Cure

37

March 27, 2010

Saturday, 9:16 a.m.

It had not been a good night for Laurie or Jack. Once the house was empty, save for the single detective hidden away manning the telephone equipment, the horrors of their experience set in with a vengeance. Knowing their child was in harm’s way in the company of terrible strangers who might be mistreating him, and being powerless to do anything about it, was a kind of torture they had never experienced. They also spoke of Leticia and the tragedy she represented, and how her death would be a source of guilt for them for the rest of their lives.

Laurie finally fell asleep around seven, after a particularly long binge of tears, but Jack had not slept at all. By seven-thirty he’d given up, made himself a pot of tea, and sat in the family room. He was breathing, but that was about all, his mind an exhausted blank.

It was in that state that the phone rang. Jack answered it in a panic, not because of who he thought might be calling but rather to try to keep it from awakening Laurie.

“Hello,” Jack blurted.

“I want to speak to Laurie Montgomery-Stapleton,” Brennan ordered, again trying to sound angry and demanding, as if he’d had reason to feel slighted.

“She’s asleep,” Jack answered. Although he’d not heard the man’s voice the evening before, Jack knew instantly with whom he was speaking, which filled him with boundless fury and resentment. He had to restrain himself from verbally attacking the man.

“She’ll speak to me if she knows what is good for her son.”

“You can speak with me,” Jack ordered. “I’m the father and the husband.”

“I need to speak to her, not you but her,” Brennan insisted. “Don’t argue with me. Otherwise, I’ll go out to the car, drag the bloody bastard kid back in here, and make you regret giving me a hard time.”

“Okay,” Jack offered, obviously not pleased but unwilling to put JJ at any additional risk. Jack laid the phone onto the side table and rushed back to the bedroom. When he pushed open the door, Laurie was sitting on the side of the bed. She was leaning forward, head in her hands, elbows on her knees.

“I’m sorry. It’s him, and he insists on speaking with you.”

Laurie nodded, reached over, and put her hand on the phone, but she didn’t answer immediately. Rather, she took a deep breath to try to prepare herself. She had a wicked bi-temporal headache as if she had drunk herself into a stupor the evening before.

“Hello,” Laurie said with a voice as tired as she felt.

“Tell your husband that when I call in the future, I want to speak to you and no one else. Is that clear? He tried to insist that I talk to him. Tell him if that happens in the future, something will happen to the tyke. Your kid will lose something, like I said last night, such as an ear or a finger, which I’ll be happy to send to you to make sure you know we are serious.”

“Is my child there with you now?”

“No, not this time. He’s out in the car. But later this afternoon, when I call again, I’ll bring him to the phone. Now I’m ready to give you our demands. Remember, no police or the kid gets hurt. We want a million dollars, but not in cash. Cash is too bulky, and it can be marked. We want a million dollars in D perfect diamonds. We don’t care about the size, but the diamonds have to have a combined wholesale value of a million dollars. They are easy to get in New York City. Any questions?”

“What do we do if we don’t have a million dollars?” Laurie asked in a matter-of-fact fashion.

“You and your husband are doctors,” Brennan said. “You can get a million dollars.”

“All our money is tied up in our house.”

“Whatever,” Brennan said, and then hung up.

Laurie replaced the receiver slowly and looked up at Jack. “Could you hear his side of the conversation?”

“Pretty much.” Jack said.

“It sounds like he’s role-playing to me.”

“I think Grover was right about these people being novices and that the ransom is of secondary importance,” Jack said. “Otherwise, why would he be so insistent about talking with you? He wants to make sure you are here and not back at OCME.”

“Maybe so,” Laurie said. The fact that these goons, whoever they were, had her son and were threatening to harm him was the only issue she was at all concerned about, and she desperately wanted him home.

“Can I bring you anything?” Jack asked.

“No,” Laurie said, a flood of despondency washing over her.

“Why don’t you come and take a shower? Then maybe you might want to eat some breakfast. Remember, we didn’t eat at all last night.”

“I’m not hungry.”

“That’s the point. Why not shower? Maybe a shower will make you hungry.”

“Leave me alone,” Laurie snapped. “I don’t want to shower or eat. I just want to lie here.”

“Okay,” Jack said. “Meanwhile, I’m going downstairs to see how the police guy did with that call. Do you remember his name?”

“I never learned it in the first place,” Laurie commented, sounding like a true depressive, falling back onto the pillow. She would have loved to have slept, but she knew it was out of the question. She felt exhausted, depressed, and hopped-up all at the same time.

Jack went down the stairs to the first floor and knocked on the guest-room door. It was quickly opened. The plainclothes officer staying in the room immediately introduced himself. His name was Sergeant Edwin D. Gunner.

“It just dawned on me,” Jack said guiltily. “You haven’t had anything to eat. Would you like some breakfast?”

“Some coffee would be nice,” Edwin said. “I’m not much of a breakfast guy.”

“Did you catch that recent phone call? It was the kidnapper.”

“I did catch it,” Edwin said, following Jack back up the stairs.

“Could you trace it?” Jack asked.

“Absolutely,” Edwin said.

“To where?”

“To one of the remaining thousand or so public phones in the city. This one is in a twenty-four-hour Laundromat on the Lower East Side. Of course a squad car was dispatched as soon as the trace was completed, but don’t be optimistic. The kidnapper would have been long gone.”

“No doubt,” Jack answered. He quelled a fantasy about being there clutching something like a crowbar the moment the goon hung up the phone.