David watched Ariel Londur run up the stairs until she vanished behind a wall. He smiled one quick smile and toook off after her.

    “David!” someone had seen him. He stopped and turned to the voice.

    “Oh, Elaina didn’t expect you to be here.” Annoyance spread through his voice.

    ”Yeah my plane came in this morning.”

     “Oh well why didn’t you call?” He asked even though he didn’t care what the answer was.

     “Today’s been really hectic and all.”

     “Well i hate to run but i have to do something really quick.” He didn’t wait for a response but turned and took off down the hall again. He bounded up the stairs trying to make up for lost time. He checked his watch…. down to twelve minutes now. That’d given the girl at least three minutes to hide. She could be anywhere. He told himself. Thirty seconds later he was at the top of the stairs, around the corner and staring down a long hallway that branched of to at least twenty doors. “Dang it!” He hissed. Another glance at his watch. Where are you at? Why don’t you come out and play Ariel? Somewhere down the hall someting fell. He took off towards the sound. He counted the doors… 5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16….. the sixteenth door was half-open showing office attire inside the little ray of light. He smiled and pushed the door open. Feeling along the wall he found the lightswitch and flipped it on. He took one step into the room, turned, closed the door, and locked it.

     “Ariel? Ariel where are you?” His voice filled the room. to his right he could see a lamp on the floor, broken. “that must be what the sound i heard was.”He whispered to himself. He slowly made his way to the lamp, picked it up and placed it back where it belonged. “Ariel, i just need you to come with me.”

   “No.” a voice whispered.

    “I just want to play with you.” He said.

    “Go away.” He walked towards the voice.

    “Ariel?” He asked again. He could hear soft sobbing. “Ariel listen to me. You have to come with me or they’ll kill your daddy.”

   “Daddy! No!” She jumped from under the desk and ran for the door. David sprung and snatched her back. Pulling her close he held tight so she couldnt run. He looked at his watch…. eight minutes left to get outside. He thought. He grabbed a roll of tape off the desk and taped Ariel’s mouth. “Come on.” He whispered.

   He led Arile out of the room and to the elevator at the other end of the hallway. He pressed the parking garage button and watched the numbers change, hoping, praying that no one else decided they need to use the elevator. Luck was with him though, no other floors called and soon he was pulling out of the parking garage with Ariel in the back seat. He pulled out his phone and hit redial. The phone rang four times then the raspy voice picked up. “Thirty seconds left David. We thought you were had chickened out.”

    “No i didn’t as you can tell. I have the girl and we’re on the move.”

    “Good, meet us at the pawn shop on the corner of Fifth and Lowe.”

     “Okay. be there in ten minutes.” The phone clicked off. David closed the phone and dropped it into the passenger seat. He looked in his rearview mirror at the little girl who’s face held so much fear. His heart began to break.

  PART 3 coming soon!