"Just thought I'd call," Mr. Grin said. "To keep you updated. It's been a long time since I've f.u.c.ked Gina, Jack. Thought you might want to hear it."

Jack wanted to say all kinds of things but managed to fight the urge and say nothing.

He heard the sound of Mr. Grin's phone shift and figured he must have been put on speakerphone.

He heard Gina wince... and speak.

"Jack. I love you. Oh, G.o.d, Jack, please find me. Please."

"Where are you?" Jack said casually into the phone. Of course, he knew Mr. Grin would probably kill her if she told him where they were.

"I can't tell you. Just... please."

Then he heard her breath coming in short bursts, skin slapping skin, Mr. Grin grunting from somewhere far away. Everything built to its strange rhythm, Gina's breaths so sharp it sounded like the phone was right next to her mouth. Mr. Grin grunted loudly and then the phone call ended. Jack looked at the phone as though it had somehow forsaken him.

He pressed b.u.t.tons until he found an options menu. He scrolled down to the "Voice Memo" selection. He highlighted that one and clicked on it. The conversation was there in its entirety. He would let Sam listen to it if the a.s.s didn't end up in jail. Maybe it would strike some sort of chord with him.

He was so full of fury and rage his thoughts turned back to the cop and he was almost ready to attack him, certain he would be able to tell him who Mr. Grin was but he was already backing down the driveway. Timed perfectly. Everything seemed like it was timed so f.u.c.king perfectly.

Sam stood at the door to his apartment.

"He left in a f.u.c.king hurry," Sam said.

"Yeah."

"He was supposed to come back and breathalyze me."

"Breathalyze you?"

"Yeah, I guess that's what you get for telling cops you drink a lot. You know how I told him I was taking you to work? He wanted to make sure I was able to do it 'unimpeded' was how he put it."

"Then he just drove off."

"Well, he did ask about the blood in the bathroom. I told him I didn't know exactly but I thought it came from my nose or maybe my girlfriend was menstruating. Good thing he didn't see that hunk of skin you tore off me. Would have probably thought we were cannibals too."

"Do your neighbors complain a lot?"

"Huh?"

"Well, I mean, if someone complained it would have had to be the people above you, right?"

"Never really thought of that. I guess so. They're never here during the day, though."

"It is Sunday though."

"No. They go away most weekends. We could go up there but I doubt they're there right now."

"I don't think the cop was really investigating much of anything."

"No?"

"No. I think he was sent as a warning."

"We should have f.u.c.king taken him out."

"That's kind of what I had planned but now he's gone."

"I guess we should be gone too, huh?"

"The sooner the better."

It was 4:36.

Eighteen.

Sam fired up the car and the sound of the Misfits blasted from the aged and badly worn speakers. He made no attempt to turn it down. He backed out haphazardly into the road, seemingly unaware that any cars may be speeding toward him, and gunned the accelerator until they were out on the state route and headed toward the highway.

He ran red lights and stop signs, acting not at all like a person who has just had a run-in with the police.

Once they reached a straightaway, Jack turned down the volume on the stereo and pulled out his cell phone. He found the latest call and said, "I want you to listen to this and tell me if you recognize the guy's voice. It's a little disturbing. I just want to warn you."

"Give it here," he said.

Jack watched for his reaction as he held it up to his right ear, a cigarette burning in his left hand. Miraculously, he managed to keep control of the speeding car.

After a few seconds, a look of distaste crossed Sam's face and Jack almost thought he was going to throw the phone out the window. Instead, he angrily flipped it closed and tossed it over onto Jack's lap.

"I tell you... When we find that guy I'm gonna cut his b.a.l.l.s off and chew on em a little bit."

"Did he sound at all familiar?"

"s.h.i.t. He sounded like every fat f.u.c.k I run into every day."

"Did you think..." Jack began. "Did you think it sounded like he was... smiling?"

"Yeah. A little." Sam plastered a smile on his face and mimicked some of what Mr. Grin said. "Yeah, I think it did sound like he was smiling. You know, there was this kid we went to school with. We all called him Smiley, you know, because it looked like he was always smiling. Maybe it was just the shape of his mouth or something."

Jack felt his hopes surge wildly out of control.

