Trust Me

by Abbott, Jeff

  It was all a delicious prelude to Hellfire.

  Very different from the first time he’d written a paper about the possibility of a major terrorist attack, and been ignored and jeered. He had been right then; he was making sure he was right now.

  Now he had struck, made his point, and all the government’s resources would go to stop a repeat occurrence.

  Which was perfect.

  Henry arrived in DC, picked up his car, drove for an extra hour to be sure he wasn’t being followed, and went home.

  He waited for another ransom call. He was prepared to talk this time; he knew what he would say that could shield him if the call was taped. He kept calling Eric Lindoe; no answer. He did not want to call the prince he’d met in the London park three days before and explain that the fifty million was missing. It would be an immediate death sentence. Unless he ran. But if he ran, Luke was dead.

  He got up, paced his floors. He listened to Bach, to Mahler, to settle his mind, to try and determine what he could do.

  He tried to distract his mind by going back through Luke’s Night Road database, reading the postings Luke had made while play-acting at extremism, marveling at the discussions he’d had with the lost. Brilliant work the young man had done. Complete, insightful, using everything he’d learned about the emotional needs of extremists to connect with them, even through the looking glass of the internet. He had been nearly a perfect spy for Henry.

  Henry had wept twice in his adult life: first when his wife, Luke’s mother, died in a car accident that never should have been. Now he wiped a tear from his eyes when he thought about Luke.

  Stupid weakness, he told himself. You didn’t even like him at first. Or his mother. You’re weak. You cannot care, you cannot.

  But he did. Didn’t the prince have a family? Didn’t Mouser? Why should he be alone? It was unfair, just as so much of his life had been. A constant, unyielding thorn of unfairness.

  On the ongoing television coverage, he watched the bodies laying forlorn in the streets of Ripley, film taken from helicopters, and he felt nothing. He saw a minivan crashed near the train depot, a boy’s body a few feet from the wreck, and he thought of Luke.

  He slept fitfully at his desk, the phone by his head. He forgot to eat.

  When the phone rang, nearly a full day after the first ransom demand, he grabbed it so hard that he nearly flung it across the room. He forced himself to gain control before he spoke. ‘Yes?’

  It was the hacker that he had asked to break into the GPS database. ‘Your son’s BMW has been parked near the Dallas/Fort Worth airport for the past day.’

  ‘Where was it before? From when it was at the Austin airport?’

  ‘The GPS tracker followed it to Houston. It stopped at two addresses. I can give them to you …’

  Henry scribbled down the addresses. He called up the addresses on his computer while the hacker continued to talk.

  ‘Then it departed to an area outside a small town in east Texas called Braintree. The coordinates match that of a rental cabin. Stayed parked there for nearly twenty minutes, then proceeded to the DFW airport, arriving at 6.07 a.m.’

  A nowhere town called Braintree. Why would a kidnapper after fifty million go to some rental cabin deep in the piney woods?

  Stashing Luke, perhaps. Or killing him and burying him among the pines. The thought made Henry’s throat go dry.

  The addresses in Houston were for a parking lot and then a bank.

  He thanked the hacker. The doorbell rang again ten minutes later, as he hung up from talking to Mouser and giving him the information on the Braintree cabin.

  Henry opened the door - to find a reporter and a television camera standing on his porch. The young woman shoved the microphone into his face and Henry froze.

  ‘Mr Shawcross, we need a comment from you …’

  9

  Everyone was dead. Luke knew it as soon as he opened his eyes. He stood in the back of the private jet and began to walk through the small cabin. The whine of the engines, racing to nowhere, was the only sound. His father’s friends lay slumped in their seats, faces blue, jaws slack. One had his fingers tucked into his collar, as though the fabric had strangled him with a noose-like tightness. Luke wasn’t breathing, either. He could see frost coating the inside of the jet’s windows. He tried to wipe it away with his fingertips. If he knelt he could see out the glass, an endless smear of the Atlantic below, no land in sight.

  The medal his father gave him, the avenging angel, burned with cold fury against his chest.

