," she pointed out quickly.
"But I've got it with me," he countered.
"I get them, I get them!" Monique called out frantically, rushing down the hallway as if Genevieve, who in fact hadn't moved, was trying to beat her to it.
Genevieve looked at Logan critically. "And you only have a shirt on. I, at least, have a sweater. You probably have a fever," she added kindly, surprising him by putting a motherly hand on his forehead. She pronounced in a knowing manner, "Thought so," to his great amusement.
"Your mom teach you that too?" he asked her with a quizzical expression.
"I had an infected foot once. We were traveling and couldn't get to a doctor for a few days. I was real hot and had a headache and I threw up all over the car," she finished a little too graphically for his liking.
"I don't think we need to worry about me doing that," Logan told her quickly.
"Yeah, 'cause it's really hard to get the smell out. My dad scrubbed at it for ages but we had to leave the windows down for days and even then you could still smell it." She wrinkled her nose at the memory of it. "And then there was the time Monique threw up in the street and this huge dog came along and..."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa," said Logan quickly, whose stomach wasn't feeling all that wonderful. He definitely didn't need another of her vivid recollections. "I think I get the idea."
"Does your stomach feel bad?" she asked him solicitously.
"Let's not worry about it - here's Monique," he said, quickly changing the subject as the child returned with a pleased look on her face that she'd accomplished such an important task all by herself.
"I got them Logan. I got them," she told him and nearly everyone else in the apartment block.
"Great," he said, wincing a little at the volume. "Put it on and we'll go."
"You don't have your jacket on," Monique objected at once.
Logan just looked at her.
"That's 'cause Logan has a temperature," Genevieve informed her.
"What's a tempacha?" Monique asked.
By this time Logan had had more than enough of the whole topic and regretted that he'd even suggested the jackets.
"Tell you what – why don't you just carry them."
Both girls brightened at that suggestion, and Logan hurried them through the door and over to the elevator.
They had just made it to the car when Monique suddenly burst into tears.
Logan rolled his eyes a little as he put his key in the door. "What's wrong with her this time?" he asked Genevieve warily. He was beginning to learn the difference between a pain and a tantrum.
The child was stammering something through her sobs, but Logan had no idea what it was.
He looked across to Genevieve who was standing unconcernedly at the door, ready to get in, but she just shrugged. He couldn't say he blamed her. He couldn't expect her to have the patience of a parent in dealing with her sister.
I certainly don't have the patience of a parent, he had to acknowledge to himself as he felt his own frustration starting to rise as he sensed time relentlessly ticking by.
Suddenly he felt inspired. "She wants her doll," he told Genevieve, with a pleased snap of his fingers, wondering at the same time what it was about three year olds that they just couldn't simply ask for what they wanted without making it a game of charades.
Monique meanwhile continued to wail.
Logan looked at is watch, then looked at Genevieve. He took a deep breath. "We'll hafta go back up and get it, unless we want her crying all afternoon," he told her, raising his voice a little to be heard above her sister.
"I can get it, Logan. Just give me that little card you use."
Logan hesitated. He knew it would be much quicker for Genevieve to go up there by herself, but he just didn't like the idea.
"There aren't any monsters," she scoffed at him.
"Okay," he finally agreed, not entirely happy but in the end deciding he was probably being too overprotective. "Here you go," he said as he gave her the security card and his door key, adding, "Come straight back," as she ran back to the elevator.
Monique's tears magically disappeared as soon as she understood that her precious doll was going to come after all, and now quite contentedly climbed into the car when Logan opened the door.
Feeling that this proxy-parenting was definitely aging him, Logan swung himself into his seat, buckled his seatbelt, then dismantled his chair and stowed it on the passenger side, all the while feeling a little anxious that he'd let Genevieve go back up there by herself.
He'd only just looked up from his task when he saw Genevieve already approaching the car. With a sense of relief he turned the key in the ignition as she climbed in.
"Good girl," he said, glancing back to congratulate her. This time he didn't miss the way his words made her blush and smile widely as she passed the doll to Monique.
