Fatal Demand: A Jess Kimball Thriller

by Diane Capri

  Harriet placed her hand on the big leather seat. “Oh my, yes! Why this is lovely! Look at all the room, Roger!” She scooted awkwardly into the window seat, and became immediately engrossed by the clouds.

  Roger said nothing. He grunted as he plopped down in the aisle seat directly across from Jess. He used a soggy handkerchief to mop his head and neck. He closed his eyes, and leaned his head back against the headrest. His breathing was labored and irregular.

  Jess gave him a few moments to recover from his exertion, leaned across the aisle, and tapped his arm. “Mr. Grantly?”

  He didn’t respond. At first, she thought he’d passed out, but then he opened his eyes and looked at her.

  She cleared her throat. “Mr. Grantly, my name is Jessica Kimball. I stopped by your son’s office this morning to speak with him, and your receptionist sent me to your home.”

  He frowned, confused. “What? You were at my home?”

  Jess kept her voice as gentle as possible, given the white noise of the aircraft. “But you’d already left for the airport, so I came here.”

  “Here? On this flight?” He frowned and glared at her. “You’re following me?”

  “Not exactly. I’m here to help.”

  “With what?”

  “With your son.”

  He sat up straighter, and wiped his face with the soggy handkerchief. “What do you know about my son?”

  “More than you might think, but I don’t know enough. We’ve got almost two hours for you to fill me in.”

  “About what?”

  “I’m working with the FBI. We want to help you get your son back alive.”

  He inched away from her. The sweat that had dappled his forehead, now dripped down into his eyes. He swiped with the handkerchief again.

  Jess stood and adjusted the air vent above his head, directing as much cold air onto his face as she could. He stared straight ahead. Not looking at her or acknowledging her actions.

  Harriet twittered on about the clouds and the plane and the patchwork of land she saw from time to time on the ground.

  Roger continued to sweat profusely even though the air-conditioning blasting from the plane’s overhead air vents was enough to refrigerate ice cream.

  Jess struggled to keep impatience from showing on her face as she waited for him to comprehend his situation and accept her help.

  Finally he levered himself from his seat with his cane. “Harriet. Let’s go.”

  Harriet tore her gaze away from the view, and watched him.

  He swayed and grabbed the seat in front. The plane shook. Minor clear air turbulence. Nothing more. He shifted his balance and moved the cane to compensate, but his jerky movements were too slow, and he thumped back into his seat.

  Jess reached over and placed a comforting hand on his arm. “Mr. Grantly, I want to help you save your son’s life. You and Harriet can’t possibly do this on your own.”

  His shoulders slumped. He closed his eyes, and his head sagged back on the headrest. The flight attendant returned with the beverage service. He served Roger a bottle of water and Harriet an iced tea, and moved on to the next set of passengers.

  Roger opened his eyes and took a sip of the water. “Tell me what you think you know, Ms. Kimball. And then we’ll see if there’s anything you can do for my son.” His resigned tone seemed like a step forward.

  Harriet looked at Jess through thick glasses that made her blue eyes look like saucers.

  Jess took a deep breath. “I believe your son has been the victim of sophisticated thieves.” A half-truth, but the best opening she could come up with.

  Roger nodded almost imperceptibly. He needed to be pushed in the right direction.

  “He’s probably been taking money from Grantly and Son to pay the thieves, which is why you don’t want to get the FBI involved.” She took a deep breath. “But we suspect he’s been kidnapped, and that you’re on your way to Rome to pay the ransom to get him back.”

  Harriet gasped.

  “And,” Jess dragged out the word, “I know for sure that you’re never going to make it to Rome, let alone bring your son home, unless you let me help you.”

  “How can you possibly know that?” Harriet’s indignation was as heartbreaking as the entire situation. If Wilson Grantly had been sitting within twenty feet of her, Jess would have cheerfully tackled him and pummeled him within an inch of his life. What was he thinking, putting his parents in this situation?

