No Safe Place

by Mary Head

  Chapter 24

  Juliet called when he was halfway to the Bureau, diverting him to a construction site in Alexandria, and it wasn’t long before David added his car to the collection of black SUVs parked haphazardly along the curb and on the gravel lot next to the construction site. He slammed the door behind him and jogged across the street, now being blocked off at either corner by local law enforcement flanked by agents.

  Chris was standing in the gate of the chain link fence, talking with an older bearded man wearing a suit and tie and a hard hat. David assumed he was the foreman, and headed in that direction.

  Chris saw David coming towards him, and abruptly cut off his conversation with the site foreman. Striding quickly towards his boss, he braced for the inevitable tirade of questions.

  “Does he know anything?” David asked immediately, nearly shouting to be heard over the grinding noise of machinery and power tools. “Have you found Han’s phone? Do we have a location yet?”

  Chris raised a hand to quiet David. “We just got here. We don’t know anything yet. Juliet is still working on an exact GPS location. Tell me what they said.”

  David sighed and stepped closer to Chris, not wanting to continue yelling to be heard. “It was a man. I didn’t recognize the voice, but that doesn’t really mean anything. He said – he said Hannah was going to die, Tuesday night at eight.”

  Chris took a breath, rubbing his hand over his cheek. “Gives us time, but not much.” He frowned and shook his head as he added, “If the bastard is telling the truth.”

  David nodded; he was already feeling the pressure of the deadline, and every time he thought about it, his heart seemed to skip a beat.

  “He knew me, Chris,” he continued, his brow creasing as he looked up at the younger man. “He called me Agent Cole. He knows who I am and where I work. This has to be personal.”

  “We’re gonna figure this out, David. We’re gonna find her,” Chris replied, raising his eyebrows as he looked at David.

  David sighed in exasperation and glanced away as he ran a hand through his hair. “What do you have?”

  Chris affected his best agent-in-charge face and said, “We have a quarter mile perimeter in each direction, and Alexandria PD is here to help us contain the area. Agents Grayson and Shaw are setting up a mobile command post. The foreman said a lot of workers were on their lunch breaks, so –”

  David stepped around Chris and started to march off in the direction the foreman went, intent on questioning the man himself, when a strong hand clamped down on his shoulder. He turned quickly and glared at Chris.

  “Don’t do it, David,” Chris warned. “You get in the way again, and Harry will suspend you for sure. Just let –”

  “Get in the way?” David shouted. He shrugged off Chris’s hand and pushed into the other agent’s space.

  “This is my investigation,” Chris said firmly. “You shouldn’t even be here.”

  David took a step towards Chris until they were almost nose to nose. “It’s my daughter who’s missing!”

  Even with the obvious difference in height, the ferocity in David’s eyes made Chris take a step back. He realized that a small circle of workmen were gathering around them, along with a few agents, and put his hands on his hips. He looked around briefly before grabbing David’s arm and leading him over to one of the parked vehicles.

  Feeling they were sufficiently out of view, Chris looked David in the eyes. “You don’t think I know that?” he asked, keeping his voice low.

  Something in David’s expression crumbled, and Chris could see the exhaustion in his face, the way his wrinkled clothes seemed to be hanging off his body, and knew this was slowly killing him.

  “It’s Hannah, Chris,” David said. His voice cracked, and his words were strained, like he couldn’t make his throat work properly.

  “I know,” Chris said. “I know, but you can’t –” David turned to walk away, but Chris hurried to slip in front of him, stopping his progress with a hand on his chest. “You’ve got to watch this one from the sidelines. You’re too close to this.”

  David grabbed the younger agent’s jacket by the lapels and spun him, slamming him against the side of the SUV. Chris grunted as the door handle pressed into his spine, and his hands came up to grab David’s wrists, trying to pull them away. Hearing the commotion, Juliet started towards them, her eyes wide. Chris held up a steady hand to stop her, but she continued forward, albeit at a slower pace.

