Dead Line

by Jack Patterson

  CHAPTER 21

  ON A BREAK DURING THE FBI BRIEFING, Cal called Noah and left a message. He wanted Seattle’s most popular professional athlete to know he was risking his own life to save his son. Even while he was leaving the message, Cal felt strange about it. He didn’t want to brag or seem like some hero, but he did want Noah to appreciate the sacrifices he was making to save Jake.

  Five minutes after he left the message, he received a text from Noah: “Thx.”

  Cal felt like complaining to Kelly about it but then thought it would make him sound like a whiny brat. That’s it? A simple three-letter text response? Instead, he began pondering a better question: What were his true motivations? To be a hero and get an award-winning story? Or to help a dad get his son back? It shouldn’t have been a question Cal had to ask—and if he was asking it, maybe the answer wasn’t so noble. This couldn’t be about him. It had to be about Jake and Noah and nothing else. If something else beneficial to his career came out of this, then great. But he had to get the proper mindset: He would do this if no one else ever heard about it or read about it. This wasn’t about him.

  Cal returned to the briefing room and sat down next to Kelly.

  “You think you can do this?” Cal asked her again.

  “Geez, Cal, I’m not some China doll. I think you know I can handle myself. Why else would you have asked me to go?”

  Cal smiled. He wanted to answer her rhetorical question but decided against it. There were multiple reasons why he wanted her to go. If she couldn’t figure that out, she wasn’t as smart as Cal gave her credit for being.

  To Cal, Kelly’s fiery spirit was more attractive than her striking outward appearance. Her mom once told Cal about Kelly’s first co-ed soccer practice. After 30 minutes, Kelly realized the boys were not passing her the ball. She ended that with an impromptu speech about how they better start passing her the ball and just because she was a girl was no excuse to leave her out. The next pass went to her and she buried the ball in the back of the net. She finished the season as the team’s second-leading scorer. That attitude made Kelly stand out in a crowd. She could be a dainty princess one minute, a Marine commander the next. She was her own woman—and she was going to make a fine partner on this operation in Juarez.

  The briefing last another 30 minutes and wrapped up just before one o’clock.

  “Your plane leaves in two hours,” Solterbeck said, handing the journalists a packet with their itinerary and contacts in Juarez. “You’ll find your new agency issued passports as well. Getting in and out of the country will be a breeze for you with these. Any final questions?”

  “Nope. I think we’ve got a good idea of what we’re supposed to do: locate where they are holding Jake and tell you what we can about the compound.”

  “That’s it. Good luck, you two.”

  * * *

  MR. HERNANDEZ HEARD THE TIRES BARK as his Gulfstream G450 touched down on his personal runway, and he headed outside. Having a place to land your private jet meant dispensing with government employees. The amount he saved on bribes alone for officials at Gonzalez International more than paid for the paved strip.

  He stood near the door and waited for Diaz to exit.

  “How was your flight?” Hernandez asked as Diaz began lumbering down the plane’s steps.

  “Good.”

  “So, we have much to discuss, starting with how we’re going to dispense of Mr. Murphy and his lady friend.”

  “It will be my pleasure.” Diaz snarled and cast a menacing gaze toward his boss.

  Hernandez had seen this look only once before from Diaz. It came when a member of the Menendez cartel nearly killed him. A few weeks later, Hernandez found the man in his compound, tied to a chair and barely alive. Diaz had cut off the man’s fingers and used them to gouge his eyes out. Five years later, the image still haunted Hernandez.

  “What really happened in Houston, Diaz?”

  Diaz ignored the question. “How are we going to dispense of Mr. Murphy?”

  Hernandez shuttered. He knew Diaz’s thirst for revenge would only be quenched one way.

  “Let’s go inside and talk.”

  CHAPTER 22

  CAL AND KELLY FLEW WEST across Texas and landed at the Biggs Army Airfield. Flying into Biggs saved them at least an hour of dealing with airport processing. Solterbeck wanted to give them as much time as possible to identify a good extraction point should things go awry.

