by David Beers
“We’re going all in,” Luke said. “We got the email just before we arrived here. Twelve agents are being transferred to us, which is partly why we came.”
“Hold on, if you don’t mind,” Vadik said. “The Director? Who are we talking about?”
“The FBI Director,” Luke said. “Alan Waverly.”
Both police officers sat down, but neither said anything.
“Look,” Tommy said. “There isn’t going to be any jurisdictional shit on this. We’re working together to find her. That’s it. Okay?”
“Yeah, yeah, of course,” Vadik said.
“Sure,” Alain agreed.
“We’re giving six of those agents to you,” Luke said. “They’ll have all the resources of the FBI at their disposal. I mean that literally. I don’t want to tell you two gentleman how to do your jobs, and I’m sure I don’t need to, but their directives are to follow every possible lead. The Director’s given us two days to find Alice, and he means to have her back by then.”
Tommy felt tears threatening again, the first time since he’d stood in his bedroom. He didn’t know the exact emotion, maybe thankfulness, maybe still sadness, maybe happiness. He couldn’t tell; he only knew the cavalry was coming.
“When will they be here?” Vadik said.
“All twelve are from the Atlanta office. The six coming to you will be here within the hour.”
Vadik looked at his watch, then glanced over at Alain. “Okay.”
Tommy thought he could read the look, a bit of fear, dread, and excitement all mixed together. He imagined they were fearful because of the spotlight now on them, dreading the hours that were about to be hoisted on their shoulders, and excited because this would be the largest case they’d ever been involved in.
So long as they kept focused, Tommy didn’t care what they felt like.
“Do you need me anymore?” he said.
“No, I think we have everything you can give us. Thank you for your time, Special Agent Phillips.”
“Sure,” Tommy said, the calm taking back over. “I’m heading back to the condo and then to the office. We’re going to stay in almost constant contact, okay? Anything you get, have a subordinate send it to all three of us immediately.”
“Okay,” Vadik said. “These agents that are coming, they have my number?”
“Yes,” Luke said.
“Alright, let’s get to work,” the other officer replied.
CHAPTER 2
L uke walked through the condo with Tommy. Christian had left for the office, going to brief the other six agents on Ted Hinson and their job duties. Tommy was meticulously looking at nearly every inch of the condominium. Luke followed him from room to room, appearing to take in everything. His mind was passively categorizing what he saw, but that was only autopilot.
The brute force of Luke’s brain concentrated on what was ahead.
Waverly’s reaction hadn’t been expected, and Luke felt annoyance at himself for not predicting it. He thought Waverly would act, but not this forcefully.
There was much to be done and now he had to deal with constant surveillance over a key piece. Tommy was silent as he walked through the condominium, and Luke kept quiet, too. His mind was performing a blitzkrieg on the situation, following out multiple lines of strategy at once, trying to understand the best course of action.
Luke, for the first time in his life, wasn’t sure he had a best course. He would make it out of this unscathed, of course, and Mr. Hinson would end up dead, but the enterprise’s overarching goal might be missed.
That couldn’t happen.
Luke refused to allow it. He knew this was God’s hand, moving against him as it always had. He didn’t mind the hand; he actually enjoyed God’s intervention most times. This, though, was a massive strike against Luke’s purpose. God was trying to defeat everything he’d worked for with a single swipe, wiping the game board clean as if he was strong enough to do that. He wasn’t.
Luke was stronger, and now he’d show it.
“What are you thinking?” Luke asked, the first words either had spoken since entering.
“Everything is perfectly in place besides the fucking door. I can’t even tell where she was grabbed at, which makes no sense. There would have been a struggle. Something would have been disturbed.” Tommy stood in the exact spot where Luke had put his arms around Alice’s neck. Tommy turned and looked at Luke. “You think it was Hinson? Do you really?”
“I think it’s a strong probability.”
“He didn’t even know I was involved. He never met me. Never saw me. It would have made more sense for him to take Veronica, or even your girlfriend.”
“Veronica hasn’t been in Christian’s life for quite some time. Riley and I haven’t seen much of each other over the past few weeks, either, so it’s possible he doesn’t know of our relationships.”
“But how would he know about me?” Tommy asked.
“That’s easier,” Luke said. “If the man is vengeful, then all he had to do was follow us—or pay an investigator to do it so he wouldn’t be seen. From there he sees you with us, and then the investigator followed you and sees Alice.”
“If it was a goddamn investigator, then he should come out now that her face is on every television station.”
“I hope so,” Luke said.
THE THREE TOOK a break for thirty minutes at Tommy’s behest. They’d spent another six hours at the office, and he finally told them to go home and shower. To get some food.
“I’m fine,” Christian said.
“Just get out of here for thirty minutes. You’ll be here the rest of the night, and this is the only break you’ll get.”
Luke was grateful. He thought Tommy might want a few moments to himself, as he hadn’t had any since walking into his condominium the previous night.
Luke returned to his house, which was only fifteen minutes from the office. He might be a little late on Tommy’s thirty minute deadline, but he didn’t think this would take long.
