by G. K. Parks
After I ran out of owed favors, I pulled all of the school personnel off the wall and started over with our new prime suspects. As I stared at the scribbled names, my mind wondered what the connection was between the three girls. Maybe Catherine and the third girl were taken to throw us off the scent of what was really going on. But why Catherine?
Catherine Cale was the odd-shaped piece in this puzzle. Her family wasn’t rich. They were middle class, upper-middle class, but still middle-class. Hell, she might have qualified for financial aid at that private school with the types of bank accounts the other families possessed. I ran a complete workup on her father and mother, but Peter and Evelyn were nobodies. Peter was a pencil pusher with little actual power and not much perceived power either. He was only on the outskirts looking in. Evelyn was a stay-at-home mom. She started out as a school teacher, but after marrying Peter and having Catherine, she wasn’t even a blip on the radar. The only possible reason I could imagine someone would take Catherine would be as payback because of Nick.
O’Connell and I weren’t on good terms and rooting around in his past wouldn’t mend our friendship, but I didn’t see any other motive for Catherine’s abduction. I dialed Jen’s cell phone, hoping she’d speak to me.
“Alexis?” she whispered. “Has anything changed?” Apparently O’Connell finally told her the situation.
“I don’t have news.” I felt guilty for getting her hopes up. “Heathcliff and I have been trying our damnedest to get something solid, and the only thing I could think was it’s someone out to get Nick.” He was shot, but they didn’t kill him. Did they mean to, or was it just a warning, like he insisted?
“Thompson thought that might be a possibility. The department’s analyzing all of his old cases, checking into recent parolees, known associates, but Nick doesn’t think that’s it. If someone wanted to make an impact, he figures they would have taken me or killed him when they had the chance.”
“I’m sorry to have bothered you. I’m sure he wouldn’t be happy to know I called.”
“I married him. I know what a hothead he can be sometimes. There’s no reason he needs to know you called, but if you need me to ask him something, I can do that.”
“No,” my mind decided on a new possibility, “is Thompson there?”
“Yes,” I could hear Jen smile, “I have faith the two of them will figure this thing out.” I suspected Thompson must have shared the leukoreduced blood factoid with the O’Connells. I just prayed that his positive attitude wouldn’t make all of them hit rock bottom that much harder. “By the way, tell James thanks for sending over that care package. I don’t think I’ve ever seen such an elaborate gift basket before.”
“I will. If you need anything, I’m here.”
I went back to my notes. The first girl, Sonia Casanov, was released within forty-eight hours of the abduction. There had been no glitches in the demand, exchange, and recovery. She was uninjured and no longer in any danger. Hypothetically, the Four Seasons were currently in possession of Adalina and Catherine. Adalina was supposed to have been released, but after Nick’s blunder and the shootout under the overpass, Winter delayed her release. This led to the Seasons issuing ransom demands for Catherine.
I failed royally, and as punishment, they painted the pier in blood. How they managed to pull that off without being seen was still a mystery. As far as I knew, negotiation for Catherine’s release ended, and according to Mercer, they were hedging on a timetable for Adalina. Obviously, something must have gone wrong.
“I was thinking,” Heathcliff said from the doorway, rubbing his face and trying to appear awake, even though he only slept a few hours, “the Seasons can’t release Catherine because they’re afraid of what Mercer would do if he was left unimpeded.”
“Wow, sleep turned you into a genius.”
He ignored my remark. “That would mean they must be aware of who he is and what he does.”
“How would they know?” I asked. “Unless you think O’Connell’s actions tipped them off.”
He frowned and went into the kitchen to pour a cup of coffee from the pot I made while he was asleep. “What if the insider is still on the inside? The Estes have staff, advisors, et cetera. We have no access to them. We can’t touch them. But what if someone inside their house is choreographing Winter’s movements?”
It made sense. Actually, it made a scary amount of sense. I filled him in on what I processed out of the information, and the two of us sat in the quiet of my apartment, trying to determine the best way to force the inside man to expose himself.
Twenty-four
“We’ve cleared the members of the insurance agency and the security personnel the Estes employed,” I announced, hanging up the phone.
“It has to be Santino,” Heathcliff muttered. “He suggested the ransom insurance and knew of the cracks in the family’s security. He possesses knowledge of where the girl was, where the tracking device would be, and who his boss hired to deal with the situation. Hell, he probably knows more about Julian Mercer than we do.
“Can you prove it?” I asked.
Proof was the thing I hated the most about the job. From a legal standpoint, it made sense. We were all human and prone to make mistakes, but sometimes, a gut instinct could never be corroborated through official means and guilty parties got away. It’s probably why cops always tended to vote Republican. Right now, I didn’t care if all the guilty parties walked away, just as long as we got the two little girls back safe.
“Shit, Parker, you want to push papers for the DA’s office?” He was irritable, and I understood why.
“You can’t arrest him. You can’t detain him. We can’t encroach upon the family’s property, given the current crisis, so what the hell do we do?”
“Doesn’t Mercer take care of things like this?”
