The Winner

by David Baldacci

  “Lisa is fine. Charlie is fine. You had a nightmare and that’s all.” He put his arm around her, squeezed her tightly to him. “We’re going to see them tomorrow. And everything is going to be fine, okay? If we go tonight and we are being followed, we’ll never know it. Don’t let a nightmare make you do something that could end up really putting Lisa in danger.”

  She stared at him, terror still in her eyes.

  He continued to murmur in her ear and his soothing tones finally reached her. She let him draw her back over to the bed and they climbed in. As he settled back to sleep, however, LuAnn stared at the ceiling, silently praying that it really had only been a nightmare. Something deep within her kept telling her it wasn’t. In the darkness she could see what looked to be a hand reaching out for her. Whether in a friendly gesture or not she couldn’t tell, because it never fully formed and then it was gone. She put an arm around the sleeping Riggs, holding him protectively. She would have given anything to be doing the same for her daughter.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

  The two FBI agents sipped hot coffee and enjoyed the late morning calm and beauty of the area. The winds were whipping up, however, as a storm system approached with the promise of even higher winds and a lot of rain, that night and into the next day. Stationed at the road leading up to LuAnn’s home, the veteran agents had seen little activity, but they kept alert despite the tedium.

  At eleven o’clock a car approached their checkpoint and stopped. The window came down on the driver’s side.

  Sally Beecham, LuAnn’s housekeeper, looked expectantly at one of the agents and he quickly waved her through. She had gone out two hours before to run some errands. When she had passed the checkpoint earlier she had been very nervous. The FBI hadn’t explained much to her, but they had made it clear that she wasn’t in trouble. They wanted her to go about her normal duties, keep everything the same. They had given her a number to call in case she noticed anything suspicious.

  As she passed through the checkpoint this time, she looked more comfortable, perhaps even a touch self-important with all of this official attention.

  One of the agents commented to the other, “I don’t think Tyler’s going to be coming back to eat any of that food.” His colleague smirked knowingly.

  The next vehicle that came down the road and stopped at the checkpoint drew some special attention. The older man driving the van explained that he was the groundskeeper. The younger man in the passenger seat was his assistant. They produced ID, which the agents checked thoroughly, then made some phone calls to verify. The agents opened the back of the van and it was indeed filled with tools, boxes, and old rolled-up tarps. Just to make sure, one of the agents followed the van up the road.

  Sally Beecham’s car was parked in front; a shrill beep emanated from the house. The front door was open and the agent could see her just inside the door deactivating the alarm system, he presumed. He was proven correct when the beep stopped. The agent watched the men get out of the van, pull some tools from the back of the vehicle, stack them in a wheelbarrow, and head around to the back of the house. Then the agent got in his car and drove back to the checkpoint.

  LuAnn and Riggs were standing in the parking lot of the motel outside Danville, Virginia. Riggs had talked to the motel manager. The police had been summoned the night before. The man in Room 112 had been attacked and badly injured. Because of the severity of the wound, a medevac helicopter had been called to airlift out the man. The name the man had given was not Charlie’s; however, that meant nothing. And the manager was not aware of a young girl being with the man.

  “You’re sure they were in room one twelve?”

  LuAnn whirled around. “Of course I’m sure.”

  She closed her eyes, stopped pacing, and rocked on her heels. She knew! She knew what had happened. The thought of Jackson touching Lisa, hurting her, all because of what LuAnn had done or hadn’t done. It was numbing, absolutely and totally incapacitating.

  “Look, how was I supposed to know you have some kind of psychic connection with this guy?” Riggs replied.

  “Not him dammit. Her! My daughter.”

  This statement stopped Riggs dead in his tracks. He looked down and then watched her resume her pacing.

  “We need some information, Matthew. Right now.”

  Riggs agreed, but he didn’t want to go to the police. That would entail wasting a lot of time in explanations and the end result might very well be the local cops taking LuAnn into custody.

  Finally, Riggs said, “Come on.”

  They went into the motel office and Riggs walked over to a pay phone. Riggs phoned Masters. The FBI still had no leads on Jackson and Roger Crane still had not surfaced, Riggs was told.

  Riggs briefly explained the situation at the motel the night before to Masters.

  “Hold on,” Masters said.

  While Riggs did so he looked over at LuAnn staring at him. She was silently waiting for the worst news she could possibly receive, of that he was certain. He tried to smile reassuringly at her, but then stopped. The last thing he could be right now was reassuring, particularly since he had nothing to base it upon. Why set her up even further for the long fall.

  When Masters came back on, his tone was low and nervous. Riggs turned away from LuAnn while he listened.

