by Glenn Meade
“Have it your way. Cuff him, Kev.”
Kevin cuffed my father’s hands and laid him on the couch. Jack leaned over the back of the couch as he tried to catch his breath.
Kevin laid a hand on Jack’s shoulder. “Let me take a look at you, buddy. Are you OK?”
As Kevin checked Jack’s wound, I saw the fury in Jack’s eyes, and I figured from all the pent-up frustration on his face that it had probably been boiling up for years.
“No more exertion, Jack,” Kevin said.
Then he probed the back of my father’s skull. It was bleeding, the skin beneath his thinning hair cracked and gouged. Kevin felt his pulse. “He’s got a head as tough as a jockey’s hide, but he’s out cold. He ought to come around soon. Here, give me my bag.”
I handed him the black bag. He rummaged around, found some alcohol, and dabbed it onto my father’s skull with some gauze, dried it off, shook on some kind of powdered antiseptic, and taped down a cotton pad on the crown to stop the bleeding.
Every now and then, Kevin flicked a look over at the TV security monitors, sweat beading on his brow. I figured he was worried, and that worry seemed to be spreading like a virus in the room. I began to feel an urgent sense of fear, of the unexpected, as if some kind of looming danger or an unknown evil was about to engulf us all. Sean was still asleep in the bedroom. At least he wasn’t a witness to this, but I began to feel a growing concern for his safety.
Jack hid the light from his flashlight by pressing it against his side, then peered out the window. “I’m betting he’s not the only one out there.”
I was so afraid my heart was thudding “Who . . . who else is with him?”
“Every other devil in this drama, for all I know. Now, go get a bucket of cold water from the kitchen. You want answers to all those questions of yours, don’t you? It’s time to bring your father around.”
93
* * *
Most guys dreamed about women. Babek dreamed about drones.
He was in love with them. Fantasized about them, bought magazines and books about them. As a kid in Iraq, he watched in rapt fascination as the early-version drones skimmed over towns and mud-brick villages, seeking out trouble. Sometimes they sent bombs and mortars and missiles raining down—always with deadly precision—on a threat, heavily armed insurgents about to launch an attack on Allied forces.
But sometimes they just watched, graceful, silent eyes pirouetting in the sky, gathering images and information. He was spellbound. Later, as a student at MIT, he helped design a bunch of drone projects.
In the dark warmth of the starry night, Babek stood on the edge of the road three hundred yards from the farm and started the Nighthawk’s four sets of rotors, their hum a bare whisper. Then he hit the remote’s buttons, and the drone lifted and hovered.
He fiddled with the remote, and the drone rose vertically two hundred feet in the air, high above any nearby trees. Babek could barely make it out against the sparkling night sky, but he didn’t need to. The drone was programmed to fly in a two-hundred-yard circle, with the farmhouse at the epicenter. He could watch the camera inputs from inside the van.
He tweaked the remote again and saw the Nighthawk fly off in the direction of the farmhouse. Babek smiled, feeling pleased.
His father was once the top missile engineer on Saddam Hussein’s Scud program. After the Americans invaded, he walked into U.S. military administration HQ with a treasure trove of missile blueprints, a list of all of Saddam’s missile engineers, and the location of every Scud in Saddam’s arsenal. A year of helping the Americans clean up the mess, and the family was allowed to emigrate to the U.S.
Engineering was in Babek’s blood, and after he graduated from MIT, his dream was to start his own company. All he needed was cash. The money Tarik paid him for the occasional job sure helped, like the one at the Serenity Ridge home or bugging the vehicles Tarik told him to or following the woman’s car to try to scan her cell phone’s high-frequency transmissions when she was talking on it. Easy-peasy. The job he was doing now was more complex, unless you knew what you were doing. If you could afford the right equipment, as Tarik could, it was simple, really.
The Escalade SUV was pulled in off the private road. The metallic-gray walk-in Ford commercial van—Babek’s communications van—was parked behind it. On top were two VHF aerials and the satellite dish. Babek was sweating as he stepped back inside the van.
“It’s done.”
Tarik and three men were crowded into the vehicle. They had AR-15s, shotguns, and automatic pistols. With Tarik were his son, Kiril, the bulldog-faced Mehmet, and the tall and muscled Abu. They were two heavies—literally—and the van seemed to tilt a little toward the back with their weight. On one side of the van, a laptop computer screen was on, and an ancient swivel chair was positioned in front of a dented old metal desk.
Everyone was watching the laptop’s screen. Babek adjusted the hovering drone’s camera angle until the infrared picture showed a bird’s-eye view in the darkness, a greenish, almost ghoulish image of a man walking in the darkness toward the farm, on a road with woods on either side. Every few seconds, the drone moved forward, keeping the man’s image on-screen.
Tarik said to Babek, “This equipment of yours had better be worth it. When will we hear something?”
Babek handed them each a set of headphones. “Soon enough, once he starts a dialogue. Here, put these on. You won’t be disappointed, I promise you that.”
They slipped on the headphones. The drone was up high and hovering, and all eyes were on the colonel’s moving figure, the infrared camera working perfectly.
