Kidnap & Ransom

by Michelle Gagnon

  Stefan was a few feet away, face tight with pain. He growled as he splashed forward. Kelly caught sight of Jake’s body drifting downstream. Stefan lunged for her again, but this time she was ready. She squeezed off three rounds in quick succession, aiming for his chest. He grunted, face caving in. At least one had hit its mark.

  Stefan gurgled something, then suddenly went still, face slack as he rolled onto his back.

  For a second Kelly thought it was another of his tricks. She cautiously kicked out with her leg, tapping him as she kept the barrel aimed squarely at his chest. He didn’t flinch. The water surrounding him turned crimson. His body slowly sank beneath the surface.

  Kelly spun. Jake was twenty feet away, the distance between them increasing as the current swept him downriver. In a moment he’d round the bend and vanish from sight entirely.

  She plowed forward with strong strokes.

  Just when she feared he’d drifted too far ahead, she caught a flash of white. With renewed vigor Kelly clawed her way through the water. It felt as if the current was deliberately keeping him just out of reach.

  Her fingers suddenly closed on fabric. She grabbed a clump of it, using it to haul herself up to him.

  Kelly wrapped her arm around Jake’s neck and towed him to shore. The banks were less steep here, and she was able to drag him out among some reeds. She bent down, pressing her ear to his chest. She couldn’t detect a heartbeat. Tried to take his pulse, but her hands were shaking too badly. She did a mouth sweep with two fingers, then started CPR.

  Kelly blew air into his mouth, watching his chest rise and fall. She repeated the breath, then started compressions. Water and blood poured out of his wound with each pump of her hands. After the third cycle, water gushed from his mouth. Kelly caught her breath, waiting, but he remained still.

  She kept going. Kelly tried not to calculate the minutes he had been unconscious and bleeding, or that it had taken her so long to reach him. Tried not to think about the fact that if it hadn’t been for her, he would never have been there. He should have been maintaining a vigil at his brother’s bedside, not trying to save her from a lunatic she insisted on pursuing.

  Breath, breath.

  Thirty compressions.

  Breath, breath.

  Every time Kelly bent down and locked her lips over his, her mind flashed to other kisses. This seemed like a mockery of those. These cold blue lips couldn’t possibly belong to Jake. She remembered the last time they’d really been together, in that shabby motel room.

  Breath, breath.

  Thirty compressions.

  A breeze stirred, raising the hairs on her arms. Kelly kept going. Help was coming. By now Landa would have realized that he’d been wrong, they’d check the other canal. She didn’t let herself think about how far away that help might be, how long it might take. They would get here. They had to get here.

  Kelly tasted salt and realized she was crying, shoulders heaving with sobs as she pressed on his chest cavity, elbows locked out. She’d lost her brother, she’d lost her parents. She couldn’t lose Jake, too. She should have married him right away, as soon as he asked. She’d always held him at arm’s length, never let him get close. He rarely complained, though she saw the hurt in his eyes. But she ignored it, protecting herself. Somehow he’d managed to infiltrate, regardless.

  “He’s dead.”

  Kelly started and looked up. Stefan was bent double twenty feet away, hands clutching his right side, blood running through his fingers. He had an odd expression on his face. If Kelly didn’t know better, she’d swear it was remorse. Kelly ignored him, turning back to Jake. She tried to breathe into his mouth again, but couldn’t seem to draw enough air into her own lungs to give him.

  She tried again, then gave up and sat back. Jake’s eyes were open, gazing blindly at the sky. Kelly followed them up. Tree branches reached out over the canal, tops dancing in the wind. The sun had finally broken through the polluted haze.

  “Beautiful day,” Stefan commented, following her eyes.

  Kelly stood and turned away from the river. The bank sloped up at a slight angle. Her legs ached from the effort of even that small climb, but the pain felt far away, as if it belonged to someone else.

  “I’m shocked that you shot an unarmed man, Agent Jones.” Stefan sounded bemused as she approached. “Now I’ll have to subject myself to third-world medical care.”

