what his life had become. He apologized for his sins and
promised that, if he was given another chance, he would
make the most of it. He would right those wrongs. Ray’s
eyes were squeezed shut, tears pouring out the sides. He
hoped it would be quick, if anything. That would be something to be thankful for.
Then Ray heard something odd. Footsteps coming back
his way. But they weren’t the loud thump-thump of the
guards’, they were the soft, muffled steps of the prisoners. Then Ray heard a man yelling, and damned if it wasn’t
Officer Shithead himself.
“You assholes get back here, right now!”
The 5 Company prisoners didn’t go back to roll call.
Instead they walked right back to their cells and sat down.
Possum, a big black man from Alabama, said, “Fuck you.
You gonna take one man, you gonna take all the men.”
Possum was talking about Ray.
Soon Officer Shithead was marching down the cell
block, nightstick unsheathed.
Officer Shithead didn’t live another minute.
After they’d beat him to death with his own baton,
Ray’s brothers in 5 Company managed to get his cell open.
Several minutes later, a guard heard a commotion down
A Tunnel, went to see what the hell was taking 5 Company
so long, and that’s when the devil unleashed hell.
Ray survived the riots with his life, his sanity, and just
one small scar on his cheek obtained on September 13
when the cops finally opened fire. A glass pane shattered,
carving out a chunk of Ray’s face. William “Billy Buds”
Moss, a surgeon in lockup for raping a patient, stitched it
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together with a spool and tweezers stolen from the nurse’s
office, moments before it went up in flames.
Raymond Benjamin would be ejected from the penal
system two years later. Thirty-nine people died in those
riots. Most of them were buried. Officer Shithead, Ray
later learned, had been burned beyond recognition. There
was barely enough of him left to bury.
Leaving Attica, Ray Benjamin was a changed man. Not
so much in deeds. He was still prone to violence, still had
the temper of a pissed-off Viking, but now he had a cause.
Not to mention a massive nicotine addiction. He told
friends that after all the pain cigarettes had caused him in
prison, he might as well get a little pleasure out of them.
Several times a month Ray would wake up at night, remembering that morning sitting in his cell, praying for forgiveness. Waiting for a death that, with mercy, decided to
pass him over. He never forgot that. Never took it for
granted. And every act of violence, everything he did that
“society” wouldn’t approve of, was going toward making
things right. It didn’t matter if people couldn’t understand
it. He knew it was right.
The Reeds were part of that plan. They were doing the
right thing.
But now they were gone, and Ray Benjamin felt
concern for the first time in a long time. If the Reeds lost
their will, they could give up everything. Ray would go
down. So would the big man. And everything Ray had
worked for over the past thirty years would be lost.
Ray thought about the Reeds. Where could they have
gone? And why would they suddenly decide to disobey
such simple fucking directions?
They weren’t at the motel. Elaine wasn’t picking up her
cell phone. He’d given them the address, a newly cloned
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phone, and now he couldn’t find them. It was like they’d
looked him in the eye and lied to him.
“This isn’t good,” he said to Vince. “The Reeds have
disappeared.”
Vince snorted a laugh, managed to keep the toothpick
in his mouth. “Ain’t that ironic.”
Ray looked at him, then said fuck it. He couldn’t help
himself.
He slapped Vince across the face, the toothpick doing
a little spiral before landing in a puddle of sludge several
feet away. That made Ray smile.
When Vince recovered, he was holding his jaw, a thin
trickle of blood at the corner of his mouth.
“Ow, man, what the fuck?”
“Couldn’t take that stupid toothpick anymore.”
“Christ, you could have asked me to throw it out!”
“Consider this an apology. Come on, let’s go.”
They got into the car, Ray shaking his head as Vince
started the engine.
“What is it?” Vince said, mopping up his lip with a
handkerchief.
“The Reeds,” he said. “I don’t trust them anymore.
They don’t realize this thing is bigger than them. They’re
being selfish, not realizing they’re putting years of work
at risk. I thought they could be trusted, that they had their
family’s best interests in mind. I guess I was wrong.”
“What are you saying, boss?” Vince asked.
“I think when we find them, we need to make them gone.”
“Gone like the kids? Or, like, gone gone?”
Ray looked at him, didn’t say a word. Vince nodded
solemnly. Ray patted the kid on the back. That was his
answer right there. Then they drove away.
33
“According to DMV records,” Curt said, “the Reeds
drive a 2002 silver Ford Windstar, license plate JV5 L16.
I don’t think it’ll come as a huge surprise to anyone that
their current address is listed as 482 Huntley Terrace.”
