by A Rosendale
* * *
Cooper peeked around the landing to see the guard file down a nail with his teeth. ‘Bad habit,’ he thought to himself in his mother’s voice. He squinted at the treadmill beside Lusana. Yes, that was definitely a gun. Carefully, he leaned further to see Mr. Johnson wipe blood from his lips and take a step across the padded flooring. An inch further and Cooper’s heart skipped. There was his dad in jogging pants and T-shirt, barefoot. He hadn’t seen Dirk but the once nearly two weeks prior.
* * *
They grappled for another ten minutes before breaking apart. Johnson was sweating profusely as he watched his subject stumble across the mat out of reach. His slim body squirmed away from Johnson’s uncoordinated, beefy hands. Bruises were becoming visible on Dirk’s pale arms and cheek, but there was no blood leaking from his nose and mouth like Johnson’s. He’d endured a slew of beatings early on in prison, but he’d forgotten how bad a blow to the face could hurt.
“You’re getting tired,” he accused, watching Dirk plant his hands on his knees, breathing hard.
Dirk couldn’t argue. The exercises he’d struggled through had paid off in helping regain a modicum of strength, but his stamina had suffered greatly. His hands shook with exertion. He clenched them into fists to hide the effect.
“You’re no energizer bunny, either.” Even his voice sounded strained and tired. Their engagement had only lasted twenty minutes so far. If it didn’t end soon, he’d no longer have the energy to defend himself. He cursed his weakness and took a deep breath.
Up to this point, he’d let Johnson charge first, but now he lunged across the mat and rammed his shoulder into the man’s significant gut. They both tumbled to the ground, rolling with momentum. Dirk judged their velocity and threw his weight to stop the jumbling and remain on top, straddling Johnson. Before Johnson could gather his bearings, Dirk wrapped both hands around his throat and squeezed. Meaty hands scrambled and tried to pry the fingers loose, but Dirk’s grip was firm.
The former politician’s face filled his vision, turning crimson. The view captivated him. Finally, this vile nemesis was at his mercy. His family’s suffering could end here and now with the man’s last breath, his last heart beat.
Johnson’s hands stopped fumbling at his attacker and he snapped his fingers frantically.
* * *
Cooper watched Lusana rise lazily from his seat and cross to where his dad pinned Mr. Johnson to the floor. His eyes darted to the gun that was left undisturbed on the treadmill.
* * *
Dirk’s tired mind was focused wholeheartedly on the goal before him, he didn’t even notice Lusana until the solid bicep wrapped around his neck from behind and lifted him away, then flung him to the side. He flew through the air, hit the ground with a breathless slam and rolled hard into a weight machine. Through his own struggle for breath, he could hear Johnson’s coughs and spluttering.
Lusana followed his projectile and was kneeling at Dirk’s side, reaching for him, when all three men froze.
“Stop!”
Dirk couldn’t believe his eyes. Cooper was aiming a 9mm pistol at Johnson. His eyes were wide and bright green, but he held the gun confidently, just the way Alma had taught him. Only a slight tremble betrayed his uncertainty.
The choice the child faced was quite clear. If he shot Eric Johnson, the whole ordeal would be over. Another shot would eliminate Lusana. Two bullets were all it would take to have his family back.
“Cooper, put the gun down,” Johnson cooed, his voice gruff.
“Put it down, boy,” Lusana growled.
His hand shook a little harder. “Dad?”
Dirk knew he would have pulled the trigger in an instant. But he stared at his son’s young, pale face, his wide, terrified eyes. Suddenly, he was back on his first assignment with Vasquez. The terrorist in his rifle sights was unaware of their presence a hundred yards away. “Now,” Vasquez had whispered. Dirk hesitated. He was about to extinguish a life, a flame that could never be reignited. The thought terrified him. “Now!” his mentor had insisted. Regretfully, he’d squeezed the trigger and the man’s life ceased in an instant. That moment had haunted him for years.
“No, Coop,” he said quietly, unwilling to shove that burden upon his child.
“Dad?” he said again, this time shooting a quick glance at Dirk.
