Healy sat back in her chair and rubbed her eyes. She had accepted working nights and weekends as the consequence of being a domestic lawyer, and most of the time she could insulate herself from the emotional ups and downs. But she couldn’t help liking Marie Jones. She knew from the way Jones spoke of her son that the woman was a good mother, and she didn’t deserve what she’d been through.
Healy ground out her cigarette in the ashtray. She thought about Jack Keller. He had gotten to her as well. It wasn’t just that he was good-looking, although he was certainly that. But there was an intensity about him that both thrilled and scared her at the same time. There’d be no half measures with that one, she mused. She shook her head. No use wondering about it, she thought. He’s off limits. For a lot of reasons. She picked up her pen and started working on her notes for her cross-examination. Marie had given her a lot of information about her ex to work with, and if Healy could drop the right bombs at the right time, she was reasonably sure she could get Marie her child back.
There was a sound from outside her door. She looked up and frowned. She thought everyone had gone home.
“Hello?” she called out. There was no answer. She got up and walked out into the front office. It was dark except for the dim illumination of her legal assistant’s computer monitor. “Hello?” she said again. She heard a sound behind her. Before she could start to turn, a damp rag was clamped over her face and mouth. An arm snaked around her throat to hold her fast. There was a strong gagging chemical scent in her nose and throat from what ever the rag was soaked in. She struggled against the restraint, but the darkness closed in on her, overwhelmed her, and took her down.
She came back to consciousness slowly. She couldn’t seem to open her eyes. She tried to lift her hands to rub her eyes, but the effort sent a lightning bolt of pain shrieking through her wrists and up her arms. The pain shocked her back to partial consciousness. Her eyes snapped open.
She was looking down at the top of her desk. Her hands were resting on the desktop. There was blood on them.
Why do I have blood on my hands? she thought muzzily.
She tried to move her hands again, but the pain nearly sent her back into unconsciousness. It was then she noticed the small silver discs that protruded slightly from the tops of her wrists.
Her hands had been nailed to the desk.
She tried to scream, but there was something blocking her mouth, something sticky. Her mouth had been sealed with duct tape. She felt a hand grab her hair and pull her head back.
“None of that, now,” a strangely accented voice whispered in her ear. “When you’re ready to be a good stukkie and tell me what I need to know, then the tape comes off. Tune me grief and try to scream, and it stays right where it is, you check?” She could only moan in terror. He gave her a savage shake by her hair. “I said, you check?” She nodded frantically, not sure of what he meant, but terrified into agreement.
“Good,” the voice said. The hand let go of her hair.
Her head fell forward. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a hand come into view and pick up the pack of cigarettes lying on her desk. She couldn’t see what was going on, and the unknown terror behind her sharpened her hearing. She heard the click of a cigarette lighter, then the long intake of smoke. She whimpered as she felt the heat of a cigarette pass lightly within an inch of the skin on the back of her neck.
“Now,” the voice said. “The little girl. Where is she, and who has her?”
***
Keller lay on his back, staring at the rough, pebbled texture of the ceiling. Get some sleep, Healy had told him, and he had honestly intended to try. He had checked into this motel for just that purpose. But it was looking like another night with his ghosts. Suddenly the room seemed to tilt. He wasn’t looking up at the ceiling any more, he was looking down on a white landscape dotted with small pebbles. He was looking down on the desert.
He sat up and rubbed his face. He had always been able to sleep at Marie’s, but that was over. He was alone again, and the realization gnawed at him like a hungry animal in his vitals. But it was all right. The numbness would return soon enough. He had faith.
His cell phone rang. He checked the caller ID. The last few calls had been from Marie. He had stared at the number but he hadn’t answered. The number this time was different. He snapped the phone open. “Keller,” he said.
“Jack,” Angela said. “Jack, where are you?”
“I’m still in Fayetteville,” he said.
“Marie called here,” Angela said. “She says you won’t answer your phone. She needs to talk to you.”
