“No!” Kelly’s voice rang out as sharp as the crack of a whip. The boys froze in place. None of them had ever heard their teacher speak in such a tone. “Everyone shut up and listen.”
Shrieks, screams, and gunshots echoed through the building, washing over the students in the cavernous room.
Kelly remembered her shelter-in-place training. The alternative was to run if possible, but that wouldn’t happen from the second floor. “Someone lock those doors. The rest of you find somewhere for us to hide.” She snapped her fingers. “Now, and do it quietly! No talking.” She hoped the courthouse had a response plan. Her district had developed one after 9/11, and they had drilled a few times, but never for a situation outside of the school building.
Not all of the kids responded as she’d hoped. Some were terrorized to the point of immobility. Over half of them pulled out their phones and their thumbs flew over the screens. She figured they were texting their moms or dads.
Kelly pulled Matt close to her side and led him away from the courtroom’s entry doors. Her son Jerry joined three other boys as they searched for something heavy to block the shooters’ access. Mary, Evangelina Nakai, and Gillian Armstrong rushed to the opposite side of the room and disappeared through a door in the back corner.
Brian Cartwright’s face was pale. His voice quavered. “Miss Hawke, it won’t work.”
“What won’t?”
“We can’t barricade from this side. The doors open out, not in.”
Behind him, Jerry flipped a thumb lock. “That’s all we can do.” He glanced downward and gripped both knobs. Pushing the doors, they gave. “I have to open this side and slide the lock on the other one into the floor. That’ll make them stronger.”
“No time!” Kelly spun on her heel. Four students were manhandling one of the large attorney’s tables over the thigh-high bar, the divider between the gallery seats and the rest of the room. “That won’t do any good. Put it down.”
Dale Haskins gave one of the spectator seats a shake. “These’re all bolted to the floor.”
Jerry pulled off his belt. “You guys give me yours. We’ll strap them through the handles. That’ll slow ’em down.”
Evangelina ran back. “This is a conference room, but there’s no way out.”
“It’ll have to do,” Kelly said. “All right. Everyone inside. That door opens inward. We’ll block it with whatever’s in there.” She examined the courtroom, desperate for a plan. “Boys, put everything back where you found it. Jerry, y’all come on.”
He held up the belt in his hand. “Let us try this.”
“Do what I said!”
Voices rose as some of the student’s calls connected.
“Mom! Someone’s shooting!”
“No, the courthouse! People are screaming!”
“I’m scared. Can you do something?”
“Dad. Come get me!”
Kelly felt like pulling her hair out. “Kids!” Her voice wasn’t much more than a hiss. “Be quiet! Text if you have to, but for God’s sake keep your voices down.”
The class packed into the room, barely keeping it together. Despite their low voices, the sheer number of students on the phone was enough to hear through the door.
Gillian Armstrong held her phone out as if offering it for examination. “Miss Hawke, how come I can’t get a call through but they can?”
Kelly patted the air with both hands. “Kids, we have to be quiet!”
She heard the courtroom doors slam against the wall.
Chapter 24
Arturo was watching my every move. I scanned the dusty attic. “Listen, there’s no way to know how many are down there, but by the comm gear that guy was wearing, and the way he’s dressed, you can bet it’s more than a couple.”
“Let’s get out of here.”
“I’d run if I could, but the only way out is right down through the middle of ’em, and that ain’t happenin’.”
“You can lower me down outside on a rope, then climb down yourself.”
I did my best to be gentle with the kid. “Think about it, hoss. There’s nothing but a big empty floor out there. There aren’t any windows at this level either, and if there were, we don’t have any rope. All I see is insulation, bricks, and a lot of electric and computer panels.”
He tried again. “We cut some wire and use that.”
“This ain’t television.”
“What are we gonna do?”
“Here’s what you’re gonna do. You plant yourself right here.” I stepped back to see around the structural supports in the harsh fluorescent lights that failed to reach the farthest corners of the attic. The platform made of raw, splintered boards measured about fifteen feet square, and a good chunk of that was taken up with the electrical panel.
