Ransom River

by Meg Gardiner

  And glanced at the doors. He muttered, “If we surrender—”

  “No.” Nixon shook him by the arm. “Do you not fucking understand the consequences? If we—Jesus Christ, surrender? Not just the payment we’d…”

  “I’m here to listen to you and to try to make sure everybody stays safe. So can you tell me please, who am I speaking to?”

  Reagan pulled his arm free. “I understand, you dick. If we don’t draw him out, we—”

  “Shut up,” Nixon said. “We stick to the plan or we lose.”

  Reagan barked a hard nonlaugh. “Plan? It’s already blown. Now what?”

  Nixon turned and crossed the courtroom. Rory couldn’t tell if he had a destination or simply wanted to get away from Reagan. And Reagan’s fear and Reagan’s questions.

  Outside in the late morning sun, police officers were positioned behind their vehicles. The news van had sidestepped the order to evacuate and taken up a position inside the parking garage. Down the street in the distance, an enormous vehicle rolled toward them. Some gigantic RV, painted in the white and blue colors of the Ransom River Police Department. It was a mobile command center. Maybe SWAT. Maybe a food truck with margaritas for the mall visitors. Jesus, would SWAT storm the courtroom? If they did, would they even know how many opponents they faced?

  Nixon’s voice came louder than she expected. “Hey, police.”

  Rory turned her head another couple of inches. Nixon stood back from the main doors about ten feet. Reagan hustled to his side.

  “What’s—”

  Nixon lifted a hand to silence him. He raised his voice. “Hey, cops.”

  The bullhorn answered. “This is Sergeant Nguyen. Who am I speaking to?”

  “The guy who’s gonna tell you what to do,” Nixon called out.

  After a pause, Nguyen continued calmly. “Okay. Can you tell me what’s happening in the courtroom? Does anyone need medical attention? Is everybody safe for now?”

  “Shut up. Shut up.”

  The air in the courtroom abruptly felt too warm. It smelled of aftershave and cordite and sweat.

  Quiet. After a second, when the bullhorn didn’t repeat its expression of concern, Nixon shouted, “Here is a list of my demands.”

  Dammit. My demands. Nixon deliberately wanted to mislead the police into thinking there was only one attacker inside. Why?

  Maybe to deceive the authorities in a way that would help him escape. With hostages. Maybe to ambush any cops who rushed the courtroom expecting resistance from a single gunman. To take out as many officers as he and Reagan could before they went down themselves.

  “Got a pen?” Nixon shouted. “Write this down.”

  Rory looked again at the parking garage. There had to be cops in there. They had to be watching the courthouse. However, with hostages crammed against the windows, those cops couldn’t see the two gunmen.

  But they could see her.

  8

  The scene at the perimeter was crowded and chaotic. Police black-and-whites blocked either end of the street outside the courthouse, and uniforms pushed back any civilian who lingered too long near the building, playing lookie-loo. The cops had no sawhorse barricades but had strung yellow police tape to mark the danger line. The crowd pressed close, angling for a good view. Noisy, confused, some with their hands to their mouths, others on tiptoe, they peered at the courthouse, trying to see the mayhem. Which, frankly, wasn’t obvious from street level.

  A Los Angeles television news crew toughed it out and barged through the crowd, the cameraman and reporter forging past people. When the police turned their backs, the news crew ducked beneath the yellow tape so they could get footage of the swarm. The reporter grabbed sound bites from people. Witnesses to horror.

  “Cops drove up like an invasion…”

  “Heard there was shooting inside…”

  “Those poor people against the windows. My God, like fish in a barrel…”

  The reporter got a one-on-one with a man who was near tears. The guy kept putting his hand to his forehead and waving at the courthouse. Great visuals.

  In the background, off to the side, the cameraman noticed a young woman pushing her way to the front of the crowd. Her face was strained with shock. She was in her late twenties, a perfect Southern California beauty. A stunner, actually. Sleek black hair that shone almost blue with the sun. Eyes to match, feline and hot. A nose ring. A sleeveless red T-shirt, unbuttoned to show creamy and perfectly augmented breasts.

