Paying the Piper

by Simon Wood

  Scott made a turn. The truck between Scott and Friedkin carried on. Friedkin made the turn as well, but lagged back.

  Until the Piper had resurfaced, Friedkin always considered his search for the Piper a form of rainbow chasing. The FBI hadn’t caught this guy with all their resources; his firm was good, but they were no match for the bureau. He didn’t feel that he was taking Rooker’s money on false pretenses, though. He thought he might dig up something on the Piper, but the FBI would beat him to the punch. But his assumption was changing. He had a feeling about the Piper this time. He would be caught. And then what would Rooker have him do?

  Friedkin slowed when Scott reached the cordon around his home. He pulled up short and watched Scott pull into his garage.

  I should bow out of this, he thought, but if I do, someone else would replace me. Possibly someone without the same moral responsibilities. He was in this for the long haul. Lancelot picked up his cell and dialed King Arthur’s number.

  “You told him?” Jane said.

  “I had to,” Scott said. “It was the only way he’d let me go.”

  He’d gotten her alone in their bedroom. The FBI detail had viewed him with suspicion when he walked through the door. The bureau grapevine worked as fast as any other workplace rumor mill, and his sudden reappearance, unescorted, defied comprehension. None of the agents looked happy about it, but he didn’t care the moment Jane came rushing over to him.

  “The Piper called while I was with Sheils. That’s how I got him to believe. He heard him.”

  Jane fixed him with a stare that said she hadn’t made up her mind that he’d done the right thing.

  “I spoke to Petey,” he added.

  Jane was stunned into silence.

  “He said he and Sammy were fine.”

  Tears filled Jane’s eyes. “Thank God.”

  “He sounded so scared. I’m scared. So far, I’m keeping up with this madman, but I’m frightened I’m going to fail.”

  He couldn’t play the tough guy any longer. It was shredding him from the inside. Jane pulled him to her. It all came out—all his fears. He told her everything he couldn’t share with Sheils, Friedkin, the Piper, not even himself until now.

  “We’ll get them back,” Jane said when he had talked himself out. She pulled away from him. “You hear me?”

  Scott nodded and went into their bathroom. He ran a damp washcloth over his face and neck. It reminded him how soiled the rest of him was. He stripped off his shirt and wiped the washcloth over his chest. As he toweled off, Jane threw him a T-shirt.

  “Can we trust Sheils?” she asked.

  “I think so. He had enough to nail me, but he didn’t.”

  They lay on the bed in each other’s arms until an agent knocked at the door. “Mr. and Mrs. Fleetwood? Agent Sheils is here and he wants to talk to you.”

  “Okay,” Scott answered. “We’ll be down in a minute.”

  Jane frowned.

  “We’re about to find out if we can trust him.”

  They found Sheils sitting alone at the table in the kitchen. “Where is everyone?” Jane asked.

  “Dinner break,” Sheils said. “We’ve got a lot to talk about.”

  Someone let themselves in the front door. Scott jumped to his feet.

  Sheils put out a hand. “It’s okay. He’s with me. We’re in the kitchen, Walter.”

  No one answered. Footsteps cut through the house. A black man with close-cropped gray hair stopped in the doorway. Although he looked to be in his sixties, he carried a fearsome build that filled the doorway.

  “Good evening. I’m Walter Jones.”

  Scott couldn’t believe it. Sheils had already betrayed him. He aimed a finger at Sheils. “You promised to keep this between us.”

  “You said we could trust him, Scott,” Jane barked.

  Sheils held up his hands. “I know. I should have told you, but I didn’t have time.”

  Jones took a couple of exploratory steps into the room. “Look, folks,” he said, his voice oozing calm, “no one breached your confidence. I’m not with the FBI. I’m retired.”

  “Walter worked the first two Piper cases with me. He’s familiar with the Piper’s methods,” Sheils said. “We need an outsider for this to work.”

  “Why?” Jane asked.

  “We can’t tip our hand. For all intents and purposes, it’s FBI business as usual. We don’t have any leads or clues. Walter can work the leads without alerting anyone.”