Logan released the brake as soon as he heard her seatbelt click. He was still hoping to make his appointment on time. "Now, I want you kids to duck down like Max had you do the other day. Understand?"
He waited until both children were well below the level of the windows, then he pulled out of the parking garage.
Logan paused a moment before turning into the road, squinting a little in the still bright, afternoon sunshine after the gloom of the garage.
Unhurriedly, he studied his surroundings.
It worried him that Max had slipped up once and missed a tail. What chance did he have?
"Logan?" came Genevieve's voice.
"Keep your head down," he told her a little roughly, revealing his unease as, with a frown, he surveyed the area.
He checked again, taking note of the few parked cars at the side of the road, then pulled out onto the road, accelerating hard so that he could cut in between two cars driving by.
Still frustratingly aware of the time, Logan turned off the most direct road that would lead him to the medical clinic adjacent to Metro Medical, only to meander along several back streets.
Logan thought he was completely safe until, after a few moments, he saw a large, black sedan turn off and follow him.
Taking a surreptitious deep breath, his eyes darted to the compartment in his door where he'd managed to hide his gun from the girls.
He hadn't expected trouble.
Max had said there had been no one watching his apartment.
At last he let out the breath he'd been holding. The black car had turned off and he was once more the only car travelling in his direction.
Feeling a little less sure of his actions, he headed back to the main road and continued on his way.
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Max paid off the cab driver and went around to the small garden at the back of the apartment block where she'd left her motorcycle.
Her full lips widened in a satisfied smile as she saw it was just as she'd left it.
Entering by a back door, she walked up the flight of stairs then followed the hallway once more to Apartment 6.
She put a hand up to knock, then paused and called out softly instead, "It's me. Max."
Her sensitive hearing picked up the sound of movement from inside, then the door opened a fraction and Emma Belding looked out at her.
Max put a hand up and pushed the door open further, forcing the other girl to stumble back a little.
"So, how ya doin'?" Max asked her, looking around with a small frown. "Where's Seth?" her next question shot out.
"He's out getting us some milk and bread," Emma snapped.
"Okay," Max said mildly as her eyes scanned the apartment. "Just checkin'."
Emma looked at her. "Has Logan...did he...he said he could help," she eventually finished uncomfortably.
"He's working on things," Max told her coolly, picking up a dog-eared paperback from one of the shelves and wondering if it had been some old favourite of Logan's.
"We can't stay here indefinitely," Emma protested. "Seth gets kinda agitated if he's not in his own place."
"Agitated enough to rip off the arms of innocent women?" Max asked bluntly.
Emma looked at her with a shocked expression. "You're sick if you think Seth would ever do a thing like that."
"We found a piece of paper in his bedroom with the details of where the girls were found," Max said a little more gently.
"He was trying to protect me," Emma said at once. "He knew I was hiding around South Market, and that's where the killings were. He was worried for me," she insisted. With a sudden note of doubt in her voice she added, "Does Logan think Seth killed those girls?"
Max looked at her, wondering what to say, but fresh in her mind was the intensity of Logan's expression a few hours earlier. "No. Logan doesn't think Seth is a killer," she admitted.
Emma looked relieved.
"Me on the other hand – well, let's just say I'm not so sure. After all, he did threaten Logan last night. I figured maybe people in wheelchairs and young girls were his thing, you know," Max suggested coolly.
A flash of anger crossed Emma's pale features.
"Didn't he tell you anything at all about the guy he said he saw last night?" Max pressed her.
Emma shrugged, clearly still upset by Max's words. "I don't know. It's hard to sometimes get a straight answer from him. He told me something about a gold ring and shiny shoes or big feet or something."
"Not much to go on," Max told her evenly.
"Look, Seth wouldn't harm Logan," Emma said insistently, returning to the earlier comment. "He likes him. He only said that because he was worried about me and he knows that you're smarter than him. Seth told me you could take him," she added wonderingly as she looked at Max's deceptively slight physique.
