"What do you mean she's gone Jordan?" Woody asked, panic settling heavy on his chest.
"I mean she's gone Woody! She's not in her room, she's not in the apartment, she's not even in the building! I've looked everywhere for her! She's gone Woody, she's gone! I fell asleep on the couch and when I went to go check on her there was a note on the bed saying that they took her!" Jordan panicked, hot tears spilling fast and furiously over the brim of her eyes.
"Jordan ... listen to me. Call Boston PD and notify them about what's happened. Tell them to call CSU as well, I'll be there in five minutes. And Jordan, called Garret and tell him to come over as well." Woody tried to remain calm, tried to to keep his voice as even and emotionless as possible for Jordan's sake, he didn't even bother to ask who 'they' were. But he could feel his own emotions starting to get the better of him, trying to swallow him and drag him into a panic attack. But he fought it. Jordan needed him right now and he would be no use to her in an irate state.
"Jordan?" he prompted again. "Jordan! We're you listening to anything I just told you!"
The line was silent for a second except for the sound of her staggered and shallow breathing. "Ya, I'm listening. And Woody ...?"
"Ya Jo?" he asked quietly, starting up his car and driving insanely through the almost deserted streets.
"Get here soon," she responded, her voice quiet and uncharacteristically vulnerable.
"You got it." He hung up the phone, closing it to end the call but immediatly opening it again and hitting speed dial three. Five years of being away and he still kept Boston PD on speed dial. It was his way of keeping his past alive, a way of reminding himself that he was always welcome to come back. Well, maybe not in Jordan's eyes, but a way of reminding himself that it was a part of his past, that there was a history in Boston and it had once been his home.
"Johnson," the chief answered on the third ring.
"Chief this is Hoyt. We have a situation," he said, passing through a yellow-turning-red light and flying past a line of waiting cars.
"What's wrong?" he asked the bright-eyed detective, sensing the urgency in the level-headed man's voice.
"It's my daughter sir. She's been kidnapped." Saying it out loud made it inevitable, took away any traces of denial he may of had and his heart dropped in dread.
Johnson didn't even bother to comment on the fact that one of his ex-detectives had a daughter he didn't know about but decided to treat it as any other case.
"We need a CSU unit over at 1657 Chambers St. Apartment 204 right away," Woody said again, pulling up outside Jordan's apartment building and jumping out of his car.
"Hoyt did you say Chambers St?" the chief questioned.
"Ya. Why?" Woody asked back.
"That's the Cavanaugh place. Emma's been taken?" Johnson asked, his voice panicked. "Emma's your daughter?" he asked again.
"We can discuss how you know Jordan and Emma later. Please just send a unit over. We need to find her."
"I'll have a unit over in five minutes. Tell Dr Cavanaugh to hang tight," Johnson said, placing his phone down on the cradle and sighing deeply.
Woody rushed up to her apartment, not bothering to knock on the door but barging right in, rushing into the living room, and stopping dead in his tracks when he saw Jordan. She was sitting on the couch, not crying but barely moving. Garret and Lily were sitting beside her, Lily's hand resting gently on her thigh. In Jordan's hand was a blanket, white, with little pink hearts on it. Woody's assumed it was Emma's. He couldn't remember ever seeing her so broken.
He walked slowly over to her, unsure if he should even try to console her. Woody knew the pain she was feeling though hers was probably a hell of a lot worse. He had only known Emma as his daughter for not even a day. Jordan had spent every day for the past five years with her. He couldn't even begin to imagine the detachment she was feeling. Taking tenative steps towards the chair he had been sitting in earlier, he walked over to her and sat down, taking the hand that wasn't in Lilly's in his and giving it a reassuring squeeze.
"It'll be ok Jordan. I promise. I'm gonna find her if it's the last thing I do," he said, holding onto her hand with both of his and closing his eyes to fight off the tears. He felt a hand fall gently onto his own thigh and he slowly looked up into the comforting eyes of Lilly who was grinning lightly at him.