Tarik said, “What about the dog we heard earlier?”
Abu replied, “I took care of it. Some doped meat.”
“Good.” Tarik grinned at Babek. “Impressive. A silent camera in the sky, and the target doesn’t even know they’re being watched or listened to.”
“You know Amazon is talking about using drones to speed up their deliveries?”
Kiril grinned at Babek’s piece of trivia. “Yeah. I bet after the first drone arrives, another five show up bearing stuff Amazon thinks you might like.”
“Shut it.” Tarik was serious as he focused on the screen. “Tell me how it’s all going to happen.”
A glint sparked again in Babek’s eyes. “You’re going to love this . . .”
94
* * *
I hurried to the kitchen, found a plastic bucket, and filled it with cold tap water.
I felt a welter of confusion as I hauled the sloshing bucket back to the front room. Kevin dragged my father into a sitting position on the couch and patted him down for weapons. He found a cell phone.
“He’s unarmed. All he had was this.”
Jack said, “We’d better be sure. He’s a wily old fox.” His gaze shifted to me. “Your old man could probably still kill us all in a dozen different ways if he set his mind to it.”
Jack did another check, even patted down my father’s prosthetic foot, until he seemed satisfied. “He’s clear. All he had was the cell.”
Kevin tossed it onto the coffee table, and Jack said to me, “Step over into the kitchen, behind the door. Don’t show your face when he becomes conscious, not until I tell you to.”
“Why?”
“Just let me ask the questions for now. Kevin, drench him.”
Kevin took the water bucket from my hands. I retreated behind the kitchen door and peered out through the crack between the door and the frame. Kevin doused my father’s face and chest, two throws of water that saturated his clothes completely.
But my father was still out of it. Kevin slapped his face, and I saw my father’s head jerk. He almost went under again, but Kevin gave him a few more slaps, and he came around, muttering.
“What the—”
His head arched back, and his eyes looked small a
nd groggy. He struggled to free his hands, until he realized they were cuffed. Then he stared blankly at Jack, as if he were looking at a ghoul.
“Jack Hayes. My God. It’s really you.” A cry of pained exasperation escaped my father’s lips. “Where’s . . . where’s Sean? And Amy?”
“We’ll get to that. How’d you find us?”
My father didn’t answer.
His silence didn’t last long, though, because Jack put the gun barrel to his head. “If I have to ask again, I’m giving you a bump the size of a baseball.”
“Tarik brought me here.”
“Where’s the conniving old snake?”
“Nearby.”
“I asked where, exactly.”
“Within a few hundred yards, that’s all I know. Tarik told me to walk here. He wants to talk.”
“I figured he might.”
“All he wants is the third mask, Jack. The money, the bonds—whatever you did with them, it’s all negotiable.”
“What if I haven’t got the mask?”
My father’s face blanched a little more, and his jaw twitched.
“How did Tarik know where to find me?”
“I’ve no idea.”
“What’s in it for you, Frank?”
“Nothing. I just want everyone to walk away from this alive. There’s been enough killing, enough death.”
“And you really believe Tarik’s going to go for that?”
“That depends on you, Jack.”
Rage erupted on Jack’s face. He struck my father a blow across the face, and it drew a streak of blood. Kevin grabbed Jack’s hand and stopped him. “How, Frank? How exactly did Tarik know where to find me?”
“He’s got the inside track. Someone’s helping him.”
“Who?”
“You’re asking the wrong man. All I know is Tarik took a couple of calls on the way here. I figured someone was passing him information. But I’ve no idea who.” He jerked his head to glance at Kevin. “You trust him?”
“With my life.”
“I hope to God you’re right.”
“So what’s your pitch, Frank?”
“Tarik’s on his way. He wants to talk, make a deal. You know how important those masks are to him.”
Jack considered, then glanced over my father’s shoulder toward the kitchen door, as if trying to see my reaction.
“First you need to talk to someone who needs you to set things straight, Frank. Come over here.”
Standing behind the door, looking through the crack, I heard the words and felt my pulse quicken like a drum roll.
I took slow, agonized steps from behind the kitchen door. The second my father saw me, his blood-streaked jaw dropped. I saw fear in his face.
“Kath . . .”
The sound of my name sounded like a cross between a cry of pain and a hoarse whisper.
My father looked at me, his mouth twisted, and then he turned away, unable to look at me, his eyes closed.
“You caused it, didn’t you? All of it,” I said.
“No, Kath, no. It wasn’t all me.” He took a deep, anguished breath.
Right then, I only had one question to ask, one question that haunted me. “You killed Mom, didn’t you?”
This time, my father looked directly at me, his eyes meeting mine. I could decipher the look on his face before he even answered, a powerful sense of shame and grief that flooded his eyes, a look that made my blood run Arctic cold.
I saw it then, saw that I had fallen for my father’s lies for years.
And that’s when I really knew he killed her.
95
* * *
“It’ll block any cell-phone signal. No calls in, no calls out. Including ours, unfortunately. Nothing I can do about that.”
