by Joy Ohagwu
Robert was sure his heart was thumping at this point and probably so was Charlie’s.
Charlie gasped and raced out of the office. “Get me a SWAT team! Fast,” he ordered toward the row of offices, leading to a scurry of police officers.
Who are you and what do you want with my daughter? Robert tapped his feet in impatience and waited for a reply. Action was going to be his next response but he needed to gauge his enemy first.
Tick tock, Captain Towers. Clock’s ticking. You steal something of mine; I take something of yours. Blame game on. You got 48 hrs.
Enough. Robert shrugged on his jacket, grabbed his badge and gun, and then raced out of his office. He roared toward the phone. “You take my daughter, and I’ll hunt you down!”
Ruby Towers pulled open her oven door and, hands covered with mittens, carefully lifted the blueberry muffin tray from it. She set it on the kitchen island to cool and pulled off her mittens.
Admiring the fruit of her handiwork, she smiled. For her, cooking today was purely for therapy. She had called Eva to ask for prayers for one of her clients, who had just been diagnosed with cancer, only to discover that Eva and her husband, Cornelius, left for Cambodia the night before. Another client, who’d been with her for almost fourteen years, had passed away at a nursing home—a cheerful, bright fellow who always wore a smile. Suffice it to say, she was definitely not having the best day.
So, to cure her soured feelings, she stopped work an hour earlier, handed off the recovery of funds from courier receipts that had not cleared to her assistant, Melinda, and went into the kitchen and got on baking.
Thankfully, the resulting creation one hour later were more than enough for her, her husband, Robert, and their daughter, Ritz, who would both wolf down these muffins within a couple of days. There was nothing like having a grown man and a teenager in the house—who were addicted to blueberry muffins. With them, food rarely went to the trash unless it had spoiled. She chuckled as she turned off the oven and set out a separate cooling tray. She would transfer the muffins there individually once they cooled, then stack them into the fridge in glass Tupperware.
Done, and feeling much less sullen, she unhooked her apron and dropped it onto a kitchen stool. She sighed and sunk into another. Finally, her emotions were less roughened enough for her to pray. She clasped her hands and bowed her head.
“Lord, you know I miss Terri and I hate that he passed away. You also know what a good client Rosalinda has been to me and to my company. She was such a kind customer, and she was crucial to her company admitting that I was not at fault when their shipment was damaged by a tornado years ago.” She sniffed and hoped she wasn’t coming down with a cold.
“Please heal her. Get her to where she will receive proper treatment and let the treatments work. In any way I can encourage her, help me to do so. In Jesus’ mighty name I pray, amen.”
Feeling better, she stood, rinsed two glasses, and poured in soda from the large Coca-Cola bottle in the refrigerator. She carried them to her home office, set one at the edge of her desk in front of Melinda, who worked in there with her, and the second glass closer to her PC.
Ruby slipped past where Melinda sat, rounded her office desk, and slid into her swivel chair. Logging back into her system, she spun to receive the file Melinda handed to her, then set it down on her desk and sat back.
Melinda took a sip. “Oh, thank you for the soda. I really needed some sugar to get my brain whirling again. Granted, it’s freezing outside, but my mind operates at a hotter temperature once numbers are involved.” Melinda sipped once more, gathered the next set of files to work on, and rose. Her robust frame disappeared into the small adjacent room Ruby had converted into a workspace for her, and Ruby settled back into her work.
When the circumstances surrounding The New Rulebook had been finally resolved, she continued to work from home as a precautionary measure, visiting her office once a week in person.
Then that schedule became a pattern, which she never reversed. Over the years, Melinda didn’t mind working from the Towers’ residence as she brought her own kids over and they played with Ritz after she was born.
Now, she and Melinda were more friends than boss and employee. She made sure to promote and increase the woman’s pay commensurately and not cheat her due to their close working relationship. Matter of fact, Ruby had gone the extra mile.
Unknown to Melinda, she had privately researched the tuition cost for her kids’ colleges and increased Melinda’s pay handsomely enough to help get her kids through college annually without them taking a student loan. The 150 percent increase had surprised Melinda, but Ruby told her she more than earned it with her firm dedication to her duties.
