The man's facade slipped for a fraction of a second. His jaw tightened, the muscles ticking rapidly. The reasonable-father mask dropped, revealing something cold and serpentine underneath.
"Open the damn door, you freak," the man hissed, stepping closer to the glass. "You think they're going to believe some biker trash over me? You look like you just crawled out of a prison cell. They're going to see a giant thug locking a little girl in a gas station. How do you think that's going to end for you?"
It was a valid point. Bear knew what he looked like. He knew how the world saw him. The cops were going to arrive with their hands on their holsters, and they were going to look at the clean-cut guy in the polo shirt, and then they were going to look at the massive, scarred biker holding the door shut, and they were going to make a very fast, very dangerous assumption.
"Gary," Bear called out over his shoulder, never taking his eyes off the man outside. "What's the ETA on those cops?"
"Seven minutes," Gary squeaked. "They said a cruiser is coming from the county line. Seven minutes, maybe eight."
Eight minutes. It was an eternity.
The man outside checked his watch. He clearly understood the timeline as well. He took a step back from the door, assessing the heavy glass, the sturdy metal frame, the reinforced hinges.
"Emma, honey," the man called out, raising his voice so it echoed into the store. "Emma, tell the scary man to let you out! Tell him I'm your daddy!"
Silence from behind the counter.
Bear turned his head slightly. The little girl was peeking out from behind a rack of potato chips. Her face was pale, streaked with silent tears.
"Is your name Emma?" Bear asked her gently.
The girl shook her head violently. "No," she whispered.
"What's your name, sweetheart?"
"Chloe," she whimpered.
Bear turned back to the glass. The man was glaring at him, his hands planted on his hips, trying to project authority.
"Her name is Chloe," Bear said through the door.
The man in the polo shirt didn't flinch. "Her middle name is Chloe. She goes by both. Look, buddy, you're making a huge mistake here. She's got a medical condition. She's diabetic. If you don't give her back to me right now, she could go into a coma. You're going to be charged with manslaughter."
Bear felt a cold spike of adrenaline. It was a brilliant lie. It created urgency. It gave the man a desperate, sympathetic reason to break down the door. It was the kind of lie a predator used when they were losing control of the narrative.
But Bear noticed something. He noticed the way the man's eyes darted toward the side of the building, checking for cameras. He noticed the way the man’s hands were now balled into tight fists, the knuckles turning white.
And then, Bear noticed the most important detail of all.
He looked down at the man's neatly pressed khaki pants. Specifically, he looked at the right front pocket. There was a faint, pink bulge pressing against the fabric.
Bear turned back to the little girl behind the counter. "Chloe. Did he take anything from you? Anything besides you?"
Chloe nodded, her small chest heaving as she tried to stifle a sob. "My backpack. And... and my medicine."
"What kind of medicine?"
"For my breathing," she choked out. "My inhaler. It's pink. It has a sticker of a unicorn on it. He took it when he pulled me into the van. He said if I screamed, he'd throw it out the window and let me choke."
Bear exhaled slowly. The anger inside him, which had been burning as a low, steady pilot light, suddenly roared into a massive, blinding furnace.
He turned back to the man outside.
The man had stopped pretending to be the victim. He had walked over to a metal trash can near the gas pumps and was currently wrestling the heavy, concrete-filled lid off the top.