Diabolical

by Hank Schwaeble

  Or did he?

  This wasn’t his fight anymore. Without Isaac, Bartlett had no leverage. Maybe it had been a bluff, a way of pressuring him to do what Bartlett wanted. He used Vivian to convey the info so he could have deniability. Vivian, who said she’d only found out days ago, but was vague on the specifics. Maybe that was the case because there were no specifics, just information carefully fed to her by Bartlett.

  Crude and at best only semi-effective. Hatcher expected more from a man of his background and reputation. Did the man really think he wouldn’t try to find the boy?

  Susan had been upset, and Hatcher felt bad about that. She was paranoid enough as it was. But a call to her neighbor’s cell confirmed Isaac was okay, still sleeping. She gave Hatcher her address and a number before hugging him. She said to call soon, because she’d probably be moving now and switching phones.

  The Carnates were obviously playing games again, but when did that become a surprise? It’s not like he made himself hard to screw with. He didn’t even know as much about his own nephew as they did.

  That thought seemed to create an echo, not wanting to go away. Didn’t even know as much as they did.

  Didn’t. Know. As much.

  Hatcher stomped on the brake pedal, the car slamming to a stop. A horn blared behind him, but he ignored it.

  No.

  He yanked the steering wheel and hit the gas, U-turning abruptly into a stream of swerving traffic.

  No, no, no.

  He punched the address into the car’s navigation system. It calculated the route, estimated his time of arrival to be in twenty-two minutes. He wrestled his cell phone out of his pocket and dialed the number. No answer.

  The closer he got, the less he observed traffic laws, driving like he was racing every car ahead of him. He’d been speeding the whole way, but now he was running red lights with only the briefest of pauses, screeching through turns, weaving through traffic.

  It took him seventeen minutes to get there. He sprinted to the front door and pounded on it.

  He heard Susan’s voice, asking who was there.

  “It’s me, Hatcher. You need to get out of there. Now.”

  He heard a deadbolt being disengaged, a latch being turned. Susan yanked open the door, eyes round.

  “What is it? What’s wrong?”

  “We need to go. And by that I mean you need to go.”

  “Why?”

  Before he could respond, a car skidded along the curb in front of the town house. Two men in matching tracksuits leaped out of it, drawing weapons, their faces covered. Another car pulled to a stop a few lengths behind it. Hatcher bulled his way into the apartment, knocking Susan back, and slammed the door. He bolted it shut behind him.

  “Back door?”

  Susan blinked, standing still for a moment, before shaking her body and hands as if trying to free herself from a thought. Then she nodded and pointed to the rear of the town house.

  “Grab Isaac and lock yourself in the bathroom. And call nine-one-one.”

  “But—”

  “Just do it!”

  Hatcher sprinted through the living room toward the back. Susan protested, but he wasn’t listening, his mind focused on sealing off all points of access. A few steps, and he was passing through a kitchen that opened to a dining area. The wall of the dining area opposite the kitchen was mostly a sliding glass door, hidden behind a row of parallel blinds. Hatcher saw the latch, exposed in a sliver of space between the last blind and the wall edge. He lunged for it.

  The door slid open before he reached it. The barrel of a large-bore semiautomatic pistol appeared. Thin stock. The recognition was instant. Colt 1911. Forty-five caliber. Distinct, unmistakable.

  The guy wielding it pushed through the louvers. He was wearing a black ski mask above a gray tracksuit.

  “Don’t move,” he said. His voice was low, loud, and harsh, the words forming a command. “Heroes die.”

  Hatcher didn’t move.

  But in his mind, he was urging the gunman to. Just about a foot closer.

  The man stayed put, his intense gaze tracking Hatcher from one hand up to his eyes down to the other hand and back. He stayed that way for about a minute, following the same visual pattern the whole time, as if he’d been counting down the seconds, then slowly retreated. The blinds swung in his wake, knocking together.

