Hostage Zero

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Jonathan kept his stride slow and casual as he made his way up the hill to Fisherman’s Cove Police Headquarters. From the snippet he’d received over the phone from Chief Doug Kramer, there was a big-game hunter on the loose in their little town, and Jonathan was likely on the endangered species list. He’d learned a long time ago that the slower you moved, the more aware you were of your surroundings.

As usual, his. 45 rode high on his hip, concealed by the jacket he wore specifically for that purpose, despite the withering heat.

The police station was an unassuming place, built of brick and taking up an entire short city block. It sported two stories above ground for offices and various administrative functions, and five basement holding cells that at first glance looked like throwbacks to Inquisition torture chambers. Jonathan had visited the cells a few times over the years, and he often wondered if a night or two in there wasn’t enough in itself to put the common street criminal on the straight and narrow.

He let himself in through the door to the street and smiled to Rachel, the civilian clerk who’d been in the job for at least twenty years. She smiled back through the bulletproof window and buzzed him in through the inner door.

“Hi, Digger,” Rachel said with a cheery wave as he crossed the threshold. “I haven’t seen you in a long time.” She pointed to the far left-hand corner. “Chief Kramer’s in his office. He’s waiting for you.”

On a different day, the station would have been empty at this hour; but on the heels of the kidnapping, the place was hopping, with starched and pressed strangers mingling among the familiar locals. Jonathan figured they had to be FBI. A few of them looked up as he entered the space, but went back to work after assessing him to be a nonthreat.

Jonathan wove his way through the jumble of desks and chairs and rapped on Kramer’s door. He let himself in without hearing the invitation to do so. Doug held his telephone to his ear with his shoulder, but beckoned Jonathan closer. As he cleared the door, Jonathan saw that Harvey Rodriguez was in the room, too, seated in one of the folding metal seats that served as guest chairs. His hands were cuffed, and his soaked clothes stuck to his skin, but aside from that, he looked to be as comfortable as conditions would allow.

“I’m impressed,” Jonathan said. “It didn’t take you long to get in trouble.”

“Better in trouble than dead,” Harvey said.

Doug hung up the phone and stood to greet Jonathan with a handshake. “So, you really do know him?”

“He’s staying at the mansion,” Jonathan explained. “And he’s safe enough not to need the cuffs.”

“His court records say otherwise,” Doug said. “He’s not supposed to be within two thousand feet of a children’s gathering place.”

“He’s my guest,” Jonathan said.

“Doesn’t change anything.”

“Is that why you have him in custody?”

Doug hesitated. “No.”

Jonathan held out his hand, gesturing for the cuffs key. “Let’s take the offenses one at a time, then, okay?”

Doug screwed up his face and cocked his head. “Since when do you have a soft spot for child molesters?”

Harvey inhaled at that, but he didn’t say anything. This was exactly the scenario he had predicted.

“I don’t have a soft spot for child molesters,” Jonathan said. “Which is why I’d like you to trust me on this and give me the key.”

Doug held Jonathan’s gaze, then begrudgingly fished the tiny key out of his pocket and handed it across the desk.

Jonathan unfastened Harvey’s hands, and handed the hardware back to the chief. “Thanks, Doug. So, why is he in custody?”

“Well, according to Harvey, somebody’s trying to kill him. When he got cornered down on the marina, he says he broke into a boat specifically to sound the alarm and bring attention. That last part worked. One of our patrolmen happened to be less than a block away.”

Jonathan shot an admiring look to Harvey. “Yeah?”

Harvey shrugged and rubbed his wrists.

“Good thinking,” Jonathan said. “And the bad guy?”

“Poof,” Doug said. “No sign of him.”

“Tell him the rest,” Harvey prompted. “Your guy saw my guy running away after the alarm sounded.”

Doug confirmed with a shrug and a nod. “Absolutely true.” He pointed to one of the other metal chairs. “Have a seat, Dig. I’ve learned over the years that shit like this doesn’t happen in this town unless your DNA is on it somewhere. Tell Uncle Dougie what’s going on.”

Jonathan sat, crossed his legs, and tried his best to look relaxed as he scoured his mind for a way to skirt what he knew was coming. “Doug, you know we’ve been friends for a long time-”

The chief laughed. “Oh, God,” he said. “When you start down the friendship road, nothing good ever follows.”

Jonathan remained serious. “We’ve always had an understanding about my business. You don’t ask much, and I don’t offer much.”

Doug turned serious, too. “That was before people started shooting the place up and kidnapping children. That was before I had reporters climbing up my ass twenty-four hours a day and the FBI camped out in my squad room. Funny how stuff changes.”

