I am thrilled that you are all enjoying this story.

Steve and Frank stood against the hillside, in the open desert.

"I'm sure this is the right place" Steve announced in frustration as he verified the GPS reading

"There is no sign of anyone ever having been here, are you sure? Is it possible she may have given you the wrong coordinates? We are literally in the middle of nowhere." Frank questioned his daughter's motives. "Maybe she was afraid you'd come after her"

"No, I promised her I wouldn't. She promised me she would always let me know where she was. We had a deal" Steve insisted

"And I suppose you never break any promises to each other?" Frank doubted

"Never" Steve answered with the upmost confidence

Frank nodded "Yet, here you are"

"Here I am" Steve had never broken a promise to her before, but despite feeling guilty, he knew in his heart this was justified.

Frank could sense the disappointment in Steve's voice. He needed to get him to focus "Ok, let's look at this from a different angle. You are the cop here, how would you treat this if it were a crime scene?"

Steve looked around taking the time to think. "Ok…. We need to find something that looks out of place. Something that doesn't belong or a patch of disturbed sand, something… anything. There is no such thing as a perfect crime. If she was here, she had to have left some sign that she was here, some kind of clue."

The two men began to painstakingly examine the area. They lifted every stone, checked behind every shrub, and sifted through the grains of sand. They were once again losing hope when suddenly, Frank paused and released an uncontrollable grunt of laughter.

Steve looked up from his position and observed the man. He wasn't sure what to think of his sudden outburst. I think the man has finally lost it, he thought to himself. Approaching the man cautiously he asked. "Frank? Is everything ok?"

Frank held up a small rectangular sheet of clear cellophane wrapper. "She was here!" he announced

Steve reached out, held the wrapper between his fingers and joined Frank in the fit of laughter.

"She hasn't broken that habit, I see" Frank looked at Steve as the two men now sat on the ground passing the wrapper to each other as if it would bring them closer to her.

"She steals those candies from every restaurant we go to. Not just one or two, but handfuls, it's embarrassing" Steve rubbed his eyes to stop the tears of laughter running from them. "She eats them when she's thinking, when she's nervous, actually she eats them all the time. Who knew this would how we find her. "

"This is our trail of breadcrumbs" Her father snickered "When she was 6, she ran away from home because her mother wouldn't let her wear makeup to school. She left a trail of wrappers leading to the neighbor's tree house. I thought her mother was going to kill her. "

"She was stubborn then too, huh?" Steve's laughter subsided

"She was born stubborn." He sighed as his fingers pressed against the plastic wrapper "This isn't the neighbor's treehouse"

"We will find her" Steve tried to reassure the man. "Now we know she was here and judging by the previous coordinates we have, it seems as if she is heading in that direction" Steve pointed north "we go that way"

Frank regained his composure. "I think you are right, let's get going, we still have a few more hours of daylight"

The two men returned to their jeep and headed in that general direction. They drove for a few hours with nothing in site.

"There is a canyon up ahead, why would she be heading straight for a dead end. I don't like this at all" Frank made his fears known

As they approached the edge of the ridge, they noticed an area that had clearly been recently disturbed.

Steve screeched to a halt, as the two men stared at what appeared to be a makeshift grave. The mound of dirt and sand, the disturbed shrubbery and the visible tire tracks, were all bad signs. They both knew that if Catherine were there and left voluntarily, she would have painstakingly covered her tracks and would have left no signs of ever being there.

"Maybe she wasn't here" Steve hoped "Maybe this wasn't her camp" He didn't want to think that the shallow grave may be her's.

The men sat in the jeep, neither wanting to be the first to examine the camp. Both men feared the same thing. They were paralyzed with fear and dread, as the sun began to set over the canyon.

As the sun settled, a ray had caught a shiny object causing it to shimmer in its light. It had caught Frank's attention as he darted from the jeep and rushed toward the object. He knelt and grabbed a handful of wrappers. "She was here!" he announced in a panic and without hesitation began to uncover what he thought was a grave with his bare hands.

Steve ran over to him and joined in. To both their relief the shallow grave was empty. Both men sat back and sighed as the frustration and exhaustion began to take its toll.

"Judging by the angle of this fox hole, she was using it as a vantage point. But what was she looking at?" Steve's eyes began to wander. There has to be something we are missing, He thought to himself. Something in the distance caught his eyes. "Look, over there! Hand me those binoculars"

Peering through them, he noticed the abandoned bunker that was nestled against the dunes. "Here, what do you make of that? " He handed Frank the binoculars

"Looks like a Taliban training facility of some sort, I see three guards, but there may be more. Do you think they have her?" His biggest fears were becoming realized.

"I don't know" Steve paused as he looked around. "Look!" He pointed to an area behind some shrubs.

Both men stood and moved closer.

"Bike tracks. Cath said she was traveling by motor bike and here" he pointed just a few feet away "we have four tracks, looks like a truck"

"Oh God! So they did take her?" Frank's voice trembled

"No, I don't think so, the tracks are heading in that direction" He pointed in the opposite direction of the bunker.

"All right, so what are we waiting for? Let's go! Let's follow the tire tracks." Frank announced as he and Steve darted towards the Jeep.

TBC

Don't forget: Steve and Frank have no idea that Catherine is with Doris and Joe.

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