  Kelly drew the gun. Stefan’s eyes widened. Without breaking stride she fired into his chest. His body convulsed with each impact. She kept pulling the trigger, emptying the clip, firing even after it only produced clicks.

  Stefan’s mouth opened and closed a few times as Kelly stood silent, watching. He dropped to his knees, then fell to one side. His body twitched and he moaned.

  It took a long time for him to die.

  When it was over, Kelly returned to Jake. She sat down beside him, gently drawing his head into her lap. She stroked his hair with one hand, the other cradling his cheek. She started by apologizing for everything she’d done wrong, all the things they’d never do together, the life they wouldn’t share.

  It was nearly dusk when Rodriguez found her there. He wrapped a blanket around her shoulders and together they watched the last rays of sunlight slide down the tree trunks, turning the surface of the canal into spun gold.

  MARCH 15

  Forty-Eight

  Syd glanced up at the knock on her door. Mark Riley was propped on a crutch, looking uncomfortable in a wool suit.

  “I’m heading out,” he said. “Sure you can hold down the fort?”

  Syd shuffled the pile of papers in front of her. Since the implosion of Tyr, their business had kicked up exponentially. She’d taken on a dozen new clients, hired more employees. Staying busy had helped her deal. Now, though, things were settling down. “Flores is running point on the Somalia situation. I think we’re all set.”

  “Great.”

  “Anything else?” Syd said, looking up to find him still standing there.

  “Just wanted to make sure you hadn’t changed your mind about coming.”

  Syd avoided his eyes. “I already said goodbye. Besides, we’re swamped right now.”

  “All right, then.” He paused. “Thing is, I know what it’s like not to get closure. Made that mistake once myself.”

  “It’s just a memorial service,” Syd said sharply. Jake’s body had been cremated weeks earlier. It had taken some time to arrange, but they were going to bury some of his ashes in a grave beside his mother’s in Texas.

  “I know, but it might help.”

  “I’m fine,” she said. “Have a safe trip.”

  He left, easing the door shut. Syd sank back in her chair and gazed out the window. Spring was arriving in Central Park, through the window she could see smatterings of green among the gray. Early blooms were battling the resurgence of low temperatures. She got up after a minute and went to her office door. Opening it, she stared down the hall.

  The door to Jake’s office was closed. She hadn’t been able to bring herself to reassign it yet. By all rights it should go to Maltz, since he’d assumed a larger role in the company. Kelly had come by a few weeks earlier and removed a box of personal items. Now all that remained was standard office equipment. Still, she couldn’t bring herself to change the name on the door.

  Syd hesitated a moment, then walked down the hall. She entered the office and shut the door behind her. Funny, she wasn’t generally a sentimental person. And it wasn’t as if Jake was ever really more than a friend anyway. Still, she could swear there was a trace of his scent in the air. She crossed the room and slowly sank into the chair behind his desk.

  Syd rubbed an indentation in the oak with her thumb, the spot where he always rested his heels when he kicked back in his chair. She half smiled, remembering his grin, the laughter in his voice when he teased her.

  After a moment she picked up the phone. “Call the engravers,” she said, voice throatier than usual. “Have them make
up a name plate for Maltz.”

  Kelly stood beside the freshly dug grave, gazing down without seeing it. Rodriguez had just left with his wife, after squeezing her elbow and offering the standard condolences. He was back on active duty after a brief suspension—somehow McLarty had managed to smooth things over with the Mexican Consulate. Apparently the U.S. government would provide a loan to assist with future excavations on the Templo Mayor site.

  Stefan had been buried in a pauper’s cemetery somewhere outside Mexico City. Kelly hadn’t asked where, and Rodriguez hadn’t offered the information. At night when she stared up at the ceiling, unable to sleep, she could still feel that gun in her hands.

  A few other mourners shuffled around, shaking hands, conversing in low voices. Kelly felt a presence at her side but didn’t look up.

  “Should have been me,” Mark said after a moment.

