by Scott Blade
Cameron craned his head and looked past the guy and down the short hallway to the master bath. The door was open, and Cameron saw a roll of toilet paper that they must’ve brought with them on the back of the toilet—and on top of that was a cell phone. A smartphone. If it was a burner, it was a pricier one. Maybe the guy had sprung for his own so that he could use the Internet.
Cord looked confused and didn’t say anything. He hadn’t looked at the monitor yet.
Cameron said, “You got me! It’s in my pocket. I took it off you earlier. You dropped it, and I guess you didn’t even feel it fall. Maybe you were too drunk.”
The guy said, “I’m not drunk.”
Cameron said, “Whatever. I don’t care. It’s in my pocket.”
The guy said, “How’d you get it in your pocket?”
“I did it when you uncuffed us earlier. I thought if I could get free—maybe ask you for a bathroom break—I’d call for help. I was waiting for an hour. Right now, it’s close.”
The guy came forward and got close to Cameron. He knelt down and said, “Which pocket?”
Cameron stayed quiet.
The guy said, “Now!”
Cameron spoke with a little intimidation in his voice like he was scared. “Okay. Okay. It’s the front left pocket.”
He had said left pocket on purpose because he’d watched the guy earlier. When he’d had the MP5 in his hand, his right hand was on the handle. His right index finger was in the trigger house. The guy was right-handed, and right-handed people always reach into a stranger’s left pocket with their right hands. Which was what Cameron had wanted.
The guy reluctantly reached into Cameron’s right pocket. He should’ve patted him down first to see if there was a phone there, but it wouldn’t have made much difference.
The guy’s hand went into Cameron’s pocket, and Cameron squeezed his thigh muscles as hard as he could. The guy’s hand was caught instantly in a tight grip, wedged between a rock and a hard place. The guy started to pull back, but the more he pulled, the tighter the grip became. Like Chinese finger cuffs.
A great invention, Cameron thought.
Suddenly, Cameron’s head exploded in a vicious head-butt. He had cocked it back the whole time the guy was moving forward and down toward him. At the perfect moment, Cameron’s head thrashed forward. The front of Cameron’s forehead connected with the guy’s face, and for the second time that night, he’d broken a nose. But this time, he did more damage—much, much more.
He hadn’t held back. The impact made a loud crack, and the guy’s nose ruptured and fragmented. The bridge was completely cracked open in several places, and his face was soon covered in blood. The force of the blow had sent him flying over Cameron’s legs, his hand still locked in Cameron’s front pocket. He hung there limp and motionless.
Cameron wasn’t sure if he was dead or not. He hoped not because they may need to get information out of him.
Cord said, “Damn! I think you killed him.”
Cameron said, “Maybe. Maybe not. Doesn’t matter.”
“How’re we going to get free? Not with the keys. We can’t reach his pockets with our hands like this.”
Cameron said, “I guess with some regular squats.”
“What?” Cord asked.
Cameron stayed quiet and lifted his knees. He squirmed the guy loose from his pocket and then put his feet on the ground. Sitting on the backs of his legs, he started to push up and out, away from the wood. Cameron hadn’t done squats in years, but he remembered the basic principle. The wood behind him was relatively new, but Cameron was strong. Strong leg muscles and strong back. He’d been hitchhiking for the better part of a year, and that meant he’d built a lot of strong muscles throughout his legs.
He pushed—hard. His feet and shins strained. He heaved upwards and jerked forward like a work ox that pulling a fully loaded cart out of a ditch. As he strained, his face exploded into a crimson color like he’d burst a vein.
He opened his eyes and stared at the monitor across the room. He saw the man still standing over Raggie. He saw that her eyes were sealed shut from the brightness of the light, but she knew what was happening. He could see the terror on her face. She squirmed as far away from the man as possible. The handcuff tugged at her one wrist.
The man was taking off his belt, and Cameron knew that next he’d remove his pants. He pulled even harder.
