by Dale Mayer
“Can you get her out?”
He shook his head. “No, I don’t think so. And I’m not sure it’s fair to her. That’s the world she knows. This would be a very different one.”
At that point, Charlotte walked in. “But, if she’s not given a choice,” she said, “you don’t know what her reaction would be.”
“True, but I don’t have that option,” Joshua said. He smiled at his sister. “You look better.”
“I feel it too,” she said brightly.
Nico studied her face, and she did look much less exhausted and almost refreshed. But then good lovemaking would do that. “I hope you don’t mind that I put on coffee.”
“Good,” she said, “because I could use a cup myself.” She sat down at the table and said, “Please tell me that somebody has a plan for today.”
“At the moment, we’re feeling a little bit at loose ends on some of it,” Keane offered.
“Not sure yet,” Nico said. “I’m waiting for a different answer too.”
She looked over at him. “Why? What answer?”
“That comment you made about the smokers last night,” he said.
“Right,” she said. “But I don’t know who that other man was.”
“And you can’t give us a description of him?”
“No, not really,” she said. “He was older than the others. I figured he was more of the boss man. And one guy did quit smoking when he was told, but the other two didn’t.”
“Right.” He looked over at Keane and said, “Charlotte mentioned that, when she was tied up in the back of a refrigerator truck, and the guys were at the end of the trailer, where the door is, and smoking. And one of the guys complained. What I want to know is, who the guy in jail is, which one of the two still alive out of those original four kidnappers.”
Just then his phone buzzed. He checked it and walked over to his laptop. “Miles just sent us part of the interview with that guy, our captive.” He sat down and brought it up on newsfeed.
She looked at it, sighed, and said, “I think he was a smoker.”
“Yeah, but was he the smoker who stopped?”
She looked at it, frowned, and said, “I think so.”
Just then the voices filled the air, and their captive asked if he could have a cigarette.
“You should quit,” the interviewer said. “It’s bad for your health.”
“Yeah, I know,” he said. “The other two guys smoked like crazy men, and they’re dead.”
“And that’s what I wanted to know,” Nico said. He hit the Pause button, looked over at Keane, and said, “We’re dealing with two separate issues here.”
“In what way?”
“What if the two kidnappers were killed not because they failed at the kidnapping or at the handoff or whatever but because of the smoking?” Even Joshua snorted at that. But then, as Nico explained, he said, “This is the guy who stopped when he was ordered to. The other two did not.”
“So, you’re saying that the fourth guy is the local boss man,” Keane asked, “and he is the one who we’re really looking for?”
Nico nodded. “So, what we have is one killer who took out his cohorts because he was disgusted with their smoking behavior, but that had nothing to do with the kidnapping.”
“So, we still have to find out who this guy is and what his relationship is to Charlotte.”
“Well, his relationship is likely that he was hired, but who was he hired by is the real question. Probably the merc.” Nico hit Play on the interview, and the same guy was being asked questions about the fourth man who didn’t like the smokers.
“He’s the one who hired us. He used to get pissed off because they were supposed to do what he said.”
“How did he contact you?”
“I was on the street one day, smoking outside the hotel, and he came out and asked if I was interested in making some money. I didn’t realize that it would get this ugly.”
“What were you supposed to do?”
“I was supposed to help kidnap this woman, who was being taken to a businessman who wanted to question her.”
“And do you have any idea why?”
He shook his head. “No, I don’t. It didn’t matter. But then killing wasn’t involved.”
“Do you know who the businessman was?”
He shook his head. “No, and we were told we’d never know.”
“Makes sense,” the interviewer said. “So, if you can’t tell us who hired you, then how about the fourth guy? The one who was the leader? How would we contact him?”
“I’ve seen him around. He hangs at the coffee shop. A couple coffee shops actually, all in the same block around the hotel.”
Just then the Mavericks chat window popped up. We’ve picked up a fourth man.
“Yes,” Charlotte said, her hands on Nico’s shoulders and squeezing tight. “They got him.”
“Yes, and that is very good news.”
The chat box texted again. He’s not talking but has been ID’d by the other kidnapper.
“So now we have ID’d the four locals who were hired.” Nico typed into the chat box, Have forensics check this guy to see if he killed the two dead men in the apartment.
A question mark came back.
Nico explained. They were smokers, heavy smokers who wouldn’t listen to him when he told them to stop. What are the chances that this is just a simple case of You work for me, so you do what I say. And, when you don’t, I’ll pop you one?
The word Shit showed up in the Mavericks chat box, and then it disappeared again.
“Which would mean that the kidnappers didn’t really intend to kill me,” Charlotte said slowly.
“Not these guys,” Nico said. “But that doesn’t mean that the one who hired them wasn’t thinking about it.”
“You know what? Businessman still takes us back to Andy’s real father,” Keane noted.
“It does,” Nico said. On another thought, he added, “I want to know what the boy’s birth mother did for a living.” He typed that question in the chat box. An answer came back almost immediately.
I believe she worked in the hotel industry. Why?
