Lisa Black - Takeover

His tone did not convince Patrick, who caught his eye. Mulvaney seemed to nod, and the Homicide detective said nothing. He was in another agency’s house now and would have to trust their judgment in an area of crime that he, Patrick, seldom dealt with. But any surprise Lucas received might prompt him to kill another hostage. He’d shot Paul; choosing Theresa, who had traded herself for Paul, might have an appealing symmetry to the sick son of a bitch. “We wouldn’t do anything to startle the robbers,” Patrick said, speaking to Jessica Ludlow’s bent head but looking at Mulvaney.

“We won’t,” the security chief confirmed.

“That’s all I can fit.” The blond woman struggled with the bag’s zipper. “How much is it? I lost count.”

The guard who had helped her said, “Eight hundred forty thousand.”

“Seven minutes,” the other one reported.

The young woman hefted the backpack with a grimace. Patrick thought for a moment that he could smell her fear, a sharp, sweaty odor. “That might not be enough,” she worried. “I’m sure he said a million.”

“It’s all you can fit in that bag,” Mulvaney pointed out.

Jessica slung one strap over her shoulder and weaved through the cubicles, making for the elevator like a student late for class. The men had to trot to keep up with her.

The elevator doors stood open; this apparently confused her, because she stopped and did not go in.

“We shut it off,” Mulvaney explained, reaching in and flicking a red switch before holding the doors for her. “So you wouldn’t have to wait for it.”

Then she moved inside quickly and stood at the front, as if trying to bar them from entering. “You can’t come with me. He said I had better come back alone.”

“I know,” the security chief said. “And I’m sorry. We’d rather do anything in the world than have to send you back there, Mrs. Ludlow. You’re a brave woman.”

She pushed the “L” button. “He has my baby.”

The doors began to slide shut. Patrick’s stomach seemed to shrink; it went against a cop’s grain to let an unarmed civilian walk into a criminal’s power, it battled with every instinct he had. But he could not see a solution.

With five inches to go, her palm slammed against the moving door. She spoke to Patrick, as if answering one of his earlier questions. “One thing. It was after they shot that guy in the blazer, the one that new lady asked them to let go. Lucas said to the other guy, ‘If the cops come in after us, we have to kill them all.’ But he nodded his head at us as he said it. He didn’t mean you cops, he meant he’d have to kill us. The hostages.”

The doors slid shut.

Before he left, Patrick asked the Fed security chief about the money packs. “There’s really nothing in there?”

“Nothing this scumbag is going to figure out.”

“If he does, who do you think he’s going to pick for his next example? He’s already shot one cop-why not one of yours? Or our scientist?”

Mulvaney held the door to the stairwell for him, possibly implying that Patrick shouldn’t let it hit him in the butt on the way out. “It’s not in the money. You have to keep this to yourself, and I mean it-the employees here don’t even know about it, for obvious reasons. There’s a metallic tracer in the bands, but all it will do is show up at the metal detector by the doors. I wasn’t lying-a robber, under normal circumstances, would never make it to that vault, so there aren’t any standard security devices there. The bands are meant to catch thieves who work here and decide to cut out early one day and head to Aruba. Last time that happened was 1963.”

“So Lucas won’t notice-”

“He might hear a beep when they go out the doors, but since the guy’s carrying a damn M4 carbine, I don’t think it’s going to worry him much. Unfortunately, it’s not going to help us at all either.”

“Mmm.” Patrick checked Theresa’s status on the security unit’s monitors but grew frustrated with the lousy audio quality. At least in the library he could hear the phone conversations. He hurried back up Rockwell, hoping nothing had happened to Theresa in his absence. Not that he could do a bloody thing about it anyway.

12:46 P.M.

Six stories down, Theresa remained occupied with the squirming child on her lap.

Two-year-old Ethan pushed at her, trying to get away from this stranger, and hit her with the stuffed Cleveland Browns dog. She gave him a bit of space but wouldn’t let go. His screams pierced her eardrums.

“Told you so,” she said to Lucas.

“Don’t hassle me, ma’am. You should be able to handle kids- you’ve got your own.”

He must have overheard her conversation with Rachael. “Just one, and it’s been a long time since she was two.”

Lucas glanced at his watch. “Hang in there. His mama’s only got seven minutes left. And how’d you know he was two?”

Her lungs seemed to seize up, and she covered herself by getting a firmer grip on the writhing boy and turning him to face outward. “He’s pretty solid for his size. And he’s definitely got all his teeth, since he just bit me with them.”

Lucas watched her with a cool, shark-eyed stare, but said only, “Don’t bite, Ethan. It’s a nasty habit.”

The boy quieted, distracted by the sweeping room and the mysterious man in front of him. He straddled Theresa’s thigh, with one of her arms firmly around his waist. “Bo,” he said, suddenly and clearly, shaking the stuffed animal. “Bo.”

“That don’t concern me,” Lucas answered, his eyes on Theresa still. “What concerns me is your mama has five minutes and twenty seconds left.”

“I still don’t see how you expect a young girl to find and then break into a small vault, or whatever the heck is up there,” Theresa said.

“You’d be amazed what people can do when they have the proper incentive.”

“You’ve got some money, you have your car. You could leave now and come out way ahead.” Theresa wished she could have read Cavanaugh’s book before getting herself into this. Whatever she said might agitate him, spur him on. On the other hand, she couldn’t sit idly by while he shot a two-year-old.

“You think so, do you?”

“I’m probably going to get fired for giving you that car, if not thrown in jail. I’d hate to have it be for nothing.”

“Yeah, what about that?” He crouched in front of her, putting them at the same eye level, submachine gun across his knees. The sudden advance startled her. “You did that because you love that cop?”

“You’re not watching the street. They might come for your car.”

“The marble behind you, Theresa, is as smooth as a mirror. I can see any movement outside. Cops are many things, but invisible is not one of them. Now, did you come here because you’re in love with that cop?”

Love. Something she had almost convinced herself didn’t exist until one night when Paul suddenly put his arms around her, outside a ring of crime-scene tape in the Metroparks after everyone else had left. He hadn’t asked her to dinner or a movie or out for drinks, knowing that her defense system would rise if forewarned. He simply stepped inside the castle walls before she had time to lower the gate.

She swallowed. “Yes.” “Crazy, the things people do for love.” She couldn’t speak around the lump in her throat. “Bo,” the child insisted. “Is that what you’re robbing this place for?” Theresa asked him.

“Love?”

“You trying to analyze me, Theresa? Figure me out? Or just distract me from the fact that Ethan’s mom has twenty-seven seconds remaining?”

“I’d like to know why my fiancé is bleeding to death and why my daughter may have to grow into adulthood without a mother.”