The Silent Ones

by James Hunt

  Mocks stared at the transmitter in Hickem’s hand. She took it from him and let it roll into her palm. “You know how many times Grant has saved my life? My family’s life?” She rolled the transmitter around her palm and slowly walked around Hickem toward the door. “He’s done things that I could never repay him for. Ever.”

  Hickem followed her, hoping that he’d finally broken through, that someone had enough sense to follow logic. “Then help him now. Return the favor by saving his life. This is the best way, and you know it.”

  Mocks stopped at the door, closing her fist around the transmitter, and looked back to Hickem. “You have your hands tied. I get that. But you also could have done a lot more to help him too. And, yeah, I get it, you’re the Director of the FBI. You have a job to do. You’ve always been real keen on that, Hickem. But as much as Grant has done for me personally, he’s done just as much for you on the professional level. If it wasn’t for him, then you’d have never been in this position in the first place.”

  “I know,” Hickem said. “That’s why I want to help.”

  Mocks smiled, shaking her head. “You never really understood him. I think that was the problem.” She stared at the transmitter again, rolling it around her palm with her thumb. “If you really want to help him? If you really want to pay back everything that he’s done for you? For this city? For everyone he helped keep safe?” She tossed the transponder back to Hickem, who snatched it out of the air like a fly. “Then stay the hell out of his way.” Mocks opened the door and slammed it shut so hard that it rattled the walls.

  Hickem stood alone in the living room and glanced down at the transponder in his hand. He took a big breath and then tossed the transponder up and down in his hand like a ball before tossing it into the ice bucket. He walked back over to the window and planted his fists on his hips, staring out at the city, and he laughed, knowing deep down, past his ego and machismo, that Mocks was right.

  50

  Sam didn’t say much on the ride back to her apartment, but she did lean over and give Mocks a big hug and a kiss on the cheek. She opened the door, letting in the cold air, and then ducked low to peek inside the car again. “I love you.”

  “Love you too, girl,” Mocks said.

  The door shut, ending the cold and wrapping Mocks back up in the cocoon of warmth that was the inside of the car. She waited at the sidewalk until she saw Sam disappear inside before she pulled away and headed home.

  Mocks knew that Sam was right, that if Grant was to contact anyone, it would be her, but she didn’t want the responsibility, and that made the guilt even worse. Guilt from the truth of how she felt. She was tired of fighting this. She was tired of coming home to new graffiti that marked her family as the enemy. She was tired that her family continued to suffer because she had tried to do her job, and she was tired of being labeled as a traitor for being loyal to the people who mattered most to her.

  Seven years ago, she might have felt different. She was younger then. And she didn’t have Chase to think about. But a child changed your perspective. It changed the way you made decisions and why you made decisions. Because the world no longer revolved around you like it had before parenthood.

  There was another life to consider, a more important extension of yourself. And Mocks needed to make sure that Chase’s life was at the top of her list. She knew that Grant would agree with her, but that didn’t bring the peace of mind that she’d hoped.

  Locked in debate with herself, the ride home was a quick one, and before Mocks realized it, she was pulling into her driveway. She shut off the engine and then leaned her head back, staring at the faded stains of the message written on the garage door. “It doesn’t just wash off anymore.”

  Mocks stepped out of the car. She headed toward the door, but then stopped halfway up the walkway. It was something that pricked the back of her neck. And for the first time in three months, Mocks was afraid.

  She was afraid of what she would find when she turned. She was afraid of how she would react when she saw him, but most of all, she was afraid of what would happen when their conversation finally ended.

  Mocks turned sharply and saw Grant duck back behind the side of the house. She would have looked around to see if anyone was watching, but she suspected that Grant had already done that. He wouldn’t have come to the house if he hadn’t.

  Mocks walked over casually, head down, her stomach betraying the calm exterior with complex aerial acrobatics.

  After turning the corner, she saw Grant standing just a few feet away, hands in the pockets of his jacket, his hair long and his face covered with a thick black beard peppered with flecks of gray.

  Despite the bulky winter clothes, Mocks could tell that Grant was leaner. His cheekbones were more prominent, and his neck was thinner. Standing there, he looked more like the homeless down at the docks, and he could have blended in seamlessly if it weren’t for his eyes.

  Grant had always held an intelligent gaze, but the past three months had hardened that stare, stripped it of anything that wasn’t necessary to either his survival or the capture of the man he was chasing.

  “You look like you haven’t been sleeping,” Mocks said, the words spilling out of her.

  “I’ve been working,” Grant said.

  “I’ve heard.” Mocks leaned against the house. She couldn’t sense why she was so uneasy. Grant had changed, that much was sure, stripped down to a machine with only a singular purpose. He was more streamlined, efficient. “Hickem came and talked to me. And Sam.”

  She looked for a reaction from him, something that made Grant stir at the mention of Sam’s name, but there was nothing.

  “Did he follow the breadcrumbs?” Grant asked.

  “He thinks that Dennis is going to attack the music festival,” Mocks answered. “They’ve tightened security. Really doubled down, I guess.”

  “Good.” Grant turned and started to head to the back of the house.

