Freeze Frame

by Judith Rochelle

  He was also sure that someone from the Phoenix Agency would call him this morning. If he didn’t have answers for them, they’d simply tell him politely—or not so politely—to kiss their ass and go off and do their own thing. He had no doubt that with their contacts and unshackled by the restraints of political pressure and government rules, they’d find out who was behind this, rescue the hostages and he and his men would all be called to Washington to have their asses handed to them.

  Well, shit.

  When he walked back into Pelley’s office, he saw that the big coffee urn from the employee cafeteria was bubbling away on the sideboard and plates of pastries had been set out. Pelley was waiting for him impatiently.

  “I got another call,” he blurted out. “And another email. While you were showering. They want the ransom drop at ten thirty today.”

  Delaware poured himself a cup of coffee and sipped it while he kicked his brain into gear. “Will you have the bonds by then?”

  “Yes. I was very specific that I had to have them by nine o’clock.”

  “What else did the email say?”

  “That the moment they have the bonds in hand they will take the hostages someplace we can pick them up and release them.”

  “That’s taking a big risk,” Delaware pointed out. “We don’t even know who the hell we’re dealing with here or where they’re keeping the hostages. We’re totally at their mercy.”

  “Do we have a choice?” Pelley asked.

  “Okay.” He pulled out his cell phone. “We’re down to the wire here. I’m calling my agents babysitting Post and Prescott and having them brought here.”

  “Here?” Pelley looked startled. “Why? What can they do here?”

  “They can wait with us until we get word. No more of this three separate emails. Because if we don’t hear from the kidnappers within a reasonable time after they get the bonds, I’m going to start squeezing all of you until the blood flows.”

  “Hey.” Pelley threw up his hands. “Wait a minute. I hope you’re not saying what I think you are.”

  “I’m saying we’ll do whatever it takes. Because if we don’t do it, Phoenix will and you sure won’t like the fallout from that.”

  * * * * *

  “I want to do this,” Kat said, stirring sweetener into her coffee. She usually drank it black but this morning she wanted the extra surge of energy.

  “Are you sure you aren’t pushing yourself too hard?” The concern in Mike’s voice was too obvious.

  “I promise you.” She looked around the table. “All of you. You have no idea what it’s like not having Brent Fontaine hanging over me. He interfered with my energy and weakened my gift. But now I’m stronger than ever. I know I can do this.”

  “We don’t have any more information than we did last night,” Mark reminded her.

  “It doesn’t matter.” She tried to find the words to convince them. “I just feel it. Inside. Here.” She tapped her chest with a fist. “I’m being pulled to do this. I’m telling you, all of you. We have to set up so I can do this.”

  They’d discussed it back and forth over breakfast, realizing their leads were down to none, pushing Andy to keep digging for more information, working their contacts via cell phone. And Kat knew by the look on everyone’s faces that the thing they didn’t want to tell her was time was getting short. They had no idea where the feds stood with the ransom and Dan was leery of calling Anthony Delaware.

  “I don’t want to get into a pissing contest with him,” he explained. “They don’t want us near this, despite the fact that Mari is one of the hostages. Something is very off about this and I think that’s why they’re shutting us out.”

  “All the more reason for me to do this,” Kat had pleaded. “I have a funny feeling that Mari and the Wrights are still someplace on Herrera’s estancia. They wouldn’t risk moving them too far away.”

  “Kat, if you can give us an idea of where that would be, I can get Andy to steal some satellite time,” Dan said, then turned to Mike. “This time he’ll need to steal it from a better satellite, one where he can zoom in. One that has capabilities of using infrared heat signatures to see if there are actually people there.”

  “Damn it.” Mike smacked his hand on the table. “We should have had him do that to begin with.”

  “We had no reason to expect the hostages weren’t there.”

  “Because you depended too much on me,” Kat apologized. “I’m very, very sorry. I did tell you from the beginning remote viewing is only eighty to ninety percent accurate. But this is the strongest I’ve felt about this since we started. And the best images I’d gotten.”

  Mike gently brushed his knuckles across her cheekbone. “It’s all right, kitten. We wouldn’t have gotten this far without you.”

  “I know I told you my powers had been…compromised,” she fretted. “Except now the situation was fixed, I thought… Anyway, I know I can do this. Please.”

  “All right, then.” Dan pushed back from the table. “Let’s get to it.”

  With the dishes cleared away, they again darkened the room and left only the only lamp lit. Kat asked for a glass of water and Mike placed one close to her right hand but far enough away so she wouldn’t spill it.

  Dan handed her the photos and she arranged them in front of her, along with a pad of paper on which to draw. Then she closed her eyes and let her mind reach out. Again, somewhat blurred, she saw the stretch of the marijuana field, the glimpses of trees. Then it disappeared to be replaced by a thick copse of trees. The trees wavered, like aspen limbs in a wind. Kat blinked and there it was. The freeze frame. Just as clear as if she was viewing it through the lens of a camera. A hut similar to the one she’d seen before, surrounded on all sides by trees. No marijuana fields here. A window high on one wall. And two guards, leaning casually against the wall on either side of a wooden door, guns cradled loosely in their hands.

