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she fought to block its emergence.
    Exhaustion lingered as her body returned to normal. What also remained was the image of Amanda—and an overwhelming need to talk to Michael Jenkins.
    For the rest of the evening, Mariah tried to watch sitcoms and block Amanda’s face from her mind. But this compelling need to speak to Michael... At ten o’clock she gave up and went to bed, hoping sleep would erase Amanda’s face from her memory. Falling asleep was no problem; staying asleep was nearly impossible.
    For three days she tried to concentrate on work, on choir practice, on anything that had nothing to do with Amanda Forrester. For three nights she woke every few hours—sweating, trembling—with the same nightmare: Amanda, being chased by a fiend whose claws shredded her dress more and more every time it got close. The details of the kidnapping (and the lack of clues) were headline news which further prevented Mariah from eradicating the little girl’s image from her thoughts.
    Moreover, she was obsessed with this need to talk to Michael. She felt foolish calling to make an appointment with him—what was she going to say? But the more she tried to ignore this obsession, the more anxious she became. She had to resolve this, if for no other reason than to get some sleep.
#
    On June tenth at one o’clock in the afternoon, Mariah called the church. She felt guilty lying to the switchboard operator about an emergency and a need to speak to Michael. The urgency in her voice must have been convincing, because she was told to come, he would fit her in. Mariah left her boss a note with some half-baked reason for her absence, and headed for the church.
    She stopped at the switchboard to announce her arrival then sprinted upstairs. On her way to the church, the symptoms she experienced the night Amanda was kidnapped had returned; rapid heartbeat, shallow and labored breathes, cold sweats. Mariah still had no idea what she was going to say to Michael. She just hoped it would be there at the right moment.
    By the time he reached his office, she was on the verge of collapsing. The sight of him nearly made her faint with relief.
#
    Seeing her in such a highly agitated state, Michael grew alarmed, fumbling his keys as he unlocked the office door. Mariah almost knocked him over in her haste to get inside, adrenaline propelling her halfway across the room before she could stop. He closed the door and turned, just in time to see her coming toward him.
    Michael was genuinely alarmed. He always enjoyed seeing Mariah Carpenter on Sunday mornings as the choir lined up in preparation to enter the sanctuary. Standing before them, he would pray to God to use the members of the music ministry to comfort and uplift those in the audience who needed the healing touch of their music. She was always smiling radiantly. He knew that in the three months since joining them, she had found a measure of confidence due to the friendship and support from her fellow choir members.
    But this woman before him was an entirely different person. Her breathing was labored, her face glistened, her hair was matted against head, and her pupils were dilated. She radiated as much tension as a mainspring in an old watch.
    His apprehension dissolved, however, when she whimpered, “Help me Michael. Something is happening and I can’t control it. It started three days ago when I...”
    The sentence died on her lips. Her hands shot out and she seized him in an immobilizing grip. Her fingers dug into his biceps right through his sports jacket. He was shocked at her strength.
    Michael had just enough time to register this when his body became rigid. His blood and bone marrow seemed to be flowing in the direction of her hands. Terrified—and feeling like he was being crushed in a trash compactor—he gasped and tried to jerk backward, but his legs were too rubbery. He truly would have collapsed if she hadn’t held him so firmly. What lasted only a few minutes felt like an