"Am I crazy, Ginny? Deluding myself? Am I only imagining this could be useful?"
Ginny's eyes shone with sudden tears as well.
"If there's any chance at all, Kirsten, you should start right now. It's not like there are any more promising possibilities on the table. Come on. Get your camera. Get going."
Kirsten swiped at her tears and hurried back into the house. Bypassing the dining room where Ann Calder sat with the men deep in strategizing, she went straight for her camera case atop the pile of luggage they'd left in the foyer.
"Kirsten?" Picking up on her single-mindedness despite being involved in the discussion, Garrett got up from the kitchen table and followed her into the living room.
"What's going on?"
"The light outside." Kneeling on the carpeting, she pulled out her digital camera and reached deep inside for the special cartridge disks, hardly pausing to explain.
"I was just outside. It looks to me as if we may be able to follow the kidnapper's path through the snow."
"Tell me how." He sank to his haunches beside her. An added urgency came into his voice.
"Ten inches of snow have fallen since" -- "But there are depressions, Garrett, beneath the newer snow. I may be wrong. It may be some kind of optical illusion that I'm seeing, some anomaly of light, but if I can catch it on film--on the disk, actually, I might be able to use the computer to enhance the tracks."
"You can do that?"
"I think so. But I have to get out there now."
He reached for her, cupping her cheek in his hand, "You're brilliant, Kirsten."
She swallowed hard. Brilliant was going to be a sad excuse if for all her cleverness, she couldn't track the kidnappers.
Chapter Thirteen
"We'll see."
She hurried back outside and took a couple dozen pictures on various trajectories outward from the house, taking her shots from different angles, from lying on the snow on her stomach to sitting, kneeling and standing, to catch different aspects of light. Inside again, not bothering to strip out of the layers of clothing she wore, she downloaded into the imaging software and went to work.
Garrett sat nearest her, but Sam and Ginny crowded around, along with Ross. Matt was long since gone, J. D. and Ann departing in a sheriff's vehicle only a few minutes before to start a house- to-house search for anyone who might have seen or have knowledge of a child missing and presumed kidnapped.
She first enlarged then digitally enhanced the photos, but it wasn't until she'd heightened the contrast of light to the maximum capabilities of the software that shadows faintly resembling the tracks of racket- shaped snowshoes appeared.
"Look! Look at this! Several inches below the surface, the snow must have been heavier, its texture wet, almost dripping wet, then frozen. Is that right, Sam?"
"That's exactly what it was like," Sam exclaimed.
"The sheer weight of it dragged down the power and phone lines within the first four or five hours."
But on the photo revealing the racket shape, it was impossible to discern tracks heading anywhere. Barely registering the discussion going on between Sam and Vorees behind her, Kirsten went from one to the next digital photo. As time had passed, the moisture content must have gone down significantly because atop the heavier pack the snow was much lighter and more powdery.
In the twenty-first shot, taken while lying on her belly in the snow, the single snowshoe shape extended into a line that went as far as the eye of the camera could see.
"Oh, my God, look! Look at this!"
"It looks like a trail to me, headed due north."
"Garrett, this might really work! I've got to get back out there."
"Okay, but slow down for one second. We've got to work this out. Sam, do you have a snowmobile J.D. and Kirsten could take to follow these tracks?"
"Yeah, but is it going to be possible to do what she's doing on the computer out in that cold with no electricity?"
"I can keep it inside my flannel shirt, keep it at body temp, anyway," J. D. offered.
"And I've got two spare batteries. Altogether enough maybe for four or five hours." She met Garrett's gaze again.
"That's all the time we have anyway, isn't it?"
He nodded.
She looked to J. D. as well.
"Do we have any better options?"
"Nothing as promising as this," he told her.
"This gives us some direction. Anything else we do is going to be more haphazard."
"Let's do it, then," Garrett urged.
J. D. added layers of clothing from his flight bag while Sam, having only thrown on a coat, went out to the garage to fire up the snowmobile.
She studied the depth and direction of the tracks through the snow one more time to memorize what she could, then put the laptop into Suspend mode, closed it up and handed it to J. D. Ann laughed out loud at J. D. "s expression when Ginny produced Christo's miniature red corduroy backpack, adjusting its shoulder straps to fit over his head, fashioning an easy access pouch for the laptop.
But it escaped no one that the child's backpack straps lay within inches of the leather holster strap, or the juxtaposition of a machine pistol with Pooh embroidered on the corduroy.
Only Ann saw the glitter of tears in Kirsten's eyes. Huffing loudly, J. D. slid the computer into the backpack.