Max shrugged. "I just know the right pressure points."
"You're very strong."
"Yeah, well my daddy wanted me to be a boy."
Emma considered Max carefully. "Logan trusts you to do the physical stuff. No wonder. I saw the way you took out Petrovsky's guy."
"He was outta shape," Max told her flippantly, but inwardly she was feeling increasingly alarmed.
"Logan must pay you a lot."
Max's eyes flashed. "Logan doesn't pay me anything!"
"I thought as much," the other said thoughtfully, her mouth curved upward in a small smile of understanding that made Max feel a little ill.
Damn, I've been played, Max realized, mentally kicking herself. One of the first rules: never expose an area of vulnerability – of course the one before that was never have an area of vulnerability.
"But we have a deal," Max continued smoothly, scarcely skipping a beat as if she were finishing a sentence that Emma had interrupted. "A business deal," she emphasized to prove her point.
Emma nodded. "It seems to work," was all she said.
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Max revved her bike hard to let loose some of her frustration. She didn't like the bitter taste in her mouth that told her she'd been outplayed.
Last night she'd felt a connection with the girl. She'd been surprised how quickly her sympathies had been raised.
She hadn't dared look too closely at Logan when Emma had told them about Seth. She wondered if he knew how much she had identified with Emma's dilemma. Was that why he hadn't looked up? Was that why he'd spent all that time studying the Band Aid on his finger?
It was easy to pronounce in a moment of cold rationality what one's sensible course of action should be, but lately she'd experienced a far stronger motive that dictated her actions. It was one that both thrilled and scared her, one that was somehow dangerous to admit, even to herself.
And Max was rarely scared.
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The basement of the apartment block where Logan had hidden Emma was an ugly place.
It had been used for years as little more than a garbage dump by the various tenants over the years who were too lazy to dispose of their unwanted goods in any other way.
For many years now, no one had even bothered to force open the door with its rusty lock and cobweb-covered hinges.
But now the mice and rats and spiders and any other scuttling creatures that enjoyed the inky blackness had a new companion.
Seth lay in a corner, only vaguely conscious.
The rope cut cruelly into his wrists and ankles and a gash at the back of his head bled sluggishly.
He tried to speak, but the dirty cloth that was stretched tautly across the side of his mouth made it impossible to shape the words.
Determinedly, he made the word the only way he was able to – little more than a hoarse whisper at the back of his throat.
"E...m...ma."
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Logan glanced at his watch as he swung his car into the underground parking garage at Metro Medical.
He hoped, as was usually the case, the actual time he got in to see the doctor would be at least ten minutes later than the time designated.
Despite his concern over the time, he wouldn't let the girls out of the car until he'd waited a few moments to check that no one had followed them in.
After the earlier false alarm with the black sedan, his conscience was feeling decidedly murky. What if he'd risked their lives because he was too afraid to be honest with Max?
When no other car appeared, he let them get out.
Genevieve already had Monique out of the car by the time Logan had transferred.
"You wanna ride?" he asked the usual ball of energy who was looking a bit sleepy after nearly having dozed off in the car.
Monique simply put her arms out towards him as an answer.
"I'll put her on your knee for you," Genevieve offered, lifting the smaller child.
Once she was on his lap, Monique settled back comfortably, leaning back against his chest and slipping a thumb in her mouth. "I sleepy," she announced through her finger.
Her sleepiness lasted all of three minutes. Once they were in the elevator she insisted on pressing the button - every button.
It took Logan a few moments to persuade her that they only needed one button pushed this time.
Then she insisted on holding her doll, which Genevieve had thoughtfully brought with her.
Logan tried to resist her a little harder this time. He wasn't sure he wanted Monique plus a doll on his lap and he was so distracted by the ensuing argument that he nearly ran into one of the cleaners who was sweeping the floor almost right outside the elevator doors.
"Sorry," he told the man curtly, feeling more and more frazzled by the minute.