If Melinda was in the know, she would probably have rejected an offered financial assistance to support her, so Ruby made it happen unofficially. She rang up Melinda’s office through their intercom when she came across some figures that didn’t match in the database. “Sorry, Mel, can you stop by please?”
When she entered, Ruby raised the sheet from the file she’d been studying. “I think we need to revisit the terms for our engagement with Real Property Partners. They’ve been consistently exceeding their transaction limits for the past three months. We limited them to four shipments, and they made six.”
“And we didn’t charge them extra for their overage those times. I agree,” Melinda added as she sipped her drink clutched in one hand.
“That must be why the Operations Center sent this file for my specific review.” Usually, her Operations Director handled such, but she was on maternity leave, and Ruby preferred to handle trouble clients herself when necessary.
Ruby tapped her pen on the sheet and leaned forward. “Okay, tell Trina at the office to draft something to that effect for me, and I’ll look it over in about one hour.”
Melinda spun and nodded while returning to her workspace. “You got it.”
Ruby settled into the next project and continued working for another hour. She glanced at the time. Ten o’clock. She had to get a couple more things done before heading out for her lunch date with her husband, Robert Towers. He’d said today would be busy but that they can certainly squeeze it in, which she appreciated.
Melinda rushed back in just as Ruby was rolling her mouse to wake up her PC screen. The woman’s face was ashen.
Ruby stood slowly. “Mel, are you okay?” She clutched her sweater, made her way around her desk, and led Melinda by the elbow to settle her down on the long office couch by the wall inside Ruby’s office.
But Melinda rose almost immediately. Her hands trembled. “I–I, your husband called my phone. Here.” Melinda shoved the phone into Ruby’s hand.
Ruby felt a frown crease her brow. Spinning, she raised the phone to her ear and spoke. “Hello? Robert?”
Why would Robert call her assistant, and why would the woman appear scared? “Are you all right?” Ruby crossed an arm around her midsection, waiting.
Sirens wailed in the background. What was going on? She gripped her shirt, scared for him. Then his voice came on roughly, like he was speaking in hushed tones. Then he got louder.
“Red! Are you okay? Is anyone at the house? Set the alarms now!” Robert shouted, between panting breaths.
Ruby raced out of the home office, sprinted down the stairs, clutching the handrails, and armed the home security system near the front door. The light blinked from green to red—showing Armed. Then she raised the phone back to her ear. “It’s done. What’s going on? Are you safe? Are you hurt?” The anxiety alone twisted her insides. She exhaled to keep her heart from popping out of her chest.
“I’m fine, Ruby. But…we’ve got a…problem.”
She didn’t like his halted tone. The last time he spoke like this was at Snowy Peaks, when Pete Zendel—now said to be an unofficial external, as-needed tech consultant to the SSPD—was still a bad guy and threatened her. Fierceness had released from his pores like vapor then. She sensed it again now. “Robert, do
n’t scare me.” She grabbed a glass of water from the dining table and downed it in two gulps.
“Ruby,” he hesitated, “please have faith concerning what I’m about to say.”
The sirens wailed louder.
Oh yeah, Ruby was scared. “Robert, if you don’t say what it is—”
“Ritz is missing.”
The room spun in Ruby’s eyes as those three words worked their way into her conscious mind. She probably didn’t hear him right. “What?”
“Our daughter was kidnapped this morning, Red. We’re closing in on where her car was spotted.” Robert’s breathing came rushed, like he broke into a run. “I got text messages from the kidnapper, followed by a phone call. And they want one thing in return.”
Ruby gripped her chest and squatted low, feeling dizzy. Ritz was missing—kidnapped? Her baby? Their only child? No! “What do they want, Robert?”
This could not be. Not be.
“The New Rulebook, from seventeen years ago. That’s what they want in exchange for our daughter.”
He halted at her gasp. “I’m sorry I couldn’t protect her, my love.” Despair etched Robert’s cracked voice.
Ruby slumped and passed out.
