Myrddin's Magic - Book One of the Magic Trilogy

Chapter Eighteen

Amalie walked home from work again that night. Gabriel trailed her, and Killian walked behind him. Amalie laughed to herself. If there was less space between the three of them, they would have looked like a conga line.

She entered the apartment building and walked up the stairs. At the top, she walked to the door and put her key in the lock. She waited until Gabriel had climbed the stairs behind her, then said hello and walked into her apartment. She took two steps into the living room, and pulled out her phone so that she could call Killian and let him know that she had made it home safely, when a man jumped out of the coat closet and pricked her leg with a needle. She tried to scream, but the man covered her face with a dirty rag and blocked the sound. A few seconds later she started to feel dreamlike. She tried to fight, but she was uncoordinated and weak, and the man held her tight. As she sank into nightmares, her last thought was a mental scream for Killian.

Killian came pounding up the stairs, his phone out as he called Gabriel. "She's gone", he said. "Where the hell were you?"

"I just said goodbye to her and I didn't hear her door open again", said Gabriel. "She's fine." He heard Killian tear into Amalie's apartment, and he hurried into Amalie's apartment to join his friend, Killian's terror transmitting to him. "She's gone!" he said, surprised. "I just saw her. How did you come in the building?"

"I ran up the stairs", said Killian, "and she wasn't there."

Gabriel streaked to the balcony door and looked outside. A rope was tied to the railing and hung down to the alley below. "This is the way they took her out", he called to Killian. He went back into the apartment. "And this is what they used to knock her unconscious", he said, picking up a needle with fingers covered with a cloth. "I'll take this to the lab and have it tested."

"There's no time to test anything", said Killian. "We have to find her now." He was panicky, a fear that was all the stronger for the lack of awareness as to how Amalie was doing. His connection with her was silent.

"We will", soothed Gabriel. "I'll leave this in her apartment and tell Brandon to stay here for the time being. I want this place searched by forensics so that we can identify the person who took her. You take the stairs, and I'll meet you down in the alley. I'm going out the window the way the abductors took", he called after an already retreating Killian. He hustled over to the balcony and grabbed hold of the rope, rappelling down the side of the building. When he was at the bottom, he called Brandon and explained what was going on. He told him to stay in Amalie's apartment and to lock the door, only opening it for Killian or himself. "I'll call you if there are any changes. And don't touch anything in Amalie's apartment. We may need something from there for evidence, and we don't know yet what we need."

"That will be hard, not being able to touch anything but still being there", said Brandon, worried that he would do something to slow down Amalie's rescue.

"Sit on the couch and don't move. You brought a book with you, didn't you?" he asked.

"Yes."

"Then read it. Killian is here", said Gabriel as his friend rounded the corner. "I have to go." He hung up the phone and finished looking around. "There isn't a lot of information here", said Gabriel. "No cigarette butts, no discarded gum. There are tire tracks and footsteps over to the car in the soil. They pulled the car onto the grass, I'd assume so that they wouldn't have to carry Amalie farther than they had to. There would be a greater chance of someone noticing if they saw Amalie carried around like a sack of potatoes."

Killian scrubbed his fingers through his hair and clenched his jaw as he tried to get hold of his emotions. "She's silent."

"I'm not surprised. She's been drugged and is probably out for the count." Gabriel tried to be soothing, but he was just as worried as Killian.