Calissa hung up the phone, turned off the light on the nightstand and lay back in her bed. The glow from the streetlamps and passing cars outside played shadow games on the dark walls of her small, second floor studio apartment. One of the flickering shadows reminded her of a scene in a movie--a castle wall, torch fire glowing against the gray stones, a darkened shape wavering and growing larger as it neared. She closed her eyes.
    Her father, battered, bruised and bound to a chair with white rope, slumped and rested his chin against his sternum. Blood caked his salt and pepper buzzed cut hair and dripped from the wounds on his cheeks and around his eyes onto his thighs. A bald, burly man stood in front of him and backhanded the right side of his face. Vince took the hit, then slowly moved his head back to center and, through the swollen slits of his eyes, stared at his assailant. Fluorescent lights hummed and flickered in their hanging fixtures, the only response to Vince’s silence.
     Calissa, watching the event unfold from a distance, reached out an arm and called his name, but she and her voice fell on blind eyes and deaf ears.
     “You should realize I’m not going to tell you anything,” Vince’s words came out low and garbled. He spat a wad of saliva-filled blood onto the dark gray, oil-stained concrete ground and cleared his throat. “After fifteen years I would think you would know that by now. No matter how many times you drain me of blood and energy or try to influence my thoughts, you won’t learn where they are.”
     “Oh, is that what you think this is about?” The big man chuckled. The hearty sound bounced off the walls and filled the empty warehouse. “Clive instructed me to punish you for escaping again. You’ve given us quite the chase for the past five years, but then if we hadn’t been obsessed with other matters regarding the king’s sorry excuse for a son, we would have caught you sooner.”
     “Why do I get the feeling you no longer need information from me?” Vince questioned with a tilt of his head and a worried tone to his voice. “Can I hope that you’ve abandoned the notion of finding my family?”
     “You’re right.” The man circled Vince, rubbing his right fist with his left hand. “We don’t need information from you anymore.” He stood in front of Vince and placed his huge hands on the confined man’s knees, his nose an inch from the captive’s. “We don’t need it because we have it.”
     “What?” Vince’s staccato voice rasped with fear.
     “We know where your lovely Maggie and Peg are.” The man pushed off Vince’s body, eliciting a wince from the abused. “Clive is taking a holiday in Oregon as we speak and before long, we’ll know where your precious Calissa is as well.”