  It was nice to have the gun out of his face, but something told Hatcher right off this couldn’t mean anything good. He barely had time to lower his arms before he heard a scream from the front. He ran back to the living room. The door was wide open. He barreled up to it, slapping his palm against the jamb to keep from careering off the front stoop, pausing to take in the scene. Susan was waving her arms hysterically in the yard as the cars sped away, engines snarling. Both cars swung left at the end of the block and disappeared before he could even reach her.

  The screams had deteriorated into moans and yells by the time Hatcher grabbed her by the arms.

  “Isaac?” he said.

  She pointed in the direction the vehicles had fled, sobbing.

  Hatcher stared down the road. The cars were already long out of view. He glanced over to the PT Cruiser. They hadn’t even bothered to disable it. There was no way he could catch them and they knew it.

  As if to acknowledge the point, the squeal of tires taking another sharp corner sounded in the distance. The fading distance.

  “How’d they get in?”

  She fought to stop crying. It took her several attempts before she finally managed to say, “They didn’t.”

  Another round of sobs began, only to be choked off in her throat as she looked past him.

  “Oh my God,” she said. “Patti . . .”

  He turned to follow her gaze and saw the door to the town house two units down was open. Hatcher hesitated briefly before sprinting to it. He paused at the threshold, glanced at the living room, then headed up the stairs, taking them two at a time.

  The first room was empty. A woman in jeans and a sweatshirt lay on the floor in the second one, unconscious. Her pale blonde hair was lumped in blood. Hatcher knelt next to her, checked her wrist for a pulse.

  He looked up to see Susan in the doorway, a hand to her mouth.

  “Is she . . . ?”

  “She’s got a pulse. It’s steady, but we need to get her an ambulance.”

  “I tried to tell you, she was watching him for me. I called her on the way, and she said he was still sleeping, told me to get some rest. She said she enjoyed having him around.”

  Hatcher nodded.

  “Will they hurt him?” she said, wiping away tears, her body convulsing in sobs.

  “I don’t think so,” Hatcher said. It felt like a lie. Truth was, he had no idea what Bartlett was capable of.

  “What do they want him for? He’s just a baby.” Her eyes squeezed shut, forcing long streams to roll off her lashes. “Just a sweet little baby . . .”

  “I don’t know, exactly. But I’ll get him back.”

  “Promise me you will, Jake. Please promise me you won’t let them do anything to my baby.”

  Hatcher slumped down onto the floor. “I promise,” he said, having no idea how he would, wondering if that word even meant anything coming from him.

  CHAPTER 13

  VIVIAN SAT ON THE EDGE OF THE BED IN HER HOTEL ROOM, kneading the flesh of her palm and chewing on her bottom lip while she listened to Hatcher’s rendition of the day’s events.

  “I left her with the police,” he said. He’d related most of what happened, keeping it simple, finishing with the police arriving and being led to Susan’s neighbor.

  “Do they think you had something to do with it?” Vivian asked, swallowing.

  Hatcher shrugged. He rubbed his clenched eyelids with his thumb and forefinger and leaned back in his chair. The police had grilled him for over an hour before letting him go. They knew something didn’t jibe, that was for sure. Lying to them had been Susan’s idea.

 
; “We didn’t tell them about the boy.”

  Vivian didn’t react. Or, at least, didn’t react more. She continued to rub her palm and dig her teeth into her lip.

  Susan’s logic was simple. If Hatcher told the police everything, they would consider him a huge liability and someone who needed to be kept under a watchful eye, and that meant they’d do their best to keep Hatcher from interfering with their investigation. She didn’t want that to happen, because he was the only one she trusted to get her son back.

  Hatcher didn’t argue the issue. Truth was, telling the police was a bad idea for more reasons than that. Reporting that her son had been kidnapped meant the FBI would be called in. Bartlett was likely to have serious pull with the federal government, friends in high places who had friends in higher places. Somebody from the DoD, like an Undersecretary of Defense, calling someone at Justice, like a deputy director of the Bureau.

  And given what he’d gleaned about Bartlett, there was always the possibility this was somehow part of a government op. Not likely, perhaps, but not something he could rule out.