  Honey shot, his instincts screamed. He tapped the reporter on the shoulder, trying to refocus his attention from Angsty Man to the frightened beauty.

  “What the hell?” the beauty said. “What’s going on?”

  An older woman said, “Terrorist attack on the courthouse.”

  Honey Shot put a hand to her head. “Oh my God.”

  “I heard shooting. I heard the gunfire,” the older woman said.

  The man behind her added, “It’s the Mirkovic trial. They’ve got everybody trapped in the courtroom.”

  Honey Shot gaped at the courthouse, openly horrified. “No.”

  “Yeah, look which courtroom it is. That’s the Mirkovic trial.”

  “Oh Jesus.”

  Finally alerted by the strength of her reaction, the reporter turned to her. The cameraman refocused. Honey Shot looked near tears.

  “You sure? You goddamned sure?” she said.

  The crowd nodded. She let out a harsh cry.

  The reporter said, “Miss—”

  “My cousin’s in there,” she said.

  Everybody’s attention clicked toward her.

  “My cousin’s a juror on the Mirkovic case. Is this for real?”

  “Miss, what’s your cousin’s name?” the reporter said.

  She pressed her hands to her head. “Rory Mackenzie.”

  “Number one,” Nixon shouted. “Defendants Jared Smith and Lucy Elmendorf will plead guilty to the murder of Brad Mirkovic.”

  Surprise rippled through the courtroom. At the defense table, Jared Smith said, “What?”

  “Two,” Nixon called. “Both defendants will sign a confession to the murder. This confession will describe their crime in full and complete detail. It will include a statement admitting they took Brad Mirkovic’s life with deliberation and malice aforethought.”

  So he knew the California Penal Code definition of first-degree murder, Rory thought. Good for him. Did he realize he was on the hook for felony murder himself, because Reagan had killed the Justice! vigilante?

  “Three,” Nixon shouted.

  Christ, these guys loved to count.

  “The defendants’ confession will be read live on all major networks. It will be read in full. And the defendants’ signatures will be shown on-screen, so everybody knows they’re authentic.”

  After a second, Nguyen said, “Okay, let me make sure I got all that.”

  Nixon shifted his shotgun, almost cradling it. The sun caught the barrel, a strange, dull light, like the glint of a reptile awakened from beneath a warm rock.

  Nguyen said, “You want the defendants to sign a confession and—”

  “And I want five million dollars in gold bullion.”

  A long, long pause on Nguyen’s end.

  Nixon shouted: “That’s five million U.S. dollars’ worth of gold bullion as calculated at the close of market yesterday.”

  “That will take some doing, but—”

  “And a helicopter, and safe passage to Mexico.”

  Nguyen paused again. Rory wondered who he was, with what experience and what authority.

  Finally, he said, “I’ll see what I can do. In the meantime—”

  “No meantime. Now.”

  Nixon turned and paced. He rubbed his forearm against his forehead, as though to wipe off sweat, despite the balaclava. Reagan intercepted him.

  “What are you—”

  Nixon raised a hand to silence him, turned, and paced back to the doors. “That’s a helicopter large en
ough to carry the pilots and five passengers, plus the lifting capacity to haul the bullion.”

  After a moment, Nguyen said, “I’m going to need some time to see what we can do. But I’ll need you to do something for me, all right? Can you let me know if everybody’s okay in there?”

  Rory breathed against the window. How did hostage negotiation work?

  She had spent years with a cop and hadn’t learned a thing about crisis negotiation. Years with Seth, a man who drank the Kool-Aid of police work like it was the river of life, and not once had she asked him how to rescue captives from a locked room where they were imprisoned by violent men with guns.

  Of course, Seth had been a cop who took on the coloring of violent men with guns. He had worked undercover.

  But she knew one thing: Hostage negotiation shouldn’t work like this. Not like Nixon screaming demands but failing to give Nguyen a time limit. She didn’t negotiate many deals, but she knew not to ask an open-ended question, hoping for yes. That betrayed weakness and poor planning. She knew so from selling her Barbies to her cousin when she was seven. Failing to institute a deadline was a bush-league mistake. As was failing to spell out the consequences if the cops failed to meet Nixon’s demands.

