by Jeff Gunhus
Bingo.
There were four separate files. The bastard Summerhays had copped to only two visits to the woman. He couldn’t help lying even when there wasn’t a reason to. Harris clicked on a few spots in the middle of the video and couldn’t help but let out a howl of laughter. He found it fitting that the man who was front-runner to lead the free world got off on playing the submissive. Harris’s favorite screenshot was of the Senator with a gag in his mouth, hands tied to the corners of the four-postered bed with Tracy Bain in full dominatrix costume. The best part was that she was doing something to the man’s rear end that Harris was pretty sure the conservative voters in America’s Bible Belt would have trouble stomaching.
He closed the video and then did exactly what he swore to Summerhays and his flack Libby he would never do. He made a copy for himself.
Only a sucker didn’t have an insurance policy when the stakes were this high. And while Harris was many things, he wasn’t a sucker.
While the computer copied the large file, Harris went back to the main folder and rolled through the thumbnails until he came to the last file. He opened it and watched the first four minutes of the video, mesmerized.
“I’ll be damned,” he murmured.
He could have kept watching, wanted to keep watching, but he knew his guests would be coming soon. Harris selected the video of Tracy Bain’s murder and copied it to his hard drive. He didn’t know if it would ever prove to be useful, but it was nice to have.
Harris picked up his gardening shears. Once he’d tried the medical version, but found the run-of-the-mill version available at Home Depot to be the most effective. He usually loved the weight of them but he was using his right hand because his left was still throbbing from being slammed in the cell door. Despite feeling awkward in his hand, the shears definitely got the job done.
“This hard drive and the laptop were the only copies?” Harris said.
“Yes, I told you that already.”
She was eyeing the shears. Harris liked that.
“Anyone else know about them?”
Natalie shook her head. “I only know about the FBI woman. I told you everything I know.” Her lip quivered as she stared at the shears. “Please, I didn’t even know what was on there until now. And Tracy told me I was the only one she sent these to. I was the only one she could trust.”
Harris clicked the shears thoughtfully, enjoying the sound of the hinge and the metal blades scraping against one another.
“I’m going to take off one more toe.”
“Nooooo, pleeease,” she whined. “I did everything you said. Pleeease.”
“I’ll make you a deal,” Harris said, placing his elbows on the table and leaning toward her as if they were a couple deciding which movie to go see. “I’ll let you choose which toe.”
Natalie kicked and bucked, screaming angrily, but the zip-ties around her ankles and wrists just dug deeper into her skin. Harris waited until she wore herself out, knowing there was no risk of her getting loose.
“You don’t like that idea?” he asked. “OK, I’m a reasonable guy. You tell me about one more copy that you made and you can keep your toe.”
Natalie started to cry. Low, baleful sobs of someone who understood the hopelessness of their situation.
“But there are no more copies,” she cried. Harris liked this part, where the person’s pride was gone completely, replaced by pure fear. “I never even looked at the files. There was a password. You saw. I didn’t even know what’s on them.”
Harris clicked the shears and bent down to inspect his captive’s feet. It was a shame because they were pretty feet, well kept, painted a fashionable red. One of the toes he’d cut off even had a little yellow flower painted on it. He thought about pocketing that one as a souvenir but then thought better of it.
“There are no more copies, you asshole!” she screamed.
“I wish I could just believe you,” Harris said, selecting a toe on her right foot this time. “Problem is, I’m not a very trusting person.”
41
Allison checked her gun, reconfirming that it was loaded. She popped her trunk and pulled out a ballistic vest. The phrase bulletproof vest didn’t quite work anymore since there were rounds specifically designed to pierce through the vests used by the FBI. She pulled it on and pulled the FBI windbreaker over it. A wave of déjà vu filled her with foreboding. Even though she rationalized that the feeling came from what happened with Sam Kraw, it didn’t make her feel any less uneasy.
“We can’t go out there,” Mike said. “This is crazy.”
She tried to look confident. “Given what this guy’s done so far, do you have any doubt that he’ll kill Natalie if we don’t go?”
Mike turned away. “Still feel like we should be calling in backup. I guarantee that Garret wouldn’t walk into something like this.”
“No, he’d let the girl die,” Allison said, pulling out a small leather bag before slamming the trunk door. The worst was that she knew Garret would be right in waiting. If she went in there alone she’d be breaking a dozen rules of engagement. If she dragged Mike along with her then it was going to be even worse. But saving Natalie was more important than her career, so she didn’t even hesitate. “The guy asked for you too. I can’t make you go––”
“––but if I don’t, I’m a coward willing to let a girl die because I’m too scared.”
“I was going to say I’d understand if you didn’t, but I like your version better.”
Allison opened her car door and looked over to Mike.
“So?”
“Dammit,” he said, opening his own door. “This better be an exclusive story.”
“If we live through this, it’s all yours,” Allison said.
“That’s comforting.”
She threw the car into gear and raced down Harlow’s deserted main drag. Everyone awake was over at the fire at the Smith-Shelly House and Allison and Mike were heading in the opposite direction.