Finally they arrived at the area where the consulting rooms were. Logan looked at his watch. They were almost ten minutes late.
He didn't like being late for appointments, particularly when the receptionist had a sergeant major type demeanour and seemed to bark out her questions instead of asking them.
"Logan Cale to see Doctor Forrest," Logan told her quietly.
The receptionist consulted her appointment book. Without looking up she barked out, "Your appointment was nearly ten minutes ago, Mr. Cale."
Logan found his temper beginning to rise. It would have been hard enough as it was getting there in thirty minutes, let alone with two children in tow.
He had just opened his mouth to make a cutting reply when the receptionist looked across from her desk and saw Monique curled up in Logan's lap.
The transformation was nothing short of miraculous, Logan observed wryly.
The woman, Fran by her nametag, suddenly beamed brightly at him. "But I can see you have your hands full," she told him, bestowing a brilliant smile on Monique, which the little one returned quite readily.
"What a dear thing," Fran told Logan, "A relative?" she asked, knowing full well he had no children as his file was wide open in front of her.
"No. I'm babysitting for a friend," Logan told her a little shortly, not sure if he preferred the sergeant-major manner instead.
"Would you like a sticker?" she asked Monique, who immediately sat up straighter, then wriggled her way off Logan's legs.
"I want some candy," Monique told the woman none too subtly, taking the sticker of a bear nonetheless.
"Come on, I'll find you some," Logan said quickly, keen to get her away before Fran asked any more questions. There was a vending machine in the corner of the waiting room, and he headed towards it. Genevieve followed him, leading Monique by the hand.
The girls chose a candy bar each and a bag of potato chips each. Logan hoped this would keep them occupied while he waited.
He looked around, wondering if any of the other seven people in the waiting room were there to see Dr. Forrest or one of the other doctors on duty. He sincerely hoped not as he set his brakes next to the chair Monique was sitting on.
"Please, Logan," Monique asked, turning to him with her candy bar held out for him to open. Once he'd done that she held out her chips to be opened.
At that moment he looked up to see an elderly lady come in. She took the seat opposite and started staring, but for once it wasn't his wheelchair that had attracted the attention, but the children, particularly Monique. He supposed there wasn't anything else exciting to look at in the room – certainly not a particularly hideous poster in front of him showing a tobacco affected lung that he could only hope wouldn't give Monique nightmares.
"What pretty children," the old lady commented to him with a tender smile when she caught Logan's eye. "I have grandchildren that age in New York."
Logan nodded, and tried to look interested without actually having to start up a conversation with the old dear. He was wondering what Max was doing; would she have her bike yet; would she be heading back into his apartment by now and, more than that, he was wondering why he hadn't simply told her the truth.
The cleaner he'd almost run into now headed down the hallway and into the waiting area, sweeping and dusting as he went.
Logan restlessly looked about, watching the cleaner carefully sweep the waiting room floor. He could feel a familiar tension as he looked at the rows of vinyl chairs around the wall, the well-thumbed magazines, the bored or apprehensive expressions on those waiting. He wondered what they were all there for. Funny, he thought, how people in doctor's waiting rooms could appear to be perfectly well on the outside, but could possibly be facing some desperate health issue on the inside. People like to hide all kinds of hurts, he mused darkly.
"Mr. Cale."
Logan looked up quickly, realizing in that instant that he hadn't planned what to do with the girls while he met with the doctor.
As if sensing his hesitation, the elderly lady said, "I'll watch the girls for you. I'll be waiting here for quite a while yet."
Logan looked at her and made a quick character assessment. He didn't think she looked like the type to carry a sawed-off shotgun in her handbag.
"Thankyou," Logan smiled at her as he released his brakes.
Genevieve, to his surprise, who'd been sitting there quite calmly, suddenly jumped up and said, "Can't we go in with you? We'd be real quiet."
"No Genevieve, You need to wait here. I shouldn't be too long."
"Pleeeese," she added, looking around the waiting room with a scared expression.