  It made sense, Scott just wished Sheils had run it past them first. He regained his cool and sat at the table. Jones took this as an all clear and joined them.

  “We don’t have much time,” Sheils said. “I don’t want my people seeing Walter. I need you to tell us everything that’s happened since the Piper conscripted you.”

  Scott recalled every stage with perfect clarity. His journalistic background had nothing to do with it. The events masterminded by the Piper had been burned into his brain. Waking up to find Redfern’s corpse would never become a distant memory.

  Both Sheils and Jones scribbled notes on legal pads. Scott hoped those notes would beget plans that would bring down the Piper.

  When he was finished, Jane slipped an arm around his shoulder and squeezed him.

  “That was good,” Sheils said.

  “Now what?” Scott said. “We need to come up with something to give the Piper tomorrow. If we do, he’ll let me talk to Sammy.”

  “I’d like that cell phone for a start,” Sheils said. “I’d like to put a trace on it.”

  “Will he be able to tell if you’re tracing the call?”

  “No.”

  “I don’t think it’s imperative that we find anything out by tomorrow,” Jones said.

  “It is to us,” Jane said.

  “I realize that, but tracing the Piper’s location may be all we need to track him down.”

  “But if we don’t track him from his call, that’s another day wasted,” Scott said. “I have until Monday to find him and go to him. We have to be doing something to further that. If Monday comes and we haven’t found him, I don’t know what comes next.”

  “I want everything Friedkin gave you today,” Sheils said. “I want to know if those guys found anything out on the Piper.”

  Scott was about to tell Sheils not to bother; Friedkin’s investigators hadn’t dug up much after eight years. Then it struck him. Someone else had done a far more thorough investigation.

  “Do you have access to Mike Redfern’s place in Oregon?”

  “Yeah,” Sheils said.

  “When I was at his place, he had box files full of stuff he’d put together on the Piper. I didn’t get a chance to read it all, but he had a lot.”

  “We got everything when we busted him,” Sheils said.

  “I’d say you didn’t from what I read.”

  “I’ll check it out,” Jones said.

  “Go now,” Sheils said. “I’ll clear the way so you don’t have any problems with access.”

  Jones rose. He thanked Scott and Jane and shook their hands before leaving the way he’d come—quietly.

  “What do we do?” Scott asked.

  “For once, we work together,” Sheils said.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  Annabel Cho lived and worked in Napa as the sales manager for a prestigious vineyard. David Cho had called Jane the day before to say his daughter was willing to speak about her kidnapping experience. The tension in Cho’s voice indicated that this was a reluctant concession, and Jane wondered if Rooker had twisted his arm. Cho had one stipulation. Only Jane could meet with his daughter. Scott wasn’t happy with the concession, but he understood. Out of all the Piper’s surviving victims, Annabel had it the hardest. It had never been reported in the press, but Friedkin’s file and Sheils’s confirmation revealed mistreatment. Annabel had returned home with a broken arm even though the girl insisted that the Piper had treated her well. Supposedly, the broken arm was the result of an accident and t
he subsequent sepsis an unfortunate side effect. Either way, the Piper delivered a very sick child to her parents after they paid one and a half million dollars.

  As Jane crossed the Bay Bridge, a weight lifted from her shoulders. The Piper had turned her city into something oppressive and ugly. She prayed the oppression would leave when they got Sammy and Peter back. She hoped her boys would blind the town with their brightness. If not, she wasn’t sure she could live here anymore.

  She hadn’t shared this feeling with her husband. There was too much on his shoulders already. It was clear he was willing to sacrifice everything for the boys’ safe return, and she knew it was more than just parental instinct that drove him. Getting their boys back and toppling the Piper was also Scott’s way of shedding his guilt. Destroying this monster would never resurrect Nicholas Rooker, but it would bring his killer to justice. Her love for Scott swelled, and she was able to forgive him for what he’d done in the past and for the deception when the Piper had inducted him. He hadn’t done this out of spite, out of malice, or for profit. How could she hate him for that?

