It was pretty likely they were going to find, in the back of that disintegrated Annihilator, a dead police detective. And further investigation by their forensic folks would show that he hadn’t died in the accident.

And last, but far from least, there was my daughter Angie. She seemed okay, but as I explained to one of the officers, she’d been drugged with something earlier in the evening and should be checked out at a hospital immediately. There were already ambulances at the scene, waiting for the folks from the fire department to see who or what they could recover from the wreckage of the SUV, so a couple of paramedics rushed over to see how she was.

“I’m going to have to answer a whole lot of questions,” I said as they loaded her into the back of the ambulance, an anxious Trevor moving from one foot to another as he cautioned the paramedics to be careful with her. “I’ll give your mother a call, send her to the hospital to wait with you. After they’ve checked you out, made sure you’re okay, the cops are going to have a lot of questions for you, too.”

Angie nodded tiredly and slipped her arms around my neck. “You look nice in your new clothes, Daddy,” she said.

“Thanks, honey.”

“Promise me you’ll have them check that bump on the side of your head?”

I smiled. “I think it’s fine. It might even have knocked some sense into me.”

She was puzzled by that, but let it go. “You were something,” she said. “You were really something.” And then her mouth dropped open, as though she’d suddenly remembered something.

“What?” I said.

“Shit,” she said. “I’ve got an essay due in the morning.”

I smiled. “I think being kidnapped and narrowly escaping death is an even better excuse than having your dog eat your homework. I’m sure the paramedics will write you a note. Which course is it?”

“My psych course. I had all the research done. All I had to do was write it up, which I was gonna do last night.”

“Don’t worry about it,” I said. “Your professor will understand. What was it about, anyway?”

She smiled. “Man and masochism,” she said. “Trying to figure out why some guys get turned on by pain.”

My eyebrows went up. “This is what they’re teaching you in school?”

“College, Dad.”

Tumblers started falling into place. “So, what kind of research did you have to do for a paper like that?”

“I read all kinds of stuff, and I even talked to Trixie.”

“Oh yeah,” I said, like I was trying to remember. “Our old neighbor.”

“She’s hardly old. She’s pretty dynamite looking, actually.”

“You know what I meant.”