Cameron pulled and strained and groaned like a bodybuilder in his toughest competition. The force he exerted was tremendous, and finally, he heard a low crackling sound. The force of his pull and the weight of his body wasn’t enough to break the board but luckily for Cameron, the nails were cheap and the work was sloppy. In a mass-produced subdivision, often times minimal work was done and minimal quality was the result. This subdivision was no different. In fact, it was worse because the investors had obviously mismanaged and miscalculated everything from the production of the properties to the costs of labor to the units that they’d sell during the early stages of development. Therefore, they’d run out of money early on. And because of that, Cameron had the advantage.
The wood splintered and cracked at the place where the nails had been driven into the plank at the top of the board. Upon hearing this sound and feeling the slight give of the board, Cameron’s effort was strengthened by his willpower. He pulled even harder—harder than he thought he could.
A second later, the board tore free from the planks at the top. It sent Cameron flying forward onto his face, but he wasn’t injured. He didn’t waste a second thanking his luck. Instead, he shimmed forward on his belly and freed himself from the wood.
Cord’s energy was returning after seeing this feat. He shouted, “Yes!”
His sentiment echoed in the room, which was good because it told Cameron that no one else was there. Otherwise, they’d have come running to find out what the commotion was. But there was no one. No mercenaries locked and loaded. No bad guys. No John Lane.
They’d left Cameron and Cord alone with the guy whose name he still didn’t know.
Cameron dropped onto his back and pulled his wrists up underneath his legs. He kicked his shoes off to get his hands easily around his feet and in front of him. He spun around and felt through the guy’s pockets for the keys and found them—front left pocket. He undid his handcuffs and then Cord’s.
Cord said, “What about Raggie?” He got himself up on his feet and wobbled over to the monitor. He could see what was happening before he got there, but like a good Secret Service agent, he stayed calm. He didn’t panic.
Cameron said, “Don’t worry about that. Get the gun. Cover the door.”
Cord didn’t question him. He didn’t throw up any kind of argument about his age and experience versus Cameron’s because Cameron had already proven his abilities. No question. This kid knew what he was doing.
Cord grabbed the MP5 and checked the clip. It hadn’t been fired. Full magazine. He wobbled over to the door and knelt down. He propped himself against the frame and took aim down the hallway. No one was getting past him.
Cameron scrambled into the bathroom and grabbed the cell phone. He prayed there was no passcode like many people had. There wasn’t. He hit the home button, and the screen lit up. He swiped the screen over to a search icon and typed in the name Valentine—just in case the guy turned out to be even dumber than Cameron thought he was already. But there were no names programmed into the phone. Just some generic factory listings like Verizon’s toll-free number.
Cameron swiped back to the home screen and then pressed the phone icon. He swiped over to the recent calls screen and scanned through them. There were several phone calls on the phone, all to the same group of numbers and the same area codes. Must be the same group of cell phones. Probably all purchased at the same time in a package deal.
He pressed the first one and put the phone up to his ear. He listened. Heard a ring. The phone rang once. Twice. Three times. Then a British voice answered and spoke one word— “P
roblem?”
Grant, Cameron thought.
He clicked the phone and hung up on the guy.
He dialed the second number listed. The phone rang.
John Lane’s voice answered and said, “Is everything okay?”
Cameron hung up again and dialed a third number.
Cord said, “What’re you doing? Calling the cops? They can’t help us!”
Cameron said, “Relax.”
The phone rang and rang a few times.
Cameron turned and walked over to the monitors. He looked at the screen. He saw Valentine had unlocked Raggie from her cuffs. Her wrist was in his hand like he was trying to lead her somewhere. The phone interrupted him, and he stood up with his pants down around his ankles. He dropped Raggie’s wrist, and she scooted in tight underneath some kind of sink.
Valentine dropped down and pulled his pants back up and buttoned them. He left the belt and zipper undone. He reached into his pocket and scrambled to retrieve his cell phone. He got it out and put it up to his ear. He said, “What? I’m in the middle of something!”