“You have every reason to be upset,” Jonathan said. “If I were in your position-”

Doug held up his hand. “Save it. I don’t need to be patronized or commiserated with. I need information, and I believe that you have it. I love you like a brother, my friend, but don’t think I won’t throw your ass in jail for obstruction. If that happens, I don’t know how I’ll be able to stop the leaks to the press about your little sideline business. I don’t know the details, but I know enough to make your life difficult. What I haven’t figured out yet, I’m sure that the press could stitch together in time. So, tell me, Dig. How fast do you want the pitches to come in this game of hardball?”

Jonathan felt stunned. “You’re threatening me?”

Doug threw his hands in the air in frustration. “What the hell else can I do? Look, I know you see Resurrection House as your pet project run by your pet charities, but the reality is, it’s in my town, and that janitor in the hospital-Alvin Stewart-is a neighbor of mine. Now, I know you’re not real keen on some of the laws of this land, but you’ve got to live by them just like everybody else. At a minimum you’ve got to share specialized information with the people who are paid to enforce them.”

Harvey Rodriguez watched the two of them as if they were a tennis match, his head turning from one to the other.

“You don’t want to know some of these details, Doug.”

The chief slammed his hand down on the desk. “Don’t tell me what I don’t want to know. I’m a big boy, Digger. I’m smart enough to sift details.”

Jonathan had never seen him like this. Of all the people he’d known over the years, Doug Kramer had always been among the most staid. It was unsettling to see him this far out of control. But he had a point. The chief had a job to do, and to the degree that his job involved protecting the children at Resurrection House, they should be in lockstep. As he made up his mind what he was going to do, he could almost hear Boxers screaming in protest. The big guy always worried that he played fast and loose with OpSec-operational security-and to tilt his hand to the chief of police, even one who’d been a friend since childhood, crossed all reasonable lines.

Jonathan sighed. “I’ll share what I know, but not what I suspect,” he said, “but on the condition that you don’t ask me to reveal my sources. You’ll either believe me or you won’t, but I won’t discuss anything about how I came upon the details. Fair enough?”

Kramer showed nothing. “I guess we’ll see.”

Jonathan stacked the various elements in his mind, then decided to drop the biggest bomb first. “Jeremy Schuler is alive and well, and in hiding across the street in the mansion.”

Doug looked like he’d been smacked. “Jesus, Digger. Do you know-”

Jonathan cut him off. “I’m not going to be lectured, Doug. Listen or don’t listen, but don’t make any speeches, okay?”

He waited for the nod.

“We know that Evan Guinn was taken as leverage against upcoming testimony from his father against the old Slater crime family. That begged the question of why they took Jeremy Schuler, and we found out that he was to be murdered outright. Our friend Harvey here was able to rescue him and save his life.”

Doug’s face remained blank as he turned to look at his former prisoner with renewed interest. Harvey smiled and waved.

Jonathan continued. “It gets deeper. We have very good reason to believe that the mission to murder Jeremy was launched by someone in the government.”

“Which government?”

“The one in Washington.”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake, Dig. Why-” He stopped himself and retreated from Jonathan’s glare.

“Like I said, I’m only telling you what we know to be fact. Once we found out that important people were after the boy, we thought it best to hide him. We kept it a secret on the off chance that the bad guys don’t know that they missed, and we didn’t want the press telling everyone that there was still a viable target.”

Doug sat back heavily in his chair and rubbed his forehead. “Jesus, Dig. Do you know how many people are out there looking for that boy?”

“I hope it’s a cast of thousands and getting bigger by the minute. The more they’re committed to finding him and his kidnappers, the less likely they’ll find him across the street.”

Doug stewed on that for a couple of seconds and then laughed. “Goddamn, you are a piece of work. So what’s with the guys who are chasing you, Mr. Rodriguez?”

Harvey started with a deer-in-the-headlights stare, then deferred to Jonathan with an upturned palm. “He’s doing just fine. I think I’ll let him talk about that.”

Jonathan squirmed in his chair and cleared his throat. “That gets close to revealing sources,” he said. “I believe that the bad guys might be missing a couple of their companions.”

“Missing?”

“Move on, Doug. We’re not going there.”

The chief conceded. What choice did he have? “So now I guess all you have to do is find the missing boy and bring him home.” He’d meant it as a joke, but when he saw Jonathan’s expression, the shock returned to his face. “Holy shit. You know where he is?”

Jonathan shrugged. “More or less,” he said.

“Where?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“Goddammit, Digger-”

“Under orders from the FBI, I can’t tell you.”

That took the wind out of his sails. “Our FBI? The ones out in my squad room?”