We were still at the 19th Precinct, corralled in a conference room on the second floor. Curt had already had to
shoo away three other officers who tried to reclaim the
room. When they couldn’t offer concrete reasons for
needing the space—the excuses ranged from “It has the
only good coffee machine in the building” to “Fuck your
mother”—I quickly figured out the cops simply didn’t
want us there. And that was fine with me. The more roadblocks were put up in our effort to find out the circumstances surrounding these kidnappings and Petrovsky’s
murder, the more insolent I became. Though I didn’t think
Curt would go so far as to have my back if I lost control
and tried to pick a fight. And I was getting pretty damn
close to that.
Amanda said, “So at least we have direct legal proof that
ties the Reed family to this guy Benjamin. But we still
don’t know why the hell they have anything to do with a
criminal.”
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“What if,” I said, “the Reeds weren’t linked directly
to Benjamin?”
“Not sure I follow,” Curt said.
“We’re forgetting about Petrovsky. He knew Daniel
Linwood and Michelle Oliveira. His career was based
around children. Bob and Elaine Reed have one son,
Patrick, and we suspect they might have kidnapped
another child, too.”
“I’m still waiting for the search on that,” Curt said.
“I’m hoping you’re wrong.”
“Anyway, isn’t it possible that somehow the Reeds
became li
nked to Benjamin through Petrovsky?”
“Like some sort of middleman?” Amanda asked.
“Exactly. I’m willing to bet Petrovsky knew Benjamin,
and Petrovsky knew the Reeds, as well. Amanda, is there
any way you could get information about Patrick Reed? I
have a feeling we might see Dmitri Petrovsky’s signature
on his delivery forms as well.”
“I’m on it,” Amanda said. She gathered up her coat and
purse and stood up. “Good luck, guys.” She spent an extra
moment looking at me, then she left.
Curt waited until the door had closed, then he said, “So
what’s going on with you two?”
“Nothing,” I said. “Absolutely nothing.”
“You sound like you’re as happy with that situation as
I am with my mortgage.”
“Just don’t know what to do. I broke up with her, but
not a day goes by I don’t regret it. In my mind I can erase
that mistake, but expecting her to… I wouldn’t expect
that.”
“You think maybe part of the reason you’re working
this story so hard is to be close to her?”
“I don’t know.”
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“That’s not a no.”
“No, it’s not.”
“Part of me don’t feel right letting her do some of the
dirty work on this. I mean, look at you, man. Seems like
every few months you get beat up. You really want her that
close to you?”
“That’s why I broke it off in the first place,” I said. “I
took the decision out of her hands. But she’s been with me
every step of the way on this. Relationship or not, she
wants to be here. And it’s not my place to tell her not to.”
“That’s a selfish way to look at the world, especially if
she might be in danger.”
“I’d kill myself if anything happened to her, Curt,” I
said. “But she’s a hell of a strong woman, and I know that
anything I can take, she can, too. Probably more so. She
works with kids every day, and she’s seen some of the most
terrible cases of abuse you can imagine. She doesn’t talk
about it much, because, well, who wants to bring that kind
of work home with her? But don’t be fooled into thinking
she’s in this for me, or for the adrenaline. This is a cause
for her. And I respect that.”
“So if it’s a cause for her, and it’s about my job for me,
what’s it about for you?”
I thought about that for a moment, then said, “The truth,
man. It’s about the truth. That’s my job.”
“So since we’re both on the job,” Curt said, “how the
hell do we find the Reeds? They obviously jetted from
Huntley before smokey the pyromaniac got his hands on
the house. They’re registered with Verizon, but the phone’s
going right to voice mail. No luck tracking it down just yet.
There are no known family members for either Robert or
Elaine Reed, and we’re checking their phone records for
friends and acquaintances.”
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“They won’t be at a friend’s house,” I said. “Benjamin
got them into the house on Huntley so they could keep
private. That place was like a fortress. You don’t go
through all that trouble only to have Elaine spill the beans
to someone in her knitting group. You said they have a
minivan, right?”
“Yeah, a Windstar.”
“Nobody buys a minivan for one kid. I’m getting more
and more sure that they’ve kidnapped another child.
Anyway, I’m betting they’re staying at a motel somewhere. A place where nobody knows them, and nobody
knows where they are except for Benjamin and his crony.”
“There’s a lot of motels in this country, man. You can’t
expect us to cover all of them.”
“No, but if you’re a parent with two bawling kids in a
minivan, do you really think you’re driving ten, fifteen
hours for the same kind of motel you can get within a few
miles? My bet is they’re still in the state. Say a four-hour
drive, make it an even two hundred and forty miles, and
that’s your radius from Huntley Terrace. They’ll stay away
from major cities and metropolitan areas.”