  Jess’s gaze met Harriet’s directly and didn’t flinch. “Because the FBI is watching you, and if you don’t take me up on my offer, the FBI will arrest you before you get on that plane tonight.”

  Harriet’s entire body was rigid. Color rose in her cheeks. “Arrest us? For what?”

  “It doesn’t matter, does it?” Jess leaned in. “Aiding and abetting your son’s crimes? Whatever it is, if you’re arrested, you won’t be in Rome tomorrow, and that’s the end, isn’t it?”

  Harriet’s lips formed a perfect circle. She leaned back and clutched her pearls. She said, “Oh,” in a whispery voice that Jess could barely hear.

  “Five of your son’s friends are already dead or missing or in prison. At this point, prison would be the safest place for Wilson.” Jess cocked her head and frowned. “Otherwise…”

  At that, Harriet began to cry. Which was the last straw for Roger. He seemed to deflate before Jess’s very eyes. He slumped in his seat, and patted Harriet’s hand.

  When he spoke again, Jess heard weary resignation in his tone. “What is it you want to know?”

  “Let’s start with exactly where and when you are supposed to deliver the ransom.”

  “Tomorrow. They’re meeting us at the airport. In Rome.” Roger made strong eye contact and flashed a curt nod. “We give them the money, they give us Wilson. We have a return flight booked three hours later.”

  Jess nodded. A simple plan. Appealing. Easy. The sort of thing that sounded sensible to sensible people. People brought up with a clear view of what was right, and what was not. She bit her lip. People from the twenties. Not the world they lived in today.

  The roaring twenties were a long time ago. Things had changed. The world wasn’t so clear-cut anymore, even if it had been then. The plan wouldn’t be simple. There wouldn’t be a handshake and a smile and a pat on the back. Money exchanged. Wilson freed. Problem over. Come home.

  Jess had written extensively about kidnappings. She’d been living her own nightmare with her son, Peter’s kidnapping for ten long years. These things were never so simple. Ever.

  She took a deep breath. “How will you get the money?”

  Roger frowned. “Get it? What’s to get?”

  “The…don’t tell me you have the ransom money with you?”

  “Of course.”

  “Not a money order, or a bearer bond, or, or…anything?”

  “Absolutely not.” Roger’s chin dipped another curt nod, as if her suggestion was preposterous.

  The situation was spiraling downward with every new piece of INTEL she managed to acquire. She cleared her throat. “How much cash are we talking about?”

  Roger lowered his voice. “Two hundred and thirty-seven thousand dollars.” He gazed straight into Jess’s eyes. “Everything we have left.” His words were slow. Individual. Painful.

  Jess looked at Roger then Harriet. She had no clue how much nearly a quarter million dollars would weigh, but neither of them could possibly be carrying that much cash on their bodies. And the security search should have found it in their carry-on bags because U.S. currency contained metal strips that were visible on baggage x-ray machines.

  She felt a sinking sensation in her stomach. “You packed it into your checked luggage?”

  Roger gave another single, slow and sure nod. “We couldn’t carry it.”

  Jess weighed her words carefully. She didn’t want to scare them more than necessary. But they had to know they’d increase their activities to the felony level for sure if they transported tha
t cash to Rome. “You know, the banks are required to report large withdrawals to the government. So, if you—”

  Harriet lifted her chest, and tossed her shoulders back. “We didn’t withdraw the money from the bank. We’re old, dear, but we’re not stupid.”

  Jess breathed a few times before she said, “Where did you get it, then?”

  Harriet’s blue-eyed gaze was tinged with a touch of steel. “We keep cash around. Always have. Banks can’t always be trusted, dear.”

  Jess exhaled. “Would Wilson know you had that money in the house?”

  “Of course. We wanted him to know where it was in case anything happened to us.” Her eyes twinkled now. She patted Jess’s hand. “Our friend, Sally Mitchell? She stashed money in books and in the freezer and all over her house. When she died, it took her kids two years to find it all. And they were never sure they’d located all her hiding places. They couldn’t even sell the house for the longest time because they were so worried about whether they’d found all the money.”