He entered his house and didn’t bother locking the door behind him. The shades were drawn across his living room windows, and he’d moved all his furniture back against the walls. Last night, when Luke left his house to meet Tommy at his condominium, Alice had been sitting up straight in the chair.
Now, she and the chair lay on the ground. Her head rested on the floor, though the rest of her body was still tied rigidly to the chair. She’d managed to scoot it maybe ten feet closer to the front door, but that was all.
She screamed through the cloth and tape around her mouth. No words, only rage, and her eyes showed the same.
She screamed again, the veins and tendons in her neck stretching against her skin. She would kill Luke if let free, or give it her best shot anyway.
Luke walked across the living room and reached down to her face. He ripped the duct tape off in one quick movement.
“YOU MOTHERFUCKER!” Alice screamed. “TOMMY’S GOING TO FUCKING KILL YOU!”
Luke looked down. This was something else he hadn’t expected. Two things in a single day. He hadn’t thought Alice would contain such anger; her personality over the years gave no indication of it. Luke had thought fear and pleading would be her natural response. This unexpected emotion didn’t matter, however. Luke was in control, and despite two unseen things in a day filled with millions of decisions, he would still succeed.
Luke positioned Alice’s chair upright. She said nothing, only panted—trying to regain the oxygen lost from her muffled screams.
He moved across the room and grabbed another chair, placing it in front of Alice.
Luke sat down. “You’re very perceptive. You saw who I was at once last night, and I’m impressed.”
“Fuck you.”
Luke nodded. “I understand why you feel that way.”
“You’re his goddamn partner! You’ve been with him for years!”
“I know. I know. This isn’t personal, Alice. Not in the slightest. It’s not even person
al with Tommy. I’m telling you the truth when I say none of this really has anything to do with you.”
“Then why are you doing it? WHY THE HELL AM I HERE, LUKE?”
“You’re a piece in a much larger game. Larger than I have the time or desire to describe right now. Just know you’re taking part in something much grander than your life could ever hope to be. Perhaps that can comfort you some with what comes next.”
“What’s going to happen?”
Luke stood from his chair. He turned and moved it carefully back to its position against the wall, Alice’s face following him the whole time. He stepped back in front of her, twelve feet away. Her movement across the living room while he was gone would actually turn out to be a good thing; it gave him more space. Luke took off his jacket and unholstered his weapon.
“Do you believe in God, Alice?”
“Yes.”
“Good. What happens next is you die, but since you believe in heaven, what happens after that should bring you comfort: Tommy dies. You can both be together again.”
Alice opened her mouth to scream, but Luke moved too quickly—her primal cry only lasted a split second before a bullet entered her mouth and opened up the back of her skull.
She slumped down and her bladder evacuated itself. Her head fell forward, her chin resting on her chest.
Luke carefully moved around the chair, keeping a wide berth, and looked at the blood spatter. None of it had touched his furniture or the walls. Only the hardwood floor, which was what he wanted. Easy cleanup. He glanced up to the wall and saw where the bullet had entered. Perhaps a subsonic hollow point would have been better, but he could fix the small hole.
Keeping his feet from touching any of the brain or blood splattered across the floor, he leaned forward and grabbed the back of the chair. Luke lifted it up, carrying it across the living room and into the foyer, then into his kitchen. He placed her out of the line of sight, so that if anyone came through the front door, they wouldn’t see anything at first glance.
Luke walked back to the foyer and looked at the mess across his floor. He didn’t have time to clean right now, and he didn’t expect anyone to come to his house before he returned. Tonight he would move Alice’s body to the needed location and throw a rug over his living room floor.
Now, though, he needed to return to the office. After all, the Bible said idle hands were the Devil’s workshop.
“FUCK!” Tommy screamed. “FUCK! FUCK! FUCK!”
Christian looked out the office window. People in their cubicles were standing up and looking into Tommy’s office. They sat down quickly once they saw him, though. It was no secret what was happening.
“What do you mean, you can’t find him?” Luke said to the speakerphone, his voice a contrasting calm against Tommy’s outburst.
“If he’s in his house, his car isn’t there. We’ve checked with the university, and he isn’t at work today. We pressed them and they said he wasn’t at work all week, and that he told them he needed another week off, too.”
Tommy grunted. Christian thought another outburst would follow, but he turned around and slammed his hand against the wall.
“So what you’re saying is, he’s completely disappeared?” Tommy asked, his back to the speakerphone.
“So far. We contacted his cell phone provider, but they won’t give us location information without a warrant. We’ve got it in front of a judge right now—Bridges and Prigam took it to him personally.”
“Where are you right now?” Christian said.
“We’re on his street. Still watching the house.”
Christian saw Tommy’s eyes fall on him and knew exactly what his partner was thinking: he shouldn’t have stopped Christian last night.
Christian thought he saw something else in his face, too.
He wondered if Luke saw it.
Tommy was going inside Hinson’s house.
“Okay,” Luke said. “Do you know when the judge will have a decision?”
“Should be within the hour.”
“Call us back.” Luke ended the call and looked up at Tommy. His next words revealing he saw the same as Christian. “If you go in there, and she’s not there, you’re finished, Tommy. Just like you told Christian last night.”
