by GM Ford
The Sheriff’s name was Jennifer. Jennifer Parsons. Over six feet, a big boned blonde in an immaculate brown uniform topped by a Stetson rancher’s hat. They introduced themselves and shook hands.
“Where are we?” Craig asked immediately.
“Your suspect vehicle is parked down in front of Ruth’s café. It’s been there for the past two hours or so. I spoke with Amy James, the old gal who runs the place. She said the guy in the Lexus came in right before supper, ordered three cheeseburgers and two orders of fries. The food’s on the front seat. Still in the bag. I’ve got my only usable deputy Bill Undlin down there keeping an eye on the car.” She felt a need to explain. “Usually there’s four of us, two to a shift and a couple of volunteers in case I need somebody to fill in, but right now I’ve got one man out with the swine flu and another over in Sioux Falls about to have back surgery.” She jerked a thumb over her shoulder. “Had to enlist my nephew Tyler to drive the other cruiser so we could give your pilot something to aim for.” She shook her head disgustedly. “Hell, I’ve got my dad, who’s seventy-seven staked out down the road at the boat landing.” She gestured to the right. “That’s the only way out of here,” she said. “Other way just peters out at a Bureau of Land Management gate.”
“How far is it to the Interstate?” Audrey asked.
“Three and a half miles.”
“How many people live between here and the BLM gate?” Craig asked.
The Sheriff’s lips moved as she thought it over. “Ten, twelve,” she said after a moment. “Several of ‘em are just summer places,” she explained.
“We’re going to need to make sure those people are alright,” Craig said. He inclined his head toward the cadre of uniformed personnel. “We’ll send two of these gentlemen to take over for your deputy at the cafe. They’ll see to it the car isn’t going anywhere.” The sheriff nodded. “We’ll send another pair of officers to accompany your deputy as they make sure the residents are all safe. Anyone who wants to leave will be escorted out of the area.”
“And those that want to stay?” she asked.
“Tell them to lock the doors and windows and get out the gun.”
“That’ll take an hour or so,” she said.
“In the meantime I want you to park your cruiser right in the middle of the road, turn on the light bar and stop anything moving in either direction. Nobody in, nobody out. Another pair of officers will assist you in that.”
“How do we know he hasn’t walked out by now?” she asked.
“We don’t,” Craig said. “However, the state police have stationed a unit at the Interstate exit and two more cruising the freeway in each direction. If he’s on foot, I’m confident they’ll find him. The Denver FBI office has a search team and three K-9 units on the way.” He checked his watch. “They should arrive just about the time we finish checking on the residents. We’ll start the ground operation once they’re on the scene.”
The sheriff nodded again.
“In the meantime, I’m going to have the helicopter do an infrared sweep of the area between here and the highway. If he’s making his way in that direction they’ll pick up his body heat signature. But first and foremost I want all the civilians out of here. You get your nephew…”
“Tyler,” the sheriff prompted.
“Tyler and your father…I want them out of harm’s way. Send them home. This fellow we’re looking for is dangerous and completely unpredictable. The only people I want out here are people being paid to take these kinds of risks.”
She smiled a big dimply smile. “My dad was sheriff of this county for forty-one years,” she said proudly. “Whoever this guy is…he shows up at my dad’s house, he gonna sure as hell wish he didn’t.”
“Send him home,” Craig said. “Thank him for his efforts on our behalf and send him back to his bed.”
Craig excused himself and strode over to the knot of uniformed officers. Audrey couldn’t hear what he said, but assumed he was relaying operational plans to the squad.
The sheriff pulled a black radio from her belt. “Dad,” she said.
A moment passed and then another. “Dad…” she said again. “Can you hear me?” Still nothing. “Dad.”
The sheriff cast an embarrassed look Audrey’s way. “Probably dozed off,” she said. “Dad,” she tried again.
“Right here,” came the voice over the speaker.
Her sense of relief was palpable. “You fall asleep?” she teased.
“Matter of fact, I just stepped around the back of the car to take a leak.”
