DeSantos looked at Archer. “Well?”
Archer’s jaw moved furiously as he chomped on his piece of Juicy Fruit and considered DeSantos’s question. “I think it’s really sad. I mean, it’s like losing a brother. Knox has been with us since—”
“I mean about Scarponi.”
“Oh.” Archer sighed. “I think the guy’s out of his mind if he thinks he can threaten the director and not have serious heat come down on him.”
“Maybe he doesn’t care. Maybe he is out of his mind. Or maybe he feels like he doesn’t have anything to lose.”
Archer shook his head. “Knox is still keeping something from us. I’m not sure what, though. You?”
DeSantos nodded. “Yeah. It’s not all adding up.” He stuck his hand into his pocket and felt a piece of paper Knox had palmed him when they shook. “With these INFOSEC pass codes he gave us, we’ve got access to just about any U.S. intelligence network we could want. I say we get started.”
Archer turned and they began to walk back to their car. “I think we have to look at it one of two ways. Either there’s nothing to be found, or he’s purposely making us work for our information.”
DeSantos chewed his bottom lip. “Something else is going on. For whatever reason, Knox isn’t making it easy.”
Just then, Archer’s phone vibrated. “Man, I hate putting these things on vibrate. Scare the shit out of me every time.” He pulled it off his belt and checked the number.
“Maggie loves mine. She clips it to the front of her pants and then calls herself.”
“You guys are the kinkiest couple I’ve ever known.”
DeSantos pulled down on the bill of his baseball hat to prevent the increasing rain from blowing in his face, then nodded at Archer’s phone. “What’s up?”
“Trish was having some cramping this morning. She wants me to meet her at the OB’s office. That was my reminder.”
“When you’re married, that phone becomes a ball and chain, man.”
Archer smiled. “For you, that must mean a hell of a good time in bed.”
19
Lauren was singing James Taylor, moving with a twirl or a skip from drawer to drawer while gathering her clothing: “all you’ve got to do is call, and I’ll be there, yeah, yeah, yeah…” She tossed a pair of jeans into her suitcase as if she were slam-dunking a basketball.
Lauren kept checking the time. Three and a half hours till we leave. Then, three hours and twenty-five minutes. Three hours twenty minutes. She couldn’t help watching the clock — she was finally going to see Michael again. She could feel it.
Her carry-on almost completely packed, she set it near the door. Bradley had left to get them some breakfast at McDonald’s while Lauren finished gathering her things. The item she really wanted to carry on with her was her daddy’s handgun, but Bradley had told her it would have to be unloaded, locked in a gun box and checked through.
She had just zipped her flight bag when she heard the knock on her back door. “Just a minute, Nick,” she called out. She bounded into the kitchen and grabbed the handles on her bag.
“All you got to do is call, and I’ll be there, oh yes I will,” Lauren sang as she made her way to the door. But her throat tightened the second she opened it and saw a man with panty hose stretched across his face. The scream was there, but it was caught somewhere in her constricted throat and never made it out of her mouth. She reached for the gold-plated key around her neck and backed away, wishing her gun were within reach. Daddy. Intruders. She was frozen, consumed by the memory, as the man grabbed her by the arms.
“I hope you liked the flowered sheets,” he said in a deep, cold voice.
Lauren bolted upright. She was still dream-drunk, her heart pounding from the horrible nightmare. The noise she had heard was a thump, nothing loud, more like a muted thud, as if someone had dropped a sack of potatoes on the carpet. She sighed relief that it was only a dream, thankful something had awoken her. The LED clock on Michael’s night table across the bed glowed 2:47 A. M.
Lauren reached for the small switch on the lamp and gave the dial a flick with her finger. But the room remained dark.
A foul-smelling cloth was suddenly shoved up against her nose and mouth. Lauren wind milled her arms, grabbing on to something or someone — an arm or a leg. She felt a painful pinprick in her thigh, then her strength began melting away.
“Nick,” she struggled to shout. But as she lost consciousness, she wasn’t sure if she had actually yelled it aloud, or if it had been a benign utterance in her mind.
Everything was black.
Now, as she was slowly gaining some form of groggy consciousness, she tried to gain her bearings. A minute passed before she became somewhat aware of her surroundings. She appeared to be lying in a car, blindfolded, her shoes removed. Hands and ankles bound. Goose bumps had risen all over her body and she was shaking. It was freezing, and she had a pounding headache.
As Lauren lay there, the blackness of her world descended on her. Amid a stale humidity inside the vehicle, a clamping pressure tightened her chest. Her throat was closing down on her and her heart rate was increasing.
Lauren forced herself to relax. She knew she mustn’t succumb to the fear, to the negative thinking that could plunge her into a panic attack so severe that it would render her completely helpless.
She felt the vehicle rocking from side to side due to rough terrain, movement she recognized from the time she and Michael had taken their neighbor’s four-by-four to the back roads in Tahoe. It was part of her therapy at the time, an attempt to take her out of her “safe places”—home and work — and help her confront her fears: unknown, open spaces. She remembered that weekend well; it was the first time she had been out of Placerville since she had stopped her antidepressants.
As the car jolted hard to one side, she used the momentum to help push herself up with her elbow into an erect posture. It didn’t help much other than to give her some sense of control over her body. But sitting there, she became aware of the feel of the seat, the way her knees were bent and the bounce of the ride. It felt as if she was inside some kind of pickup or sport utility vehicle.
Suddenly, the truck lurched to a stop. The gearshift slid into PARK and the engine cut off. The front door slammed, and the rear door to her left — no, the right — opened as she felt a rush of cold air snake around her bare feet.
“Let’s go.” The voice was male, deep and matter-of-fact.
“Who are you?” Lauren’s speech was still somewhat slurred from the drugs she had been injected with. “What do you want from me?”
Her abductor did not answer. Instead, he yanked her out of the rear seat with rough, calloused hands. She fell from the vehicle, a distance that confirmed her impression that it was an SUV of some kind. But the fresh air felt good. No walls, no confining spaces.
The man pulled her up and fastened what felt like a collar around her neck. He pulled her along, leading her like a dog, across freezing, crunching ground cover. Snow.
The duct tape binding her ankles made it impossible for her to walk. She had to hop awkwardly, her bare feet slipping on the sharp, icy snow. Several times she went down — and each time she fell, he yanked on the collar until she righted herself, only to stumble and fall again.
“It’s hard to breathe,” she gasped, her voice as raspy as sandpaper. “You’re choking me.”
After traversing what seemed like thirty or forty feet, she was pushed up onto what felt like steps and into a cold, damp enclosure. When her feet thumped against the dry wooden flooring of the interior, she realized how wet and numb they were.