The Killing Games

by J. S. Carol

  Tony sat first, closely followed by Simone and a man with HARRY written on his forehead. JJ could afford to pay a million, that wasn’t the problem. The problem was the gnawing feeling that there was a catch, and that whatever that catch was, it was going to end up with someone dead. Sit or don’t sit? She was going to have to decide. Leave it much longer and that would look odd, and looking odd meant standing out. She sat down and stared at the floor, and hoped to God that she’d done the right thing. The bomber was looking at her. She could feel his eyes on her.

  ‘And then there were ten,’ he said. ‘Okay, if you’re not in a position to immediately transfer a million dollars, please sit down.’

  A fifty-something woman with JEN on her forehead sat down. Dan Stone wasn’t far behind. He had the look of someone who’d been wiped out at poker. JJ guessed he was cursing himself for buying that new Ferrari. If he hadn’t done that he might still be standing.

  ‘And then there were eight. Okay, I need to lose a couple more. You and you sit.’

  JJ glanced up and saw Kevin Donahue and Ed Richards sit down. Both looked as devastated as Stone had. Natasha Lovett was still on her feet. During the last hour and a half the movie director had aged a hundred years. Her shoulders were hunched, her head bowed, and the spark in her eyes had died. This was not the Natasha Lovett that JJ knew. That person was confident and fiery and opinionated. When it came to her chosen causes, Natasha would have taken anyone on, and won. It was as though everything that had made her who she was had been stripped away and destroyed.

  Carrie Preston was standing beside Natasha. She was beautiful and perky, and specialised in girl-next-door roles. Her long red hair was almost as famous as she was. Carrie’s revolving-door love life made her a favourite with the tabloids. Every other week she was either stepping out with someone new, or breaking up with them. She gave great pictures, and even better heartbreak. The woman next to Carrie had HAILEY written on her forehead. JJ had never seen her until today. She was in her mid-forties and in pretty good shape, although it looked as though this was due to surgery rather than to a personal trainer. This was a rich body rather than a fit one.

  JJ knew two of the men left standing. DeAndre Alexander was a record producer who specialised in R&B acts, and Gary Thompson was the Dreamworks Neanderthal who’d ordered steak. Thompson was thin-faced, mid-fifties, completely bald, and, judging by his sour expression, the last hour and a half had done nothing to make him any less of an asshole.

  Alexander was also bald, but bald by choice. He was considerably younger than Thompson, and black. He’d made his first million by the age of twenty, his first hundred-million by thirty. He’d been raised in the Bronx projects and had escaped through a combination of talent and luck. His older brother hadn’t been so fortunate. He’d been killed in a gang shooting.

  The record producer made regular trips back to New York to talk to the kids in his old neighbourhood. His mission was to show them that drugs and guns were not the answer. If he could escape the vicious circle, then they could, too. That was his message, and it was one that generated great PR. There was a good chance that was his motivation, but JJ wasn’t convinced. Very occasionally you found someone who actually believed in what they were doing, as opposed to being forced into it by some PR guru. She had a feeling that Alexander might be the exception rather than the rule.

  She did a quick head-count. There were six hostages left standing, which didn’t make sense. The bomber had definitely said that he was letting five people go. So what was the catch? What was she missing? She was starting to think that opting out had probably been a good move.

  ‘Nat, step over here.’

  The bomber was next to the laptop, holding a chair out like a waiter. JJ could see the terror in Natasha’s eyes, and understood it. A short while ago she’d been standing where the film director was standing. It was one of the loneliest places in the world.

  ‘Don’t be shy,’ the bomber prompted. ‘I won’t bite.’

  Natasha walked over and sat down in front of the laptop. She typed in her log-on details then looked up.

  ‘Where do you want the money sent?’ she asked in a shaky whisper.

  The bomber removed a slip of paper from his pocket and laid it on the table. Natasha picked it up and inputted the details. Five seconds passed, ten seconds.

