LURING

by Blake Pierce

  He had an axe in his hand that he was using to split small logs on a tree stump.

  He was wearing his full-dress Marine officer’s uniform.

  She pointed down at Mommy’s body and said …

  “Daddy, please do something! Help Mommy!”

  Daddy frowned and split another log.

  “It’s too late to do anything, girl. She’s dead. You let her down. You let her die.”

  Riley gasped with horror at his words.

  Then she heard those voices around her again …

  “Don’t let us down … don’t let us down … don’t let us down …”

  Riley called out to Daddy and those dead FBI Agents …

  “What can I do? I’m just a little girl.”

  Daddy chopped another log and said …

  “No, you’re not. Not anymore. You’re all grown up. It’s time you acted like it.”

  Then Riley realized—it was true. She wasn’t a little girl now. She was a woman in her early twenties.

  But what could she do, even now?

  She couldn’t bring Mommy back to life.

  As a deep and terrible darkness closed in around her, Riley shouted …

  “What can I do?”

  Riley sat bolt upright in her bed, sweating and gasping.

  A dream, she realized. It was just a dream.

  Sunlight was pouring into the dorm room window.

  She saw that Frankie wasn’t in her bed. She knew that her roommate liked to get up and run laps before classes. But usually Riley was awake by then.

  “Oh, my God!” Riley said aloud. “What time is it?”

  She looked for her alarm clock on her side table, but it wasn’t there. She jumped out of bed and saw the clock lying broken on the floor. She must have knocked it off the table when she was thrashing around during last night’s nightmares.

  She darted across the room to look at Frankie’s clock.

  Shit!

  She was late!

  The day’s first activity would have started by now. All her classmates would already be there.

  Riley scrambled into her clothes and dashed out into the hallway and down three flights of stairs. Once outside she hesitated for a moment to remember the way to her morning class.

  Then she ran.

  Finally, she came to a sign that read …

  WELCOME TO HOGAN’S ALLEY

  CITY LIMITS

  Underneath was the word “CAUTION” and other words in smaller print.

  At the bottom in larger letters, the sign also said …

  HAVE A NICE DAY

  Riley walked warily past the sign into the area called Hogan’s Alley. On the introductory tour yesterday, she’d been struck by how oddly quaint the small town looked, with its barbershop, drugstore, pool hall, a movie theater called the Biograph, a hotel called the Dogwood Inn, rows of storefront businesses, and cars parked along the curbs. There was even a phone booth on one corner—a sight that was getting to be rare in these days of cellphones.

  Yesterday there had been quite a few people roaming the streets. But today she didn’t see anyone right away. The morning sunlight was shining straight into her face, and it took a few moments for her eyes to adjust.

  Then she noticed that she was hardly alone.

  A police car was parked a little way up the street. Frankie herself was standing next to the vehicle with a couple of other NATs in Riley’s group, all of them wearing FBI vests. Frankie was holding an electric megaphone, and the others had pistols in their hands. More NATs were hiding behind cars, and others crouched on rooftops. Some of them were armed with sniper weapons.

  All the weapons seemed to be pointed at her.

  Riley gasped, thinking …

  What have I walked into?

  Then Frankie called out through the megaphone …

  “We’ve got the place surrounded, Ivor. This doesn’t have to end badly. Just come out with your hands up.”

  Riley glanced to her left to see who Frankie was calling to. She realized she was standing on a street corner right next to the town bank.

  As she watched, two people stepped out of the bank. One was a man, gripping a frightened-looking woman by her arm. He was holding a pistol to the woman’s head.

  “I’ve got a hostage!” he yelled back at Frankie.

  Now Riley understood—the weapons weren’t pointed at her, but at the front door of the bank.

  Frankie hesitated for a moment, then called out on the megaphone …

  “I can see that, Ivor. I’ll tell you what we’re going to do. We’re going to send in a hostage negotiator and …”

  The man named Ivor interrupted with a terrified-sounding cackle …

  “Not a chance! I’m the one in charge here! I’m going to walk right out of here quietly, and you’re going to let me, or this hostage dies! Do you understand?”

  A silence fell over the whole scene.

  Nobody seemed to know what to do—including the man, who stood wavering indecisively with his terrified hostage.

  Riley wondered whether anybody had even noticed her arrival on the scene.

  Probably not, she thought.

  She was off to one side and, after all, everybody here had other things on their minds. She still wasn’t sure if any of her fellow NATs had noticed her presence. But she was sure the hostage-taker had no idea she was there.

  Then a thought began to dawn on her …

  Since the hostage-taker has no idea I’m here …

  But no, it was a crazy idea …

  Don’t even think it.

  After all, she’d just walked into this situation. What was going on right here was none of her business. She’d shown up too late to be part of it.

  On the other hand …

  She remembered things she’d heard people say about Hogan’s Alley …

  “Anything goes.”

  “No rules.”

  “All bets are off.”

  “You make the most of bad situations.”

  And maybe most important …

  “You get an idea, you just run with it.”

  Riley had an idea, all right.

  And maybe—just maybe—she could turn being late to her advantage.

  While Riley was wrestling with her decision, the hostage turned her head, and her eyes met Riley’s.