Babek had an arrogant look, the kind that the highly gifted sometimes reserve for those they consider of much lesser intelligence. He gestured to a homemade plastic control panel about six inches square. It had several switches and a dial, all connected to the laptop via a couple of USB connectors.
“Block everything except our walkie-talkies, correct?” Tarik plucked one of his slim cigars from his top pocket and lit it with a gold lighter. The stench of cigar smoke was overpowering in the van.
Babek hated smoking of any kind, but he knew better than to complain about his uncle’s nasty habit. “Yes. You can use the walkie-talkies to communicate. They’re on a different frequency.”
“And the wire the colonel’s wearing?”
“Same thing. It won’t block that signal, either. He doesn’t even know that the software bug is planted on his cell phone, because I downloaded it remotely. I even tweaked it so the microphone is at max sensitivity. It ought to pick up any chatter as soon as they start talking.”
“What about the property’s security system or any booby traps that might be around the place?” Tarik sucked on the cigar, blew out more smoke.
Babek coughed. The cigar stench was killing him. “I can’t vouch for physical booby traps, like trip wires or whatever. But I did a frequency scan.”
“And?”
“There’s a security system in the area that’s broadcasting on a few hundred megahertz. Judging by the signal strength, it probably belongs to the farm. I’m guessing there are remote sensors to pick up movement, and cameras, too.”
Babek pointed to the control panel connected to the laptop. “But that will take care of any signals we want to block.”
“Meaning?”
“I can interfere with the security system, including any remote sensors. Whoever’s watching the input to the security cameras won’t see anything on-screen except snow.” Babek grinned. “So they won’t see you guys coming.”
“If you’re wrong, we could be dead.”
Babek’s grin widened. “Trust me. I want to get paid.”
Tarik nodded toward Babek’s homemade panel. “That thing of yours won’t affect the drone?”
“No. It works on a different frequency. It’s all about frequencies. Once they’re different, they won’t interfere.”
Tarik said, “What about other devices?”
Babek nodded. “You still need to watch these rednecks, they’re pretty cunning, so keep a lookout for trip-wire flares and stuff like that. The gear I’ve seen them buying at gun shows freaks me out. Trip-wire explosives, detonators, bomb-making equipment. But I reckon if you stick to the main road once the cameras are out of action and watch the road ahead of you, you should be OK.”
Tarik patted Babek’s jaw with the palm of his hand. “You’re a clever boy. We could have done with the likes of you when we were crippling the Americans with our IEDs.”
Babek pushed one of his earphones closer to his head. “I think we’ve got something.”
They all listened on their headphones and heard the booming voice in their ears. “I know you’re in there, Jack. It’s me, Frank. I’m unarmed. We need to talk.”
Then silence.
They waited, but no other sound came.
Until they heard a grunt. All of them turned to look toward the far end of the van.
The young man from Serenity Ridge was lying on the floor and tied with rope. Silver duct tape was plastered around his mouth. He looked horrible. Sweat glittered around his eyes and on his brow as he became conscious, the sedative wearing off. Even his spiky hair looked wild from living too long among the depressed, the disturbed, and the eccentric. Terror lit up his eyes as soon as he saw the van’s occupants and the unfamiliar environment.
Tarik sucked on his cigar, blew out a ring of smoke. “Time to go meet them. See if they take the bait. If not, we do it the hard way.”
96
* * *
“Hang a right.”
“You sure?”
Tanner was driving as Courtney stu
died the colored image on her cell-phone screen. “You don’t argue with Google Maps. No point. Nobody answers back.”
“How far?”
“Going by the scale, I’d reckon about five hundred yards.” Courtney peered into the blackness beyond the wash of the headlights. “Hey, you think it’s wise knocking on doors in the middle of nowhere in darkness? Let’s pull in and take a sec to figure out what to do next.”
“Sure.” Tanner pulled in on a rutted gravel track.
The headlights flooded the track for about fifty yards ahead. A telegraph pole with a sulfur-yellow light on top saturated the wooden entrance gate to a property, the hinges hanging off and the gate wide open.
Courtney rolled down the passenger window and inhaled. A piney-fresh smell. Big dark spaces and the twinkle of a few distant lights. They were deep in the countryside, and even the highway they left ten minutes ago had been deserted. It had been a long day’s driving.
They’d visited ex-sergeant Dan Riker’s address in Cooke County, only to be met by his mother, a rake-thin elderly woman who told them that her son had attempted suicide three months ago and was in a VA psychiatric hospital in Cincinnati.
Then there was a long drive to Asheville to find Joe Feld, only to learn that he had moved to Alaska, where he was now a state trooper.
Tanner killed the engine and flicked off the headlights, and they were smothered in complete darkness until Courtney turned on the map light.
“What’s wrong, Tanner? You look reflective.”
“Reminds me of home. I spent the first half of my life trying to get away from crappy countryside like this. Nowhere places with minds as narrow as the back roads.”
“Not so many happy memories, huh?”
“Fish fry on a Saturday night. Wearing camo when you’re not even hunting. The smell of manure and the sound of crickets. The only big dream you had was of owning a truck. Need I go on?”
“Doesn’t matter if you divorce your wife, she’s still your sister or your cousin or whatever.”