"Yeah, but what if he doesn't really have the kid? What if the neighbor called in a false tip because he just wanted to get rid of the bastard?" Lucas, for some reason, had the nagging feeling that was just what happened. And his nagging feelings had an ugly habit of being right. "If you stumble on the kidnapper by yourself, he'll blow your ass away. And the kid would be toast."

Frustration flashed across Ray's face. "I'm tougher than you think."

Lucas eyed him. Why the hell does he want me gone? It was a troubling idea. Ray was a damn good police K-9 trainer, but he was also a civilian, which is why Lucas had been assigned to ride herd on him. Was he dreaming of a little vigilante justice?

Not that Lucas wouldn't mind beating the shit out of their target himself.

Three hours ago, four-year-old Jennifer had been out playing in the back yard while her mother read on the screened-in porch. Apparently, the dark screen had kept the kidnapper from realizing Tammy Rosemond was there. He'd emerged from the woods behind the house and snatched the little girl right off her swing set.

Tammy screamed and charged out to rescue her daughter. The man had drawn a gun and fired at her. Luckily he'd missed, but as the woman ducked for cover, he'd carried the child into the woods.

Tammy had run to the phone and called 911. Soon afterward, every cop in Harrisville County roared onto the scene, sirens screaming. Lucas, though a city cop and technically out of his jurisdiction, had been one of them. In a case like this, everybody pitched in.

They'd just gone into the second hour of the search when their helpful tipster had called. Now it was getting dark, and everybody but Lucas and Ray was off on what might be a wild-goose chase.

And if it was, the bastard would get away. Unless Ray and Lucas found him.

"Bothers me that this guy snatched the kid in the middle of the afternoon with all those neighbors around," Lucas murmured to the handler as they walked along behind the dogs, scanning the trees for any sign of the kidnapper. "He's not just a pedophile, he's nuts." Thinking about what he might be doing to the child even now made Lucas's belly twist into a sick knot.