Hhmm. I think I need some reviews. Maybe this chapter will elicit them. I don't know what exactly you're looking for, but I'll try to give it to you. Here's a win/win situation. I write chapters, and you review. How does that sound? Anyway, why don't you read this next chapter? Don't forget to review at the end! (And again, I thank ChaCha1? for her wonderful suggestions that I have tried to put into this chapter!)

Chapter Two

Safe?

Steve and Mark Sloan sat in their house on a couch. On the couch opposite them was a girl a young officer had recently found. The father and son had been working for hours trying to get the girl to say anything, especially something that would help them. However, the only thing the girl ever did was draw her knees up to her chest and hug them; but her gaze never left the men sitting in front of her.

Steve was getting very frustrated very quickly. The only thing that was different in this interro-gative time with the girl from the one he had had in the precinct was the fact that the girl's eyes didn't look glazed over as if she was in a different world, and she didn't put up quite so much defiance. It was as if she was tired of trying to resist. She had given in, but she still could not talk. Can't or won't? Steve thought, more than a little irritated. His father was the only thing that prevented him from making this girl talk his way.

Something traumatic had happened to the girl in front of him. That much was for sure. However, what was it? Mark saw that the girl offered little resistance while being led into the living room and ques-tioned, almost as if she thought something bad would happen if she did. However, the first thing she did as she sat on the couch was draw her knees up to her chest and wrap her arms around them. Steve had told him that the girl had said that there was another person in captivity. That made the situation all the more fragile. Mark was determined to get the girl to talk again, but he didn't want to scare her. "You know that the life of whoever else was with you depends upon you telling us where they are," Mark said.

The girl was very scared. She hated being with someone she didn't know, and she hated being questioned. But what she hated the most was that she couldn't talk. She wanted to. Oh, how she wanted to! She just couldn't. She needed to tell them where the other captive was, but she couldn't. All she could hear was that horrific scream reverberating in her head over and over again. Finally, she grabbed a piece of paper and a pen, carefully keeping her eye on the two men sitting on the couch across from her the entire time. Then, she drew a picture and handed it to Mark.

Mark and his son looked down at the picture in Mark's hands. There was a picture of a boy probably no older than fifteen. The words "Ben: my brother" were written with an arrow pointing to the boy. Beside the boy was a picture of a large building that the father and son could only guess was a warehouse. The word "(Scream)" was written, coming from the building. "Is this the warehouse where your brother is in?" Mark asked gently.

The girl nodded.

"Is this his scream?"

Another nod.

"Is that what has kept you from speaking?"

Yet again, the girl nodded. Mark looked over at Steve with his eyebrow raised. They had found out who the other captive was, where he was, and what had kept the girl from talking. Now, they just had to figure out which warehouse, how to get in, and how to get to the boy without harming him.

"What is your name?" Mark asked.

The girl took another piece of paper and hurriedly scribbled something down. Then she handed it to Steve. "Leah," Steve read, pronouncing it like "Leea." Then he saw the girl shake her head ferociously and stick out her tongue, obviously signifying that the wretched name was not hers. "Oh," Steve said, a sudden spark of realization hitting him. "It's Leah." This time, he pronounced it with a long e and a short a, like the name in Star Wars; and this time, the girl nodded. Steve looked at his father, and the two had a conversation through their eyes.

Steve told his father that he was going to go to the station and see what he could find about this captive and the warehouse he was in. Mark told his son that he would stay and continue to work on getting the girl to trust them and talk again. Then he told Steve to be careful and quick. He didn't know what was happening, but it was surely bad. Because now that Leah had run away, their captors had probably gotten pretty angry; and their was no telling what they would do. Steve nodded and left, leaving the girl a thousand miles behind and his father so far about a mile behind.

Sorry this chapter was so short. I have ideas of what I want to do, but I don't know how to get there. I'll keep working on my story, and you keep working on your reviews. See ya!