  Kat drew as fast as she could, not concerned with the neatness of her sketch, only with accuracy and trying to get as many details down before the images faded away.

  Not yet, not yet, she shouted inside her brain, as the image began to waver and fade.

  Then it was gone and she leaned back in the chair, exhilarated at what she’d seen. Rick pulled the drapes open and she blinked against the blaze of sunlight. Sipping the ice water, she tried to gather her thoughts to explain what she’d seen.

  “If you sit back down at the table,” she told the others, “it will be easier for you to see this and for me to explain what I’ve drawn.”

  She took them through it, pulling out as many details as she could, answering their questions to the best of her ability.

  “Will you have to wait until tonight to go in for them?” Kat asked, trying to hold back her anxiety.

  “It would be the optimum thing to do,” Mike answered, “but we may be running out of time here.”

  “Now that we’ve got something to go on,” Mark said, “wouldn’t this be a good time to call Delaware and rattle his cage? See what’s happening on their end?”

  “I agree,” Dan said. “Why don’t you do that while I call Andy and order him to use every trick he can to steal the satellite images we want. This time we’ll make sure there are people inside.”

  * * * * *

  Shit! Hell and damnation!

  Anthony Delaware closed his cell phone with a vicious snap and shoved it in his pocket. He’d known Phoenix wouldn‘t leave him alone indefinitely. Not with their connection to one of the hostages. The call wasn’t what bothered him. It was Mark Halloran’s reaction to the news they were getting ready to pay the ransom.

  No further questions. Nothing about the release of the hostages. None of the usual questions he’d ask in their situation. That meant only one thing. They’d learned who the kidnapper was, where he was keeping the hostages and they were mounting their own rescue mission.

  He’d told his boss this was likely to happen. Nothing he said would keep them out of this, a
rresting them would only create a huge clusterfuck and he knew in his bones by the time he got through he and the entire FBI would look like incompetent asses. His only piece of good luck was the fact that these guys didn’t want publicity, didn’t like it and didn’t seek it. So whatever went down would remain hidden as much as possible.

  That still didn’t solve his immediate problems. Where the hell were the hostages, who had kidnapped them and what assurance did they have of getting them back? And finally, best of all, which one of the three jackasses sitting at the table in Pelley’s conference room was the poison in the pie?

  “All right, everyone.” He took his seat at the head of the table. “I think we’re about to make a huge mistake but we don’t appear to have a choice.”

  “I want to know why you’ve had me dragged here,” Rand Prescott demanded. “It’s bad enough I’ve had one of your agents breathing down my neck for three days. Now I’m forcibly dragged from my hotel suite and told I have to stay for…well, no one said for how long. I know we have a crisis situation here but I still have businesses to run.”

  “I’m sure you do,” the agent told him. “But I’d like to think Eli Wright’s life and that of his family and Miss Culhane takes a little precedence.”

  “Bag it, Prescott.” Ryan Post’s voice dripped with sarcasm. “None of us has a choice here and you know it.”

  Since he’d arrived with his escort, Delaware had watched him downing coffee liberally laced with aged brandy from Ron Pelley’s well-stocked bar.

  “I want to know who that was on the phone,” Pelley demanded.

  “No one you need to be concerned with.” Delaware was damned if he’d give the information about the conversation to these people. Things were bad enough as it was. He looked at his watch. “It’s almost time to leave. I think we can safely assume these people will use the same process they did yesterday.”

  “How are we supposed to follow a motorcycle?” one of the agents wanted to know.

  “We’re going to try air surveillance,” he answered. “I called my boss and he pulled some strings to make this happen. With all the military around here, no one’s going to think twice about their helicopters flying over the city. They’ll start practice runs at ten o’clock and keep it up until we find out where the motorcycle gets to. They’ll let us know and we’ll take it from there.”

  “That sounds very chancy to me,” another of the agents commented.

  Delaware slammed his hand on the table, his nerves finally getting to him. “Do you have a better plan? If not, then just do what you’re told.”

  Silence dropped over the room. For long moments no one spoke. Finally Ron Pelley cleared his throat.

  “I’ll just get the package together,” he said, rising from the table and heading for his office. One of the agents rose also and trailed behind him.

  Delaware swallowed the bitter taste in his throat. No matter what he did, there was no way this could have a good outcome.

  * * * * *

  When Pedro and Enrique brought their morning ration of water and tortillas, the hostages had just risen from a fitful night of on and off sleep and washed themselves as best they could in the disaster of a bathroom. Mari helped Sydney clean the cut on her face as best she could but it had become infected and she was worried about what would happen with it.

  Eli had developed some horrendous-looking bruises from the jabs with the butt of the rifle and he was having trouble keeping down even the terrible tortillas. Mari hoped he didn’t have any internal damage from it. Her own head continued to ache but either it was subsiding or she was just getting used to it.

  And Lissa. Lord, she’d been so good, so strong but she was only seventeen and this situation was becoming almost more than she could cope with. It was especially difficult for her to see what was happening to her parents.

  Hurry, Kat. Bring those men here quickly. I don’t know how much longer we can hold out.