Just searching for some answers. Keane raised an eyebrow at the chat box exchange, and Nico shrugged. “That might be how she connected with a merc. Maybe someone who stayed at the hotel? Or someone who knew someone. The average person isn’t going to be able to pick up the phone and call for a hired killer.”
With the idea that they now had the four men who had been hired to kidnap her, coffee was poured, and their conversation was animated as they came up with ideas.
Finally she got up and said, “I need breakfast. Bacon and eggs for anybody?”
Nico laughed. “Absolutely,” he said. “You can feed me bacon and eggs any day.”
She tossed him a special smile and pulled out the bacon and put it in the pan. He absolutely loved the domesticity of this. But, at the same time, he also knew that Keane and Joshua were well aware of the change of status in Nico and Charlotte’s relationship. Tough. If they didn’t like it, too bad. He was a happy camper.
Chapter 14
Charlotte made bacon and eggs for everyone, while they waited for more answers. She didn’t know how much of a change this was, and the fact that they had accounted for the four local men involved in her kidnapping was huge. Just then she set the plates on the table, and Nico’s phone rang.
He pulled it out and said, “What’s up?” After a pause, he said, “Okay, well, that’s good news.” He hit the Speaker button and put it on the table and said, “You’re on Speakerphone.”
“We have the boss man’s phone, and there is proof now that it was the boy’s father. He can say he had no connection to the kidnapping all he wants, but we have texts back and forth, including the amount set up to do the job.”
“Woo-hoo,” she said, “although that sucks big time.”
“I know,” Miles said, “but we’re about to pick up the father now.”
“Will do.”
With that, everybody dug into their bacon and eggs. She ate slower, her mind thinking about the loss that Andy’s birth family had experienced and wondering how she’d feel if she had lost a child when a teenager to adoption and then to go through it all over again when the child died, finally at the age of majority to choose for himself who he wanted to be around. Because really the birth family had lost the war originally, when they were young. Even if you go on, and you have another family, surely you don’t ever really forget that firstborn son of yours. “I can see how somebody might want answers. I hope they didn’t want to kill me out of revenge though.”
“It’s hard to say. Until we get a hold of the birth parents, there’s no way to know.”
She nodded. “So can we go out of the house today, or are we stuck here?”
“I’m going out,” Joshua said. “I have to head to a couple debriefings. I don’t even know if I’ll be home today. I hope so though. I don’t have much in the way of gear. Everything got left behind.”
“And did they kill you to get rid of you in that undercover scenario?” she asked.
He gave her half a smile. “I don’t know,” he said, “but I can’t imagine that they left too many threads loose.”
She nodded. As she got up and finished the dishes, with both Nico and Keane helping, Joshua walked over and gave her a hug. “I don’t have a phone, but, if you give me your number, when I get hold of a phone and get things set up, I’ll call you. Otherwise expect me back later today.”
She kissed him on the cheek and gave him a big hug. “I’m so grateful to have you back in my life.”
He turned and headed out to the front door.
She faced Nico and Keane and said, “Wouldn’t it be nice to have this over with today?”
Keane nodded, but his voice was serious as he said, “Things generally happen fast when we get to that point.”
“But, of course, it’s all getting to that point,” she joked.
He nodded. “Exactly.”
She smiled and sat down, and, when the front door opened again, she called out, “Did you forget something?”
“Yeah, I did.” But his voice was different this time.
Startled, she stared up as he came in and behind him was her assistant. Joshua had his hands up and a hard look on his face. He looked over at the two men and said, “Sorry, she was waiting for me outside the front door.”
Keane swore and said, “What the hell? She must have just arrived then.”
Maggie pushed Joshua to the empty chair at the table. “Sit down,” she barked.
He sat down gently.
Charlotte stared at Maggie. “I don’t understand,” she said. “What’s this all about? Maggie?”
Hate twisted Maggie’s face until it was almost unrecognizable. Maggie walked over to the kitchen sink and grabbed some paper towels, got them wet, added a little bit of the hand soap that was there, all the time keeping the gun pointed at everybody. And then she reached up, with one eye closed, and quickly swiped down that side of her face, then the other. As the paper towel came away, covered in makeup, Maggie’s face had turned into this nightmarish facade, half without makeup and the other half with the makeup a smeared mess.
Charlotte stared in horror. “Seriously?”
Maggie laughed. “You’re such a fool.”
Charlotte sat down hard. “Maybe because I wasn’t looking for an enemy in my own ranks,” she whispered. She stared as Maggie made several more passes with a paper towel and wiped off 90 percent of the makeup.
What emerged was a woman in her forties, showing some age. But the evil darkness in her eyes said much about who she was. “I don’t give a shit what you were expecting or not,” she said, “but somebody has to pay for what you did.” She leaned back against the sink, this time with a dry paper towel in her hand. She wiped the moisture off her face and still more makeup came with it. She kept raising the gun when any of the men shifted. “Don’t even think about it,” she said. “I don’t give a shit about who and what you are in any way when you’re associated with her.”
“How can you say that?” Charlotte asked. “I’ve never done anything to you.”
“No,” she said, “you probably didn’t. But what you did to my son was way worse.”
