Текст книги "Shattered Secrets"

Автор книги: Karen Harper

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Текущая страница: 4 (всего у книги 19 страниц)

“See you later, Marva!” Tess called as she got back in her car.

She turned down one country road and then another, just driving, thinking. Finally, she found herself stopping at the spot where a man in a pickup truck had seen her walking dazed along the road eight months after she’d disappeared. Eight months! And she couldn’t really recall one thing about her time away.

No cars were coming from either direction. Tess stopped and, sitting in her car with tears in her eyes, thanked the Lord for letting her be found in this very place—well, somewhere along here, Mom had said. And she prayed Sandy Kenton and the two other missing girls would be found safe and sound and soon.

5

“Is it true? Another girl gone?” Mayor Reese Owens shouted at Gabe as he ducked under the yellow police tape across the front door of the gift shop and exploded into the room. That’s the way Gabe always thought of the man’s entrances—explosions. Reese would have made a great national politician with his dramatic actions and shoot-from-the-hip comments.

“Sandy Kenton is missing—true,” Gabe told him, gesturing for Reese to keep his voice down. “But by the same kidnapper as the others, not sure yet because of the different M.O.” He put his hands on Reese’s shoulders and backed him up to keep him away from the Kentons, who were huddled together at the checkout desk. He didn’t want Reese lecturing Lindell that this was her fault. Reese loved to play the blame game.

“Yeah, well,” Reese said, not taking the hint to keep his voice down, “besides being desperate to get his hands on another one, maybe he wants to make a point about Teresa Lockwood coming back—like a warning to her to shut up or get out of here.”

“It’s been well publicized Tess—she goes by Tess now—has amnesia about her time away.”

“So? People get over amnesia. She’ll just draw media interviews—especially when this gets out, which it has. I already got a call from my wife and a Columbus TV station. I want publicity for the town, but not this again.”

Reese was out of breath, but he was also out of shape. At least eighty pounds too heavy, he was all swagger and stuffing. Years ago, Reese had married one of the richest women around, Lillian Montgomery, whose grandfather had once been governor of the state, and that gave him instant clout. He owned the hardware store and a lot of property in town, not to mention he was one of the first Lake Azure investors.

In his mid-fifties, Reese had thinning auburn hair and a rising forehead—and usually a rising temper. Dealing with the man was one of the challenges of Gabe’s job, enough to sometimes make him wish he still headed up a bomb squad in Kirkuk.

“Listen, Reese, I’ve called in outside help, and we’ll have a civilian search party fanning out in about half an hour.” He sat the man down on a bale of hay under an array of big yarn spiders and cobwebs, then perched beside him. “If you can handle the media while I head up the search, that will be a big help.”

“Nothing’s going to help if this is that same SOB again. I mean, what are we, rural rubes, can’t track someone who’s struck more than once at the same time of year, then disappears until he wants another kid? I know you’re young and partly riding on your pa’s reputation, only in your first term, but—”

Gabe interrupted him before he heard the rest. The last thing he needed from this man was to be blamed for any of this. That cut too close to his own guilt feelings for losing Teresa all those years ago.

“That reminds me,” Gabe said. “I’ve got to call in Sam Jeffers and his hunting dog. I swear his hounds can follow any trail.” He dug his phone out of his utility belt and started skimming through his phone book on it. “Years ago, when Teresa was taken, the dog Sam had then got us partway across the field before the trail turned cold. And Sandy left a doll behind we can use to have him get the scent.”

“I’ll bet you and Jace have obscured that by now.”

“Mr. Mayor—how about you leave this to me and you handle the outsiders?” Gabe said, trying to keep his own temper in check. He hit the phone number for Jeffers. No answer, no voice mail option. The guy was always out hunting this time of year. He’d probably turned his ringtone off so as not to scare his prey; so maybe he couldn’t help. Gabe’s gut fear was that maybe nothing could.

* * *

Tess almost drove into the Hear Ye compound again on her way home but decided she was too upset to see her family right now, especially the little ones. To her surprise, her cousin Lee was sitting on the front steps of her house with a bicycle leaned against the porch pillar.

“Lee!” she called as she got out and hurried toward him. He hugged her but didn’t look her in the eye. He seemed distracted and upset.

“Is everyone all right?” she asked. “Did you hear what happened in town?”