  Either way, Bartlett would be insulated. Maybe become the subject of an investigation, maybe not. Maybe forced to change his plans because of police attention, maybe not. But the bottom line was, Susan was right. Regardless of whether it affected Bartlett, Hatcher’s ability to do anything would be extremely limited if the police were involved, especially if they started to take an interest in him.

  He also couldn’t help but wonder if that’s what Bartlett had been counting on in his planning, to operate behind the cover of an investigation, to keep Hatcher away, buy him all the time he needed. He’d gone to elaborate lengths to find the boy; he could have easily factored that kind of response in.

  “If they figure it out,” Vivian said, staring at her lap, one hand still wringing the other. “They’ll try to blame it on you, won’t they?”

  Hatcher swallowed a glass of tap water. “Maybe,” he said.

  “This woman,” she said. “The neighbor . . . was she hurt? Is she going to be okay?”

  They’d kept the story simple. Susan and Hatcher told them he had stopped by to visit, Susan called her neighbor to say they were coming over to get the baby, and found the neighbor unconscious on the floor. Some kind of robbery.

  The baby, she claimed, was sleeping in his room at Susan’s place, just as fine as could be. The risk was that at least one cop would want to see the child, have it examined by a doctor or at least take a look at it to see if there was anything relevant to document. But no one did. They bought the robbery story.

  Patti, the neighbor, had briefly regained consciousness, but just barely, and wasn’t in any condition to talk. She voiced a groggy concern about the baby, and Susan told her everything was fine. EMTs took her in an ambulance. Hatcher’s presence seemed to bug the cops more than the woman’s injuries, so they spent most of their time questioning him, which more or less confirmed that Susan’s instincts about not mentioning the kidnapping were on target. No, he didn’t see anything except a car speeding away. Yes, it was quite a coincidence this happened right after he arrived. No, he didn’t hit the woman or know the person who did. They checked his cell phone, took his ID like it was a credit card they were revoking, and ran his name through a database. If they realized he was an ex-con recently released from an Army Regional Confinement Facility having served a two-year felony sentence, they didn’t show it. They were just as hostile before they ran the check.

  “I think so,” Hatcher said. “An ambulance took her.”

  “You don’t know if she’s okay?”

  “Viv, there’s nothing I can do for her. From what I could tell, she should recover. In the meantime, I need to find Isaac. And that—”

  “But what about when she is able to talk to the police? Won’t she tell them she had . . . tell them what really happened?”

  Hatcher rolled his head back until he was staring at the ceiling, then closed his eyes. “Maybe. But that shouldn’t matter if I find Isaac.” He leveled his gaze at her. “That means I need to get to Bartlett. Now.”

  “Bartlett? Why?”

  “Do I really have to spell it out? He used me, used me to track down Isaac. That means he used you, too.”

  “Jake, please. You’re going to get yourself killed. Or hurt. Can’t you just . . .”

  Hatcher tossed his hands into the air. “What? Let it go? Jesus, Vivian, what’s gotten into you?”

  “I . . .” She lowered her gaze to his shoes. “Nothing. This is spinning out of control, that’s all.”

  “I don’t understand. Yesterday, when you thought he had Isaac, you were all for me ‘doing what I do.’ Now we know he does, and you’re all timid about it.”

  “How do you know?” she asked, deep furrows creasing her brow. “You said they had masks.”

  Hatcher lowered his head, swinging his jaw slowly from one side to the other several times. God, women could be stubborn.

  “And yesterday,” she continued, “I was telling you to do what Bartlett wanted, not to go against him.”

  “Look, Viv, you need to be honest with me—did he threaten you?”

  She shut her eyes, let out a weary sigh. “No.”

  “Well, he’s done something. You can spin it all you want, but he’s gotten in your head somehow.”

  The words seemed to frustrate her. She reached forward, placed her fingertips on his knee. “Jake, don’t. You can’t be sure it was him.”

  “You know something? You’re right. I can’t. Not until I confront him. So, I need you to tell me how to find him.”

  “I told you before,” she said, withdrawing her hand. “I don’t know.”

  “Vivian.”