  “Eat up,” Pedro told them. “This may be your last meal with us.” When everyone froze in place, he laughed, the mean sound they’d grown familiar with. “You may go home today, gringos. If all goes accordingly to plan.” Then he looked from one to the other. “But we have not yet decided in what condition to return you. Your friends thought they could outsmart El Jefe yesterday. That does not mean good things for you. El Jefe is a man with a temper.”

  He laughed again, then backed out with Enrique, slamming the door into place after him. The clunk of the wood across the door sounded like a death knell to the hostages.

  Eli let out a slow, painful breath. “We aren’t beaten yet. We’ll find a way out of this. I promise.” He looked at the window and then at his daughter, “Come over here sweetie. I’m going to boost you up on my shoulders. I want you to tell me what you see.”

  It was an excruciating exercise, with Eli stifling his groans and trying not to stagger under even the slight weight of his daughter. Mari bit her lip as she watched them.

  Hurry, Kat. Hurry, hurry, hurry.

  Chapter Fifteen

  After they’d packed everything up and just before they checked out of the hotel, Dan called the Wright pilots and asked them to hang on a little longer. Then he persuaded them to take part in a little charade at the airfield.

  Just in case anyone was watching, they all put on a show. Mike and Ed engaged the manager in a loud conversation about winds and weather, asked him about traffic condition heading east and made sure anyone hanging around the terminal heard both of them announcing their intention to head back to San Antonio.

  “You mean you’re leaving without finding out what happened to your friend?” one of the pilots asked. The two of them had arrived fifteen minutes earlier and were standing around drinking coffee.

  “Sorry,” Mike said. “We’ve decided to leave it all to the FBI. They’re better equipped to handle this.”

  “What about your friend?” the manager asked Mike. “Weren’t you looking for someone in particular?”

  Mike pulled Kat close to him and hugged her. “We decided this way is best. But we’ll be in constant touch with the feds.”

  Dan turned to one of the pilots. “You have our cell phone numbers. Let us hear the minute you find out anything.”

  The man nodded.

  They drove the SUV to the hangar where Mike and Ed had parked the plane and helo. Again they made a show of unloading their luggage and stowing it in the plane. Troy drove the SUV back to the terminal. Left the keys with the manager and jogged back to the hangar.

  “Isn’t it dangerous doing this in daylight?” Kat asked

  “Yes but we’ve done this before,” Dan reassured her. He gave her arm a friendly squeeze. “Don’t worry. We’ll get it done.”

  Mark’s cell phone rang and he walked away from the commotion to answer it. The conversation was short and when he returned to the group his face was grimmer than usual.

  “Oh, my god,” Kat said. “What’s wrong? Did something bad happen?”

  “Bad for some people,” he told her, then looked at everyone. “Andy earned his keep today. He decided to run a credit card check on our three suspects and see what he came up with. He was looking for anything that would tell him who made the deal here. Prescott’s in big trouble with the SEC, which we knew and he’s trying to hide it from Eli Wright because it involves the two companies they partnered in. Ryan Post’s spa chain is leaking red ink and he’s had some interesting visitors to the one in Mexico. And Ron Pelley…well, we know about him.”

  “None of this is new,” Mike said impatiently.

  “But this is. I had him text this to me so everyone could actually read it.”

  He held the phone so everyone could read the screen as he scrolled through the text message. They all stared at each other as the last word disappeared.

  Dan finally said it for them all. “Son of a bitch.”

  * * * * *

  The military helicopters began filling the air space as the convoy left the Wright Internation
al headquarters. Pelley tried not to keep looking up at them as he sat on the low stone wall in front of the Alamo. He clutched the package tightly as he watched for the motorcycle. The message had said same arrangements, so he was prepared for a snatch and grab, just like the day before.

  When this is over I’m going someplace to hide and never show my face again. How had things gotten so badly botched up? How had this mess happened? They’d all be lucky to get out of it with their skins in one piece.

  He watched the traffic, ears tuned for the high whine of a motorcycle engine. It was there almost before he heard it, sleek and black, zooming along the inner road. He loosened his grip on the padded envelope and as the motorcycle slowed in front of him, held it out to the outstretched hand. The rider grabbed it, increased the engine roar and sped off.

  Pelley gritted his teeth to keep from looking up to see if one of the helicopters had caught the action. He didn’t know whether to be upset or relieved. He only felt numb.

  Now what?

  He sat in place as instructed until one of the men from the conference room walked up to him and took his arm.

  “Let’s go, Mr. Pelley. Time to get back to the office.”

  All he could think as he let himself be led to a waiting car was, God, I hope they don’t kill the hostages.

  * * * * *

  Javier waited until the sleek Gulfstream and the massive Black Hawk had lifted off and headed east before hiding behind the hangar and pulling out his cell phone.

  “They are gone,” he told Nando.

  “What do you mean?”

  “They left. That’s what I mean. They are all headed back to San Antonio.”

  Nando was silent for a moment. “Something doesn’t sound right here. Are you sure?”

  “Positive,” Javier insisted. “I heard them myself and saw them leave. I watched until they were out of sight.”

  “It doesn’t seem likely that people like them would just walk away from this. Not when they’re personally involved.”