“I don’t understand; why would the Bureau do that?”
“They think I’m incompetent, that I’ve been letting Jack walk all over me. Maybe they’re right, but I’ll be damned if I can see anything else I could have done, and I’m also proud to say that I’ve gotten every child back from him safely.”
“I can understand them being disappointed in your inability to capture him, but I’ve listened to your previous interactions with Jack and agree that there was nothing else you could have done. Are you certain there’s no other motive behind your dismissal from this case?”
Brice gazed at the floor as he spoke.
“It seems Mr. Ryan is also unhappy with me. In particular, he didn’t like the fact that I involved you and your husband in the case.”
“But you didn’t involve us, Samantha did, when she was being threatened she called my husband. She called the one person she thought might be able to help her, and she was right, we will help her, by helping the Bureau get her back safely.”
“Your help is no longer needed, Doctor,” said a deep voice from behind them, they turned their heads and found Agent Croft walking towards them.
Jessica sent him a tight smile.
“Agent Croft, I hope you’ll reconsider that. I think that I may have some insight into the kidnapper’s motivation, a motivation that may cause him to make a mistake.”
Croft smirked.
“This asshole’s only motivation is money, and thanks to Brice’s accommodating nature, this ‘Jack’ is getting rich. I’ll stop Jack one way or another and make sure that he never sees a dime of the ransom money. I know how to handle these guys; I’ve already caught three of them and I’ll catch this guy too.”
“Do what you want, but make sure that the children stay safe,” the doctor’s husband said.
Croft shrugged.
“Of course, now please, leave, I have work to do here.”
Before they could reply, Croft walked over to talk to Brendan Ryan, shortly after, the two men stared over at them with sour expressions.
He took his wife’s hand. “Let’s go. There’s nothing more we can do here.”
***
After leaving, they went to a local dinner and had coffee with Agent Brice.
“This is not good. I know Jack, and he will not take kindly to Agent Croft’s no-nonsense approach.”
“Why was he chosen to replace you?”
“He’s the Bureau’s ‘Golden Boy’ right now. He’s third generation FBI, and frankly, he’s damn near as good as he thinks he is. However, I know Jack. Jack has to be the Alpha Male. If Croft pushes, Jack will push back.”
He stared at Brice.
“Do you think Jack will hurt Samantha?”
Brice sighed.
“I fear for her.”
***
At four o’clock, Jack’s masked face appeared on the laptop screen and as Croft’s young face stared back at him, Jack’s eyes narrowed.
“Get me Brice,”
“Special Agent Brice has been reassigned. You’ll be dealing with me now. I’m Special Agent Croft.”
“Fuck that! I want Brice and I want him now.”
Croft smiled as he shook his head.
“Not possible, now listen, we have the ransom, but I need to see that Samantha and Maria are unharmed.”
What little flesh showed about the edges of the mask were now crimson as the figure on screen appeared to tremble.
“Brice, I want Brice you stupid, lackey pup. You have one hour.”
The screen went dark.
Brendan Ryan walked over and stared at Croft with concern.
“Maybe we should bring back Agent Brice?”
Croft shook his head.
“There’s no need; this man Jack is too used to being catered to, but he’s dealing with me now. When he contacts us again and sees that I’ve ignored his wishes, then he’ll know that he’s not running the show. Once that’s settled, I’ll get him to agree to a drop-off point of our choosing, and then we’ll capture him and get your granddaughter back safely.”
Brendan Ryan nodded as he looked around.
“Where’s my chauffeur, William? This involves him as much as it does me.”
“He’s being interrogated again.”
“But I thought that Agent Brice cleared him of any involvement?”
Croft smiled.
“I’m not Brice.”
***
On a hill overlooking the cabin, two men lay on their bellies and stared through pairs of binoculars, as a third man, a man with a long beard, walked over while crouched down and lay beside them.
“Did you see anything?” the first man asked, the one that was bald.
“Yeah, that back bedroom, the one they never use, the window is boarded up.”
The second man spoke to the first one. He had a full head of hair and was clean-shaven.
“What the hell is goin’ on? These ain’t cops.”
“No they ain’t cops, and I’d bet money that they got John and Delores tied up in that back bedroom.”
“There’s a van parked near the well,” the bearded man said.
“One van? Well hell, then there can’t be that many of them.”
“Yeah, maybe, but there could be more out in the field, harvestin’,” said the second man,
The bald man nodded. “Let’s go take a look.”
The three backed away from the crest of the hill and circled around toward the back of the cabin, a few hundred yards farther along and they came to a cornfield.
“It’s time to split up fellas, and hey, be careful and quiet,”
The other two men nodded in agreement to the bald man before the bearded man headed left and the clean-shaven one headed right.
As his companions walked the edges of the field, the bald man stepped among the stalks. A few steps in, the corn thinned out and he came upon a different crop.
It was Cannabis sativa, the marijuana plant, and there were hundreds of them.
