The Doll

by Taylor Stevens

  BRADFORD FACED THE whiteboards and the diagram he’d put up this morning when the image of Munroe toppling off the motorcycle was still fresh and raw and hadn’t felt like two weeks of decay smothering his airway.

  He rubbed out his previous words and replaced them simply with Michael. Then, as if on autopilot, filled in the blanks with what little he knew: They, whoever “they” were, knew Michael was in the country, knew where to find her, knew she was a woman, knew who Logan was to her, and knew how to find him and that his place was wired. In the heaviness of the unanswerable, Bradford’s eyes wandered along the boards to Jahan’s latest updates on the team in Peshawar. The satellite phone bill on that job alone was going to bankrupt him.

  Seven of his core team were currently out on assignment—the two in Pakistan, plus four in Afghanistan and one in Sri Lanka. With the exception of himself, who as boss and owner got to cherry-pick for his own schedule, the overseas assignments were rotated with homebase operations and factored by time and expertise.

  Home was nice, but the big money was in the hazard pay. It took a certain mentality to sign on for something that meant more time living rough in shithole situations than with hot water and clean sheets. The job was difficult on relationships, if you were lucky enough to have them, and it seemed at times that a good portion of running the business involved weeding out the lunatics.

  Dozens of others worked under Capstone’s umbrella, foot soldiers who came and went, but like partners in a law firm, these nine—ten if you counted Munroe—were vested: they were Bradford’s people, tried and proven, a breed apart from polite, or even impolite, society. Their motives for staying with the company varied, but one thing was consistent: They were each very good at what they did because the incompetent didn’t live long.

  VIABLE FOOTAGE WAS sparse, but not for the reasons Bradford had expected. Though the intruders had grabbed the original disk, they’d still taken precautions against being recognized. They were a pack of three, with a leader who had let himself in with a key, followed by two accomplices with baseball bats, their faces shielded from the camera by caps and lowered heads. The fight, which had taken place in the kitchen, was off camera but had lasted a painful four minutes.

  Three against one. For four minutes.

  When they’d hauled Logan out, his right leg appeared to be broken. He was cut and bleeding, but so were two of his assailants, and he still fought, still took a beating, all the way out the front door.

  The final scene was cued at 10:13 A.M., minutes after Munroe had arrived at Capstone, and for a long while the war room was cocooned in stunned silence. Almost simultaneously, Bradford let out a stream of expletives and Walker went off in Brazilian Portuguese. Jahan remained quiet, his fingers tap-tapping against the desk. Finally he said, “Did they take out Michael to get to Logan, or take out Logan to get to Michael?”

  The question was more or less the same line of inquisition Walker had raised in the car and Bradford didn’t want to run through it all over again. “Put out a run for information,” he said. “See if Logan owes anyone money or if there are any jealous lovers in recent history. My bet is he’s clean. He’s got too much to lose, is too focused on living life and reconnecting with his daughter.”

  Jahan said, “But—”

  Bradford cut him off. Said, “Michael is the target, Logan is the collateral.”

  “Collateral for what?”

  Bradford closed his eyes. Pressed the base of his palm to his forehead. Another go through the same information. “Collateral to save their own lives. Protection. They just grabbed Michael,” he said. “Michael.” He paused for emphasis. “Assuming she’s tranquilized now, what happens when she wakes up? Logan is the cage, the shock collar, the shackles …” He stopped. This was pointless. A waste of time.

  In his peripheral vision, he saw Walker shush Jahan. She’d tell him later. They would hash out reservations and alternate theories on their own. At the moment the motive didn’t matter half as much as moving quickly with what little they knew.

  Bradford paused, waiting for argument, for contradiction, and got nothing. Said, “Besides those of us here in this room, those on our team, how many people know the role Logan plays in her life?”

  Walker shook her head. Jahan turned palms-up.

  “There can’t be many,” Bradford said, “and that does us some pretty big favors in narrowing the playing field.”

