Lindsay woke up feeling warm and fuzzy. She smiled and rolled in her blanket. It smelled like hay. She wondered if she was back in the barn in Montana. She used to make out with her old boyfriend, Stevie Bennet, up in the hayloft where her parents wouldn't go because of the rotting ladder. She smiled. Stevie – she hadn't thought of him in a while. Maybe she'd open her eyes and see him, braces, gangly legs and all, lying beside her. Maybe that would make sense, because nothing else did. When she opened her eyes, though, all she saw was her little baby, swaddled in his blue quilted blanket. She sat up quickly. Blood rushed to her head, and she had to lean on the side of the cold, metal box she seemed to be in.
She pulled the sleeping baby into her lap. The box swayed back and forth with creaks and shakes of the walls. Lindsay held Dominic tighter to her chest. He gave a little grunt and turned towards her.
"You hungry, baby?" she asked softly. She really didn't see what else she could offer him besides a hug, a kiss, and milk. She held him to her chest and lifted her baggy shirt and pulled down her bra cup. She winced as he latched on. As he sucked, she looked around the little box, and decided that she must be in a truck. She could hear a dull roar, presumably of the traffic outside.
Once Dominic had finished, she pulled up her bra and slowly brought her shirt down. The shirt smelled like Danny. Hell, it was Danny's. None of her old clothes fit her, same with the maternity clothes she'd accumulated over her pregnancy. She'd resorted to sweats and Danny's baggy shirts. This particular one was gray and worn, with a small hole near the bottom hem and another right at the end of the long sleeve.
Dominic needed to be burped, so she took a blanket next to the one she'd been resting on and threw it over her shoulder. She carefully placed Dominic on her shoulder and patted his back.
The truck swayed and creaked, and the dull roar of the traffic became less and less. Dominic opened his eyes and looked up at his mother. Lindsay held him in her lap, cushioning his body with the thick, quilted blanket. She made happy noises and touched his hands. He made sniffling noises back and tiny little grunts that reminded her of Danny when he slept.
"We'll be fine, baby. We're going to be fine. If I can't fix this, then Daddy's going to come get us in just a little bit, and we'll all go home," she said in her happy baby voice. "Because he loves us so-o-o much. He's going to come get us. And if he doesn't know where we are, I'll fix this. We'll be fine, baby, don't worry," she cooed.
Dominic didn't seem to worry. He grunted and moved his fingers at Lindsay's soft curls, which glowed gold in the light that drifted from the vents in the top of the metal box.
"Have you checked her cell phone?" Danny asked, leaning over the edge of Adam's chair. Maybe it's on. Check it."
Adam typed quickly, bringing up her number on the screen and checking to see where it was. It was just where he'd expected it to be, at Danny and Lindsay's address.
Danny rubbed his eyes with the back of one hand. "Check my cell phone. Maybe she took it."
"It's in your pocket, Danny," Adam said softly.
Danny stomped off without warning and headed into the layout room. Stella was there, reviewing Lindsay's files. Danny nodded hello to her and sat, taking a huge stack of the cases Lindsay had worked on before her pregnancy.
He thumbed through them, acquainting himself with felons and suspects of all types, searching for something, anything.
"Got something," Stella said.
Danny dropped his case file and sat up.
"She didn't … I totally forgot about this, I swear. She never told you, she didn't want it to be a big deal, so –"
"Spit it out," Danny snapped.
"She was hit by a suspect a few weeks before she went off field duty."
"Name?" Danny asked.
"Roger Towers. Some unknown actor. Evidence fingered him as the killer of a nineteen year old girl. When Lindsay and Angell went to talk to him, the guy slapped Lindsay. Angell smacked him back and arrested him for assaulting an officer."
Danny stood up. "Let's go talk to him."
"Danny, we have no evidence that he …"
"What's the address?" He grabbed the file and scanned it, then jogged out of the room.
"Danny!" Stella called. She groaned in exasperation and called Flack to go keep an eye on him.
"You didn't have to hit him so hard, man," Flack rebuked as he drove back to the lab.
"He deserved it," Danny sniffed, staring out the window.
"He didn't take them. His dentist said he was there all day, undergoing a root canal."
"So? He still hit her."
"Well you didn't have to hit him in the jaw. It was probably sore already."
"Good," Danny grunted. "Now could you go any slower? Put the lights on. We gotta get back to the lab."
