35.5 Hours Missing

The phone woke him up.

It was one of those annoying rings that seem to ring really loudly, and if he hadn't been so tired and groggy, he probably would have realized that the phone was ringing sooner, but even though that damn phone was severely pissing him off, he was content to just let it ring. Because, at the moment, he was pinned beneath the warm, soft, naked, decidedly feminine body of the most amazing woman in the world, and even if he had been capable of moving, he didn't want to. And eventually, the ringing stopped.

But it rang again, just seconds later, and the noise caused Molly to stir. She didn't wake up completely – just enough to roll onto her side and off Danny's chest. With her no longer on top of him, he had no excuse not to answer that stupid phone. He crawled to the edge of the bed and fumbled in the dark for his cell.

He answered it with a, "Taylor," but was met with nothing but silence. In fact, the phone continued to ring.

And that's when he remembered that he had turned his phone off, so that Jack and the others wouldn't be able to get in contact with him or trace him via the GPS. The ringing was coming from Molly's cell, which was on the other side of the room.

Danny gave serious thought to answering her phone, just to stop that infernal ringing. But he ultimately decided against it, because he had no idea who was calling her – although to call in the middle of the night, it must have been important – and it could have been her boss or worse – his boss. It wouldn't have taken Jack long to find Molly's phone number. Danny was half surprised Jack hadn't considered that before. So instead, Danny got up, padded across the room to the coffee table, picked up Molly's phone, and stumbled back to the bed. And again, it stopped ringing.

He was about to hurl it across the room in frustration when it came alive in his hand, ringing and vibrating. He collapsed on the edge of the bed and gently shook Molly.

"Molly. Wake up."

She groaned and curled herself into a ball, mumbling something that sounded like, "The math test isn't until next week, leave me alone."

He shook her again, more firmly this time. "Molly. Answer your phone. It's pissing me off."

She opened her eyes, blinking several times, and slowly propped herself up on one elbow. "It's probably someone drunk dialing me. Just toss it and come back to bed."

He was sorely tempted, but that ring was grating on his last nerve. He would never be able to block it out and get back to sleep. He held the phone out to her. "It's rung three times. It could be important."

She groaned again, much more loudly, and took the phone. She flipped it up and answered it with, "You better have a damn good reason for waking me up at four-thirty in the morning."

Her face immediately paled. "Kate?" She sat up, hugging the sheet to her chest. "Where are you? Are you okay?"

Danny strained to hear the voice on the other end, but he couldn't hear a thing. He was able to infer most of the conversation from Molly's responses, though. And it didn't sound good.

"Can you see anything? Do you have any idea where you are? No, stay there and don't panic. I will come for you, okay? I will come for you."

She hung up and buried her face in her hands. Danny could hear her taking several deep breaths and was about to put his arm around her when she suddenly dropped her hands and looked at him, her eyes hard as steel. "Get your gun," she said. She slid out of bed and immediately began retrieving her clothes. "And call your boss."

Danny blinked, not quite sure if he'd heard her correctly. "Are you sure that's a good idea? What if these people do something to hurt her?"

Molly shook her head as she crouched low to the floor. She crawled under the bed and emerged seconds later with one of her socks. "They won't."

Danny sighed, but set about getting dressed as well. He found his pants dangling from the chandelier and was amazed at where clothes ended up when you were so intent on taking them off that you didn't notice where you threw them. "How do you know?"

"Because," Molly said, yanking her shirt off the bedside lamp, "if they were going to hurt her, they would have done it by now, and don't you think it's a little weird that she managed to get to a phone?"

He zipped his pants and turned to look at her. "You think it's a trap?"

She shot him a look and said nothing.

He walked over to the dresser and picked up his phone. "Do you even know where she is?"

Molly jammed her right foot into her shoe and sighed. "I can find out. Toss me my phone, will you?"

Danny did as she instructed and watched her as she dialed. "Good morning, Dave," she said into the phone. "I need you to do something for me. Yeah, I know, it's early, but trust me, this is important. I need you to do a trace on the last number that called my phone. Thanks." She cradled the phone between her head and her shoulder and tied her shoes. She glanced at him. "Shouldn't you be dialing?"

He rolled his eyes and started to punch in Jack's number, but changed his mind at the last second and dialed Martin's.

