The Southern Comfort Series Box Set

by Clark O'Neill, Lisa

  “With a grandson,” Kathleen interjected. “Who we’re currently checking out.”

  Beall sent the detective a glare, and Clay continued as if he hadn’t noticed. “We have reason to believe that the man inside the house assumed the elderly woman – Alma Walker’s – identity as part of his plan to kidnap the child. We have reason to believe that this is a dangerous, unstable individual who is part of a longstanding human trafficking operation. We have reason to believe that just yesterday he killed his partner in cold blood. So no, sir, this isn’t some farmer defending his property.”

  “Okay.” A little of the bite had gone out of the older man’s attitude at the calm authority in Clay’s voice. “So I guess we need to try to establish some kind of dialogue. Any idea what kind of demands we’ll be looking at to make this end the way we want it to?”

  Clay shook his head and stuffed his hands into his pockets, afraid Agent Beall would notice them shaking. “Aside from retribution and a free ticket out of here, I’m afraid I don’t have enough information about our abductor to make any viable comments at this time.” Once Clay heard some of the negotiator’s dialogue with the man – if he was willing to talk – he might have a better idea. “I do know, however, that this is a man who’s on the edge. And the fact that we showed up when we did, essentially trapping him, is going to make that edge he’s on even slipperier. Most hostage-takers go into their situation expecting the police to show up. It gives them a forum to air their grievances. We took this guy by surprise, and he’s not going to like it. I think that we should approach the situation with as little show of force as possible, because he’s likely to strike back, hard and fast.”

  Agent Beall nodded. “Okay, Agent Copeland. You just earned a spot next to the negotiator. He’s going to need backup if this thing drags out.”

  Clay hesitated. Because he knew that wasn’t a good idea. Not only was he completely biased and in fact wanted nothing more than for that son of a bitch to die and die hard – and that sort of emotion was completely contrary to setting up a productive dialogue with a hostage-taker – but also because the bastard clearly knew who he was and what Max meant to him.

  But how to broach that subject without Beall ordering him off the scene?

  Clay cleared his throat, sweat trickling down his back. It ran cold, despite the relentless heat.

  “With all due respect, sir, that’s a position I’d rather not take. The last time I tried to negotiate a little boy died. I’ll be happy to advise, but I can’t talk to the offender.”

  Beall’s raised eyebrows suggested his opinion of Clay had just tanked. But he was prevented from commenting on that fact by the appearance of a member of the Charleston PD’s SWAT team.

  “Our men are ready to move in,” he said, staring at Beall as if he dared him to stop them. “Webster, the negotiator, hasn’t been able to pull up a land line, and so far the HT seems either unwilling or unable to call the cell number we posted to get him to communicate. He’s going to use the bullhorn to tell him we’re only moving in to get the deputies some medical attention.”

  Clay tensed. It was a horrible situation. They needed to get those deputies out of there, but he felt that anything they did to upset this man’s perceived balance of power was going to put Max in further danger. “Offer him a trade,” he said suddenly, surprising the others into looking his direction. Surprising himself. “Right now, those injured deputies are his leverage. You go in there and take them out, however peaceably, and he might perceive that as loss of control. We need to offer him something in return.”

  “How do we know what to offer,” Kathleen asked, “when he won’t even talk to us?”

  “Offer me.”

  A chorus of shocked protests erupted, as Clay had known it would. But dammit he had to try something. Him walking into that house as a voluntary hostage would not only give him a chance to assess the situation from the inside, but also create a heightened sense of power for Rob Johns. He’d have a federal agent in the doubly vulnerable position of hostage and man who wanted to protect his child. Johns’ need for control would be safely un-assailed, and Clay would have a better chance of influencing him.

  Beall held up a hand to silence everyone’s comments. “You’re not seriously suggesting that I allow an unarmed federal agent to walk into a crisis situation with an unstable offender, who has already shown no compunction about shooting cops.”

  Clay held the other man’s gaze. “Yes sir. I am.”

  Beall expelled a short burst of disbelieving air. “You just said you didn’t want to negotiate with the man, but you’re willing to let him hold a gun on you?”

  Clay tried to get Beall to see the logic of his suggestion. Or maybe it wasn’t logical. Hell, he didn’t know. And he was too desperate right now to figure it out. “As a negotiator and a hostage-taker, Johns and I are on relatively equal footing. However, put me in the position of hostage and Johns suddenly becomes the one in control. He’s the type personality who’ll be less dangerous if he feels less threatened. He’ll feel less threatened if he has both me and the child as leverage.”

  And Clay could get close enough to him to snap the other man’s neck.

  “Do you have any idea what kind of precedent that would set, Agent Copeland? Word gets out that I let something like that go down, and every hostage-taking psychotic in the country would be demanding a federal agent for every civilian they release.”

  “Sir. You realize that every situation is different. If you would just –”

  Beall shook his head, body language dismissive, and turned his attention to the SWAT team member at his side. “Get your men ready to get those deputies out of there. Tell your negotiator to get on the bull horn and let the HT know you’re coming, and that he’d better hold his fire.”