Don sighed, but did what he was told. He sped past the other cars, weaving in and out of traffic. "There's not much you or I can do right now, Danny," he said softly.
"We can try," Danny said firmly. "We'll only get her back if we try."
"We are trying, Dann-o. Everyone's working overtime. Everyone's worried. We're doing all we can. We are gonna find her, we just need time."
"We can do more," Danny said gruffly. His phone rang. He picked it up halfway through the first ring. He listened quietly for a moment before motioning to Flack to turn around.
"You sure? He's been lookin' at me?" Danny said quickly. "Great. Perfect."
"Where to?"
"A guy from my old neighborhood. Friend of Sassone. Stella says he's been lookin' into me. He tried to bribe some guy who works at the lab to get my file. He got a parking ticket two blocks from our place. He's been watchin' me. Take a right here."
"So I'll ask you again. Where. Are. They." Danny held his fist up, ready to hit Carlo Bernouli's face again.
"I dunno, I swear," the guy whimpered, speaking around the pool of blood in his mouth. "I dunno, I never took 'em."
Flack looked around uneasily at the greasy apartment. "Danny, maybe we should –"
"Shut it, Flack. Now I'm gonna ask you again," Danny said roughly, pulling out his gun. He shoved it under the man's chin, forcing his eyes to meet with Danny's. "Where is my family?"
Carlo started to whimper. "I … please, Messer, I never took anybody. Sonny told me to keep watch on your place. He wanted to figure out what you were up to, that's all, I swear, man, please," he sobbed, "please don't kill me. I got a wife."
"Yeah?" Danny grunted. "Well so do I. And if I find out you took her, your wife will be a widow. Got it?"
Carlo nodded and gasped heaving breaths as Danny let him fall to the floor. He brushed past Flack and headed out of the apartment, leaving Carlo panting and crying on the floor.
"Your wife?" Flack asked softly as they left the apartment.
"She will be." As soon as she gets home. 'Right time,' my ass. She's getting married to me the second she comes home.
Lindsay turned her head quickly when the sliding end of the metal box opened. She blinked in the sunlight, though it was dusky and nearly dark out. She picked up Dominic and held him to her chest.
She kept silent, sitting and watching and letting her eyesight adjust so she could identify the figure at the end of the box.
"Get out," the figure called. "Now."
Lindsay crept out, holding Dominic tight to her chest. He'd fallen asleep in the past few hours. When she had been home with Danny, they'd joked that he was nocturnal – awake and cranky at night, sleepy and calm during the day.
She sat on the edge of the box, letting her body recover from the cramped position. She let herself fall carefully to the ground, absorbing the shock from the baby.
She recognized the figure before her in no time. She gaped at the person, nearly tripping as she walked towards the dark house.
"Why?" she asked, holding the baby close.
"Isn't it obvious? Revenge," the figure retorted, and pushed her onto the porch.
A shaggy lump of a man answered the door wearing filthy jeans and no shirt. Lindsay was transfixed by his hairy chest, until she was pushed into the dark house.
"Watch her until I get this worked out," the figure hissed.
"I can't do that," the shaggy man hissed back.
"You, sit!" the figure spat at Lindsay. Lindsay sat down in the chair to which the figure pointed. The shaggy man tied her ankles to it and taped her chest. They left Lindsay to hold the baby with her untied hands while the two went into the kitchen.
Lindsay heard their murmured voices, falling and rising in volume, until, finally, the shaggy man came back into the room. He looked at Lindsay, rocking the baby slowly, and grunted. The figure left, locking the front door.
"Want food?" the shaggy man asked.
Lindsay nodded. She mentally took down every characteristic of his, from the limping walk to his blonde mane and the scar on the curve of his nose. She was preparing to identify him, if she ever got out of this mess.
"Daddy's coming," she promised Dominic. "Just a little more."
Dominic sniffled.
The shaggy man returned holding a hunk of bread, which he fed to Lindsay. She wanted to spit it out, sensing the stale crunch and the lack of flavor, but she knew that it was better for Dominic if she ate.
She let herself pretend that Danny was feeding her toast, like he had no more than a day or so ago. She closed her eyes and imagined his slow breathing, his soft chuckle, and his soft touch to her face.
She opened her eyes to see that it was the shaggy man whose hand was resting on her cheek. She nudged it off with a flick of her head.
"Let the baby go," she hissed. "Let him go and I'll do what you want."
The shaggy man shook his head. "Just do what I tell you, and you'll live."