“That’s partly why I came to see you were okay. Reverend Monson announced it at the end of the church service.”

“A church service on a Tuesday?”

“Whenever it’s needed.”

“I guess it would be good to have everyone together for an announcement like that, to pray for the child, comfort each other and all.”

“Listen, you’re invited to come visit us.”

“Oh, that’s great. I can’t wait to see the kids. I almost stopped there today, you know, just to be with my family,” she confessed as he pulled the bike away from the porch and held it between them. It was an old one with fat tires and scraped paint. He rode that here a couple of miles on these hills? She wondered why he didn’t use their car, but she didn’t want to seem to criticize.

“And if you do come, can you help me with some dowsing?” he asked, his voice beseeching but his face worried. “I think I have a find, but I want to be sure if we’re going to drill for another well, and your power was always better than mine, even when you were so young. Both of us, a gift from our grandmother—and the Lord, of course.”

“But I haven’t pursued water witching,” Tess insisted. Tears sprang to her eyes. How could anyone talk about things other than the missing girl right now? How could life go on when she must be in mortal danger?

“Don’t ever call it water witching,” Lee said, giving his bike a shake when he probably wished he could shake her. “Water dowsing or, better yet, water divining. Like I said, a divine gift and not to be taken lightly. Tess, both your father and mine had the gift.”

“My father quit doing it before he left.”

“Yeah, well, it still meant something to him. His dried willow wands—branches—are still in a corner of the basement inside. That’s like an omen, a sign from God, so quit stalling.”

“They’re downstairs? He kept them? But if I don’t feel comfortable helping, does that mean I’m not to see your family?” she challenged, finally realizing she felt hostile vibes. She always thought that Lee had wanted Gracie to steer clear of her as phone calls and visits had waned over the past few years. And as Lee had been more and more sucked into the religious group that Gracie had evidently, finally embraced too.

“Sure, you can visit anyway,” he insisted, frowning. “I just would appreciate your help with the willow wand, that’s all. I’ll still hold it if you just want to watch. A new well would benefit everyone, you know, Kelsey and Ethan too.”

He knew her soft spot for kids. Even as she agreed to help him tomorrow afternoon, she thought again of the little Kenton girl she’d never met, but—if she’d been taken—Tess’s heart and soul were right there with her.

* * *

When Tess heard on the radio that a citizen search team had fanned out from the gift shop until dark, she cursed herself that she’d fled the town so fast. She would have helped with that, even if people stared or whispered or—like Marian Bell—asked her what she remembered. Then again, the radio and television people, no doubt, newspaper reporters too, would be around by now. Only a few times over the years had a reporter or a true-crime author located her in Michigan and wanted an interview, which she and Mom had never agreed to, even though they could have used the money.

As dusk descended, Tess stayed inside her house using only a flashlight to get around even when strangers knocked on her door, rang the front bell or called her name.

Unfortunately, her posters in town worked against her when word got out that her phone number was on them. Hoping it would be Gabe on the phone, she answered her cell only to hear it was a reporter from Live at Five News from as far away as Cincinnati. She hung up without a word.

She ate a cold dinner and drank cider—nothing tasted good—and sat with the curtains closed, huddled on the floor in a corner of the living room with her knees pulled up to her chin, ignoring the knocks on her front and back doors, her name being shouted by reporters. Then finally—finally—a voice she wanted to hear came from outside.

“Tess, it’s Gabe! You in there? I’ve got everyone off your property. They went back into town! You’re not answering your phone. Tess?”

She ran to the back door but peered out before opening it.

She undid the bolt, the locks, and swung the door wide, only to have to unlock the storm door too.

“Did you find her?” she asked as he came up the steps and entered. He closed and locked the door behind him. She leaned against the kitchen counter. She had almost done the unthinkable, throwing herself into his arms and holding on tight like a kid.

“Wish I could say yes. The search and dragging part of the creek turned up nothing. Same story. Girl vanishes into thin air.”

“Like me and Jill Stillwell—Amanda Bell too.”

“Yeah. In broad daylight, without a cornfield, with her mother in the next room and while you and I were talking on Main Street.”

“You...you don’t think it was some sort of challenge or message to you or me. That someone else was taken so close to when I was?” she asked.