  Frustrated, Clay stepped forward and got large, looming directly over the other agent. “Sir, I really think this would go much more smoothly if we offer the exchange I suggested.”

  “Duly noted,” Beall said dryly. “Now why don’t you and Detective Murphy step behind that line over there, and I’ll let you know if I need your opinion again.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  INSIDE the farmhouse that had become her own personal hell, Casey listened to the sound of the bullhorn. She couldn’t make out most of the words – something about deputies and fire – but what the man said didn’t really matter.

  What mattered was that he was here.

  Someone had finally come for her.

  Or maybe he’d come for the little boy who was currently lying across her lap.

  Whatever. It didn’t matter. As long as he – they, whoever the heck was out there – got her out.

  She was so giddy that she started to weep.

  Shifting the kid’s head off her thigh until it lay on the cool bathroom tile, she shimmied out from under him. She couldn’t stand fully, because she was handcuffed to an old, rusty pipe under the sink, but she twisted and strained and almost wrenched her shoulder from its socket in an attempt to see through the narrow window.

  There were trees – not up next to the house, but close enough to distinguish their leaves – and she knew from the time she’d stood on the edge of the tub that there was a roof almost directly beneath the window. It wasn’t large, maybe five feet wide at most, and she guessed it covered some kind of stoop.

  Very quietly, Casey pulled on the handcuff to test its hold. The blond man had told her that if he heard her make one sound he’d shoot her in the head. And she had no doubt that he would actually do it. After all, he’d already…

  No. Don’t think about that now. Right now she just had to think about getting out of there. About sleeping in her own bed. Playing Chutes and Ladders with her sister.

  She even wanted to smell those stupid funnel cakes.

  Shaking, tears streaming down her face from so much hope, Casey sat back down on the floor next to the boy. He was a cute little guy – all freckles and shaggy dark hair – and she bet he ha
d a mom and dad somewhere who were really worried.

  She lifted his head again, settling his soft cheek against her lap.

  “Don’t worry,” she whispered, stroking an unruly lock of hair off his forehead. “The good guys are out there now, and they’re going to help us.”

  CLAY was losing it.

  Losing. It.

  In typical SNAFU fashion, someone had let it slip that he had a personal involvement with the child inside, and now Beall was even less inclined to listen to anything he had to say. In the field, the behavioral side of the Bureau lacked the authority to dictate how tactical situations were handled, serving only in an advisory capacity. They could suggest, and recommend, but in the end it was out of their hands. And when they had a personal stake in the case that could be construed as clouding their judgment – well, they might as well not even bother.

  And that was exactly how Agent Beall was acting toward Clay. Like things would be so much easier if he and his psychobabble opinions weren’t around.

  “I’m a damn agent with the damn Bureau, just like him – although on second thought, he doesn’t have a PhD – and yet he’s treating me like the village idiot.”

  Kim reached out to grab Clay’s arm. He was pacing so fast and furiously in one small patch of dirt that he’d worn a groove under his feet.

  It had been over thirty minutes since Beall had dismissed his suggestion that he trade himself for the deputies and there was still no sign of communication from the house.

  On the up side, the SWAT team had pulled the two Bentonville deputies out, without an exchange of gunfire, and miraculously, Josh Harding was still alive. He’d lost a tremendous amount of blood, but none of the three bullet wounds were in themselves life threatening. There was a strong chance that he would pull through his ordeal in one piece.

  On the down side, Rob Johns was refusing to communicate, and they’d still been unable to determine whether or not Max was faring okay. Patience was running low, nerves were running high, and Clay knew they were running out of time.

  “We have to find out more about him,” he said to Kim when she finally managed to force him to stand still. “I’m afraid someone’s going to have to wake Tate and show her that composite. If she recognizes him, she might be able to offer us some insight as to his background. There has to be something there – some personal connection – and if we find out what it is I might be able to reach him.” He blew out a breath of frustration. “This isn’t your run-of-the-mill child abduction, so I’m not sure what buttons to push.”

  Kim nodded and squeezed the hard arm under her hand. “I know you were holding that out as a kind of last resort because you wanted to spare her from having to go through this, but I think that’s a good idea. Why don’t I fax a copy of the composite over to the hospital? Maybe get her uncle or her cousin to look at it first. If they recognize him, Tate sleeps through this. If not, they can wake her up.”

  “Okay.” Clay scrubbed a hand down his sweat-streaked face, watching Beall and a handful of others confer over how long to wait before they breached the interior. He knew that unless Johns opened up a dialogue, or unless one of the snipers got a chance to take him out through a window, that eventually that’s what would happen. The reactive stage of the situation would give way to a proactive operational strategy.

  But something in Clay’s gut told him that if they pushed Johns that way, he’d push back. He was probably planning to push back. His lack of willingness to negotiate up to this point suggested that he had no interest in playing give and take. Some personality types – like, dear God, the man they’d cornered in Topeka – refused to accept any part in a production over which they didn’t exert absolute control. Left with no options or meaningful choices, he’d be desperate to end this on his own terms.

  And Clay feared that was what they were dealing with.

  This man would probably prefer to go down in a design of his own making than allow himself to be taken by the authorities.

