Tom Reed Thriller Series

by Rick Mofina

  “Who are you?” Gabrielle repeated coldly.

  “Zach Reed. How do we get out of here?”

  Squeak-creak. Squeak-creak.

  “We can’t. Mr. Jenkins has got everything locked up.”

  “Who?”

  “Mr. Jenkins.” Gabrielle pointed at the ceiling.

  “Well don’t worry, that doof is not going to hurt us!”

  Danny started to whimper. “Can you take me home, now? I want to go home.”

  Zach put his arm around him. “Don’t worry, Danny. It’s going to be okay. I’m gonna fix it so somebody comes for us.”

  Garbage covered the floor--fast food bags, wrappers, and containers. The basement’s only window was barred and covered with newspapers. Zach noticed the door was wide open.

  “Where are we Gabrielle? San Francisco? You know what street?”

  Gabrielle shrugged.

  “And are there any other people here?”

  “Just Mr. Jenkins. My dog Jackson was here, but Mr. Jenkins said he ran away. Did you see him? He’s a blond cocker spaniel.”

  “No.”

  Squeak-creak. Squeak-creak.

  Gabrielle burst into tears, triggering Danny’s sobs.

  Zach didn’t know what to do, so he hugged both of them, fighting his own tears. “It’s gonna be fine. Shhh-shhhh. It’s okay.”

  “He’s a crazy man!” Gabrielle sobbed. “He killed a rat and he’s always praying to us on his knees! He calls us by other kids’ names, shows us old movies of them and makes us wear their old clothes! I’m so afraid! We tried to run away, but he’s got us locked up, and he keeps making us sleepy!”

  “Does he hurt you?”

  “Gabrielle shook her head. “He just baptizes you.”

  “What?”

  “You’re going to get it soon.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “He puts you in the tub and dunks your head. After that, he starts to call you by another kid’s name. He told us you’re the last one he was looking for.”

  “The last what?”

  “Angel.”

  Squeak-creak. Squeak-creak.

  Zach saw the door and thought. “Does he always leave the door open?”

  “Uh-huh. So we can go upstairs to the bathroom.”

  Zach looked around for something, anything that might help him try to escape. He was surprised to see a corner of his backpack protruding from the stinking garbage. He fished it out.

  The creep had never touched it. Zach dumped the contents, grabbed his father’s business card, his cash, his portable video game, then his tiny Swiss army knife. He opened it and ran his finger over the three-inch, razor-sharp blade. He folded it and stuffed it in the crotch of his underwear. Bad guys always frisked you, but a guy never checked another guy there. He was not supposed to. It was like a world rule, or something.

  “Does this house have a phone, Gabrielle?” Zach said.

  “In the kitchen, on the wall.”

  Squeak-creak. Squeak-creak.

  “All right.” Zach glanced at the ceiling and sniffed. “I’ve got a plan to get us outta here.”

  SIXTY-NINE

  Reed pushed his way through the throng of reporters, photographers, and TV crews waiting in the lobby of the ancient fourteen-story Star Building in downtown San Francisco.

  “Reed, is it true you know the kidnapper from a story?”

  This was real. It was happening.

  “Has there been a ransom demand?”

  Something was roaring in his ears.

  “Did this guy take your son because you were suspicious he abducted Danny Becker and Gabrielle Nunn?”

  He couldn’t concentrate clearly.

  “Any connection to the Donner case and Virgil Shook?”

  His only thought was of his son.

  “Can we have a picture of Zach?”

  “I can’t talk now,” Reed managed.

  Cameras flashed and TV lights burned as he shouldered his way in. Sydowski, Turgeon, Rust, and a half-dozen other police, shields hanging from pickets and neck chains, surrounded him, ensuring no one else got on the elevator with them. It was closing when a security officer wedged his arm between the doors.

  “What the hell you doing, Butch?” Reed demanded.

  The plump, gray-haired guard felt the hard glare of the detectives and he cleared his throat. “Uhmm, sorry, Tom. But orders are that you’ve been terminated. Barred from the building. Mr. Benson’s orders.”

  “Back off,” Sydowski growled.

  “Just doing my job. Good luck, Tom.” Butch saluted.

