'Nice resolution,' Darby said.
'Cameras are using a 24 para-digital lens,' Trent said. 'We can rotate them 360 degrees, and we got infrared capabilities in case — '
A phone rang.
Trent scooped up a pair of headphones from his desk. Lee calmly picked up a pair with an attached mike as he swivelled around in his chair and faced the monitor set up on the desk.
'Hello, Charlie,' Lee said brightly, as if he were speaking to a personal friend. 'Dr McCormick just arrived. She's here with me right now. Would you like to speak to her?'
Darby couldn't hear Charlie's response, but she could read the words filling the screen. Voice-recognition software had converted his speech to text:
'I want to speak to her inside the house. Alone.'
Lee glanced up at Darby. She nodded.
'Okay, Charlie,' Lee said. 'Dr McCormick has agreed to come inside and meet with you. Alone. I delivered on my promise; now you need to deliver on yours. Release your family.'
Charlie's response appeared on the screen:
'She needs to see them first.'
Lee's brow creased in thought, but he didn't seem rattled or concerned.
'You gave me your word,' the hostage negotiator said, his tone sounding neither confrontational nor impatient. 'You need to show the police that you're willing to cooperate — that you have no intention of harming your family.'
Charlie responded: 'I told you I won't harm them. I gave you my word on that.'
'I know you're agitated,' Lee said. 'And I sympathize with your frustration at having to wait for Dr McCormick to arrive. But she had to come all the way from Boston. We ordered a private helicopter to get her up here as quickly as possible. I delivered on my promise, and now you have to deliver on yours. You don't want me to look bad in front of my boss, do you?'
Lee spoke in a relaxed way, his tone amazingly empathetic, as though he was connecting with a long-lost relative.
'I need Dr McCormick to bear witness,' Charlie responded.
Lee said, 'To what?'
No response.
Darby glanced to the screen holding the heat signatures. The man pretending to be Charlie Rizzo appeared to be holding something against the ear of one of the hostages. A phone? A gun?
She sidled up to Trent and whispered, 'What's he saying?'
'Don't know,' he said, keeping his voice low. 'We didn't install a mike in the house. I was going to have one of my men install a parabolic while you were in there talking to him so we — '
'Keep your men back until I give the order.' She moved back to Lee, reading the words scrolling across the computer screen.
'Please,' Charlie responded. 'We're running out of time.'
'That's the fifth time you've mention that,' Lee said. 'Please tell me what you mean so I can help you, Charlie. Everyone here wants to help you through this. We don't — '
Lee stopped talking to listen to Charlie.
Darby watched the computer screen. 'I'll tell her. Dr McCormick. Alone,' Charlie had responded. 'Have her go through the front door. No escorts, no tricks. And remember to park the bulletproof van or car or whatever it is you brought — I want it waiting for me near the front of the house. After Dr McCormick has heard what I have to say, she'll arrest me and bring me out. You have my word on that. Do what I ask, and I'll release everyone as promised. But if you don't do what I ask — if you try to trick me — then I'll kill my family and then myself. I can't survive the wheel again.'
'Tell me about the whee-'
CALL TERMINATED flashed across the screen.
Lee took off the headphones.
'What's the wheel?' Darby asked.
'I don't know,' Lee said. 'You?'
She shook her head.
Lee rubbed the bridge of his nose. 'Charlie has placed a call to me every five minutes inquiring about your arrival. Each time his voice has vacillated between agitation and panic. When I was on the phone with him just now and confirmed that you were, in fact, here, he sounded relieved, even… well, hopeful.'
'Has he given you any indication as to why he asked for me?'
'No. I've asked, and each time he's refused to answer — and he stubbornly refuses to talk about the person he shot and dumped in front of the house. Any time I broach either subject, his voice changes. I can tell you this much: he's afraid.'
'Do you think he's suffering from a schizophrenic disorder?'
'That was my original thought, but he's not showing any signs beyond his delusion that he's really Charles Rizzo. His speech is coherent. He doesn't stop midsentence and start jumbling together meaningless words. His thoughts are organized and he can follow a conversation.'
That didn't mean he wasn't schizophrenic. There were varying degrees, varying symptoms. She wouldn't know until she spent time with him.
Lee said, 'Do you know the first rule of hostage negotiation?'
'Form a bond.'
'Yes. That's your primary goal. Always remember that. When you go in there, let him think he's Charles Rizzo. Don't fight him on it. Listen to his grievances. If he believes you really do care about his pain, cause, whatever, he'll be more receptive to releasing the hostages, which is our goal. Remember to always be working on that bond. We'll be listening in and speaking to you over an earpiece. That's all I have.' Lee glanced to Trent.
'The APC will take you in,' Trent said.
'And SWAT won't move in until I give the order?' Darby said.
'Until you give the order,' Trent repeated. 'You have my word on that. But at the first sign of trouble, I'm ordering my men to breach.'
The APC had built-in ladders on both sides of the back doors to allow a sniper quick access to the roof. She didn't want to ride inside or in the back. She had all of her equipment, and the fresh, cold air was keeping her head clear.
Darby extended one of the ladder's rungs, climbed up and knocked on the side of the APC. The driver looked in his rear-view mirror, saw her standing on the back, then put a hand out of the window and waved.
The engine came to life, rumbling, and the APC started crawling towards the house.
5
Darby mulled over the cryptic conversation she had just heard between the hostage negotiator and the man calling himself Charlie Rizzo. I need Dr McCormick to see them first, Charlie had said. I need her to bear witness.
Bear witness to what? Killing the family? And what the hell did he mean when he said he couldn't survive the wheel again?
Another police blockade had been set up on the far end of the street. She spotted three cruisers, their flashing blue and whites lighting up every inch of the neighbourhood, a place far different from, and light years beyond, the Rizzos' former Brookline address with its multimillion-dollar McMansions and professionally landscaped lawns and gardens, high-end BMWs and Mercedes parked in two- and three-car garages. A real-estate agent would call these three New Hampshire homes — the only ones here on this long stretch of woodlands — either 'cosy' or 'fixer-uppers'. No garages, just driveways with small, dependable economy cars. Living here in the Granite State gave you plenty of land and privacy. The houses were spaced far apart from each other, and each one looked like it had been dropped in the middle of the woods. No streetlights either.
She caught two remote cameras set up on tripods on the front lawn and driveway of a small colonial with white-chipped paint and dark green shutters — the new home of Mark and Judith Rizzo. The windows, at least the ones she could see, were dark, the shades on the top floors drawn, just as Trent had said. Two cars were parked in the driveway: a white Jeep Cherokee and a maroon Honda Civic. She could make out stickers for the 'University of New Hampshire' on both back windows.
Darby glanced to the ranch house across the street. It took her a moment to spot the sniper. He was lying on the flat roof, staring down his target sight. His partner, the spotter, knelt behind a chimney and stared at the Rizzo home through a thermal-imaging scope.