"Yeah." Ashe nodded, his eyes downcast.
"Honey, you're only grounded one more week, and then you can play with Sali. School will be out, too, so you can help watch over Edward and the others."
"Mom, we need to find out if those kids can do anything that might get them killed. And they need to know not to leave Cloud Chief unless somebody's with them."
"I hope this has driven that lesson home, honey."
"It kind of has, Mom, but I still have the feeling that there's something going on with the rest of them that isn't affecting me, somehow." Ashe wasn't about to bring up Renegar; the blue-skinned Larentii said that Ashe was unreadable. The other six half-Elemaiyan children had been easy enough for Ren to locate. It made sense that the Elemaiyan hunters might possess the same talent.
"We can't know that for sure. Why don't you read or watch TV for a while?"
"I think I'll read." Ashe hadn't read anything for fun all week. He walked through the middle door and clumped downstairs. Ren was waiting for him at the bottom.
"I'm very sorry," Ren seemed sad. "I could not tell you she'd escaped, but you did realize quickly that she gained her abilities."
"How did you find that out?" Ashe shouldered past the taller child as he walked toward his bedroom.
"I placed Nexus Echo on Salidar's father and on the agents, so I know about the investigations."
"You know who the murderer is." Ashe turned sharply to stare at the Larentii youth.
"Ashe, I am not allowed to interfere." Ren's contrition was evident.
"But you are interfering. With me." Ashe wiped away the tear he couldn't hold back. "You stand there and tell me you have information you can't give while I watch people die. Do you know how frustrated and helpless that makes me feel? Do you?" Ashe stalked through his bedroom door and slammed it behind him, leaving Ren standing in the hall outside, worried that he'd lost his friend.
* * *
"Ashe made a good suggestion, Aedan. He says we should find out if any of those other children might have shown some kind of ability," Adele told Aedan as he stopped at the house for a brief break before Adele went to bed.
"It isn't a bad idea, but how do we find these things out? I have no idea what the talents might be, so how do you ask or test for these things? We still don't know how Ashe discovered his talents or when. And these children are older than he was when he developed them." Aedan shook his head in confusion.
"Ashe is always ahead of the curve, Aedan," Adele pointed out. "What if these others are ripe to develop these talents? Do we have any information from the Director or those agents regarding the average age these children are disappearing? Perhaps we shouldn't gauge the dead ones against the ones that are counted as missing? There are two sides in this; two sides that are hunting these children for two very different purposes, according to Mr. Winkler."
Had they known it, Ashe was in his bedroom surfing his computer, searching for the same information.
* * *
"Ren, you can't offer information, but will you tell me if I'm right?" Ashe hadn't spoken to the tall youth until then, but he hadn't chased Ren away when he'd appeared inside Ashe's bedroom.
"If you say what's true, I can confirm that," Ren nodded slightly.
"Good. What I'm seeing here is that the ones who disappeared, most of them anyway, came up missing around age fifteen or sixteen. That means their talents develop around that time. True?"
"Correct," Ren verified the information Ashe had gathered.
"Then how did I get mine before turning thirteen?" Ashe mumbled to himself.
"I cannot say, since I do not have an answer for that," Ren replied, although the question hadn't been aimed at him.
"Elizabeth was fifteen and a half; anyway that's what Luanne told us when we visited Wynn and Dori last week, so that fits," Ashe ignored Ren's statement, putting his musings together aloud. "Edward is already sixteen, so he may be able to do something and not even know it. Macy is seventeen, so same there. In fact, all of them are older than Elizabeth, so we may be sitting on a time bomb."
"Correct," Ren affirmed.
* * *
Jane Scott settled her cell phone on the kitchen counter after talking with a friend. Jane lived alone and after a long and trying day at the dress shop (would she have to cover for the charges made on a stolen credit card?), she settled for a microwaved dinner. Doors carefully locked and the alarm set, Jane waited for her meal to heat. Locked doors and an alarm failed to prevent the burly male from leaping through the picture window in Jane's living room. Jane screamed and reached for her cell as the alarm blared and a neighbor rushed toward Jane's home from next door, a loaded shotgun in his hands. The intruder clapped a hand over Jane's mouth and dragged the struggling woman toward her garage.
* * *
"How can this be a coincidence?" Marcus stared at Agent Lawford. "We're in her store this afternoon and tonight she's abducted? I don't doubt we'd be dealing with a body now if she hadn't had an alarm system and a neighbor who came running with a gun."
"I agree with Marcus," Aedan nodded slightly at the Cloud Chief Packmaster. "The kidnapper had no desire for discovery so he took the woman away in her own vehicle. It is a shame it was dark and the neighbor didn't get a good description."
"Agreed," Nick Lawford said. "The local sheriff has his employees searching, but so far there has been nothing. We have a search helicopter en route from Oklahoma City, but the woman may be dead before it arrives. Mr. Evans, will you allow Ashe to help with this?" Nick Lawford was begging that Ashe might help prevent Jane Scott's murder. He felt responsible, somehow, for sending the killer in her direction. Obviously, someone was keeping a very close watch on local events.
"You have a description of the vehicle and which direction it was heading?"
"Yes."
"Then we'll try."
Before Agent Lawford was prepared, Aedan lifted the tall black agent with one arm about his waist and rushed toward the Evans home so quickly Marcus almost missed the movement.
* * *
Ashe jerked in his seat when his father knocked on the bedroom door. Ren was still sitting on the end of Ashe's bed while Ashe did his best to locate more information regarding the missing children on his computer.
"Ashe, we need your help, son," Aedan walked inside Ashe's room with Agent Lawford right behind. Knowing Ren was shielding himself from visitors; Ashe stood and nodded silently at his father.