Tom Reed Thriller Series

by Rick Mofina

  “…we’re at one hundred feet now…”

  Every iota of Emily’s being was focused on the TV monitor and the tiny camera searching the crevasse for her daughter. The horror was clawing at her; the camera was dropping deeper and deeper, its intense light reflecting the slick, sweating rock walls, like the throat of some overwhelming evil entity.

  “…one hundred twenty…”

  Did she fall here?

  Was Emily’s only child devoured by the mountains that haunted her for much of her life?

  The camera was descending.

  Darkness into darkness.

  “Every family has secrets, Emily,” Zander’s attention, like those of the others in the small task force room, was on the monitor. “Tell us what you think happened.”

  Doug?

  Where is Doug? What did they do to him? He has that cut on his hand. He has a lawyer. He was the last to be with her. Emily sobbed. Her body convulsing.

  “…one hundred ninety…”

  This time, no one comforted Emily as she wept.

  “Oh, Paige,” she whispered through her tears.

  Inspector Walt Sydowski glanced at her briefly. He was troubled. Zander was the lead and he was very good, but Sydowski did not like his approach. Something about the pieces just didn’t fit. It was close but it wasn’t there. Hood’s case was forcing them to accelerate. Lives and careers were on the line. The entire file was a national, political time bomb ticking in their hands. But what they had so far didn’t feel right to Sydowski. It gnawed at him yet; he couldn’t put his finger on it.

  “Maybe we should consider removing Emily from the room for the time being, Frank, since we don’t know what’s coming.”

  Zander’s attention remained on the monitor.

  “…two hundred ten feet…”

  Zander did not respond.

  “Frank?”

  “You can step out if you like, Walt,” Zander didn’t turn from the TV. “Emily, are you prepared to tell us what happened? It might help you.”

  “I don’t know what happened.”

  “…two hundred twenty—wait, we’ve got something…”

  Everyone in the task force room froze as the three-second delay passed. The FBI agent operating the probe narrated as a white fabric-looking object came into view. “It looks like a…wait--” The camera turned and moved in, then pulled back. The object was hung up on a small, sharp edge.

  Emily groaned. “It’s her sock.” She thrust her face into her hands.

  “Should I bring this pair, Mom?” White cotton with pink frilled ankles. “Will these work in the mountains?” Purchased one night a few weeks ago during a mother-daughter shopping expedition to Stonestown. Oh, my baby.

  The camera resumed its descent.

  Emily trembled; someone said something.

  “It would be in your interest to tell us what happened, Emily,” Zander continued to work on her. “To tell us what you think happened?”

  “…two hundred forty…”

  “Doug told us things.”

  Emily sniffed.

  Tracy Bowman passed her a tissue. She didn’t know what to think, couldn’t believe what was happening. Was Zander a genius, or a monster?

  Was Emily the monster?

  “… three hundred feet…three hundred ten…hold it! Got something--”

  The images floated on the TV screen. It was impossible to determine what it was. Then, yes, it was a backpack. A small backpack. The task force members knew it from the photos of the Baker family.

  It was Paige Baker’s backpack.

  “Everybody got that? A backpack?” The camera operator’s voice crackled over the radio.

  Emily moaned, raising her palms slowly from the table, replacing them silently as if in unbearable pain, as if begging for an end to it.

  “Please,” she whispered. “Oh, please.

  The camera descended.

  “Emily, how do you think Doug hurt his hand?”

  She did not answer Zander.

  “We understand he can be a violent man some times.”

  “…three hundred seventy…”

  “What happened twenty-two years ago with your sister? What really happened?”

  Her monster, Isaiah Hood, was laughing.

  “Why did your mother change your name? It seemed like you were running from something. Show her the old report from the attorney general, Tracy.”

  Bowman slid an FBI file folder to Emily, opening it for her. But Emily did not need to read it. She knew about the letters she had written all those years ago.

  “…four hundred feet…”

  Paige. Rachel. Oh, why?