  As Reed and the police swept through the newsroom, heads snapped around, conversations stopped and people gaped. By now, the entire department knew Zach had been abducted. And everyone knew Reed had been fired.

  He hurried to his desk, whispers following his wake.

  His only crystalline thought was for Zach. Finding his son. Ann was right. It was his fault, and if it was the last thing he did, he would find Zach. Alive. Nobody would stand in his way. Every molecule of his being was focused on his son.

  Everything remained on Reed’s desk exactly the way he left it yesterday when he was still employed. He rifled his paperwork: his yellow file on Keller was gone. Sydowski and the others encircled his cubicle as he searched in vain.

  “It was right here, a yellow legal-size folder!”

  “Tom?” Molly Wilson materialized, her teary voice thickening. “I know everything. What Benson did. Zach. I’m so sorry, Tom.”

  “I need help, not sympathy, Molly. Where’s my Keller file?”

  “I’ll help you, Tom.” She sniffled, eyes going to Benson’s office. He was on the phone, reading from a yellow file folder. “I’ll help you right now!” Wilson ran off, bracelets chiming.

  Reed burst into Benson’s office, snatched the Keller file, and returned to his desk to show Sydowski and the others.

  Benson leapt after him. “What do you think you’re doing, Reed?” Benson grabbed the file back.

  “Give me that file, Benson!” Reed spat.

  “Tom, I’m terribly sorry about what’s happened. Really. But you have to calm down and think rationally. This file is the property of the newspaper and you, as a former employee, are trespassing.”

  “What?” Reed was incredulous. “What did you say?”

  “I’m afraid the only way to take this file is with a warrant.”

  Sydowski said, “We’ll get one right away. Linda.”

  Turgeon picked up a phone. “What number to get out?”

  “Nine,” someone said.

  FBI Special Agent Ditmire rolled his eyes. “I don’t believe this. This is a hot pursuit. Can’t we charge this man with obstruction, Merle?”

  Reed thrust his face to within an inch of Benson’s. “The clock is ticking on my son’s life! If you don’t give me that file now, it starts ticking on yours.”

  Benson blinked.

  Reed continued. “Give me that file now or I hold a news conference outside and every parent in the Bay Area will know what Myron Benson at the Star is doing! Then I’ll join the Beckers and Nunns to sue you for the wrongful deaths of our children.”

  “Myron, give Tom his file, now.” It was Amos Tellwood, the publisher. Molly Wilson stood beside him. Newsroom activity ceased.

  “I’ve just been fully enlightened. Tom, you have the paper’s unbounded support.” Tellwood turned to Sydowski. “I am the publisher and you have full access to anything we have that will expedite finding Tom’s son. We shall not lose another second debating it. Tom, you remain a Star employee. Myron, in my office. Now.”

  Reed opened the folder. Sydowski and the others took notes, and went off to the telephones. Tom told Sydowski and the others about Keller’s pilgrimages to the drowning spot at the Farallons. Sydowski told him Keller had bought a boat.

  The hunt for Zach Reed, Gabrielle Nunn, and Danny Becker intensified. The FBI double checked with the US Coast Guard: Yes, the Farallons had been s
ealed. And the FBI and California Highway Patrol each put choppers up, searching for a new white van, possibly with rental plates, or anything trailing a boat like the one Keller had bought in Calaveras County. They had a team of police at Half Moon Bay, and alerts to all marinas.

  Statewide bulletins with photos and more information were continually broadcast. Police stationed at every known point in Keller’s past were watching for him and the children. Detectives went to the homes of Danny Becker, Gabrielle Nunn, and Reed’s mother-in-law in Berkeley, where a phone trap was being set up. They were setting up a trap on Reed’s newsroom line.

  The SFPD tightened its surveillance of William Perry Kindhart, and undercover cops turned their radar for any street talk on the kidnappings. Detectives questioned other members of Keller’s bereavement group; others canvassed every car rental and leasing outlet in the Bay Area. The FBI’s psych profiler pored over Reed’s file on Keller and discussed it with Dr. Martin. The photo department kicked out three clear pictures of Keller taken secretly when Reed had sat in on Martin’s research group and duplicated Reed’s wallet snapshot of Zach. It was more recent than the framed one on his desk. Other newsrooms were calling the Star for Reed--for quotes, for photos.