A moment later, the bearded man walked over to him from the left.
“It looks like they’re all here,” he said.
“Yeah, but they need water, no one’s irrigated the field in days.”
The bearded man looked to his right.
“Where’s Bobby? He should have been here by now.”
“You’re right, let’s go find him.”
They found Bobby, the clean-shaven one, not far from the edge of the corn. He was on his knees, and he turned and gazed at them with a tear-stained face.
“I’m so sorry, Kevin,”
“What are you talking about?” said the bald man.
Bobby gave a great sigh and pointed to his right.
“I tripped over them as I was walkin’ out here.”
The bald man walked over to where Bobby pointed, as the bearded man followed.
“No!” the bald man cried, as he flung himself to the ground, ground that held the shallow graves of John and Delores, the graves of his sister and brother-in-law.
The first man had swept the dirt away from their faces after finding the graves, and their dull, lifeless eyes stared up at the sky.
As his tears finally dried, the bald man rose from the ground and spoke to his friends.
“I’m going to kill whoever did this, are you with me?”
The men walked over and clamped a hand each on their friend’s shoulders, as the bearded man said six words.
“You don’t even have to ask,”
CHAPTER 6
At five o’clock, Jack activated the monitor and the Ryan living room appeared on screen.
When Jack saw Croft’s face on the monitor, he said one word.
“Brice?”
Croft shook his head.
“As I said before, you’re dealing with me now.”
Jack rose from his seat and began to pace, as an exasperated chuckle escaped his lips.
“You know, Junior, I am actually trying to be a good guy this time. I left
the chauffeur alive. I could have shot the dumb sonofabitch in the head, but no, I only stunned him. Then, when I discovered that his daughter had come along for the ride, what did I do? Did I kill her? No, I took her along, and I haven’t asked even a penny for her safe return. This is my last job. I just want everything to go smooth and for no one to get hurt. Now, I’ll say it once again. Get me Brice! I’ll make contact again in one hour. If I don’t see Brice... well, what happens after that is on you. Get, me, Brice!”
Jack reached out and cut the signal. As the green light faded, Cinda walked over to him and took his hand.
“Baby... you... you wouldn’t really hurt those little girls, would you?”
Jack looked at her and through her, before turning and marching out of the room.
***
Kevin, the bald man, opened the door to the pickup truck and reached into the glove compartment. When his hand came out, it was holding a .38.
Kevin checked the cylinder.
“Why are there only five rounds?”
The bearded man answered.
“That deer we hit last week, remember? It was suffering and we shot it to put it out of its misery.”
“Oh yeah, I forgot about that,” Kevin said.
Kevin, like Jack, had never done an honest day’s work in his life, which was not to say that he had never done hard work.
He had spent his life growing pot. He has dug irrigation ditches, built elaborate greenhouses and driven cross-country mule runs with little sleep, while raising a family and keeping a step ahead of the law, for again, like Jack, he has never spent a day in jail.
Kevin gazed down at the gun and then up at his two friends.
“We can’t just go charging in there. We’ve got no idea how many of them there are or what kind of weapons they have.”
The man with the beard scratched at his nose.
“Another thing, why the hell is that back window boarded over? Could they be keeping someone locked up?”
Kevin took out his phone and tried it.
“Damn, I sure wish these things worked out here.”
“Why? Don’t tell me you’re thinkin’ of callin’ the cops?” Bobby said.
“It might be the best thing.”
“No way, once the cops come, we lose that crop. We need that crop.”
“Okay then, here’s what we do. I’ll go check out the house, while you two fuck-up that van. No flat tires or nothing like that though, the best thing would be to cut some wires under the hood. That way, no one will know it doesn’t work until it’s too late.”
“All right, but keep that gun with you and be careful.”
“I will, but I really want to know what’s in that back room.”
***
Kevin made his way to the cabin via a circular route. He knew the landscape well. His grandfather had built the cabin in the waning years of Prohibition and the property had once boasted over a dozen whiskey stills. As a boy, he would play, and later, hunt in the woods, and off to the north the tree house he had built with his father still sat atop its branches, although he was certain that the local wildlife had long since made it their home.
As he maneuvered around to the rear of the cabin, he spotted the small satellite dish attached near the gutters, by the side window in the living room.
He shook his head.
What the hell is going on?
He continued on until he was amongst the trees, which sat directly across from the boarded up window. He was so nervous that the gun threatened to slip from his clammy hand and he constantly mopped his bald head with his sleeve.
He took a deep breath, squatted low, and crept toward the window. After taking a look around, he pressed his ear to the boards and was startled when he heard the sound of children laughing.
***
Samantha was having fun.
The toddler, Maria, had asked her to tell a story, and to Samantha’s surprise, she remembered the ones her mother used to read to her, remembered them word for word.
When she bared her teeth to simulate the wolf in Little Red Riding Hood, Maria pointed at her and broke out in laughter. After that, Samantha tried to portray each part, and the little girl laughed harder with each new character.