“No, she doesn’t,” Keller said. “She needs me to stay the hell away from her.”
“Jack,” Angela said.
“She told you what happened?”
There was a pause. “Yeah.”
“So,” he said. “Knowing what this asshole ex-husband of hers is using to take her kid away, you really think she needs to be talking to me right now?”
“It’s that easy, then?” she demanded. “You just walk away?”
“I didn’t say it was easy,” Keller said.
“Come home, Jack,” Angela said. “Come back to Wilmington. Be with your friends if you can’t be with Marie.”
“I’ve got something I have to do first,” he said. “I should be back in a day or so.”
“What is it?” Angela said. “Where are you going?”
“I’ll tell you when I get back,” he said.
“And what are you going to do then?” she said.
“I’m not really thinking that far ahead.”
“Jack,” Angela said. She sounded alarmed. “For God’s sake, don’t do anything to hurt yourself. Call Lucas. Talk to him.”
“Don’t worry,” he said. “I’m not planning to do myself in.”
“I am worried,” she said. “And I’m going to worry about it till I see you again. Please tell me where you’re going.”
“Just somebody I need to go pick up,” he said. “It’s a favor for a friend.”
“Marie?”
“In a way, yeah,” he said.
“Then please be careful,” Angela said.
“Don’t worry,” he said again. “I’m not expecting any trouble.”
***
You’ve got nothing to be ashamed of,” DeGroot said to the woman. She didn’t answer; he had replaced the tape over her mouth after she had finished telling him what he wanted to know. “You did well. I was surprised, actually. At how long you held out, I mean. After all, what are these people to you?” Her shoulders convulsed softly. She was crying. “Ag, well,” he said, “we’ve all got things we feel like we need to do, hey?” He drew a silenced pistol from the toolbox and placed it to the back of her skull.
“But in the end,” he said, “it’s what I need that matters. My job is to make what matters to me matter to you. And I did, didn’t I?” He pulled the trigger.
Afterward, he picked the line of cigarette butts, six in all, off the corner of the desk and dropped them into a small plastic bag. He stashed the bag in the bottom of the toolbox next to the gun. He knew that even the police in this backwater city had access to technology that could extract his DNA from the filters. Most likely, he didn’t have anything on file to match it with, but you never knew. He shook his head. “Six,” he said, looking at the bag of used cigarettes. “Ag shame, you were a tough old bitch.” He patted the dead woman on the shoulder, almost fondly. “Don’t get up,” he said. “I’ll let myself out.”
He drove through the streets, turning the information he had gathered over in his mind. He now knew where to find Powell and Riggio, or at least where they were going to be at a specific time and place. But they weren’t stupid. They’d have put safeguards in place. He couldn’t bet on just showing up at the meeting place, taking them down, and retrieving the key.
He sighed. Bringing the three Deltas into his plan had been a risk. But he needed their silence, and buying it had seemed preferable t
o trying to take all three of them out. They were good, the best the Americans had. Even if he’d succeeded in neutralizing them, there’d be questions if they failed to return from the badlands. Investigations. Searches. “Leave no man behind,” they always said, and the silly buggers actually believed it. In his worldview, if a man was dead, that was the end of it, and going back into the kak to retrieve his torn carcass was lunacy. You could raise a glass to him later if you wanted to honor him. He shook his head. Americans, he thought. Killers and romantics in the same skins, and you never know which one you’ll end up dealing with. Which led him back to the original problem. He had faith in his own capabilities, but two against one was not the kind of odds he played if he could help it. He needed an edge. He needed them off their guard. He sat at a traffic light and tapped his fingers on the steering wheel. They’d be expecting the lawyer and the big fellow, Keller. But they wouldn’t necessarily know what the lawyer looked like.
A man and a woman, then. He thought of the woman he had seen earlier. Jones. And then he knew what he needed to do.