  “It’s Hannah,” David said again, though now his voice was strong and angry.

  “David. I know.” Chris pried David’s hands free and pushed himself off the side of the car. “We’re all too close to this, but you especially. You can’t beat up every suspect until they tell you what you want to hear. I know you know that, but you don’t right now.”

  David closed his eyes and kicked at the ground in frustration before looking back up at Chris. “I’m sorry, I just – I want this bastard. We need to tear this fucking place apart until we find him, and then tear him apart until we find Hannah!”

  “No, we have to find him,” Chris argued. “And that doesn’t include you.” David scowled, but Chris kept talking. “You can stay over there with Juliet and Eli,” he offered, pointing in Juliet’s direction. “You’ll be kept apprised of the situation, but you have to stay out of this.”

  David raised an eyebrow at Chris’s tone. Slowly, he was beginning to realize that the overeager young agent he used to know had managed to grow into a decent leader. It still didn’t sit well with him that he wasn’t in charge. Every second that passed without Hannah being found felt like another second off his life. This was the most progress they’d seen yet, the only good lead since she was taken, and every fiber of his being screamed to follow it, to claw and scratch and fight until she was safely in his arms.

  “David,” Chris said softly. “Please. Let us handle this. Trust us. Trust me.”

  David still looked unsure, but nodded anyway as he put his hands on his hips, pushing his leather jacket back. Chris frowned when he saw the loaded and holstered sidearm.

  “Jesus, David, you can’t have that here. You’re on leave.” David realized what he was talking about and pulled his jacket closed. “Go put it in your car or something, but do it before Harry gets here.”

  “Harry’s on his way?”

  Chris gave a frustrated sigh and rubbed his forehead. “Yeah, he told me to call him whenever there was a development. He’s going to flip his shit when he sees you here.”

  “Sorry,” David muttered, only half meaning it.

  “Yeah.” Chris sighed again and looked his boss – his friend – in the eye. “We’ll find her, David.”

  “We have to,” David replied before turning and starting towards Juliet.

  Chris watched him go until another agent hurried over. “Sir, the foreman has the list of employees and contractors.” Chris nodded. “And SAC Greene is here.”

  “Fantastic,” was Chris’s sarcastic reply, and he sighed again as he turned to follow the agent.

  Juliet fell into step beside David as he walked to his car, and she watched as he stowed his gun under the seat. He straightened, his expression heavy as he took a breath, and propped his hands on his hips as he lowered his gaze to the ground.

  Juliet stayed silent, waiting for him to speak if he wanted to, and he cleared his throat after a couple of minutes.

  “Has anybody talked to John lately?” he asked.

  Juliet frowned, confused by the seeming randomness of the question. “Han’s professor?”

  “I was doing laundry when I got the call and came across the shirt she was wearing that day,” David elaborated. “It just made me think of everywhere she went that day, wondering if anybody might have noticed anything.”

  Juliet shrugged. “The police talked to him yesterday morning, before Harry took over the case. Chris wanted to interview him again afterward, but we couldn’t get a hold of him. His boss said he had a family emergency
to tend to, and I told Chris to let it go, since he had John’s statement he gave to the police.” She frowned slightly. “You don’t think –”

  “No,” David said, shaking his head. “Just sort of hoping he might’ve seen something, since he was the last person she was with that day.”

  He sighed and lowered his gaze to the ground a moment before looking back up at her.

  “What do you have?” he asked, lifting his chin in the direction of the command post.

  “Not much yet,” she replied, her tone apologetic.

  “Show me.”

  She led him over to the command post, a set of tables erected under a large white tent, wires snaking along the ground to a nearby generator.

  Eli was seated in front of one of the laptops, and he jumped up when he saw David and Juliet striding towards him. Juliet took the newly vacated seat, and David came to stand behind her, peering over her shoulder at the screen.

  “Not much,” she said again, gesturing at the screen. “The radius is still pretty wide; we’re working on narrowing it down.”

  “How much longer?” David asked.