She liked Maria, which surprised her. She rarely liked anyone, and found children most annoying, even though she herself had to pretend to be like them whenever an adult was around.
Except for Mr. White, she thought. She never had to pretend to be something she wasn’t with him.
Maria’s eyes went wide and she pointed at the window behind them. When Samantha turned to see what had caught the little girl’s attention, she saw one of the boards move to the left and an eye peeked in.
Samantha slid Maria from her lap and stood. She then reached up to unlock the window, but she was a bit too short to touch the lock.
The owner of the eye whispered to her.
“What’s going on?”
“My name is Samantha Ryan and I’ve been kidnapped.”
“Kidnapped? Oh my God, well, listen, kid, don’t you worry, me and my friends will get you out of there.”
Samantha swiveled her head as she heard footsteps approaching.
“Shh, someone’s coming,”
She watched the board slide back in place a moment before the door unlocked.
It was Jack, and this time he hadn’t bothered to wear the mask. As he stared at them with soulless eyes, Samantha felt fear for the second time in her life.
CHAPTER 7
SIX O’CLOCK, OUTSIDE THE CABIN
Kevin watched through a sliver of space between the boards, as the big man herded the kids from the room and down the hallway.
He got down on all fours and crawled along on his knees and elbows until he was beneath the living room window.
As he raised his head above the level of the windowsill, a soft grunt escaped him as he realized that the curtains were drawn. But, if he couldn’t see in then no one could see out, and so he stood.
A flash of light caught his eye, and he realized that it came from a gap at the curtain’s edge. With his face pressed hard against the glass, he was just able to make out the front of the room, where a large laptop computer sat open, but dark.
He turned his head slightly and placed an ear against the glass. He was rewarded by the sound of mumbled voices, if he had to guess, he would have said that the voices came from two men and one woman.
He tried to peek through the gap in the curtain again, but his breath had left the glass misted. After carefully wiping away the condensation, he saw that the man who had gathered the children was taking a seat before the laptop and turning it on.
The man was about his age, but fit. Despite the man’s size, there was a leanness about him that reminded Kevin of his cousin, the one that used to box. His cousin had that lean look just before a bout, after he had spent weeks running mile after mile.
A clicking sound came from over Kevin’s head and he saw a red light come on at the base of the satellite dish. When he peered back through the window, he saw that the monitor was showing the inside of a large room, a moment later, and a young man in a suit appeared.
The young man seemed confident, cocky even, and Kevin would have bet his share of the crop that the man was a cop of some type. One of the reasons he had never been caught was because he could spot them on sight, and this faculty had helped him avoid at least two sting operations run by very convincing, undercover DEA agents.
The large man spoke a single word to the cop on the screen, and the cop answered with a short sentence, before the big man spoke again.
Kevin couldn’t make out any of it, but whatever the cop had said caused the big man to rise from his seat and head to the back of the room, while passing closely by the window.
A few seconds later, the children began screaming, and when the big man fired his gun, Kevin crumbled to the ground and into darkness.
***
Jessica walked out of the hotel bathr
oom and found her husband gazing pensively out the window. Since there was nothing to see from the view other than the parking lot and the ramp that led to the highway, she knew that he was seeing inner sights.
She came up from behind and pressed herself against him.
“I know it’s hard, but there’s nothing we can do. I only hope that Agent Croft knows what he’s doing.”
“This kidnapper, this, “Jack”, in some ways he’s worse than a murderer. What drives a man to spend his life terrorizing children?”
“In his case, I would say that he doesn’t look at it that way. From what little I know, I would say that he kidnaps children for no other reason than that they’re easier to control.”
He smiled.
“What?”
“With Samantha, Jack may have picked the exact wrong child.”
“Maybe, but she’s still a child,”
The grin left his face.
“I need to do something. She called me for help and all I can do is sit in this hotel room and wait for it to be over.”
“Brice said that he would talk to his superiors. There’s still a chance that we’ll be given access again.”
He closed the curtain and turned to face her.
“If I get the chance, I’ll kill Jack.”
She nodded.
“I know.”
***
SIX O’CLOCK, INSIDE THE CABIN
Once again, Jack powered on the laptop. As before, the backdrop behind him showed a white sheet hanging upon a wall, however, this time his two masked companions stood in front of it with Samantha and Maria between them.
Jack gazed into the monitor and saw only Special Agent Kyle Croft looking back.
“Brice?”
“No! Forget Brice; you’re dealing with me now.”
In a calm voice, Jack said, “This is on you.” He then rose from his seat, walked past the curtained window to the back of the room, and grabbed Maria by the throat.
The little girl screamed in terror even as she clung to Samantha. Jack snatched her away and walked back to the monitor, where he placed his gun against Maria’s head, and pulled the trigger.
CHAPTER 8
Kevin awoke only a few seconds after he had passed out.
The TAKEN! Series - Books 5-8 (Taken! Box Set Book 2) Page 13