Cameron said, “If you let the girl go right now, then I won’t beat you to death.”
Valentine froze in place. He looked left and looked right out of instinct or habit or just plain stupidity. Cameron wasn’t sure.
Cameron said, “That’s right, asshole! I can see you!”
Valentine turned around and looked up at the camera. He said, “Cameron?”
“You got it! And I’m coming for you!”
Valentine said, “Where’s Mitchell?”
Cameron looked back and down at the other guy. Mitchell, he presumed, but Mitchell didn’t move.
Cameron said, “He doesn’t look so good. Might be alive still.”
“Lane’ll kill you.”
“If I were you, I wouldn’t concern myself with what Lane may or may not do.”
Silence.
Cameron said, “Don’t you want to keep your pathetic life? Don’t you want to keep breathing? Because if you don’t walk out of there right now and disappear, I will find you and end your breathing. Believe me. That’s a fact.”
Valentine started to say something, but he didn’t. He looked dumbfounded. A deer in the headlights.
Cameron watched and smiled. He didn’t know Raggie, but he’d formed a mental picture of her in his head as a tough girl. She was a girl who’d been raised in a family of military and Secret Service agents. She and Cameron had had a similar upbringing. But one thing separated them—Raggie might’ve been even tougher than Cameron because she’d survived a vicious shark attack. She’d lost her arm yet rebounded back to the ocean and to surfing despite it.
So when she moved back to the sink and then started to pull back out with a jug in her hand, Cameron smiled. She’d been smart. She hadn’t known about Cameron, and she hadn’t sat back and waited for the agents to come and save her. Instead, she’d started to design her own plan for escape.
Cameron said, “Valentine. Last chance before you get hurt.”
Valentine lifted his hand up to the camera to flip it off.
That was when Raggie exploded to her feet and said something that was not quite audible to Cameron but sounded like “Hey, asshole!”
Valentine spun around and caught a face full of ammonia. She didn’t splash it on his face, she heaved it, jug and all, like a grenade or a Molotov cocktail. The liquid sprayed into his eyes, and Valentine dropped the cell phone. It fell to the ground and shattered into tiny plastic parts.
Cameron lost the signal and couldn’t hear anything anymore, but he could watch.
Raggie had flung the liquid into Valentine’s eyes, and now he was clutching at them helplessly. She pushed him as hard as she could. He spun and grabbed at thin air. He fell back into the sink, nailing his head on the counter.
It wasn’t a fatal blow or even enough to knock him out because he was still squirming around. He reached one hand up, trying to get a grip on something, and the other hand clutched at his eyes. Cameron thought he saw thin wisps of steam coming off of his face, but he wasn’t sure if it was real or just a trick of the light. Did a chemical burn emit steam after skin contact? He wasn’t sure.
Raggie looked up at the camera like she wanted to talk to it. She’d heard her side of the conversation and must’ve known the caller was watching Valentine from the camera. She must’ve also known that he wasn’t one of them. He was a good guy.
What Cameron hoped she’d figure out was that they might not’ve been the only people watching the feed. Cameron figured Lane or Grant might’ve been watching from another location.
He tried to redial the phone to warn her to get the hell out of there, but there was no answer. The phone rang and rang. She wasn’t responding. Therefore, there must be no ringing on her end.
Raggie waved at the camera and then scrambled out of the frame and out of the room.
Valentine remained, still trying to stand. He looked like he was in a lot of pain. He was probably screaming at the top of his lungs.
Cameron could only hope.
Chapter 40
RAGGIE WALKED PAST THE BARKING DOGS and carefully opened the outer door to make sure Valentine had been alone. She saw no one. She turned back to the room with the caged dogs. They were barking stridently. Then she ran back to the other door. She didn’t want Valentine making it out of there, so she inspected the door, looking for a lock. There was none.
