Pat raised his eyebrows. “Holy shit, doesn’t Ivan’s dad fund all of Woodrow’s research? If Ivan goes to his dad Max, he could cut off the money spigot.”
James shook his head. “Not gonna happen. Max had Ivan locked up in the cracker factory for nearly a year after his breakdown. We kept it quiet, not many people know about his little vacation. Since he got out, father and son have not spoken to each other. Ivan disappeared into his house in the woods and never leaves. He does his radio show right from there, hawks his survivalist gear to make money. I heard he has a ton of gold coins he is hoarding there. But who knows?”
“Well, families are tough. I think we have all have our daddy issues.”
James held out his hand. “Give me your phone, I have something for you.” He fiddled with the Congressman’s iPhone for a moment, and then the phone chirped.
Pat took the phone back hesitantly. “What did you do, plant a listening device on me?”
James smiled. “A little gift. Some insurance. I downloaded you an app that we use for our VIP protection customers.”
Pat looked at his phone and viewed a large round red icon on his phone screen. It had the word HELP in bold capital letters across it.
James pointed. “You see that button? If you ever run into trouble, press that button and hold it for five seconds. We can track you anywhere, even down to what floor you are on within a building. You get into trouble, you press it. Just like in high school, we will come rescue you from the bullies, even if it’s one of Ivan’s alien invasions.”
Chapter 8
Crisis Negotiation
The crisis negotiation team had already established a command post at the suspect’s neighbor’s house by the time Detective Sean McGreevy arrived and was briefed on the situation. A couple of hours earlier, a woman had heard screams from the house next door and called the police.
A phone connection was established, but the suspect was irrational, stating his family was ill, had become mentally unstable and violent. The man holed up in his home keeping the police at bay said he feared what would happen to both his family and the surrounding community, if he let his family out of the house.
There were some screams, a scuffle, and the phone line was disconnected. That had been thirty minutes ago.
The crisis response team had established its base of operations in the elegant living room of the same neighbor that had called the police notifying them of screams from his neighbor’s home. Detective Sean McGreevy had already been up half the night. He’d been called in to deal with the chief’s brother, who came barging into the station at dawn, pissed off and loaded for bear.
A couple of hours earlier, the chief’s brother was driving past a small park where the protest group ‘Occupy Princeton’ had set up a squatters’ camp and there had been some sort of confrontation. The brother had reported that a group of occupiers had covered themselves with fake blood, ostensibly as a protest of some sort, and attacked his SUV.
They pounded on the windows and attempted to jump on the hood. He took off, but thought he may have run one of them over. Detective McGreevy had passed the information on to the Princeton police to investigate. Let them deal with the hippies; it was not his jurisdiction anyway. And besides, the chief’s brother was an asshole who probably taunted them as he drove past.
Now the weary detective had to deal with this hostage nonsense. A local resident, one Mr. Paul Wolcott, a man neighbors called the model father, husband, and friend, had inexplicably locked his family in his house and was refusing to let them out or let anyone else in.
Detective McGreevy took over as prime negotiator of the standoff; Detective Shelia Anderson was acting as the “coach” in this incident. She briefed him on what had transpired prior to his arrival. Shelia possessed that “tough girl” beauty that Jersey girls could work to perfection. Feminine, yet if need be, she could curse like a seasoned sailor and fight like a mixed martial artist in the ring. The detective struggled to pay attention as he imagined her tan skin and long black hair against his pasty white freckled flesh.
A police robot delivered a throw-phone to the suspect’s front door, which Mr. Wolcott quickly retrieved, and phone communications were again restored. The phone was a large, bulky device with an old time receiver connected to a box and had a direct wire leading to the other receiving phone, which was being used by the negotiator next door.
What Mr. Wolcott did not know was that there was a small camera in his phone receiver, which was transmitting live video back to the crisis team, so Detective McGreevy could surreptitiously view the suspect and his immediate surroundings.
“Mr. Wolcott, this is Detective McGreevy. Can we talk and better understand what is going on?”
“Detective,” Mr. Wolcott began, “this is not what it looks like. I am not a lunatic, and I don’t want to harm my family.”
“I know that, Mr. Wolcott, and we don’t want to harm you or your family either, we are only trying to find out what is going on.”
“They are sick, my wife, and my two sons.” Mr. Wolcott’s voice was cracking with pain.
Detective Anderson was engaged in Active Listening, which involved her listening for all those cues and contradictions made by the suspect that the prime negotiator might miss. She did this to keep the conversation flowing so the suspect was engaged by providing the main negotiator, the “prime”, with topics to discuss via flashing notes onto the laptop screen in front of McGreevy. She also updated Detective McGreevy with all known information about the suspect:
• Suspect, name is Paul Wolcott, age 52, job is VP for a financial services company
• Two sons, Trevor=12 and Dillon =14
• Wife, Susan, scientific research assistant at Post Conflict Restoration Corp
• No pets of any kind in the house
• No known weapons in the house
• Medical history, high blood pressure, no history of drug or alcohol abuse
• No previous calls about domestic violence, although one neighbor said they heard a loud argument several nights ago, sounded like a typical husband/wife spat, no police involvement
“Mr. Wolcott?” McGreevy said. “Paul, may I call you Paul? How are Trevor and Dillon?”