  “Hey.” Mocks jolted forward, cutting Grant off and forcing him to stop. “That’s it?”

  “I needed to make sure Hickem understood my message.”

  Mocks frowned, staring him up and down. “He said that you were hurt.” She looked him over like she could diagnose his condition with X-ray vision, but he didn’t look hurt.

  “I’m fine,” Grant said.

  Mocks waited for more, anything else, but there was nothing. “You are anything but fine.”

  “I’m going to finish this, Mocks,” Grant said. “No matter what.”

  “And what about Sam? What about—”

  “Whatever future we had together is gone. You know that. She knows that. I know that.” It was the first time that he let any emotion through, and it was only in the eyes, which had reddened.

  Watching him now, seeing what he’d become, both mentally and physically, Mocks realized that she was seeing him as he would have been if he hadn’t met Sam two years ago, if he hadn’t walked away from the line of work that was slowly wearing him down to a fine point. This was the incarnation of Grant that she had worked so hard to prevent.

  “You can still walk away, Grant,” Mocks said, starting to cry. “We can call Sam right now. She’ll go on the run with you. I can give you money, you can get out of the country, head north into Canada. I bet I could even get Hickem to help you with relocation. He’s trying to help. Really. It might not be the life you imagined, but it will still be a life.”

  Grant retained his stoic posture, gazing down at her as though he were a statue carved out of marble or bronze. But again, there was the slightest crack in his armor, a single glint of the pain that rested beneath all of that focus and rage.

  “He has to be stopped, Mocks,” Grant said. “And we both know that I’m the only one who can do it. I’ve gotten inside of his head. I know how he thinks, how he moves, how he…”

  “Hunts?” Mocks asked, finishing the sentence for him, arching her eyebrows. “So you’ve what? Become him? Is that what you’re telling me?” Sh
e shook her head. “You’re not like him, Grant. No matter how much time you’ve spent chasing him, or studying him. It’s not in your nature to be like Dennis Pullman. It’s duty that drives your pursuit, and honor that keeps you feeling guilty.” She paused, holding back the tears. “You don’t have to do this.”

  Mocks had seen that look in Grant’s eye in junkies during her time on the streets. He was heading for a final confrontation that would put Grant six feet under. He hadn’t come home to just stop Dennis. He’d come back to Seattle to die.

  “Hickem hasn’t been able to get the job done,” Grant said. “Dennis is too smart and too elusive.”

  Mocks snarled. “After everything that’s happened, after all you’ve gone through, this is how you’re going to go down? In some self-righteous blaze of glory? Why? What do you have to prove, Grant? Why do you want to die?”

  “Because it’s all I have left to give her,” Grant answered, his voice cracking as he twisted his mouth to seal up the grief before it poured out of him. He lowered his head, regaining his composure, and when he raised his gaze to Mocks once more, all that remained were the remnants of his tears. “I know how much this has hurt Sam, but it only hurts because I’m still out there in the world. Because I’m alive, she will always think we have a chance at being together. But that’s not what will happen, Mocks. Life on the run is no life, no matter how you try and spin it. We’d never be safe. You can’t sleep with one eye open and get any rest. I don’t want that life for her.” He nodded. “After I’m gone, she’ll be devastated. I know she will be. But she’ll have a chance to move on, to find someone new. It won’t be what we had, but it will still be good. She’ll come through the other side, bruised and bloodied, but alive. That’s what I can offer her, Mocks. I can make it so she doesn’t have to hang on anymore.”

  “She hasn’t given up on you,” Mocks said. “And if death won’t stop that woman from looking for you.”

  “She’ll spiral like I did after Ellen died,” Grant said. “But you’ll help pull her out. You’ll be the light she can follow out of that hell, Mocks. Just like how you did it for me.”

  Mocks collapsed back against the side of the house. She opened her mouth a half dozen times to speak, but the words wouldn’t come, so she simply shook her head. This wasn’t a fight she was going to win. He had made up his mind a long time ago. The only reason he came to talk to her now was to say his final piece.

  “Promise me, Mocks,” Grant said. “Promise me that you’ll pull her out.”

  After everything that Grant had done, she knew she couldn’t refuse, but that didn’t make the decision any easier. “Okay. I promise.”

  “Thank you.” Grant’s hardened resolve fractured once more, only for a moment. “How’s Rick?”

  It wasn’t much, but it was the first semblance of the old Grant. The one that clung to the body standing in front of her like a shadow, ready to disappear the moment darkness descended.

  “Good,” Mocks answered. “Well, better at least.”

  “And Chase?” Grant asked.

  Mocks’s expression softened. “He misses his Uncle Grant.”

  Grant nodded. “I miss him too.”

  She waited for him to ask about Sam, but when the questions never came, she took it upon herself to bring it up. With his guard finally lowered, she might be able to reach him.

  “Sam misses you,” Mocks said, and in the same instance she mentioned her name, she saw Grant raise that guard once more. “If you’d just talk to her—”

  “I told you I can’t.” Anger shimmered in Grant’s voice, and the growl caused Mocks to step back. “I’m too far gone, Mocks. You see that, don’t you?”

