The Cornwalls Are Gone

by James Patterson

  Then I slam the closet door shut before I break down and lose my focus. I can’t lose my focus.

  I just can’t.

  I race downstairs and damn it all to hell, a phone rings and it’s mine, stashed in my soft leather briefcase, and I’m tempted to ignore it while I prep to get the hell going, but suppose—just suppose—it’s good news?

  Tom was a tough reporter and is now a tough writer, working on a nonfiction book. I know he wouldn’t sit back and be a nice, cooperative prisoner. He would fight back. He would look for means and ways of escape. He would—

  I drop my iPhone on the floor, think, Tom, Tom, Tom, as I grab it and pick it up.

  CHAPTER 4

  WITH MY iPhone finally firmly in my hand, I see the name on the screen.

  BRUNO WENNER

  Damn, of all times.

  Bruno is a major assigned to my unit, the executive officer to my boss, Lieutenant Colonel Hugh Denton.

  The phone keeps on ringing.

  I should let it go to voice mail, but Bruno’s a good guy who’s backed me up and helped me along in navigating the increasingly bureaucratic world of an eighteenth-century organization adjusting to one very challenging and strange twenty-first century.

  I slide my finger across the screen, bring the phone up to my ear.

  “Cornwall.”

  “Oh, Amy, glad I caught you,” Bruno says. “You at home?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Tom and Denise okay?”

  I clench my jaw and say, “They’re fine, sir.”

  “Of course they are…I just sent you an email, and just to reconfirm, your meeting is on for oh-eight hundred tomorrow.”

  “The meeting…”

  Right now about 90 percent of my body and being—the other 10 percent focusing on breathing, heart beating, so on—is wrapped up in one thing, and one thing only.

  Bruno sounds concerned. “You know, the meeting with Warrant Officer Vasquez? From the CID? To interview you about…well, what happened in Afghanistan two months back. The incident with the prisoner.”

  Afghanistan.

  Like a stone-and-dirt avalanche, the memory of the “incident” pours over me. The grueling hours interviewing a captured Taliban member who shouldn’t have been in the government-controlled territory we were supporting. The grin, the joking from the prisoner…his utter assurance that nothing would happen to him, especially with me—a woman!—in charge of his questioning. The heat, the sand, the dust that got into everything, the messages from on high demanding to know why the Taliban member was there, what I was going to do about it, what I was going to learn. Come on, Captain Cornwall, we’ve got lives depending on your skills. Get to it!

  Yeah. Right up to the point where I went to pick him up in his cell for another go-around and found him huddled in the corner, blood and foam around his nose, lips, and beard.

  Dead.

  On my watch, under my control.

  “You sure, sir, oh-eight hundred?”

  “That’s right, Amy.” His voice lowers. “Just so you know, the colonel is increasingly going apeshit over this matter. So far it’s been kept out of the news, but the more people know about it, the better the chances it’ll get leaked. He really wants you to…cooperate with the CID officer as much as possible tomorrow. To nip everything in the bud.”

  And relieve my superior officer of any troubles from his superior officers, I think.

  “Okay, Major, message received,” I say. “I’m on it, sir.”

  “Good,” Bruno replies, almost in relief. “Amy…this could be a career-ender. Or worse, if your meeting tomorrow doesn’t go well.”

  Yeah, I think. Worse means exchanging my usual uniform for a brown, heavily starched outfit at Leavenworth, joining other prisoners who are in there for rape, murder, drug trafficking, and, at last count, two for treason.

  “Thanks for the reminder, Major. May I go, sir?”

  “Very well, Captain.”

  I disconnect the call, shove my iPhone back into my leather bag along with the Ruger and burner phone, grab that and my purse, and toss my duffel bag over my shoulder.

  In the movies, this would be where the frightened yet determined heroine would stand mournfully in the hallway outside of the door, recall and flash back to all those happy times in here with her strong and smart husband and her precious and also smart young daughter, ready to start those fearful steps from childhood to growing into a young woman.

  To hell with that.

