Lisa Black: Takeover

“Unless they take a hostage with them.” Jason spoke up. He seemed to be hunting for an outlet. “Then the situation would get even worse. Here, you’ll be able to see for yourself.”

Theresa shuddered, suffering from a mental picture of Paul moving forward, a gun at his spine, serving as a human buffer between the robbers and the snipers. Suddenly, waiting and letting the hostage takers calm down seemed to be a good idea.

She watched Jason set a small box in the window seat between two paintings, one of Clio, the muse of history, and the other depicting a winged figure with a book. A thin wire connected the box to both the monitor and a laptop on the reading table.

“Thanks for the use of your monitor, Ms. Elliott,” the young man said. “We have three, but they’re all built into our un-air-con-ditioned van.”

“Can you see something?” Theresa moved around the table.

“In a minute.” Jason tapped the laptop’s keys, and the screen flicked through a number of windows before a black-and-white montage of four pictures popped up. Theresa gasped.

She saw Paul immediately, in the lower left-hand corner. That camera-labeled “West”-faced the center of the east side of the lobby. A gap there led to a hallway and elevator banks behind a marble reception desk. In front of the desk sat seven people. Paul, in his gray blazer, sat second from the end, between a young woman and that older black man. The picture was small but clear, and he was alive. Definitely alive.

“He’s all right,” Frank said in a low but firm tone, passing her a handkerchief.

She realized that the water on her cheeks did not come from sweat, and she dabbed at it as unobtrusively as she could. She did not take her gaze from the monitor.

With a glance she took in the view from the other three cameras. The east camera faced the entrance from East Sixth Street with its revolving door flanked by inner and outer sets of glass panel doors. The north camera showed the south half of the lobby, with teller cages facing one another along the east and west inner walls. The south camera showed the educational center on each side of the north half and a single door at the end.

The two men with guns were also visible. One-the taller one-paced in front of the hostages, and the other stayed farther down the south end, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. From there he could not be seen by snipers or hit by an assault force, coming from either the Sixth Street entrance or the employee lobby. But he could stay close enough to shoot the hostages. He wouldn’t even need to aim.

“Clear picture,” Frank said.

“That’s the beauty of working with such an august institution.” Jason juggled several cords, then ducked under the desk to retrieve one he’d dropped. His voice grew muffled. “No expense is spared. You should see their security center-they have sensors and monitors up the wazoo in that building.”

“Why aren’t we over there, then?” Theresa asked. Anything to get closer to Paul.

Frank had jammed his hands into his pockets hard enough for her to count his knuckles. “We couldn’t see the street from there. If anything happened to the feed, or if they decided to take out the cameras, or if they left the building-we’d be blind. We’re better here.”

“We can’t see anything except that spot right in front of the door! ”

“We can see them if they move into the offices or the Learning Center. Those windows to the street are clear. Plus, CPD is setting up a camera here, six floors down, directly across from the Fed entrance, to fall back on in case they do decide to take out the lobby cameras.”

Please don’t, she thought. If she could at least see him, it wasn’t so bad. Yet she wondered. “Why haven’t they?”

“Shot out the lobby cameras? I don’t know. They’re mounted pretty high… Maybe these guys have enough respect for the marble not to take potshots at it.”

“I doubt it.”

“Or they’re too hopped up to even notice the cameras.”

Paul sat cross-legged on the floor, hands behind his head. His arms must be getting tired, and she guessed that he was feeling frustrated. Really frustrated. She watched the slender guy pass in front of him, each step calm and measured. “I don’t think so. They didn’t have someone to stay with the getaway car and they didn’t have a plan for the cameras. These guys really thought they’d be in and out.”

Jason plugged in his last wire and stood back to admire his handiwork. “Or they’re leaving the cameras in place so that we won’t have a reason to install new ones.”

“How could we do that?”

“Down air vents, ceiling tiles-well, not that ceiling,” Jason amended, in light of the intricately painted and vaulted ceiling. “Around a corner. Letting us see them takes away a big reason for us to approach. Oh, here’s Chris.”

Chris Cavanaugh entered from between two rows of thick reference books, dressed in a sparkling oxford shirt and expensive slacks. He carried nothing but a boyish look and deep dimples, at odds with the receding hairline. And he smiled, actually smiled, which made Theresa itch to grasp his lapels and shake him. Where the hell have you been?

Everyone turned to her.

“Did I say that out loud?” she hissed to Frank.

Cavanaugh’s dimples only deepened. “You did indeed.” In one sweeping glance, he took in Theresa, the Greek gods on the wall above the books, the windows, the communication center spread across the reading table, and the staff office section with its hum of voices, then settled on the monitor. “They’re certainly armed.”

The quiet concern in his tone worried her. Knowing that the hostage takers had guns was one thing; seeing the long black automatic rifles held so tightly in their hands was entirely another.

“Any change since you called?” he asked Jason.

“No.”

Jason performed quick introductions. Cavanaugh acknowledged each of them with a nod and a smile, though his attention always returned to the monitor; when done, he jerked his head toward the muffled tones and asked his assistant, “Is that the dog and pony show?”

“Yep. They’re working out how the FBI is in charge but everyone else’s valuable assistance will be greatly treasured.”

“Good. Then we’ll be up and running before they break for coffee. The stuff looks good. Let’s powwow before we make contact. Please sit, everyone. And I got here as soon as I could,” he added to Theresa. “I had to shower and change.”

She said nothing, well aware that outbursts might get her evicted. At the moment Chris Cavanaugh accepted her presence as a member of law-enforcement personnel. He might not want her around as a distraught family member.

Apparently he took her silence for rebuke and explained, “Negotiations can go on for hours, sometimes days. It’s very important that everyone, including me, be comfortable. We eat, we stay hydrated, we take breaks. You’ll see how it goes.”

This disturbed her even more. What happened to home in time for dinner?

“Sit down,” Frank told her, collecting a straight-backed chair for her. “You look hot.”

She tried, unsuccessfully, not to glare at him and sat. So did Frank, Jason, and, after a brief hesitation, Ms. Elliott.

Cavanaugh, of course, sat at the head. “How’s the perimeter?”

Jason answered him. “SRT has traffic diverted. It doesn’t help that Superior is about the busiest street in Cleveland these days, since so many stores closed on Euclid. We’ve got a lot of whining middle-management types at each roadblock. We’ve corralled the press in front of the library, where the heat might convince most of them to leave. Phone service going into the Fed lobby has been shut off, except for the reception desk, because we’ll use that.”