Helen Hanson - Dark Pool

by Helen Hanson

The mechanical voice sounded like a synthesizer during a brown-out. The noise swelled in her head, and she had a hard time discerning anything. “Please, I’m sorry. Could you slow down?”

  In the movies, only hyper-alert people answered the ransom calls. They captured the minutest details of a ransom message delivered in one smooth take. Often they heard some subtle background noise that led them directly to the hideout. Maggie just wanted to understand all the words and not throw up.

  She turned the receiver outward, so Travis could hear too.

  “Skyline Boulevard intersects with Kings Mountain Road. There’s a cell phone at the base of the stop sign on Kings Mountain Road. I’ll call you on that number in one hour. Come alone. Just you and your brother.”

  “We don’t have two million dollars.”

  “Your father does.”

  “But he can’t—”

  “One hour. Is that clear?”

  Travis bobbed his head.

  “Yes,” Maggie said. “Please don’t hurt my father.”

  “That depends on you and your brother.”

  She thought she heard him hang up. “Hello.”

  The doorbell spooked Maggie. The phone clattered on the counter.

  Travis said, “Whoever it is, I’ll get rid of them.”

  The ocean waves seemed to move in slow motion today as if the water had become more viscous. She used to love surfing, but she hadn’t surfed since Trisha became ill. No time, she told herself, but really, she was afraid. Surfing required a concentration she couldn’t afford to spend on anything frivolous. A solitary lapse meant risking peril. One slip and everything would spin out of control. The wave would close off the remaining light, snuff out all the air, and drag her down into the deep, dark pool.

  “Maggie.” Ginger stood next to her with a fist on each hip. “Any news?”

  She lifted her face to meet Ginger’s. “No. No news. You are always so sweet to us. Thank you for everything.” Maggie stood and hugged her and then rested her hands on Ginger’s shoulders. “I’m sorry. Now’s not a good time. Can we visit later?”

  Ginger’s face wore apprehension. “I brought you some Keke pua’a.”

  Maggie noticed Travis with some bags.

  “Do you need anything?”

  “Just Daddy.”

  A frown dimpled Ginger’s chin. Maggie knew her friend had more to say but decided against it. “I’ll leave you be. Let me know what I can do.”

  “Thanks.” Maggie walked Ginger to the foyer, kissing her cheek before she departed.

  With the closing door, Maggie shifted gears. Her pace picked up energy as she entered the kitchen. She’d already showered and dressed before the call. “How much time?”

  “Fifty-five minutes.” Travis was packed and ready to go.

  “It will take us half an hour to get there. I need a couple of minutes to get my shit together.”

  “Sorry. Ginger looked so sad. And she brought food. I couldn’t brush her off.”

  Maggie felt badly about lying to Ginger, she deserved far better treatment by them, and Maggie could trust her. But trusting Ginger about the kidnapping or the ransom didn’t buy them any advantage. Even if Maggie told her, she simply couldn’t do anything to help.

  Unfortunately, the only one that could help, she didn’t trust at all.

  Chapter Sixty-Two

  Maggie usually enjoyed the drive along Skyline Boulevard. A two-lane road flanked by trees with branches stretching overhead to greet the other side, it inspired her to imagine. Today, with only forty minutes left before a stranger murdered her father, it was the very reason she hated it. After the kidnapper’s call, her imagination added butane to the fire. She pressed the accelerator.

  Travis kept his laptop plugged in the 12V outlet and clicked away at something. Maggie didn’t know what he thought he’d accomplish this late. Either he had two million dollars on tap, or Daddy was a dead man. Travis said he wasn’t sure, but Maggie would have to trust him.

  Right.

  She felt as if they were a mile high in the sky and falling. No sign of a net. Maybe they’d find some nylon and bounce. Or hit concrete and splat.

  Another ache rolled through her.

  No matter the outcome, she’d never again blame Travis. She finally understood his frustration. He’d been abused like a sideshow clown and then abandoned in center ring to tame the angry lion. When all along, Daddy had rammed the big cat in the eye with a stick.