  “That’s what I keep thinking,” Kelly said. “He wouldn’t have been there if it wasn’t for me.”

  “None of you would have been there if our mission hadn’t been compromised. You can’t blame yourself.”

  Kelly looked at him. Mark had lost weight during his hospital stay. Gaunt hollows carved out his cheeks. His suit hung loosely around his shoulders. In some ways it made the resemblance to Jake stronger.

  “I heard you went to work for Longhorn.”

  “Yup. Should have been there all along, I was just too damn stubborn.” He shook his head. “My mom always used to say that if you spend your life racing the devil, eventually he’ll win. But she meant me, not Jake. Every time we got into trouble, it was my idea.” He nudged a chunk of loose sod with the heel of his crutch. “I still can’t believe he’s gone.”

  Kelly couldn’t answer. She stood rigid, staring down at the dusty mound of soil.

  “I’m scattering some of his ashes in this gully we used to hang out in when we were kids, if you want to come along,” he offered after a moment. “Chris and Susie are having people over, too.”

  “I know, they invited me. I just… I can’t.”

  “Okay.” He nodded, then reached over and awkwardly hugged her. “Hang in there, okay?”

  “You, too.”

  He swung around on his crutches. Kelly heard an engine start, the sound of a car pulling away. She couldn’t move. She kept waiting for tears to come, but since that first day none had. She was numb inside. Kelly had barely stopped moving since the plane landed in New York. Without allowing herself to think about it, she found a new apartment and moved overnight. Packed up all of Jake’s things and shipped them off to Chris. All she had left was a stack of photos and a windbreaker she’d found on the final pass through their empty apartment, tucked away in the far corner of their bedroom closet. She’d pressed it to her face, remembering when Jake wrapped it around her shoulders on a blustery day, but still—nothing.

  “What are you going to do now?” someone asked.

  She turned to find Maltz gazing levelly at her. “I have no idea.”

  “Syd would be happy to take you on.”

  “No, she wouldn’t.” Kelly managed a tight smile.

  “I could get her to do it anyway,” Maltz offered.

  “I’m not cut out for that.” The clouds overhead parted, and the rays of a weak winter sun sifted through. “I’m talking to my boss back at the FBI on Monday. Maybe they’ll put me on active duty.”

  “Good luck with that.”

  “Thanks,” Kelly said.

  They stood in silence for a few more minutes. Then Kelly forced herself to turn and walk back to her rental car, arms wrapped tight against the cold.

  Author’s Note

  In December of 2008, I stumbled across a news report on the kidnapping of Felix Batista. Batista was an American security consultant for ASI Global. Over the course of his career, he had personally negotiated the release of more than a hundred hostages. He was in Saltillo, Mexico, to offer advice on handling the uptick in abductions for ransom. While dining with local businessmen one evening, he received a series of cell-phone calls and excused himself from the table. On his way out of the restaurant to get better reception, he handed his companions his laptop and a list of phone numbers in case he didn’t return. Moments later an SUV pulled to the curb and Batista was forced inside. Since then, no one has had any communication with him, and no one has claimed responsibility for his kidnapping.

  The irony of the story started the plot wheels spinning in my mind. I want to emphasize that the character of Cesar Calderon is not meant to represent Felix Batista in any way, shape, or form. I sincerely hope that Mr. Batista is returned to his family unharmed.

  Kidnapping for ransom has been on an upswing worldwide. All of the facts and statistics cited in this book are true to the best of my knowledge. Iraq, Mexico and Colombia currently rank as the kidnapping capitals of the world, although the former Soviet bloc nations are not far behind. According to Insurance Carrier AIG’s Crisis Management Division, over 20,000 kidnap-for-ransom incidents are reported annually, with forty-eight percent of them occurring in Latin America. Approximately eighty percent of kidnap-for-ransom cases go unreported, so that means an average of 100,000 people are snatched and held every year. The number of cases has increased exponentially in the past few decades as drug cartels and terror groups seized upon kidnappings as a relatively low-risk source of additional financing. Books such as Ransom: the Untold Story of International Kidnapping, by Ann Hagedorn Auerbach, and Kidnap for Ransom, by Richard P. Wright, were extremely informative on this subject and, at the same time, terrifying.