  Masters said, “I just checked with the local police in Danville. Your information is correct, a man was stabbed at that motel on the outskirts of town. The ID found on him gave his name as Robert Charles Thomas.”

  Charlie? Riggs licked his lips, gripped the phone. “His ID? He couldn’t tell the police?”

  “He was unconscious. Lost a lot of blood. Damn miracle he’s even alive, they tell me. The wound was professionally administered, designed to slow-bleed the person. They found darts from a stun gun in the room. Guess that was how he was incapacitated. As of early this morning, they weren’t sure if he was going to make it.”

  “What’s he look like?” Riggs heard some paper rustling over the line. He was almost certain it was Charlie, but he needed to be absolutely sure.

  Masters started speaking again. “Over six feet, in his sixties, strongly built, must be strong as an ox to have survived to this point.”

  Riggs breathed deeply. No doubt now. It was Charlie. “Where is he now?”

  “The medevac took him to the UVA trauma center in Charlottesville.”

  Riggs felt the presence next to him. He turned to find LuAnn staring at him; the look in her eyes was scary.

  “George, was there any mention of a ten-year-old girl being with him?”

  “I asked. The report said that the man came to for a few seconds and started shouting a name.”

  “Lisa?”

  Riggs heard Masters clear his throat. “Yes.” Riggs remained silent. “It was her daughter, wasn’t it? This guy’s got her, doesn’t he?” Masters asked.

  “Looks like it,” Riggs managed to get out.

  “Where are you?”

  “Look, George, I don’t think I’m ready to give you that information yet.”

  Masters started speaking more forcefully. “He’s got the little girl. You two could be next, Matt. Think about it. We can protect you both. You have got to come in.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Look, you can go back to her house. I’ve got the entrance under twenty-four-hour guard. If she agrees to go there, I’ll fill the place up with agents.”

  “Hold on, George.” Riggs held the phone against his chest and looked at LuAnn. His eyes told her all she needed to know.

  “Charlie?”

  “Unconscious. They don’t know if he’s going to make it. The good news is that a medevac helicopter flew him to the trauma center at UVA hospital.”

  “He’s in Charlottesville?” she asked.

  Riggs nodded. “It’s only a short hop from Danville by air, and the trauma unit there is top-notch. He’ll get the best care.”

  She continued to stare at him, waiting. And he knew exa
ctly what for.

  “Jackson probably has Lisa.” He moved on quickly. “LuAnn, the FBI wants us to come in. So they can protect us. We can go to Wicken’s Hunt if you want. Agents are already guarding the entrance. They think—”

  She snatched the phone out of his hand.

  She screamed into it. “I don’t want protection. I don’t need your damned protection. He’s got my daughter. And the only thing I’m going to do is find her. I’m going to get her back. You hear me?”

  “Ms. Tyler, I’m assuming this is LuAnn Tyler—” Masters started to say.

  “You just stay out of the way. He’ll kill her sure as hell if he even thinks you’re around.”

  Masters tried to remain calm even as he said the awful words. “Ms. Tyler, you can’t be sure he hasn’t already done something to her.”

  Her reply was surprising, both for its content and its intensity. “I know he hasn’t hurt her. Not yet.”

  “The man’s a psycho. You can’t be sure—”

  “The hell I can’t. I know exactly what he wants. And it’s not Lisa. You just stay out of the way, FBI man. If my daughter dies because you got in the way, there won’t be any place on this earth that I won’t find you.”

  Sitting at his desk in the heavily guarded Hoover Building, with twenty-five years of high-level criminal detection work behind him, during which he’d confronted more than his share of evil, now surrounded by a thousand superbly trained, hardened FBI special agents, George Masters actually shivered as he listened to those words.

  The next sound he heard was the phone slamming down.

  Riggs raced after LuAnn as she stormed to the car.

  “LuAnn, will you wait a damned minute?” She whirled around, waiting for him to speak. “Look, what George said makes a lot of sense.”

  LuAnn threw up her hands and started to get in the car.

  “LuAnn, you go in to the FBI. Let them protect you from this guy. Let me stay on the outside. Let me track him down.”

  “Lisa is my daughter. I’m the reason she’s in this danger and I’m the one who’s going to get her out. Just me. Nobody else. Charlie’s almost dead. You were almost killed. Three other people have been slaughtered. I’m not involving anybody else in my screwed up, miserable, sonofabitchin’ excuse for a life.” She screamed the words at him; when she stopped, both their chests were heaving.

  “LuAnn, I’m not letting you go after him alone. If you don’t want to go to the FBI, fine. I won’t go either. But you’re not, repeat not, going after him alone. That way you both die.”