The rest of the attic was full of rafters, braces, HVAC ducts, and wires. A singletree and a cracked saddle gathered dust on a platform made of rough-sawn 2x4s. A horse harness was an odd thing to find up there, but then again, the attic was a great place to store things.
A strip of rough plank flooring maybe six feet wide led around the panel to a desk and chair resting on another platform suspended in a cloud of pink insulation. A folded cot behind a wide brick chimney said we’d found the maintenance man’s fair-weather hideout in the unventilated attic.
“This’s the safest place for you, especially with the lights out. If anyone comes through the door, you can quick like a squirrel work your way over yonder.” I pointed. “You get behind that stack of bricks and hide.”
“Where are you gonna be?”
I thought about Kelly and the twins and a lump rose in my throat. “I have to see what’s happening, and check on the rest of those kids down there.”
I couldn’t count how many times I’d hammered the twins on what to do if strangers approached, if someone grabbed them, or if a shooter showed up at school.
My entire family knew what to do and how to fight dirty when necessary. I’d taught them there’s no such thing as a fair fight, and to go for the bad guy’s eyeballs if he laid hands on them, reactions that are shocking to civilized people, but effective. They also knew what to do in an active-shooter situation, to run if possible, and if not, hide. Fighting came last. I prayed my training had taken root.
Arturo wasn’t acting like all the kids that hung around my house. He should have already been on his phone and squalling for someone to come get him. “Where’s your phone? I need to give you my number if you can get through.”
“We barely have money to eat. Mama has a flip phone, but that’s all.”
Dammit.
“All right. You stay here and I’ll be back in a little bit, then we’ll decide what to do.”
“Aren’t you scared?”
“Spitless.” I wasn’t about to lie to the kid. Fear was a live, twisting thing in my gut. “But I’ll push through it. You can be scared too. It’s all right, but you have to control it.”
He shivered, and this time not from nervousness. The temperature in the uninsulated attic was dropping, which meant the blue norther was settling in.
I stopped to think. “Oh hell.”
“What?”
I pointed at the communications panel. “Now I know why that guy was up here so quick. His job had to do with the computers and phones. Hand me that pack of his.”
He shrugged the strap off his shoulder and passed over a desert tan 5.11 tactical backpack. I sat it on the floor and peered inside to find a laptop computer, tools, wires, and a black box the size of a loaf of bread.
We bumped heads as Arturo stuck his head in my way. “What does all that mean?”
“I don’t understand all I know about this. They have a plan, though, and that means I stopped him from doing whatever he was sent up here to do.”
“So?”
“Somebody’s gonna call pretty quick and wonder why he isn’t finished. When they don’t get an answer, they’ll be up here to check it out.” I felt a sinking spell coming on and k
new I had to get after it before I ran out of steam and started second-guessing myself. “Come on, kid. We have to drag that dead bastard in here with us, before his friends show up.”
Chapter 25
The landmark Posada Hotel built during the Great Depression buzzed with activity. The steamy lobby was filling fast with anxious patrons full of questions. Hard-eyed men rushed in, their jaws set and ready to do whatever it took to deal with the situation at hand.
Ethan and Deputy Frank Malone took over the banquet room on the far side of the lounge just off the lobby. Andy Clark abandoned his post behind the registration desk and had his staff hopping. A steady stream of employees and guests hauled tables, chairs, office equipment, and televisions through the lounge and into the large room.
Ethan surveyed a table filling with hand-drawn maps, laptop computers, and firearms, glad there were glass doors between him and the noisy lobby. He’d already ordered the lounge to be cleared, and from where he stood, the extra insulation would be invaluable.
“Frank, what are you hearing from the rest of the guys?”
Deputy Malone looked sick. “I don’t have a radio. It took a round in the station. They missed me by that much.” He held up a thumb and forefinger about two inches apart.
Ethan gave him a pat on the shoulder. “We were both lucky. Take mine and find out where the guys are. See when they’ll get here, and tell ’em to come loaded for bear.”