CHAPTER TWO
“For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and His ears are open to their prayers.”- 1Peter 3:12
Robert crouched low and jogged with stealth behind the SSPD SWAT team tactical squad’s armored vehicle as it crawled toward Ritz’s car in the alley. Puffs of vapor and smoke escaped from the exhaust pipe, and his stomach clenched at the thought of where she could be.
Daddy, a small car is just fine. I don’t want to crash a brand-new car. Moreover, no one’s ever going to bother me with a car that’s not flashy, Ritz had pleaded eight months ago. His usually security-conscious mind succumbed to her plea, even as he knew he should’ve chosen differently for her. If they had gotten Ritz a brand-new car, it would’ve yielded more pointers to aid their search. Now, he simply had to do this old school. Rounding the left corner between Ritz’s humming vehicle, Christiana’s car, and the alley, the SWAT vehicle stopped, and he paused behind it.
“Ready to engage, sir.” A SWAT team officer met his black-smeared face with one like his, weapon raised and alert.
Robert gave a curt nod. “Stay at my six o’clock. I’ll check the first car, and if we’re clear, you’ll go check the other vehicle. I see someone in there. Probably a female named Christiana. Confirm with me when you arrive.” With that order, Robert trotted, raising his gun as he approached Ritz’s car door. He swept a glance inside the back seat but saw no one there. He neared the driver’s seat. On the floor mat, lay her phone. With a gloved hand, he reached out, picked it up, and handed it to an officer behind him. The man took it and bagged it for evidence. He spun and pointed toward the shadow approaching.
The first SWAT team officer, who had approached Christiana’s vehicle, strode closer. “Sir, there’s an unresponsive female in the car. She’s alive but has a weak pulse. I called an ambulance for her.”
Robert exhaled long, a bit relieved. “Thank you. Give CPR if she gets worse before the ambulance arrives.” Robert’s heart was hurting for his daughter’s friend. “Please inspect the car for any evidence and report back to me.”
The officer nodded and hurried back to her.
Robert returned his attention to Ritz’s car. He searched for any signs of a struggle inside but found nothing more than her typical clutter—a spare jacket, her favorite yellow sunshine hoodie, her backpack and, in the glovebox, some chocolate. He sighed, straightened, and pushed up his bulletproof goggles. There had to be something. He glanced around. Anything. Just to have a clue where she was.
The sirens of an arriving ambulance interrupted his thoughts. He whirled around as paramedics rushed to Christiana’s car. Then he followed. Maybe, if she woke, she might offer a clue, but as he saw her being lifted onto a gurney—with dried blood from a gash on her forehead and swollen eyelids—that option slipped fast.
He swallowed, shelving his gun, and approached an attending paramedic. “Is she going to be all right?”
The paramedic turned, holding an IV bag in one hand, and the other end stuck into Christiana’s arm. The young lady smiled. “She was very lucky. Yes, she will be fine, but it appears she might need to be sedated for some time if there’s inflammation in her head, which I suspect based on her head injury. If she sails through that, she’ll come out all right in a couple of days or a week.”
Great news for Christiana, but Robert didn’t have a week to find Ritz. Forty-eight hours. He had a mere forty-eight hours. “Thank you for the update. Please let us know what hospital she’s admitted to so we can check on her. She’s my daughter’s best friend.”
A curt nod followed. “We’ll do that for you, sir. Thank you for calling us in time. That could ultimately save her life.”
As the ambulance rolled away, a tap nudged on his shoulder. A SWAT officer held out a crowbar. “We found this beside the unconscious lady’s vehicle.”
Finally, some hope. “Good. Send it to be run for prints in the lab.” He slapped the man on his shoulder, and his gear clinked. “Good job.”
Another approached as the first one left, holding a black bag, and peering inside. “Sir, I found this in the trash a few feet from here down in the alley.” He looked up. “A phone and some other stuff are inside.”
Hope lit up inside Robert. “Walk it to the lab and hand the bag to Randolph and no one else. Tell him I need results fast.”