  “Matthew, did you hear me? Just get out of this. Go to your buddies at the FBI and let them get you a new life somewhere the hell away from all of this. The hell away from me. Do you want to die? Because if you hang around me, you’re going to, sure as I’m looking at you.” The polished facade had fallen away, shed like a snake’s skin in autumn. She was one long, raw muscle standing alone.

  “He’ll come after me, regardless, LuAnn,” Riggs said quietly. “He’ll find me and he’ll kill me whether I go to the FBI or not.” She didn’t respond so he continued. “And to tell you the truth, I’m too old, too tired of running and hiding to start it up again. I’d rather go down the cobra’s hole and meet him head-on. I’ll take my chances with you next to me. I’d rather have you than every agent at the Bureau, than every cop in the country. We’re probably only going to have one shot at this, and I’ll take that shot with you.” He paused for a moment as she stared at him, her eyes wild, her long hair billowing in the wind, her strong hands balling up into fists and then uncurling. Then he said, “If you’ll take that shot with me.”

  The wind was really picking up now. They each stood barely two feet apart from the other. The gap would either swell or diminish with LuAnn’s answer. Despite the chill, cold sweat clung to each of their faces. She finally broke the silence.

  “Get in.”

  The room was completely dark. Outside the rain was pouring down and had been for most of the day. Sitting in the very center of the space, her body bound tightly to a chair, Lisa was trying, without much success, to use her nose to inch up the mask that covered her eyes. The intense darkness — being totally and completely blind — was unnerving to her. She had the impression that perilous things were lurking very near her. In that regard she was completely right.

  “Are you hungry?” The voice was right at her elbow and her heart nearly stopped.

  “Who is it? Who are you?” Her voice quavered.

  “I’m an old friend of your mother’s.” Jackson knelt beside her. “These bindings aren’t too tight, are they?”

  “Where’s Uncle Charlie? What did you do to him?” Lisa’s courage suddenly resurfaced.

  Jackson quietly chuckled. “Uncle, is it?” He stood back up. “That’s good, very good.”

  “Where is he?”

  “Not relevant,” Jackson snapped. “If you’re hungry, tell me so.”

  “I’m not.”

  “Something to drink then?”

  Lisa hesitated. “Maybe some water.”

  She heard some tinkling of glass in the background and then she felt a coldness against her lips and jerked back.

  “It’s only water. I’m not going to poison you.” Jackson said this in such a commanding fashion that Lisa quickly opened her mouth and drank deeply. Jackson patiently held the cup until she was finished.

  “If you need anything else, to use the bathroom for instance, then just say so. I’ll be right here.”

  “Where are we?” When Jackson didn’t answer, she asked, “Why are you doing this?”

  Standing there in the darkness, Jackson considered the question carefully before answering. “Your mother and I have some unfinished business. It has to do with things that occurred a long time ago, although there have been repercussions of a very recent vintage that are motivating me.”

  “I bet my mom didn’t do anything to you.”

  “On the contrary, while she owes her entire life to me, she has done everything in her power to hurt me.”

  “I don’t believe that,” Lisa said hotly.

  “I don’t expect you to,” Jackson said. “You’re loyal to your mother, as you should be. Family ties are very important.” He crossed his arms and thought for a moment on the status of his own family, of Alicia’s sweet, peaceful face. Sweet and peaceful in death. With an effort he shrugged the vision off.

  “My mom will come and get me.”

  “I certainly expect her to.”

  Lisa blinked rapidly as his meaning suddenly dawned upon her. “You’re going to hurt her, aren’t you? You’re going to try and hurt my mom when she comes to get me.” Her voice had risen.

  “Call if you need anything. I don’t intend to make you suffer unduly.”

  “Don’t hurt my mom, please.” The tears materialized behind the mask.

  Jackson did his best to ignore the pleas. Finally, the crying turned to bawling and then dissolved into exhausted whimpering. He had first seen Lisa as an eight-month-old infant. She had certainly grown up into a lovely child. Had LuAnn not accepted his offer, the orphaned Lisa would probably be in a foster home somewhere. He looked over at her, suffering terribly inside, her head slumped onto her chest in her private agony. A lot for a ten-year-old to handle. Maybe she would have been better off in that foster home, without ever really having known her mother. The woman Jackson was going to now eliminate from her life. He had no desire to cause pain to the daughter, but such was life. It wasn’t fair. He had told LuAnn that the very first day they had met: Life was not fair. If you wanted something you had to take it. Before someone else took from you. Neatly dissected down to its essence, life was one long series of lily pad hoppings. The quick and the resourceful were able to adapt and survive; all others were simply crushed as a more nimble creature landed on the lily pad they had occupied for too long.

  He stood completely motionless as though conserving all his energies for what lay ahead. He stared off into the darkness.
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