  ‘The money’s been transferred,’ she said.

  ‘And it’s a pleasure doing business. Okay, go stand over there.’ The bomber waved her towards a piece of empty floor to his left, then turned back to the other five.

  ‘Gary, you’re next.’

  Gary Thompson kept one wary eye locked on the bomber as he walked over to the laptop. The film executive was wearing a small pair of briefs and had a deep bronze tan. His nails were manicured. He sat at the computer and went through the same process as Natasha. When he’d finished, he walked over and stood beside the director.

  The next three hostages transferred their money without a hitch, and then it was DeAndre Alexander’s turn. The bomber called him over, but the record producer didn’t move. Beads of sweat rolled down his cheeks. He looked ready to bolt. A memory of the accountant’s execution flashed through JJ’s head. Don’t do it, she thought.

  The bomber walked slowly towards Alexander, his footsteps cutting through the silence. He raised the gun and pressed the silencer into the record producer’s chest, dimpling the skin above his heart.

  ‘I hope you didn’t lie about being able to get the money.’

  ‘No, I can get your money.’ Alexander hurried the words out. His eyes seemed unable to focus on any single point.

  ‘So what’s the problem?’

  Alexander nodded to Natasha’s big orange bag. ‘I need my billfold. It’s in there. It’s got all my account details in.’

  The bomber lowered his gun and Alexander ran over to the bag. He dropped to his knees and rummaged frantically through it, a panicked expression on his face.

  ‘Come on,’ the bomber called out. ‘Some time this week would be good.’

  ‘Okay, okay, I’ve got it.’

  Alexander held the billfold up, then jumped to his feet and ran back over to the laptop. He crashed into the chair and started clicking the touchpad and pounding the keys. He was concentrating furiously on the screen, lips moving as he repeated the same two words in a seamless rush. Come on come on come on. He finished with a sigh.

  ‘The money’s in your account,’ he said.

  The bomber nodded towards the five standing hostages and Alexander hurried over to join them. JJ didn’t think she’d ever seen anybody ever look so relieved.

  ‘Right then,’ he said to the standing hostages. ‘Those of you who can count will notice there are six of you standing there. Five of you will be going home very soon. Unfortunately, one of you won’t.’

  14:30-15:00

  1

  Seth ignored the dirty looks being flashed in his direction and lit a Marlboro. This was his newsroom and he could do what the hell he wanted. The health Nazis could go screw themselves. Anyway, what was he supposed to do? They were surfing the crest of a major news story here, one that was big enough for the station bosses to pull the ads. It wasn’t like he could leave his post and head out to the smoking area.

  He took a long, rebellious drag, savoured it, then reached for his half-empty coffee mug and tapped off the dead ash. It hit the cold coffee with a sizzle. The story was panning out well. Rob was doing a fantastic job over at Alfie’s. His interview with the chef had been first-rate, so good that the highlights were being aired again right now. That made the third time and counting.

  The curse of the twenty-four-hour news station was repetition. Quite simply, there just wasn’t enough bad news to fill a full day’s worth of hours, minutes and seconds. The trick was to recycle in a way that made Joe Public think they were getting something new with every airing. Seth was a master at that, which was why TRN paid him that six-figure salary.

  The timing of this st
ory couldn’t have been more perfect. His contract was up for renewal next month and there were mumblings that, now he’d hit sixty, it might be time for him to head off into the sunset. It was that old battle that had raged in TV since the beginning of time, youth versus experience.

  The doubters were arguing that TRN needed someone with energy and vitality and, this was the bit that got him, relevance. Roughly translated, that meant some kid who looked good in a suit but knew nothing about journalism. Well, this story would shut the doubters up once and for all. If they wanted relevance all they had to do was look at the way this story was being presented. Seth had no intention of retiring any time soon and if anyone thought they could edge him out, then they were going to find out just how much fight he still had left in him.

  Relevance. What a crock.