It took him a few minutes to find his way back to the motel where he had followed the man and the boy. He cruised the parking lot slowly, looking for the truck he had seen. When he found it, he parked in a vacant space nearby. He looked at the doors of the rooms on this side of the motel. There were lights behind the curtains of three of them that he could see. He sucked air through his teeth as he thought. They were probably in the room right where the truck was parked. But the rooms were small and close together, and it could be any of the rooms on either side. He’d like to be seen by as few people as possible, and knocking on the wrong door meant someone else might see his face. He shifted in the seat and reached under it for the silenced pistol. He pulled it out, never taking his eyes off the doors. A slim leather case was next, and that went into the pocket of his leather jacket. One of the doors swung open and the man he had seen earlier walked out onto the sidewalk. DeGroot smiled. That one, then. He continued to watch. The man walked toward the office at the front of the motel, where the office was. DeGroot waited. The man bypassed the office and walked across the front parking lot toward the street. DeGroot remembered there was an all-night convenience store across the street. He waited until the man was out of sight, then opened the door and slid out of the car. When he got to the door he looked around for possible observers, then put his ear against the door. There was a TV on in the room. He stepped back and knocked softly. There was no answer. He knocked again, more firmly. After a moment, a small voice said, “Hello?”
“Front desk,” DeGroot said. “I have those extra towels you asked for.”
There was a pause. “I’m not s’posed to let anyone in.”
“Come on, kid,” DeGroot said in as reasonable a voice as he could muster, “Your dad asked for extra towels. I may get busy later and not be able to get back. Just open the door and I’ll hand them to you.”
Nothing happened for a moment, then the door cracked slightly. DeGroot put his shoulder against it and shoved his way into the room. The little boy stumbled and fell backward onto his rump, looking up at DeGroot with huge eyes. His mouth hung open in shock. “Shhh,” DeGroot said, his finger to his lips. “I’ve come to take you home. To your mum.”
“Mom?” the boy said. “Where is she? Where’s my mom?”
“Waiting for you,” DeGroot whispered. “Come on. We have to hurry.”
“My dad said to stay here,” the boy said.
“Right,” said DeGroot, “But you want to go home, right? I mean really, booitje, do you like it here?”
The kid shook his head. “I want to go home.”
“Of course you do,” DeGroot said. “Your mum misses you. She really wants to see you.”
The kid still looked doubtful. DeGroot was running out of time. “There’s something we have to do first, though,” he said. “Here. Sit up here.” He patted the mattress. Still looking wary, the boy sat on the bed. DeGroot reached into his jacket pocket and took out the leather case. He flipped it open and took out a hypodermic needle. It glinted in the light of the room. The boy’s eyes widened. “What’s that?” he said.
“Something to help you sleep,” DeGroot said. “We’ve got a long trip ahead.”
“I don’t want to get a shot,” the boy said. “No.” He started to cry. He tried to climb off the bed but DeGroot knocked him backward with a forearm, pinning him down.
“No!” the boy said as DeGroot plunged the needle into his arm. “Stop! Owwww! Mom!” He continued to struggle. DeGroot dropped the hypodermic and covered the boy’s mouth with his hand. “Shhhh,” he said. “Shhhhh.”
In a few seconds, the boy’s thrashing grew weaker, then he lay limp. DeGroot stood up. He heard the rattling of the doorknob. He stepped back into the darkened bathroom and drew the pistol. The outside door opened, then closed. “Hey, sleepyhead,” he heard the man say. “Crashed on me already, huh? Let’s get you into—”
DeGroot stepped out of the bathroom. The man turned from where he was leaning over the boy. He held a pack of cigarettes in one hand. It fell to the floor as he put his hand up. His mouth dropped open, just as the boy’s had.
DeGroot was chuckling to himself at that as he put two bullets into the man’s chest.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The sharp chirring sound of his cell phone jolted Keller out of the light doze he’d fallen into. He was lying on the bed, on top of the covers, still fully clothed.