  I don’t have time, so I open the front door and get the hell out of this place that used to be a safe home.

  CHAPTER 5

  AND THEN this brave heroine, off on a quest to save her family, comes within inches of bowling over an elderly woman standing on the concrete steps.

  I do a half dance and jig, and then land with both feet on the lawn. Shirley Gaetz, our next-door neighbor, utters a mixed laugh and cry of surprise as she steps away.

  “Oh, Amy, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

  “It’s okay, Mrs. Gaetz, honest,” I say, rearranging my duffel bag, which nearly fell off my left shoulder. “What can I do for you?”

  “Well, it’s this, my younger son, Timmy, ever since his father passed on years back,” she begins, and she starts a long and winding tale of how her son had agreed to help take care of the house after Shirley’s husband, Roger, had passed on after serving more than thirty years in this man’s army, and on and on and on…

  Mrs. Gaetz is the oldest resident in the development. She’s watched over Denise when Tom and I were out on our respective jobs, and she looks adorable in black stretch slacks and a floral top that could camouflage a dirt mound into a flower bed.

  I look longingly at my black Jeep Wrangler, and I interrupt her and say, “Mrs. Gaetz, I’m terribly sorry, but my office called. I need to get back to the base, straightaway. How can I help you?”

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” she says, reaching up to adjust her white-rimmed eyeglasses, secured by a thin gold chain around her fleshy neck. “It’s just that I’m curious if you and Tom were pleased with your carpet-cleaning service, the one that stopped by a few hours ago.”

  I stand there like the proverbial dopey wife who doesn’t know what’s going on with her family. With our weird work schedules and occasional separate trips, organizing our lives and that of our daughter’s sometimes feels akin to planning the invasion of Normandy. Lots of moving parts, lots of time-sensitive schedules. I’m ashamed to say it, but twice poor Denise has been left abandoned at soccer practice because Tom and I each thought the other had it covered.

  But a carpet-cleaning service?

  “Ah…well, I haven’t talked to Tom yet, so I really don’t know,” I say.

  “Oh,” she says with disappointment. “I was hoping you could give me a recommendation.”

  Then it clicks, just like that. “You know, I didn’t really notice. I’ll have to ask Tom when I see him.”

  “Oh,” she says, glancing at the CR-V. “He’s not here?”

  “Ah…he’s out with Denise.”

  “I see.”

  “Tell me, did you get the name of the company?”

  She shakes her head. “No, I’m sorry. It was a bright-red van, and I saw letters on the side, advertising some carpet-cleaning place. Funny thing, I saw it drive in, and then turn around and back in, right up to the garage door.”

  I thought, Driver makes a mistake, heads in with the front, then turns around so whatever they’re doing can be blocked from view from most neighbors.

  “Was there one guy, or two?”

  “Two,” she says. “Wearing those gray…what do you call them, jumpsuits.” A pause. “Amy, is everything all right?”

  Good God, what a goddamn question.

  “Things are fine,” I say. “Did they stay long?”

  “Now, funny you should say that. No, they didn’t stay that long at all. I just saw them come out with two of your Oriental carpets and put them in the back of t
he van.”

  It feels like there’s a giant hand in the center of my chest, squeezing, and squeezing hard.

  Tom and I don’t own any Oriental rugs.

  “Well, I hope they do a good job,” I say. “I bet they wrapped them up nice and secure.”

  Mrs. Gaetz smiles and nods. “That’s what struck me, when they left. They opened the garage door and came out with the rolled-up rugs between them, and they put them in the van, real careful like, one by one. Like those two rugs were very precious.”

  I manage to say, “You have no idea,” before hustling by her and getting into my Jeep.

  CHAPTER 6

  I STOP at the intersection, waiting for the light to change. Our house is on a cul-de-sac, meaning there’s only one way in and one way out.

  One way out.

  Before me is the busy traffic of Kingstowne Boulevard, which eventually leads into the extremely busy traffic of I-95 if you make a left-hand turn. If you were kidnapping a dad and young child from this neighborhood, heading to I-95 would be your best bet. Get buried in traffic, lots of options north and south to make your escape…

  Escape where?