  “…four hundred twenty—wait. Christ! You see that? Jesus--”

  The task force room tensed. The three-second delay passed and something shining fluttered on the monitor.

  A pair of eyes.

  Dead. Soulless. Reflecting the light. Not quite in focus. Strange-looking.

  “Dear God,” Bowman said.

  And a row of white teeth near the eyes. Slammed tight against the rock. But the transmission was unclear. A blizzard of static hissed. The image vanished.

  “What the hell happened?” Zander said.

  “Stand by. We’ve got satellite trouble.”

  Emily’s breathing quaked. Her skin and scalp prickled with horror.

  Please, God. Not again.

  Her soul was screaming.

  SIXTY-FIVE

  In his newly restored office in the neoclassical capitol building, which dominated Helena’s skyline, Montana’s Governor Nye was grappling with a crisis.

  His stomach tensed as he witnessed the early morning news reports of Isaiah Hood’s eleventh-hour claim for clemency.

  It churned watching Hood’s Chicago lawyer, David Cohen, tell the country live on every network that Montana was going to murder his client.

  That cocksure SOB had pushed him into a corner and he didn’t like it.

  Every news organization in the nation wanted the governor to state his reaction and intentions.

  He sat at his desk, studying the framed photograph of his wife and their daughter.

  Two quick knocks on his door were followed by his attorney general and John Jackson, his chief counsel. The governor had been talking and meeting with them since 6:00 A.M. when the Washington Post called him on his personal cell phone. How the Post reporter got the number was a mystery to him. He had declined to comment until he had reviewed the latest events.

  The AG and Jackson seated themselves. The governor gritted his teeth, then exhaled. “I am not backing down here.”

  The two men exchanged quick glances. The governor had given the wrong answer.

  “Sir, there are many considerations,” the attorney general began.

  “Cohen went public with his claims; as I see it, that’s it.”

  “You have to take into account the Glacier situation,” the attorney general said. At least what we know of it. Not a trace of the little girl has surfaced. Investigators have mounting evidence of criminal intent.”

  “My feeling at this point is that we cannot link the two cases,” the governor said. “What if Doug Baker killed his daughter? Or someone else? That has nothing to do with Hood’s case. Tragic for Emily Baker. But Montana convicted Hood fairly. The letters after the fact were in the possession of the county attorney who felt no compunction to reopen the case.”

  “Of course he didn’t. It would have been political suicide. An admission of failure, to point at the little sister and free the person whose blood the community wanted for the death of this child. It is understandable the county attorney would have downplayed or diminished the role of the letters. Would you like to follow that course, in light of what is now happening in Glacier?”

  The governor sighed, sitting back in his chair, looking at his daughter’s face.

  “You seem to be singing a different tune from the other day,” the governor observed.

  “I just think this is
a dreadful case and we should not push too fast in any direction that is not reversible.”

  “Be indecisive? Soft on crime?”

  “Be responsible, respectful and responsive to facts at hand.”

  The governor turned to Jackson. “What is going on in Glacier, John? The last we had was the ax, the T-shirt, Dad on the polygraph.”

  “I’m awaiting word from our people on the task force. Indications are some new evidence has surfaced.”

  “Something indicating she is alive?”

  “Not sure. I expect to hear soon.”

  “What was the reaction from David Cohen’s boss in Chicago? They going to rein him in? Not that it matters now--the damage is already done.”

  “No is the short answer. They’re proud of him.”

  “I don’t like this. Not one damn bit.”

  The intercom buzzed.

  “The U.S. Attorney General’s Office in Washington, Governor.”

  It was a short conversation with the Governor politely but forcefully let the attorney general know how “Montana is going to do the right thing here. After we examine all the facts, separating reality from rhetoric. I am sorry--what was that? Right. No, we did not know that. We are awaiting word from Glacier. An update? Yes. They are certain it’s her? I see--”

  As the call ended, John Jackson’s cell phone rang. It was word from Glacier that they are ninety-nine per cent certain they had found the corpse of Paige Baker at the bottom of a crevasse nearly two miles from her parents’ campsite.