  He still couldn’t believe he was sixty. Aside from those days when he woke up hung-over, he didn’t feel sixty. Nor did he act sixty. It only seemed liked yesterday that he was back in Arkansas, stepping into the newsroom of the Jonesboro Gazette for the first time. From the get-go he’d loved being a journalist. The excitement of wrestling down a good story. The buzz of seeing his byline on the front-page lead. He’d always known he was bigger than Arkansas, and aged twenty he’d headed off to the New York Post. He only stayed there a couple of years. He’d hated being a small fish in such a big pond, hated the harshness of the New York winters. The west coast had been the obvious place to go.

  He’d got a job as a reporter on the Los Angeles Times and, although he’d still been a small fish, the climate had made it bearable. He’d progressed steadily through the ranks and had ended up as a news editor. The move from print to radio had broken his heart, but it was inevitable. The money was better and, by then, he was already on wife number two. The move to TV had happened ten years later and had coincided with his divorce from wife number two. And somehow he’d ended up being sixty.

  His kids had organised a surprise party to soften the blow. It had been a touching gesture, one that he really hadn’t expected, but that particular hangover had been a killer. Out of everything that had happened when he’d hit sixty, that was the thing that had brought home the fact he wasn’t getting any younger. Back in his Jonesboro Gazette days he could shake off a hangover without even trying.

  Seth took a final drag on his Marlboro and dropped the butt into his coffee mug, where it extinguished with a hiss. Over the years he’d been involved in some pretty major stories, but this was without a doubt the biggest. It had everything. Drama, the human interest angle and, most of all for LA, celebrities. Having a megastar liked Ed Richards involved would keep the viewers glued to their screens. A real-life celebrity in a real life-or-death situation. It didn’t get much better than that. And having Alex King in there wouldn’t hurt ratings, either, that was for sure. Seth wondered how he could exploit that angle. The Hollywood old guard and the new kid on the block, there had to be some way to use it.

  He was still wondering about this when the interview clip finished and Caroline Bradley came back on screen. She stared deep into the camera and gave a quick round-up of the latest developments over at Alfie’s. Seth smiled to himself. He couldn’t help it. He was hearing the facts laid bare for the umpteenth time and they still hadn’t lost any of their impact. This was the story that just kept giving. It really was a thing of beauty.

  2

  The bomber rummaged around inside his backpack and brought out an old wooden box that was about fifteen inches long and ten inches wide. It was varnished, the grain running deep and dark. He placed the box beside the laptop.

  ‘Dan, come over here. I’ve got a job for you.’

  Dan Stone looked around desperately, like he was hoping there might be another Dan in the room. The stress was getting to him. His hair was a mess and the red ink on his forehead was smudged. For once, he looked every one of his forty-two years.

  ‘Well, don’t just sit there, Dan. On your feet.’

  Stone got up reluctantly. He took a step forward, then glanced over his shoulder and fired a dirty look at JJ. It was like he was trying to make out that this was all her fault. But how could this be anybody’s fault? Did he honestly think that she wanted to be here any more than he did? How dare he try to lay this on her?

  It was a case of wrong place, wrong time. That’s all. It was always happening. Some guy gets held up because he burns his toast and ends up leaving for work five minutes later than usual, and winds up dead in a car wreck. Stories like that were a daily occurrence. They happened seven days a week, three-hundred-and-sixty-five days a year. JJ had originally planned to meet Dan tomorrow, and, had that happened, then she’d be in her office right now, glued to the TV, watching events unfold from the safety of her desk.

  The bomber nodded towards the table with the wooden box on it. ‘Go stand over there, Dan.’

  Stone glanced at the submachine gun, then followed this up with another quick, hate-filled glance for JJ. She met his gaze without flinching or turning away. She wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction.

  ‘What’s this?’ the bomber asked. ‘Have we got some issues we need to work through here?’

  JJ looked away quickly. She could have strangled Stone. What was the idiot playing at? They were in enough trouble as it was. Getting pissed and acting like a sulky teenager was not going to help.