  Solterbeck remained in Houston but another FBI agent had accompanied them on the flight and drove them to the border.

  “Remember, we have agents in Juarez, but we don’t want you to contact them unless it’s an emergency,” he said as they stopped near the customs gate. “Until your interview tomorrow afternoon, check in every hour with a text message per the instructions in your briefing so we know you’re safe. Otherwise, a team will respond immediately and pull you out. Got it?”

  “Got it,” Cal said.

  “Be safe.”

  With that, Cal and Kelly got out of the car and walked through the pedestrian gate and into Juarez. They disappeared into a sea of people streaming along the sidewalk. Two blocks later, they came to a parking lot and identified the car that had been left for them. They threw their belongings into the car and headed for the hotel.

  “You still OK?” Cal asked.

  “Well, it’s a little more real now,” Kelly said. “Let’s just say I’m slightly more scared now than I was when we were running for our lives through Idaho corn fields.”

  Cal nodded. Escaping from a single thug on their turf seemed much more manageable than infiltrating a dangerous cartel and delivering life-saving information.

  “But it is kind of exciting, isn’t it?” Kelly said.

  “I don’t know if that’s the word I would use for it.”

  “The adventure, the rush of being in the middle of danger—don’t you find that exciting?”

  “I guess I like my excitement a little less life-threatening.”

  “That’s why you write and I shoot photos.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “You just like to sit back and contemplate the right words to describe something. I don’t need words. I just capture the moment in its raw form.”

  “Aww, geez. You’ve got to be kidding me. It takes no skill to snap a photo.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong, Cal. Framing the moment takes way more skill than it does to use a thesaurus to find a different word for ‘beautiful’ or ‘incredible.’ Besides, what’s a picture? A thousand words? I can write the equivalent of a thousand words with the touch of a button.”

  “That’s exactly my point. It takes me a couple of hours to write a thousand words.”

  Kelly laughed. “A thousand words that nobody reads.”

  The car lurched to a stop behind a flatbed truck carrying a mix of goats, chickens and bed mattresses. A young boy clinging to one of the goats scowled at them.

  Cal turned and looked intently at Kelly. He wasn’t sure if she was needling him for fun or serious.

  “Are you really gonna go there?” he finally asked.

  “Oh, Cal. You’re way too serious about your craft. Lighten up.”

  She then pointed her camera at Cal and took his picture.

  “Nice expression, Cal. I think this is a keeper.” She paused. “Now, how many words have you written today?”

  Cal shook his head and smiled. Her playful banter took the edge off the situation. He was serious about his craft. So was she. But what they were about to do had less to do with the fine art of writing or photography and more to do with the precision of investigative journalism. They needed to gather hard facts and insightful information from their interview with Hernandez. And they needed to snoop around his compound without raising suspicion.

  * * *

  NOAH DAILED HIS WIFE’S cell phone number. The call went to her voicemail.

  “Honey, please call me,” Noah said. “I need to talk to you. The FBI is go
ing to try and rescue Jake tomorrow night. I don’t know how much longer I can pretend like everything is fine. Call me. Please.”

  He hung up.

  Just over 72 hours remained until the Super Bowl kickoff and Noah could hardly make sense of the jumbled thoughts rattling around in his head. He couldn’t concentrate. His preparation for Sunday’s game was so poor that he thought his performance might not have to be faked. I just might lose to the Dolphins because I’m not ready.

  But nothing else mattered really. The Super Bowl didn’t matter. There wasn’t a moment in his life until this week where he would have ever thought such a thing. But it didn’t matter. It was just a game, a bunch of grown men acting like kids and getting paid handsomely to do it. So what that a hundred million people were going to be watching it—it was only a game.

  But Jake was his son, his only son. That mattered more than anything in the world to Noah. He and Ellen struggled to get pregnant and thought it would never happen. Fertilization treatments. Surgeries. None of it worked. If they wanted any children, they would have to adopt, at least that’s what the doctors said. But biological children? Forget it. Out of the realm of possibility.