  Jahan stood and strode to the whiteboard. Added notations to Bradford’s scrawl. He turned to the others. “Where do we go with this?”

  Bradford said, “Find Michael, find Logan,” and turned back to the screen, where the image of the intruders stood frozen in time, two heads down, the leader’s tilted up just enough that the side of his face showed to the camera. There was a look of youth in his posture, an arrogance that hadn’t yet dimmed through time and experience. “That son of a bitch knows it’s there,” Bradford said. “And he’s smirking.”

  Walker came to stand beside him, then drew closer and also focused on the image. Jahan said, “Perhaps we’re giving them too much credit for sophistication. Maybe they’re bumbling idiots, figuring it out as they go along.”

  Bradford and Walker stared at him.

  “Or maybe not,” he said. “But while I have your attention, and without intending to sound callous or change the subject, with Michael out of the picture and our available resources put toward finding her, what do you want me to do with the Tisdale assignment?”

  Bradford paused and blinked, a long, slow open-and-shut, then turned to look at his office, where, although he couldn’t see it, the Tisdale folder still sat on his desk and the signature page Munroe had signed this morning waited to be faxed. Tisdale. The reason she’d come into the office today.

  Tisdale wasn’t a security gig or one of the peace offerings Bradford handed Munroe to entice her to hang around longer. This was different, a request for her services, though it hadn’t named her specifically, and it hadn’t arrived through normal Capstone channels.

  The plea had come to Bradford personally from two frantic, desperate parents in California, in the hope that he might know where and how to locate Munroe. They might not have known her by name, but anyone who was anyone within the upper social strata knew the story of Emily Burbank, missing for four years in Africa and presumed dead, and how Munroe had found her. Bradford was still connected to the board of trustees that had bankrolled the search. Henry and Judith Tisdale, one a Silicon Valley giant, the other a United States senator, with their combined power and influence, hadn’t needed much time at all to track him down.

  Neeva Eckridge.

  Missing person.

  Could Munroe find her?

  Bradford had made no promises, given no indication that he even knew how to locate Munroe, told them he’d see what he could do. And now Munroe was missing, too. If the Eckridge kidnapping had been a ruse to pull her in, it was a goddamn masterpiece of ruses, because the whole world was looking for Eckridge and nobody could find her.

  Two weeks ago, the girl had been an up-and-coming B-list Hollywood starlet and now hers was the most recognizable face in the country. Amid a busy schedule and a flurry of appointments, she’d vanished in the only one-hour window that she would have been unaccounted for. No signs of foul play, no eyewitnesses, no details: It was as if she’d simply vanished.

  What started out as sensational gossip soon turned into a media feeding frenzy, because until Neeva Eckridge had gone missing, nobody, not her agent, not her boyfriend, not her Hollywood friends, had had any idea that the Tisdales were her parents. Speculation buzzed as much over Neeva’s true and fabricated pasts as it did in regards to what could have happened to her, and regardless of the angle—sensational, fearmongering, alien abduction, or otherwise—Neeva’s picture, and her parents’, were everywhere.

  Bradford continued to stare at his office, toward the documents. Munroe had wanted the assignment, had been eager for it, but if she was the Tisdales’ best hope fo
r finding their daughter, then at the rate things were going today, it was a lost cause.

  Walker drew near and stood beside him, the top of her head reaching his shoulder. When he’d shifted straighter, taller, and had obviously returned to the present, she spoke.

  “Do you think they’re connected?”

  “I can’t see how,” he replied. “But the timing is freakishly coincidental.”

  “We have Michael taken down,” she said, “Logan being held as a hostage, and all of this possibly connected to Neeva Eckridge, who also disappeared with no witnesses. What thread draws them together?”

  “I wish I knew,” he said. “Because if I had that piece of information, I’d find the bastard who’s behind this that much faster.” He turned to her and she looked up to meet his gaze. “I will find him,” he said. “And I will destroy him.”