  Maggie had always regarded her father as a moral man. But what the hell was he thinking? She knew she’d never get a satisfactory answer to that question. In his current state, she couldn’t even be certain he was thinking.

  They neared the drop point. Or the pick-up point in Maggie’s case. Why would they leave a cell phone? She thought they just wanted money.

  The rendezvous site was more than two roads crossing. A five-way intersection occurred there. Skyline Boulevard coming and going counted for two of the spokes, King’s Mountain Road turned into Tunitas Creek Road on the other side of Skyline, and Blue Jay Way spurred off for no apparent reason to the south-southwest. None of the five roads offered Maggie an escape.

  Travis looked up as they reached the site with seven minutes to spare. He snapped his laptop closed and slipped on a pair of latex gloves. Maggie slowed to make the hairpin road to the left, turned her car around, and parked on the side of the road.

  The stop sign stuck out of the ground with no cover. She expected to see a bush or at least a hearty fern. Travis jumped out as another car putted up to the intersection from Blue Jay Way. When the other vehicle was out of sight, he squatted at the base of the stop sign. He dug at the ground and then hustled back to the car with something in a sandwich bag.

  Travis opened the bag and let the phone drop to his lap.

  “Any fingerprints?”

  Travis lifted the phone by the edges as if it were capable of injecting venom. He rocked it back and forth to let the light reflect off the surfaces. “I’m no CSI, but it looks like somebody wiped it. I would have.”

  “Me too.” According to her watch, they had five minutes before the next threat. “What time does it show?”

  “Four minutes to go.”

  Her breath shuddered. “So. Do you have a plan?”

  “I have—” He hesitated too long to bring her comfort. “—a decision matrix.”

  “A decision matrix.” Any other time, she would have laughed. “Seriously?”

  His eyes widened. “Do you really want to hear it all?”

  She didn’t. Travis’ world relied on gut and sense and reason. Maggie’s needed tangibles, anything she could touch and grip and clutch. She had enough fault lines cracking her terra firma.

  They both fell silent.

  And time ticked.

  Cyclists whizzed past them in packs down Skyline Boulevard. Maggie wished she were one of them. Dressed in colorful spandex, blasting down the road, going somewhere. Her luck, she’d end up in a pack with Carl Pinkerton.

  A car turned down their road. She avoided eye contact as the phone cried in Travis’ lap.

  Their heads whipped toward each other.

  Time’s up.

  She clasped her hands to steady them. Travis leaned in and gave her the phone.

  She hit the talk button. But the caller only wanted her to listen.

  “I’m watching you. I know you’re alone. I’m sending a text with directions to a warehouse. Drive directly there. Park on the south side of the building and enter through the door at the southwestern corner. Bring the phone. Get here within thirty-five minutes, or your father is a dead man.”

  Her inhale never made it back out as words. She wanted to tell him there wasn’t enough time, but she didn’t even know where she was going. When she hit the end-call button, a text awaited.

  “You read it.” Her hand wobbled as she passed the phone to Travis.

  He stared at the tiny screen.

  “I don’t want to know any more than the next
step.” She put the car in gear and gripped the wheel. “Don’t tell me three or five or ten steps right now. I can only do one.”

  Alarm shadowed her brother’s face as he put his arm around her. “We’ll get through this, Magpie, I promise.”

  She pushed a palm across her eye, hair bouncing off her cheeks as she nodded. “Tell me, Trav. What’s the next step?”

  “We go find our father.”

  Chapter Sixty-Three

  Stephanie.” Kurt rarely bellowed, but the moment called for some excitement. He’d studied the contents of the package from Patty O’Mara long enough to understand the significance. The man was full of surprises even from the grave.

  He heard the clomping before she hit the doorway. “Is there a fire?” She feigned annoyance, but a lilt in her voice cued her curiosity.

  “Maybe.” His smile amped. “Call Spencer Thornton. Ask him to meet me for dinner tonight. Tell him to name the place, and I’ll be there.” Thornton always had a busy schedule, but Kurt hoped he could make time. Thornton paid a small fortune to hire a magician. Kurt wanted him to enjoy the show.

