Jeff Abbott: Trust Me

‘Head out. Say nothing to the attendant.’

Luke backed out of the parking space, drove out of the garage, blinking at the sunlight. Two of the tollbooths were open; it was mid-afternoon, the rush of late-day flights not descending yet.

‘Here’s money for your parking,’ the man said. ‘My treat.’ He stuck a five-dollar bill under Luke’s nose and the money trembled slightly.

He’s scared, too, Luke realized and the thought did not comfort. A panicked man with a gun and a knife was more frightening than an icy calm kidnapper.

Luke closed his fist around the money, powered down the window.

‘Your ticket, sir?’ the attendant asked. He was a big kid, college age, dark hair cut in a burr, a wide friendly smile.

Luke dug into the pocket of his coat and felt the knife nestle into his ribs, where the attendant couldn’t see it. He yanked the ticket from his pocket, handed it to the attendant with the crushed fiver.

The attendant returned his change in ones. ‘You all right, sir?’

Most people would never notice. Luke heard himself say, ‘Airsick. Rough flight.’ He sounded unsteady.

‘Feel better.’ The wooden gate rose and he drove forward.

The bite of the knife went through his shirt and he nearly drove off the road. ‘Do you think I’m stupid, Luke? Do you? Were you trying to make him remember you?’

Luke winced at the sharp pain. The knife withdrew from denting his flesh and he now felt the barest trickle of blood ease along his ribs. ‘No, I didn’t mean anything, I did what you asked…’

‘You just paid for short-term parking but you complain of a rough flight. Flyers don’t park in short-term. You tried to stick in his memory. For when he talks to the police.’

Luke flinched, then put his eyes back to the road. ‘I didn’t know what to say. You cut me… are you crazy?’

‘I’ll make you a deal.’ This was apparently the guy’s favorite phrase. ‘You cause trouble and I’ll cut your stomach open and you can see what your guts look like. Do you understand?’

‘Yes. I understand.’

‘Exit the airport. Head east on Highway 71.’

‘Look, seriously, I didn’t know what to say…’

‘Don’t pretend to be stupid. It will just piss me off.’

Luke turned onto Highway 71, which threaded through the outskirts of Austin and eastward toward Houston. He eased into the traffic. The knife left his side but the gun returned to his ribs.

‘Drive to Houston.’

Three hours away, three hours sitting next to this lunatic. The suggestion unnerved him. What did this guy want? He knew your name. He knew where you parked. ‘Houston… why?’

‘You’ll find out when we get there. You pull over or try and wreck us, or get brave and fight me, you’re dead. You obey me, you get out alive. Now shut the hell up and drive.’

‘You’re crazy, man. Please, just let me go!’ Crazy. The word thudded past all his fear. A guy who looked ordinary, but had a single-minded mission of violence. Luke glanced at him again.

‘I’m not crazy,’ the man said, and Luke saw that he wasn’t. Not a glint of madness in his eyes. He was utterly and completely intent on what he was doing.

Are you one of them, Luke thought? One of the people I drew out of the darkness?

The Night Road, Luke realized, had found him.

Highway 71 curled past the towering lost pines of Bastrop County, crossed over the Colorado River as the waterway snaked south and east toward the Gulf of Mexico. The land was rolling as it slowly flattened into the coastal plain. Traffic was light.

I am being kidnapped. The realization cut through the shock in Luke’s brain. No one would be missing him until tomorrow. Henry said he’d call tomorrow – an eternity, now. No one else would be expecting him or looking for him. Maybe the doorman at his condo, but if he didn’t see Luke, he wouldn’t think much of it. He wasn’t on duty every day. Maybe, Luke thought hysterically, the doorman’ll think I’ve finally gone out to party.

He drove in silence.

Luke ran the options through his mind, trying to calm his nerves. Stopping the car and simply running would get him a bullet in the back. He rejected the idea of crashing the car; if other drivers stopped to help, he’d be putting them in danger. Brawn couldn’t beat a gun. He needed to figure out how he might reason with the guy. But everything he knew about the psychology of violence seemed to evaporate from his brain. He kept thinking about the knife and the gun.

‘Don’t quit your day job to play poker,’ the man said. He had not spoken since ordering Luke toward Houston. Forty minutes of gallows silence.

‘What?’

‘You’re thinking it through. How soon you’ll be missed. How long it will take for someone to realize you’re not where you should be. Plan A is obeying me. You’re trying to hatch Plan B.’

‘I wasn’t.’

‘You live alone in a tower condo in downtown. You’re sort of friendly with your neighbors, but not so much that they’ll notice you’re not around today or tomorrow or even the day after. It’s spring break; you don’t have classes.’

‘You know a lot about me.’ Maybe, Luke thought, because he’s one of the people you went looking for. He played out the times when the Night Road responded to his postings via private messages to his online accounts, engaged him in long conversations about their obsessions and agendas. He’d been most careful not to reveal any real information about himself. But this man had still found him.

‘What do you want from me?’ Luke’s voice was steadier.

‘I just want you to come with me. Play nice and you don’t get hurt.’

Draw him out, Luke thought. Draw him out the same way you would if he was on the other side of the computer monitor. ‘If I understood what you were trying to accomplish…’

‘You don’t.’

‘Have we talked before? Maybe online?’

The man gave a soft laugh. ‘I’m not one of your research projects.’

He definitely knew about the Night Road, then, at the least he knew what Luke was doing for Henry. ‘My stepfather will call me as soon as he lands in New York.’

‘Give me your cell phone.’ The gun’s barrel dug into his ribs.

Luke winced and fished his smartphone out of his jacket pocket. The man took it and tossed it to the car’s floor. He crushed it under the heel of his heavy shoe. ‘Instant peace of mind.’

Luke glanced at the radio. Above it was a button to a locator/monitoring service – one that would call him if the car was in an accident or that he could call if he needed directions or assistance. But he remembered, with a jolt, that he hadn’t bothered to renew the service contract last summer. The monitoring service was useless.

‘If you let me go,’ Luke said, ‘I won’t tell the police. We’ll pretend this didn’t happen. I never saw you.’

‘It can’t work that way.’ The man’s voice went quiet and low, but not calm. ‘I’m sorry for you. But this is going to happen.’

Going to happen. He thought of all the empty side roads that lay between Austin and Houston. The woods. Places a body could be dumped. He made himself stay calm.

‘Doesn’t have to,’ Luke said. ‘We’ll say… You let me out here, by the time I walk to a town you’re already halfway to Houston. I’ve already forgotten what you look like…’

‘No negotiation.’ The man wiped his lip with his finger.

‘Trust me, I don’t need to remember you, I won’t. I am very practical that way.’

‘We’re already past the point of no return.’

‘Wrong. You can always turn back.’ He didn’t want this guy feeling more desperate than he already was. ‘You have a choice.’