“Put the gun down, Cooper.” He thought about ordering him to bring it to him, but Lusana was too close. There was no way out of this situation that would both liberate them and maintain his son’s innocence.
“But…”
“It’s okay,” he said softly.
The same instant the gun touched the ground, Lusana bolted across the room to scoop it up. Cooper passed him at a run and dove into his father’s arms. His whole body trembled as Dirk cradled him against his chest. He buried his face in Dirk’s shoulder while his dad rubbed his back in comfort.
“Why-” the boy started to demand.
“I couldn’t let you do that,” he muttered, watching Lusana help Johnson to his feet.
“But-”
“Sshh,” he whispered. Stiff and sore, he pushed the both of them to their feet, keeping Cooper close under his arm.
Johnson touched his neck tenderly as he glared at the pair. He motioned to his guard and together they advanced on Dirk and Cooper.
Dirk drew the boy behind him.
“Don’t touch him,” he said acidly.
“Step aside, Travers.”
“Go to hell.”
Lusana pointed the gun at him casually. Dirk froze. The guard grasped him by the upper arm and jerked him away. Cooper clutched at his shirt, but Johnson grabbed his thin wrist. He backhanded the boy so hard he fell to the mat.
“Leave him alone!” Dirk yelled, struggling.
Cooper stumbled to his feet. He wondered for a moment what that metallic taste in his mouth was, but Johnson had grabbed him again before he could identify it.
“Stop!”
Lusana shoved the pistol barrel under Dirk’s chin and grabbed his hair, yanking his head back. “Shut up.”
“Stop,” he muttered again through clenched teeth.
Johnson hit Cooper again. This time when he hit the ground, there were spots in his vision.
“Go to your room,” Johnson ordered.
Cooper scrambled across the room. He paused at the stairs, blood seeping from his mouth. He shot a terrified look back at his dad.
“Go,” Dirk added.
He turned and ran.
“Your son is as stupidly cavalier as you are, Travers. It will obviously get him killed, just as it will you.” He nudged Lusana’s gun aside and grabbed Dirk by the throat.
* * *
Cooper pounded desperately on his mother’s door. When there was no answer, he tried the knob. It twisted easily in his hand and he stumbled inside in surprise. But the room was empty, as was the attached bathroom. Terror built in his throat and he brushed furiously at the tears clouding his vision. Blindly, he went next door and knocked on Wyatt’s door.
“Wyatt?” he said in a strangled voice.
“Cooper? Is that you?”
“Hold on.” He wiped his nose on his shirt before standing on tiptoes to take a tiny screwdriver from the top of the doorframe, then reached for an identical tool hidden on the top of his mom’s door.
“What are you doing?”
“Just hold on a second.” He focused on the door lock. He’d seen Dirk pick the lock on their back door at home once when they’d accidentally locked the keys inside while playing with Bailey. ‘It can’t be that hard,’ he’d thought. Over the past few weeks, he’d discovered the tiny screwdrivers above every door and fiddled with them in his own bedroom lock late at night.
After thirty seconds, the lock mechanism sprang apart and he stumbled into the room. Wyatt took in his blood shot eyes, bloodied mouth, and pale skin, then pulled him into a one-armed hug. The comforting touch brought the boy to tears and he collapsed. Wyatt steered
him to the bed and they sat on the edge until the sobs subsided and Cooper could speak intelligibly.
“What happened, bud?”
He looked at the FBI agent for the first time since Dr. Miles’s house. His left arm was in a sling and his cheeks were scruffy and unshaven. The jeans and flannel shirt were laundered, but definitely the same outfit he’d worn upon their capture.
“I…I tried to shoot Mr. Johnson, but my dad wouldn’t let me.”
Ramsey almost cursed, but suddenly realized the father’s perspective. “I’m sorry, Cooper, but I think your dad was right.”
“But I had him in my sights! I could have ended everything!” He rubbed furiously at the childish tears that filled his eyes.
Ramsey didn’t think it was his place to explain Travers’s reasoning. He put a hand on the boy’s knee. “It’s okay, bud.”