  The governor was nodding, his finger caressing the frame of his daughter’s picture. He ran his hand over his face, stood, walked to his window, looked out to the mountains.

  “They suspect the parents,” the governor said. “The case is virtually sealed against them.”

  He asked the attorney general if he could still invoke executive clemency for Hood after first refusing it.

  “Yes, the statutes allow for it when new evidence surfaces,” the attorney general had answered. “You can intervene and grant thirty days of relief for Hood’s case to be investigated in light of events. If he has a case, he can make a new appeal to the Board, or he can go right to court with it.”

  The governor nodded at his advisers.

  “I’ll do it. I’ll call the director of DOC. I suppose I have to sign something, then fax it to Deer Lodge. Better alert Pardons and Parole, too.”

  “I can arrange all that, Governor,” Jackson said.

  “Thanks. And call Cohen. He’s probably going to be on with Larry King tonight. We better schedule a news conference, say in three or four hours here. Let the pack at Glacier get here.”

  The attorney general checked his watch.

  “Wait, Governor. You’ve got well over fourteen hours yet.”

  “Yes?”

  “Why not wait a few more hours? See what happens. We can keep everything in this room for the time being. See if someone plays a card. If charges are formally laid and the FBI announces it, then you are not seen as too eager but reacting accordingly. A few hours one way or the other are not going to matter much.”

  Governor Nye considered the suggestion and agreed.

  “We’ll give it a few hours.”

  SIXTY-SIX

  “Yes, it’s one of his seizures. A massive one. His vital signs are deteriorating.” The anxious senior nurse was talking to the warden from the death watch guard’s phone as she stared at Isaiah Hood.

  “Can he be treated on-site?” the warden asked.

  “Not a chance.”

  “Give me odds.”

  “Ninety-five per cent likelihood he’ll be dead within two hours if he’s not airlifted now to Montana General Mercy.”

  “Is he secured?”

  “Yes, but he’s convulsing again. I have to go.”

  The warden immediately called DOC Director. Hood was high profile and it was imperative he alert the director so they could weigh the ramifications of transporting him.

  “I’m sorry sir, the director’s in a meeting,”

  “Interrupt it now--”

  “But--”

  “Now!”

  The director came on the line, annoyed until he caught the urgency of the situation.

  “Are you going to give this one to the governor?” the warden said, aware of the director’s legendary contempt for the man. The dislike was mutual, stemming from embarrassing grillings the director endured during corrections review committees chaired by the future governor.

  “The governor does not run the prison. I do.”

  The director analyzed the situation. Hood’s case, its entanglement with the Baker drama, was tainting the governor’s administration and his aspirations for national office. If Hood died now, the crisis facing the governor would vanish. Or worsen if Hood was proven innocent or was wrongly convicted. The director considered the ramifications. He was bound to follow the laws of the state. That is what he would do.

  “We can’t execute Hood unless he’s healthy. That’s our law. I urge you to give him immediate medical attention, as is the policy under the Corrections Act,” he told the warden.

  The chain-of-command decision took just under two minutes.

  An air ambulance in Missoula was dispatched. ETA was twenty minutes.

  Under the warden’s order, security escort procedures would be followed to the letter. Two uniformed officers would accompany Hood, who would be restrained. They would have radios and a cell phone. One would have a prison-issued firearm. The county sheriff’s office was advised and confirmed two deputies would be standing by to assist at General Mercy in Missoula.

  “I want a news media blackout, understand?” the warden told the security supervisor.

  Johnson-Bell Field was situated on an expanse of flat terrain at the edge of Hellgate Canyon at Missoula’s northwest edge. The air ambulance service for Montana General Mercy was known as Mercy Force. All flights were dispatched from its hangar where a crew stood by twenty-four hours a day, seven days a weeks. They could be airborne in eight minutes.