  Reed found a moment’s sanctuary at an empty corner window desk, where he had a partial view of the Bay Bridge between the office towers. In his hand he held a picture Ann had snapped on a cable car a month before the breakup. He traced Zach’s face with his finger.

  He remembered Nathan Becker, sitting in that boutique in Balboa, drowning in fear, clutching Danny’s picture, and Nancy Nunn pleading before news cameras for Gabrielle’s life, and how he thought it was sad for them, but a dynamite news story.

  What had he become?

  Wait until it happens to you.

  Sydowski rolled up a chair beside him. They were alone. “How you doing, Tom?”

  Reed shook his head, unable to answer.

  “Hang in there. If we have anything going for us, it’s that we know more about the bad guy than we ever did, thanks to you.”

  “Do you think Zach’s dead?”

  The two men searched each other’s eyes.

  “No.” Sydowski gave him the truth. “Not yet.”

  Reed turned to the window.

  “Tom, I think whatever he’s going to do, he’ll do it tomorrow on the anniversary.”

  Reed agreed.

  “Look, Tom, you met the guy. What does your gut tell you?”

  “He’s a madman.”

  “You know we’re doing everything conceivable to find him. Right now we’ve got nothing--no driver’s license, no record with Pacific Bell, utilities, voter’s registration, taxes, credit cards, nothing. On paper he doesn’t exist. We’ve got people dealing with Fargo, following the bill he paid for the flowers on his family’s grave. We may get a lead there. It’s a question of time.”

  Reed nodded.

  “Tom, this is the guy you wanted to tell me about after the Nunn case, after you met him at Martin’s group, and saw the rough home video we had from Nunn’s party?”

  “I held off because of the Donner fiasco.”

  Sydowski wanted to tell him everything about Franklin Wallace and Virgil Shook, but decided it wasn’t the time. “Go home and be with your wife, Tom. She needs you. If something pops, I’ll call you. We’ll be moving everything to the Hall of Justice very soon.”

  “Walt?”

  “Yes?”

  “He’s our only child. He’s all we have.”

  “I know.” Sydowski patted Reed’s shoulder. “Be strong for him,” he said, then left.

  Reed rubbed his thumb over his son’s picture, picked up a phone, and called his mother-in-law’s house in Berkeley.

  Ann’s mother answered, her voice quavering.

  “It’s Tom, Doris. Is Ann there?”

  “She’s resting. A doctor from the university came over and gave her a sedative. There’s lots of police here--Oh, they’re signaling not to tie up the line.”

  “I’ll be there soon.”

  “Tom, I’m praying for everybody.”

  “I’ll bring him home, Doris. I swear I’ll bring him home.”

  Reed covered his face with one hand. His life was slipping away, slipping through his fingers and there was nothing he could do. The eyes of the whole newsroom were on his back. He heard a familiar tinkle of jewelry and knew Molly was near. She touched his shoulder.

  “Molly, I don’t know what to do. Talk to me, about anything.”

  “Go home to be with Ann, Tom.”

  “I don’t know if I can face her. She blames me.”

  “Tom, no one on this earth can think clearly when something like this happens. No one.”

  Reed turned to the window. “Thanks for getting Tellwood.”

  “Benson’s a vampire. He sent me to Berkeley. I don’t think you saw me in the pack.”

  Reed looked at her.

  “He went crazy when he heard Keller’s name over the police scanners. He grabbed your file, pulled up the Keller feature you wrote yesterday, and said he was going to turn it into a Pulitzer. Planned to keep you out by saying you were too distraught to be reached but your exclusive Star probe led to Keller, who retaliated by taking Zach before police could catch him.”

  “What?”

  “It’s true.”

  “He’s diseased.”

  “Tom...” Wilson’s voice broke. “Tom, don’t hate me, but what’s happened is news. I’ve got to write a story, Tom.” She glanced at the news desk and swallowed. “They want me to interview you.”

  Disgusted, he shook his head. But he knew the truth, better than anyone. From across the newsroom, a telephoto lens was aimed at him.

  He had become the carrion and the ants were coming.