“Sorry to intrude,” she joked.
“Nothin’ was happening anyway,” he grumbled. “Getting old’s a bitch.”
Craig had finished briefing the squad. Four of the officers were making their way over to Tyler’s county police cruiser. The other two were standing by.
“I need you to go on home,” she said.
“You sure?”
“The Secret Service is here. Things are under control.”
“I saw the chopper comin’ in. Hell of a rig they got there.”
“Yeah. Sure is. They’re going to make an infrared pass over the area. Anyway Dad, pack it in… and Dad…Special Agent Craig told me to thank you for the help. They really appreciate it. We’ve got the staties camped out at the Interstate. I’ll get on the horn and let ‘em know you’re gonna be coming by.”
“See you in the morning darlin’.”
“Not if I see you first,” she said. The sheriff snuck an embarrassed glance over at Audrey Williams. Her big pink face reddened. Audrey helped her out.
“My dad and I have one of those too,” Audrey said. “He’s in the restaurant business, so ours ends with ‘okey dokey artichokey’.”
The sheriff chuckled.
Behind them, the helicopter engine whined to life. The rotors began to circle.
__
The squawk of the radio jerked him from his stupor. He opened his eyes, brushed the hair and river debris from his face and looked around. He was half-in, half-out of the river, wedged against the side of a concrete boat ramp, pinned in place by the force of the current with only his head and shoulders above the water.
The boy lay spread-eagled on the bank just above his head. From his vantage point, the geometric pattern on the bottom of the boy’s sneakers was all he could make out in the darkness.
“Dad.” A woman’s voice and then, a moment passed and then another. “Dad…” she said again. “Can you hear me, Dad?”
Then he remembered. He’d gone in after the kid. They’d been adrift for what had seemed an eternity. Eventually, the river had thrown them together. With what he’d assumed to be his last ounce of strength, he’d tossed the boy up into the bushes before slipping beneath the water for what he had imagined to be the final time.
“Dad,” the electronic voice came again.
“Right here.” The voice was closer and real and male.
He threw a knee up onto the boat ramp and pushed himself up until his other foot found a purchase on the river bottom . His shoe immediately filled with mud.
“You fall asleep?” the voice teased.
“Matter of fact, I just stepped around the back of the car to take a leak.”
“Sorry to intrude.”
“Nothin’ was happenin’ anyway. Getting old’s a bitch.”
He used his elbows to propel himself up the bank. He was looking at the back of a car. An old battered sedan, with the driver’s door hanging open. He wiped mud and leaves from his eyes and focused. A tall man stood next to the car, leaning back against it, talking into a hand-held radio. He wore a plastic-covered cowboy hat and a long rain slicker that reached nearly to his ankles.
“I need you to go on home,” the woman’s voice said.
“You sure?” he asked.
“The Secret Service is here. Things are under control.”
The words froze him in place. ‘Secret Service’. He couldn’t for the life of him imagine how he’d been
located so quickly. Experience said the ploy at the airport should have gained him a minimum of twelve hours. Instinctively, he reached for his belt. The forty caliber was gone. Somewhere along the bottom of the river, he guessed. Sleeping with the fishes like that gangster guy. He reached for his boot and was rewarded by the feel of his knife resting against his lower leg.
The big cowboy was talking now. “I saw the chopper comin’ in. Hell of a rig they got there.”
“Yeah. Sure is. They’re going to make an infrared pass over the area. Anyway Dad, pack it in… and Dad…Special Agent Craig told me to thank you. They really appreciate it. We’ve got the staties camped out down at the Interstate. I’ll get on the horn and let ‘em know you’re gonna be coming by.”
“See you in the morning darlin’.”
“Not if I see you first.” The radio snapped and crackled and then fell silent.
He watched the big cowboy pocket the radio and begin walking his way, unbuttoning the raincoat, pulling it aside so he could get at his button-fly jeans.
He watched in disgust as the man freed himself from the jeans and stood there, holding it in his hand. He looked to be straining. Nothing was coming out.