  Park rangers had an air ambulance chopper out of Kalispell on-site for transport. The Mercy Force was on standby for backup. Shane Ballard, the pilot of Mercy Force, had just come on duty. The tanned, thirty-one year old, former U.S. Air Force pilot knew the terrain. He had flown Mercy’s twin-engined chopper to scores of scene calls for hiking accidents within the park.

  Like most Americans, Ballard was consumed by the live televised news reports on the case of Paige Baker and now Isaiah Hood, trying to decide what to make of it all.

  “What do you think happened out there, Mya?” Ballard called to the on-duty paramedic, Mya Wordell, who was pouring coffee for the crew in the lounge. She was engaged to be married in two weeks to an emergency surgeon at Mercy.

  “I just think it’s so tragic.” She passed coffee to Ballard. He was going to be one of the ushers at her wedding. Earlier, he showed her pictures of himself being fitted for his tux.

  Wordell then passed a cup to Jane McCarry, the emergency nurse, who was her best friend in college and now her maid of honor.

  “It’s just a horrible thing to watch.” McCarry sipped from her cup as Mercy’s hot line rang. Ballard grabbed it, jotting notes.

  “On our way!” Ballard slipped the note into a zippered pocket of his blue flight suit, then clapped his hands. “Let’s go ladies. Traumatic incident at Deer Lodge.”

  Isaiah Hood’s medical records were pulled from Montana State Prison files by the nursing supervisor and clipped to the stretcher as they wheeled Hood through the penitentiary.

  En route to the front gate, they were met by several officers and the grim-faced security chief, who was wearing a suit. He had cancelled a departmental meeting and was gripping his own clipboard of checklists, hastily authorized offender-transfer sheets. He was relieved to visually confirm that Hood was restrained by straps, cuffs and shackles. No SNAFU’s on my watch. No sir.

  “I want him scanned on his way out,” the security bo
ss said as they rolled Hood along the exterior walkway from death row toward the main gate. Hood’s head bobbed. An oxygen mask covered his mouth and nose. He appeared unconscious. Inside the main gate, they wheeled him near the prison’s high-tech security equipment.

  A state-the-art X-ray system, able to detect metal or drugs hidden anywhere, was connected to a camera wand with a high-definition screen. An officer passed it slowly over Hood’s body as half a dozen pairs of eyes watched the monitor. Anything contraband would stand out on the screen and trigger a warning bell, which began pinging and displaying a metal object in Hood’s lower abdomen, in the vicinity of his navel. The sound mixed with the beating of the approaching air ambulance. The security boss frowned.

  “What the hell is that?” He pointed to the object on the screen.

  “Bullet fragment,” the nursing supervisor said. “Hood was shot as a teen. Hunting accident.” The medical official was flipping pages of Hood’s records. “Here, see? It’s in his file.”

  The security chief studied the record, then the screen, slipping on his glasses. “It looks fairly large.”

  “Read his file.”

  Sure enough, a bullet fragment was duly noted, twenty-two years ago when Hood was first processed. He took drugs for it to prevent blood poisoning. Doctors recommended against it being removed. The discomfort was minimal but the surgery was risky.

  The helicopter was nearing.

  “Fine,” the security boss said. “Let’s move him. We’ve got an LZ in the parking lot.”

  Ballard brought the blue and white Mercy Force helicopter to a soft landing, keeping the rotors idling as Wordell and McCarry lowered the aircraft’s rear clamshell doors. Prison staff helped load their patient into the compact interior, which was crammed with advanced life-support equipment.

  Ballard flinched when he saw the two corrections officers squeezing in. No way! The weight will kill us. It’s too risky. All Ballard could do over the noise was wave them away.

  The security chief hurried inside to joust with Ballard in the cockpit, his face a scowl of authority.

  “No damn way can they come,” Ballard shouted. “We can only carry the patient. It is a weight issue and not one for debate.”