If Angels Fall (tom reed and walt sydowski)

by Rick Mofina

  Reed saw Ann arrive and hurried to her, plucking herfrom reporters, pulling her to the sanctuary for the parents as the chopperspounded above. Ann wept. The agent who brought her left, to get some answers.

  “Tom, is he dead?”

  Reed tried to get his wife to focus on him. “Ann! Wedon’t know anything. No one is telling us a word.” He hugged her.

  “Something is happening,” Gabrielle’s father said,“because this morning we found Jackson — Gabrielle’s dog — scratching at ourback door, looking pretty frightened.”

  “Why the hell is it taking so long to tell ussomething?” Nathan Becker demanded. “Officer, please get us someone! We deserveto know what is going on. What have they found?”

  The uniformed cop nodded, turned away and spoke intohis radio.

  Reed held Ann. He was numb with helplessness. Fear.What was he going to do if they started carrying out bodies? His son. His onlychild. Only yesterday, Zach had locked his arms around him, enthralled with thehope his mom and dad were going to move back to their house.

  Daddy, you have to come and get me!

  Sydowski emerged and ushered the parents away from thechaos and toward the relative tranquility of the bus.

  “All we can determine is that Keller fled with thechildren.”

  “Where?”

  “We’re trying to determine that right now.”

  “What about Half Moon Bay?”

  “We’ve got people there.”

  “When did Keller leave?”

  “We think sometime in the night.” Sydowski then raisedhis hand. “We have nothing to show they’ve been harmed, outside of being heldin a foul, scary environment.”

  “But the clothes?” Nancy asked.

  “He’s likely changed their appearances, to make itdifficult to find them.”

  Phones were ringing inside the bus.

  What were they doing to find Keller, Paul Nunn wantedto know.

  “We suspect he is going to put to sea, somewhere alongthe California coast. The Coast Guard is on full alert. We’ve got everyavailable search plane — ”

  “Inspector?” an officer with his hand covering a phoneinterrupted. “Sir, it’s the Ranger Station at Point Reyes.”

  SEVENTY-FIVE

  George Hay sat at the counter of Art’s Diner in Inverness, eating a clubhouse sandwich.The front page of The San Francisco Star was folded precisely beside hisplate and he read while he chewed.

  He was engrossed in the multiple kidnapping case. Itwas fantastic. Has to be a ball-breaker for the people on it, he figured,reaching for a French fry. All that glory. Sure. And all that career-bustingpolitical bullshit, too. He took a hit of coffee. Admit it though, you miss theaction, he told himself. Cases like that gave you a helluva rush. Yeah, hemissed it, like he missed not being in pain.

  Damn, he winced, putting his cup down to massage hisleg.

  Two years back, a carjacker’s bullet had shattered hisright thigh, leaving him with a partial pension, a bastard’s attitude, and apermanent limp after fifteen years with the San Jose Police Department. Asuccession of rent-a-cop security jobs and lost weekends sunk his marriage. Tohell with it. Allana was not the stand-by-your-man type; she was thekick-you-in-the-teeth type. George still had trouble believing that rightbefore she walked out on him he was actually contemplating knocking off anarmored car for her, thinking the money would keep them together. He shook hishead. That was when a buddy got him work as a U.S. Park Ranger in Point Reyes,the national seashore park, just north of San Francisco.

  He spent his first months swallowing what bits ofpride he had left and going through the motions of his job. Gradually, heburied the things that made him an asshole and came to appreciate thetherapeutic qualities of the park. He was even good natured about the ribbinghe got from old police friends. “Collar any perps with pic-a-nic baskets,George?” He found a postcard-perfect cabin near Dillon Beach and was secretlytrying his hand at writing a police mystery. Instead of a drunk, he had becomea philosopher, a seaside poet. So fuck the world, old George was doing finewith the hand that was dealt him. There, his leg felt better. He gulped thelast of his coffee and tucked a crumpled five and two ones under his plate.“See ya, Art.”

  A fat man, wrapped in a grease-stained white apron,peeked through the kitchen’s serving window, waving as he left.

  George clamped a toothpick between his teeth andinhaled the salt air, limping to his U.S. Park Service Jeep Cherokee. A CoastGuard spotter plane roared in the distance as he climbed into the Jeep, grabbedhis Motorola mike, and checked in with park headquarters in Bear Valley, sevenmiles away.