  Just across the street is a Sunoco service station and minimart.

  The light changes.

  I hit the accelerator.

  Drive across the street and behind the service station.

  I take a deep breath, step out.

  Inside the service station there’s a coffee setup, a pastry cabinet, and the usual narrow aisles filled with overpriced junk food, from chips to cupcakes—and I shouldn’t be a wiseass, because there have been a number of times when I’ve stopped here with Denise to pick up something to drink or munch on while going on an errand or a school trip.

  At the left is a counter with two register stations with piles of cigarettes in shelves on the rear wall, and there are lines of three people each in front of the registers.

  Busy day.

  I’m wearing my class B service uniform with a short zippered dark-blue jacket, and that has the benefit of not displaying my name tag. Good enough.

  But the lines aren’t moving.

  Any other time, any other day, I’d be patient.

  By God, this sure as hell isn’t any other time or day.

  I push my way forward, saying, “Excuse me,” in a low but brisk voice, and I pull out my military ID—making sure my thumb is covering my name—and I come up against a cashier named Sarah, plump with brown hair and a silver nose ring.

  I flash my ID at her. “Ma’am, I need to see the manager. Right now.”

  “Ah.” Her eyes widen. “That’s Tommy…he’s on break.”

  “Then who’s in charge?”

  She looks over to another woman, older, with long pink fingernails and bright blond hair. Her name is Tina, and she shrugs and says, “It’s you, hon. You’ve been here longer than me.”

  Sarah nods, takes her new responsibility well, puts up a sign saying USE NEXT REGISTER PLEASE with a little arrow pointing to Tina’s station, and leads me around to the side office as the three good Americans in line quietly join the other one.

  I don’t waste time. “Sarah, I’m investigating a matter of national security. Can I look at your surveillance camera system, please?”

  “Sure,” she says, pointing to a wall that has a bank of six small monitors, with a larger monitor nearby, and a computer and keyboard. The wall is cluttered with tacked-up greeting cards, notices from the Virginia Department of Labor and Industry, and sloppy photocopies of memos from the home office, warning workers about the latest phone scams.

  There’s a counter below the keyboard and two chairs, and I take one and Sarah takes the other, and I look at the six monitors and oh my God, yes, yes, yes, monitor number 4 shows the entrance to the Sunoco station, Kingstowne Boulevard, and the very beginning of our street, Jackson Street.

  “Sarah, I know you have lots of questions, but I’m sorry, I can’t answer them,” I say. “But I need for you to go back and review the footage for monitor number four.”

  She scoots the chair closer, starts working on the keyboard. “How far back do you want to go?”

  I check my watch. It’s six p.m. Mrs. Gaetz said the supposed carpet guys were at our house “a few hours ago.” Call it four hours, just to be safe.

  “Starting at two p.m.,” I say.

  “All right.”

  She works with a wireless mouse, and on the large monitor, a menu appears. After a series of clicks, we’re watching the video feed from monitor number 4, and the time stamp is for two p.m.

  “Great, Sarah, that’s just great,” I say. “Now…can you fast-forward it for me, please?”

  “Sure,” she says, and soon enough, the images of the cars and trucks are moving along—flick flick flick—like a silent film from the 1920s speeded up, and at the 2:46 p.m. mark I see our CR-V turn into Jackson Avenue, and I just nod and think, Okay, Tom’s home, and the flick flick flick goes on until—

  A school bus stops, extends the Stop sign from the driver’s side, and when the bus moves away, there are four little shapes racing out of view, one with a pixie blond haircut, wearing a soccer uniform, and I must have gasped or made some sort of noise, because Sarah says, “Oh, do you want me to stop there?”

  “No,” I say firmly. “Keep on going.”

  And, thank God, I don’t have long to wait.

  A red van shows up at the traffic light and I say, “There, right there.”

