Page 8 of Fox in Plain Sight

5

Nick had waited for the right moment for several days. It was time.

He’d done his homework and had found out where Michelle lived, what her routine was, who she met, where she shopped, and what she ate. Most of the information he’d gathered simply by following and watching her without her noticing him. The rest he’d gleaned from internet searches. There wasn’t much online about her, almost as if somebody had taken great pains to wipe out her digital footprint. Either she’d done it herself or somebody in a high enough place had done it for her.

In either case, Michelle was on the path to becoming a ghost. Here today, gone tomorrow. Instinctively Nick knew he didn’t have much time to make a move. Today he’d go to the coffee shop and ask her out. He’d use all his charm to get her into bed, and then he’d look at that precious computer of hers, the one she never left home without, the one she never let out of her sight, not even when she used the restroom at the coffee shop, when he’d seen plenty of other customers leaving their laptops unattended while using the facilities.

Freshly showered and shaved, Nick waited at the next pedestrian crossing for the light to change. Beside him several people waited while a woman jogged in place, her eyes pinned to the lights across the street.

The premonition came out of nowhere like it always did, though he didn’t always know immediately what he was looking at. This time he did. He recognized her immediately: Michelle. She was leaving the coffee shop, bumping into a customer on the way out. The man was cursing at her, but Michelle didn’t even turn her head as if she didn’t notice him. She appeared distracted, with a worried look on her face. Something was bothering her.

Nick felt himself reach out his hand, wanting to wipe the worry from her face, but in his vision Michelle kept walking, approaching the intersection where the light turned at that moment. She only briefly looked to her right, before stepping into the crosswalk. She didn’t even see the taxi coming from the left. It hit her and flung her into the air. Behind the cab, her body slammed onto the hard asphalt like a rag doll. He knew immediately that she was dead. Knew it with a certainty that sent a chill to his bones and froze the blood in his veins.

“No!” he cried out and pushed the vision aside.

Tossing a quick look to either side of him, he dashed through the intersection, darting between the cars, drawing vile curses of the motorists onto himself. But he didn’t care. He had no time to lose, or Michelle would die.

Why he had the visions and when, or how they appeared, Nick didn’t know. It was his special gift—and the reason he lived in hiding. But today, he would use his gift to save a human life. If he wasn’t too late already.

The light backpack he always carried slung over one shoulder, Nick ran through the busy early afternoon crowd that clogged up the sidewalks, pushing people out of his way if they didn’t let him pass quickly enough. Curses and angry shouts followed him, but he barely took any notice. He was close, so close. Just another two blocks to the coffee shop.

He raced down the sidewalk, briefly stepping onto the street when a wheelchair user blocked his way. A car honked at him, but he kept running, darting between two vehicles to make a right turn into the street where the coffee shop was located at the end of the block.

A man he recognized from the premonition approached the door of the coffee shop. The door almost hit him in the face as it was opened. The woman exiting was Michelle.

Shit!

From the corner of his eye, Nick saw something flash yellow. He snapped his head to the side. The cab was passing him.

“Michelle!” he called out at the top of his lungs, waving at her.

She neither heard nor saw him and kept walking, approaching that fateful crosswalk.

Nick launched into an even faster sprint, pushing off the hot asphalt with all his strength. His heart raced as his lungs worked overtime.

Gotta get to her! Run! Damn it, run!

“Michelle!” he cried out again, but a car honking drowned out his voice.

A few more yards, just a few more. You can do it!

He darted past a woman with a small child, catching up with the taxi. Ahead of him, Michelle stood at the crosswalk, looking to her right, away from him and the approaching cab. Everything seemed to happen in slow motion now. The cab approaching the intersection… Michelle lifting her foot to take a step into the street…

“Michelle!” Nick barreled toward her.

Michelle ripped her head in his direction, eyes wide, mouth open, freezing in her current position, one foot on the street, one on the sidewalk. Nick lunged for her, turning her sideways in a split second, away from the traffic, inserting himself between her and the taxi, which had just reached them.

He pushed her away from him, toward the middle of the sidewalk. He tried to pivot with her, but the mirror of the cab caught in the strap of his backpack, ripping it from him and swiping his arm. The impact knocked him sideways. Nick was slammed against a metal newspaper rack, his left arm and side taking the brunt of it. But he didn’t have time to worry about that now, nor about the screeching tires or the excited shouts around him.

Instead he searched for Michelle. When he finally found her, she was in the middle of the sidewalk, upright, but visibly shaken. He ran his eyes over her, but saw no obvious injuries.

Relieved, he slumped to the ground and rested his back against the newspaper rack. “Thank God,” Nick murmured to himself, air rushing from his lungs now.

“Jesus Christ!” Michelle ran toward him, staggering a little and looking shaken. “Oh my God!”

“You all right, Michelle?” He looked up at her.

She breathed heavily as she crouched down to him. “That cab would have hit me!” Her lips trembled. “If you hadn’t been there…” She closed her eyes for a moment, swallowing hard.