"Now who's scared of monsters?" he smiled gently at her, prying loose the hand that clutched at his arm. "I promise I won't be long."
"Come and sit with me, dear. We can talk if you like," the elderly lady suggested kindly.
Genevieve gave her a suspicious look and turned back to Logan with pleading eyes.
"Genevieve..." he simply said, immoveable on his stand.
The child looked at him then nodded dully.
The last image he had of her before heading in to see the doctor was of her standing disconsolately in the middle of the waiting room.
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Logan slowly wheeled himself into the large, but cluttered, room with a deep breath. A few scenarios were spinning around in his head and he didn't like any them.
"Logan, what can we do for you today?"
He looked up at the doctor who was such a contrast to Sam Carr, his neurosurgeon.
Whereas Sam was particular in his personal appearance, with a professional manner that managed to be calm yet kind, Hal Forrest was more like an eccentric scientist in appearance with a shock of almost white hair and round, black-rimmed glasses that seemed to continually slip down his nose. Far from appearing calm, he seemed to exude a nervous energy and was inclined to go into raptures over difficult and interesting cases because they presented a challenge for him.
Thus it was he positively gloated over Logan's knees, once he'd had Logan strip to his boxers and pull himself up onto the examination table, rather than the usual tut tutting most doctors would have done. It was one of the reasons Logan liked him – as far as doctors went anyway, and for all his eccentricities he was regarded as one of the best in Seattle dealing with any issues relating to spinal cord injuries, which was why Sam had referred Logan to him in the first place.
"You've done a good job here," he positively beamed at Logan. "What have you got planned for the next twenty-four hours?"
That question made Logan feel decidedly jumpy as the doctor started pumping the band that was around his arm full of air to check his blood pressure.
"I'm babysitting two kids for a friend, actually," Logan told him, hoping he sounded immoveable on the point.
"We could have a problem there," Forrest murmured as he checked the reading.
"Is there a problem with my blood pressure?" Logan asked with a grimace.
"Eh? Blood pressure? No, it's fine – so far," he added, as if hoping it wouldn't stay that way. Normal blood pressure provided him with no challenge at all.
"Then what's the problem?"
Doctor Forrest looked at Logan from over the rim of his glasses. "You're a bright boy, Logan. You know we can't let something like this go on for too long. We need to nip it in the bud," he told Logan, pantomiming a pair of scissors with a vigorous 'snip' of his fingers. "Otherwise, before you know it, your blood pressure will be skyrocketing, heart rate plummeting, you'll feel like hell...If you don't already," he added, peering at Logan as if the thought had just crossed his mind.
"So, you're suggesting...?"
"Quick hospital stay, my boy. Pump you full of antibiotics and you'll be back in business in no time."
"Can't you just," and Logan hesitated a little before saying, "give me a shot instead?"
Dr. Forrest looked at him, contemplated his chart, examined his knees once more, cleared his throat, walked to the window, then walked back again to stand in front of Logan.
"Not my best option," he finally pronounced, "but we can give it a try."
Logan mentally wiped his forehead, then watched as the doctor grabbed a felt pen and began drawing a circle that outlined the inflammation on his knees.
"I'll give you a shot now, and a course of antibiotics to take home with you, but if the redness extends past the point that it is now, you'll have to come back ASAP. No buts."
Feeling like he'd got out of it better than he'd feared, Logan was almost philosophical as he watched the older man preparing the syringe.
"Bumped into your uncle the other day," Forrest murmured as he swabbed Logan's arm with an antiseptic wipe.
Logan nodded politely as he carefully turned his head away, wondering irritably to himself why they never stuck the damn things in his ass.
"Of course the man's a pompous bore," Forrest continued, ignoring Logan's involuntary flinch. "I suppose I shouldn't say that to you," he suddenly added as the thought struck him, looking at Logan over the top of his glasses
Suppressing his grin, Logan told him in a non-committal tone, "Well, I don't have a lot to do with them nowadays."