As McGreevy spoke, he could tell from the angle of the camera hidden in the phone that Wolcott turned his gaze towards a closed door in the background when the question was asked. It had a chair and small table pushed up against it.
“That must be where he is holding the family,” he whispered to Shelia.
When the camera shifted again, McGreevy saw the obvious signs of violence that had taken place in the foreground, a blood-soaked white carpet in the living room next to a flipped over end table.
Det. McGreevy needed to keep the conversation going. “Paul, please tell me what is happening in there.”
Mr. Wolcott seemed dazed. “The three of them, they didn’t feel well. Two days ago it started. I thought it was the flu, that my wife must have caught something at work. They got so sick so fast and….” His voice trailed off to sobs.
“Paul, your neighbor said they heard some shouting over here a couple of nights ago, was there an argument?” the detective asked.
“It’s so silly now. She was changing her blouse and I saw what looked like a bite mark on her breast. I freaked. I accused her of cheating. She insisted it was from work, that some chimp they worked with for medical testing had bitten her. I insisted it didn’t look like a monkey bite, it looked like a man’s bite. What monkey has a mouth that big, what is she working with there, gorillas? But she insisted and I calmed down. I get so jealous.”
“I can understand,” Det. McGreevy sympathized. “We are all married, it’s good to be jealous, means you love your wife.”
“She is so secretive,” Wolcott said. “My wife is a lab researcher, but really I don’t even know what the hell she does at her job. What she did at her job. Oh god…” he sobbed quietly.
Det. McGreevy assumed the most car
ing tone he could fake. “Paul, please, let’s take care of your family, can I have a nurse come in and—”
“NO!” Wolcott shouted. “No one is coming in!”
“Paul, please,” McGreevy pleaded, “let me have a doctor or nurse come in and ensure everyone is okay.”
“I had a nurse come in. Carol, a family friend. I told her how sick they were and she came to check on them. It happened so fast. I don’t know what triggered it.”
At this point, Anderson flashed a note onto the screen: ‘Carol Schwartz, the wife of his golf buddy George, has been missing since yesterday.’
“Paul, is Carol in there, may I speak to her?”
A brief, uncomfortable pause followed McGreevy’s request until Wolcott remorsefully conceded, “She’s… she’s gone.”
“Paul, did she leave? Do you know where she went?”
“No, she didn’t leave… she’s gone!”
Another short pause as McGreevy readied his next question, knowing full well that Wolcott’s response could change this negotiation scenario.
“Mr. Wolcott, what happened to Carol?”
“They fucking ate her, okay!” Wolcott exploded. “My family ate her. They ripped her to shreds and ate her!” Wolcott sobbed. “Then they chased me and I ran into the bedroom to get away. They were so out of it, I got past them, ran back out of the room and locked the door. They’re still in there. I put what was left of Carol in the garage. They are NOT RESPONSIBLE! My wife and kids are sick and they don’t know what they’re doing.”
“Mr. Wolcott, are you saying your wife and sons killed Ms. Schwartz?”
At this point, Anderson typed a note to McGreevy that appeared on his laptop in bold font so McGreevy would not miss it: ‘TIME TO GIVE SWAT THE GREEN LIGHT! Mentally unstable individual.’
“You… you don’t believe me,” Wolcott said plaintively. “You think I am fucking nuts, don’t you?”
“Mr. Wolcott, Paul...”
“I am not lying!” Wolcott brayed. “I need to get my thoughts together; I need to get my lawyer. My family is not responsible.”
McGreevy thought how much he needed a drink right now. He could taste it on his lips. How fucking long had it been since he tasted booze for real? Focus! he thought.
“Paul, please can we talk to your wife and kids?”
Wolcott paused; he looked back over to the closed door. “They have been quiet for a while. Hon? Trev, Dillon?” There was no response. Nothing but silence.
The phone was placed down on the table and the team had a clear view of the barricaded bedroom door. The detectives watched the video feed as the man slowly and on unsteady legs made his way to the door.
Detective McGreevy had it all figured out already. His fifteen years in law enforcement had made him cold and detached. This Wolcott guy must be connected to people in high places for McGreevy to be brought in on his day off to handle this incident. He was a good cop, but he understood that he served more than just the public. He had been asked directly by the chief to come in and resolve this particular standoff quickly and quietly. The chief did not want SWAT playing hero on this one and needed as little attention drawn to this situation as possible. The question was, who was up the chief’s ass on this one? The wife worked for Maxwell Gold’s company, was he the one who wanted McGreevy handling this? What was his angle? Was old man Gold banging this guy’s wife?
Nah, the bite mark cancels that out. The old man can barely sink his teeth into Jell-O.
Everything told McGreevy that this was most likely a cut and dry case of a guy thinking his wife was having an affair. He confronted her, the family friend stepped in between them and wound up dead, and the wife and kids were now being held locked up in the bedroom.