  It was all Jess could do not to swear. Wilson must have told the kidnappers about the hidden cash, the people he had involved himself with in the first place, and dragged his parents into the extortion.

  She didn’t quite know what to say. The flight attendant walked down the aisle, interrupting the conversation for a moment. Jess rested her head on the back of her seat and closed her eyes.

  Jess had been inside their home. She imagined how they’d done this crazy thing. Roger must have looked at Harriet for agreement. She’d nodded. They said nothing because everything that could be said, had been said.

  They felt they’d had no choice.

  They’d have levered themselves from the chairs, and collected their life savings together. The money was probably spread around their house. Hidden under floorboards, behind cupboards, and inside false-bottomed boxes in their pantry. The dollars they had accumulated through long hard years of honest work, and the pennies they had saved, eating in, drinking water with their meals, forgoing cable TV for the free signals that came snowy over the air.

  They’d have sorted the money on their dining room table. The hundreds next to the fifties. The twenties by the tens and lower denominations. Colorful, crisp bills. Short stacks butted against each other. The twenties, tens, and ones taking up most of the space. A thin elastic band surrounding each bundle. A post-it note recording each stack’s value.

  They’d added up the post-it notes. Once each. Their numbers agreeing, a miracle given their shaking hands and failing eyesight. They recorded their numbers on a sheet of paper, and memorized the total before tucking it behind the supplies in the pantry. Hiding the evidence. Not from the neighbors or the police, but from themselves.

  They’d wrapped the bundles in plastic grocery bags, and secured them with short strips of cellophane tape. They’d paused a moment to look at the sight on their kitchen table. The tight plastic pressing on the corners of the thick wedges of bills. The grocery store emblems twisted between the folds that sealed the packages. Plastic folded over plastic. Waterproofed as best as they could manage.

  “Better safe than sorry,” Mrs. Grantly probably said.

  Mr. Grantly’s lip had trembled. His knees quivered. He’d sat down. A chair beside the table. “Everything we have in the world.”

  She’d taken the chair beside him, their knees touching. He’d put his hand on hers. She’d wrapped a thumb over the back of his hand. Tears came. Sniffles. Gasps. Tight grips of bony knuckles. Salty drops trickling down faces. A prelude to sobs, to hugs, to tissues.

  To brave words.

  They’d bolstered each other’s reserves, raised their morale, and stiffened their resolve. They were doing the right thing. The only thing. The only thing they could do for their only son.

  They’d carried the bags, pausing a moment outside the door to their son’s room to remember happier times.

  They packed the money in an old blue suitcase, a layer of clothes all the way round. Protection from the elements and prying eyes alike. They placed the suitcase in the far corner of their bedroom, as if the distance dulled the pain of what they were doing. What they had to do. For Wilson.

  They had no choice. That much Jess clearly understood.

  The flight attendant passed through the cabin and they were free to talk across the aisle again.

  Jess said, “You know that moving that much cash out of the country is illegal? If you get caught, you’ll both go to prison.”

  Roger put his palms together as if he was praying and leaned the fingers against his chin. “Do you have children, Ms. Kimball?”

  It was an everyday question. Normal enough. A conversation starter usually. But for Jess the question was always a warning. A red flag signaling danger to come. The conversation moving into areas she could not and would not attempt to discuss.

  She took a deep breath for strength and offered the answer she always gave. Not a lie, but not the full truth, either. “No, I don’t.”

  Roger nodded as if he’d expected as much. “Our youngest son died. Iraq. Eight years ago. In combat. Second Infantry division.” He pushed his lower lip out then brought it back in, his feelings not weakened, but harnessed. He looked at Jess, his face much ruddier than it should have been. “If you had only one son left, you would do anything to keep him alive. You’d pay anything. Go anywhere. Do whatever you had to do.” His face was an even brighter crimson now. His chest rose and fell as if he were on the verge of tears he refused to shed. “Wilson asked. Our son wanted help from us. So how could we not help him?”