“No, I didn’t mean that. I’ve been comforting her family and getting the personnel we need here to find her fast. And it must have been someone she knew because she didn’t make a peep, even if she was—is—a friendly kid. Tess,” he said, stepping closer and taking her hands in his big, warm ones, “I gotta level with you. The fact that you came back home after being away for almost eight months, even if it was years ago, gives me a bit of hope for Sandy Kenton—Jill Stillwell too. There’s a thing called a golden window, a very short period of time—usually three hours, I’m afraid—when young children are kidnapped that they are likely to be kept alive, but you came back after a long time away.”

“Which is why people don’t want to believe me that I can’t recall anything to help. I wish I could, really, Gabe!”

“I believe you. Maybe we should finally let it out that you had needle marks in your arms, that you were probably drugged, maybe with some sort of amnesiac drug.”

Her nostrils flared, and she sniffed hard. She was shocked. Why had she not been told that? In a way, it helped. She snatched her hands from his grasp and moved out into the living room, where she had all the curtains drawn. With Gabe here she felt safe enough to snap on a light, and then she collapsed, weak-kneed, into one of the rocking chairs.

“I should have been told about the drugs!” she said when he followed her and sank wearily into the other rocker. Their feet almost touched, but neither of them moved their chairs except to tilt them closer together.

“The decision was made, with your mother’s approval,” he explained, “to keep the drug thing quiet.”

“And he was never caught, was he?” she shouted when she hadn’t meant to raise her voice. If you raised your voice, people got upset and you could be punished; she’d learned that from her father—or was it from someone else?

“No, he was never caught,” he said, tipping even farther forward in his chair with his elbows on his knees. “It’s the great regret of my father’s life. He started having heart trouble about then. But the failure to find you and then Jill—and the kidnapper—now may be my fault as well as my father’s.”

“I said before I don’t blame you.”

He nodded. “I want you to know, I told Marian Bell to steer clear of you. If she so much as glares your way, let me know. And I admit it would help if you could recall anything, anything at all.”

“About back then, nothing but being dragged off through the cornfield—and yes, maybe that something stuck me in the neck. Maybe drugged, right away.” She rubbed her arms through her sweater as if she could feel other needle marks there. She did remember tiny train tracks on her arms, that’s what she used to call them, but Mom never explained, even when she could have taken the truth.

In a sudden surge of need to help this man and the lost girl, Tess said, “I can tell you at least that Marva Thompson Green was home shortly after the abduction today, and Dane wasn’t. He was out in his van making Lake Azure house calls, according to her.”

Gabe sat up straight. His rocking chair jerked.

“How do you know that? Did you phone or see her? Did you see him or his van in town?”

“No, I stopped to talk to Marva at their place before I drove the back roads. I told her I was just returning her earlier visit and gave her some donuts since she’d brought me some baked goods.”

“Right when you came back Marva came to visit? To kind of feel out what you remembered?”

“Maybe. At least my mother did tell me where I was found wandering around the day I was recovered—and I’ve never really recovered,” she said. She stood so fast her chair rocked and bumped the back of her legs. “But I went there today.”

“Look,” Gabe said, rising too and stopping her with a strong grip on her elbow, “I don’t want you on deserted roads or around Dane’s place or letting him or Marva in here. You do know he was the prime suspect for a long time, don’t you?”

“Yes, at least someone saw fit to tell me that.”

“Tess, about the fact that you were drugged. It’s common police procedure to hold back some vital evidence, some piece of insider information that will be valuable when questioning a person of interest or preparing a trial after an indictment.”

“Don’t you—didn’t my mother—realize it would have helped me to know? If I was drugged, maybe that’s why I can’t remember, can’t help Marian Bell, the Stillwells and Sandy’s mother!”

“I didn’t—and don’t—want you to use that as an excuse. There can still be things you can recall, anything at all.”

“So you’re saying your offer to help and protect me was just a cover so you could hang close and see what you could shake out of me? Even before this poor girl was taken today?”

“I didn’t say that. No, that’s not true.”

“Well, see, Sheriff McCord, here’s my problem, one at least. I don’t know what’s true and what isn’t about my nightmares. I have them, sometimes at night, but flashes of things when I’m awake too.”

“What’s in the nightmares and flashes?”

“Feeling lost. A horrible feeling of dread. Like I have to flee something, but I don’t know what. Some kind of big machine, sometimes maybe a dinosaur, I think, and what sense does that make? Nothing I can clearly recall, and that’s worse than if there was some bogeyman I could face and try to fight or conquer!”

