Hidden (Jacobs Family Series Book 1)

by Vannetta Chapman

  She walked around her desk to go in search of a bagel or cup of yogurt. She was so hungry she’d even settle for conning one of those energy bars out of Ben.

  Her mind on food, she nearly collided with Captain.

  His white eyebrows were drawn in a straight line of concern, and his voice didn’t waver as he thrust the printout into her hands. “Intercepted this from local dispatch. You’re going to want to send a team out, including Marshall.”

  Dana read the words and knew it couldn’t be a coincidence. Worse, she realized he knew their every move to date and was again one step ahead of them. Maybe she’d been foolish to leave the surveillance devices in place.

  “Pull the devices now. General meeting in ten minutes.” She pivoted and returned to her desk.

  All thoughts of food vanished. First, she sent encrypted messages to her team members. Then she advised her regional office she was entering phase two of their predetermined plan. Eight minutes later, she logged off and walked out into the main room.

  Her group was assembled. Ben, Clay, and Nina had already donned Kevlar vests and were loading additional ammunition into them. Red stood at the front of the room, holding a report briefing. Sayeed monitored the GPS board, his left arm still in a sling to protect and immobilize his shoulder. Captain sat at the edge of the group, radio set covering one ear.

  Dana marched to the front. “Red, tell us what we were able to learn about the surveillance devices.”

  “We’ve had a little over thirty-six hours to trace them. He’s using a scatter device, which isn’t a surprise. The signal is received, scatters it to three other locations, which then receives and scatters it again. We have a possibility of nine hot spots so far, all in the northern part of the state. Swing shift is working on identifying and monitoring them from home.”

  “Good. Nina?”

  “I’m still following up on the book. Grapes of Wrath is basically about a family dispossessed of their land. I’ve been going through the rolls of people in the Taos area who were forced into bankruptcy over the last twenty years, matching them to the height and weight of the man on the video surveillance—though he was probably a boy then so I’ve had to account for the time factor. So far no matches.”

  “Captain, relay to our late night people that I want to increase that parameter to forty years.”

  “Copy that.”

  “Clay, what have you found on the types of surveillance he was using?”

  “He likes the newest and the best. Unfortunately, they can be bought on the Internet by anyone. Due to the level of sophistication necessary to use them though, I’d say we’re talking about someone with a highly technical background.”

  “Red, keep updating the profile and make sure everyone gets it.” Dana pulled herself up taller and gripped the printout in her hand. “Now this, and he knows we’re coming.”

  Dana looked around at her group and drew in a deep breath. She didn’t have to look down at the facts on her sheet. Fear had etched them on her heart the first time she’d read them.

  “Eighteen minutes ago local dispatch received a call from a concerned mother. UPS delivered thirty bags of fertilizer. She tried to refuse the delivery, but it had been prepaid. Specific instructions were to deliver it to the garage apartment where her teenage son sometimes hangs with his grunge band. Captain intercepted the call.”

  “Local officers have no record on the kid—officially. Unofficially, there’s some domestic disturbance history. Dad left town after a restraining order was filed fifteen months ago. Mom’s behind on some payments, but working hard to stay current. Kid’s a loner, according to the school resource officer.”

  Dana shook her head, amazed as always how her people were able to pull together so much information so quickly.

  “Ben, anything you want to add before we head out there?”

  Ben looked around, his normally easy smile missing from his face. “Ammonium nitrate is an oxidizing agent. When combined with diesel fuel or kerosene it’s quite explosive. We know it was used in Oklahoma City.”

  When no one said anything, Ben added, “Unless someone crashes a truck into the garage or starts a very large fire, we should be okay.”

  Dana nodded, thinking he was finished, but he wasn’t.

  “I wouldn’t put it past him, Dana. He knew we were listening. Knew we’d intercept this call, and he’s probably waiting.”

  “We can’t be sure of that.”

  “No, we can’t. But it is a possibility. This could be a trap.”

  Dana searched the faces of each of her team members.