“I didn’t do anything,” she cried out. “What are you talking about?” But inside, she knew. Inside, she had a really ugly feeling that this was the dead kid’s mum. “Are you Andy’s mother?”
Maggie’s face twisted. “Yes. That kid was my son! My only son! And you killed him.” Her voice broke on the last word.
“I didn’t kill him,” Charlotte protested. “You know that.”
“I don’t know anything about it,” Maggie said, suddenly calm.
Her moods were volatile and switching. It was something else Charlotte had never seen. Maggie had always been the most mild-mannered person. Maybe that’s why she’d worked so much from home because there she didn’t have to keep up the pretense. But, even now, Charlotte could see that things were unraveling. “And do you think I killed him at that rally?”
“You curried his favor. You built yourself up in his eyes so that he was so in love with you and so fascinated by who you were and what you were doing. He was on fire to do anything for you.”
“I didn’t even know him,” she said.
Just then the gun leveled at her.
“What?” Maggie asked in a super-quiet voice.
Instantly Charlotte realized she’d made a mistake. “I didn’t know him personally,” she said. “I had no correspondence with him.”
“Lies,” she said with a wave of her hand. “All lies.”
“What are you talking about?” she asked.
“I checked your emails. There were several from him. You couldn’t even be bothered to answer. The poor kid was completely awestruck with you, and you wouldn’t even give him the time of day.”
How did that even work in terms of having a relationship if she hadn’t even responded? Didn’t that mean she didn’t have a relationship? But she knew there was no such thing as logic anymore with this woman in front of her. “I don’t remember seeing any emails,” she said. “I even searched to see if there were any.”
“Well, there weren’t,” Maggie said. “I forwarded them to myself and then deleted them forever. There are ways to recover all kinds of stuff, but I made sure you wouldn’t recover these.”
“So I didn’t even find these emails,” she said in disbelief. “But you’re still blaming me for his death?”
“Well, you’re responsible,” the woman said in a very reasonable tone.
It was that tone that scared Charlotte more than anything. The look in Maggie’s eyes and the tone of her voice were such complete opposites that it was obvious Maggie had lost whatever little bit of sanity she had. “I’m sorry that you lost him as a child.”
Maggie’s face twisted with fear. “Just because we were teenagers,” she spat, “everybody else fought us. They took my son away and made it very clear that we were not old enough to raise him.”
“And they gave him to somebody else?” Charlotte asked. She looked at the other men, but they were all sitting frozen, completely motionless. But she wasn’t fooled either. They might not be moving, but their brains were as they tried to figure a way out of this. If all three of them jumped Maggie, they would definitely overpower her. But somebody would get shot in the process. And Charlotte definitely didn’t want any more killings on her hands.
The woman sneered. “They gave him to friends! Family friends who had always wanted to have a child but couldn’t.” Her voice broke again. “I bawled and cried and screamed and went to the police. It was pretty nasty, but the police sided with my parents.”
“How old were you?” Charlotte asked. “Surely they wouldn’t have taken the child from the mother.”
“But I was no longer allowed to stay at home,” Maggie said. “And, if the child is deemed to be better off with an adopted family who would give him more of a life than I could, then everybody was against me.”
“And what about the father?” Charlotte asked.
“He was screaming along with me,” Maggie admitted. “But he was just a teenager, like me. We didn’t have jobs. We hadn’t finished school, and we were a mess. But we really, really wanted our son.”
“I’m sorry you didn’t have family who supported you,” Charlotte said.
“They were embarrassed and horrified that I’d gotten pregnant out of wedlock.”
“Which was also very common in those days,” Charlotte said with a nod. “You might have gotten a different reception at this day and age.”
“Maybe. I made a stink for as long and as hard as I could, until the adopting parents picked up and moved away, and I lost track of them. It broke my heart, and I never forgave my parents.”
“Did you have to kill them though?” Nico asked quietly beside her.
Charlotte looked at him in horror and then back at Maggie. “Please tell me that you didn’t kill your parents.”
“Why not?” she asked. “I was glad to. They killed the most important thing in my life, which was the relationship with my son. They shouldn’t have had any relationship with each other either. The world is a much better place without them. So basically you should be thanking me.”
“What did you do?” Nico asked. “I never did see any reports as to how they died.”
“Accidental asphyxiation,” she said. “Funny how the gas overcame them.”
Charlotte stared at her in shock. “You gassed them?”
“Well, I fixed their tea and knocked them out, then put them in the kitchen and just let the gas run.” She smiled. “It’s really easy to kill somebody, you know.”
“Are they the only ones you killed?”
She shrugged. “It does get easier.”
“And what about your son’s adoptive parents? You didn’t kill them?”
“I really wanted to,” she said. “I really, really wanted to. I saw them with my son several times, and, as much as I hated to admit it, they were really good with him. And he really loved them. And I found that I couldn’t do anything that would hurt my son. I wasn’t allowed to have anything to do with him until he was an adult, and I knew, at that point in time, everything that they had done wrong, I would hear about. And anything they got right, I would also hear about because my son would tell me everything.”