  Jane reached Napa by ten thirty. Annabel had specified they meet at the winery itself. Its marquee name made it a tourist spot as well as a working winery, so she found the place easily enough. She parked and followed the signs to the restaurant where they’d agreed to meet. Annabel had said it wouldn’t be open this early in the day and they would have the place to themselves. The restaurant door was locked, and she knocked on the windowpane. A striking Asian woman emerged from a booth. She waved and unlocked the door, but showed Jane no warmth.

  “Mrs. Fleetwood?”

  “Yes.” Jane smiled, hoping to melt the ice between them. “Call me Jane.”

  Annabel nodded and led Jane over to the booth.

  “Thank you for seeing me,” Jane said. “I think you’re one of the few people who understand what we are going through.”

  “My parents can.” She kept the remark on the right side of polite. “I have more in common with your sons.”

  “Yes, you do. So for my boys, I thank you.”

  “How can I help you, Jane?”

  “I’m trying to learn something about the Piper. I’ll be candid with you. The Piper’s drive this time isn’t monetary, as it was with you and the other children he kidnapped. It’s personal. He wants to inflict maximum damage on my family.”

  “He’s not like that.”

  Jane was surprised. “What do you mean?”

  “The Piper was never mean to me.”

  Jane noted a hesitation when Annabel said “the Piper.” She could have sworn Annabel had almost called the Piper by his name.

  Annabel moved quickly to add, “He was anything but. He was a gentleman.”

  Jane threw out the game plan she’d walked in with. There was something wrong here; Annabel was holding back. Jane had to play this carefully. “But this gentleman broke your arm.”

  “Not on purpose,” she snapped.

  Jane sipped her water to give Annabel time to cool down. “How did you break your arm?”

  “He was carrying me down a ladder, and he slipped and fell. He did his best to protect me, but I landed awkwardly on my arm, and he broke it by falling on me.”

  “It was an accident.”

  “Yes.” Her answer was emphatic.

  “But he made no attempt to take you to a hospital.”

  “He was hardly about to do that, considering he kidnapped me.”

  “But, Annabel, it was a compound fracture. He was risking your health by holding on to you. A smart move would have been to leave you at a hospital and cut his losses.”

  “He knew how to take care of me.”

  “So he had medical training?”

  “He wasn’t a doctor, but he knew how to take care of the break.”

  Jane doubted that. Friedkin’s file indicated that Annabel had undergone numerous procedures to reset her arm to prevent necrosis and deformity. She guessed the Piper knew only rudimentary first aid.

  “But your health deteriorated then, right? You went into septic shock?”

  “He did his best with what he had.”

  “Ryan Rodgers remembers being kept in a cellar or basement. Is this what you remember?”

  “I remember a room without windows. I couldn’t swear to it being a basement, but I wasn’t there long.”

  “He moved you?”

  “When I got sick.”

  “To where?”

  “A bedroom.”

  Jane struggled to contain her excitement. Was this another lead? Another break? After feeling so impotent for so long, she was getting somewhere.

  “A bedroom—where? In a house? An apartment? A ranch?” The mention of a ranch halted Annabel. “Why did you say a ranch?”

  “Ryan Rodgers mentioned a ranch. Do you remember a ranch?”

  Annabel’s expression tightened as she tried to squeeze out a recollection. “I don’t think so.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “I’m sorry. I don’t really know.”

  Jane could feel Annabel selecting her answers carefully.

  “Horses. Do you remember horses? Did you hear them or smell them?”

  “I don’t remember a ranch.”

  You’re pushing too hard, Jane, she thought. Her excitement was getting the better of her, and Annabel was shutting down. Her hand trembled when she picked up her water glass, so she put it down.

  “Did you mention to the FBI that the Piper moved you?”

  Annabel uttered a disgusted laugh. “Your boys are going to see the other side of the FBI when they come home. They badgered me like I was a suspect. I didn’t know what was going on. I was eleven years old. I didn’t make sense of what went on until much later.”

