I See You

Chapter Twenty-Two

        Cody stood in his Gran's kitchen pacing while the two women studied Sara's picture and the words attached.

        "This girls a sight if I ever saw one, her," Gran marveled quietly. She turned the picture this way and that, her forehead wrinkled as she looked at the overall situation depicted in the image. Cody couldn't look at the image of Emma's body, broken and bleeding on her side with blood pooled out beneath her anymore. But he studied the walls that really didn't tell them anything other than she was somewhere underground.

        Cody swore and walked away to stare out of the window overlooking the small courtyard behind his parent's home. Where was she? His mind raced at what could be going wrong right at that moment. Maybe he should go back and try to get William and Miss Beth to talk to him again. He leaned his head against the leaded glass panes and listened to the other important women in his life speaking softly.

        "I honestly wish we had this young woman here to talk to," Marissa spoke while nibbling on her thumb nail. "I can't understand this. She said 'not visible from outside, hidden in plain view'. So it'd have to be inside a building or something right?" Marissa studied the words and frowned thoughtfully. "It seems like gibberish to me. But it has to mean something."

        Sophia grunted softly as she sat in her chair at the table. "This here's a puzzle, Rissa. We got to figure it out," Gran stated as she pulled out a pencil and started to write the words down, mumbling to herself as she did. "Ain't gonna miss out on that beautiful grand baby, me."

        Cody shook his head and turned to look at where his dad was prowling around the kitchen island opening containers of different foods. Drew looked up at his son and offered a plastic bowl filled with apple fritters, Cody declined wordlessly. If Emma wasn't eating, he sure as hell wasn't going to. Drew dug around more and started some coffee in the old machine. Now, coffee, that he could do, it'd keep him going until he had her in his arms again. Cody faced the courtyard again allowing his mind to wander.

        "Coffee son," Drew murmured, handing him a steaming mug of chicory coffee. Cody took it with a soft thanks. He sipped it and turned to sit with his dad at the long worn table.

        Marissa glanced at him. "Son, where was this girl anyway?"

        He frowned and swallowed. "Tony took me to her, she was giving out snacks to the kids playing in Lakeview," he shrugged.
"He said she wasn't always an easy woman to find because she's always moving around. Apparently she's very secretive about where she stays. I don't know her personally." And it seemed she didn't care much for Tony. He grinned into the mug at the memory of their interaction as he took another fortifying drink. "Why?"

        "Mainly because it'd help us figure this out," Marissa continued to read the words aloud as if this would make it easier to figure the riddle out, "hidden in plain view, behind what was once broken and not fixed again hidden below the place where she sleeps. If not found quickly she'll lay forever in darkness. Goddess what could all this mean?"

        "Seems pretty simple to me if you take it literally," Drew spoke up quietly as he picked off stray bits of dough on his dessert.

        Gran looked at her son-in-law. "What you say there, you? Speak up, you hear?"

        Cody glanced at his father who sat nibbling on a fried apple fritter thoughtfully.

        Drew licked a crumb away focused on the pastry in his hand, his tone thoughtful but as always so calm. "I think it's pretty clear really. Almost like she's talking about a hidden room or something, maybe a basement because of the mention of being beneath where she sleeps."