  She’d also learned that from the Barbie transaction with her cousin. Who had pushed her into the sticker bushes by the creek and run off with the entire collection. Rory knew from bush-league mistakes.

  What in hell was going on here?

  Reagan caught Nixon and put a hand against his chest. Quietly, he said, “What about the girl?”

  Nixon brushed his hand aside and continued to pace.

  The girl.

  Four people had been tapped on the back with the shotgun. Three men and her. She didn’t like the odds that the gunmen were talking about somebody else.

  In the parking garage across the street she saw the news van, in the shadows. And she saw shadows she didn’t think had been there earlier.

  She inched her hands up the window. Slowly, gently, she spread her fingers against the glass.

  9

  Seth stood at the counter in the taqueria, eyes on the TV, phone in his hand, waiting. Instinct told him this thing in Ransom River was more than big. This thing at the courthouse was about to erupt into the realm of the very bad.

  Traffic on Wilshire was busy. The autumn sun cut through the window and caught him. He scrolled through his contacts and hovered over his dad’s number.

  On TV, the news crew that was hunkered down in the parking garage zoomed in on the courthouse. Sirens in the background. The focus blurred and sharpened on the image of hostages pinned to the courtroom windows.

  Seth’s hand slowly fell to his side. He forgot about calling his dad. His dad was fine. His dad was retired and wouldn’t go within two miles of the courthouse for fun or profit.

  The reporter’s voice was hushed. “This is Jennifer Warner-Garcia at the scene of a developing hostage situation at the Ransom River Superior Courthouse.”

  There on-screen, up against the glass, stood Rory.

  Seth’s nerve endings seemed to snap with sparks. It was Rory, no question. No doubt, not a chance he was imagining it. Two years since he had seen her, since he had touched her, since she had given him that fateful look and told him, No more. Two years that hadn’t passed so much as scored him like a rusted knife.

  When had she come back? Nobody had told him. Not her parents, of course—if her father approached him, it would be with a baseball bat. Her dad, the guy who wouldn’t let a sparrow with a broken wing die on the forest floor, the guy who thought Seth Colder was a maniac with a death wish.

  Seth had thought she would never set foot in Ransom River again. That she was gone for good.

  Aurora Faith, what are you doing there?

  He heard reporter Jennifer Warner-Garcia mention gunman and shots fired.

  Rory looked beautiful. She was wearing the turquoise necklace he had given her. He thought, seeing it, that he might crack into pieces.

  The hostages at the windows had their hands up, palms pressed to the glass. They looked like figures in a Navajo sand painting. Seth could guess what they’d been told: Hold still or get shot.

  Though Rory was holding still, she seemed to thrum with energy. And he saw that she wasn’t completely motionless. Her hands were moving. She put two fingers of her left hand against the glass. She shaped her right hand into a gun.

  “Goddamn,” he said.

  Two guns.

  Then she walked her fingers up the glass, as if they represented a little human figure. With her left hand she continued to press two fingers to the window.

  Two gunmen.

  The sparks beneath Seth’s skin turned chill.

  She was silently signaling the police that two armed hostiles were inside the courtroom. Obviously, Rory thought the cops didn’t know how many attackers were inside. And she thought they needed that information to rescue her and everybody else there.

  Rory paused and glanced to the side, as though checking that nobody in the courtroom had seen what she was doing.

  “Watch yourself,” Seth said.

  She put one finger of her left hand against the window. Slowly, with her right, she drew letters on the glass, like a kid writing in condensation. D-E-A-D.

  She paused. Again she put one finger against the window with her left hand. With her right, she spelled out H-U-R-T.

  One dead, one injured.

  The reporter didn’t comment. Maybe she didn’t see what Rory had done. She said, “We have no audio from inside the building, but it’s apparent that the hostages are in fear for their lives. We can see—it looks like nine people—against the glass. We can’t view anything of the interior of the courtroom.”