His hand slid to his knife just as the unmistakable popping sound of helicopter rotors reached his ears. He returned the knife to his boot and settled lower into the grass.
Still holding himself in one hand, the cowboy turned toward the sound. The helicopter was invisible, nothing more than the sound of slapping rotors until, at about two hundred feet, the pilot turned on the halogen spotlights. The powerful white lights turned night into day, illuminating an area half the size of a Wal-Mart… a brightly lit rectangle moving directly toward where he lay. He stared stupidly for a moment and then began to move.
He grabbed the boy around the waist and pulled him down the slope, until both of them were in the water again. The boy’s skin was cold.
The chopper was nearly overhead now. He pulled the boy down until only his face was above the water, using the frigid river to mask their infrared images. He ducked his head below the surface and held his breath for as long as he was able. As soon as he surfaced, he heard the cowboy’s voice.
“Jesus,” the big cowboy groused. “Can’t even take a piss in peace anymore.”
The helicopter spun on some invisible axis, hovered above them for a moment and then started west along the river, its bright lights and invisible heat-seeking eye sweeping the ground, searching for the warm signature of life.
He heaved the boy up onto the bank. He pulled his knife from the boot and crawled to the top of the bank where he peeped through the gnarly bushes.
The old cowboy had once again freed himself from his jeans and was once again trying to take a leak, except that his back was turned now. The glow of the bright white lights and the sound of flopping rotors grew fainter and fainter.
31
They sat hip to hip on the front stairs of Ruth’s Snack and Yak Café. The only place Audrey was warm was the six square inches where their bodies touched. Everything else was cold and wet and dirty. For his part, Craig seemed oblivious to the cold and damp.
The Lexus had long since been towed off to the police garage in Sioux Falls. FBI Forensics was already working the car’s contents. Ground search crews were reforming and awaiting further orders. The mood was touchy and disconsolate. Neither of them said it out loud, but both were thinking they’d just missed their best chance to apprehend the kidnapper and rescue Michael. They’d gotten lucky with the shoes. They’d contained him in a narrow valley, a place with only one way out and virtually no place to hide from the kind of technology they’d thrown at him, and still he’d managed to elude them.
A small army of dogs and federal officers had turned over every rock in the valley. The helicopter had completed three separate passes over the area and come up dry. The South Dakota State Police reported nobody coming past their position other than a steady stream of law enforcement vehicles going the other way.
“Why here?” Craig asked. “Why would he get off here for food? Compared to most of the other freeway exits, this place is a wasteland. Twenty miles back he drove right by every kind of fast food in the known world. Why would he decide to stop here?”
“Maybe he doesn’t like cameras,” she said pointing upward.
Jackson Craig got to his feet. As he rose, his knees cracked like castanets. He swallowed a groan as he stretched his back and looked over the front of the café.
He checked the poles. Not a camera in sight.
“You know,” he said. “I you think may be right. He’s trying to avoid surveillance cameras.”
“That’s what I’d do,” Audrey said. Another yawn set her lower jaw to quivering. This time she covered it with both hands. “Sorry,” she said.
“It’s been a hell of a long day,” Craig acknowledged.
“What now?”
“You tell me,” Craig said.
“He’s headed home,” she said without hesitation.
“Chicago?”
“Somewhere in the vicinity. It’s the only place he knows. The only place he feels even moderately safe.”
“Is that sympathy I detect?” Craig looked amused.
Audrey thought it over. “A little, I suppose,” she said thoughtfully. “But…you know, if we’re all really products of nature and nurture, and this is really Colin Satterwaite we’re chasing, which I’m convinced it is, then somewhere along the line, before he ever sat down to play, this kid got dealt a really bad hand.”
“A wise man once said: ‘Just because the world hands you a dead mouse, doesn’t mean you have to carry it around in your pocket for the rest of your life.’”
