Page 66 of Chasing Dreams
“Sometimes.”
“Can you fall asleep dreaming of the people who lived here, raised families...?”
“Made whoopee in this bed every Saturday night,” he finished.
Laughing, she threw a pillow at him.
* *
Austin called Ken in the morning, and after a quick breakfast in the inn’s dining room, he and Shaine set out to meet him at a roadside cafe a short distance from the convenience store where the white Corsica had shown up.
Once there, Austin led Shaine to a booth. “Shaine, this is Ken McKade. Ken, Shaine Richards.”
“Miss Richards.” He was a little older than Austin, not as filled out, with dark hair graying at the temples. He wore a pair of brown slacks with a neutral shirt and tie.
“Call me Shaine,” she said.
“All that exercise is paying off, Allen,” he said, with a wry grin. “If it’s possible, you’re more fit than you were years ago.”
Austin shrugged. He ordered coffee and brought the conversation to the point. “Shaine is the one who saw her nephew alive.”
“Saw him?” Ken asked. “How?”
“She saw him in a dream.”
“Oh.” Obviously used to Austin’s extrasensory skills, he accepted that information and turned to her. “Where was he?”
“I don’t know. I couldn’t get a handle on the location.” She explained her dreams and the visions she’d experienced while holding Jack’s toys. “Austin’s the one who held them and got the couple with the Corsica.”
“Could have knocked me over with a feather,” Ken said with a shake of his head, “hearing you’d taken it up again.”
“I haven’t,” Austin clarified. “Only this one case. Just to help Shaine find her nephew.”
“Okay. Well, you know I’m not a skeptic. That’s why I dropped a couple of other cases going nowhere to back you up when you called. If you’re seeing it, it’s coming down.”
“Thanks, Ken.”
“We’ll walk the perimeter of the store first. You can go inside. It’s been a long time, though. Thousands of people have come and gone.” He stirred sugar into the coffee the waitress had placed in front of him. “But you never know.”
Shaine sipped her coffee and listened, fascinated by the respect between the two men.
“Then we’ll go to this Lorenz woman’s place and see the car. By then I should have the paperwork approved to check out the evidence.”
The plan sounded solid, and Austin showed no signs of uncertainty. Finished with the discussion, the three of them parted and met again in the convenience store parking lot.
Shaine hung back as Austin and the agent walked around the lot and the building. While the two men went inside, she glanced around. Cars and distracted customers came and went. A year ago, the kidnappers had stopped here with Jack. He’d been a tiny boy in a strange car and a strange city without his mama. What kind of people stole a baby? And what had the kidnappers done with him? Sold him? The idea was sick.
The men returned. Ken reached into his navy blue sedan and found a slip of paper for Austin. “The address in case I lose you.”
Austin and Shaine got into their rental and pulled out into traffic.
The woman was expecting them. She offered coffee and chocolate chip bars in her comfortable living room.
“That’s all I know,” she said, after relating her version of the missing car and its return.
“Did you notice anything unusual about the car when you got it back?” Ken asked.
“It stunk to high heaven,” she said with an irritated grimace. “I had to have it professionally cleaned to get out the disgusting smell of cigarette smoke.”
