Speaking into her cell phone with a touch of frustration in her voice, she says, "This is Detective Nelson. I'm with Detective Molina, and we're waiting to meet with you in Threat Management. Captain, please call or text me, and let me know if you are on your way." After leaving the message, she places her cell phone on the desk where it's visible. "We should just go ahead and get started without the captain; I'm sure she'll be here soon. You may have heard the rumors floating around about what happened to Lt. Flynn two days ago." She studies the man's face for a reaction, but his face remains impassive. "I need to get you up to speed because this case has turned into much more than a simple robbery and attempted homicide." Reaching into the briefcase on the floor by her side, she picks up a thick file, and hands it to Detective Molina. "Here's all the information we have on a man named Mark Evans. Two days ago, Lt. Andy Flynn was attacked in Captain Sharon Raydor's condo in the middle of the afternoon. We believe Mark Evans is the man who attacked the lieutenant, and he has been stalking the captain."

"What were the men doing in her condo?" asks Molina.

"Lt. Flynn stopped by the condo to do a favor for the captain's son. The boy needed some paperwork for college; the captain was busy at work, so Flynn went to her condo to retrieve the paperwork. He expected the place to be empty, but he heard a noise in the master bedroom, and went to investigate. Mark Evans was hiding in the closet; when Flynn looked in the closet, he was jumped by Evans who hit him in the head with one of the captain's shoes, and then punched him in the stomach before running out of the condo.

"The attacker used a shoe from the closet and his fist?"

"That's correct. He was apparently unarmed at that point," Nelson answers.

"What do you mean at that point?"

"Well, Flynn pursued him out to the parking garage where Evans attempted to run him down with his vehicle. They actually fought in the vehicle, and Evans took Flynn's gun off him before throwing Flynn from the vehicle and driving away. Flynn sustained some injuries and spent the rest of the afternoon and evening at the hospital."

"Why was Evans in the condo?"

"Robbery was our initial thought, and that's correct, but there's a lot more to it than that," answers Nelson. As Detective Molina opens his mouth to ask another question, Nelson's phone rings. "That's probably the captain now," Nelson says while reaching for her phone. Frowning at the unfamiliar number on the screen, she answers and has a brief conversation with Lt. Provenza, "No, the captain is not with me. She is supposed to be, but she's running late."

Provenza replies, "She had to go to Cedars-Sinai to check on her ex-husband, who was admitted early this morning, but I've called her a couple of times and she hasn't responded. Please have her call me when you hear from her."

"Yes, I certainly will," she responds before hanging up.

"We can meet later today if you need time to locate her," states Molina.

"No, she's probably just running late. We should continue our briefing. It's vital for Threat Management to get involved. We really need your help. The more I learn about Mark Evans, the more he scares me."

Captain Sharon Raydor is also scared. As she steps out of the hospital with Evans, she loosens her grip around his waist. This provokes him to hold her even tighter, and place his mouth close to her left ear. "Sharon, my angel, don't do anything stupid. Keep your arm around me; just act natural or you'll be the first of many victims this morning. I don't even need to use a gun; I have a scalpel; your death will be swift and silent if you don't cooperate." Walking under the portico, they pass a dozen people entering the hospital. She looks at each person they pass; some spare her a quick glance, but most are lost in their own world. They have problems of their own; some are entering the hospital as a patient; some are visiting a sick friend or family member. None of them suspect the pair walking away from the entrance is anything but what they appear to be: a loving couple walking arm-in-arm to the parking garage.

Inside the hospital, the detective, tied up on the floor in the bathroom of Room 933, is resting his muscles and vocal chords for just a minute. He has fought against his restraints until he has rubbed skin and hair off his arms and legs. Screaming with a mouth full of gauze, and his mouth taped shut has proven ineffective. He has no idea a nurse has entered the room to hang a new IV bag. She slips and almost falls in the puddle of clear IV fluid on the floor; looking down she sees the plastic tubing has been cut, and is no longer attached to the patient. Looking at the empty bed, she is puzzled. The patient's chart is located on a clip hanging off the end of the bed; she looks at the chart to find the patient's name. "Mr. Raydor, are you in there?" she asks while knocking on the bathroom door. She can hear noise prompting her to open the door, but it's locked. There's definitely noise and the sound of someone struggling in the bathroom, so she hurries out of the room to find a key.