She looked around hastily but then heard some scuffling from the next room. Valentine was moving around. It sounded like he was on his feet. She reacted and reached over and grabbed a rack full of caged pharmaceuticals. She pulled and jerked with all of her might. The cage started to tumble. She leaped up and put all of her weight into the downward force. The cage came crashing down. She dodged it and rolled out of the way as the large metal apparatus impacted with the wall next to the opposite side of the door.
Valentine had found the doorknob and had opened the door, but its motion was instantly halted by the obstruction of the cage.
He started to scream profanities at Raggie. “You little bitch! Get back here! I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you! Let me out!”
Raggie had stepped back into the noise of the barking dogs and couldn’t really hear anything Valentine was screaming. She watched the door carefully to make sure he wasn’t going to escape. It looked like he was pretty secure, and his phone had broken. No need to worry about him making any calls. Unless he had a backup phone, which some people did. Her dad, for instance, carried two different cell phones. One was for some guy he called POTUS, and the other was for everyone else.
Raggie looked around the room one last time and decided that she shouldn’t be the only free bird that night. She smiled. It was good to have a sense of humor. Without hers, she’d have gone nuts a long time ago. She started to unlock the cages of all the animals in the room. There were five cats, one of them with several kittens. They followed their mother out of the cage and ran out the open door. The nineteen dogs ran out after the cats and then waited in the front room, barking. One of the dogs was a weird breed she hadn’t seen before. It had puffy fur like a poodle only it was huge like Belgian shepherd or something. It came up to her and stared. It didn’t bark like the others.
She looked at a medical tag attached to its collar. It read, “Name: Max. Breed: Shepadoodle. Age: 8.”
She said, “Max, let’s get out of here.”
The dog looked at her like he understood completely.
Raggie wondered what the hell a Shepadoodle was. Whatever it was, this was a great dog. It seemed to have an automatic instinct to protect her. It escorted her past the office, where she stopped and stared at the laptop screens. She saw Valentine’s feet on the monitor. The rest of his body was out of the shot because he was banging on the door.
Then she saw another screen which was programmed to CNN. News anchors were waiting at Dulles International Airport. It was some kind of press event. She couldn’t hear anything because the s
ound was turned all the way down, but she read the text on the screen. It basically said that the president was going to land soon and give some kind of important speech about the state of Africa.
Raggie thought of her father. She needed to let him know she was okay, but she couldn’t call him. First off, there was no phone anywhere in sight, and secondly, he was on Air Force One and couldn’t receive calls. At least that’s what she thought.
The last thing that she remembered was riding in a car with Graine and then waking up here with these guys. Maybe they had been attacked? Maybe he was dead? Either way, she didn’t know who to trust—except she knew she could trust Agent Lucas. She needed to get home and tell him what happened. Tell him that Graine was probably dead, and these guys had kidnapped her.
Off to the side of the laptop, she saw a black object. It was a gun. It looked like a Beretta M9. She wasn’t an expert on guns, but she’d seen plenty of Berettas. She lifted it. It was light—too light. And then she realized that, of course, the magazine was missing. She looked around the desk. No clip. She looked back at the monitor showing the room she’d been in. Valentine must have it on him.
She left the gun and turned and left the office. She went to the front of the veterinary clinic and walked to the entrance. The animals were all lined up like they were ready to go out. Luckily, the keys were already in the door and not in Valentine’s pocket. That would’ve been a difficult situation.
She unlocked the door and pushed it open. Somewhere behind the desk, a buzzer sounded indicating that someone had entered the clinic. It was probably to alert the staff, but this time, no one was entering, and everyone was escaping.
She waited for the dogs to run out first, and then the cats mixed in. The last to leave the building was the litter of kittens and then her and Max.
Chapter 41
CAMERON STOOD OVER THE GUY CALLED MITCHELL and checked his pulse. He was barely alive. He pulled him over to another exposed wood wall and handcuffed him to it the same way he’d been handcuffed.
