Chapter Two

Jason Raids was at his seat in the conference room, attending an emergency briefing called by the assistant director in charge of the FBI L.A. field office. The briefing was for senior staff alone and he was head of the field teams. There was a major situation in the city and all hands needed to be on deck. A young drug dealer who had escaped with a highly dangerous biochemical agent during a largely successful FBI raid, mistaking it for a cache of heroin, was currently on the loose and could unintentionally release it anywhere in the city. Intelligence was sketchy but firm, and all efforts were being directed at locating the young man and securing the substance before it would be too late.

The assistant director was sparing neither efforts nor words in making clear to everyone under his command that finding the boy and retrieving the chemical was the top and only priority. The field teams were already on standby, awaiting further intelligence from the analysts. But so far, there was still no new information. After the briefing, Raids would join his men to be fully informed by an expert on all they needed to know concerning the handling of this chemical. He knew it was going to be a long night and perhaps a long day to follow, so he was glad that Summer was at his home to keep an eye on Chrissie. But when he received a call from her, he was a bit surprised. He quickly excused himself and rushed outside to pick the call.

“What's up, sis?”, he asked.

“Chrissie's not home.”

“What? What do you mean?”

“Exactly what I said, Jason," Summer returned. "She's gone off to God knows where. Christ alone knows what I'm gonna do to that girl when I lay my hands on her. How dare...”

“Calm down, sis. Just relax. Tell me what happened.”

“What's there to tell? I'm up in the middle of the night to take a glass of water and find that the lights are on in her room, so I go to her door and tell her to go to bed and guess what? No answer. The lights are still on. I open the door and I see her on the bed asleep, only its not her, but a very cunning replica of her stupid self made from her clothes! Can you just imagine the effrontery! She got out through the window!”

“Oh Christ,” Jason moaned, running his hands through his hair. “Where the hell has she gone to? Have you tried calling her?”

“Yeah, about a hundred times. Switched off as a dead bell.”

“Uh... I'm on my way. Just stay calm.”

Jason moved back and forth confusedly. He didn't know exactly what to do. Chrissie had to be found. It was too late in the night not to worry about her whereabouts, but at the same time, they were in the middle of a crisis situation and he was needed here at the office. No, there were other agents that could replace him. He had to find his daughter now.

“Owens,” he called to one of his men who was discussing with another colleague.

“Sir,” Owens answered, going straight to his boss.

“Hey, I need you to try to cover for me. If I'm not back soon, tell Robbins he's in charge.”

“But if...”

“You heard me Owens, didn't you?”

“I did, sir.”

“Thanks. I owe you one.”

Jason rushed off without further ceremony and jumped into the nearest elevator he could find, startling the earlier occupants. He mouthed his apology for such an abrupt entry and rode silently, but impatiently.

Jason made the journey home faster than he had ever done before. Thankfully it was late and traffic was light. He rushed into his house to find Summer waiting for him.

“Is she back yet?”, he asked expectantly.

“No, Jason,” Summer replied, shaking her head. “I can't believe she has the balls to try such stuff, with me in the house.”

“Beats me too, sis,” Jason grumbled as he made his way to Chrissie's room.

He checked the entire room: the bed and under it, the closet, among the clothes, and everywhere he could think of. It was clear that she had left willingly, but certainly in a hurry. He could see her unique touch in the disturbances made in the room. Like his sister said, Chrissie had opened the window and climbed down. It wasn't a long way down, but he couldn't imagine his daughter doing the jump without a contrivance of some sort or perhaps a lot of determination. And there it was - a large metal barrel that he had used recently, in the absence of a ladder, to fix the light bulb outside her room. He sat down on the bed and put his head in his hands. He was worried and scared. What if she got in an accident? What if she missed her way or perhaps got into trouble with some bad people? What if she got raped? Or overdosed on something? A lot of 'what ifs' were going through his mind and he figured he'd have to start an active search as soon as possible.

“Hey,” Summer whispered, seating herself beside him, “don't worry. She'll surely come home soon.”

“I hope so. She's all I have.”

Chrissie was an only child. Her mother had died soon after she was born and Jason had decided never to remarry and to face his job as an FBI agent and a single dad with everything he had.

“Well,” he sniffed, rousing himself, “I've gotta do something. Can't just wait and hope. Lemme call her friends.”

“That's a great idea,” Summer nodded. “I'll keep trying to reach her.”

“Thanks sis.”

“Don't worry,” she smiled, “I'll have my reward when I finally get hold of her.”