  “Please, Jake.”

  He rocked forward out of the chair. He took hold of her upper arms and lifted her. Not much, but enough she wasn’t quite sitting anymore. “Tell me.”

  “Jake . . .”

  “Tell me.”

  She turned her head and shut her eyes, a pained expression tightening her face. She seemed to think long and hard before answering.

  “He’s rented a house. I heard a couple of his men talk about it. They said it’s a big one, a corner lot. On Mulholland Drive.”

  THE PLACE WAS LESS A HOUSE THAN A COMPOUND. FULL PERIMETER wall, iron gate complete with guardhouse. The guardhouse looked empty, but there was a CCTV camera pointed at the drive.

  Through the twisted curves of the gate, Hatcher could see a bald guy in camouflage pants and a dark shirt walking a circuit. He had an earpiece over one ear with a flex mike curving down to the side of his mouth. One hand rested along the top of an M4, with the other loosely wrapped around the grip, trigger finger resting on the guard, strap pulled taut over his shoulder, holding it across his body in a ready position.

  Sometimes, Hatcher figured, the direct approach is best.

  He parked Vivian’s rental along the street and walked toward the gate. It had enough play for him to move it open and walk through. He walked straight toward the sentry with the M4.

  The guard eased the muzzle of the rifle in Hatcher’s direction. Not quite at him, but close enough to make the point.

  “That’s far enough,” the man said.

  Hatcher took two more steps, stopped about ten feet away. “I’m here to see Bartlett.”

  “Get down on your knees, hands clasped behind your head.” The guard raised a hand to his earpiece, was about to speak into the mike.

  Rolling his eyes and his head in an exaggerated gesture, Hatcher frowned and moved a few steps closer. “Look, my name’s—”

  The man snapped the weapon up, staring through the sights. “I know who you are. And I gave you an order. On the ground.”

  “If I can just—”

  Hatcher slapped a hand to his neck. He pulled it away and looked at his palm, then held it out to show the guard. Blood, and a metal dart. Then he collapsed.

  The guard covered him with his rifle, approaching cautiously. He looked dow
n at the dart, warily glanced to each side. He nudged Hatcher’s body with his foot, then gave it a prodding kick. Nothing. He swept the perimeter with a quick rotation of his head before taking a knee and reaching for the dart next to Hatcher’s palm. He raised his other hand to his earpiece, started to speak.

  He never got the chance. Hatcher launched his legs over the man’s head, scissoring his neck. He grabbed the rifle stock in the same motion, pointing the muzzle away from his body, and gave a violent twist of his hips. Both of them came crashing to the concrete, Hatcher’s lower body slapping flat, the guard slamming down onto his back. Air blasted from the guard’s lungs with a loud grunt. Hatcher released his grip, spun himself around, and flipped on top of the man, punching him once, twice, three times, each blow causing the back of the man’s skull to bounce off the concrete.

  The guard’s eyes rolled back. Hatcher ripped off the headset, unfastened the rifle sling, and took the M4. He shot looks front and back, side to side, checking for movement. Nothing.

  His best assessment was there was really no chance that they didn’t know he was there, though he figured there were still two ways to play it. But it didn’t matter, because anger was making the choice for him. He grabbed the man by the back of his collar and yanked him to his feet.

  A body, especially one of a grown man, is heavier than most people realize. The key to forcing someone’s body to do what you wanted was getting them to assist you with their own movement. That meant a state of dazed consciousness worked best, the kind where the person would try to stand, use some of their own balance and leg strength to achieve the goal. Though he was a little too wobbly to walk smoothly, the man offered just enough of an effort at keeping his feet for Hatcher to push him toward the house, rifle in his back. The man staggered forward, his head bent into his hand.

  The front door to the house was constructed of ornate panels of etched glass set in a cherrywood frame. Hatcher dug his hand deeper into the man’s shirt, bunching more cloth into his fist and clenching as tightly as he could. He pulled back slightly, then thrust forward, running the stumbling man into a near sprint, propelling over two low steps, across the porch, and smashing him headfirst through the designer glass.