Ginny poured a thermos full of hot coffee and packed a plastic grocery bag full of homemade cinnamon rolls, then layered more clothes on Kirsten while J. D. chose the maps he wanted.
Within ten minutes the snowmobile was warmed up and the two of them stood by ready to climb aboard.
Garrett took her aside. Snow crunched loudly under their feet. The sun peeked briefly out from the solidly overcast skies. He plucked off his glove and cupped her nape, emotion thickening his voice.
"Bring back our son, Kirsten. Please. Bring him back."
the going was more miserable than she could have imagined. With the temperature well below zero before the wind chill she grew numb inside of the first half mile--roughly the distance necessary to begin again.
She had J. D. stop well short of the trees to reorient and took five photos on her belly, covering a hundred-and-eighty-degree arc.
He had the computer up again and ready for her download by the time she made it back through the snow.
By some intuitive dint of luck, the subtle indications of a path skirting the tree line showed up on the first photo. She went through the rest to make sure of the direction, and that there were not two sets of tracks splitting off, then worked quickly with the digital contrast.
"These are different." She pointed out a spot very near the trees where the depressions became significantly more narrow.
"The kidnapper must have changed over from snowshoes to skis here."
J. D. oriented to his satellite photos, figuring the distance to be covered, talking aloud so Kirsten could follow the gist of his thinking about what had been in the kidnappers' minds.
"The tracks head west-north-west here." He traced with his finger two destinations he thought likely, both over a ridge perhaps two miles away, noting on the map where the tracks would lead in each case. On the satellite photo, there wasn't much difference between the two, probably both the roofs of mountain cabins.
He lifted his binoculars, no larger than a deck of cards, to scan for any hint of a trail.
By the time they crested the ridge, Kirsten had spent a frustrating half hour trying to pick up on the trail that she could no longer make visible, and they were both too chilled to think clearly.
J. D. made the decision. They would circle wide and approach the cabin that was at least two miles beyond the other.
"If Christo is in either one of those places, it's the one farther west."
He handed her the binoculars, and she saw why J. D. had made that seemingly arbitrary call. The closer of the two structures was covered with snow, no hint of melting on the roof, while on the farther cabin, the snow had melted around t
he chimney.
Four o'clock. Three hours left. By Kirsten's reckoning of the time they'd spent just getting to the ridge, it would take them another half hour to get to Christo, if he was there at all.
J. D. took another thirty seconds to call back and update Garrett, letting him know where they were and where they were headed.
Loehman still hadn't called to name the place and time for the han doff. Garrett was going slowly nuts, but her body numb with the subzero cold, Kirsten's heart began to race.
at thrity-five minutes after four, Garrett's cell phone rang.
Guiliani, not Loehman, was on the other end of the call, his voice edgy.
"Where are J.D. and Kirsten?"
Garrett leaned over the kitchen table to doublecheck himself though he knew to the degrees of longitude and latitude where J. D. had expected to be. He gave Matt the coordinates, then listened while he conferred with his CIA buddy.
Matt cleared his throat.
"Did J.D. take a cell phone?"
"Yeah."
"Can you raise them?"
His chest tightened.
"I don't know. Why?"
"You're not going to believe this, pais an
Impatient, his heart thudding, trying to keep cool, he snapped anyway.
"Try me."
"I think I know where Christo is."
"Where?"
"A building on the north side of Jackson. It's closed up in the wintertime."
"How?" Garrett felt the plastic casing of his own cell phone giving way under his ferocious grip. He switched hands and forced himself to loosen up.
"How do you know?"
"I don't know for sure, but the cell phone you gave the Wilders is there."
The cell on which Kirsten had tried for days to reach Christo.
"You've got to be kidding me."
"Nope. I'm betting Christo stashed the thing in his duffel bag after the first time Kirsten called him. He probably messed with the buttons and turned off the ringer, or whoever's holding him would have found it and taken it away from him by now."
"So, you've filtered out half a million other cells-" "I can't take the credit, but yes."
"And you're saying Christo is trying to use it?"
"That's exactly what I'm saying. The signal's gone silent now, probably the battery's dead, but in the past six hours it's been pretty much a free-for all for international long-distance calls lasting a couple of minutes each. My guess is they've left Christo alone in that building, he's found the cell again and he's been trying to call his mom ever since."
Something fierce and tender, some emotion at once wildly grateful, proud and terrified gripped his throat at the thought of his own small son, alone, trying to reach Kirsten. Tears collected at the inner corners of his eyes and for a good long time he couldn't squeak out a word because he was hoping, too hard, that it was possible a four- year-old could do what Matt thought he was doing.
The alternative, of course, was that Loehman had Grafted a nasty ambush.
"You there, Garrett?"