  “All right. Let’s move out. You have comm units from Captain. Keep them live. I’ll ride with Clay. Nina and Ben, you’re together. Red, I want you to stay with Captain in case he plans to attack here while we’re out.”

  Red touched the Glock in his shoulder harness. “We’ll be ready for him.”

  “Captain, relay a request to local law enforcement. I want a three-block perimeter around the house, but I’d rather it be unobtrusive if at all possible.”

  “Got it.”

  “Let’s move out then.”

  Dana met Ben’s gaze as she walked toward the back door. She resisted the need to reach out and touch his arm. Somehow managed not to tell him to be careful. Ben Marshall had been dealing with explosive situations all his adult life. She had no doubt he could handle this one.

  Driving toward the two hundred block of Brockshire, it occurred to her she no longer believed it was a coincidence he was here when she needed him. She wasn’t ready to call it a miracle, but she knew enough to be grateful for a gift when one fell in her lap.

  Twenty-eight

  Ben studied the shabby, one-story, frame house. It didn’t look so different from the slums in Fallujah—different building material, same despair.

  Near dead flowers suffered in a broken pot near the front door. A child’s bicycle lay abandoned in a yard that hadn’t seen grass in several years. Scraggly cactuses grew near the street, but no trees adorned the yard.

  “Movement in the garage.” Ben spoke softly into his comm unit.

  Nina glanced at the right-hand corner of the garage, which he indicated with a nod of his head. They were positioned across the street and two houses down where fortunately, there were shrubs to crouch behind.

  “Roger that.” Dana’s voice was calm. “I’m going to the front, try and talk to the mother.”

  “Bad idea, Dana.” The words were out of Ben’s mouth before he could stop them.

  “Didn’t ask for your opinion, Marshall. Clay will cover me. We’ll give you and Nina a two-minute head start to circle around to the garage. On my mark. Everyone confirm.”

  Three clicks filled the silence of the comm unit, though Ben certainly wasn’t happy about her plan. He would have laid fifty-fifty odds their perp was either in the house or watching it. He could feel it as surely as he could feel an itch between his shoulder blades he couldn’t possibly reach to scratch.

  “Mark.”

  Ben was first and foremost a soldier. At Dana’s command, he sprang out of his crouch and skirted to the right as Nina went left. His back was against the peeling paint of the garage wall within forty-five seconds.

  He tapped his comm unit to indicate he was in position, then heard Nina do the same.

  “I’m going in,” Dana said.

  Ben exhaled his breath slowly.

  “I have her covered,” Clay said softly.

  He heard Dana knock on the door. Another minute passed, then she knocked again. Finally, the door squeaked as it was opened.

  “Mrs. Mifflin? I’m Dana Jacobs. You called about a delivery of materials that concerned you?”

  “Yes. I came home from walking my middle son to school and a truck was here, unloading bags into the garage. I told them to take them back, that I wouldn’t sign for anything. He said I didn’t have to.” The woman’s voice rose in agitation as she spoke. “I told him I couldn’t pay for it either. He said it was alr
eady paid for. I don’t know what he was talking about. We don’t have the money to pay for food, let alone bags of stuff we don’t need. I don’t know what Reggie’s gotten into, but I want those bags outta my garage.”

  “I understand, ma’am. Do you know where Reggie is now?”

  “He’s supposed to be at school, but I just got a call from the truancy officer again saying he wasn’t there. I tell you, Miss Jacobs. I don’t know what I’m going to do with that child. He’s not a bad boy, but he’s lost his way.”

  “Do you think he’s in the garage now, Mrs. Mifflin?”

  “No. He only goes in there at night when his friends are around. They play music, or what they call music. I’ve never seen him in there during the day.”

  Ben again tapped his comm unit, indicating he’d received all the information he needed.

  “Mrs. Mifflin, do I have your permission to go into the garage and remove the items that were delivered?”

  “I’m the one who called and asked you to, so yeah. I’d say you do have my permission.”

  Ben spoke softly into his unit. “We’re moving in now. Nina, take the back. I’ll go in the front. Clay, keep your sights on Dana.”