  A ghost plane, everyone dead. A flight to nowhere. He stood from the ice-shrouded window that looked out over the empty sea. The door to the cockpit was closed. Between him and the door stood a man in a mechanic’s uniform. Ace Beere. He was short, red-faced, pathetic. ‘You killed them all. You sabotaged the plane. You took my dad. For no reason.’

  ‘For every reason,’ Ace Beere said. He tapped his temple, marred by a bullet wound.

  Luke pushed past him. His father and the pilots would be in the cockpit, they would be okay, not dead like everyone out here …

  He opened the door. ‘Dad?’ he called.

  The cockpit was empty, gone, the ocean rushing at him like a wall.

  Luke jerked awake. He thought for a moment he was on that ghost plane, flying with its suffocated corpses over the ocean until its fuel was gone. But it was just a dream. He was in a far worse situation as he moved his arms and heard the clink of the chains and remembered he was bound to the cabin bed.

  Trapped in a death, just like his father had been, far from everyone he loved, beyond rescue. Except his father had no chance. Luke was going to have to make his own luck.

  Betrayed. That son-of-a-bitch Henry betrayed me. The thought cut like a knife in Luke’s mind.

  For most of the morning Luke had slept. Exhaustion, driven by the long dance with adrenaline, put a stronger claim on him than fear. He awoke in the late afternoon, bleary from his nightmare, twenty-six hours after Eric kidnapped him, his stomach knotting in hunger and thunder blaring outside the windows. He felt a childish urge to cry - a clutching in his jaw and his chest - and he kept it at arm’s distance until it passed. He tested the chains again, as though their strength had weakened while he slept, and then he dozed some more. When he awoke the rain dropped to a steady hiss, a white noise that allowed him to think.

  The chain cuffs were blister-tight against his wrists and ankles. He found enough give in the chains to allow him to sit up on the mattress and stand up next to the bed.

  He examined the room. The metal bed was pushed close to the wall and bolted to the wooden floor. The shackles were attached to the iron bed, not the wall. Under the bed sat a small plastic container. He opened it; it was a chemical toilet. It needed emptying but he felt a sudden relief that he wouldn’t have to soil himself or his bed. Crumpled peanut butter cracker wrappers and an empty water bottle were also under the bed. Under the heavily draped window, a table stood. On it was a small lamp, casting an anemic glow on the hardwood floor. A plain wooden chair. Another door was in a corner, maybe leading to a closet. He couldn’t get close to it.

  Henry’s betrayal echoed in his head: I can’t help you. I’m going to hang up now.

  Henry could have lied, he could have stalled. He didn’t. He left Luke at his kidnapper’s mercy. Henry was a Judas of the basest sort, and when Luke tried to summon an excuse for his stepfather, he could not.

  So what would happen next?

  The possibilities were few: the British woman, Jane, might come here. Either to get rid of him, or to try and force a change of heart from Henry. She might prove she meant business with violence.

  The other possibility was that no one was going to find him, no one was coming, and a slow, lonely death from dehydration and starvation awaited him in the coming days or weeks. How long would it take him to die?

  Luke had to find a way to escape.

  He checked his pockets. He still had his wallet and he dumped the
contents on the bed: Texas driver’s license. Forty-one dollars. A VISA card he used often, another MasterCard for emergencies. A University of Texas graduate student ID. And against his chest, the cool of the Saint Michael’s medal, his father’s last promise of protection. So much for promises.

  Nothing to use against the locks.

  He got up from the bed and pulled hard on its metal frame. It didn’t budge. He inspected the four legs of the bed. Three were bolted down tightly but one - the left rear - was a bit loose. Barely. He noticed heel scuffs marring the wall.

  Aubrey hadn’t just laid here waiting for her knight to come rescue her. She’d tried to kick the bed loose.

  Luke inspected the slightly loosened screw. She’d gotten it to give way from the floor just a hair. Not much. The screw was a crosshatch, Philips-style. He put the corner of the credit card in it. Tried to turn, gently, so the plastic wouldn’t shred. Careful. He felt eagerness, a cousin to panic, rise up his arm and he smothered the urge to hurry.