  The hostage seemed to silently implore Riley …

  “Help me! Please!”

  Before she knew it, Riley was running down the sidewalk toward the criminal and his hostage. She thrust her fist straight in front of her and hit the criminal on his wrist, sending his gun flying away.

  She took hold of the criminal with both hands and yanked him away from the hostage. Then she wrestled the man to the ground.

  Something hit her in the side with a stinging “pop.”

  Her side was soaked yellow liquid.

  A paintball, she realized.

  She heard another pop, then she looked up in time to see the hostage get hit in the center of the chest, causing an explosion of blue liquid.

  But where had those shots come from?

  Riley turned and saw that another armed man had come out of the bank door, wielding his own handgun.

  He had just shot both Riley and the hostage.

  Suddenly the two criminals were standing side by side exchanging fire with the NATs. In a matter of seconds, the men were dripping with red, blue, and yellow dye. But before they’d been hit, they’d managed to splatter several of the NATs with paintballs from their own weapons.

  Riley heard a female voice call out …

  “Code Red!”

  Riley knew that was a signal to stop the exercise—which had already come to a pretty grim conclusion.

  Agent Aubrey Rogers, a tactical instructor Riley had met yesterday, came striding toward Riley.

  She said, “Want to try that again, Sweeney? You didn’t quite get everybody killed.”

  Riley slouched with embarrassment. Some nervous laughter bro
ke out among the NATs, who were now walking toward Riley and Rogers.

  “I wouldn’t laugh, if I were you,” Rogers called out sternly to the group. “Sweeney hit you with a surprise out of the blue. That’ll happen in real life more than it happens here. This wasn’t just Sweeney’s screw-up. Did anybody here even consider the possibility that the hostage taker had an accomplice who was still inside the bank?”

  Most of the NATs said no.

  Rogers said, “Well, if you had thought about that, maybe this wouldn’t have ended in a bloodbath. There were a dozen good ways to handle this situation. The whole bunch of you failed to think of any of them. That’ll be all for today. But when you come back for your next session, I want each and every one of you to be able to tell me how you could have done better—even with Sweeney throwing a wrench in the exercise.”

  As the NATs started to walk away, Riley saw Frankie coming toward her, shaking her head with a grin. Riley grinned sheepishly back at Frankie and started to walk to meet her.

  But Agent Rogers said sharply …

  “Sweeney, you and I have got to have a little talk.”

  Frankie gave Riley a pitying look, and Riley followed Agent Rogers down the street. They passed by the three paid actors who had participated in the exercise—the two criminals and the female hostage. They were laughing and playfully wiping some of the dye off of each other’s clothing.

  As she and Rogers walked, Riley looked around at Hogan’s Alley—which was, of course, an extremely detailed mockup of a small town, exactly like a movie set. One building wasn’t just a facade, though. It housed a real classroom where trainees were taught tactics. Riley followed Rogers into the classroom.

  Riley sat down at a desk, while Rogers paced back and forth in front of her, saying nothing for a few tense moments.

  Finally Rogers said, “I hear you had trouble with your fitness test yesterday.”

  Riley gulped hard.

  She hadn’t realized that word had gotten around among instructors about her poor performance.

  “I’ll try to do better next time,” she said.

  Rogers’ lips twisted a little and she said …

  “Next time.”

  Riley felt overwhelmed with dread …

  Oh, no.

  Maybe there wasn’t going to be a next time.

  Maybe she was getting kicked out of the Academy right now.

  Rogers pulled up a chair and sat down facing Riley. She said in a voice that sounded tight with anger …

  “Sweeney, I swear to God, what you did back there was so stupid, it was almost good. But a miss is as good as a mile, as they say. And it wasn’t good. It was miles away from good. You screwed up, and you screwed up really bad.”

  “I’m sorry,” Riley said, almost in a whisper.

  “Sorry doesn’t cut it at the Academy,” Rogers said.

  She paused again, then said, “Hogan’s Alley may look like a game, but it isn’t one.”

  “I know,” Riley said.

  Rogers leaned toward Riley and stared at her.

  “No, I’m not sure you do know. Let me repeat—Hogan’s Alley is not a game.”

  Riley stared back at her silently.

  Then Rogers continued, “Back in 1986, there was a bloody, four-minute gunfight in Miami. Two FBI Agents were killed and five were wounded. The Bureau realized that agents needed better tactical training—something realistic and hands-on, where they could act out life and death situations. That’s why Hogan’s Alley got built in the first place. That’s why you and the other NATs come here to learn.”

  Riley felt as though her heart would sink through the floor.

  Again, she thought she heard the voices of those dead FBI Agents …

  “Don’t let us down.”

  And now, on her second day of training, Riley felt like she had already let them down.

  Rogers said, “I’m going to have to report this stunt you pulled. Meanwhile …”

  Rogers was interrupted by the sound of the door opening behind Riley. Riley saw Rogers’ eyes open wide with astonishment.

  “Oh, my God,” Rogers murmured. “Agent Crivaro!”

  Riley turned and saw her mentor standing in the doorway.