  Sarah works the keyboard again. The view goes into normal time. In the movies you get to see the keyboard operator freeze the film, zoom in so you can see the license plate of the suspect vehicle, and sometimes you can even see the driver’s lips move and decipher what he’s saying.

  This little Sunoco station is definitely not Hollywood. On the screen the van makes a left-hand turn onto Jackson Street and I catch some of the letters on the side: ABLE CARPET. It looks like it has Virginia license plates, but the numbers and letters are too fuzzy. I check the time.

  Wait.

  Per the video feed, the van comes back sixteen minutes later. There are two men in the front. Can’t tell if they’re Caucasian, Asian, African American, or any mixture thereof. I chew on my right thumbnail. My two loved ones are in the rear of this van. I’m positive.

  The van makes a left and then disappears. I know the geography. The exit to I-95 is only about five minutes away.

  That’s that.

  I push the chair back and say, “Sarah, thank you so very much.”

  She nods, looking quite serious. “Glad I could help. And I promise, I won’t tell anyone.”

  “Thanks,” I say. “One more favor? I need to use a restroom.”

  Sarah says, “I’m not supposed to let customers use it…but this is important, right? Follow me.”

  Six minutes later, at the rear of the service station, I’ve changed into civilian clothes—blue jeans, black turtleneck, short black leather jacket. I quickly walk to my Wrangler, lots of thoughts and plans bouncing around in my head.

  I suddenly remember being with Tom on a warm night in McLean, walking off a fine restaurant meal, and as we went past a corner Walgreens, a man leaning against the wall, smoking a cigarette, smiled at us both and said something I didn’t understand.

  Tom said, “Excuse me,” and walked back to the man, said something. The man said something back and went after Tom, and in a quick movement Tom made a boxing stance, and in one hard punch, the man was on the ground.

  Tom later said, “He called you a whore in Farsi. I told him he shouldn’t have said that. You saw what happened.”

  “I didn’t know you knew boxing.”

  “For a while, I did.”

  “Why did you stop?” I said.

  “Every time I got hit in the face, I cried,” he said.

  So I knew Tom would do his best to keep Denise and himself alive.

  But it was up to me to get them safely free.

  Near the Wrangler is a pump island for diesel,
and four tractor-trailer trucks are lined up, refueling. I tug out the burner phone. This is my connection to the kidnappers, the ones who have upended my life, have stolen my husband and child, and who’ve put them in danger.

  I go to a nearby tractor-trailer truck, belonging to Walmart. I shove the phone in a crack under the doors and go back to my Wrangler.

  Earlier the kidnapper thought he had sent me on a mission.

  He has.

  Mine.

  Not his.

  CHAPTER 7

  IN HIS years as a journalist, Tom Cornwall has been in some tight places: under artillery bombardment in a Kurdish peshmerga outpost in Syria, accidentally separated from a Filipino army patrol while they were hunting Abu Sayyaf terrorists in the jungles of Jolo Island, and in an armored-up Humvee convoy in Afghanistan when the lead vehicle did a flaming backflip after it ran over an IED.

  In all of these close calls, Tom had one sustaining mantra: his circus, his monkey. He was in danger because that was his choice, his life, and if things went to shit, well, he’d be the only one bloodied out.

  Sitting on the edge of a cot in a concrete cube somewhere, he sighs, rubs his head. Now he is in danger again, but now it is so terribly different.

  He lifts his head. His daughter, Denise, is curled up on an identical cot, on the other side of the room. She’s barefoot, wearing black tights and an oversized sweatshirt from Epcot Center. She’s clutching a stuffed Tigger in her arms, and it’s been ten minutes since she last let out a sob.

  Progress, of a sort.

  She looks up and says, “What about Mister Banjo?”

  Tom gets up and examines their quarters. A square room, made of light-green cinder blocks. Concrete ceiling with a small air vent. Concrete floor with a drain in the center. One metal door, leading out. No handle or doorknob on this side. Four lightbulbs dangling from black cords. A dial that can lower the lights but not turn them off. In the corner of the room, a metal sink and metal toilet.