“And if she is there, I save her goddamn life.” He turned to Christian. “You think it’s him, too, don’t you?”
Christian nodded, though something wasn’t feeling exactly right about this. He hadn’t been able to look at all the information his brain had processed over the past eighteen hours—certainly hadn’t entered his mansion—but the longer the day went on, the more something felt off.
Just like it did in John Presley’s house.
“What are you thinking?” Tommy asked.
“It’s got to be him,” Christian answered. “There’s no one else that would do this. Break into your home, take nothing, and kidnap her. It’s got to be him giving us the middle finger.”
“Then I’m going in his home. That’s all there is to it.”
“He’s not there,” Luke said.
“Did you check at the wife’s house?”
Luke nodded. “No one was home. I’m going back in a few hours.”
Tommy was silent for a few seconds. “Alice might be at his place, even if he isn’t.”
“And if not? You’re off the case. Most likely she’s wherever he is. You don’t want to hear this, but you need to. Hinson probably snapped, and this is bigger than some sort of revenge kidnapping. He might not ever return to that house.”
Tommy turned to the window again. “Then how do we find him?”
Christian agreed with Luke’s logic, but Luke wasn’t considering everything. “We can go in. If we find her, we save her. If we don’t, no one has to know we went inside.”
“What?” Tommy said.
“It’s easy, really. You and I take over the surveillance tonight. We tell Waverly we want to try and see if we catch something the other agents are missing. Then, we pick the lock and go in. If he’s there, I’ll kill him so you’re clean. I was going to do it anyway. If he’s not, we lock the door and get back in our car.”
Tommy studied Christian’s face carefully. “You think Waverly is going to let us get that close to him? He’ll know I’m on edge.”
Christian smiled. “Let me do the talking. I’m not on edge at all. I’m looking forward to killing the bastard.”
LUKE SAT QUIETLY while the other two spoke with Waverly. Luke, of course, hadn’t gone over to Hinson’s ex’s house yet.
He certainly was going to, but he’d been able to buy himself some time when he told Waverly he’d check personally.
Ted Hinson and Christy Mackenrow had a child named Callie. If Luke hadn’t said he would be going over there, the FBI would have begun their surveillance of her.
And rightfully so.
If Luke was a betting man, he would have put a lot of money on Dr. Hinson being at his ex-wife’s house. Luke thought Dr. Hinson might have snapped; he wasn’t simply saying that to Tommy. A psychopath’s mental state deteriorated over time; their actions never fully satisfied, and they continued wanting more. Maybe Christian hadn’t gone into his mansion to understand what was happening, but Luke had done his research.
The women started going missing after his divorce. That’s why they were still alive, or at least most of them. Hinson was trying to replace his wife, and if one wife hadn’t worked, then he would have multiple.
Yet, the blood stain Luke saw in the basement showed Hinson’s anger was getting the best of him. And perhaps, if Luke’s luck held, he had finally snapped. Perhaps, Dr. Hinson had gone to Ms. Mackenrow’s house, in hopes of truly reclaiming his family.
And now Luke’s two partners would slip over to Hinson’s house alone, leaving him to find out where the man actually was.
And if Tommy and Christian found the women locked in the basement? Well, they would of course manufacture a reason to have entered. Probably something along the
lines of hearing someone scream. No one would say a word otherwise, not once Ted Hinson’s true nature was discovered.
And then?
Well, they’d all be looking for Dr. Hinson and Alice.
Yes, Luke could set this up nicely, and in the end, Christian would find that the spring weather trying to enter his life no longer existed. He’d find himself in a frozen prison forever.
CHAPTER 3
T ed sat in his wife’s living room. He no longer thought of Christy as his ex-wife. That was in the past, even if she didn’t fully realize it yet. Christy was being stubborn, just like she’d always been, but he could deal with that. Hell, he’d dealt with it for ten years before she finally left him. He would wait this stubbornness out.
It was Callie he worried about.
She sat next to him now, her red hair so pretty. Neither Ted nor Christy had red hair, and so when they first saw Callie’s color, they both got a good laugh out of it. He had ribbed Christy, asking if Callie was really his child. Those had been good times.
Callie and Ted sat on the couch with the television on in front of them. He saw that she kept looking over at him, probably checking out the scratches on his face. At eleven-years-old, it was harder to lie to children, but he had told her a feral cat got into his house and scratched his face as he tried to capture it.
Ted wasn’t completely sure she believed it, but she’d gone along. She certainly had no idea what actually happened, which was all that mattered.
“Dad?” she said.
“Yes, honey?” Ted didn’t look away from the television. He loved this show, and though Lockup might not be suitable for someone Callie’s age, he didn’t mind letting her watch it.
“Is Mom coming home tonight?”
“No, not tonight, honey. I told you already. She’s going to be home next Thursday.”
“Why didn’t we go to your house then?”
“Well,” Ted said, “first off, that cat really tore things up pretty bad, so the place isn’t in the best condition. Second, she wanted me to watch over this house while she was gone.”
