James Grippando - The Abduction

He watched his speedometer, staying just below the limit. His heart pounded as he rechecked the rearview mirror. The squad car was gaining steadily, though it was traveling too slowly to be in pursuit. No siren, no emergency flashers. No need to panic.

Not yet.

He slowed the car as they neared the intersection, praying the red light would change. It flashed green. He accelerated through a six-lane cross street. The squad car pulled even in the left lane. Repo reached for his gun.

“Don’t!” Kristen shrieked.

He let his hand slide past the pistol and into his lap. The squad car was passing, pulling away. Repo sighed. “Looks like we may have lucked out.”

He glanced in the mirror. Three cars back was a white sedan, possibly an unmarked police car. “Then again, maybe not.”

In fifteen minutes, Harley was cruising in a Jay-hawk helicopter above the old neighborhoods near Vanderbilt University. The orange setting sun hovered before him, its sharp glare cut by the tinted Plexiglas bubble. Below, a tangle of commercial and residential streets fed into increasingly residential areas as the chopper sped away from downtown Nashville. The rolling landscape had a bemusing schizophrenia, a contrast of wintry bare trees and lush green lawns that had been raked of fallen leaves.

Harley’s conference call with his unit chief and both the special agent in charge and the assistant special agent in charge of the Critical Incident Response Group had taken only minutes. Kristen’s hometown of Nashville was one of a handful of cities in which a squad from the FBI’s elite Hostage Rescue Team was on ready-alert. The decision to deploy them was quick and unanimous.

From his copilot seat in the cockpit, Harley glanced over his shoulder at five specially trained HRT members in the compartment behind him. All were dressed in full SWAT regalia with Kevlar helmets and flak jackets. Four were armed with fully automated M-16 rifles. The fifth, a sniper, touted a 308 sniper rifle. Harley’s gaze drifted back toward the setting sun, which was now little more than a half circle on the horizon. He spoke into the microphone attached to his flight helmet.

“Not much daylight left,” said Harley.

“We have night vision,” came the team leader’s reply.

Harley drew a deep breath. He knew the FBI was prepared, but he was more concerned about what a panicked kidnapper might do in the darkness when the bullets started flying.

He turned off the intercom on his headset and switched to cellular capability. He’d already told Allison about the successful tracing, and she’d insisted on being kept apprised of further developments. He connected his phone and dialed her emergency number.

“Allison, it’s Harley. We’ve got a possible positive ID on a suspect.”

She was backstage at a rally. She pressed the phone to one ear and plugged the other with a finger, blocking out a long-winded introduction by a Florida congressman on stage. “Already? How?”

“We narrowed the trace on the cellular phone to less than a square mile. Our voice analyst identified the disguised voice as that of a white male, so we issued a be-on-the-lookout broadcast on police radio for any white male traveling in the area with a young black female.”

“And you got a hit?”

“A Davidson County deputy sheriff responded. Says he saw a white male with a black female in a sedan headed west out of downtown Nashville. He gave silent chase for about six miles to a private residence.”

“Whose residence?”

“Not clear yet. It’s leased. We can’t reach the landlord, so we’re not sure who the tenants are. I’m headed there now.”

The helicopter dipped to the right in its initial descent. The open green space of Centennial Park came into view. Harley noticed the makeshift heliport and staging area near the imposing Parthenon, a to-scale remake of the ancient Greek ruin.

“We’re landing,” said Harley. “I have to hang up and clear the airwaves.”

“Call me when you get down. Make whatever contact as a negotiator that’s appropriate, but I want to be fully briefed before any paramilitary offensive is launched.”

“Roger,” he said, then switched off the phone.

The helicopter hovered over the park. Gusts from its whirling blade stripped nearby trees of the last vestiges of autumn color. The final fifty feet were slow and straight down, until the runners settled in the grass less than thirty yards from the stone Parthenon. Five HRT squad members quickly unbuckled their seat straps, pushed open the door, and jumped to the ground. Harley sprinted with them to the unmarked van waiting in the parking lot. He took the front passenger seat. An agent was behind the wheel with the motor running.

“Let’s go!” Harley shouted.

The van shot from the lot, speeding down West End Avenue until they passed beneath the interstate. After a few quick turns through quiet side streets, they came to an abrupt stop in a parking lot atop the hill. A recreational vehicle was parked at one end. A large antenna protruded from the roof. Loaded with high-tech equipment, the RV would serve as the FBI’s on-site command center. Three other vans loaded with FBI SWAT from the field offices were unloading simultaneously. Another van marked DAVIDSON COUNTY SHERIFF squealed into the parking lot, nearly flattening Harley. A SWAT team jumped out, led by the county sheriff. He had the neck of an Olympic wrestler and the mustache of a walrus, an imposing man in a Paul Bunyan sort of way-neither fat nor muscular, just large.

Harley hurried toward him. “Evening, Sheriff. I’m Harley Abrams, FBI.”

The sheriff shook his hand firmly-too firmly, as if showing off his strength. “Thanks for coming, boys. Good to have the backup.”

Wonderful, thought Harley. A turf war. “We’re not here as backup, Sheriff. This is what we do.”

“It’s what we do, too. Got a SWAT team of our own.”

“Doesn’t everybody? Pretty soon the Neighborhood Crime Watch is gonna get one.”

His eyes narrowed, shooting daggers at the FBI. “We know what we’re doing, and we have every reason to be here. It was my deputy who spotted the suspect.”

Harley nodded, shifting to a more conciliatory tone. “That’s true. And that was good work. I’d like to talk to him. How positive is he on the ID?”

“Not a hundred percent, but it looks very good. He spotted the vehicle well within the area you described in the broadcast. Never once lost sight of it.”

“Any chance the suspect knew he was being followed?”

The sheriff made a face. “We’re talking about one of my most experienced deputies here. Never turned on his lights or siren, nothing to cause alarm. Pretty heads-up on his part. We still have the element of surprise.”

Harley sighed, as if wary of surprises. “Sheriff, you and your men can be of greatest assistance by helping us seal off the neighborhood at both ends of the street. I’ll position our snipers on rooftops across the street and behind the house. If anybody is going into the house, it will be my squad from the Hostage Rescue Team. But first, we’re bringing in floodlights and a loudspeaker. We’ll give a verbal warning, try to start a dialogue. I want to do everything possible to reach a peaceful solution.”

The sheriff shook his head, grumbling as he placed his hands on his hips. “Well, damn it. That means we lose the element of surprise.”

“I’d rather lose that than lose the girl. Let’s be a little patient. And in the meantime, let’s be damn sure nobody gets trigger happy. Got it?”

The sheriff shot him a cold glare, not so much as blinking. “Got it,” he muttered.

Kristen sat on the bare hardwood floor with her knees up and her back against the wall. Repo sat on the floor in the corner, near the window with no drapes. The empty living room was dark, but there was nothing to see anyway. No pictures on the walls. No rugs or furniture. They’d tried to turn on a light, but the power had been cut off. The house was growing colder as night settled in.