  Rogers stammered, “I hadn’t expected … this is such an honor …”

  Crivaro interrupted …

  “I need to speak alone with Riley Sweeney.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Riley’s initial surprise almost turned into a giggle of amusement. For several long seconds Agent Rogers just stood there staring dumbly at Jake Crivaro with an awestruck expression. The stern trainer who had so adamantly criticized Riley now seemed unable to speak.

  Finally Crivaro said, “Did you hear me? I need to talk to Riley Sweeney alone.”

  Rogers stammered, “Y-yes sir. Absolutely, sir.”

  As Riley watched her instructor stumble nervously out of the classroom, she remembered what Frankie had said to her the night before last …

  “You do know that Jake Crivaro’s a living legend in the law enforcement profession, right?”

  Riley had thought at the time that maybe Frankie was exaggerating.

  But judging from Agent Rogers’s reaction to his unexpected arrival, Frankie must have been telling the truth.

  Crivaro stood and looked at Riley for a moment, as if he were trying to make up his mind what he wanted to tell her.

  Sounding a bit evasive, he said …

  “So. Hogan’s Alley. They didn’t have anything like this when I was in training here. What do you think of it?”

  Riley fought down a sigh …

  “Right now it’s not my favorite thing in the world,” she said.

  Crivaro scoffed and shook his head.

  “Yeah, I was watching the whole thing from around a street corner. Jesus, what a crazy thing to do. Didn’t I tell you that you needed to develop some impulse control?”

  Riley said, “I guess I’m not making much progress in that department.”

  Crivaro said, “No, it doesn’t look like it.”

  Another silence fell.

  Riley wondered …

  Did he come here just to gripe about how I’m doing at the Academy?

  If so, there didn’t seem much point in hanging around for it.

  She said, “I’ve got to go, or I’ll be late to my next class.”

  Crivaro stepped toward Riley.

  “You’re not going to your next class,” he said.

  Riley’s eyes widened with surprise.

  “I beg your pardon?” she asked, feeling panic rise again. Was Crivaro here to finish the job of expelling her?

  Crivaro said, “I talked to Marty Glick, your group instructor. I told him I’m borrowing you for a day or maybe two.”

  Riley could hardly believe her ears.

  “You what?” she said.

  Crivaro took a deep, long breath and said …

  “Maybe you’ve heard about the two recent murders in West Virginia. The victims wrapped in barbed wire.”

  Riley started breathing normally again.

  She said, “I’ve seen it on the TV news.”

  Crivaro let out an embarrassed chuckle …

  “Yeah, and I guess you’ve seen me on TV, too. According to the media, I’ve got my own impulse control issues. But that thing with me and the reporter—believe me, it wasn’t what it looked like.”

  Crivaro put his hands in his pockets and looked out the window at the make-believe street.

  He said, “Anyway, I need your help. At this point in a case, my instincts usually kick in and I’ve got some kind of insight into the killer. That’s not happening at all this time, and it worries the hell out of me. There’s a serial murderer out there, and the only thing I sense is that he’s liable to kill again before I can catch him. But if you come with me and check out the crime scenes, try to get into the killer’s head … well, with your natural instincts, I’ll bet you pick up on something in no time at all.”

&n
bsp; Riley was nearly overwhelmed by a cascade of confused and contradictory feelings. Part of her was flattered and proud that Crivaro had come to her instead of countless well-seasoned agents for help. But another part of her felt angry and resentful …

  Who does he think he is, charging in here and dragging me away like this?

  It didn’t seem right.

  “I can’t do it,” Riley said. “I just got here the day before yesterday, and I’m already failing at things. I’ve got to stay focused, get myself together, start doing better. If I don’t, I’ll get kicked out.”

  “You won’t get kicked out,” Crivaro said. “Glick told me about your problem with the fitness test. You’ll ace it next time. And if you just stop doing stupid things, like running rampant into simulated crime scenes, you’ll do fine. You’re a smart girl.”

  Riley bristled inside …

  “A smart girl?”

  She knew Crivaro meant it as a compliment, but it felt condescending. And anyway, she wasn’t nearly as confident as he seemed to be that she’d soon be doing better at the Academy. Getting kicked out seemed like a real possibility.

  And besides …

  “There’s another thing,” Riley said. “I got a summons from the circuit court for next week. I can’t miss that.”

  Crivaro said, “Yeah, I got one of those too. We’re both supposed to testify at Brant Hayman’s murder trial. Don’t worry, we should be done with this case by then. With some luck, I’ll have you back here by tomorrow or the next day.”

  Crivaro looked at his watch and said, “Anyway, we’ve got to get going. You need to stop by your dorm room, put together whatever you might need in case you have to spend the night in West Virginia. Come on, let’s go.”

  Crivaro walked out of the classroom.

  Riley stood watching him for a few seconds.

  I don’t have to follow him, she thought.

  I don’t have to let him tell me what to do.

  Then Crivaro turned and called out to her …

  “Come on, kid. We’ve got lives to save.”

  Those words set off some kind of spark inside her …

  “… lives to save …”

  The words she’d heard in that dream last night—the words of those dead FBI Agents—rang through her head again …

  “Don’t let us down.”