While the man hopped into a cruiser and drove off, Robert felt his nose pinch with the bitter cold. He swept a frustrated hand over his hair. Did Ritz even have any warmth wherever she was being held? He turned and made his way to grab a squad car and head home to see his wife while his team finished up. He was worried at the abrupt way the phone call had ended when he broke the news to her, hoping she didn’t lose it. And if she did, he didn’t want her going through such anguish alone. He revved up the cruiser, hit the pedal, and zoomed into traffic, sirens blaring.
When Ruby came to, she heard Robert barking orders to his men by phone. She peeled her eyelids open. He stood beside the glass-encased china cabinets wearing full tactical gear. He also wore a deep frown, probably not liking what he was hearing from the other end of the line.
Ruby rotated to her side, feeling an ache there as Robert continued speaking. “Listen, Charlie, ignore what he said to you. The phone call said they wanted to exchange Ritz for The New Rulebook, so we will assume that is really their intent until proven otherwise.”
He massaged his neck, and she cringed, feeling bad for him, for the pressure he must feel with all this.
“I need you to call President Jacobson. Find out whether he can confirm that The New Rulebook is secure as he’d promised Ruby many years ago. I know he’s no longer President, but the current President can relay a confirmation through back channels, considering this is a potential national security threat. If there’s a breach—however these crooks got to know about it—we need to plug that hole. I want everyone and everything that ever mentioned that software checked out—thoroughly. Who they are, where they’ve been, what they’ve done, what they ate last night. Every detail. Now. And gather the Special Investigative Unit. I have a different related mission for them. Thank you, man.” He cut the call and exhaled loudly, wiping perspiration off his forehead.
Still heavy-lidded, Ruby watched him glance around like he searched for something.
Behind Robert, Newton bent down, setting up some equipment—something similar to a PC on a quadruple-legged stand—in the middle of their living room. “Hey, Newton. Get me Zendel on the line, please. Maybe he knows something. Use the secure SAT phone to make a trace unlikely. And don’t mention anything about The New Rulebook or say anything about Ritz’s kidnapping. I need to ruffle his feathers without telling him any details. Just…bring him here. Tell him it’s urgent.”
He seemed to revise on second thought, wit
h an inching of his brow. “Actually, direct him to proceed to the SSPD. He must never know where Ruby and I live, nor Ruby’s office location, understood?”
Newton nodded. “Best kept secret.” He shrugged on a thick winter coat around his bulky frame and grabbed his squad car keys. “Yes, Captain.” He walked out of the door, leaving them alone. At least, if there was someone else around, she didn’t see them. Where was Melinda?
Just then, Robert glanced to the couch. He hurried over and squatted beside where she lay, leaning his arm on the couch. When his weapons belt with his gun clipped on it pressed against the edge, he shifted it aside. His top two uniform buttons were undone, his hair a bit roughened, his eyes haggard and lacking their usual brilliance.
Ruby suspected that Melinda—who now approached carrying a tray with two steaming cups on it—got her into the couch before Robert returned. Melinda smiled, set the tray to the side, and walked away to give them privacy.
He peered into Ruby’s face with concern, sweeping a gentle hand over her hair and cupping the base of her neck. “Hey, my love. You okay?”
A brief pause followed as his intense green eyes scanned her face. “I’m so sorry about Ritz. We’ll get her back. Have faith, okay?” He swallowed hard as his face reddened to a dark shade.
A tear slid down Ruby’s cheek sideways and dropped onto the couch. The churn in her belly made her doubt she could rise without fainting.
Ritz was their world. She was not simply their only child—she was their blessing. She brought a spark that made their home alive always. Of course, Ruby and Robert loved each other and enjoyed one another’s company, but their daughter brought vibrant, youthful energy into their lives. Ritz made them parents, a role they cherished.
And they were not going to lose Ritz, come what may. Ruby firmed her jaw. She couldn’t summon the energy to pray now. The pain was too fresh. She simply wanted to cry. She wasn’t sure she felt strong enough to deal with the devastating news. Rather, she felt hollow. She felt as though the enemy who took her daughter had emptied her, leaving only a shell of Ruby. She lifted slightly to sit, and Robert’s strong arm curved around her, bringing her up to him. Fingers fisting up wads of his uniform, she sobbed into his shoulder, and he simply held her, running a gentle hand over her hair until she quieted.