"Still, you don't want to isolate yourself," the older man rambled on. "It's good to have family or friends around you...someone you can trust," he finished with a keen look at Logan.
"Right," agreed Logan a little abruptly, wondering why he felt an uncomfortable stab of guilt at the doctor's words as he slid back down into his chair.
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"Hey girls."
Genevieve looked up from the ancient magazine she was pretending to concentrate on.
"You okay?" she asked quickly. Logan was a little touched to see the look of concern in her eyes.
He held his hands out wide. "No problems."
Her face broke into a smile and she turned to Monique, who had been the picture of good behaviour, quietly looking at some picture books with the elderly lady.
"Time to go, Monique," she told her.
The three year old rushed across excitedly to Logan, throwing her arms enthusiastically about his legs with enough force to make him glad he couldn't feel his knees.
The grey haired grandmother looked across at Logan. "Lovely girls," she smiled at him.
Logan was getting a bit embarrassed by this time, wondering if she thought they were his, so he nodded with a smile and said, "Yep. Friends...kids," he added a bit disjointedly, before thanking her for watching them.
"We going home now?" Monique asked him as she purposefully climbed up onto his lap.
"We are," Logan told her firmly, heading towards the elevator, but not before quickly checking that Genevieve held her doll.
"Hey, your doll's got eyes just like yours," he told Monique with a smile.
The child's eyes went to her doll, then totally unrelated she suddenly called out, "I wanna drink. I want Coke."
"Mon..." began Genevieve.
"Pleeeese,' the other jumped in very quickly.
Logan glanced at his watch. He was still hoping to be back before Max.
"Pleeeese, Logan," Monique tried again, this time tugging at his shirt.
"Okay, but you'll hafta drink it in the car," he warned her.
"She might spill it," Genevieve warned him quickly.
"Well, I can always clean it up if she does," was Logan's philosophical answer.
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"Okay, buckle up," Logan called to the girls as he waited to pass them their large size Cokes. He had a vague idea that their mother wouldn't thank him for it, but it seemed the easiest way to avoid an argument when Monique insisted on the large size because Genevieve had one.
"She won't drink it all," Genevieve had warned him yet again, but by that time he was just too tired to worry about it.
"Doesn't matter. We can always dump it out later."
Once he'd passed them their drinks, after making sure their seatbelts were on, he opened his own door, positioned his wheelchair, then hauled himself, with a little difficulty, into his seat and stowed the wheelchair beside him.
Logan, you gotta get some sleep tonight, he told himself ruefully as he stared out the front windshield, hoping desperately that the meds Dr. Forrest had given him would kick in soon.
He could hear the girls sipping happily on their drinks through their straws, and he took the opportunity to take a few quick swigs of the bottled water he'd bought for himself before starting the car.
He wondered idly what Max was doing as he got out his cell phone and turned it on, checking for messages.
There weren't any, so he concluded, a little guiltily, that Max must be still out.
He was about to change it to hands free so that he could use it should someone call while he was driving, when his phone unexpectedly rang.
"Logan," said the other voice.
"Martin. Where are you?" said Logan quickly.
"I got some good news for you. I found the girls parents," his cousin's voice came back a little jerkily over the line.
"What?" Logan snapped, glad the girls couldn't hear Martin's end of the conversation.
"I used some of Dad's contacts with the FBI. Found out their name was Hackett. I'm with them now, Logan."
"I'm amazed," Logan said slowly into the phone.
"Can you meet with me now? Brad and Sharon are really keen to see their kids."
"Now?" Logan questioned with surprise. "What's the hurry?"
"Wouldn't you be in a hurry to see your kids if you'd been separated? I thought you'd be keen to get them out of your hair, Logan."
Logan thought quickly.
"They are their kids, Logan. I'm just doing what they asked," Martin continued insistently.
"So, where are you?" Logan asked brusquely.
"The FBI has them in some sort of converted warehouse at the corner of Fairmont and Ridge."
"I'll find it," Logan replied shortly as he turned his head to quickly look at the girls.
