Childfinders, Inc.: An Uncommon Hero. Marie Ferrarella

she called out to Jon, she’d cause a scene. The last thing she wanted was a scene. Just peaceful anonymity. “I’m afraid I don’t have the time right now.” She tried to move past him again, but the man swayed, blocking her every move. “I need to be somewhere else,” she said.

      He put up his hand against a shelf, cutting her off from making an exit. “Yes, with me.”

      Suddenly, he found himself being spun around and looking up at a stranger who was several inches taller than he was.

      “The lady said no. What part of ‘no’ didn’t you understand?” Ben asked.

      Cold fury contorted the man’s handsome features. It was evident he wasn’t accustomed to being turned down, or opposed. “This doesn’t concern you.”

      Ben’s hand tightened around his arm. He gave the man no reason to doubt he meant business. “Lack of manners always concerns me. Now, apologize to the lady and let her pass.”

      She’d always loved westerns as a child. The rugged hero in the white hat coming to the aid of the wronged, put-upon but feisty heroine. Time and again, she’d eat up the stories even though they were always the same. Only the faces and names changed.

      And now she had her very own cowboy riding to her rescue.

      Annoyed but smart enough to know when he was outmatched, the man glared sullenly at her. “I didn’t mean anything by it.”

      Ben slowly nodded his head, as if evaluating the words. “A little lacking in poetry, but it’ll do.” Releasing his hold on the man’s arm, Ben held his hand up. “You can go. Now.”

      Embarrassed, the man stalked out.

      Ben shook his head, watching to make sure he left before turning back to the sultry-looking woman. He had no doubt she had more than her share of run-ins like that. Women with faces and figures as beautiful as hers generally did. “I apologize for my species. Just because we all walk upright doesn’t make us all civilized.”

      The laugh that bubbled up in her throat was just a little nervous. “Thank you.”

      “My pleasure—” he glanced down at the small, square name tag “—Gina Wassel.” He raised his eyes to hers. “And now, would you mind pointing me in the direction of the manager?”

      She would have liked to stay and ask him if she could help, but the jerk who had tried to put the moves on her had eaten up her margin of time. She should have already been on her way.

      “He’s right over there.” She pointed toward Jon. “Now, if you’ll excuse me.”

      Ben nodded, stepping aside. “You have an errand to run.”

      “Emphasis on run,” she said, tossing the words over her shoulder as she hurried out.

      He allowed himself exactly half a second to take in the view. The woman looked just as good going as she did coming.

      But he wasn’t there to pass judgment on form. He was tracking a kidnapper.

      With that in mind, Ben made his way over to the man the woman named Gina had pointed out to him.

      Chapter 3

      Jon Peterson slowly stroked his small goatee as he stared at the reprinted photograph of a woman with a little boy that Ben had handed him.

      Longer than was necessary, in Ben’s estimation. Gloria Prescott had either come in and applied for a job in the last few days, or she hadn’t. Granted, the photograph wasn’t a very good one, but it was the only one McNair had had of either Gloria, or his son. Ben could see not having photographs of the nanny, but it was difficult for him to understand why McNair had no available photographs of his son. He supposed that the man’s excuse, that he wasn’t the kind to take pictures, held some water. But he bet that McNair had plenty of photographs of himself around.

      Blurred photograph or not, Peterson knew what Gloria looked like. According to her great-aunt, she’d worked here for four years. The man was either stalling for dramatic effect, or was debating something. Not knowing him made it next to impossible for Ben to tell.

      When the bookstore manager finally raised his eyes to his, Ben had the impression that he was being scrutinized far more closely than the photograph had been.

      “Nope, sorry, can’t help you.” Placing the photograph on the counter, Jon pushed it back toward him. He paused as if thinking. “Haven’t seen Gloria in, what? I guess about four, five years now.” The small, dark eyes gave no indication of what was going on in his mind as they looked at Ben. “Maybe even longer.”

      “Then she didn’t come here looking for a job,” Ben reiterated.

      The meeting apparently over, Peterson drew his book back to him and lowered his head, effectively blocking out any noise and any unwanted inquiries.

      “That would have meant I’d seen her, wouldn’t it? Sorry, she’s not here. Wish she was. Best damn employee I ever had here. She actually wanted to work, not like some of the others.” He turned a page in his book. Because Ben wasn’t leaving, Peterson raised his eyes to look at him again. This time, his displeasure was not that difficult to discern. “Anything else I can do for you?”

      Ben had come across more sociable pit bulls. He slipped the photograph back into his pocket. “Would you happen to know where Gloria might have gone if she’d returned to San Francisco?”

      “Nope. Never meddle.” Peterson returned to his mystery, making it painfully obvious that he considered Ben an annoying obstacle to his reading pleasure. “Keeping your nose out of other people’s lives is the secret to a long, healthy one of your own.” Bent over his book, Peterson spared him one more pointed glance. “Know what I mean?”

      “Yeah.” He knew exactly what the older man meant. Get lost. Ben took one last look around the store. He’d already walked up and down the aisles methodically, not once but twice. That was how he’d happened to notice the college preppie putting the moves on the salesclerk. Not that he could actually blame him. The woman had been a looker in a classy sort of way. “Thanks for your help.”

      Engrossed in the book he was reading, the store manager grunted his acknowledgment.

      There was nothing for Ben to do but retreat to his car.

      Rather than drive off immediately, Ben put in a quick call to Savannah and came up empty there as well.

      “If Gloria Prescott’s in San Francisco, Ben, she’s not using her charge cards,” she told him.

      “No paper trail of any kind?”

      “Not unless she’s leaving bread crumbs behind her on her way to the forest,” Savannah quipped. “The canvassing down here’s coming up dry, too. Rusty’s been showing the photograph around in the area and he said to tell you that nobody’s seen Gloria or the boy. I’m sorry, Ben.”

      “Not your fault,” he murmured before hanging up.

      Putting his cell phone back in his pocket, Ben stared at the bookstore across the street, not really seeing it. He doubted that driving back to Saratoga to ask Sugar any more questions would yield any further insight into finding Gloria.

      That only left one other person to talk to.

      The expression on Stephen McNair’s face was far from welcoming when his secretary admitted Ben into his office. The man’s countenance made Ben think of Zeus, presiding over Mount Olympus and bringing Mercury to task for failing to deliver the message he’d been anticipating. Ben had a hunch that even the man’s furniture had been chosen with an eye toward intimidating anyone entering the office. Massive, opulent and expensive. The man certainly didn’t assume his present position in life graciously.

      Sitting as straight as a spear in his gray, imported leather office chair, McNair gripped the armrests as he scowled at him.

      “Shut the door.”