  “I don’t know,” she replied, shaking her head as her shoulders rose in a shrug.

  “Well, what do you know?” he asked irritably, pushing off the back of the chair and turning away.

  Juliet twisted to look at him, her expression annoyed as she watched him stalk to the far edge of the tent. “What do you want me to do, David?”

  “I want something that’s god damn useful,” he snapped, whirling to face her. “I want to find my daughter.”

  “You don’t think I want that too?” she replied, jumping to her feet. “I want to find her just as much as you do, but I can’t make something out of nothing. I can’t make the program run faster; I can’t wave some fucking magic wand to give us all the information that we need.” She stared at him, her blue eyes meeting his, hard against furious. “Stop acting like nobody cares. Everybody fucking cares. So either shut up, or go sit in the car.”

  Her hands were clenched into fists at her sides, her body trembling like a taut wire. She understood his fear and his anger, but she was scared and angry too, and he was picking at her already frayed nerves.

  They glared at each other for a moment, and then he turned, heading for the nearest SUV and climbing inside, slamming the door. She looked over, meeting his gaze until he closed his eyes and rested his elbow on the center console, propping his forehead against his palm.

  Juliet sighed, running her fingers through her hair as she looked away, and saw Eli watching her. He averted his gaze, pretending to busy himself on another computer, and she shook her head as she settled back into her seat.

  A few more minutes passed, in which Eli wandered restlessly around the tent, wishing there was something more he could do. Seeing David so agitated and angry made him anxious. He’d always had this image of his mentor as being calm and collected, an image culled from news footage and an interview David did a few years back for a local magazine, and it shook Eli a little to see this side of him.

  Glancing over at Juliet, he saw a vague frown on her face as she stared at her computer, and he moved to stand in front of her, looking down at her from across the table.

  “Find anything?” he asked, raising his eyebrows hopefully.

  She lifted her gaze to his face, staring at him over the screen of the laptop. “If you’re going to hound me like Agent Cole, then you can go sit in the car with him.”

  Eli cast a glance over his shoulder at the SUV where David still sat, scowling out the windshield, and shook his head.

  “I’m good,” he murmured, and Juliet smirked.

  Another few minutes passed before Chris and Harry came over to stand beside Eli.

  “Anything?” Harry asked, hands on his hips as he stared down at Juliet.

  She took a breath, still staring at the computer screen. “The last time the phone was on, it registered with a tower six blocks south of here. But the last location information was transmitted to the tower on top of the bank across the street.”

  “Meaning?” Chris asked, frowning a little.

  “Meaning that whoever had it was moving south to north.”

  “There’s a lot of fast food places down that way,” Chris murmured. “Could have been a worker or someone on their lunch break.”

  Juliet sighed, tapping a few keys. “The best I can do is within about 100 meters, which puts it on the north end of this construction site.”

  “That’s where all the dumpsters are,” Eli spoke up.

  Chris and Eli exchanged a look, and then both spun away, hurrying to the gate of the construction site, Chris snagging a couple of agents along the way. David stared after them and then stepped out of the car, hurrying over to the tent.

  Harry scowled when he saw him. “David, I thought I told you to stay away from this.”

  “Don’t start, Harry,” David muttered before turning his attention to Juliet. “What’s going on?”

  “We estimated the phone’s location to within 100 meters. They were just –”

  David turned on his heel before she could finish and sprinted towards the gate.

  “David!” she called, jumping to her feet as Harry swore loudly, and the two of them hurried after him.

  As they neared the dumpsters, one of the agents lifted his hand into the air. “Agent Tyler, over here!”

  Chris hurried over and so did David, shrugging Juliet’s hand from his arm when she tried to stop him and making her stumble back a step.

  David moved to stand beside Chris, pushing up on his toes to peer into the large yellow dumpster.

  Right there on top was a cell phone, the screen a spider web of broken glass; across the cracked screen was a smear of blood. David’s eyes were fixed on the small glittery pink star sticker stuck to the bottom of the casing, right next to the home button. Hannah had put it on her phone when she first got it, telling him it was to personalize it before grinning and sticking another glittery star on his cheek.