  Then the unimaginable happened. A year to the day after their last visit to a fertility specialist, Noah and Ellen rode out to the beach together. They wanted to bury their dream together, cast it out to sea in a bottle. They needed to do something therapeutic as a couple, to put a stake in the ground and say that being without biological children wouldn’t define who they were as a couple or their marriage. They had decided to adopt and it was time to let go of the past and look forward. So they bottled their dream and Noah chucked it into the chilly Pacific waters. It was gone.

  On the way home, Ellen got sick. She asked Noah to pull over so she could throw up. He got out with her and held her hair back as she heaved. Then she cried and slumped into his arms. The emotional experience had been too much for her.

  Later that evening, Ellen told Noah she needed to go to the grocery store to grab a few essentials. She returned with a pregnancy test kit. She took it and it registered as pregnant. Her scream from the upstairs bathroom in their home sent Noah bounding up the stairs.

  “What is it, honey?” he asked.

  “We’re pregnant!” she said.

  Noah felt like he had thrown a touchdown to win the Super Bowl on the last play of the game. It was an exhilarating high.

  But now here he was about to actually play in the Super Bowl and he had sunk to the lowest he’d ever felt in his life. Even lower than when doctors told them they would never get pregnant. His son’s life was hanging in the balance—and there was nothing he could do about it but hope and pray.

  CHAPTER 23

  CAL WAS SETTLING INTO HIS ROOM across the hall from Kelly when his phone rang. It was Josh.

  “Hey, Josh. How are you enjoying Houston?” Cal asked.

  “Man, this is incredible, but I was calling to give you my condolences about your aunt.”

  My aunt? Cal wondered if that was some cover story Fink created.

  “Yeah, it’s been rough. She was a good woman.”

  “Well, I’m sorry to hear about her passing—and sorry for you that it had to happen on this week.”

  “We knew it was coming soon, just not so soon.”

  “That’s too bad.”

  “Yeah, well, don’t screw up the coverage, OK? This is a big break for you.”

  “Don’t worry. I won’t mess it up. The only thing is they stuck me on the Dolphins beat this week.”

  “You’re ready to be a real sports writer—you’re covering the Super Bowl and whining already.”

  “Yeah, well being forced to listen to Steve Spurlock ramble on about how he’s the best quarterback in the game would make anyone complain.”

  “That’s what he’s saying?”

  “Yeah, this guy has an ego fitting for this state. I wish someone would remind him that the Dolphins are only in the Super Bowl because the Steelers fumbled away the game, not because of something he did. From the way Spurlock talks, you would think Sunday’s outcome is a foregone conclusion.”

  Cal was quiet. It would be a foregone conclusion unless he helped the FBI save Jake.

  “Well, good luck with everything. I’ll see you soon.”

  “Later.”

  Cal ended the call. He hated lying to his best friend, but he knew Josh. And Josh wouldn’t keep quiet about his situation. In less than 24 hours, this whole mess would be over with.

  * * *

  RIVERA RELIEVED MORALES of his shift, but not before demanding some answers about the state of Jake’s room. Jake sat in a corner, quietly sobbing.

  “What happened here?” Rivera asked.

  The primitive room looked like a bomb had exploded in it. Jake’s bed frame had been split in the middle and was unusable. The lone table and chair brought in for Jake to use for coloring and other activities to pass the time lay splintered on the concrete floor.

  “Did you do this?” Rivera asked again when Morales refused to respond.

  “No.”

  “Who did then?”

  “Diaz.”

  “Is he crazy? He doesn’t need to do this to the kid?”

  “Look, you need to ask yourself if you’ve got the cajones to do this. Hernandez is going to test you after he gets his money.” Morales leaned in close to Rivera to deliver a message in a whispered voice. “He’s going to make you kill Jake.”

  Morales then pushed Rivera aside and exited the room, slamming the door behind him.

  Rivera knelt down beside Jake.

  “Are you OK, little buddy?”