“Mouse?” Audrey’s tone was incredulous. “This isn’t a mouse, it’s a moose. I mean…at the time when Harry Joyce was killed, he’s what seventeen years old? He’s been terrorized and sexually abused by a complete madman for nearly all of his life. At some point he comes home to the only place he can ever remember. It’s cordoned off. Half the block is demolished. Harry Joyce is gone, never to be seen again.” She paused. “Where does he go? What does he do? How does he survive in South Chicago? He’s got no marketable skills. No anything. How does he get by?”
Surprisingly, Craig had a ready answer. “Gilbert always said Harry must have had a back-up location. Probably more than one. Guys like Harry Joyce always set up fallback positions. It’s standard military tactics. He figured that was why ATF didn’t find anything incriminating in the rubble. He figured Harry had someplace nearby where he kept his weapons, his money, his means of procurement, some manner of keeping contact with those who required his services.” As Craig’s mind’s eye ran the movie of it, the anger disappeared from his eyes. “At this point, if I had to hazard a guess, I’d guess Gil was right and the boy went where he’d been trained to go,” he said.
“Which would explain the fifty-caliber Barrett,” she said. “He’s still got Harry Joyce’s weapons and most likely Harry’s money too. That’s probably how he survived. I mean it’s not like assassination is a highly marketable skill. You’re not going to find it in the want ads after Accountants. Predatory Abductors generally build a nest, a place where they’re able to carry out their…their…” She stopped herself. “…a place where they can work out their fantasies with a minimum chance of being detected.”
The sound of an approaching automobile grew increasingly louder.
The County Sheriff’s vehicle slid to a stop at their feet, engine whining, wipers slashing at the mist on the windshield. The window slid down. Sheriff Parsons leaned her head out. Her face was flushed, her expression grim. “Got a call from over in Collier County,” she said. “They’ve got a fresh body over there. A boy. Four to six years old. Probably of Mexican descent.” She swallowed hard. “Dead about three hours, they say.”
32
After fifteen minutes of off-loading and setting up equipment, the FBI Mobile Forensics Team began the job of taking samples and x-
raying body. As the room was without proper radiation protection, only one lead-clad technician was permitted to risk his reproductive future while the x-rays were being taken.
The remaining FBI technicians and their samples had retreated to their mobile laboratory. The funeral director made himself scarce elsewhere in the building, leaving the three of them waiting for the bad news in a room so quiet you could hear dust settling to the carpet.
Jackson Craig got to his feet and began to pace the room. Seemed like seasons passed before the door at the far end of the waiting room hissed open.
The technician had shed his lead apron. He carried his laptop before him like a bouquet as he entered the room. Everyone crowded around the screen. “Nine inch titanium rod in the right leg,” he pronounced, pointing at the image on the screen. “Seven screws holding the device in place. Recent. Past ten months or so.” He looked directly at Craig. “Doesn’t square with your victim’s medical records,” he announced. “Your victim’s well documented. Had the same pediatrician all of his life. No record of any such injury or any such surgery.”
“What if his records aren’t complete,” the sheriff asked. “Lotta people don’t...you know with the kids…a lot of people…”
“There’s another problem,” the technician interrupted.
“What’s that?” she asked.
“My colleagues outside tell me that, according to the family medical records, both parents are Rh positive. The victim is Rh negative.”
“Can’t be,” Craig said.
“No it can’t,” the technician said.
Audrey felt a need to say it out loud. “So that’s not Michael Browning in there.”
“Assuming the data we’ve been provided is accurate, and I have no reason to believe it’s not, then that is definitely not Michael Browning in the other room.”
He gave them a minute to digest the heady information. “I took the liberty of searching local hospital records for any surgery of this nature taking place in this part of the country. There were three in the past eighteen months. Only one performed on a child. Sioux Falls Hospital. Patient: Diego Aldo Gonzales. Four years nine months at the time of the accident. Got his leg caught in a hay baler. Broke it in three places. One titanium rod, seven stainless steel screws.” He snapped the laptop closed. “The file contains an official addendum from the child’s social worker to the effect that she has her doubts about the cause of the injury and that any further instances of hospitalization should be thoroughly investigated by Child Protective Services.”