"We don't doubt you for a second," she said, tapping her fingers on his leg before removing her hand.
"Jordan I need to see the note," he said quietly, unsettled by her silence.
She still remained silent but handed him the note, tissue seperating her prints and DNA from the card. He took it gently from her, taking the tissue as well so he didn't get his prints on it. It was a simple white piece of paper, standard printer issue, impossible to trace, with individual letters cut out from magazines and newspapers. The message was eerie and menacing and Woody could tell from the blood drops on the bottom that they meant buisness. He earned to know whether or not it was Emma's blood, whether they had already hurt her just to get a message across to him or Jordan. The possibility that she was taken because of him, because of a case he had once worked on or some criminal he had pissed off made his heart drop to his stomach and the familiar feeling of excess saliva crept up the back of his throat.
'We've taken Emma. We'll be in contact. Don't hold your breath,' the note read. Woody had the sudden urge to crumple it up and throw it across the room but he knew that the fate of his and Jordan's daughter possibly rested on any information this note could give them.
"Is it Emma's blood?" Woody asked, settling for clenching his jaw and fists.
"Nigel's running a comparisson right now," Jordan said for the first time since he walked in.
Woody's head whipped around to the far corner of Jordan's apartment where he noticed for the first time Nigel was sitting, computer in his lap, fingers typing feriously against the keys. He smiled despite himself. The morgue really was a family. They always came though for each other whenever one of them was in trouble and Woody was at least grateful that Jordan had them while raising Emma. The computer in Nigel's lap dinged and everyone's eyes darted expectantly up to where he was sitting.
"We've got results," he said, fingers still flying across the keyboard.
"Well," Garret said in his usual impatient tone.
"It's a match. The blood on the bottom of the paper is Emma's," Nigel said sadly, his head dropped low on his chest. This situation brought back the same bad memories of Sarah when Maddie had gone missing. He only hoped that it had somewhat of the same ending; that, just as Maddie had been, Emma was returned home safe and sound, as happy and heathy as always.
The results seemed to have brought out a grim realization among the crowd, that and the fact that sirens could be heard blaring down towards their street seemed to have brought out the worst in everyone. Jordan shuffled closer to Woody, tears pooling on the brim of her eyes. But her stubborness and pride prevented her from letting them spill over. Woody stood up from his chair and placed himself gently down beside Jordan, wrapping his arm around her tired shoulders. She leaned he exhausted body against his chest, resting her head against his shoulder. His hand flew instinctivly up to her head as he brushed stray pieces of her dark hair that reminded him so much of Emma's out of her eyes.
Even then, in the comfort and safety of Woody's arms, did she allow her tears to take over. There was something inside her that prevented her from showing others her weaknesses, something that seemed to make her think that she needed to maintain this persona of indestructability. Woody wrapped his other arm around her tiny body, forming a tight, protective circle around her, allowing her to wrap her arms around him and cling onto the back of his shirt for support. She closed her eyes and took deep, steadingly breaths, breathing in the scent of his familiar, masculine colonge, the smell she missed so much over the past five years.
A sudden knock at the front door pulled her reluctantly out of he stuppor and she opened her eyes, head piviting in the direction of the door but not moving from her comfortable spot. Garret answered the door, a dozen police officers following after him, followed by the CSU unit.
"I think you should see this," one of the detectives said, handing an envelope to Jordan who still hadn't moved from Woody's embrace. "It was found in the mailroom back at the precinct. It's addressed to the two of you," he said quietly.
Jordan looked up at Woody who nodded in encouragement. She slit open the fold on the envelope, pulling out another piece of paper. She gasped in shock and awe as her gaze fell upon a picture. Above her, Woody felt his stomach convulse in sickness. The picture was of Emma, though it was not one that Jordan had ever taken. She was lying against the wall of a dark cement room, her body lying on the floor, head propped up by the wall, her blue eyes opened wide in fright, chestnut brown hair scattered haphazardly over her face, blood like a fountain pouring from a bullet wound in her chest.