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"Why did they come back?"

"Well, it certainly wasn’t for love of Rain or the two of us Patrick’s father had left forty thousand dollars in a trust fund for Greg He wasn’t entitled to the ht then Patrick and I refused to knuckle under to his demands He and Shelly were furious, and I was terrified they’d retaliate by taking Rain"

"Why was Greg so insistent on the ency myself They told us they wanted to buy a farm so they could establish a commune Their claim was they’d paid a thousand dollars down and needed the balance by the end of thesaid there wasn’t one; it was a gentlewash, and so did I"

"Had they lived in a coh by then they were full-blown hippies Greg was calling himself Creed and she was Destiny Shaas Sky Dancer The plan was to be self-sufficient, far the land Others would join theinations They’d share the chores and pool their o into an account to pay expenses They thought Patrick should advance the funds, but he wouldn’t budge Neither of us liked Shelly anyway She was poor white trash, arrogant, foulmouthed Shaas born out of wedlock, just as Rain was"

"When was Rain abducted?"

"Tuesday, July 11 There’d been a series of blowups Lots of screa and hysterics The uproar finally died down and we thought they’d backed off Then suddenly, on the sixth, they disappeared It was the saood-byes, no here’s where we’ll be Five days after they decamped Rain was ‘kidnapped’ I put the word in quotes because we kneas the they snatched Rain to force the issue?"

"More like they were getting even,us suffer because we hadn’t done as they asked," she said "It wasn’t a sophisticated plan, but they were stoned all the time and that’s how their minds worked Anyway, they didn’t demand the entire forty thousand They asked for fifteen, which I guess was their way of being clever I’ I should probably stick to the facts"

"Actually, I find it helpful to knoas going on in your ely du in her sandbox I’d given her so pin She had her bucket and shovel and she’d pour water on the sand, flatten it, and then cut out cookie shapes The phone rang; so a survey He asked ten or fifteen questions that I answered I wasn’t h By the tione Later she told me a man came with a yellow kitten and said she could play with it at his house Don’t ask h that part of it blow-by-blow It was horrendous when it happened and it’s horrendous every tiht I’d die I can’t revisit the trauives me heart palpitations even now Look at that My hands have started to sweat"

"Understood," I said "I’ or you’d have recognized his voice"

"I’ood as far as I knew I didn’t expect to hear fro for"

"If it wasn’t Greg on the phone, there uy"