  Ben gripped his firearm, pressed his back against the building, and moved silently as a cat toward the front of the structure. What had been a single-car, garage had been boarded up. Now there was a door to the right with a cracked window he couldn’t see through because a dirty shade covered it.

  He tried the doorknob, but it was locked.

  Estimating the strength of the hinges, he made his decision, took two steps back, and charged.

  He rolled as soon as he busted through the door and came up in a crouch with his weapon drawn.

  Stacks of fertilizer surrounded the drums, amplifiers, and electric guitar. None of that mattered at the moment.

  Ben had his attention focused on the tallest stack of fertilizer bags. Someone stood behind them, no doubt the boy, Reggie. All that Ben could make out in the dimness of the garage was a dirty AC/DC ball cap and the rifle the boy was pointing at his chest.

  Twenty-nine

  Ben heard Nina plow through the door behind him. He held up his left hand to stay her off and continued holding his Glock in front of him with his right.

  “You need to put down the weapon, kid.” His voice was soft, reasonable.

  The rifle wavered, as if trying to determine its target. Apparently, deciding Ben was the bigger threat, the boy corrected his aim slightly.

  “Set it on the ground and no one gets hurt.” Ben brought his left hand down to his side slowly. He could feel Nina behind him, frozen in place.

  “Easy for you to say, holding that Glock.” The boy’s voice was still changing, couldn’t settle on a pitch.

  “Tell you what, kid. You let Nina back out, and I’ll put the Glock on the floor.” Sweat ran down Ben’s face, though the morning was still cool. “We got a deal?”

  “She’ll shoot me through the window.”

  “Nah. She’ll leave her gun in here. Won’t you, Nina?”

  Nina’s Glock hit the garage cement and slid past Ben’s feet. The sound broke the stillness like a rocket tearing through a clear, blue sky.

  “She’s going to back out now, Reggie. Just like she came in. Soon as she does, I’ll put my firearm down beside hers.”

  The only response was a slight nod of the AC/DC cap.

  There was the almost imperceptible sound of Nina’s footsteps, backing slowly away. Her shadow crossed the place where light filtered between the door and Ben, throwing the room into darkness.

  Ben knew it was when he should have pounced. But he didn’t. Some instinct told him not to.

  “All right, Reggie. I’m setting mine down. Real easy.” Ben squatted and placed the Glock gently on the floor, never taking his eyes off the boy.

  “How’d you know my name?”

  “Your mom, Reggie. She told us.”

  Sunlight glinted on metal as the boy’s finger twitched on the trigger. “You’re lying. She’s at work.”

  “Not yet. She came home from walking your brother to school. That’s when she saw the delivery truck. She thought they had the wrong house. Then she got scared and called us.”

  An eye appeared from behind the rifle. “You don’t look like a cop.”

  “I’m not a cop, Reggie. I’m a guy trying to help, but first I need you to put the rifle down.”

  “So you can cart me off to juvie? I’ve heard how it is there, and I ain’t going. I’ll run away first.”

  “Why would we take you to juvie, Reggie? For ordering some fertilizer?”

  A brown hand came up, tugged on the ball cap. “We both know it’s more than that.”

  “Put the rifle down. We’ll talk about it—just two guys. That’s all I’m asking.”

  Reggie again adjusted the cap, this time moving it up to get a better look at him. “You ain’t taking me in?”

  “No, Reggie. You have my word we’re only going to talk.”

  “He said you’d make promises. If you ever caught me.” The boy readjusted the rifle. “My dad made promises too. Never kept a one. You’ll double-cross me the first chance you get.”

  “I’m not your dad, Reggie. If I’d wanted to double-cross you, I could have done it when Nina was leaving. Remember when it got dark for a second? That’s when I should have shot you, Reggie.” Ben had been holding the same position for too long. He felt the muscles in his left leg begin to quiver from the stress and adrenaline. “That’s what they taught us in the Army. How to take out the enemy. But you’re not the enemy, Reggie. So put down the rifle. Let’s go in the house and talk this out.”