  “Forty-two here, Dell. Got anything? Over.”

  “Pretty quiet, George, except for — Just a sec…”

  That was Dell, always misplacing something. Georgepried a piece of bacon from between his teeth. Three hours left in his shift,then four days off. While Dell searched, George flipped through the papers onhis clipboard: faxes, alerts, and bulletins. Routine stuff about amendments tolaws, and regs dealing with the park, and the Gulf of the Farallons, overlooksfrom Sonora and Marin counties, Coast Guard notices. Usual crap. Ah, there itwas. The stuff from the FBI on the Keller kidnappings. George read it again,awestruck by the magnitude. Details on the boat, the trailer, the vehicles,background on Edward Keller, the children, that reporter. Helluva case. BetKeller took them to Half Moon Bay, where he took his own kids twenty years ago.He heard they had heavy surveillance going down there, Coast Guard, FBI, thestate boys.

  “You still there, George?”

  “Ten-four, Dell.”

  “Okay. Lou at the Valente place called. Saw sometrespassing headlights late last night. Must’ve been kids partying on theproperty again. Wants you to check it out when you can.

  “The spot down by the old cow path to the beach?”

  “That’s it.”

  “On my way. Ten-four.”

  Overnight and through the morning, the park wascloaked in chilly fog. By mid-afternoon it had yielded to the sun and asparkling clear day. George hummed to himself driving from Inverness, onTomales Bay on the north side, to the Sir Francis Drake Highway, meanderingwest across the sixty-five-thousand acre park. He loved, no, he revered thePoint, its majestic, craggy terrain, it’s Bishop pine and Douglas fir forests,the estuaries slicing into its sloping green valleys where dairy cattle grazed;the mist-shrouded beaches and jagged shorelines, glistening today with seaspray as sea lions basked in the sun. And the place had wild weather,simultaneously throwing up hot California sunshine, cold fog, and damp,pounding winds all within a few miles, manifesting the mood of the peninsula.It sat on the San Andreas Fault, rendering the rocky shelves of her coastalwaters a ships’ graveyard. But beyond the beautiful treachery was the celestialPacific and eternal hope. That’s what it did for him. The Point was a living,breathing deity. Damn. He had become a tree-hugger! Admit it. He laughed outloud. Laughed until his goddamn leg hurt.

  The Jeep curled past Schooner Bay, Drakes Estero, andthe sea. George passed the overgrown ruins of the ancient mission church. Heonce read of plans to rebuild it years ago. Wonder what happened? About a milebefore Creamery Bay, he left the highway for Valente’s property. It stretchedin a near perfect two-mile square between the road and the Point’s north beach.He kicked the Jeep into four-wheel-drive, bumping his way down a tractor trailthat meandered to a small lagoon at a valley bottom. The path was longabandoned, but now and then local kids trespassed, usually in ATV’s, to party.Looked like it happened again. George spotted fresh tire tracks at the valleybottom. Seemed strange. They were deep, mud-churning troughs, going to theshore, then disappearing into the tall dense brush. But no tracks led out. Novehicles were in the area. Nothing. George stopped.

  “What the hell is this?”

  He cranked the emergency brake, killed his engine, andgot out to investigate, pulling on his rubber rain poncho because much of thebrush here thrived with poison oak and thorns. Slipping on work gloves, hefollowed the tire impressions into the thicke
t, using his baton to slap asidebranches. Suddenly, he froze. Something chrome reflected the sun. He moved toit. Looked like the ball of a trailer hitch. It was! George chopped his waydeeper, coming up on a tarp, barely concealing a late model van. A rental bythe looks of it. Who would take time to hide this stuff? he asked as theanswer, rolling on a wave of knowing, crashed down on him.

  The van was unlocked. Frantically, George scouredinside. Nothing. He jotted down the tag, struggled to get through the brushagain, finding a manufacturer’s plate for the trailer, jotting down its number.This was it. He knew it. Nettles snagged him as he fought his way back to hisJeep, snapped through the pages on his clipboard, and checked the trailer. Thiswas it! This was the goddamn trailer! George looked up and down the shore.“Where’s the boat?”

  No trace of a boat. He stared at the ocean. Keller putto sea here. He launched here. George pounded the wheel. That was right,everyone would be sitting on Half Moon Bay. From here, around the westernmostpoint at the lighthouse, it was only twenty miles to the Farallon Islands. Washe too late? Didn’t Lou see the headlights last night? George snatched theradio mike.