“There’s still a shitload of fleabag motels in that
range, Henry.”
“Christ, Curt, you’re a cop. Don’t you guys do this all
the time?”
Curt smiled at me. “I’m on it. Go run some more of
your magic. I’ll give you a ring if we get any more info on
the Reeds or other missing children.”
“Thanks, Curt, appreciate it. You want to sock me in
the eye once, gain a little street cred among your fellow
boys in blue?”
“Tempting, but tell you what. Leave the building like I
broke you down into tears, we’ll call it even. Deal?”
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“Deal.”
I left the 19th Precinct with a sullen look on my face,
as if Curt Sheffield had just ripped the head off my favorite
teddy bear. Rounding the corner onto Lexington, I called
the Gazette from my cell phone. I asked to be connected
to Wallace Langston’s office, and the editor-in-chief
picked up immediately.
“Wallace, it’s Henry.”
“Henry, good to hear from you. What’s the latest?”
“I’m in the middle of tracking down a family that I’m
ninety-nine percent sure is part of some sort of weird kidnapping ring that involves the Linwood and Oliveira
children. There’s a link between the Reed family and this
psycho Benjamin who mistook me for an ashtray. I’m
running down the link, and when I have that I’ll let you
know. How’s Jack doing?”
Wallace sighed. “They released him yesterday. He’s
got the rest of the week off for some R and R and detox.
I’ve never seen the man like this before. It worries me.”
“What do you mean?”
“Jack has been with this newspaper since he was a
young man, Henry, younger than you are now. He’s
worked himself to the bone for his profession. He’s a
legend in this field, and he’s paid his dues to become that.
But Jack’s not a young man anymore. You can’t go with
that same kind of drive, that kind of passion at his age,
without compensation. I wonder…God, I can’t believe
I’m saying this…but I wonder if his career isn’t beginning
to wind down.”
I felt like I’d been punched in the gut. But rather than
a sensation of pain emanating from it, I felt anger. How
could Wallace even begin to question the longevity of
Jack’s career? Things were looking bad now, but everyone
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was entitled to fall off the wagon once or twice. It was a
divot in the road, not a full-blown earthquake. And it
pissed me off to hear Wallace insinuate otherwise.
“He’ll be just fine,” I said through gritted teeth. “Give
it a week or two, he’ll be tracking leads and breaking
stories like
he’s a new man.”
“I sincerely hope you’re right, Henry. But it worries and
saddens me to think you may not be. Listen, my friend,
keep pushing on this story. I’ve gotten three calls from
Gray Talbot’s office since your detainment up in Hobbs
County. Our friend the senator is no doubt perturbed that
we’ve ignored his requests. I expect a hate-o-gram to arrive
any moment in the mail, but until you see me led away in
handcuffs, keep pressing.”
“That’s what I do,” I said. “Talk to you later, Wallace.”
I hung up.
It took a moment to register that my stomach was
growling. I stopped at a deli and wolfed down a bagel with
lox spread and a large coffee. When that was polished off,
I had half a blueberry muffin for dessert. My natural
reaction to that would be to run it off the next day, but my
legs were beat. I hadn’t put in for vacation time in ages. I
didn’t think Wallace would be all that surprised to see my
paperwork cross his desk in the near future.
When I finished the meal, I took a cab back home, sat
down on the couch and waited. This was the worst part of
the game, and as a reporter the most frustrating part of the
job. The waiting.
So much of my work was dependent on sources getting
back to me, but every moment that phone didn’t ring there
was a fear that the story was slipping through my fingers.
I worried that Curt’s searches would turn up empty. That
Amanda would discover Patrick Reed was born in Idaho
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and not Hobbs County like I suspected. Not to mention
cigarette boy Benjamin wandering the streets somewhere,
and I had a little more anxiety at that moment than I liked.
I had to distract myself. Music, that would do it. Calm,
soothing music.
I turned my computer on, opened iTunes and started to
play Dylan’s “Not Dark Yet.” The melody calmed me.
I thought about Daniel Linwood, Michelle Oliveira.
Two children with their lives once laid out in front of
them, yet forevermore they would be outcasts. They would
always live with that stigma, never fitting in. The beauty
of a child, the pain from a life stolen away.
And just while those lyrics had begun to burrow their
way into my skull, my cell phone rang. If there was ever
a time to be jostled out of morose thoughts.
The caller ID read “Amanda cell.” I answered it without
hesitating.
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