To her amazement, though she wanted to strike out at him, hit him, instead she threw herself into his arms. Breathing hard, he held her close for a moment. Her belly pressed against his gun belt, her thighs against his. He felt strong and steady, but he must be using her. She pushed back so hard against his rock-solid chest that she almost fell.

“Tess, honestly,” he said, grabbing for her arm again, though she shook him off. “Besides getting rid of the media mavens outside, I just stopped by to tell you that, even though I’m going to be working this new case day and night, you are not forgotten. Anyone bothers you, you let me know. Or if you recall anything in a bad dream or broad daylight. If you can’t get right through to me, call Ann or Peggy on the desk. If you call 911, you’ll get them too, and they’ll get me. Got that? Promise?”

Tess nodded jerkily, kept nodding. She blinked back burning, unshed tears. The weight of having experienced things that could save others, things just out of reach, pressed hard on her heart. For one moment, she thought she heard a roaring noise, felt something awful flapping in her face, but then it was gone.

After a quick squeeze of her shoulder, Gabe hurried toward the back door.

“Lock up behind me!” he called back to her.

Without another word, she followed and did as he said. But could she really lock him out of her life anymore? The man meant a lot to her, much more than the boy ever had. She wanted to help him, but he stirred strange feelings in her that she feared almost as much as her buried memories. Need. Even desire. Instead of locking him out in any way, she longed to let him inside her defenses.

6

The first thing Tess thought when she woke from a fitful sleep was that it was the twentieth anniversary of the day she was taken. Most anniversaries were happy, but this one—now that another girl was missing—felt doubly cursed.

As soon as it was daylight and she’d eaten breakfast, she turned on the basement light, took a flashlight too and went downstairs. The basement stairs creaked as she went down. It smelled a bit dank down here. She thought she should buy an air freshener in case anyone came to look at the house. Should she accompany potential buyers down here, or could that be dangerous? Since her kidnapper might still be in the area, he could try to test her to learn if seeing his face again would trigger a memory. Or would he think she should be silenced?

She knew she had to be wary today, stay strong. But even if horrible memories came flooding back, it would be worth it if she recalled something to help the poor child who’d gone missing and the girls who had been taken before.

Lee hadn’t exactly said where he’d seen her father’s dowsing wands. She could picture his collection of green, slender willow tree boughs. She wondered why Lee had kept them, if they were dry. Since Dad had been so skilled at dowsing, maybe Lee thought they had some special power, or that it would be bad luck to trash them. And why hadn’t Mom done that, especially after Dad deserted her?

Over the years Mom, Kate and Char had tried to explain to Tess that Dad’s leaving wasn’t her fault, though Dad had blamed Mom for letting a boy keep an eye on her, even if he was the sheriff’s son. She remembered their terrible arguments. But Kate and Char assured her that Dad was just looking for an excuse to leave, and it was cruel and wrong of him to blame their mother for something no one could predict or prevent. Could Gabe have prevented it?

Tess found a pile of six willow wands behind the furnace. She shone the flashlight on them. Of course, they were not supple and green anymore but dried and dusty. Lee’s father and hers, twin brothers, had possessed the gift to locate underground water by walking with a Y-shaped willow branch held out in front of them until it quivered in their hands. And most of the time, freshwater lay beneath.

She recalled her mother telling her about a sunny day, the Fourth of July the year she was taken, when her family was picnicking at a friend’s house. At age four, she had picked up the willow wand Dad had brought to show people. She had imitated him, walked with it toward their friend’s barn and felt the pull, a magnetism, making it quiver and tremble in her hands. Other times in the weeks of that late summer, Dad had tested whether her finds with the wand matched his, and they always had.

So, was that very willow wand among these? She touched them, stroked the top one. Some people thought dowsing was mere superstition or fakery, just chance finds or playing the odds. But others, especially older folks, believed it could find not only water but buried treasure, even lodes of precious ores. Some said it could point to graves, especially if the corpse had been buried with metal jewelry. If only, like a dowsing wand, she could find the thing that would point toward her buried memories!

She heard the ringtone of her cell phone, which she’d left in the kitchen. Taking the top willow wand with her, she dashed upstairs and grabbed the phone from the table.

“Hello?”