  The screw wouldn’t budge. The plastic wasn’t stiff enough to turn it. He tried the driver’s license. Same result.

  He needed something stronger. He had to look at the room with new eyes - seeing everything as a potential tool - but there was nothing. Panic churned in him and then he noticed the lamp. Lots of parts: bulb, base, cord, plug. It was a good six feet away, and he could see where it was plugged into the wall. Luke stood and took two steps from the bed. That was close as he could get; so he needed to get the lamp closer to him.

  He had an idea.

  Luke tore the blankets and sheets from the bed. He knotted them into a long rope, with the care of a Boy Scout testing for a badge. He double-checked the knots, then slowly fed the improvised rope, thick and awkward, through his hands.

  He lay on the chilly hardwood floor and stretched as far from the bed as he could. His feet remained on the bed; the chains would not give farther.

  He whipped the sheet-rope hard toward the table. He wanted to snag a table leg, with the other end of the rope back in his hands. First try, it missed. He tried again, putting more snap into his wrist: missed. He realized he needed the heavier section - the blanket - whipping toward the table leg; the sheet was too light. He reversed his makeshift rope. His arms ached. He threw the rope again. Missed. Again. His arms felt dense as stone. Missed. Tried again. The makeshift rope caught the right front leg of the table, part of it U-turning past the leg, back toward him. But out of reach.

  He got to his feet and picked up the little side table next to the bed. He smashed it against the wall and jumped on the legs, splintering them from the base.

  He picked up a leg that had a bent nail sticking from its end.

  Holding the leg, he reached for the edge of the makeshift rope that was wrapped back toward him. He wanted to grab the blanket so he could pull the table toward him. He pretzeled his body to reach as far as the chains would let him. He turned the leg so the tip would face the blanket.

  The cabin was cool from the rain, but sweat poured down his back; he didn’t know how else he could drag the table toward him if this didn’t work.

  He aimed the leg, with its nail tip, toward the blanket rope. The nail caught an edge of the blanket. He let out a tense sigh; he ached as though pushing a truck up a hill.

  He began to pull the blanket back toward him, using the jerryrigged table legs. The nail, trapped in the blanket, made a light hiss as he dragged it across the hardwood. Soon he had both ends of the blanket-rope in his hands. Slowly he began to tug at the rope. The table, with the lamp atop it, began to inch away from the window. He drew the table three feet nearer and the lamp’s cord went taut. He stopped.

  He stood, holding the broken table leg with its bent crown of nail. He leaned as far as he could. The nail caught the edge of the lampshade and came free. He tried again, pulling the lampshade toward him, every muscle straining against his chains.

  The lamp tottered and it fell to the floor.

  Darkness. But he saw as the light died where the lamp fell. He groped in the dark, used the nail to catch the lampshade now on the floor. He could feel the counter tension of the lamp’s power cord, still mired in the outlet. If the lamp’s cord broke he was finished.

  The lampshade crumpled, but he kept pulling on the top of the lamp. He heard the plug fall to the wooden floor. Breathless, he pulled the cord toward him.

  His fingertips caressed the narrow edges of the plug’s metal tips. Thin and strong.

  Luke inched to the bed leg. Groping in the dark, he wedged the plug against the groove in the bolt.

  The screw turned.

  He fought down the hammer in his heart. He worked with the calm of a jeweler setting a tiny stone. Don’t rush, don’t lose patience.

  He pulled the first screw free. It worked. Four screws on each base of the cot’s legs. Sixteen screws total. Fifteen to go.

  He worked steadily in the darkness, without panic. He unscrewed the first leg and worked the chain loose. Moved to the second. Now the back legs of the bed were both free. He started on the third leg. Then the fourth. His fingertips felt raw.

  And with the last leg removed, he shivered in relief. He staggered to the far wall, the chains still on his ankles and wrists, but free from the bed.

  The barest glimmer of light began to touch the edge of the curtains.

  Flashlights?