  SEVENTY

  Zach Reed stared into his hand before closing his fingers around their ticket out of this rat hole.

  Squeak-creak. Squeak-creak.

  Zach crouched at the bottom of the basement stairs, primed to make his move. It was all planned. Gabrielle and Danny had gone upstairs to the bathroom. They were going to flush a whole roll of tissue paper, plugging the toilet, then call the man.

  Squeak-creak.

  A TV was blaring upstairs. Good, that would help. The toilet flushed, gurgled. It flushed again.

  “Mr. Jenkins!”

  Good, Gabrielle. Good.

  The squeak-creak stopped. Someone walked from the TV to the bathroom. A man’s voice over loud, rushing water cued Zach. He padded up the stairs, breathing quickly, panting. Had to be brave. Only gonna get one shot at this. Adjusting to the light, his eyes widened at what he saw. Nothing had prepared him for this.

  Enlarged pictures of Gabrielle and Danny covered the living room wall. A worktable was cluttered with a computer, books, and papers that had cascaded to the floor. The paint was peeling, blistering. Ignored. Windows were sealed with ragged sheets. The place was desolate. Something icy, something decomposing, reeking of death dwelled here. He spotted the three binders, the printed names of Joshua, Alisha, and Pierce, paired with Danny, Gabrielle...and Michael.

  Michael? How did he know his middle name?

  Pasted to one wall were news clippings about the baby girl they found last year in Golden Gate Park. Some of them were his dad’s. Zach’s stomach knotted.

  He’s going to kill us!

  His eyes stung. The faces of his mother and father circled him. He was going to collapse. The ceiling was coming down on him. Stop it! Stop it! Stop it! Nobody’s gonna get you outta here but you. Quit being a baby. Quit it! Hurry up!

  Fist balled, he found the kitchen, scoured it until he found the phone. A wall phone with a long cord and the dial pad in the handset. He reached it easily, scanning the filthy counter for a magazine, a phone bill, anything with an address. Nothing. He swallowed.

  The splash of water on linoleum echoed from the bathroom.

  Hurry!

  He couldn’t stop shaking. He sniffled, stretchin
g the cord from the kitchen to the rear entrance. Wait! He tried the door. Nope. Locked solid. From the inside. Try the front door? No. No time. The cord was long, allowing him to hide in the rear closet. Leaving the folding door open slightly, he opened his fist and by a shaft of light read his father’s business card.

  TOM REED

  STAFF WRITER

  THE SAN FRANCISCO STAR

  415-555-7571

  It was his dad’s direct line.

  Zach pressed the buttons for the number, shaking so badly he misdialed. Please, he sniffed and redialed. There. He put the phone to his ear, the line clicked, and began ringing.

  Squeak-creak. Squeak-creak.

  Keller sat before the TV news coverage of Zach Reed’s abduction, his finger unconsciously caressing the body of Christ on the silver crucifix around his neck.

  They have not died. I can bring them back.

  “...it is unbelievable what has happened...”

  Skip Lopez, a green reporter for Channel 19’s Action News team gripped his microphone.

  “Zach Reed, the nine-year-old son of Tom Reed, a reporter with The San Francisco Star, was abducted this afternoon from this hobby store in Berkeley. Reed had been covering the earlier kidnappings of two other San Francisco children, Danny Becker and Gabrielle Nunn, when this latest abduction occurred...”

  Squeak-creak.

  W--what was--Keller heard little voices. Water? The bathroom?

  “Mr. Jenkins, sir.” Gabriel was calling.

  Keller left the living room and found Daniel and Gabriel in the bathroom, fearful. “What is it?” Water cascaded from the toilet, puddling on the floor. Obviously it was backed up. He found a plunger under the sink.

  “Step away,” he told them. A few solid churns cleared the blockage. “Use the towels,” he pointed to the spilled water. Returning to the news, he stopped in his tracks.

  Michael?

  He hurried back to the bathroom.

  No sign of Michael.

  SEVENTY-ONE

  Sydowski shouted Reed’s name again.

  Why was he yelling his name, holding up his phone?

  “Tom! Tom, it’s Zach!”

  Zach?

  But Zach’s kidnapped, how could he be calling?...Zach!