I blew out a breath. “Do you think he’s in on it?”
“Mercer?” He considered the possibility. “I asked you that before.”
“I just don’t understand how he wouldn’t realize the party responsible was standing next to him in a room,” I growled. We were only theorizing, and it was getting us nowhere, but despite this, he laughed. “Did I say something funny?”
“Mercer negotiates and shoots people for a living. He isn’t in the business of determining who’s responsible. He’s just there to talk and shoot.”
“Then it’s about time we get him on board to do something more than that. If Mercer can get us access to the Estes’ estate or something solid to use against Santino, then you can bring the bastard in and shake something out of him.”
“Do you want me to tag along?”
“No. Mercer and I have an understanding, and if he reneges on our verbal agreement, then just make sure to make his life short and miserable.” It was sort of a joke.
“Okay, watch your back. I’ll drop by the precinct and then head home, unless I hear from you.”
“I’ll see you tomorrow.” He collected his notes and a few items he wanted to further analyze and left my apartment.
My head pounded, and I wanted all of this to have a simple and positive resolution. Clearly, that wouldn’t be the case. I changed the sheets on my bed, took a shower, and dressed in more work appropriate attire. Dialing Mercer, I waited for an answer. But he was preoccupied at the moment, whatever that meant, and we could meet at his rental in two hours.
Glancing at the time, I went to the MT building. It was almost six p.m. but there was a good chance with the conference last week and the new security implementations that the building might still be busy. Swiping my new card at the door, I found Jeffrey in the security office.
“Do me a favor,” I held out my old card that Mercer had taken, “make sure no one tried to access the building or any of MT’s records. If my card was used for anything since Sunday onward, find out what it was and send copies to my office.”
“But you found your card,” Jeffrey protested.
“No. Someone delivered it.”
He didn’t understand my cautious attitude, but if Mercer was snooping around, I wanted to know what he was looking for. “And flag the old access strip and number. I know it’s deactivated, but if anyone tries to use it, I want to know.” There was also a possibility Mercer could have duplicated my card.
“Will do, Ms. Parker.” Jeffrey smiled warmly. “Anything else I can do for you this evening?”
“Has Mr. Martin left for the day?”
“I don’t believe so.”
“Okay, thanks.” I took the elevator to the seventeenth floor and knocked on Martin’s door.
“Hey.” He smiled up at me from under a sea of paperwork. “Are you okay?”
“I think so. I was here to talk to Jeffrey and thought I’d stop by. Thanks for the distraction the other day and for putting up with me, and Jen said thanks for the gift basket. You didn’t have to do that.” Martin looked confused by my rambling. “O’Connell and I aren’t speaking at the moment, so I hope you don’t end up being in the doghouse by association.”
“I’m not too worried about it.”
“Okay, well, I have a meeting to get to. I’ll give you a call when life returns to normal.” I headed for the door.
“Alex,” he hesitated, “did they find her?”
“No. Thompson thinks she’s still alive. Heathcliff and I are working leads, and the PD is calling this a missing person. No one knows what the fuck is going on.”
“You’ll figure it out. You always do.”
I let out a cynical laugh and rolled my eyes. “Not always. And not always in time.” Leaving the MT building, I went to Mercer’s apartment, hoping he’d have something concrete we could use against Estobar Santino.
* * *
“Lovely to see you again,” Bastian said, holding the door open so I could enter. “Pity you’re still not in a lacy, little see-through number.”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “Where’s Mercer?”
“Julian stepped out for a moment. He’ll be back soon.” No one else was in the apartment. “Care for some tea?”
I took a seat on the couch and tried to determine a practical use for Bastian. “Let me guess, you’re Mercer’s houseboy?” It sounded a bit more scathing than I intended, but he laughed it off.
“Not quite, although I’m sure Jules would love that.” I raised an eyebrow and waited. “Tit for tat. Are you game?”
“Of course. Can’t you tell, I’m an open book.”
“Anything but, love.” He sat across from me. “How’d you get roped into this mess?”
“One of the girls taken was my friend’s niece.” He leaned back and nodded. “My turn. Explain the dynamics of your team.”
“Boxers or briefs would have been more insightful,” Bastian smirked. His commentary was meant to make me uneasy, but it seemed harmless. Maybe I was accustomed to infantile comments and jokes from spending too much time with Martin. “Donovan is our long-distance resolution expert. Hans deals with reconnaissance. Julian,” he looked toward the door, probably afraid his commander was about to walk in, “coordinates, and I do a little bit of everything.”
“Jack of all trades,” I surmised.
“Why are you assisting if you think the girl’s dead?”
I paled. “Is she?”
“You think she is. Is this penance for screwing up?”
“You don’t do a little of everything. You’re the goddamn analyst.” He grinned at the comment. “How do you read this situation?”
“I don’t think you have the proper clearance.”
“This isn’t the fucking SAS,” I retorted.