He groaned out loud as he saw the time. Nine a.m. He picked up the phone and held it to his face, looking at the number that glowed on the display screen. Angela again.
He opened the phone, still lying on his back. “Yeah,” he said irritably.
“Jack,” Angela said, “you need to call Marie.”
“We’ve been over this.”
“Jack,” she said, “something’s happened to Ben.”
He sat up. “What?”
“I don’t know,” Angela said. “But she sounded…Jack, call her.” There was no arguing with the tone in her voice.
“Okay,” he said. “Okay.”
“And call me back as soon as you can.”
“Yeah,” he said. “I will.”
He punched the button to end the call, then the button for speed dial. The phone barely got through half a ring before it was snatched up. “Jack?” Marie said. She sounded on the ragged edge of hysteria.
“What’s wrong?” he demanded.
“Jack,” she said, “get over here. Please. Get over here as quick as you can.”
“What’s happened?” he said. “What’s going on?”
“Someone called me,” she said. “A man. He said he had Ben.”
“Did you call—”
“I tried to call Carson. And he doesn’t answer.”
“The guy who called you,” Keller said. “What did he say?”
“He said he wants to talk to us,” she said. “Both of us. He said he was going to call me back at ten. And if we weren’t both there, or if I called the police, he was going to…” She choked. “Just get here, Jack. Please. Please.”
“Okay,” Keller said. “I’m on the way.” He snapped the phone shut and took a deep breath. He pulled his boots on.
The sun was well up, promising a scorching day as he walked out to the Crown Vic. He popped the trunk and looked down into it for a moment before reaching in and pulling out the shotgun. The box of shells came next, and he rested it on the bumper as he loaded the weapon, sliding each round into the magazine tube under the barrel with calm deliberation. When he was done, he racked the slide, the clack-clack-clack of the action sounding loud in the morning quiet. It was only then that he noticed the man standing by the drink machine. It took Keller a moment to recognize the desk clerk that had checked him in earlier. He was a young guy, already pale and paunchy from nights sitting behind the desk. He was holding a can of Dr Pepper. His mouth hung open in surprise. Keller rested the butt of the shotgun on his hip and fished the roo
m key out of his pocket. The motel was still using the old-style key. He tossed it to the kid, who made an ineffectual grab at it. The key fell to the ground at his feet. “Checking out of 105,” Keller said. He slid behind the wheel.
The Crown Vic was an ex police cruiser and Keller had left the upright weapon rack installed by the front seat. He slid the shotgun into the rack and started the car.
When he reached Marie’s house, it was quiet. She opened the door before he reached it. There were dark circles of fatigue under her eyes. He took her in his arms. She rested her head against his chest for a moment, gave him a quick squeeze, then pulled away and walked back into the house. He followed her into her living room. She was pacing back and forth.
“Have you heard from him?” Keller began.
“No,” she cut him off. She looked at the clock. Nine-forty-five.
“Tell me as much as you can remember,” Keller said.
“What he said. How he said it.”
“He sounded…He had a funny accent. I couldn’t place it. Kind of…I don’t know.”
“What did he say?”
“Oi hev yer boy,” she mimicked. “That’s how it started. I thought at first it was Carson, calling to gloat. But then he said that I had to do exactly as I was told or he—Jack, he threatened to cut one of Ben’s fingers off.”
“Did he let you talk to Ben?”
She nodded, tears brimming in her eyes. “Yeah,” she said. “For a second. He was…It was like Ben was drunk. He only said a few words, but I could tell it was him. When the man came back on, he said that Ben was going to sleep for a while.”
“The guy drugged him, maybe.”
She shook her head. “Jesus, who’d do that to a little boy?”
“Somebody who wants to keep him quiet,” Keller said. “That may mean he’s near somewhere public. Someplace he’s afraid of making a fuss.”
Marie grimaced. “Nice that you can be so analytical.”
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