Sweating in their worn Carhartt coveralls, Grady Spears, the maintenance man at the courthouse, and his buddy Ricky Grubbs, who worked for the Posada, wrestled a heavy tube television into the banquet room and hooked it up.
Grady commented as he passed the sheriff, “Man, if I hadn’t stopped by to visit with Ricky, I’da been right in there with ’em.” He plugged the television into the wall and attached a cable to the outlet. The trusty old TV fired right up and they brought up CNN before heading back to the storeroom for more chairs. “Y’all let me know what else you need.”
Ethan turned down the volume. “You’re lucky. At least we won’t have to get you out.”
The tension in the hotel was thick as jungle humidity. Law-enforcement officers mixed with volunteers who’d in past years worked incidents such as fires, or tourists lost in Big Bend or on the huge ranches surrounding Ballard. The number of conversations raised in a steady volume as they prepared for the worst.
Ethan’s phone rang and he stood in the middle of the swirl, one ear plugged with a forefinger. “I can’t hear you, Nancy. Hello? Hello? Are you there?” He punched the screen. “She’s gone. Frank, these cell phones are going to hell. The lines are getting so clogged that they’re failing.”
Deputy Malone snorted. “That’s what people do these days every time something bad happens. I’m way ahead of the curve. Andy’s bringing some phones in. This room’s still hardwired with jacks, so we’ll be on landlines . . . if they still work.”
“You’re a good man. We need some guys outside.”
“We set up a perimeter around the courthouse, best we can. No one’s getting in or out.”
Ethan was glad to see his deputy on the ball. “I doubt those guys want to get out right now, anyway.”
Andy hurried through the lounge with two black desk phones in his hands, followed by Ricky, who was loaded down with extension cords, power strips, and a tangle of more phones. “Here you go. Ricky, start plugging these in.”
Ricky dumped the cords, stretched a telephone line across the floor, and clicked it into the wall outlet.
Andy lifted the receiver, hearing the dial tone. “You’re in business. We can get you more phones if you need ’em, but the lines will probably go down pretty soon anyway, an’ we moved Deputy Pelham’s body into one of the rooms . . . an’ ever’thing.”
“Thanks for thinking of it for me.” Ethan pointed at the phones. “How many more of these do you have?”
“A bunch, but not as many outlets. You can use all the ones on the desk, and there’s one over there in the bar and kitchen. They all work, ’less the lines ice up and . . . an ever’thing.”
Ethan slapped Andy on the shoulder as he passed. “All right, Frank, get these guys in here and let’s get this show on the road. We’ve lost too much time as it is.”
Chapter 26
Kelly Hawke’s attempt at shelter in place didn’t work. The terrorists’ raid was well planned. She and her students huddled in the semidarkness, the cramped office lit by filtered light through the window, listening to the sounds of people moving through the courtroom.
Footsteps stopped outside the locked door. Holding her breath, Kelly watched the knob turn until the individual on the other side encountered resistance. Her students rippled like a room full of frightened puppies, whimpering and whispering to each other.
Shadows darkened the crack under the door as a Middle Eastern–accented male voice addressed those inside. “I know you are hiding in there. I am going to fire if you don’t come out. You will do that now! Come out!”
Kelly realized all was lost. “All right. Don’t shoot. Class, do what he says.” She rose and unlocked the door.
She opened it to reveal a tall, dark-skinned man with a scraggly beard. Assault rifle popped into her head when she recognized the weapon pointed at her chest. Sonny taught her and the twins how to use his AR-15, and they shot them often, but the gun in his hands reminded her of a movie prop.
She dubbed the terrorist Stretch. He stared at her with the coldest, most unfeeling eyes she’d ever seen. They roamed over her body before his attention flicked over her shoulder to the class huddled on the floor.
He stepped back and jerked the rifle toward the judge’s bench. “Out. Everyone.”
“Students. Do as he says.” Kelly led and they trooped out behind her, some weeping, others trembling, even more terrified than before at the sight of the terrorist aiming a weapon at them.