However, the way Wolcott approached the bedroom door gave the detective pause, the almost palpable fear in his movement. Wolcott did not know there was a camera filming him, that the detectives were secretly watching his every move. Was this guy putting on a show, or was he really scared of what was behind that door?
Wolcott spoke to the closed door. “Honey? Kids? Please, I love you. We can fix this, just please...stop!”
Paul Wolcott did not know if his pleas were having any effect. He could hear nothing but what sounded like gentle scratching against the wood on the other side.
"Why are you doing this?" he cried.
He hesitantly opened the door to view his bloodied and wild-eyed family.
What occurred after was something that even McGreevy’s years as a beat cop and as a homicide detective had not prepared him for.
Wolcott’s wife and kids surged forward. Paul caught a glimpse of Dillon's Night of the Living Dead t-shirt that he had given him as a gift for his son's last (and now final) birthday. Paul had always thought it was a cool shirt. The irony escaped his notice. Trevor had been knocked over in the mad surge forward and was now crawling for his father’s legs. Dillon grabbed Paul by the front of his shirt and right arm and started snapping his bloodstained teeth towards his father's neck. Susan's chipped and blood caked fingernails dug into his face and eyes, and Trevor's teeth dug deep into his flesh above the left ankle. Paul's cries of pain and unimaginable horror came to a gurgling halt when Dillon bit through the front of his throat. His beloved wife's fingers drove through his now empty eye sockets and became the final things to— literally— go through his mind.
The scene that was happening before his very eyes was too horrific for McGreevy to comprehend. The shrill screams were enough cause for SWAT to breach the door and open fire on the suspect, but Mr. Paul Wolcott was dead well before the bullets tore into him, or at least what was left of him. The gunfire ceased, and Sean could see in the camera that the entire family had been riddled with bullets. He put down the phone receiver and began walking over to the Wolcotts’ former residence.
Chapter 9
Smoke
Virgil Ganado, also known as Big V, sat in his car stopped at a train crossing. His meaty arm hung out the driver’s side window to keep his lit cigar outside. He was trying to keep the smoke from reaching his young daughter Rita sitting in the back seat. She was quietly counting the train cars as they passed by. In the passenger seat sat his wife Angela, applying her makeup in the mirror. She was every bit the consummate Jersey Italian Princess.
Virgil curiously eyed the large freight shipping container marked Giant Voice System that sat on the back of a military flatbed truck near the intersection. He leaned towards his wife. “I have to go into the club tonight, the guys are making collections and lately they have been coming up light. I have to make sure they ain’t spending it on lap dances.”
“Is Vito going to be there?” Angela asked before scraping some lipstick from her teeth with a vibrantly painted and well-manicured fingernail.
“Of course. Why? What do you care?” Virgil snapped back.
“Ask him how Marie is doing. Vito Jr. is away, and she’s a wreck.”
Virgil smirked. “He ain’t ‘away’, he’s in Bergen County prison, which is like thirty minutes from their house. Probably the first time she actually knows where her kid is. Besides, that kid is a scumbag. If his father wasn’t so important to me, I would have whacked that kid long ago for dealing in my club.”
“Anyway, see how she’s doing,” Angela insisted.
“Yeah, I’ll put that on my agenda,” Virgil wisecracked.
Rita giggled excitedly from the back seat. “Daddy, Mommy, look at the army cars. They look like a tank and a car had a baby together.” The young girl pointed to the brown MRAP armored fighting vehicles being transported by the train and began counting the rail cars as they passed. “1…2….3…4…”
“Ya don’t have to count every one of them, sweetheart, there are a lot of them little tanks. We see, that’s good enough,” Virgil commented with an intonation that conveyed annoyance but with a father’s love.
“What time will you be home tonight? All these soldiers around, it makes me nervous, like something is up. Do you th
ink Bin Laden is planning something else?” Angela asked, picking at a clump in her mascara.
“First, no, he’s dead,” Virgil said. “Second, when did you get so nervous and narcotic?”
“Um, you mean neurotic,” Angela corrected her grammar challenged husband. “And I’m not, it just don’t seem normal.”
Rita continued from the backseat. “…16…17…18…”
“Yeah, sure that’s what you’re worried about,” Virgil needled his wife. “You sure it ain’t the club?”
Angela rolled her eyes. “That too, all those skanks dancing up there, shaking their asses for you, they’re all trying to get with you.”
“What can I tell you? I’m the total package. Besides, wasn’t too long ago you were up on that pole,” Virgil teased.
Angela glared at her husband.
“24…25…26…wow, so many, Daddy.”
“That’s enough, sweetheart, we know, there are a lot of those little tanks going by.” Virgil reached over and turned on the car radio.
It was the top of the hour and the news roundup was starting: “…domestic dispute that turned into a hostage standoff ended in tragedy tonight. A local man killed his wife, two children, and a family friend and then barricaded himself in his home. A SWAT team was eventually forced to enter the home, killing the man. One SWAT team member and a detective were later taken to the hospital with superficial bite wounds during the investigation. A police department spokesman said the injury occurred post-incident, possibly from a family dog that was spooked by the events, but did not have additional information. In other news...”
Exit Zero Page 4