  Jane felt sympathy for Annabel. She’d seen how Sheils had treated Scott. Sheils’s drive to capture the Piper was relentless.

  “Why didn’t you mention it to them later? The Piper kidnapped other children after you.”

  “My family drew a line with the police after my return. They weren’t going to subject me to more FBI interrogations.”

  It was a selfish attitude, but Jane could empathize. Sammy and Peter’s lives were at stake. No one else mattered. She’d crawl over anyone to save her babies.

  “Do you remember the drive at all?”

  “No.”

  “No one knows whether the Piper worked with accomplices or alone. Did you ever see or hear other people, Annabel?”

  “Just him.”

  “Ever see his face?”

  The question took Annabel by surprise. This had been Jane’s intention. This woman was holding out. Jane got the feeling she’d gotten close to the Piper. Too close.

  “No. Never. He kept his mask on at all times.”

  Jane frowned. “I don’t believe you.”

  “I don’t care what you believe, and now I’d like you to leave,” Annabel said. “I only agreed to this meeting because my father asked me to. I think I’ve given you more than enough of my time. I’m sure your children will be returned to you, unharmed.”

  Annabel slid out from the booth.

  Jane grabbed her arm. Annabel attempted to wrestle it free, but Jane clung on. She pulled Annabel toward her until their faces were inches apart.

  “The Piper killed two people. It’s more than likely he’ll kill my sons.”

  “I don’t know anything about that.”

  “You know more than you’re saying. I suggest you say it.”

  Annabel pulled free and stepped back. “I don’t know anything. Now leave.”

  Jones stretched his back out. He’d been at Mike Redfern’s files for five hours straight. He got up and walked around Redfern’s living room.

  “Coffee break?” the young officer assigned to him asked.

  Sheils’s words had gotten Jones through the door, but not out of it with Redfern’s files. The locals were okay with an outsider rummaging through Redfern’s things, but only under their supervision. Cooper
ation was one thing. Rolling over for the Feds was another.

  “Yeah,” Jones said. “I’ll make the run. You want anything?”

  “Tall mocha. Low fat.”

  “Son, I’m getting coffee, not a cocktail. Coffee comes one way—black and hot, like Angela Bassett.”

  The kid smiled. “Then I’m good.”

  Jones frowned. “I’m betting you don’t want a doughnut, either.”

  “You have to keep a handle on the carbs, or they’ll have a handle on you.”

  Jones frowned. “You dishonor the brotherhood. I’ll be back in ten.”

  He drove out to a doughnut place he’d seen on his way to Redfern’s. He bought two coffees and a couple of pastries the kid wouldn’t like, but he should know his roots.

  On the drive back, he thought about Redfern. He had to hand it to the guy, he’d been resourceful. How the holy hell he’d gotten official police reports, phone records, and all manner of documentation was beyond him. The case file he’d put together was impressive. They could have used his insight during earlier investigations.

  Redfern had put together a map showing the snatch sites of all the kidnapped kids, and it showed a pattern. All the kids had been kidnapped within a thirty-minute drive of one central point. In Redfern’s notes, he clung to the notion that the Piper kept the kids somewhere in the East Bay, probably Oakland. Jones gave it six out of ten with an A for effort. He saw something that made a lot more sense to him. The central point Redfern pinpointed wasn’t the Piper’s hideout—it was his escape route. The central point was within spitting distance of five freeways—I-80, I-580, I-680, I-880, and I-980—that could send him in any direction. His hideout could be anywhere.

  The only thing that reined in the hideout location was the Rodgers kid’s claim about the ranch. That restricted things. Jones couldn’t see the Piper straying too far from the action, because he needed to be close to the ransom drops. If he were the Piper, he wouldn’t want to be more than three hours away from the Bay Area. Dollars to doughnuts, the bastard never had the kids with him during the ransom drops. Dozens of cities were clustered around the Bay Area, making it difficult to possess a secluded ranch with horses, so he surmised the Piper’s ranch was within two hundred miles of the Bay Area.