  Jake looked up. His shiner was almost gone but there was a long scratch across his forehead. A trail of dried blood marred his face.

  “Who did this to you?” Rivera asked.

  Jake didn’t answer the question. “You said they wouldn’t hurt me any more—and they did.” Jake burst into tears, sobbing and moaning. “I want my daddy!”

  Rivera couldn’t believe he was doing this. Guarding a little boy like he was an animal. Treating him like one, too. It was disgusting. But he knew that if he didn’t do what Hernandez said, it would be his son in a similar predicament.

  However, Rivera knew he could never kill the boy. He had to draw the line somewhere. He had to think of a way out.

  CHAPTER 24

  HERNANDEZ SWIRLED THE TEQUILA around in his glass. Mr. Murphy presented a small kink in his plan. It could have been worse, but it wasn’t: Mr. Murphy was coming to his house. It gave Hernandez every possible advantage. He could control everything about the situation. The reporter and his lady friend would be helpless pawns in his game—just like the quarterback.

  “Let me finish them off, boss,” Diaz said.

  “And how do you propose to do that?” Hernandez asked.

  “I’ll just take them to the shed and beat them to death.”

  “I was thinking about something a little more discreet, something that wouldn’t draw any attention to us. We do run a legitimate business here after all.”

  “So what’s your idea, boss?”

  Hernandez paused. That’s what he liked to hear. His ideas were always the best. That’s why he was the boss.

  * * *

  CAL AND KELLY SECURED their valuables in a safe in their rooms and proceeded to the lobby together. They needed to find a place to meet up in case they were separated or if they needed to be extracted. While Cal remained fearful of what might happen in the next 24 hours, he couldn’t help feeling a little bit excited about playing spy games with Kelly.

  Their hotel faced a small square with a grassy tree-lined park in the center. The cobblestone pathways extending in all directions from the center of the park would have been a nightmare for rollerbladers—or anyone else trying to navigate a wheeled device. Large tufts of grass sprouted between the bricks. Gaps of missing bricks reminded Cal this wasn’t some pristine park in Seattle. This was Mexico.

  At the far
corner of the square sat San Augustín Chapel, a plain Catholic church. Scaffolding covered up most of the front of the church as construction crews repaired the cracking façade. Cal remembered he had actually heard about this particular church in the news a few months before when a fire gutted the inside but left the Virgen de Guadeloupe unscathed. The story amused Cal. He thought people believed what they wanted to believe. And if they wanted to believe that God spared a statue of Mexico’s patron saint—while letting the crucifix of Jesus burn to a crisp—then so be it. Some false beliefs are unhelpful but harmless.

  “Let’s check out that church,” Cal suggested.

  “OK. Good idea.”

  Cal and Kelly walked across the square and toward the church in silence. The idea that they were in one of Mexico’s most dangerous cities instead of enjoying Super Bowl festivities still bewildered Cal. He noted the scenery with great detail—the elderly men playing chess in one corner of the park, the boys kicking a soccer ball, the mother carrying her baby on her back. It looked so peaceful.

  They crossed the street to enter the church. Cal gestured for Kelly to enter first.

  The interior of San Augustín Chapel did not match the outside. Although gutted by the fire it had been completely rebuilt. The trusses spanning the width of the building displayed detailed carvings of saints and other biblical scenes. Magnificent artwork adorned the walls, depicting the lives of different saints. There was even a new painting by a local artist that showed fires leaping around the Virgen de Guadeloupe statue but not touching it.

  Cal continued to scan the sanctuary for places to hide or meet should it be necessary. Lost in his analysis, Cal didn’t see the priest approaching.

  “May I help you, señor?”

  Cal looked down to see a short older man wearing a robe.

  “Oh, I don’t think so, Father. I’m just admiring the beautiful architecture.”

  The priest smiled.

  “Well, I don’t know if I’d go as far to say that it’s beautiful, but it’s certainly practical.”

  Nodding, the padre continued. “So are you new to our parish?”