  Most likely taking Max with him.

  Unless Clay could find that one significant factor that would somehow tip the balance in their favor. But what then? Could he persuade Beall to even listen?

  Clay breathed, a ragged intake of humid air.

  Thought of that purple bear.

  And prayed to God Max lived to call him Daddy.

  JR went about his business as quietly as he could. He was sure those assholes had listening devices aimed in his direction. He’d studied up on enough law enforcement techniques to know that was SOP. And he also knew exactly what they were hoping to accomplish with that piece of shit negotiator and his bullhorn.

  Just talk to me, the idiot said. Let me know what you need. I want to help you resolve this.

  What a bunch of crap. What that cop wanted was for him to spend the rest of his life looking at the world through a set of iron bars.

  He was not going to end up in prison.

  He wrenched the old-fashioned stove sideways, turning the valve so that gas leaked into the air. JR figured he had maybe thirty minutes before the goons out there got antsy enough to come after him. Now if he were negotiating, that could go on for hours. But by refusing to talk, he’d speed this farce up and get it over with.

  He pulled himself out from his awkward crouch behind the stove, rubbed the dirt and grease he’d accumulated onto his pants. Thirty minutes was plenty to turn this place into a time bomb. Enough gas would build up that one spark – one shot from a weapon – would send the entire place up in flames, taking everyone nearby with it.

  It wasn’t exactly the way he’d planned for things to turn out, but he figured it would do in a pinch. He’d lose the girl and he’d lose the kid, but hey, watching Tate and her FBI prick pick pieces of the kid off the surrounding vegetation had to be good for a laugh or two.

  He wondered where Tate was right now.

  He’d tried to catch a glimpse of her from one of the upstairs windows, but he knew there were snipers around and hanging out where they could pick him off was not such a hot idea. Still, he really hoped she was here to see this. Her boyfriend probably had her stashed somewhere, sitting safe and comfortable in an air conditioned police car, waiting to tell her that he’d saved her precious son.

  Hah. He’d like to be a fly on the wall for that little conversation, after good old grandma Alma’s farmhouse went sky high.

  But he knew better than to risk sticking around. If nothing else, this little fiasco had reminded him that it didn’t pay to get cocky and take chances. A smart man knew when to cut his losses and walk away.

  And JR was nothing if not smart.

  Satisfied with his handiwork, he turned to leave the kitchen, heading toward the door to the cellar. Good thing he’d gone exploring during that one summer he’d actually been invited to visit. If he hadn’t, he never would have known about the old tunnel that ran under the house. Some kind of leftover hidey hole from Prohibition, his grandma had informed him. After she’d whooped his hide for getting into places he didn’t belong.

  He paused at the head of the stairs, reconsidering his decision about leaving the boy. He’d actually been looking forward to the idea of keeping him…

  But no. That was a liability he didn’t need. It was going to be challenging enough to get out of here himself, to disappear and fade into the background, without trying to drag a kid with him.

  Dismissing all that he was leaving behind, JR turned and headed toward freedom.

  CASEY was growing tired of waiting. It had been a long while since the blond man locked them in, and she hadn’t seen or heard him since.

  Was he waiting outside the door, listening for her to make a noise?

  Was he downstairs, hiding from the police?

  She knew he wasn’t talking to them because she could hear bits and pieces of what the man with the bullhorn was saying. But what was taking so long? Why didn’t they just come in and get her?

  She shivered, despite the heat that filled the small bathroom i
n steamy waves. With the door closed, no air moved in the tight space, and Casey was beginning to feel both lightheaded and nauseous. There was a funny smell to the stagnant air.

  Something tightened in her gut. She felt herself sliding into panic.

  She had to get out. Had to. Maybe the policemen outside didn’t even know she was here. Maybe the blond man would just give up, go with them, and then they’d all go away, never realizing she’d been left.

  Maybe the blond man would shoot her and the little boy before he gave himself up.

  Oh God, she had to get out of here.

  Casey used her free hand to push her sweat-dampened hair off her face, shifting the little boy back onto the floor. Poor kid. She guessed he was lucky that he was drugged.

  He didn’t have to worry about the fact that he was probably going to die.

  No. Casey refused to let that happen. She refused to be this close to ending this nightmare and then just sit here, waiting.

  She pulled on the handcuff attached to the pipe – really yanked, with all the strength she had left – and bit back the cry that threatened to erupt when the hard metal bit into her flesh. Oh it hurt.

  Biting down to distract herself from the pain, Casey kept yanking until blood ran. Its slick metallic warmth brought bile rushing into her throat, but she choked it down and pulled and pulled and pulled.

  Chunks of flesh scraped off the bone, but Casey stifled her sobs. This agony was nothing compared to a bullet. Like an animal desperate enough to gnaw its paw off to escape a trap, she would do whatever it took to get out of there.

  Finally, tears streaming down her sweaty face, dizzy from a combination of pain and drugs and hunger, she managed to yank her mangled hand free, collapsing in a ball of anguish.

  Oh God, oh God, oh God. It hurt so bad she thought she might pass out.

  But she just knew that if she did, she might never awaken.