by Mark Stone
“What are you talking about?” I asked as I neared her, though I honestly didn’t need to wait for her to speak to know the answer. I knew that look. It was the kind of look only a mother could wear. Besides, I’d seen it on her before, the night Jack was taken. It had happened again. Somehow, amid what was supposed to be a relaxing time with family, Jack had disappeared again.
“My son!” she screamed. “He’s–he’s gone!”
“He’s probably just playing,” the older man said, looking around the beach frantically before yelling, “Jack! Jack, where are you?”
“He’s not playing, Dad,” she said, her voice as shaky as the rest of her was. “He hasn’t left my side for more than thirty seconds since the fire. He’s been too afraid. The only time he hasn’t been with me is when he was with you. He wouldn’t just walk off now. I was just sitting here. I was watching him toss a football into the air. Then my phone rang. I looked down to see who was calling, and then when I looked back up, he was gone.”
“He’s here, Alexis!” her father yelled. “Just calm down and let me find him.”
“I’ll help you,” Davey said, nodding at the man as the two of them started running around the beach, yelling Jack’s name.
“He’d answer,” Alexis cried out. “He’s not the type of kid who hides. He’d answer if he was here, if he thought he could.” She looked at me again, grabbing my hand and squeezing it desperately. “They’re back. Whoever took Jack, the second person, whoever helped George is back, and they’ve got my son!”
“They don’t have your son,” I said, trying to keep my voice calm. “It’s impossible. The only people on this property are people you trust, right? It’s gated. There’s no way—” A thought crashed into the forefront of my mind, pulling at all the momentum I’d built up and stopping my sentence in its tracks. “The people with the trays,” I muttered.
“What?” I heard Mia ask from behind me.
“Parker brought in a tray of food, and I saw people walking around the beach, handing out drinks.”
“It’s just the catering company,” Alexis answered weakly. “We hire them for all our events.”
“Like your bonfire?” I asked, my eyes widening as the possibility played out in my head. “Was it the same company? Are they the same people?” I looked beyond the woman and onto the beach. A few minutes ago, a man with a long rattail folded into a braid marched along this beach passing out really sweet piña coladas and really fake smiles.
He was gone now, too, though a survey of the area showed me his silver tray lying on the sand, glowing against the light of the sun. Beside it lay a single sandal, small enough for a child to wear.
“He took him,” I said instantly. “The guy with the drinks, he took Jack.”
“I knew it!” Alexis yelled. “I knew it!” She crumpled toward the sand, but I grabbed her, holding her up.
“The gate!” I yelled. “The gate at the front of the property, is it the only way out of here?”
“Yes,” Alexis said, tears flowing down her face anew. “Wait! No! There’s a back way, a service entrance.”
“A service entrance?” I asked. “Which means the catering company would have the code to open and close it.”
“Oh, God,” Alexis said. “He’s taking my son!”
“Not today, he’s not,” I answered. “Which way is the service entrance?”
Alexis pointed to the left, behind the house. Before she had a chance to say another word, I rushed off in the direction she’d shown me. I wasn’t about to let Jack get taken again. He had already been through enough. I’d be dead before I let him go through anything else.
Chapter 19
The world receded into a blur as I ran toward the back of the house. My mind was spinning, running every bit as fast as my body. Somehow, it was still focused, though. I thought of nothing but that little boy, nothing but making this right for him. There were a thousand questions that needed to be answered. What made Jack a target like this? What did a catering company and its employees have to do with anything, and with George dead, who the hell was behind all of this, anyway?
Those questions would have to wait, though. None of that mattered until Jack was safe and sound, back with the family who loved him. Mia might have just berated me because of my willingness to jump into action when this sort of stuff happened, but if I didn’t, then who would? I couldn’t exactly trust the police to be unbiased, and just in this area, not when the sheriff was foaming at the mouth to pin his son’s death on me. No. I would have to handle this the way I saw fit, and that was the hands-on way. Hell, I was basically Batman, after all. Mia said so herself.
Nearing the house, I saw him. The man who, up until a few moments ago, was handing out drinks and harmlessly nodding in the sand now ran toward a white carrier truck. It had the words Blanche Catering across the back along with an exaggerated cartoon chef holding up a plate of fish with a phone number under it directing all who saw to Call for all your culinary needs. My heart pulled to a stop in my chest as I saw what was in his arms.
Jack lay across his arms, limp and unconscious. Where last time, the kid screamed and kicked as they pulled him away, this time, he was completely still. My blood ran cold, wondering how he’d been rendered like this, and then rage pooled up in me. I should have kept silent. I should have preserved the element of surprise, but I couldn’t. I was just feeling too much to keep my mouth shut. So, as hard as I tried, I couldn’t stop my mouth from opening as I screamed, “Stop right there, you scumbag!”
I wasn’t sure what I thought was going to happen. I had seen enough movies—hell, I had been in enough turmoil at this point—to know that people never actually stop when you yell at them about it. Instead, the tall guy rushed to the front of the truck, whipped open the driver’s side door, and tossed the poor kid into the front seat.