The gentle words rather than a slew of rationale caught Cooper off guard. He swallowed and tried not to think of his dad, still trapped in the basement with Johnson and Lusana.
“I…I couldn’t find my mom,” he said quietly. “Her room is empty.”
Ramsey set his jaw and ground his teeth hard. He put his arm around the boy again and struggled with how to distract him.
“What else has been going on?”
“Well,” he sniffled, “We met a guy named Flescher. Michael Flescher, I think. He’s an-”
“Ambassador,” Ramsey finished, surprising his young companion. He’d read about the man a number of times.
“Uh, yeah. Mom thinks he might help us.”
Ramsey scoffed. “He’s always been one to play both sides.” He read sudden alarm on Cooper’s face. “But, that’s not to say he won’t help,” he hurried to reassure the child.
Chapter 79
Alma came awake slowly. Her whole body ached and she regretted the necessity to open her eyes. The room was unfamiliar; bright daylight cut through the drapes, striping the white walls like prison bars. The sheets were cool on her bare skin and the down comforter provided a comforting weight.
With a groan, she sat up, hugging the sheets to her chest. She was in a king-sized four-poster bed. The furnishings in the room were elegant and in pristine condition.
The sudden memory of metallic blood in her mouth sent her careening toward the attached bathroom. She gagged violently, but there was nothing in her stomach, so she spat instead, dredging up every drop of saliva to expel the memory of blood from her taste buds. Finally, she looked around the bathroom, deciding officially that this was the master suite, Johnson’s suite. The gray and white tiled room consisted of a glass walk-in shower, a Jacuzzi tub, and two beautiful vessel sinks.
A sudden chill flushed her skin with goose bumps. She realized she was naked, in Johnson’s personal suite, in his bed. Her stomach roiled at the obvious course of events and she dry-heaved over one of the sinks. A glance in the mirror showed a dark purple bruise covering her swollen right jaw. It looked like she had an egg stuffed in her cheek it was so inflamed.
Disgusted, she turned the shower on blistering hot and scrubbed every inch of her skin until it was lobster red. When she could take no more, she returned to the bed, wrapped the comforter tight around her, and curled around a pillow to cry.
* * *
“You said he was ‘weak’!” Johnson exclaimed as he sloshed vodka into a glass. Some of it splashed out in his shaky hands. He hissed when the alcohol burned the open cuts inside his mouth.
“He was!” Dr. Smith insisted. “Hell, he was shaking like a leaf less than two hours ago.”
Johnson scoffed. “Well, he made a miraculous recovery!”
“Where is he?”
“In the basement. He was alive, right?” His question was pointed at Lusana who was clipping his holster back on his belt with a self-deprecating scowl.
The black man shrugged. “Who cares?” he muttered angrily.
“You better check before you go, doctor. But right now, what do you recommend?” He motioned to his swollen mouth and nose, then down to his bruised neck. He found a small inkling of satisfaction knowing Travers would have matching bruises when he woke.
“Travers did this?” Smith said incredulously. He stood to gently inspect Johnson’s face and neck.
“Ow! I can’t believe you’re a doctor with those clubs for fingers!”
Smith crossed his arms. “Even Travers is less sensitive than you,” he sneered. “Nothing’s broken, you big baby. Put some ice on it. It’ll help with the swelling. And for God’s sake, grow up, Johnson.”
The big man glowered as the doctor picked up his bag.
“Don’t forget to make sure Travers is alive,” he growled.
“You want me to leave him there or take him upstairs?”
“Just make sure he’s breathing and leave him there.” He was already pressing the vodka glass to his face, alternating the cooling effects of the ice with the numbing of alcohol consumption.
Smith rolled his eyes and started out the office door. Then he paused. “What about the woman? Does she need-”
Johnson let out a hearty laugh. “No. She’s fine. After she passed out last night, I had Amelia put her in my room. She thinks I had my way with her and I don’t intend to tell her otherwise.”
The doctor shook his head. ‘What a crazy bastard,’ he thought to himself and backed out of the room.