  “Will do.” Stephanie stepped outside but held on to the doorknob. “Does your sudden exuberance have something to do with the delivery?”

  “Possibly.” He waved her away. “Now, go. I’ll explain all my secrets after the grand finale.” He picked up the phone and punched ten digits.

  Stephanie had the last word. “Ever the showman.”

  Some days, all he had was his smoke and mirrors. But not today.

  “Samantha. It’s Kurt. How soon can you get here?”

  Chapter Sixty-Four

  A black Mercedes drove onto the road and u-turned behind Maggie’s car. In front, another sedan idled up to her bumper.

  Thirty-five minutes. She had to leave. Now. She honked the horn.

  Travis grabbed her hands. “Maggie, don’t.”

  In her rearview mirror, she saw a man in a dark suit approach the window. She rolled it down.

  “Ms. Fender.”

  “Move your car. I have to get out of here.” Wait. How did he know her name? Travis’ face told her she was behind the curve again. Damn that curve.

  “We know you didn’t have opportunity to place the GPS tracker in Jack Scarson’s car when you went to his house, but we have one on yours. May I see the cell phone?”

  Maggie remembered the man from Penniski’s place as being the bigger of the two thugs. Her gnawing ache exploded into panic. “Please. I have to leave. He’s going to kill my father.”

  “The phone.”

  With or without weapons, she didn’t have a choice. Her car was pinned and surrounded by mobsters. She gave him the phone.

  He pushed a few buttons and studied the screen a moment before handing it back. “We have little time to lose.” He handed her a key with a quick release. “Add this to your ring, now. Make sure you keep these with you at all times.”

  She considered not taking it, but time was ticking like a bomb. He waited for her to clip it on her key ring and said, “Please, lead the way.” With a single wave, the lead car cleared her path.

  “Let’s move, Maggie,” Travis said. “We’ve only got thirty-three minutes.”

  The muscles in her legs began to twitch, her foot bouncing off the pedal. She hunched over the steering wheel and started her car. The engine coughed but refused to ignite.

  “No!” She slapped the dashboard. “Not now.”

  “Try it again.”

  The engine wouldn’t turn over.

  “Pop the hood.”

  By now, two of Penniski’s henchmen stood at the front of her car. Her hair hung over her face as she pulled the hood-release lever. Travis got out and disappeared behind the open hood.

  “Try it again, Maggie.”

  Still nothing.

  The main thug went to consult with those by the engine. He returned to her window. “Do you have sufficient fuel?”

  By her watch, they were down to thirty-one minutes. She turned the key to the accessories position. Out of gas.

  Her head dropped to the steering wheel.

  “Yuri,” he said. “Get some petrol in this vehicle.”

  Someone maneuvered the lead car close to hers. Another man positioned a flexible hose into his gas tank and put the other end in his mouth. He stood close to Maggie’s open fuel port. When the gas showed up in the hose, he shoved the end into Maggie’s tank.

  As fuel siphoned over to her vehicle, Maggie kept one eye on her watch. Twenty-nine minutes.

  The men closed up her car, and Travis rejoined her in the front seat. “He said to take off.”

  She fired up the engine and pulled onto the main road. Even with the sedans out of her view, she knew they’d follow her to the warehouse. Daddy’s life was just a poker chip.

  “They know everything. They even knew what we bought at the spy shop. How?”

  “They said they used GPS to follow us to Scarson’s.” Travis leaned forward. “They probably tapped our phone at the box outside. It’s the only way they could’ve heard both sides of the calls.”

  “What if they put listening bugs in the house?” Then they know all about the emails from Dad. And the money.

  Travis must have had the same thought because he held a finger to his lips. “They could be listening now.”

  The words hit like a glancing blow. Not physical pain, but forcing her to reckon with the relentless assault. People had taken shots at her family the whole freaking week. Penniski’s thugs were only the newest challengers. A sensation rushed over her like an incoming tide. The same way she felt before punching Peter. Frustration. Injustice. The primal throb of anger.