Was it possible?

"So, you think it could be him? What was his name?"

"Oh, his name was David Lattimore. It couldn't be him though. He killed himself shortly after graduation." Sam chuckled. "Maybe I'm sick but the only thing I could picture was him swinging from that rope with a smile plastered on his face. It must have been a f.u.c.king weird thing to see."

Jack picked the phone up from his lap and held it in his hand, not putting it away, cradling it, trying to draw some kind of answer from it.

Soon they reached the highway and Sam slowed down. It looked like every highway exit area on every interstate in America, lined with chain hotels, chain restaurants and chain gas stations. Like the developers had dropped their pants and shat out what every mid-size city in America had.

"Where do you want to start?" Sam said.

Jack thought about it.

He didn't know.

Didn't have any ideas.

He realized what a monumental undertaking this would be. Not to mention the fact he had absolutely no idea what they were looking for. Could he just walk into the motels and ask if they had seen someone fitting Gina's description come in that morning?

He didn't think that would do a lot of good. If Mr. Grin had had a morning of torture planned for Gina then he probably wasn't going to go parading her through all of the hotel lobbies. Most likely he would have left Gina restrained in the car while he did the checking in. Maybe he even worked at one of these hotels. And he thought it must be some sort of unwritten code of privacy that the hotel clerks only give information to police. After all, at least a fourth of people checking into hotels and motels were there to do something they probably wouldn't do in the comfort of their own home.

Sam pulled into the lot of a King's Castle.

"Here?" he asked.

Jack continued to look helplessly at his phone. Did he even want to begin looking here? What was the likelihood they would actually find her? And how much time would they waste going into each of these places?

"I don't know," Jack said. "Do you have any ideas at all?"

"I'm as lost as you are, Jack. Let me listen to that conversation again."

"Okay." He cued it up.

Again, Jack found himself looking at Sam while he listened to his sister being raped. This time, Sam's brow was furrowed in concentration.

Once finished, he pulled the phone away from his ear and handed it back to Jack.

"Listen to it again," he said. "I was trying to see if there was any kind of sounds that would give it away- you know, like the highway in the background or something? But I didn't hear any of that. But I think I heard something else. Towards the end, when she's panting or something, listen, and it almost sounds like she's trying to say something."

Jack couldn't listen to it fast enough. He started at the beginning and relistened to everything, paying close attention when it got to the end.

There was definitely some rhythm to her panting. Why would she be seductively panting in the first place? He figured if her mouth was uncovered, she would be screaming her head off unless she was someplace where she knew she wasn't going to be heard or unless she was trying to convey some sort of message without Mr. Grin's knowledge.

Jack started over and listened to it again.

He tried to verbalize what she may or may not have been trying to say.

"When... will... I... die?"

"Could be," Sam said.

"That doesn't make any sense."

"Yeah. It does seem like sort of a half-hearted musing for someone in her situation."

"When... words... ride?"

"That's just dumb."

Jack started from the beginning, skipped straight to Gina's part.

It hit him hard. He felt his head spin. He thought he knew what she was trying to say.

"Turn around," he told Sam. "We're wasting our time up here."

Sam whipped the car around, all squealing rubber, and they tore out of the King's Castle parking lot, bolting across their lane and into oncoming traffic.

Nineteen.

Sam jerked the wheel to his right in order to avoid the oncoming traffic and ended up back in their own lane.

"So what did you hear?" he asked.

"I don't know if it'll make any sense to you," Jack said, his heart pounding away. "Where worlds collide."

"Huh?"

"Where worlds collide. Does that sound familiar?"

"Can't say it does."

"It's a place. Off of Groves Road. There's like this huge field there. But, more importantly, there are some train tracks where it looks like two engines have collided..."

"Ahhh. I know the place. It's where all of the teenagers go to smoke pot and drink and make-out. All that good stuff."

"Yeah. Well, Gina took me there once but I didn't know she had a name for it until I went to see Tim Fox this afternoon..."

"Her old boyfriend?"

"Yeah. Her old boyfriend."

"You really are serious about finding her."

"Anyway. He told me she called it 'When Two Worlds Collide'."

"But you didn't know she called it that?"