“Tess, it’s Kate. I can’t talk long. I’ve been making great progress on researching the Celts. I’m hopeful I can link their culture to the ancient Adenas of the American Midwest. Next time I’m home, I’m going to take a closer look at the burial mounds in our area because that could be another link to prove the Celts came to the eastern U.S. But I wanted to call you to see how you are. You know, especially today. I’ve been thinking about you. Are you back in Cold Creek to sell the house? How are you doing?”

“I’m here, and it was okay at first. But another girl was taken yesterday, like my coming back was a curse!”

“What? Taken from her backyard? Taken into the corn?”

“Taken from the back room of a gift shop uptown while her mother worked in the next room. It’s a shop on the site of the old police station.”

“That’s terrible. Listen now, you call Char and let her talk you through this. She’s better at that than me. And don’t you go blaming yourself, or fixin’ to hang around there to help.”

Tess bit her lip. Don’t you go blaming yourself...fixin’ to... Her big sister was calling from England. Kate Lockwood, high school valedictorian, full college scholarship recipient, Phi Beta Kappa, magna cum laude, professor and published author, could travel the world to study and teach ancient anthropology, but when she got upset, she still sounded like a southern Ohioan from Cold Creek. And she wouldn’t like to be reminded of that one bit.

“Tess, are you there? How’d you find the old place after Lee and Grace cleared out?”

“It’s pretty empty, but the ghosts are still here, if you know what I mean. I’ve got posters up all over town to advertise selling it. And I just found Dad’s old willow wands in the basement.”

“Witching wands, you mean?” she said, her voice turning sharp. “He should have taken them when he cleared out of our lives. You know, I looked up a lot about water divining once, even wrote an undergrad paper on it.”

“So what did you find out?” Tess asked, stroking the cracked wood of the old wand. At least that would get Kate off the subject of the house.

“You’re interested in dowsing? Okay, here’s what I recall...”

Here’s what I recall... The words echoed in Tess’s head. Again, she wished desperately she could recall who had taken her and where twenty years ago.

“So, besides dowsing appearing in artwork from ancient China and Egypt,” Kate was saying, obviously in her lecture mode, “some claim that when Moses and Aaron used a rod to locate water in the Bible, that was dowsing. Martin Luther called dowsing ‘the work of the devil.’ In more modern times, Albert Einstein believed in it, and during World War Two General George Patton—well, he believed in the paranormal anyway—had a willow tree flown to Morocco to find water to replace the wells the German army had blown up. And that reminds me, the Brits used dowsing in the Falklands, and in Vietnam the Americans used it to locate weapons and tunnels.”

“Your memory always amazes me, Kate. I’ll have to tell Lee about all that.”

“If he’s still so gung ho for that whacked-out religious cult, he probably couldn’t care less. But one more thing. I read that from time to time, some have used dowsing to track criminals or find missing persons. But don’t go telling the new Sheriff McCord about that, or he’ll think you’ve gone off the deep end. What’s he like all grown up?”

“Very dedicated. Really intense.”

“Intense? Tess, what does he look like?”

“Tall, broad shoulders. Icy blue eyes but dark hair. Black uniform. Strong but gentle...”

“Okay, okay. Intense about solving these crimes, you mean?”

“Yes, that’s what I mean,” Tess said, realizing she was sounding a bit shrill, as if she had to defend Gabe.

“So, is the town as diverse economically and socially as Grace has been telling you?” Kate blessedly changed the subject.

Tess explained the great divide in town and how that had changed things. But she told her how seeing Etta Falls at the old library made her feel as if she was in a time warp.

“She was so encouraging to me about reading and learning,” Kate said. “Especially the months you were—were gone—she tried hard to distract us with books Char and I would love, books for Mom on how to cope with loss, things like that. I remember our first-grade class went on a field trip to her house, because it still had one of the first pioneer cabins way out in the woods on their land. She showed us an old pistol and a family graveyard out back, but the tombstones were so old you couldn’t read a thing on them. And that mother of hers is like a historic relic herself.”

They talked too long, but Kate could probably afford it. Despite the great divide between her and her sisters—in education and ambition—she loved hearing their voices. Whatever her differences with them, she wished so much they were here to help and to hug.