Instinctively, my legs started pumping even harder. I was getting closer, but if he got into that truck, he and Jack would be gone and there would be nothing I could do about it. I mean, even Batman couldn’t outrun a truck on foot.
As I ran faster than perhaps I ever had before, I watched as the man turned around. He must have pulled a gun from the front seat of the truck because when his eyes met mine, there was one in his hands, pointing at me.
Immediately, I dropped to the sand. Given how fast I was running, I slid more than a little, sand burning as it dug its way into parts of me I’d rather not disclose right now. Hearing shots ring out, I kept my head down. Then, after the noise passed, I looked up to find the man climbing into the driver’s seat of the truck.
Rubbing sand off my face, I jumped up to my feet and kept running. As I did, though, I realized that I had no weapons on me whatsoever. I had come here in a crisis, not to fight for a kid. So, for the second time since moving to Bonita Springs, I found myself unprepared to save Jack Jenson. I wouldn’t allow things to end up the way they had before. Sure, I might have saved Jack from the house fire, but this time, they’d never take him. The truck flew into reverse, backing away from another truck before the reverse lights died out. As the truck moved forward, I lunged toward it, grabbing handles on the back and pulling myself up. My bare feet dragged the ground as I held onto the back of the truck. It hurt like hell, my toes and the soles of my feet running against the pavement at such high speeds. Still, I wasn’t about to let go. Yelling from the pain, I pulled my feet up and rested them on the back bumper as the truck started gaining speed.
Swallowing hard, I looked around. We sped away from the house and through the open gate of the service entrance before reaching the back road where the large house resided. I needed to move quickly. Obviously, the guy who had Jack had no idea I was hanging on the back of the truck. Otherwise, he’d have likely just stopped the stupid thing, gotten out, and shot me. I might have given up the element of surprise before, but I couldn’t do that now. Still, if we made it out to the freeway with me in my current situation, I had little doubt that some concerned driver would let t
he guy know I was there and then he would turn me into roadkill and make off with Jack. No, I was going to have to get inside quickly.
I studied the truck. As a trucker—well, a former trucker, thanks to the Illinois State Lottery—I knew a thing or two about cargo vehicles. Now, if this was a different kind of a truck, I could climb underneath and look for a latch that might lead me inside. This wasn’t that kind of truck, though. It wasn’t nearly big enough. Because of that, it left me with only one choice, and it was a more painful one.
Luckily for me, this truck had a set of windows at the center. So, taking a deep breath and steadying myself on the bumper, I wriggled out of my shirt. Looping my arm around the spoke of the handle, I wrapped the shirt around my right hand and waited for a bump.
Once we hit it, I slammed my hand against the window. It hurt like hell, a spasm of pain running up my arm. Unfortunately, the window didn’t give way. Thankfully, though, the guy didn’t seem to hear my assault. So, waiting for the next bump, I repeated the process.
The bumpy nature of this road came in handy. The truck kept hitting them, and I kept hitting it. Soon enough, the glass started to give way. One particularly large bump gave me the cover I needed to level a hell of punch against what was left of the glass, and it finally fell away. But that was only half the battle.
Swallowing hard, I slid into the back of the truck. The whole expanse was empty, save for a few tables and stacked up chairs, all of which had been strapped down. A small square sat in the upper center section of the back wall with a latch on it. I could pull that latch and slide right in there with Jack and the man who took him, but I’d need something first. He had a gun, and that meant I couldn’t show up empty handed, even if I did have that wonderful element of surprise I had been talking about on my side.
Moving toward the chair, I pulled at one of the wooden legs until it snapped. It wouldn’t be much against a bullet, but maybe it would be enough to ensure I didn’t have to worry about that bullet in the first place. With the leg in my hand and my heart beating fast, I walked toward the back latched door and remembered my training.
When I was in the Middle East, my platoon and I did more than a few ambushes. You would think that stealth would be the most important thing when on that kind of mission, but you’d be wrong. While it is important, the most vital part of any ambush is always confidence. You’d be surprised how many missions were ruined by a soldier second-guessing what he or she was doing. When sneaking up on someone you wanted to overtake, you needed to move quickly and concisely. You needed to do what you were going to do and not think twice about it.
So, that’s exactly what I did. The truck took a quick left, and I made my move. I needed to go quickly, before we got out on the freeway. Fighting this dude in a moving truck wouldn’t be ideal. It would put the both of us and Jack at risk. But if I got it done before we hit the main road, it would lessen the chance of us winding headlong into oncoming traffic. The fewer people in danger, the better.
Pulling the latch, I dove into the front seat. Swinging the leg of the chair in the driver’s direction, I felt the satisfying crack as it connected with the man’s head.
Hearing a thud, I steadied myself as the truck swerved off the road. I grabbed the wheel with one hand and took the chair leg to the man’s head again. He caught it, though, and pulled it away from me. Jerking the wheel back toward the road, I drove an elbow into the man’s face and then into his windpipe.
He grappled for his gun, but he was too frantic, panicking too much. I took it instead, and guiding the truck off into an embankment, I hit the butt of it across his temple, knocking him out.