He cocked his head to one side. “True.” He scrutinized me for a moment. “Ah, bird,” he smiled, “you’re not letting this go, are you?” I remained silent. It was one of the few talents I possessed, thanks to my days interviewing suspects at the OIO. “This reads like an inside job. The third girl, Sonia Casanov, was released practically the moment she was taken. Whoever grabbed the girls didn’t want the Russians involved. She wasn’t the intended target or the main motivation. That means we’re left with two, Estes and Cale. Miguel has a gold mine and unofficially controls the entire country. Money, power, politics, there’s a million reasons to nab Adalina, but the kidnappers are barely scratching at the surface.”
“Four million is scratching at the surface?”
“Four million is an asking price. Don’t tell me you buy a car off the lot without haggling,” he looked pointedly at me. “Reasonably speaking, we could negotiate down to a million and a half, maybe two. But that doesn’t explain why the kidnappers aren’t asking for something more substantial, like power, protection, or an insurance policy to make sure we don’t shoot the blokes in the back once we get the girl.”
“Is that why they keep delaying?”
He laughed. “They’re delaying because they don’t know what the fuck to do with your hostage.”
“You know Catherine’s alive?” I leaned forward, practically jumping off the couch.
“Not the point,” he was being unreasonable, and I resisted the urge to leap across the coffee table and strangle him. “They took Cale for show. She wasn’t the main target either.” Everything he said went along with at least one of the theories Heathcliff and I were considering.
“But she’s nobody.”
“Aw, how darling. You remind me of a kitten playing with a ball of yarn, full of wonder and amazement.”
“Careful, I have the claws and fangs to match.”
“I don’t doubt that,” he smiled roguishly, “but Cale has something that no one else at that school does.” He leaned back like the cat that swallowed the canary, which made all the names he’d called me even more confusing. I ran through my knowledge of the other students and Catherine.
“Her uncle’s a cop.” The truth hit like a ton of bricks. “They had to ensure the police would get involved.”
“Bloody brilliant, isn’t it? They can specify no cops, but they have a cop’s niece. There will definitely be some coppers, and just in case your buddy wanted to follow directions, they shoot him in order to turn it into an official police investigation.”
“Holy shit.” I eyed Bastian as the pieces tumbled together.
The cops would add to the legitimacy and ensure the insurance company issued the ransom payout. Maybe the amount was doubled or even tripled to get as much as possible, but there must be a cap on the policy. The only problem with Bastian’s theory was after the police became involved, Catherine was no longer a sought after commodity. She was expendable.
“If you’d like to snog now, I wouldn’t mind,” he spoke, breaking my thoughts into a million fragmented pieces.
“I’ll pass.”
“Suit yourself.” He fished his phone from his pocket and sent a text. Within three minutes, Mercer entered the apartment.
“Up-to-date?” Mercer asked.
“Were you afraid to give me the details yourself, or do you really like to delegate?”
“You seem more amicable with Bastian.” It wasn’t an answer, but apparently Mercer realized we would butt heads, instead of exchange valuable information. Although, it was another illustration of how he was manipulating the situation and me. I didn’t like it.
Having limited options, I filled in Bastian and Mercer on our suspicions concerning Estobar Santino and the insider still being a valuable asset or member of the Estes family. When I was finished with my rendition of the facts, they exchanged a meaningful look.
“Santino is under a microscope, but nothing has surfaced,” Mercer offered. Our give and take seemed taxing for him, probably because it required he hide his loathing long enough to converse civilly.
“Can you get me inside? This is what I do,” I retorted.
He frowned. “No.” I swallowed the urge to slap more than a one word answer out of him, and Bastian gave him a hard glare. Finally, Mercer spoke again. “But I will try to sway Senor Estes to permit you on the premises.”
“In the meantime,” B
astian decided it best to break the tension in the room, “we’ve been using satellite imaging to locate the Four Seasons’ base of operations.”
“We were at their base of operations, and we didn’t do a damn thing,” I argued.
“That was one of their mobile locations,” Bastian interjected. “We thought it was the location for the girls and planned a recovery. It wasn’t. They’ve been moving around every six to twelve hours to avoid permanent detection. Actually, only two of the four kidnappers were present. The two patrolmen were rent-a-cops with no idea what was going on.”
“How do you know any of this?”
“We know,” Mercer replied, and from his voice, I knew the way he obtained the information involved torture. The bile rose in my throat, and I forced it back down.
“What do we do in the meantime?”
“You stay by the phone and answer it when it rings. Other than that, stay out of my way.” He was back to being his warm and cuddly self. There was no use in arguing, so I stood.
“Fine. Call as soon as you know anything.” Glancing over my shoulder, I added, “And if you hold me at gunpoint one more time, I’d suggest you pull the trigger.”
Twenty-five
Instead of going home, I went to the OIO. After meeting with Kate and a few government sanctioned hackers, who preferred to be known as internet specialists, I had a clear picture of what the Estes’ gold-mining business and ransom insurance policies looked like. The gold-mining industry was lucrative and stable. Thousands of dollars were mined daily, and the ore was stockpiled in a warehouse before being shipped to another facility for purification and melting or maybe it was smelting. The actual procedure didn’t warrant my full attention.