  Reggie stood straighter behind the stack of fertilizer sacks. Ben wondered for a split second if the boy meant to raise the rifle to his shoulder and shoot him, but then he threw it out on the shorter stack of fertilizer bags next to him.

  It lay there, discarded like so many other unwanted things in the old barn.

  Ben waited as the boy shuffled over to him. He was clearly part Apache, though the mother had sounded Caucasian.

  When he came within a few feet of Ben, he stopped and stared at his feet, apparently waiting to be cuffed.

  Finally, he looked up, and for a moment it was as if Ben were looking at Joe Tafoya. Reggie’s eyes were the same deep black, his cheekbones high and rising up to meet the dark circles, which proved he hadn’t slept much. But in this boy’s eyes there was no laughter and certainly no hope.

  Ben held out his hand and waited for the boy to shake it.

  “Ben Marshall,” he said when Reggie finally pulled his hand from his ragged blue-jeans pocket and offered him a halfhearted shake.

  “I’m Reggie. Reggie Mifflin, but you already know my name.”

  “Yeah. Guess I do.” Ben picked up his Glock off the floor, saw Reggie flinch as he did so. “My boss gets mad if I leave this anywhere.”

  He stuck it into the paddle holster at the back of his pants, then motioned for Reggie to lead the way out of the barn.

  Nina stood waiting, four feet away, her backup weapon drawn.

  “You won’t need that, Nina.”

  She looked uncertainly from Ben to Reggie. After a second’s hesitation, she holstered her firearm, then moved inside to pick up her Glock.

  Dana and Mrs. Mifflin stood at the back door of the house. Reggie’s mom was thin like Dana, but there any similarity stopped. Her red hair was chopped in a short haircut, one she’d probably done herself. Though she couldn’t have been older than forty, the stress of raising three boys had permanently etched lines on her face—lines that temporarily softened when she saw Reggie walk from the barn.

  The teenager didn’t look at anyone as he walked into the kitchen.

  Ben noticed how clean the room was. A scarred Formica-topped table sat to one side, and chairs with cracked seats had been covered with white plastic.

  No one spoke for a moment, then Ben sat, leaned forward, and waited for Reggie to
meet his gaze. When he did, Ben said, “Reggie, we need you to tell us everything about him.”

  Thirty

  Fifteen minutes later, Dana waited with Mrs. Mifflin in the front living room while Ben spoke with Reggie in the kitchen. Clay continued to watch the front of the house in case their perp did plan an attack, and Nina guarded the garage.

  Dana attempted to calm Mrs. Mifflin while she monitored Ben and Reggie’s conversation through her comm unit.

  They had learned very little.

  The man went by Edmond Jones, no doubt an alias. He’d contacted Reggie when their grunge band had advertised online for a new bass guitarist. Over the last three months, he’d woven quite a web of deceit around the boy.

  “You’re sure he didn’t say what the ammonium nitrate was for?” Ben’s voice was soft, relaxed.

  Dana wanted to smile. Clay would have throttled the teen by now.

  “No. He kept saying we’d get even.”

  “Get even for what?”

  “Never really said. Mostly how it wasn’t fair some folks had so much while we barely got by.”

  “Times have been tough, I guess.”

  “Yeah. My mom works hard, but you know. There’s four of us, and my old man never comes around.”

  Dana looked at Mrs. Mifflin who sat staring across the living room. She’d put the youngest boy, Frankie, down for a morning nap after calling into work and telling them she wouldn’t be in today. How had she handled raising three boys alone? She couldn’t make much more than minimum wage at the hotel where she cleaned rooms.

  Ben’s voice came back over her comm unit. “He ever help you out?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “Cash?”

  “Once in a while. Then he gave me a credit card and had me order the stuff.”

  “And this was the card?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You didn’t use it for anything else?”

  “Once or twice.” Reggie’s voice grew softer, though he’d shown no indication he realized the communication system was broadcasting their conversation. “I bought some groceries on it a couple times when my mom couldn’t work. And once we blew an amp, so I went down to Radio Shack and got a new one.”