“Our FBI, yes. But definitely not the ones in your squad room. I need you to keep all of this from them, Doug. Not a word. Lives depend on it. Including mine.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Doug countered. “You want me to believe that the FBI is keeping secrets from itself?”

Jonathan said nothing. Doug could believe what he wanted to, but there’d be no more details from Jonathan on the information shared by Irene Rivers.

“So what the hell am I supposed to do?” Doug said. Exasperation had driven his voice an octave higher.

“He did tell you that you wouldn’t want to know,” Harvey said.

“You shut up,” Doug snapped, aiming a forefinger at Harvey’s nose.

“I can’t tell you what to do,” Jonathan said. “You’re welcome to check in on Jeremy if it’s important that you know for yourself that he’s safe, but please remember that whoever wanted him dead in the first place probably still does.”

“So you want me to obstruct justice in my own town, letting the Fibbies chase their tails while I know full well that it’s a false mission.”

“It seems harsh when you put it like that,” Jonathan said.

“How is that going to make me look when the word finally leaks out?”

Jonathan felt a rush of disappointment. “Since when did you start worrying what people think of you? The Doug Kramer I grew up with worried only about doing the right thing.”

The chief flushed. “You know what I mean.”

“No, I don’t think I do. When I talk about protecting the life of a child, you counter with protecting the legacy of your career. As if the two are remotely equivalent.”

Doug laughed derisively. “Ah, the ambiguous moral code of Digger Grave, Lone Ranger, ever perched atop his personal pedestal. You must tell me one day what the world looks like from up there.”

Jonathan couldn’t believe what he was hearing. This was the same man who not too long ago offered to suborn murder in the name of justice. “Who am I talking to?” he asked.

Doug locked his jaw and glared through the back of Jonathan’s head.

“Step outside, Harvey,” Jonathan said.

“What?”

“Just wait in the squad room for a few minutes.”

“With the FBI?” Jonathan might as well have asked him to set himself on fire.

“Don’t say anything to anyone, and don’t wander off. Just wait.”

Harvey looked to Chief Kramer for an appeal, but Doug was studying a spot on his desk blotter.

“It won’t be long,” Jonathan promised. His tone found the perfect balance between request and demand.

Harvey left.

“Talk to me, Doug,” Jonathan said. “What’s happening?”

The chief continued to stare at his blotter, clearly intending to say nothing; but when the silence did not relent, he rocked his eyes up. Somehow, he’d aged ten years in two minutes. “Don’t you get what an incident like this does to a town like ours?” he said. “Don’t you get the collective loss of innocence? This isn’t a war zone, Dig. Hell, it’s not even a city-not really. In New York and DC the place gets shot up, and once the media gets past it, so does everyone else.

“It’s not like that here. This kind of violence erodes the very heart of this town. There’s no getting past it, because the way things used to be doesn’t matter anymore.”

Jonathan scowled. “But what-”

“Hush. Just listen. For once in your life, just listen. With all your running around these past couple of days, I don’t suppose you’ve had a chance to read the newspapers, but maybe you ought to. There are a lot of harsh words being thrown around-chief among them the I — word. Incompetent. That would be me.

“I’ve dedicated my life to this little burg. While you were off touring the world and defending our freedom, I was busting my balls for nothing an hour, keeping Fisherman’s Cove from caving in on itself. And you’re right, I was never in it for the legacy, or even the praise. I’d have been perfectly happy to remain anonymous, but I’ll be goddamned if I’m going to be judged as incompetent.”

A pause followed, during which Jonathan thought his friend had finished. He had not.

“I’ve been with you every step of the way on everything you’ve ever done, Dig. I know what a shit life you had as a kid, and I know what a good friend you are to everybody in this town. But there’s got to be a limit to this secrecy shit. Your neighbors are in tears in their homes, praying for the safety of a boy who is already safe. It would mean everything for them to know that their prayers were working.”

“And soon enough, they will,” Jonathan said. He leaned forward and rested his forearms on the edge of the desk. “But not until his safety is guaranteed. Doug, when all this settles out, I fear that it’s going to be much, much bigger than a simple kidnapping. There’s violence coming, one way or the other, and until we really know what it’s all about, we’ve got to keep the lid on.”

Doug sighed deeply and stretched his neck muscles. “I know you’re right,” he said, his tone again soft and sane. “I don’t like it, but I do know it. It’s just not the way things are supposed to be.”

Jonathan smiled, happy to see the return of the man he knew. “Nothing about any of this is the way it’s supposed to be,” he said. “I’ll fix it, though.”

“Do you really know where the Guinn boy is?”

“I think so. We’re pretty sure we do.”

“And you’re going to go get him?”

