Jason Pinter - The Stolen

Then Ray heard something odd. Footsteps coming back his way. But they weren't the loud thump-thump of the guards', they were the soft, muffled steps of the prisoners. Then Ray heard a man yelling, and damned if it wasn't

Officer Shithead himself.

"You assholes get back here, right now!"

The 5 Company prisoners didn't go back to roll call.

Instead they walked right back to their cells and sat down.

Possum, a big black man from Alabama, said, "Fuck you.

You gonna take one man, you gonna take all the men."

Possum was talking about Ray.

Soon Officer Shithead was marching down the cell block, nightstick unsheathed.

Officer Shithead didn't live another minute.

After they'd beat him to death with his own baton,

Ray's brothers in 5 Company managed to get his cell open.

Several minutes later, a guard heard a commotion down

A Tunnel, went to see what the hell was taking 5 Company so long, and that's when the devil unleashed hell.

Ray survived the riots with his life, his sanity, and just one small scar on his cheek obtained on September 13 when the cops finally opened fire. A glass pane shattered, carving out a chunk of Ray's face. William "Billy Buds"

Moss, a surgeon in lockup for raping a patient, stitched it together with a spool and tweezers stolen from the nurse's office, moments before it went up in flames.

Raymond Benjamin would be ejected from the penal system two years later. Thirty-nine people died in those riots. Most of them were buried. Officer Shithead, Ray later learned, had been burned beyond recognition. There was barely enough of him left to bury.

Leaving Attica, Ray Benjamin was a changed man. Not so much in deeds. He was still prone to violence, still had the temper of a pissed-off Viking, but now he had a cause.

Not to mention a massive nicotine addiction. He told friends that after all the pain cigarettes had caused him in prison, he might as well get a little pleasure out of them.

Several times a month Ray would wake up at night, remembering that morning sitting in his cell, praying for forgiveness. Waiting for a death that, with mercy, decided to pass him over. He never forgot that. Never took it for granted. And every act of violence, everything he did that

"society" wouldn't approve of, was going toward making things right. It didn't matter if people couldn't understand it. He knew it was right.

The Reeds were part of that plan. They were doing the right thing.

But now they were gone, and Ray Benjamin felt concern for the first time in a long time. If the Reeds lost their will, they could give up everything. Ray would go down. So would the big man. And everything Ray had worked for over the past thirty years would be lost.

Ray thought about the Reeds. Where could they have gone? And why would they suddenly decide to disobey such simple fucking directions?

They weren't at the motel. Elaine wasn't picking up her cell phone. He'd given them the address, a newly cloned phone, and now he couldn't find them. It was like they'd looked him in the eye and lied to him.

"This isn't good," he said to Vince. "The Reeds have disappeared."

Vince snorted a laugh, managed to keep the toothpick in his mouth. "Ain't that ironic."

Ray looked at him, then said fuck it. He couldn't help himself.

He slapped Vince across the face, the toothpick doing a little spiral before landing in a puddle of sludge several feet away. That made Ray smile.

When Vince recovered, he was holding his jaw, a thin trickle of blood at the corner of his mouth.

"Ow, man, what the fuck?"

"Couldn't take that stupid toothpick anymore."

"Christ, you could have asked me to throw it out!"

"Consider this an apology. Come on, let's go."

They got into the car, Ray shaking his head as Vince started the engine.

"What is it?" Vince said, mopping up his lip with a handkerchief.

"The Reeds," he said. "I don't trust them anymore.

They don't realize this thing is bigger than them. They're being selfish, not realizing they're putting years of work at risk. I thought they could be trusted, that they had their family's best interests in mind. I guess I was wrong."

"What are you saying, boss?" Vince asked.

"I think when we find them, we need to make them gone."

"Gone like the kids? Or, like, gone gone?"

Ray looked at him, didn't say a word. Vince nodded solemnly. Ray patted the kid on the back. That was his answer right there. Then they drove away.

"According to DMV records," Curt said, "the Reeds drive a 2002 silver Ford Windstar, license plate JV5 L16.

I don't think it'll come as a huge surprise to anyone that their current address is listed as 482 Huntley Terrace."

We were still at the 19th Precinct, corralled in a conference room on the second floor. Curt had already had to shoo away three other officers who tried to reclaim the room. When they couldn't offer concrete reasons for needing the space-the excuses ranged from "It has the only good coffee machine in the building" to "Fuck your mother"-I quickly figured out the cops simply didn't want us there. And that was fine with me. The more roadblocks were put up in our effort to find out the circumstances surrounding these kidnappings and Petrovsky's murder, the more insolent I became. Though I didn't think

Curt would go so far as to have my back if I lost control and tried to pick a fight. And I was getting pretty damn close to that.

Amanda said, "So at least we have direct legal proof that ties the Reed family to this guy Benjamin. But we still don't know why the hell they have anything to do with a criminal."

Jason Pinter

"What if," I said, "the Reeds weren't linked directly to Benjamin?"

"Not sure I follow," Curt said.

"We're forgetting about Petrovsky. He knew Daniel

Linwood and Michelle Oliveira. His career was based around children. Bob and Elaine Reed have one son,

Patrick, and we suspect they might have kidnapped another child, too."

"I'm still waiting for the search on that," Curt said.

"I'm hoping you're wrong."

"Anyway, isn't it possible that somehow the Reeds became linked to Benjamin through Petrovsky?"

"Like some sort of middleman?" Amanda asked.

"Exactly. I'm willing to bet Petrovsky knew Benjamin, and Petrovsky knew the Reeds, as well. Amanda, is there any way you could get information about Patrick Reed? I have a feeling we might see Dmitri Petrovsky's signature on his delivery forms as well."

"I'm on it," Amanda said. She gathered up her coat and purse and stood up. "Good luck, guys." She spent an extra moment looking at me, then she left.

Curt waited until the door had closed, then he said, "So what's going on with you two?"

"Nothing," I said. "Absolutely nothing."

"You sound like you're as happy with that situation as

I am with my mortgage."

"Just don't know what to do. I broke up with her, but not a day goes by I don't regret it. In my mind I can erase that mistake, but expecting her to… I wouldn't expect that."

"You think maybe part of the reason you're working this story so hard is to be close to her?"

"I don't know."

"That's not a no."

"No, it's not."

"Part of me don't feel right letting her do some of the dirty work on this. I mean, look at you, man. Seems like every few months you get beat up. You really want her that close to you?"

"That's why I broke it off in the first place," I said. "I took the decision out of her hands. But she's been with me every step of the way on this. Relationship or not, she wants to be here. And it's not my place to tell her not to."

"That's a selfish way to look at the world, especially if she might be in danger."

"I'd kill myself if anything happened to her, Curt," I said. "But she's a hell of a strong woman, and I know that anything I can take, she can, too. Probably more so. She works with kids every day, and she's seen some of the most terrible cases of abuse you can imagine. She doesn't talk about it much, because, well, who wants to bring that kind of work home with her? But don't be fooled into thinking she's in this for me, or for the adrenaline. This is a cause for her. And I respect that."