  Whoever was coming would hear him, running with the clinking shackles. He remembered Eric had taken the keys to unlock the shackles from underneath the flowerpot. God only knew if Eric or Aubrey had returned them.

  If he went out the front door whoever was coming would see him. He opened the room’s door, shuffled toward the back door. He tested it. Locked. He undid the deadbolt, eased the door open, and waddled out, trying to keep the chains silent.

  He closed the door behind him.

  The night lay heavy and dark against the trees. The rain had stopped, and the wind hissed in the pines. Luke could hear voices and footsteps on gravel. A man. A woman. For a crazy moment he thought Eric and Aubrey had returned. But too much time had passed, and they had been far too anxious to escape and leave him to his fate.

  ‘Here’s the problem with blowing up casinos,’ the man said. A bit of complaint in his voice. ‘It’s mostly going to affect just one industry.’

  ‘No,’ the woman said. ‘It makes entertainment venues likely targets. There’s a trickle-down effect, to theme parks, movie houses, resorts …’

  They clearly weren’t cops coming to rescue him. Blowing up casinos sounded like a plan hatched by one of his Night Road buddies. His heart boomed in his chest.

  Luke heard another mumbled cursing - from the woman - and then the key working the lock, the front door opening.

  Luke ran along the edge of the house, toward the front door, clutching the chains closer to him. He lay in the dirt close to the cabin. Risked a look around the corner. The front door was open and light came from the rectangle of the door. The flowerpot had been moved from its base.

  Maybe the keys to the shackles were still there, waiting for Henry if he’d changed his mind about the ransom. He stood, slowly, trying to see if he could spot a silvery glint on the step.

  ‘We’re screwed,’ he heard the woman say. She had a low, raspy voice. ‘Or maybe he was never here.’

  ‘Someone was chained to that bed. He dismantled it. We better report in,’ the man answered in a heavy baritone.

  ‘He’s in chains, he can’t have gotten far,’ she said. Her tone was like an echo in a cave of wet stone.

  ‘Maybe someone came and collected him. Whoever grabbed him changed their mind, took him again.’

  ‘No, Mouser,’ he heard the woman say. ‘They would’ve just unlocked him or killed him on the bed. Luke pulled an escape trick.’ He heard a foot kick at the broken desk.

  Mouser? And this woman knew Luke’s name.

  Luke put his eye back to the cabin’s corner. It wouldn’t take them long to search the upstairs and the downs
tairs. Maybe just a couple of minutes. He’d have a few seconds alone with the keys, if they were still under the flowerpot. Then he could run like hell, vanish into the woods.

  The woman stepped out onto the front step. She was tall, thin, wearing jeans. From the light inside the cabin, he could see a crown of dyed white hair and a thin tracery of scar along her jawline. She held a gun in her hand and a flashlight in the other. She walked toward the woods. Away from him.

  Luke would wait for the trees to swallow the woman, and then he’d hurry and retrieve the keys to the chains if they were there. At least get his legs free. Then he could run.

  She stepped into the heavy darkness of the trees.

  He turtled toward the flowerpot, trying to move quietly enough where the crinkle of the chains sounded like the wind nuzzling the pines.

  Luke knelt by the flowerpot. He heard the man call out from deep inside the house, ‘There’s food in the fridge.’

  He tipped over the flowerpot. The keys to the shackles were gone.

  Behind him the woman called, ‘You’re not very smart, are you?’

  ‘I guess not.’ Luke stood and faced her.

  The woman wasn’t even bothering to point the gun at him. She walked close to him, and aimed the flashlight into his face. ‘Don’t take it the wrong way. I’m amazed you even got halfway free.’

  So close, he thought. He noticed she wasn’t aiming the gun at him and wondered if she even considered him a threat. In a flash he thought: you’ve studied these people but you’ve never faced them. This is different than reading a book or a loudmouth posting on the web. You can’t analyze them, you just have to fight them. Because you know what they’re like. Single-minded. Brutal. Reasoning hadn’t worked with Eric; it wouldn’t work with these two.