  “Dell, it’s George! I’ve got something here! You’regoing to have to make some fast phone calls!”

  The radio hissed with silence.

  “Goddamnit, Dell! Are you there? For Christ’s sake!”

  SEVENTY-SIX

  A great blue heron glided in the sunlight a few feet above, head extended forward,neck folded back on its shoulders, soft plumage drooping as it stalked preyalong the beach.

  Lady of the waters. Keller smiled, looking up from hisworn Bible, eyes brimming with tears. He gazed at the afternoon sea: water madeholy by the suffering of Christ, you who are washed in this water, have hope ofHeaven’s kingdom.

  I am the resurrection, the way, and the light.

  The light, the light … under cover of the night. TheLord was with him, guiding him, thwarting Lucifer’s every attempt to interfere.Yes. After he had intercepted Michael’s phone call, Keller gathered the Angelsand took the back routes of the East Bay, driving here in a Taurus stationwagon he had prepared weeks earlier. It had Nevada plates and each rear windowwas curtained in black with a small silver cross affixed to its center. Kellerhad magnetic signs custom made for the driver and front passenger doors,reading: A amp; B MORTUARY SERVICES, CARSON CITY, NEVADA. The children, whowere sedated, slept in a large, oblong cardboard box in the wagon’s rear. Alongthe way, Keller stopped to pick up the trailered boat and switched the stationwagon to another rental van, which he hid in one of the double-sized garages ofa self-help storage facility in Novato. He drove to the park, launched the boatin darkness, concealing the van and the trailer in thick brush.

  Keller knew Point Reyes from his pilgrimages. Yearsago, he had submitted a bid to rebuild the old mission church. “Upon this rockI will build my church; and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it. AndI will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of Heaven.” Three days after heput in his estimate, he lost his children. Out there, near the Farallons. “ButSatan shall not prevail, for God had given him the keys to the kingdom.” DivineDestiny.

  Navigating by moonlight with the running lights off,Keller inched the boat safely around the Point Reyes Lighthouse, Overlook,Chimney Rock, and along some twelve miles of shore to this hidden cove nearDrakes Estero, where he had taken sanctuary for the night, anchored andtethered to the nook’s jagged rocks. Bitter, cold winds fingered into the cove,knocking the boat against the rocks. Keller did not risk a fire. Again, hesedated the children, leaving them to sleep aboard under blankets and tarps. Hecloaked the entire craft with camouflage netting. Keller did not sleep. Hehuddled nearby under a blanket, as the wind rocked the boat, reading Scriptureby penlight, keeping a vigil, counting down the hours, talking with God.

  Now, afternoon had come. He could hear the childrenunder the blankets, waking groggily. Keller could not stand it any longer. Itwas time. For twenty years he had waited, suffered, repented, and prepared forthis day, this day of celestial glory and light.

  Sanctus, sanctus, sanctus. Dominus Deus sabaoth.

  Keller checked his watch. From their location, itwould take over an hour to reach the islands at the right moment. He hadmemorized the charts. Everything he needed was in the boat. He was ready. Whywas he waiting? It was time. But as he moved to the boat, his adrenaline-driveneuphoria had given way to exhaustion, fear.

  It should have been you, you bastard!

  Accept that you cannot change reality. You mustforgive yourself and move on.

  The children are innocents.

  The entire world knows your pain. Do not extend itto others who never harmed you.

  Whoever committed this desecration shall be damnedall the days of his life!

  It’s time, Edward. Your children are waiting.

  Are you doubting Divine Will?

  I am the resurrection and the life.

  Your children are waiting.

  Through his tears, Keller saw his son Pierce.

  “Why are you doing this?”

  Keller was in the boat, holding his hand, his smallwarm hand.

  Pierce was alive! Here, talking to him.

  The resurrection and the life.

  “Please, don’t hurt us.”

  Oh Pierce. Keller stretched out his hand, caressed theboy’s shivering head, his young hair. Enraptured, Keller wept, his heart risingand falling with the boat … the black waves rolling. His children screaming: Joshua, Alisha, Pierce. Like lambs in the night. The cold darkness swallowingthem, devouring them.

  Joan’s body twisting in the attic.