  ALTITUDE 29,000 FEET, U.S. AIRSPACE

  OVER THE GULF COAST

  Valon Lumani looked down at the woman lying on the bench seat, so docile, so relaxed. Studied her face and tracked the length of her long body, and as he’d done the first time he saw her, he scoffed.

  Because she was a woman. This was the solution he’d gone through such effort to secure on behalf of his uncle.

  Lumani understood the need for expertise and the need for a stranger, but not why so much energy and expense had been put toward this one in particular, even if the nonsense was true—and really, maybe half was about right.

  She was even less worrisome up close than she’d been from a distance, dressed in black on that black motorcycle. Even so, he’d used a heavy dosage calculated for her height and estimated weight, and he’d give her another during the trip to keep her unconscious until it was safe. But the rest of it? The rules and the talking—so much talking? Bah. Superstitious nonsense.

  Do not let her hear your language, the source had said, she will use language as a weapon. Keep the area around her free of objects, everything will be used as a weapon. Stay clear of her reach, she doesn’t need a weapon to kill you. Don’t use restraints, she will find a way out of them, and they will only give a false sense of safety. Do not touch her, the source said. Leave her in peace, and treat her respectfully, only then will the violence stay muted. Disrespect these and make no mistake, she will kill you.

  Lumani smiled and made his fingers into the shape of a gun, placed it to her forehead, and pulled the imaginary trigger.

  Bang.

  In the end, this woman was no different from any other piece of merchandise. Disposable. He patted her face, the way he would a dog, as if to say Sleep well, little animal, until you are needed. And then he straightened and moved to the fore of the cabin, where a drink waited for him.

  He took no alcohol today because until he delivered, the job wasn’t complete, and because once started there would be no stopping until his own inner carnival ran dead. There would soon be time enough for private celebration.

  Lumani took a sip of the soda and checked his watch. They flew against the sun, seven time zones east, on a Gulfstream G550, an extravagant expense toward speed and flying range that nudged the overhead for hunting down this one woman to the same level as for a run on merchandise, maybe more.

  Who could say if she would be worth it? He was only the right-hand man, the doer. Extract, Uncle had said, and so Lumani had performed, and perhaps in having executed this job so perfectly, he’d achieved enough to earn a smile, or a Well done, or something, because to solve the problem would bring enough to lease this jet outright for years, if that’s what Uncle wanted—although he wouldn’t. Only idiots kept toys that attracted such attention.

  Another glance at his watch.

  Once beyond U.S. airspace, he would notify the pilots of the change in plans: They would land in the Dominican Republic to refuel and then continue on to Tenerife, where he had connections and could charter something smaller and more affordable—something European, less ostentatious and easier to hide.

  Not that he really worried. He’d taken precautions within the United States to buy time, and once they were international, he might as well have become invisible. The switch in the Canary Islands was one last precaution in case the pilots talked when they returned, because someone highly motivated would come looking for this woman, and Lumani knew better than to lead a straight path to her.

  DALLAS, TEXAS

  Palms against the glass, Miles Bradford stood precisely where he’d been when Munroe had toppled. His eyes roamed from the frontage where she’d fallen to the neighboring buildings and then over and across the Dallas North Tollway, up one office tower and down the next, creating a mental map, searching out the several positions a shooter could have used to make the hit.

  The fear was gone now. Shut off, tamped down, and replaced with the same emotional detachment that kept him alive in combat, allowed logic to replace panic, and made it possible to block out the anguish of holding a bleeding friend to the last breath, in order to go on to fight and survive.

  This was a war in which the fight had been brought to Bradford’s doorstep, and in place of fear sat only the mission: track the enemy, find him, destroy him, and take back what had been stolen.

  From behind, Walker said, “If it was me, I’d be perched over there.”

  Bradford turned and watched, silent, as she strode across his office to stand beside him. Paul Jahan had come with her from the war room, but he remained in the doorway, arms crossed and leaning against the frame.