“If Travers is dead, I’m cutting your pay in half,” Johnson called after him.
“What?!” He stepped back to the threshold. “I’m not the one that beat him to death in the basement!”
But the corpulent man turned his back in dismissal. Seething, Smith found the basement stairs.
Chapter 80
Exercise machines looked like alien shadows to Dirk’s addled brain. His whole body ached and he assumed Johnson and Lusana hadn’t stopped their blows after strangling him into unconsciousness. He was considering sitting up when the overhead lights flashed on and sent daggers of pain through his skull. Eyes shut tight, he lay still until a finger pressed against the bruised skin on his throat. Then he flinched and scooted away, afraid the fingers would grip his larynx again.
“Easy,” Dr. Smith’s voice cooed. “It’s just me.”
“Oh. That’s a relief,” he croaked sarcastically.
Smith sat back on his heels. Before Johnson and Lusana had abandoned the man, they’d zip tied his hands behind his back.
“Better me than that asshole,” he muttered, pointing to the ceiling toward Johnson’s office.
Dirk’s scoff came out as a strangled cough. “Have you seen my wife lately? Johnson took her from my room last night. Did he rape her?” There was a murderous glint in his eye.
Smith considered his response. Johnson’s casual dismissal and monetary threat still grated on his nerves. “He didn’t rape her. She’s fine. He just wanted both of you to think he did.”
A sigh of relief made Dirk collapse against the machine at his back.
He looked at the end of his rope, Smith thought. Hell, the man had nearly died at least twice since he’d known him. “What the hell did you do to Johnson?” he asked curiously. Until now, he hadn’t bothered to care; he was only involved for the extraordinary amount of money. But Johnson’s grating comments and threats were getting old.
“I put him in prison twenty years ago.”
“For?”
“For plotting the murder of thousands of innocent American’s.”
“And that guy upstairs?”
“The arresting agent.”
“He’s going to kill you all. You know that, right?”
His patient sighed heavily. “Yeah. I just need to get my family out of here before that happens.”
Smith frowned. “You’re not exactly in good form to do that.”
Travers slumped and nodded. “I know.”
The doctor studied him and finally shook his head clear. “Johnson said to leave you down here. Sorry.”
Dirk’s eyes widened in surprise. It was the fir
st time the man had apologized for anything.
He gained his feet, picked up the bag, and disappeared upstairs.
* * *
Dirk rested against the exercise machine for a while longer, then wiggled his wrists under his feet. ‘That maneuver was easier when I was twenty-five,’ he thought as stiff limbs stretched awkwardly. They were still tied together, but at least he could use his hands now.
Finally standing, he started for the stairs. Johnson had demanded he be left down there, but Dirk had no intention of sitting around waiting when he could be doing reconnaissance of the mansion, gathering valuable information for a potential escape. Whisper quiet, he crept upstairs.
Johnson’s bombastic voice echoed from the hall to his right, so he turned left and slipped into a massive kitchen. He was rounding the island when Amelia appeared from the pantry. She froze in shock, giving Dirk enough time to run out of the room toward what he suspected must be behind the kitchen. Sure enough, there was a hidden staircase meant for the help to use so the master of the house didn’t have to endure their constant comings and goings. It was a common fixture in massive homes like this. He heard Amelia’s first startled cries as he mounted the steps.
The stairwell opened right outside the room he’d been held in. There was the bed with the wrist restraints, the window that looked longingly over green fields and forestland. ‘Alma. Where would Alma be?’ he thought. ‘Johnson’s bedroom,’ he answered himself grimly. He hurried along the long hallway, which was eventually bordered on one side by a bannister and locked doors on the other.
By now he could hear Amelia’s alarms and Johnson’s heavy footfalls underscored by Lusana’s lighter, faster gait on the hardwood floors nearing the elegant staircase ahead. Beyond that, Dirk could see a double door framed by crown molding and correctly assumed that was Johnson’s master suite.
He passed the staircase seconds before Lusana crested the top step and barreled toward the door. He was reaching for the knob when the guard tackled him from behind, slamming his upper body against the door with a painful thud.