* * *

Gabe recognized the older of the two BCI agents the minute he got out of the plain black car that had pulled in next to the blue-and-white mobile crime lab truck in the police parking lot. Despite it being two decades later, Gabe saw it was Victor Reingold, the agent who had worked with his father on Teresa Lockwood’s abduction, though he hadn’t been back to help with the second abduction nor had Gabe brought him in on Amanda’s case.

Gabe hurried over to meet the agents. Reingold’s shock of unruly hair had gone white, but his brown, hooded eyes looked as sharp as ever. He walked with a slight limp, and almost always dressed in black, like Batman without a cape, Gabe used to think. The man in the lab truck was a lanky blond wearing rimless glasses and a dark blue jacket with BCI emblazoned on the back. He looked as uptight as Reingold looked at ease and in control. Gabe thought the younger guy might as well have Forensics Techie tattooed on his forehead.

“Glad the posse’s here,” Gabe told them, shaking first Reingold’s hand and then the other man’s. “Sheriff Gabe McCord,” he told them, though he guessed that was pretty obvious.

“Mike Morgan,” the younger man said. “I usually do lab forensics, so I’m glad to be out in the field, especially on this one. I have three young daughters, so I’m all in.”

“Remember me, Gabe?” Reingold said as Gabe led them toward the building.

“I sure do, Agent Reingold.”

“You were pretty young on that first case and pretty upset about being so close to it. Tough on you and on your dad as sheriff. He was a very good man, Gabe. My sympathies on his death. Glad to be back on the job with you to get this longtime pervert, but sorry it happened again. I was on special assignment in Washington, D.C., on the second abduction, but I kept up on things. So let’s do this. And call me Vic, okay?”

“Thanks, Vic. Mike, you too,” he said as he opened the door to the station for them. He knew the BCI agents liked to assess local facilities and staff before possibly calling for more help. He introduced them to Ann and Peggy, then, pointing things out, gave them a brief tour of the station.

As he walked them back to his office, he gave them the rundown. “The crime scene’s a cluttered storage room of a gift shop, where we bagged the doorknobs.”

“Good work,” Mike said. “We can even track palm prints now. Ohio was the test case for that. And our databases for fingerprints use the automated APHIS system and are FBI connected.”

“Outside of that storage room,” Gabe told them, “it’s a long shot, but I’ve got a local guy coming in, a tracker with a good nose dog to sniff the child’s doll and see what that gets us. But I figured you’d want to fine-tooth comb the crime scene first. We did an exterior search with local volunteers beyond the alley that runs behind the stores near the creek, and dragged the water where it’s deep. We found nothing—just like the other two or three takes.”

“Or three?” Vic demanded, scrutinizing the huge map taped on the wall of Gabe’s office. It was a site map he’d inherited from his father and had been updating. “I thought I’d read up on everything—but three previous to this Sandy Kenton?” Vic asked, turning to stare at Gabe.

“I think the possible number three, Amanda Bell, was a child snatched by her father, who left the country. He’s hard to find but we think he’s in South America. I’ve worked on the case, and the family has hired a private detective. The mother will probably be after you as soon as she hears you’re around.”

“Hard to believe it’s been twenty years since that first abduction—my case,” Vic said, turning back to the map and thumping his index finger on the site of the Lockwood house. “But Teresa Lockwood’s surviving was pure chance, so I intend, just like you, to solve this fast.”

“Teresa goes by Tess now and she’s back in town briefly to sell her family homestead, the crime scene.”

“Recall the place well, and her, when we finally got her back,” Vic said, turning to look at him with narrowed eyes again. “Traumatized, drugged, been beaten, a real pretty little girl. Were the others blonde and good-looking too?”

“Not a common factor. I’ve got dossiers and all kinds of stuff on each victim you can look over.”

“Great. You bet I will.”

Gabe saw the man still had an unusual habit he remembered. He chewed wooden toothpicks to a wet pulp, then spit them out. If only these abducted kids had had some sort of habit where they left a trail, other than maybe a scent.

“Yeah, the dog on the scent trail’s worth a try,” Vic said as though he’d read Gabe’s mind. “We could call in a K-9 unit, but time’s of the essence. We’ll just have to make sure you’re with the guy, step for step. But remember, he ain’t nothing but a hound dog, and we’ve got two leads right under our own noses. Number one, the abduction scene. Let’s see the gift shop storeroom, where Mike can start working, but then let’s you and me, Gabe, go pay a call on our ace in the hole, Teresa Lockwood.”