  Keller squeezed the child’s hand and scanned the cove.

  Something humming, growling in the air. A search plane,far off, over the sea near the horizon.

  Satan would challenge him to the end.

  “You won’t win this time! It is destined,” Kellershouted at the sky. He glared at Zach. “Get back under the tarp! Now!”

  Keller raced to the console, started the twin Mercuryengines, pulled a machete from under the seat, and sliced the tether lines. Thecoastal waters were heavy with afternoon traffic, pleasure crafts, charters,fishing boats, and commercial ships. He raked the back of his hand over hisparched lips.

  Sanctus, sanctus, sanctus. Dominus Deus sabaoth.

  Easing the throttle forward, Keller set off for theislands.

  SEVENTY-SEVEN

  The spiresof the Bay Bridge, then the Golden Gate, passed below the FBI’s Huey helicopterafter it lifted off from Hamilton Navy Air Force base in Alameda near Oakland.It headed west over the Pacific.

  Mid-afternoon. Visibility, excellent.

  Langford Shaw, the San Francisco FBI’s SWAT teamleader felt the tension aboard. He glanced from his notes to his men, whilelistening over his headset to the play-by-play of the bureau, the Coast Guard,the Navy, and the task force in Wintergreen. It was a massive rescue operationand he was in charge.

  Four years to retirement and fate drops this ball-breakingfucker in your lap. A fuckup here and you were done. Well, he was a veteranagent of many wars and he’d be damned if he would allow that to happen. Shaw’sface betrayed nothing, although his gut hardened when he got the call toactivate: the kidnapping case again. The FBI’s elite Hostage Rescue Team was enroute on a Lear from Quantico, but they were hours away. Until then, it was allon Shaw’s shoulders and those of his team.

  Intelligence put Keller in a twenty-one-foot,twin-engine open craft with three child hostages somewhere in the Gulf of theFarallons, between Point Reyes and the islands. Each SWAT member was handedphotos of Keller, his boat, the children. The top theory said Keller would killthem at sea between four and six P.M., if he hadn’t already done so. What theyhad here was a life-and-death hot pursuit and Shaw expected to execute thefinal option.

  The Coast Guard’s C-130 Hercules out of Sacramento andtwo Twin Otter auxiliaries were flying track crawl search patterns over thearea. The guard also had its HH-65 chopper with the rescue hoist and dive
rsscouring the islands. The Point Brower, a 110-foot cutter, armed with athree-millimeter cannon, had long since put out from Yerba Buena, making forthe islands at twenty-five knots. Two high-speed, aluminum, diesel-powered“ loaders” were searching the region. A second cutter, the Point Olivo,was coming down from Bodega Bay. The guard offered to scramble two Falcon jetsfrom L.A. Shaw accepted. He then requested a U.S. Navy chopper pick up fouradditional SWAT team members at Hamilton, drop them at sea on the PointBrower. That would give him two sniper teams at sea level and another angleon the target, should they find him.

  Shaw’s bird was the command post where everything wasbeing coordinated. Once more, he checked assignments, setting up the Huey’ssniper points. “Mitch, you’ll take starboard, and Ronnie, you set up on aft fora clear shot.” Shaw indicated Fred Wheeler, the negotiator, on the satellitephone to Professor Kate Martin, learning about Keller’s background and stresspoints. “Fred will try to talk him out of it, if he gets the chance. The restof you are assault, depending on how we unwrap this one.” Shaw switched fromthe chopper’s intercom to his team radio. “Roy, Doc! Call when you put down onthe cutter.”

  As they passed over San Francisco’s shoreline, Shawwas called from the FBI’s office on Golden Gate Avenue with word that anotherbureau Huey, just in from L.A. on a maintenance run, was empty and available.Good, he wanted two more sniper teams picked up for a third angle. And he hadanother idea. “After getting my guys at Hamilton, pick up some task forcemembers on the house at Wintergreen. We could use them up here. Put a rush onit.”

  FBI Agent Merle Rust took the relay call from Shaw tothe mobile command center at Keller’s house in Wintergreen, then requested theSFPD clear the park a block west of the house for a helicopter landing.

  “Walt,” Rust told Sydowski, “they want us in the airas observers. A chopper will be here in fifteen minutes. You and me.”

  “They spot anything out there yet?” Sydowski followed Rustout of the bus after they informed the others.