  “Of course not,” Seth said. “The gunmen want it that way.”

  He raised his phone and scrolled to a new number. It was time to take this to another level.

  But he stopped, riveted by the sight of Rory, her necklace gleaming in the sun. She had gone very still. But her lips were moving.

  The reporter said, “The hostages in the Ransom River courtroom seem to be a microcosm of the people who make up this Los Angeles suburb. Women and men, young and old, black and white and Latino. We can’t know what’s in their minds, but it has to be terror. And…one woman seems to be praying.”

  The camera focused on Rory. She was speaking, whispering, to herself. Her lips moved clearly. Seth stepped closer to the screen.

  “She seems to be reciting a prayer,” the reporter said. “It’s heartbreaking.”

  Rory, pray?

  Seth watched her, feeling helpless. And then the last vestiges of heat poured from beneath his skin and left him shocked and empty. He watched Rory’s lips.

  Things I’ve never done…

  She wasn’t praying. Not Rory Mackenzie, who might believe but would never submit to the idea of begging mercy from a remote and capricious power. She was singing to herself.

  He murmured, “Never much but we made the most…”

  Seth couldn’t believe it, and knew what she was going to say next. It was her favorite song, never fashionable, sad and harsh and beautiful. A little indie lullaby about loss and the thirst for love.

  “Welcome home,” he whispered.

  Two years. No good-bye. No wave over the shoulder, no word that she had planned to move overseas, no postcards. And yet here she was, murmuring words he knew from a hundred nights in her arms.

  I’ve come home…

  Not her song. Their song.

  He grabbed his truck keys.

  10

  Rory’s hands felt numb. For forty-five minutes she’d pressed them to the window, and the blood was draining from her arms. A twisted quiet held the courtroom. Nobody tried to rush the gunmen. Nobody begged to be let out. Rory had stopped singing. Trapped, they were waiting for whatever came next.

  She didn’t know if the police had seen her hand signals. Two gunmen. One civilian dead. One hurt.

&n
bsp; Behind her, Nixon paced like a buffalo. She caught him at the edges of her vision, shotgun resting across his forearms, masked face staring at his cell phone. He scrolled and texted and paused, perhaps to read incoming messages.

  At the court clerk’s desk, computer keys clicked. The clerk was typing up the confessions of Jared Smith and Lucy Elmendorf. Nixon had dictated it to her. The defendants had complained about this, but their counsel told them the law would disregard any declaration of guilt signed at gunpoint.

  Rory listened for the sound of Judge Wieland’s breathing. He had gone fearfully quiet. She risked turning her head.

  Wieland lay on his back, bunching the wet fabric of his robe against his shoulder to keep pressure on the wound. He looked pale and vague with pain. Forty-five minutes without medical aid. A knot lodged in Rory’s throat.

  She opened her mouth to say something to Nixon. He saw her and jerked his head.

  “Eyes out the window,” he said.

  “This is Sergeant Nguyen. Is everybody still okay in there?”

  Nixon yelled at the doors. “Where’s my gold bullion?”

  “If we’re going to talk about that, let’s do it over the phone so we don’t have to shout. Can you pick up the phone at the judge’s desk?”

  “No. You better tell me the gold’s on its way.”

  “If we’re going to arrange that, we need something from you,” Nguyen said.

  “When will it be here?”

  Reagan jittered to Nixon’s side. They whispered a moment. Reagan, twitchy, hissed, “Mexico? Don’t like that.”

  “It’s a stopgap.”

  “But it won’t be the end.”

  “It will be for us unless we get out of here.”

  Nixon turned back to the door. “And get the networks here to broadcast the defendants’ confession. I don’t see any TV cameras outside.”

  “That might be workable. But for a broadcast to be arranged, we all need to work on an agreement. I understand that the defendants’ confessions are being signed. That’s major. So earn yourself some goodwill in return. How about you let some of the hostages go?”

  “What part of no don’t you get? You give me what I ask for; then we’ll see who comes out.”