  “It’s hers,” Chris muttered, glancing at David, who nodded numbly, his fingers tightening on the edge of the dumpster.

  “Get evidence collection over here,” Chris said as he turned away.

  One of the agents hurried off, and David stepped away from the dumpster, one hand tight on his hip as he ran the other through his hair.

  Juliet approached him tentatively. “David –”

  “Don’t,” he growled. “Just – god damn it!” he exploded, startling Juliet and making her recoil. He whirled suddenly and bent down to snatch a piece of broken concrete from the ground. Juliet took a step back as he pulled his arm back, launching the bit of stone at one of the other dumpsters.

  It hit with a resounding clang and he went to retrieve another one. Juliet took another step back, staring apprehensively at him, afraid of him for the first time in her life. A pair of hands circled her upper arms, pulling her away, and she glanced back to see Eli, looking as scared as she felt.

  As David reached for a third piece of stone, Harry stepped forward, placing himself between David and the cluster of dumpsters. David stared at him, chest heaving and eyes blazing, and Harry met his gaze. His expression was firm, but a flicker of regret passed over his face as he opened his mouth to speak.

  “You’re suspended, Agent Cole. Effective immediately.”

  The words seemed to hang in the air, heavy and tense; David’s expression was mutinous.

  “Give me your badge,” Harry continued. “I know you have it on you.”

  Another tense moment passed, and then David yanked his badge from his pocket, thrusting it into Harry’s hand.

  “If you interfere with this investigation again, I will have you arrested for obstruction.” Harry paused, and then shook his head. “I’m sorry, David,” he added in a low voice, heard only by Juliet and Eli, who were still standing fairly close.

  Harry took a step back and gestured towards one of the other agents. “Agent Martinez, ple
ase escort SSA Cole to his car.”

  The agent stepped forward, looking a little apprehensive as he reached for David’s arm. David glared at him, seemingly daring him to touch him, and Martinez’s hand fell to his side, though he didn’t move away.

  David threw one last look at Harry before turning and starting across the construction site, Agent Martinez trailing behind him.

  ◊◊◊

  Unnoticed by anyone, Eddie stood by the chain link fence, separate from the rest of the workers. He took a drag on his cigarette, his eyes narrowed as he watched David stalk towards his car, and couldn’t stop the slight curve of his mouth. He had already disrupted David’s life by taking his daughter away from him, and now he was seeing firsthand how it was spilling over into everything else.

  It amused him to be standing in plain view of the father of the girl currently locked away in his basement, knowing the other man was none the wiser. Eddie figured he could probably walk past David and say hi, and he would have no idea who he was.

  It made him feel powerful, and Eddie’s mind flicked to the girl, remembering the feel of her body pressed against his and the way she trembled when he held her close. A dark wave of pleasure swept through him, and his smile widened.

  It was all about power. David had stolen it from him, and now Eddie was taking it back. When David had truly lost everything, maybe then he would understand what it was like.

  “How many damn cigarette breaks do you need?” The voice of Eddie’s supervisor cut through his thoughts and he looked at the other man. “This isn’t a show for your entertainment,” he continued, gesturing irritably at the police and federal agents scattered around. “Get back to work.”

  Eddie scowled and stubbed his cigarette on the bottom of his boot before flicking it through the fence. He cast one more glance at David as he got into his car and slammed the door, and a small smile returned to his face as he shuffled back to work.

  Chapter 25

  Jackie held loosely to Hannah’s arm as she stepped from the bathroom, preparing to take her back down to the basement. Her heart pounded almost painfully fast, but she welcomed the nerves; she would need the adrenaline rush if she wanted to pull this off. Asking to go to the bathroom had been part of the plan, though initially she had only intended to use it as a way to get out of the basement. When Jackie had helped her to her feet, however, the water she had drunk suddenly made its presence known.