Stretch pointed. “You will sit here and do not move!”
They settled onto the floor near the judge’s bench. A second, shorter terrorist picked up a wastebasket and waded into the sprawl of students. He spoke with the same accent. “Phones. If you try and keep one back, I will kill you.”
Kelly held her own phone aloft. “Kids, do as he says. All of them.”
Sobbing and sniffling, they dropped their devices into the wastebasket as the man Kelly dubbed Shorty moved through. A button lit up on the desk phone sitting on a narrow table. She counted thirty silent blinks before it stopped.
The double doors opened, and a group of subdued adult hostages trooped inside, followed by a female terrorist with a compact machine pistol. She spoke through the wrapping covering her face with an unexpected Spanish accent.
Confused, Kelly searched for features that might indicate kindness, hoping to establish a bond with the other woman, but found nothing but dark eyebrows and even darker eyes.
“Do not talk. Do not sit with the children.” The woman addressed the adults and jerked her weapon toward the opposite corner behind the bench. “You will sit there.”
Kelly wondered at the mix of Spanish and Middle Eastern accents. The only sound from the hostages was the rustle of clothing and a few popping knees as the adults grunted, knelt, and sat on the floor. The woman scanned the room, taking note of the students. Satisfied, she spoke to the short man beside the door. “This is all of them. Keep them quiet. If anyone gives you any trouble, kill them.”
She moved like a jaguar. Kelly saw Stretch lick his lips as he watched the female terrorist take up a position under the tall windows. The Adam’s apple under his beard bobbed. She shivered.
Beside her, Matt had taken all he could stand. “I want to go home.”
She put her arm around the Down’s boy in an effort to keep him calm. He wiped at his cheeks with a soft hand and refused to look at the men with automatic weapons as they paced in front of the double doors.
“Matt honey, it’s all right,” She spoke in a whisper. “But we need to be quiet now, baby.”
“I’m not a baby.” His voice was loud with agitation. Matt set his jaw, rocking as he always did when he was angry or nervous.
She gave him a pat on the shoulder and shifted her gaze over the students. “Shhh. That’s right, honey. You’re not a baby, and you’re doing just fine.”
Several of the girls and more than a couple of the boys were also wiping tears. Within arm’s reach, Kelly’s twins, Mary and Jerry, sat shoulder to shoulder, drawing comfort from each other in the way of all twins.
“I want to go home.”
Kelly watched Stretch from the corners of her eyes. He was taut, knuckles white on the gun’s pistol grip. “I know.” She rubbed her fingers through Matt’s hair, an unconscious habit she had when she soothed her own kids since they were toddlers. “Shhh.”
Stretch launched himself away from the wall and stalked toward her with his weapon at port arms. “No talking!” His accent was thicker with anger. He stopped at the bar and glared at Kelly.
She composed herself, but her voice broke. “He’s scared and doesn’t react the same way as the rest of the kids.”
She had a sick feeling that Matt’s stubbornness was going to be their downfall. Down syndrome children were known for digging in their heels at the slightest provocation.
The terrorist kicked the top rail that cracked with a loud report. Spindles came loose and leaned outward like jagged teeth. “Shut him up!” Stretch stepped beside the twins and jabbed the muzzle at Kelly and Matt like a spear. “You shut up you!”
The black muzzle was inches from Jerry’s head, and she saw his eyes flick toward the terrorist. An icy ball of fear clenched her chest. She knew her son very, very well. “Jerry, no.”
Stretch jabbed again. “That is not the name you used earlier!”
Relieved to see the set of Jerry’s jaw relax, she hugged Matt closer. “You’re right. I’m scared and used the wrong name. I meant Matt.”
Jerry met his mother’s gaze. He blinked first and scowled at the polished hardwood floor. Kelly knew he wasn’t shaking in fear, but in constrained fury, a trait he’d inherited from his father. She worried that her son might not be able to restrain himself as his anger rose in intensity.
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