  ‘Much as I’d like to help you kids out, it’s going to have to wait. But rest assured, we will come back to this. That’s a promise.’ The bomber turned to the six standing hostages. ‘Okay. Spread out and get yourselves into a circle. Once you’ve done that, sit down on the floor, legs crossed, hands resting on thighs.’

  Natasha looked uncertainly at the other five hostages, then shuffled into position and sat down. The others weren’t far behind. The bomber rearranged them until he was satisfied, then went back to the table and opened the box. JJ’s heart sank when she saw what was inside.

  3

  Alex King took out his cell phone and checked for texts. There were a load of new ones, most of them from his agent. The one he wanted wasn’t there, but what had he expected? He’d been a complete asshole to his ex. The cold shoulder was nothing less than he deserved. He pulled up the list of recent callers, selected the one at the top and connected the call. Brad Carter answered on the first ring.

  ‘Alex, how are you doing?’

  ‘I want out, and I want out now.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Alex, I can’t do that.’

  ‘What do you mean you can’t? Come on, you’re the FBI. You guys can do anything.’ King took a deep breath. ‘Look, I’ve done what you asked. I risked my life to plant your goddamn camera. It’s time for you to keep your side of the deal. Please, just get me the hell out of here.’

  ‘If we could, we would. You’ve got to believe that, Alex.’

  King almost laughed. ‘And why should I believe you, Brad? Tell me that. Why should I believe a single word that comes out of your mouth?’

  ‘Because it’s the truth.’

  ‘Look, I’m standing beside the kitchen door right now. I’m just one door away from getting out of here. We’re talking a couple of inches of wood. Now, are you honestly telling me that the FBI can’t get me out?’

  ‘It’s not that simple, Alex.’

  ‘Yes, it is that simple. All you’ve got to do is cut through the grille, break down the door, and let me out.’

  ‘If we do that we’ll be putting the other hostages’ lives at risk. I’m sorry, Alex. I really am.’ Carter paused. ‘I know this isn’t what you want to hear, and I know you’re scared, but I need you to sit tight and hang on in there, okay? I promise we’re doing everything we can to get you out. You and all the other hostages.’

  ‘Forget the other hostages.’

  The silence coming from the other end of the phone went on long enough for King to realise what he’d said. He sank to the floor and rubbed his face. ‘Shit, I’m sorry, man. I didn’t mean that. I don’t want anyone else to die.’<
br />
  ‘There’s nothing to apologise for, Alex. I think you’re handling this amazingly well. There aren’t many people who could handle this as well as you.’

  King took another deep breath and wondered for the millionth time how the hell he’d ended up in this situation. ‘Okay, what happens now?’

  ‘Now you sit tight and let us do our thing. We are going to get you out of there. That’s a promise. In the meantime, why don’t you go back and hide in the restroom? You’ll be safer there. Can you do that?’

  ‘Yeah, I can do that.’

  ‘And Alex? Be careful.’

  King hung up and shook his head. Be careful. What the hell else was he going to do?

  4

  The bomber took out the revolver and held it up for everyone to see.

  ‘This is a Smith & Wesson Model 29. The very same gun that Dirty Harry will tell you is the most powerful handgun in the world. Please don’t confuse this model with the 629. The 29 was made from carbon steel, whereas the 629 was fashioned from stainless steel.’ He turned the gun lovingly in his hand. ‘It really is a beautiful piece of precision engineering. Crafted in America and made with pride.’

  He placed the gun next to the laptop and took a single bullet from the box. Once again he held it up for everyone to see.

  ‘The core of the bullet is brass. However, the problem with using brass is that it’ll wear a gun barrel out in no time. To get around this, some bright spark came up with the idea of coating bullets in Teflon. This little baby is capable of piercing metal and bulletproof vests, so you’ve got to wonder what it’s going to do to someone’s head. Anyone ever seen a watermelon being used for target practice?’