Slowing to a stop, I looked over at Jack. He was snoring softly in the seat. Whatever the man gave him to knock him out must have really done the trick because even all of this couldn’t wrestle him awake.
Suddenly, I heard sirens behind me. Looking up, I saw Mia at the window, pointing a gun in my direction.
“Police! Come out with your—”
She went silent as soon as she saw me, her eyes widening.
“You’re welcome,” I said breathlessly. Then, falling against the seat, I muttered, “I’m Batman.”
Chapter 20
“I don’t need this,” I said, sitting with my legs swung off the end of a hospital bed with an ever tightening band wrapped around my arm. “My blood pressure is fine. My ‘everything’ is fine, actually. You’re just wasting time and money checking me out.”
The nurse attending to me, a pretty brunette with a light scar on her forehead and friendly eyes, chuckled as the words escaped my lips. She had been in here for about ten minutes now, weighing me, checking my temperature, and making polite conversation as I complained during all of it.
“You’d be surprised how much time is wasted in here,” she answered. “Half of medicine is just trying to figure out what’s wrong. You do that for any period of time at all, and you’re bound to head down the wrong path.”
“You don’t have to go down any path,” I said. “Nothing happened.”
“That’s not what I heard,” she said, looking at me from over a clipboard where she recorded the results of the blood pressure test. I had no idea whether the numbers on the screen were any good, but they weren’t flashing red and there was no loud, ominous beeping sound coming from the machine. So that had to be a good sign, right? “I heard you jumped onto the moving truck, broke in, and beat the guy inside to hell so you could save the same little boy you saved from a fire a couple of weeks ago.”
Well, I mean, that’s technically true,” I said, shuffling as she pulled the cuff off my arm. Her fingers were cold, but I wasn’t complaining. Ever since I moved down to Florida, I realized I ran a little hot. “I’m sure it wasn’t as impressive in real life as it is in your head right now.”
“And what makes you think you can see inside my head, Lucky John?” the nurse asked, writing something else on her clipboard.
“You read the magazine article too?” I asked, wincing at the sound of my nickname coming off her lips.
“What magazine article?” she asked, reaching into her pocket. She produced her phone and tapped the screen, flipping it toward me. “I just read a blurb about what happened on Facebook.”
“What?” I asked, peering at the phone. The blurb, splashed across a site called The Coastal Fury, showed the truck I’d just been sitting in on the embankment I’d just pulled it on. The heading of the blurb read, Lucky John’s Streak Continues as he Thwarts Second Kidnapping Attempt on Young Boy.
“Lord in Heaven,” I muttered, shaking my head. “Why would they print that?”
“Because it’s news,” the nurse said as though the answer should have been obvious. “Besides, I don’t know why you’d be upset about it. This paints you in a really good light. Not only are you a multimillionaire, but you’re also a hero. I can think of worse things to say about a guy, especially a single guy looking for dates.”
“H–how do you know I’m single?” I asked, peering at the woman.
“Says it right here,” she said, flipping her screen back toward her, scrolling through the article, and turning it back to me once she’d gotten to the piece she was talking about.
I grabbed her phone instinctively and read the part in question.
“Oh, he’s definitely single,” Lucky John’s best friend and army buddy revealed. “Single and ready to mingle. Actually, he’s extremely ready to mingle. We both are.”
“Davey,” I muttered through clenched teeth.
“See?” the nurse asked, snatching her phone back from me. “It’s a good thing. An article like this, plus the money, plus the fact that you’re as cute as puppies, means there won’t be a girl this side of the Gulf who isn’t ready to call herself ‘Mrs. John’.”
“Lucky,” I said as a bit of aggravation flew through my voice. “She wouldn’t be Mrs. John. She’d be Mrs. Lucky.”
“Damn right, she would,” the nurse said, winking at me.
I sigh
ed. “What about the boy? Does the blurb mention his name?”
“No,” the nurse answered. “But they didn’t really have to. An Amber Alert was issued for Jack Jensen when he was taken the first time. Everyone knows you’re the one who saved him. So, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to put the pieces together, given the blurb’s headline.”
“Right,” I said. “I wish they wouldn’t have done that. That kid has been through enough without having to worry about the entire city looking at him.”
“As I’m sure you’ve learned by now, there are good ways to look at somebody. I’m going to head out, but the doctor will be with you shortly. Just stay put until then, if you can manage it.” The woman chuckled again as she walked out, closing the door behind her.
Ten minutes of me lying on my back, staring at the ceiling, passed before the door opened again. I braced myself, expecting the doctor. Instead, I saw Mia walked through the door, an unamused look on her face. I should have braced myself more.
“How’s Jack?” I asked the instant I saw her, running a hand through my hair.
“He’s fine,” she answered. “He’s napping on the pediatrics floor right now.”
“Has he been awake at all?” I asked, remembering that he was unconscious when they carted me into an ambulance to bring me here a couple of hours ago.
“For a few minutes,” Mia said. “He was dosed with a sedative when he was taken, and it’ll take a little while for it to run its course.”
Anger rushed through me, a torrent of rage. I couldn’t believe someone would drug a sweet little kid like Jack. The idea of why they wanted him sent chills up and down my spine.