  I relied on a number of first-person accounts to construct the story of what a hostage experiences after being taken. The most helpful (and heartbreaking, and harrowing) were Out of Captivity, by Gary Brozek, Marc Gonsalves, Tom Howes, and Keith Stansell, and Deliver us from Evil, by Ernestine Sodi. Many kidnapping victims are held for months, or years. Some continue to be held even though their ransom has been paid. Many never make it home again.

  I dedicate this book to them, and to people like Felix Batista who devote their lives to freeing them.

  As always, I have many people to thank. This book marked a particular challenge for me, since it’s the first time I set a story in a place I’ve never had the opportunity to visit. I relied heavily on people far more familiar with the territory, particularly Mauricio Marban, who was also kind enough to correct my egregious Spanish errors—any remaining mistakes are mine, not his. Please forgive me for taking some liberties, particularly with the geography of Xochimilco.

  On the recommendation of Patrick Millikin I delved into the work of Paco Ignacio Taibo II, Mexico’s reigning noir king, to get a feel for day-to-day life in Mexico City. David Lida’s book First Stop in the New World was also a great resource, as was Luis Urrea’s, By the Lake of Sleeping Children.

  Doug P. Lyle, M.D., answered medical questions including survival rates for gunshot wounds, states of unconsciousness and proper use of defibrillators, all for the bargain price of free future drinks. I doubt he’ll ever be able to produce a bar tab adequate to the debt I owe him, however.

  Steve Kurzman’s blog mynewleg.net provided extremely helpful details about the trials and tribulations of adapting to a new below-knee prosthesis. Steve was also kind enough to answer questions about what Kelly’s capabilities would be, thanks to her new condition.

  Joe Collins, pyrotechnician, illuminated me (no pun intended) as to the best way to blow up a dock, and to the explosive potential and properties of Primacord.

  And as always, thank God for Google Maps and the internet, I’d be lost without them. Literally.

  My beta readers went above and beyond the call of duty this time. I’m particularly grateful to Kirk Rudell, who has a gift for pinpointing exactly where the plot went off the rails, and better yet provides helpful recommendations for getting it back on track. Jason Starr is always kind enough to listen to my rants and to help me brainstorm, plus he’s a surefire title generator. My fellow bloggers on The Kill Zone:
Clare Langley-Hawthorne, Kathryn Lilley, Joe Moore, John Ramsey Miller, John Gilstrap and James Scott Bell are invaluable sounding boards, as well as a damn fine group of people to virtually hang out with every week. My Sanchez Grotto–mates Raj Patel (aka The Maitreya), Kemble Scott/Scott James, Diane Weipert, Joshua Citrak, Shana Mahaffey, Alison Bing, Ammi Emergency, and Paul Linde are always kind enough to come to my events, even the nuttier ones (although let’s be honest, those tend to be the most fun) and to provide feedback, constructive criticism, and very welcome interruptions. Some of my Facebook and Twitter friends provided character names: a special thanks to Clifford Fryman, Penny Ash, Elizabeth Sneed White, Nick Daniels and Sean.

  Thanks to David Fribush, Ty Jagerson, Dave Kane, and Michael Maltz for continuing to lend their names to the commando boys.

  The folks at MIRA including Lara Hyde, Valerie Gray and Miranda Indrigo are a pleasure to work with.

  My sister Kate has, as always, shepherded this book through from the first draft to the last, in exchange for occasional dinners and borrowed clothing. My parents correctly claim that when it comes down to it, every book should be dedicated to them (but they have graciously conceded that I may give other people a chance from time to time).

  Last but never least my husband and daughter, for endless supplies of love and support.

  ISBN: 978-1-4268-7437-6

  KIDNAP & RANSOM

  Copyright © 2010 by Michelle Fritz-Cope

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher, MIRA Books, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario M3B 3K9, Canada.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.