He smiled too, knowing the amount of trouble Chrissie had gotten herself into with this disciplinarian of an aunt. Pulling out his phone, he decided to ring the few friends he knew Chrissie had or used to have. She certainly had been making a lot of new ones lately, ones that he didn't approve of.

“Hello,” drawled a groggy voice at the other end of the line.

“Hey Jude, did I wake you?”

“Who's this?”, came the angry retort.

“It's me, Jason Raids. Chrissie's dad.”

“Oh! Mr. Raids. Uh.. how do you do?”

“I'm great, Jude. Do you know where Chrissie might be? She seems to have left home without telling anyone and we're a little worried.”

“Wow. I have no idea, Mr. Raids. Haven't seen Chris in ages. Why don't you try calling her?”

“Well, her phone's turned off. Can you think of anyone she might be with?”

“At this time of the night? Well.. I.. can't say. You can try Liz. She might know a thing or two.”

“Liz Farmer?”

“Yeah.”

“Great. Thanks Jude.”

Liz Farmer was a very close friend of Chrissie's, but recently, Jason had noticed that they were not as close as they used to be. Nevertheless, he called Liz and as he had expected, she told him that she'd not talked to Chrissie in a long time, but when he asked if she knew anyone that Chrissie might be with, she gave him the name, Hannah. Hannah McMurdo.

Unfortunately, she didn't have a number for Hannah, but she was positive that Chrissie and Hannah were very close. They hung out together at school and did practically everything together, almost like sisters. Raids thanked her and decided to try other of Chrissie's friends he knew. The ones that picked up either told him that Chrissie no longer hung out with them or that they hadn't seen her in days. When he asked if they had Hannah's number, he received total negatives.

Exasperated, he took a seat and tried to think of what next to do. Then an idea crawled into his head.

“Hey Jacy,” his data analyst friend shouted at the other end of the line. “Where are ya?”

“Somewhere on planet Earth, Tony. Am I being missed over there?”

“Only Owens seems to care about your existence. Kid's asked me twice if I've set eyes on you.”

“Why? What does he want?”

“I have no idea, man. Perhaps he was told to find you?”

“Whatever," Jason sighed. "I need your help, Tony.”

“With what?”

“I need phone and address of a Hannah McMurdo...”

“Who's she? Ex-girlfriend?”

“No. And I need you to look into someone else for me. Phone calls. Emails. Everything. I need a location ASAP. I'm sending you all the details you'll need. Got it yet?”

“Um.. yeah. Wow, but this might take some time. You know the situation around here.”

“Hey, I don't care," Jason returned. "This is an emergency too. Just get me what I need. Work fast and hack through anything that gives you trouble.”

“Okay, okay. Which do you want first? The Ha...”

“Get me Hannah McMurdo's phone and address. Thanks Tony. I owe you one.”

“Two actually. Remember last week?”

“Yeah. Whatever. Thanks, man.”

Jason disconnected the call to avoid continuing the conversation. He knew that Tony wouldn't stop talking if given the chance. He sighed and rested his head on the wall, thinking what on earth would make his daughter steal away from home at this time of the night.

Minutes later, he felt his phone vibrate and checking it, he saw that Tony had come through with Hannah's contacts. That was really fast. But he didn't waste any time in dialing her up.

“Hello,” she sounded awake and alert.

“Hi Hannah. This is Hannah McMurdo, right?"

"Yeah. Wh..."

"I'm Jason Raids, Chrissie's dad. I'm sorry to bother you. I heard you're a friend of Chrissie's, so... I was wondering if you know her whereabouts? She left home kinda suddenly and we're all worried over here.”

“Uh...,” she began hesitatingly, but suddenly fell into a fit of coughing.

“Oh sorry. Are you okay?”

“Uh... yeah. I'm good. Uh.. ahem.. Chrissie... I don't know. Haven't clapped eyes on her since a couple of days back. Sorry, I can't help you.”

“Bu...”

The line suddenly clicked off. Jason stared at the phone, wondering why she had cut him off so quickly. He had a feeling she knew more than she was telling him and if he was reaching, he'd say she knew where his daughter was. He called again and found that the line was switched off. Bingo.

Just then, Summer came in with a cup of tea, but Jason had made up his mind to move immediately. He took a slip of paper from several on Chrissie's writing desk and wrote out Hannah's address.

“Take this, sis. That's where I'm headed off to. Will call you if I hear something new.”

“What's this place?”, Summer asked as she received the address from him.

“Chrissie's closest friend,” Jason shouted from the door.

“Okay. Good luck!”