Jonathan nodded. Ordinarily, he would not have responded to that question at all. But he owed Doug that much.

The conversation became awkward, as if they’d burned through all the available words.

“I’d tell you to be careful,” Doug said, “but I know how much you hate that.”

Jonathan did indeed hate it. In his line of work, careful people died young, just behind the foolish ones. Aggressive and smart won the day every time. “Are we done here?” he asked. He started to stand.

“Actually, no.” Doug hadn’t moved, and his expression remained stern.

Jonathan settled back into his seat and waited for it.

“Your friend Harvey. There’s the not-small problem of his parole. I’m willing to forgive the violation because you vouched for him, but what am I going to do with him? I can’t let him hang around. Your vouching for him doesn’t take away the judgment against him. And since you’re going away, even that is moot. He’s got to go.”

Jonathan hadn’t anticipated this. “Even though people are looking to kill him.”

The chief shrugged. “I could put him in protective custody.”

“There’s no way he’d tolerate that.”

“I’m just presenting options. Turns out it’s a damn short list.”

Jonathan stewed on that. It was a good point, well-made. While he trusted Harvey to be the person he said he was, he had to confess that his opinion was more gut than fact. There were limits to what he could ask even from a friend as close as Doug Kramer.

He shrugged. “I’ve got to convince him to come along.”

Harvey stopped dead in the foyer. “You’re out of your mind.”

“It’s not as if you have a lot of options,” Jonathan argued. He’d had Doug drive them back to the mansion just in case the guy in denim was still lurking in the shadows waiting to take a shot.

“How about living? I’ve always been partial to that one.”

Jonathan laughed. “How’s that working for you so far? You still haven’t dried out from your dive to dodge a killer. Where are you going to dive next time?”

“Nowhere in Colombia, I can tell you that. I hated the desert, and that was a dry heat. You’re talking fuckin’ jungle.”

Jonathan laughed. “The issue remains that you don’t have a lot of options.”

Harvey gaped, trying to think of something-anything-to toss out as an alternative to exposing himself to gunfire again. “Were you not listening when I told you about my PTSD? I’m crazy.”

“Crazy’s a continuum,” Jonathan countered. “You’ve met my friend Boxers, so you know that. You handled yourself really well back there at the marina. That was good thinking. And young Jeremy is perfect evidence that your medic chops are still good. Add the fact that I could use an extra hand, and I think this is a good opportunity for you.”

“Opportunity.” Harvey tasted the word. Didn’t like it. “Is that what you call it? An opportunity to do what, other than dying?”

“To regain your self-respect,” Jonathan said.

Harvey blushed.

“I don’t mean to presume,” Jonathan continued, “but I’ve been watching you. You’re nowhere near as crazy as you pretend to be. You’ve had some hard breaks, and you’ve been aggressively screwed by the system, but I think that even you see the difference in yourself over the past couple of days.”

Harvey blushed redder. “Now you’re a psychiatrist in addition to all of your other superhuman skills? Can you see through walls, too?”

“Scoff if you want,” Jonathan pressed. “I’m just telling you that the way things have been for you doesn’t have to be the way it is from now on. What are you going to do? Go back to your tent? How do you expect to watch your back at night? How do you really ever sleep again?”

“Because you killed those guys! Thanks a lot.”

“No, no, no. Don’t you lay that all on me. I was there, remember? You were the point on that spear. You chose to help Jeremy Schuler. You chose to nurse him back to health.”

“What was I supposed to do? He was dying.”

Jonathan cocked his head. “Are you going to tell me that you weren’t tempted to just pull out and go the other way?”

Harvey looked at the floor.

“It shows that you made a choice,” Jonathan pressed. “You could have walked away, but you didn’t. You could have sold the boy out in the bar, but you didn’t, and by remaining quiet you almost got yourself killed. Like it or not, that’s heroic behavior. Somewhere out there, there’s a drill sergeant who’s damn proud.”

Harvey wanted to argue. You could see it right there on the front of his face. His mouth worked to form words, but none flowed.

“Come on, Harvey,” Jonathan said, moving to seal the deal. “When was the last time you got the opportunity to do something noble?”

He was close. So close. “Why me? There must be a hundred eager soldier wannabes who’d piss all over themselves for the opportunity to shoot up a jungle.”

“Because I don’t have time to recruit. And because once you walked into this thing, you got skin in the game. You’re a native Spanish speaker, right?”

Harvey shrugged.

Jonathan tapped a point in the air. “I thought so. Deep down inside, you’re thrilled to be involved.”

Harvey smiled. “I am, am I? How deep down inside?”

“Actually, not deep at all.”

They shook on it.