John Gilstrap - Hostage Zero

“You can pull me off of this thing anytime you want,” Sjogren said. “But unless you do, I’ve got a job to finish. You want me to stop looking and just let the kid go?”

Brandy closed her eyes and inhaled. How could it possibly have come to this? “No,” she said, her lids still closed. “I want you to finish it.” The words seemed to come from someone else. Seven years ago, when she was graduating from Georgetown with her degree in political science, the thought of ordering the murder of a child would have been inconceivable. Now she’d just done it for the second time in less than a week.

Jonathan entered the mansion at ten-thirty, feeling human again after a very long, very hot shower. The two hours of sleep didn’t hurt, either. Officially, the massive colonial-style behemoth held the administrative offices for Resurrection House and housed Venice and her family. Unofficially, to the rest of the town, it would always be the Gravenow mansion, Jonathan’s childhood home. He’d happily deeded it away at his first chance for the whopping sum of one dollar.

Its towering, wainscoted memories were worthy enough of forgetting that Jonathan rarely entered the place anymore. When he did, it was only for a very good reason.

He barely slowed as he strode the ornately inlaid foyer and crossed under the massive staircase to open the narrow door that led to the basement. Jonathan tried not to remember the days when the basement suites housed teams of servants. Back then, they all worked for Mama Alexander, who, with her daughter Venice, had qualified for better-ventilated quarters on the mansion’s third floor.

Jonathan thought it curious that the basement suites looked bigger than he remembered, and far less like a dungeon. The hallways were wide to accommodate the various food carts and cleaning apparatus that used to be shuttled from one service elevator to the next, and the sleeping quarters on either side were reminiscent of his dormitory days at William and Mary, twelve feet square with ten foot ceilings. Now these spaces were largely empty, except for a few that were stacked with junk that someone had deemed worth saving.

“Ven?” he called.

“Down here!”

He looked behind him to see Venice step into the hallway and beckon with one hand. In her other, she held a manila file folder. She looked five years older than she did two days ago. Her chocolate-colored skin had a slack, sallow look to it that spoke of too many tears shed over too short a time.

“Is Jeremy in there?” Jonathan asked as he closed the distance, nodding to the room Venice had just left.

She shook her head. “No, he’s in the rectory with Dom.”

“Is he okay?”

“Physically, he seems okay,” Venice said. “Dom had Doctor Hamilton come in to take a look at him.”

Jonathan felt a flare of anger. “I thought I told you-”

“Dom impressed on him the need for secrecy,” Venice said, heading off the exact objection that Jonathan was about to launch. “He’d been drugged, Dig. We had to have him looked at.”

She was right, of course, but at this juncture, the best way to keep Jeremy alive was to let everybody think he was still missing. Whoever had lost track of him the first time wanted him back badly enough to dispatch a team of killers. That kind of desire doesn’t go away just because it gets difficult to do.

“Just make sure that the word is limited to as few people as possible.”

“Does that include Doug Kramer or not?”

“Not just yet,” Jonathan said. “Let’s keep him out of the loop until we don’t have a choice. He’s busy enough handling this firestorm. How’s Mr. Stewart?”

Venice winced and shrugged with one shoulder. “They think he’ll come out of it okay, but they’re worried about his liver and spleen. Apparently the bullet did damage to both, and then when they punched him…” She stopped as her voice broke.

Jonathan didn’t need to hear the rest. The important part was that he’d survive. On a day when few things were going well, he’d take it. “And what about our new friends?”

“Of the two you shot, one is invisible. I can’t find any record at all. He’s like you-he never officially existed.”

Jonathan’s stomach tensed. In this day and age, everybody had a fingerprint on file somewhere-all except those whose fingerprints had been deliberately erased. To do that on every file was not easy. “What about the other one?”

“Sean O’Brian,” Venice said. “We only know that because he was fingerprinted as a child offender twenty years ago. That’s the only print on file, even though his juvie record shows that the judge pushed him to join the Marine Corps, which he did. That’s clearly documented in his criminal file.”

“Let me guess: the Marine Corps has no record.”

Venice nodded. “Databases never heard of him.”

Jonathan folded his arms and leaned against the wall. “So they were government agents,” he thought aloud. “Or civilian contractors working for them. That fits with what Jimmy Henry told us, too.” He briefly recapped the prisoner’s version of his role in the kidnapping.

“Why would the government be involved in an assault on a school?” Venice asked.

“Clearly, they wanted those boys.”

“But they’re only children. What could they have done to deserve this?”

Jonathan suspected that they hadn’t done anything-at least not knowingly. There are only so many reasons to kidnap someone. When governments get involved, the list boils down to three: to extort information; to ensure silence; or to leverage cooperation. He chose not to mention any of the options to Venice.

Instead, he said, “I need any and all information you can find on the shooters and on the children. Those boys have something in common-a shared secret-and we need to know what it is.” He paused for a breath and a change in topic. “What about the hippie?”

Venice pointed toward the closest room. “He’s in there,” she said. “He’s not talking, though. His name is Harvey Rodriguez. Born in Venezuela, moved to the States when he was fifteen. He’s a child molester.”

Jonathan recoiled.

Venice handed him the file. “It’s all right here. In fact, there’s a lot in there. You should give it a read before you talk to him.”

He took the folder, but held Venice’s gaze for a couple of seconds before he opened it. Was there anyone left on the planet who just wanted to let kids grow up normally?

“Don’t tell Boxers about this,” Jonathan said, hoisting the file. “He’ll kill him.”

“And that would be bad because…?” She headed for the stairs.

It took Jonathan only a few minutes to absorb the basics of Harvey Rodriguez’s file. When he was done, he opened the door and entered.

Despite the availability of a chair and a desk, Harvey stood in the corner, his back to the wall and his arms folded across his chest. An empty plastic water bottle lay on its side on the desk next to a full one. “You have no right to hold me here,” he said in a rush as soon as Jonathan crossed the threshold. It was as if he’d been rehearsing the line and needed to say it quickly before he lost his nerve. “You’re not a cop. You can’t make me stay.”

Jonathan cocked his head, then shrugged. “Leave,” he said, stepping aside and clearing the way.

Harvey’s eyes narrowed. “You’re serious?”

“As a heart attack. As far as I’m concerned, we’re protecting you, not imprisoning you. You want to leave, leave. The easier a target you are on the street, the less I have to worry about you bringing trouble here.”

Harvey hesitated.

“Seriously,” Jonathan said. “Go.”

The hippie’s eyes darted, as if looking for the scam. Then they grew wide as the reality dawned on him. “People are going to try to kill me if I leave,” he said.