  “But there are many ways to help—”

  He shook his head. “We already sacrificed one son for our country, Ms Kimball.” He breathed noisily through his nose. “Tell me you wouldn’t do exactly what we are doing.”

  Jess sighed. She couldn’t voice the lie. Of course, she would be doing exactly what they had done. She’d done much harder things for Peter. She’d do them again. And she wouldn’t care whether some lawyer said she’d committed a crime or not.

  She glanced at her watch. Less than an hour of flight time left before they landed in New York. She’d have to call Morris, and he would have to bring in an FBI team. She was way out of her element, and the Grantlys were even further afield. No matter how much they wanted to help their son, there was little chance Roger and Harriet would survive their crazy scheme, let alone Wilson Grantly, who might even be dead already.

  Harriet leaned past Roger and whispered, “Do you really think we’ll be stopped? From saving our son?”

  Jess swallowed. Wilson was a heartless, sniveling coward to sell his parents out in such a scam, but she understood their blind love for the son, and the pain their failure would bring. “We’ll find a way, or…” She couldn’t promise anything from Morris. He’d already made that clear. “I will find a way.”

  She leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes. Kidnappers, a hostage, two feeble but determined ninety-year-olds, and a quarter million dollars. She had no idea how to fix any of that, but she was working on it.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Luigi glanced at his watch. They’d been flying for almost two hours. The plane was on schedule. They would be landing in New York shortly.

  After takeoff, the Grantlys had been moved into the first class cabin. He couldn’t see them on the other side of the privacy curtain, but he wasn’t worried. Where could they go at thirty-thousand feet? He’d find them easily enough when the plane landed.

  The flight attendant announced the captain had begun the initial descent, and instructed passengers to return to their seats. Harriet pushed aside the first class cabin curtain, and preceded Roger to row eighteen. She reclaimed her center seat, and Roger sunk heavily into the seat on the aisle.

  The seat back monitor in front of Luigi indicated the plane would land at John F. Kennedy International Airport in twenty minutes. He closed his eyes for a brief period of quiet before he’d be subjected to Harriet’s incessant babbling again.


  The next time he looked, Roger’s head had fallen to one side. The old man was sleeping. Luigi’s father had slept a lot in his final years. But then, his father hadn’t been well. When he’d died of a massive heart attack, Luigi had been with him through his last hours. He’d had nausea and sickness, trouble breathing, pains in his side and arm. He remembered the pain in his father’s chest had grown unbearable. Luigi had left to bring him a glass of water, but when he returned, his father’s head had lolled over, much as Roger’s did now.

  Luigi sat up straight. Was the old guy having a heart attack? He’d certainly been sweating and red in the face. If Roger died, the deal could die with him. Luigi hadn’t come this far to see the deal fall apart now.

  He looked up and down the length of the aircraft. The flight attendants were busy preparing for landing. He needed to do something to keep Roger alive. But what? Without bringing attention to himself? Precious seconds lumbered past.

  Luigi stood and walked toward the front of the plane. When he reached Roger’s seat, he swung his hip and bumped Roger’s shoulder, hard, pushing the old man’s head onto Harriet’s shoulder. She turned, probably to scold her husband or start another stream of her babbling nonsense, but instead, began to scream. Thank God.

  Luigi walked on to the first class cabin, stepping aside as the flight attendants rushed toward Harriet’s screams. He ducked into the restroom, and sat on the toilet lid to wait. There was a request on the intercom for a doctor.

  After a few minutes, Luigi emerged and headed toward his seat. Old man Grantly had been moved to the rear of the plane, Harriet beside him. The old guy was moving a bit, which was a good sign.

  “What happened?” Luigi asked a young mother seated by the window, holding her baby to her chest.

  “That old man. Back there. They think he had a heart attack. It’s just awful!” she said, tears threatening her pretty, green eyes.