Genevieve looked up and smiled trustfully at him. She'd been quietly chanting rhymes to Monique.
"How soon can you make it?"
"When I'm there," Logan snapped back. "Wait for me."
Logan hung up, then stared unseeingly out his windshield where the wipers had left the screen free of dirt.
His thoughts were uneasy...suspicious.
Was it possible that Jonas could so easily accomplish what he had been trying for days to do? The thought niggled at him annoyingly.
Still, it was undeniable - Martin had all the facts; he certainly had the names right at least.
Logan absently rubbed his forehead where it still ached. The thing that bothered him the most was the note of desperation in Martin's voice.
"Logan...Logan...we going?"
Genevieve undid her seatbelt and leant forward. When Logan still didn't respond she tentatively put a hand on his shoulder.
He turned around quickly to look at her.
"You okay? You look kinda...funny," she finished with a dissatisfied shrug that meant 'funny' wasn't the word she'd wanted but she couldn't think of anything else.
Logan nodded, absently biting his lip as he returned his gaze to the windshield where, once again, he viewed the surrounding cars with narrowed eyes.
Genevieve let her own gaze follow that of Logan's, but she could see nothing there that would be so fascinating to him. She began to look a little scared and she hushed Monique irritably when the child began to make noises of discontentment that they weren't moving.
Monique's whining quickly progressed to the point of being uncomfortably loud in the small confines of the car.
"Logan," Genevieve said again, giving his shoulder a small shake this time with her hand as she warily looked around outside the car. "I wanna go," she added in a small voice.
This time her touch seemed to break the spell and he lost the far away look in his eyes, as if he suddenly seemed to realize where he was. He looked at Genevieve and said, "We gotta go."
More than a little confused, she sat back and did up her seatbelt again as Logan turned on the ignition, released the brake, and let the car inch forward, his mind still furiously analysing the situation he found himself in.
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Max knew as soon as she walked in the door that the apartment was empty.
Out of habit, she called his name anyway.
"Why am I not surprised," she muttered as she headed to his desk.
"Now that is a surprise," she murmured as she saw a sheet of printer paper folded neatly in half and left clearly for her on his computer keyboard.
Max – I had to go out for a while. I've got the girls. Be back soon.
Then, almost as an afterthought, it looked like he'd quickly scrawled at the bottom, Don't worry.
"Gee, thanks," she told the silent room, a conflicting array of emotions momentarily coursing through her as she headed to the windows in his living room and looked down, as if she could somehow see his car returning from such an impossible angle.
Sitting on the windowsill with one leg up in front of her she stared outside. She wondered why she didn't feel angry, or worried, or annoyed or a thousand other emotions – the only emotion she really felt was one of hurt.
Hurt that he still couldn't trust her.
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"Uh oh."
Logan quickly glanced in his rear-view mirror. "Uh oh? What does 'uh oh' mean?" he asked Genevieve quickly.
Monique's sudden cry told him exactly what she meant. "She dropped her drink, didn't she," he told Genevieve fatalistically.
"Yep."
Logan's response was a quick, sharp grunt of frustration.
"I told yah she would," Genevieve untactfully reminded him.
"You did," Logan acknowledged dryly, looking for a store to replace her drink so that she would stop crying.
He looked distractedly out the window with a mind that was still firmly set on the problem before him.
Coke and cousins, he thought with a sigh, only to immediately change his expression from one of frustration to one of sudden enlightenment as he realized in those two words he had the answer to his problem.
Within minutes he'd stopped outside a small Asian general store.
Logan put his hand into the top pocket of his shirt and pulled out a ten-dollar bill.
"Here, Genevieve. You take Monique in there and buy her a drink and show her some of the toys down the back, and I'll be there in a minute."
Genevieve quite happily took the money he held out to her, but then looked at him suspiciously and said, "What are you gonna do?"
"I'll be there in a minute. I gotta make a phone call."
Logan watched them until they were safely inside, then he dialled his own number.
"Hey, it's me," he said a little uneasily as Max answered his phone.
