His kidnappings in the old days had been well planned. He had spent time out in the nightlife scene looking for rich people who weren’t observant or well protected, and shopped for victims at real estate open houses, nice hotels, oceanfront bars, and even golf courses. When he had selected candidates, he had put in the time and effort to learn all about them: Who could be expected to pay a ransom for their lives? How much money would that be? Where did they live? Who else lived there, and what were the security features? It had gone on and on.

Now that he had been to prison, he couldn’t do it that way anymore. If he wanted to get back into kidnapping, he would have to think much smaller and operate without his helpers, who had been unreliable anyway. He would have to do it all himself. That meant working by stealth and taking someone who was sure to be unarmed and unable to put up much of a fight. The best place to find someone like that would not be in bright sunshine by their pool or at their country club, or in the bright lights of the nightclubs or on the streets in front. It would be in the dark parking lots behind the buildings very late at night.

What he envisioned was a lone girl walking out to her car in a lot after an evening of heavy drinking. As he formulated the idea, he further defined the victim he was imagining. It would probably be a college girl. That was the age when a girl might be alone late at night and drunk. He could perform something like a screening process by walking in the lots behind bars and nightclubs, searching for a suitably expensive car that had been a present to a young single woman. It would be something small and a little bit sporty, but not hard to drive. It wouldn’t be a Lamborghini or Ferrari. It would be something like a small Mercedes or BMW with an automatic transmission. It would be painted a light color. It probably would have a license plate holder or a window sticker with the name of a college. It might even have a vanity license plate that said something like PRINCESS or CUTIE. He could stay nearby, waiting to see who came to claim it, and simply take her away.

Other refinements began to occur to him as he walked. He could abduct her and not contact her family for a few days to give them the time to imagine terrible things were happening to her, or even longer, to persuade them that she might be dead. Then, when they heard her voice, they’d be delighted to pay whatever he asked. The circumstances would dictate whether he freed her or actually killed her, but that would be a decision for after he had squeezed them for money.