  “Fyodor’s probably the one who bugged our phone. Security business my ass. He’s just another mobster goon.”

  “You don’t know that, Mag.”

  “Damn it. I never should have gone to Penniski’s.”

  “It didn’t matter either way. Dad was already on his radar,” Travis said. Besides, we’d still be stuck back there without his help.”

  She sneered at her brother. “Remind me to thank him.”

  “We still don’t know if Jack Scarson kidnapped Dad.”

  “Neither does Penniski.”

  Maggie concentrated on the winding road in order to make good time without crashing. Whoever called them understood the commute traffic. This time of day, the bulk of the gainfully employed had reached their destinations allowing others passage at a reasonable speed.

  Godspeed. The phrase finally made sense.

  Travis navigated the few road changes. His directions led them toward the bay. Much further and they’d hit Highway 101. “We’ve got four minutes. Turn left at the next intersection.”

  They entered a rundown neighborhood where cyclone fences divvyed up the ground into auto repair shops, payday loan stores, and apartment complexes. Here, security bars clad the windows while the earth yielded to asphalt.

  As they passed each street, her chest constricted. Travis watched the clock, but she knew they were at the end.

  “Take the next left.”

  They circled back to the commuter railroad tracks they’d already crossed. The road came to a tee as expected.

  “Turn right.”

  Houses backed up to the tracks and for-sale signs jutted from scrubby lawns. Plywood covered several front windows. Not a single candidate for a REMax commercial. Beyond the shabby neighborhood, large buildings loomed. The industrial end of the line.

  “It’s the second building on the left.”

  As she drove to the southwest corner, she didn’t see any cars in the parking lot. Vehicles were sparse at the other buildings. Like everywhere else, business suffered.

  She parked near the entrance and shut off the engine, half expecting to hear a siren, a bull-horn, an explosion. Something. Overhead, the birds twittered. Unlike the residents trapped nearby, they could simply fly away.

  “We’ve got one minute, Maggie. You ready?”

  �
��Yeah.” But she wasn’t. She’d never be ready to enter this place. Typical industrial construction, it was a beige block of concrete with three loading bays facing the tracks on the western wall. A single, dingy window offered the only break in the monotonous design. Raggedy rosemary bushes lined the short path to the entrance while lava rock filled the narrow space between building and blacktop. Behind the pale-mustard door obscured by a dusty olive tree, someone held her father prisoner.

  She stuffed her purse under the seat. Travis came around to her side of the car. Her knees threatened to rebel, but he helped her to a shaky stand. He clasped her hand, and they trudged toward the warehouse together.

  “Where’s your laptop?” She whispered.

  “Same place as your purse”

  “Don’t you need it?”

  He squeezed her hand. “Not anymore.”

  The squeeze gave her confidence. Not in the situation, not in whatever was inside that warehouse, but it gave her confidence in her brother. No matter what happened from here on, they were a team.

  When they reached the door, it creaked open as if by electronic eye. Travis stepped up to enter first. The weather was warm in the valley. She wore a t-shirt with a long-sleeved shirt over it, but still, Maggie shivered.

  Inside, rows of gray pallet racks—empty and stacked to the ceiling—dominated the space. Jack Scarson cycled a round on his sawed-off shotgun and waved them in deeper with the weapon. He wore latex gloves snapped tight as if he were a surgeon. But not a mask. He didn’t care if they saw his face. Maggie knew then, Scarson wouldn’t let any of them out alive.

  Chapter Sixty-Five

  “So it was you all along.” Travis glared at the man who cost him over a year of his life.

  “Where’s my father?” Maggie started toward Scarson.

  “I’ll take you to your father.” He aimed the shotgun at their faces. “But first, hands up against the rack and spread ‘em.”

  “Sure.” Travis leaned against the heavy shelf support and assumed the familiar position. Scarson patted him down and lifted the cell phone from his shirt pocket. There was nothing else to find.