Evans and Sharon head to the far end of the parking garage. She knows the odds of getting out of this mess unharmed go down with every step she takes. Evans constantly scans the area for people; there's nothing but cars, and a trash can that's attached to a concrete pillar. He tells her to stick her hand under the trash can, and get his keys. She just stares at him; he repeats himself, and she complies. She stoops down next to the trash can, and sticks her right hand under it; it's sticky; she can't locate the keys. "More to the right," he says. Moving her hand to the right, she feels the keys; scooping them up, she stands and shakily holds them out. He takes them from her with his right hand, keeping the gun, hidden in the sling, trained on her. They walk twenty more feet to a black Cadillac CTS parked with the nose of the car pointing out of the space. She noticed a few security cameras when they entered the parking structure; however, there doesn't seem to be any cameras in the immediate vicinity of them at the moment. That's probably why he chose this space, she thinks to herself. Squeezing between the Cadillac, and the car parked next to it with Sharon in front of him, they walk to the rear of the vehicle. I have to do something, I have to do something is the mantra playing over and over in her head, but she can feel the barrel of the gun digging into her back, and the thought of the scalpel glinting in the sunlight turns her stomach. Evans pops the trunk using the key fob. She dreads what's going to happen next: being confined in a small, dark space is one of her biggest fears.

Ray Campos is enjoying his second cup of coffee when he realizes he's being paged to the ninth floor, stat. As physical plant manager, he has never heard his name paged in the three years he has been employed at Cedars-Sinai. There's too many people waiting for the elevators; he decides to take the stairs, two at a time. By the seventh floor, he realizes he made a mistake. He's sucking wind and hasn't moved for four minutes.

The detective can't move. He's on his stomach wedged between the toilet and the wall, wondering why it's taking so damn long to open the bathroom door.

Captain Sharon Raydor can wiggle her fingers and feet, but that's it. In under a minute, Evans forced her into the trunk; he had her hands and feet bound together, and her mouth gagged and taped shut using supplies he'd stowed in the trunk. She is now stowed in the trunk, curled up in a ball, lying on her side with her head resting on the pillow he provided because, as he told her before closing the trunk on her, "I don't want you to be unduly uncomfortable."

As each minute ticks by, Detective Nelson grows more uneasy during the briefing with Detective Molina. She checks her phone often to see if the captain has responded to her message. She has supplied every piece of information she has to Molina. He's studying the computer generated note found in the backpack, and the note written on papyrus that was attached to the gift basket. It is our destiny is the last sentence of both notes. As he's pondering the significance of that sentence, Nelson picks up her phone to call the captain one more time.

Ray Campos finally makes it to the ninth floor nurse's station where a small crowd has gathered. There's a couple of nurses, a housekeeper, and even a few patients standing around gawking at the noise and confusion. "Sorry it took me so long to get here. What's going on?" he asks.

One of the nurses says, "Follow me." She explains as they make their way down the hall that the patient in Room 933 is not able to communicate or unlock the bathroom door. "I can't locate the key," she says as they enter the room. Campos fingers the set of master keys attached to his belt, and approaches the bathroom door. It takes him a couple of tries, but he finally unlocks the door. He and the nurse can't believe what they see. She reacts quickly, and begins searching for the scissors in the plastic bin near the detective's head. The scissors aren't in the bin where she left them earlier. She rushes back to the nurse's station to retrieve another pair.

Mark Evans is in no real rush; he buckles up, puts his sunglasses on, and turns up the radio before pulling out of the parking space. "Walking on Sunshine" is playing on the 80s station, and that's one of his favorite songs. He sings along at the top of his voice, "I'm walking on sunshine, and don't it feel good." Yep, he thinks, it feels damn good. Today just might be the best day of my life. He pulls up to the small booth located at the exit ramp of the parking garage. All he has to do is pay the parking attendant, and be on his way. He lowers his window, reaches into the center console, picks up the ticket, and hands it to the attendant. A few seconds pass, and the attendant says, "That'll be five dollars." They complete the transaction. The attendant says, "Have a nice day." Evans just looks at the man in the booth and gives him a big smile before driving away.