The location given to them over the phone was only a fifteen-minute drive, but it might as well have been a helicopter drop into the middle of nowhere. A rusted-out sign on the road marked the entrance to Chaney’s Quarry but the gravel road was overgrown with weeds that reached as high as the car’s headlights. With the high beams on, Allison saw the faint outline of the path another car had recently taken through the weeds. This was the right place.
The car bounced along the road. They passed by a chain-link fence that looked to be mostly reclaimed by the forest growing around it and finally arrived at a hulking warehouse next to an enormous hole in the ground.
Allison parked the car some distance from the warehouse and turned off the engine.
“Now what?” Mike said.
Allison pulled out her phone and dialed. “Sheriff, this is Agent McNeil.”
“Goddammit, where are you?” the sheriff shouted, loud enough that she had to hold the phone from her ear. “I have people looking for you. Thought you were fool enough to go back into the fire.”
She could hear sirens in the background. It meant he was still at the fire and didn’t know about his deputy yet.
“I’m sorry, but I need you to listen to me closely.” She explained what was going on, where they were and what she needed the sheriff to do. To his credit, the only time he interrupted was when she told him about Deputy Cal back at the station.
“Wait. Say that again,” was all he said. She heard him groan when she restated the bad news of his deputy’s death, but that was it.
When she was done, the sheriff didn’t say anything. All Allison could hear was the sounds of sirens and the commotion of a fire being fought. It occurred to her that the large man might very well have had a heart attack and was lying sprawled on the grass lawn.
“Sheriff Frank, did you hear what I said?” she said loudly.
“Yeah, I’m here, goddammit,” he said. “Copy. Will have units en route to your location.”
“Stay off the radios; a
nyone with a police scanner will pick that up. If someone breaks radio silence, this guy will kill Natalie.”
“Copy that. We’ll coordinate with cell phones.” There was a long pause. “And you’re gonna hold tight until we get there, right?”
“You bet,” Allison lied. “Just hurry it up.”
“Frank out.”
“What was that all about?” Mike asked.
“By the time they get here, we’ll either have this guy in custody or we’ll be dead along with Natalie. If we showed up with a posse, he would have killed her and escaped. For some reason, this guy wants to talk to us. Especially you. Any idea why?”
Mike shook his head. “Not a clue. You know everything I do.”
Allison reached for the leather bag she’d taken from the trunk. She pulled out a second Glock and held it out to him.
“You know how to use a gun?”
He took it, smoothly slid out the mag and checked that it was full before snapping it back into place.
“I hang out with a lot of law enforcement,” Mike said. “I’ve spent a lot of time at gun ranges blowing off steam with the guys.”
“It’s different when it’s a person,” Allison said. The image of Sam Kraw’s head disappearing in a cloud of red mist came to her. “Keep in mind we don’t know how many people are in there.”
“That’s comforting,” Mike said.
Allison climbed out of the car and Mike followed. They approached the big sliding doors that led to the loading bay of the warehouse. One of the doors was slid back on its rusted track to create an opening. Judging by where the weeds stopped growing, it looked like someone had opened the door recently.
“Let’s split up,” she said. “I’ll go through here. You check out that door down there.” She pointed to a door about twenty yards to the right.
Mike nodded and took the order without question. He jogged down to the door, staying close to the wall. While Allison waited for him to get into position, she leaned against the building, her heart knocking in her chest as the adrenaline pumped into her system. She was taking huge risks, propelled by the momentum of events. Her only operating philosophy had been to catch the killer, and now she added rescuing Natalie to that. But with even a few seconds pause, she felt needling self-doubt creep up on her.
Everything she was doing went against her training. The truth was that it was bordering on recklessness and she knew it. But she’d played out every scenario she could imagine if she played it by the book and they all ended with Natalie dead. Even though she’d just met the woman, she felt a disproportionate sense of responsibility to her and her murdered sister. Maybe it was because of the story of their abuse. Or that people their entire lives had abandoned them when they needed them most. She knew these women and she was willing to do anything necessary to save one and avenge the other.
Down the wall, Mike reached the door and stood ready, waiting for her signal to go in. A voice in her head whispered for her to call it off, to wait for Sheriff Frank to arrive with whatever law enforcement he’d mustered from surrounding towns. She knew they would have been called in for the fire; something like that was big news. There would be people from three or four towns away, so he was probably able to round up some decent firepower. But one look at the warehouse and the property and she knew it was impossible to block off all of the exits. Natalie would be dead and the killer or killers out of there before the first trooper rolled his car to a stop.
No, this was the only way to go. For whatever reason, the voice on the phone wanted to talk to both her and Mike. Obviously, there was something they had that he wanted. It was a bargaining chip, perhaps a small one and not enough to keep them from getting killed, but it was all they had.
She held up her hand toward Mike and counted down from three, then entered the warehouse.
42
She didn’t like it.