"Yeah," Max answered abruptly.
Logan hesitated for several moments, his face betraying the unease he felt.
"You still there?" Max's voice prompted him.
"You get my note?"
"Yep. Not that it told me anything." This time Logan thought he could hear a distinct note of dissatisfaction in her voice.
"I had to see my doctor," he told her quickly. "It was kinda urgent and he could fit me in so I took the girls with me."
The silence her end spoke volumes.
"I had a call from Martin," Logan went on, keen to change the subject.
Max wasn't ready to let him off the hook so easily as she stood by his computer desk where she'd answered the phone, one hand on her hip with an attitude that said she was in anything but a conciliatory mood.
"So...what was wrong?" she asked evenly.
"Well, Martin..."
"Not with Martin - with you," she snapped a little, with a frustrated gesture swapping the phone to her other hand. "You dying or something or what?" she asked bitingly, then winced as soon as the words were out of her mouth as that had been exactly what had almost happened not so many months ago.
"No," his answer came back dryly, "it was just a problem with those grazes on my knees. I didn't do the right thing...they got infected. No big deal."
Max listened carefully, not so much to the words themselves, but to each nuance, each inflection.
"Must've been all that praying you've been doin' lately," Max told him. She knew Logan well enough to appreciate what it cost him to admit that to her.
Logan smiled back. "Oh yeah."
"So Martin's not dead either, then?" Max continued, feeling far more charitable towards him again.
Thankful for the now warmer tone to her voice, Logan quickly told her of his cousin's phone call.
"How could he know all that stuff?" she wondered aloud when he'd finished.
"I think I know how," Logan admitted quietly. He couldn't help wondering if the warm tone he had welcomed just a few moments ago was destined to disappear again. "When I checked his phone calls this morning there were three to Petrovsky's casino."
"Oh," was all she replied.
"I wasn't sure what that meant...so I didn't want to tell you about it."
For once Max ignored his inability to be completely truthful with her. "So what are you gonna do? I don't like the sound of this, Logan. He could be in bed with the Russians..."
"Max," Logan interjected.
"...or they're using him to get to you to get to the girls."
"Let's go with the second scenario. If Petrovsky's holding Martin, I don't see that I have any choice."
"Logan," Max warned him.
"Listen. I've got an idea."
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Logan drove towards the warehouse area, constantly checking his watch.
He knew that timing would be important to his plan.
Late on a Sunday afternoon, the area was practically deserted. Logan wasn't sure if he should be grateful for the fact, or all the more worried.
He was still a few streets away from his destination. There was only one major road into the small industrial centre where Fairmont and Ridge were located and he slowly swung into it.
They must have been waiting for him.
Logan didn't see them until it was too late. The first car roared at him from one of the crossroads at his right.
Logan turned his head and found himself, as it were, looking at a movie in a darkened room. He felt for a moment as if time had slowed down, even though everything about him was happening at breakneck speed. In that one glance he knew exactly what was going to happen as he experienced a quintessential moment of time when all things could be viewed with perfect clarity.
Of course he recognized the scenario – you don't forget the nightmare that has relentlessly tormented you over and over again.
And then abruptly, he was back in the waning afternoon sunlight. The moment of awareness passed and the events in his life approached him at full speed once more.
He pulled the car towards the left in a defensive manner but he knew the others would be entering the intersection to cut him off – to block his only means of escape.
The Aztek hit the second car with a bone jarring shock that brought it to a sudden halt.
Logan placed both hands, now slick with perspiration, on the steering wheel of his car.
He felt like he was in some sort of a vacuum where every sense was magnified – he was clearly aware of his heart thumping with an almost painful intensity in his chest, the sandpaper-like dryness of his mouth, the sudden chill that swept through his body even though his skin burned to the touch.
They were walking towards him slowly now with the confidence of the victorious.
Logan didn't reach for his gun – instead he turned on instinct to look at the back seat.
The blue eyes stared back at him unblinkingly.
TBC