  “Or there, or there, or there,” she added.

  Bradford followed the line of her finger as it jumped from building to building, returning finally to her original target: a twelve-story at ten o’clock, with an attached parking garage.

  “It’s a clear line of sight,” she said. “The garage offers a place to stash a vehicle during the wait without worrying about it getting ticketed or towed, and it’s close enough for a half-assed shooter with a decent rifle to guarantee a hit. Even if he’s an expert marksman, if he tranqued her, then he’s using something special, something modified, and that’s going to affect the calculations, maybe limit distance, so he’s going to want to get in as close as possible for accuracy. If it had been me set up there, I’d be gone before the ambulance even got here.”

  Bradford nodded and returned to staring out the window. Out of the many points from which to choose, Walker had singled out the same location he’d zeroed in on. He pounded the glass, a brief hit of frustration, and then straightened, took a calm step back, and said, “Go find me my building, Sam. Call me when you’ve got it, and we’ll pick up the leads from there.”

  He would have preferred to work with her directly, hunting clues, staying updated to the instant, but Walker would find what they searched for more quickly than he could and he needed to see what had become of Logan’s place after the call to 911. She lingered at the glass and Bradford waited until she turned and passed by him into the hall, watched her go and then moved to head out.

  Jahan stepped into his path.

  Impatient, Bradford attempted to brush past, and Jahan shifted fully into the doorway. Bradford said, “Get out of the way, Jack. Don’t make me knock you on your ass.”

  Jahan put a hand on Bradford’s shoulder. Maneuvered so that Bradford couldn’t avoid his eyes. “Listen,” he said, “I know you’ve gotten a lot of flak from all of us for bringing Michael onto the team, but we’ve got your back on this, okay? She was ours, too.”

  Had the words been said yesterday, Bradford would have countered wiseass to wiseass, but at the moment he had nothing but a desire to get out the door, to keep moving, so he nodded a silent thanks and gave Jahan’s shoulder a jab of camaraderie.

  Jahan caught his fist. “You’ll feel it eventually,” he said. “You know you will, and when that happens, don’t take it out on someone else or get yourself killed or arrested; you come to me.”

  Bradford held his place, kept silent, until Jahan released his hand, and then continued to the exit without a word. The conce
rn was warranted, but getting killed or arrested wasn’t on the agenda, he was smarter than that.

  BY MAKING THE call that he hoped had turned Logan’s place into a crime scene, Bradford had added manpower and resources to the task of solving, at the least, Logan’s disappearance. He wanted latents that might lead to whoever had taken Munroe, and there was no point in doing what local law enforcement was better equipped to handle. He made the trip to confirm the level of interest in the broken and bloodied office, a shortcut to figuring out whom to pressure, where to start calling in favors—or, as the case may be, discover where new friends needed to be made.

  The parking area in front of Logan’s building was busy, as much a result of the morbidly curious as from city vehicles and the official personnel. The crowd was a good sign, meant crime scene techs had been called in, and if anything was worth having inside that building, he could eventually get to it.

  Bradford drove to the end of the block, parked in front of an upholstery wholesaler, and walked the slow trip back to the yellow line—just one more face in the gawking crowd—until seeing all he’d come for, he made the return trip to Capstone.

  Three blocks from the office, his phone chirped.

  On the other end, Walker, excitement in her voice, said, “I’ve got it.”

  Bradford checked his watch. If she’d truly found what they wanted, she’d done it in under two hours: fast, but not surprising. Walker wasn’t shy about utilizing sexism’s dirty flipside, casually oozing sexuality and preying on hormones and the stupidity they induced to get what she wanted. He expected that right about now, in a building somewhere along the tollway corridor, a security guard was hiding a hard-on and jumping all over himself to get the lady whatever she wanted.

  He’d never asked that behavior of her, but if that’s what she chose to do to get the job done, then like an exotic weapon used in battle, he was glad it was on his side.