Martin hurt. Muscles he didn't even know he had were sore, and he couldn't figure out why, until he opened his eyes and realized that he'd fallen asleep on one of the couches in the waiting room – not the most comfortable piece of furniture he'd ever slept on. He rolled onto his side and winced as a stabbing pain shot through his legs, which had evidently fallen asleep, since he was too tall to fit on the couch. He glanced at the couch across from him and saw that Sam was snuggled under his jacket. As the events of the previous night came back to him, he shook his head in a vain attempt to alleviate his bleariness, wondering what had woken him.

He found Jack standing at one end of the couch, staring at him with one eyebrow raised. "Good morning, Sunshine," Jack said.

Martin groaned and tried to sit up, pins and needles in every major extremity. "What time is it?"

"Around quarter till five," said Jack, moving over to the wall and flipping the light switch. The sudden brightness made Martin's head pound, and he was looking forward to solving this case and sleeping all day. But when he saw the look on Jack's face, he knew that wasn't going to happen. "I sent Viv home. She didn't look too good."

Martin squinted. "You noticed that, too, huh?" He dug the heels of his hands into his eyes. "Did you get any sleep?"

Jack shook his head. "No. You?"

"Not enough," Martin said, swinging his legs off the couch and attempting to stand. "After the butcher shop, Sam and I came back here, tried to do a little background research on all the women in Molly and Kate's lives. No luck." Martin punctuated his statement with a yawn that he couldn't quite contain and glanced at Jack. "Did you find Danny?"

"No," Jack said with a sigh. "This girl's smart. She hasn't made any ATM withdrawals or used her credit card, so we have no way of tracking her, short of knocking on every door in the city."

Martin shrugged. "Starting to sound like a viable option."

Suddenly, Martin's phone rang. He reached across the arm of the couch to retrieve it. "Fitzgerald."

"Hey, Marty."

"Danny," Martin said, quickly glancing at Jack. "Where the hell have you been, man?"

"Not important. Look, we need backup. We think we know where they're holding Kate. Can you meet us there?"

Martin yawned again, surprised that Jack hadn't ripped the phone out of his hands in order to tear Danny a new one. "I'll see what I can do. Where?"

"Saint Bart's on West 13th."

"Okay, I'll tell – " But Danny had hung up.

36.5 Hours Missing

Saint Bartholomew's on West 13th Street was a fire hazard – a decrepit, rundown building with half the ceiling missing. Most of the outside was obscured by scaffolding, and it was enclosed in a perimeter of yellow police tape.

"What happened?" Danny asked. He and Molly stood outside the tape, guns drawn. At first, Danny had been surprised to learn that Molly even carried a gun, but she'd explained to him that all agents were required to have one. She just didn't keep it with her because she never went out into the field.

"Fire," said Molly. "It burned down about eight years ago, and the city hasn't been able to raise the funds to rebuild it." She lifted the tape and crossed under it, holding it up for Danny. "Come on."

He shook his head. "I think we should wait for backup."

Molly rolled her eyes. "Fine. You wait. I'm going inside."

He reached out and grabbed her by the wrist. "That's not a good idea."

She looked at him, her green eyes sad, and said, "I know. But if Kate's in trouble, and it's my fault, I'd never forgive myself if something happened to her." She sighed. "I just want this to be over."

Danny pursed his lips. "All right. But I'm coming with you. And if we die, I'm totally blaming you."

Molly grinned and winked at him, and the two of them carefully picked their way through the debris to the church doors. Danny gently pushed the doors, hoping for a quiet entrance, but the rusted hinges gave way, and the entire door crashed to the floor with a resounding thud that echoed through the building. He shrugged apologetically, but Molly was already inching her way into the sanctuary, gun leading. She disappeared behind a corner, and Danny followed quickly after.

But when he rounded the corner, Molly wasn't there. He barely had a chance to register that fact when everything went dark.

A/N: Sorry to leave you guys with such a cliffhanger! And unfortunately it's going to drive you all nuts for at least two weeks, because I've been summoned to jury duty. Blah. I will be writing while I'm sequestered in the hotel, but I won't have computer access, so I'll be unable to post. Hopefully I'll be able to come home, type what I've written, and get it all posted. I'll probably be bored out of my skull while I'm there.

Only been to NYC once. Don't sweat the details.

I hate drunk dialers. One time this guy kept calling my roommate at like 2 in the morning, and she wasn't even there. I stopped answering the phone after 4 times.