The warehouse space seemed impossibly large, soaring upward three stories and with great lateral span that made it seem like an airplane hanger. Enough of the glass had been broken out of the upper levels of the structure that moonlight filtered in, painting everything in ghostly shades of grey. Metal walkways crisscrossed the area over her, following the path of guide tracks for old pulley systems that looked like they hadn’t been put to use in decades. The floor of the warehouse, which appeared to have been some kind of assembly plant or a factory at one point, was littered with rusted shipping containers, old tires and piles of trash. A loud, irritated squeaking noise came from the biggest pile of debris near her and a dozen rats scurried away. She was just happy they were moving away from her because they were scared and not toward her because they were hungry.
She looked to her right and saw Mike briefly outlined in a shaft of moonlight before the door he used to enter closed behind him. Once it was shut, he disappeared into the shadows. She felt a pang of guilt for bringing him along. He was a civilian after all, not trained for this, nor paid to be here.
Of course, she was a behavioral analyst and not really trained for the field either. And she would be getting paid the same if she was taking her administrative leave on a beach somewhere. As she looked around her position, facing hundreds of spots where a sniper could easily pick her off, and with no plan of what she was going to do to rescue Natalie Bain even if she did find her, a beach suddenly sounded kind of inviting.
Bottom line, they had made the choice to be there and step into harm’s way. There was only one way to go. She stepped forward into the dark, cavernous building, crouched low, gun drawn.
“Special Agent McNeil.”
The voice boomed in the open space, smashing the silence. Allison flinched and threw herself against one of the shipping containers. The sound reverberated through the warehouse, making it impossible to peg where it came from.
“Thank you for coming on such short notice.”
“Where’s Natalie?” Allison called out.
“She’s fine,” came the voice. “Thanks to you. I was getting antsy.”
“What do you want?”
“Is Mike Carrel here with you?” the voice asked, the fake gentility giving way to an edge of anger. “I told you to bring him.”
“He’s here,” Allison said. “Bring Natalie out where we can see her and we’ll talk to you.”
“Not the way it works,” the voice said. “I don’t think you’re taking this seriously enough. Look next to you.”
Allison felt her throat constrict. She looked to the container on her left and saw nothing at first. Then, like magic, a red dot from a laser scope popped into existence two inches from her face, painting the metal surface. Allison held her breath as the dot moved over and took a position on her chest.
She fought to control her breathing and keep her wits about her. Logic told her that the shot would have already been taken without all the theatrics if that were the end game here. Still, being at the end of what she assumed was a high-powered rifle wielded by someone who had killed two people in the last twenty-four hours made it a little hard to relax. There was a chance that a sudden movement would throw the shooter off, but then what? In her exposed position and without knowing where he was, what chance did she have? What had just seemed like a really bad idea minutes before now seemed plain stupid.
“Why don’t you tell Mr. Carrel what’s going on and ask him to step out where I can see him?” the voice boomed.
“Bring out Natalie so we know she’s OK,” Allison yelled.
She didn’t even register the movement of the red dot down her torso and coming to a stop on the outer thigh of her right leg.
The sound of the silenced bullet registered in her brain a split second before all of her nerve receptors were overloaded with an explosion of pain. The bullet ripped through her quad, blowing a chunk of it out the backside of her leg. The impact spun her around and she slammed to the floor. She screamed, a guttural call that was both pain and anger. She latched onto the anger only because giving in to the pain meant curling up into a
ball and sobbing. If she did that, she knew she would die in a shitty warehouse in Harlow, West Virginia. That wasn’t her plan.
“C’mon, Agent McNeil,” said the voice. “It’s not that bad. That was a clean shot. Right through the meat.”
She dragged herself around the back of the container, pulled herself into the open end and sat against the interior wall, her chest heaving. She reached back and put a hand on the exit wound behind her leg and felt around. Besides the blood gushing around her fingers, there was a flap of skin and flesh hanging there. She put them back into the crater created by the bullet and pressed hard, groaning from the pain. She spotted an old piece of cloth farther back in the container, reached for it and dragged it to her. It was covered with oil stains and who knew what other kinds of chemicals, but it was better than bleeding out. She rolled it around her thigh a few times and cinched it tight.
“Mr. Carrel,” said the voice, “if you’re in here, I’d like for you to show yourself. Now.”
Allison stilled her breathing, wondering how Mike would react. The shooter had just admitted he didn’t know whether Mike was in the warehouse yet. That was an advantage. The play was to keep quiet and let the shooter keep talking to reveal his location. As long as he didn’t also keep plugging her with bullets, it was the best chance they had.
“What do you want?” Mike asked, his voice seeming to come from higher up in the structure.
So much for their advantage.
“Ahh…there you are,” said the voice.
Allison figured the shooter would be using his scope to search for Mike so she decided to make her move. She stood and found she could put more weight on her wounded leg than she anticipated. Gritting her teeth, she limped as fast as she could away from the container, heading toward a wreck of a delivery truck in the opposite direction of Mike’s voice.