"Yeah." He let out his breath.
"Even if I can't raise J.D." he should be calling in shortly. Tell your Spock friend I owe him. "
"Yeah, well, don't worry about it. Has Loehman called yet to tell you where to be when?"
Garrett swore.
"No."
"Well, that's not a surprise, is it? You know he's not going to leave you time enough to vet the location."
"I know, but I don't have to like it." He was sorely tempted to go after Christo himself and deal with Loehman later.
"How soon can you get to Christo's location?"
"It'll take a good hour."
"That's what I thought." He still needed the ex- spook's expertise in assessing photos downloaded from whatever satellite happened to be hanging in the night sky over Loehman's choice of a meeting place.
"Hang there another half hour," Garrett decided.
"If our call doesn't come in by then, we'll have to forget it. Recovering Christo takes precedence. Get to him, check out that scene. Make sure we won't be taking Kirsten into an ambush. I don't know how soon she and J.D. will be able to get there, but assuming the rescue is a go--that Christo is even there, coordinate with J.D."
He rang off with Matt and punched in the number of the cell phone
J. D.
had taken. Vorees sat across the kitchen table from him, waiting to be filled in, his features harsh, forbidding as the granite Tetons.
Pushing redial every few seconds, Garrett knew the feeling well. It didn't help to be sitting here twiddling their thumbs waiting on Loehman's call. He filled in the few blanks Vorees had after hearing Garrett's side of the conversation.
Vorees cut loose with an angry, frustrated tirade.
"Take it easy, Ross," Ann urged him.
"You take it easy," he snapped.
"Let me just say I would personally like to tear the son of a bitch limb from limb."
Ann ignored him.
"Garrett, what would you think if I went in for Christo? I'll get Ginny and Sam to take me... oh, except" -she broke off, irritated at herself "-- that won't work because Matt has their vehicle and you'll need Ross's."
Garrett nodded, chewing his lip. The highway patrol would come get her, but if Loehman's lackeys were watching their movements or Christo's location, a state vehicle could bollix the deal. He cursed under his breath.
"C'mon, Thorne, answer the damn phone."
from half a mile out, Kirsten's heart began to sink. From their vantage point above, approaching the mountain cabin with the snow melted around the chimney, she saw tire tracks departing the property.
While that could mean anything, she worried that they were too late.
Christo might have been there;
he was probably gone now.
J. D. brought them as close as he dared risk the noise of the snowmobile engine, then helped her off the machine and down through the trees. He left her concealed behind a granite boulder thirty yards from the cabin, then moved, ran, half skidding the rest of the way to check it out first.
Her fears, however induced by the bitter numbing cold, proved dead on, once she was inside the cabin. There was no one in the house, only proof positive that Christo had been there. Off to the blind side of a naked mattress dragged in front of the fireplace in the great room lay the feather that belonged in Christo's medicine bag.
Panic knifed through her. If she'd had any energy left, it would have consumed her. As it was, she shot a dozen exposures of the place where Christo had been held hostage, then followed J. D. woodenly back outside where, in an outbuilding he broke into, he found a Jeep. He worked for ten minutes to hotwire the thing before he gave up.
"I would really have liked it if just one damned thing could have gone right for us." He gave her a brief hug, ordered her to go back into the house where it was warmer and then took off up the mountain for the snowmobile.
She went inside and picked up the telephone to call Garrett but the line was dead. Ten minutes later, when J. D. skidded to a stop at the front door to pick her up, they learned the cell-phone battery was dead as well.
Swearing heartily under his breath, J. D. consulted his satellite map again and plotted a course to the western edge of town. He guided the snowmobile down the mountain road like a bat out of some frozen hell, swerving across the snow-plowed state highway to the first sign of life--a single-bay gas station. Naturally, the pay phone was out of order. Taking in J. D. " the fresh-faced kid behind the counter offered up the station phone without a word and poured a couple of disposable cups of coffee.
J. D. punched in the numbers to Garrett's cell phone. He pulled Kirsten close enough and lowered his head so that she could hear as well.
Ann Calder answered.
"J.D.?"
"Yeah."
"Where are you?"
"On the highway, a half a mile or so south of town."
"We've been trying to reach you for almost an
hour. We know where they've taken Christo. We think he had the cell phone stashed in his duffel bag, that he's probably alone and trying to call Kirsten."
Her teeth gritted against crying out, Kirsten clapped a hand over her mouth as well, but the cry tore loose anyway.
"It's a town hall of some sort," Ann was saying, "usually closed up in winter. You're probably only ten minutes from it." Pulling herself together, Kirsten got out their maps to locate the building Ann described.
Carly Bishop - No Baby But Mine Page 20