  The truth was that she did. While there were glimpses of the man she had known, the partner that she had spent two years with on the streets, the man who had saved herself and her husband, the man who had become her closest friend was gone. But she wouldn’t tell him that.

  “It’s not too late,” Mocks said. “You’re never too far gone, and you know that I understand that better than anyone. Just come home, Grant. We’ll fix this. I promise.”

  And for one fleeting moment, Mocks watched Grant’s reaction and saw that he was considering it. She saw the conflict, the doubt, the desire to come back to the people whom he cared most about. But the moment was gone in the blink of an eye, and that man who had taken over Grant’s body returned.

  “Goodbye, Mocks,” Grant said.

  Mocks watched him leave, but then sprinted after him, forcing him to stop. “Wait!” She held up her hands and forced him to stop. “Just… wait.”

  Once she was convinced that he wasn’t going anywhere, she hurried back to the garage and unpacked an old Kevlar vest that she’d bought for Rick a long time ago. The pair were about the same size, though Grant had lost a considerable amount of weight.

  Grant was still waiting for her when she came back out, but he shook his head when he saw the vest. “If I’m caught, they’ll trace it back to you and—”

  Mocks shoved the Kevlar into Grant’s chest, and he grabbed it before it hit the ground. “Don’t make me beat you up.”

  Grant smirked, that quick flash of his old self returning, and then nodded. “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome.” And before she thought better of it, Mocks wrapped her arms around Grant and squeezed as hard as she could. “I love you, Chase Grant. Sam loves you too. We all do. Just remember that, and maybe you’ll finally hear us.” She stepped back quickly, as if the hug had never happened, and Grant turned to leave without another word.

  She wasn’t sure if he left because she had started crying, or if he had and he didn’t want her to see. But after Grant was gone, she collapsed to her knees, where she stayed sobbing until Rick’s sister came out to find her curled up on her side on the cold ground.

  51

  Hickem repeatedly checked his phone, hoping that he’d get a call from either Mocks or Sam, or even Grant himself, but none came, and after the interaction he had with both of the women at the hotel, deep down he knew that he was on his own.

  “Sir?”

  Hickem broke from his daydream and returned his attention to the schematics of the festival that his surveillance team had put together. “Go on.”

  “We’ll have snipers on every building within the two-hundred-degree perimeter of the festival.” The agent ran his finger along the invisible line. “Because the rest of the festival is backed up against the water, we’ll be able to devote and concentrate our considerable resources at the egress points along that same line.”

  “I want the same kind of presence along the water,” Hickem said.

  The agent paused, glaring at the rest of the team. “Sir, it would be a waste of manpower to keep—”

  “How many serial killers have you dealt with during your career that have escaped from a maximum security prison?” Hickem addressed the entire team. “Really? Not one?”

  The lead agent exhaled, dropping the pen onto the map. “Sir, I think we all understand the unique nature of this—”

  “I don’t think you understand shit.” Hickem pressed his finger into the map, the pressure so great that the table beneath it groaned from his weight. “We’ve thrown nearly all of our domestic resources at this guy for the past three months, and we’ve got jack shit to show for it. Whatever plan you’ve come up with, he already has a contingency for. Now, we are not going to get another shot at this, so I want us thinking a little more progressively when it comes to capturing this lunatic.” He smashed his fist onto the table. “Do I make myself clear?”

  A unanimous chorus of ‘yes, sir’ echoed in response, and Hickem stepped away from the table.

  “Then I want a new strategy before the end of today. We stay up all night if we have to, but we don’t stop until we get it right.” Hickem shouldered open the door and exited the conference room of the small FBI building that acted as the Bureau’s Seattle office.

  The walls were yellowed, the lights flickeri
ng, and every inch of the building somehow reeked of mildew, which the agents had tried to mask with air fresheners and Febreze, but the synthetic aromas didn’t help.

  Hickem moved swiftly through the office, turning heads with every agent and employee he passed. He knew most of them by name now, but he didn’t respond to any of the pleasantries as he passed, every discarded hello no doubt causing great harm to the psyche of the employee he ignored. It was one aspect of the job that he enjoyed.

  Power was a hell of a drug.

  A blast of cold air quickly erased the building’s stench from Hickem’s nostrils and provided a needed boost of adrenaline from the mundane meetings that had plagued him all afternoon.

  Without realizing it, he had walked all the way down to the street corner. With the traffic light red, he took a right, not wanting to break his stride.

  Hickem pulled the coat of his jacket tighter against the stiff breeze, one more reminder of why he wanted to get the hell out of this city. DC was cold, but it wasn’t this biting. And at least Virginia had snow, which helped cover up the dead of winter.

  A few more blocks, and Hickem reached into his pocket and pulled out a cigar. It had been a while since he smoked, but he decided to cut himself some slack. He cupped his hand around the end of the cigar to block the wind.

  An orange glow radiated from the end of the cigar, and he tucked the lighter into his pocket and then found a bench that had a clear shot of the water to the west.

  Trailing clouds of cigar smoke, Hickem walked over and brushed off the seat before sitting down. He leaned back and puffed smoke, the tobacco providing relief as the stress of the day slipped away.