She and Adam Koch were reading from the same hymnal.
“Actually, things started to come unglued when Jimmy Martin picked his kids up to take them for ice cream. You just didn’t know it.”
She winced, like she’d been slapped. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Jimmy took his kids out for breakfast the day they disappeared. He was supposed to be stealing copper for you, but he couldn’t pass up the chance to be with his kids. I’ll bet you called him to see if the job was done and he told you he’d get to it later. That’s the way Jimmy did things. When he told you he had his kids, you told him to drop them off with you and pick them up when the job was done. Then, when he got busted, you realized you had a big problem if Jimmy talked, so you went to see him and told him that if he said a word, he’d never see his kids again.”
“No!”
I opened my cell phone and read the text message from Superintendent Fibuch. “Then why did you go see Jimmy at the Farm the day he was arrested and once a week after that?”
“I would never hurt those kids, never! I was going to give them back as soon as I got the money for the guns. I swear I was!”
“But Mendez wouldn’t pay your price, and you decided to hold out, make him sweat.”
“I couldn’t believe it! He wouldn’t pay, and Terry wouldn’t either.”
“People like Terry Walker and Cesar Mendez don’t negotiate like that. When they say take it or leave it, they mean it. It’s easier and cheaper to kill you and steal the guns.”
She wiped her face on her sleeve, forcing a smile.
“But it can still work out. Everything can still be okay. We can tell the police what I told you, that I didn’t know anything about the guns, that it was all Brett and the others.”
“That’s why you put two extra bullets in Terry. You didn’t care that he jilted your grandma fifty years ago. You wanted to make sure he was dead because he was the last one besides me who could tie you to all of this.”
“For God’s sake, Jack. I’ve saved your life twice. You owe me!”
“Not that much. Why would I let you walk away from this?”
She stood, her face grim, her lips peeled back.
“To save Evan and Cara. Back me up, and as soon as the cops say that everything’s cool, I’ll tell you where to find them and you’ll be a hero all over again.”
“And if I don’t?”
“Then no one ever sees those children again. I’ll go to my grave, and their parents will never know what happened to them. You have to choose, Jack. If you want to save those kids, you have to save me first.”
Chapter Seventy-five
“I don’t think so.”
“I’m not bluffing, Jack. I’ve got nothing left to lose.”
I used the cord from a floor lamp and the belts Terry and Brett had been wearing to bind her to a kitchen chair.
“You know what people like you always forget? There’s no such thing as a simple plan. There are too many moving parts and too many things that happen that you never thought could or would. Like you paying the utility bills for this house even though it’s vacant, in foreclosure, and Nick didn’t have the money.”
Her eyes widened. “How could you possibly know that?”
I smiled. “See, that’s what I mean. It never occurred to you that when you left your office unlocked I’d walk in, look at your computer, and find the connection between Nick Staley and Forgotten Homes LLC. And I’ll bet you never thought I would break into your office tonight and steal your mail, but I did. I saw the utility bills addressed to Forgotten Homes and saw that the accounts were current. Nick didn’t have the money, but you did and you paid the bills.”
“The bank demanded that I keep the power on.”
“I believe you,” I said, walking out of the kitchen.
She strained against the belts. “Where are you going?”
I gathered my gun and Terry’s and the Redhawk. “Upstairs to get Evan and Cara.”
She slumped in her chair, defeated. “How did you know?”
“One of the bills was from the cable company. I doubt that the bank made you order Disney movies. At least you let the kids watch TV while they were locked away upstairs. After all, how much fun could they have, especially after you boarded up the windows? Be sure you mention that to the judge before he passes sentence.”
There were two bedrooms upstairs, both of them locked. I knocked on the door at the top of the stairs and heard the same hurried footfalls as when I came in the house.
“Evan and Cara, my name is Jack. Your mom sent me to bring you home. Move away from the door.”
I waited a moment and kicked the door open. They were huddled together on the bed, wearing pajamas, arms around one another. A lamp on a nightstand next to the bed provided the only light. Stuffed animals and other toys were scattered on the floor along with empty McDonald’s bags. A small television sat on a dresser, the screen blank.
“You’re safe now, but I want you to sit tight until the police get here.”
I left them to go back downstairs. I had to call Adrienne Nardelli, Quincy Carter, Lucy, and Joy. I was buzzing with adrenaline, and, for the moment, I wasn’t shaking. I made it to the top of the stairs when I heard a familiar voice.
“Hello, Jack,” Braylon Jennings said. “Walk down slow and easy and keep your hands above your shoulders.”
He was standing in the front hall next to Cesar Mendez, who was aiming a shotgun at me, one of his men from earlier in the evening backing them up. They were too happy to see me, Mendez taking my guns when I reached the bottom stair, emptying them and dropping them on the floor.
Jennings said to Mendez. “Go see what’s upstairs.”
Mendez cocked his head at the other man. “Alvaro,” he said, passing Jennings’s order down the line.
“I told you to go,” Jennings said to Mendez, “not Alvaro.”
Mendez screwed his face tighter than the grip on his shotgun, swallowed, and trotted up the stairs. It was Jennings’s way of reminding Mendez of the pecking order and telling me how wrong I’d been about Jennings.
He was on the Nuestra cartel’s payroll, sent by the home office to find the guns Mendez had promised. He needed Brett Staley to do that, which was why he had made certain Quincy Carter let Brett leave the hospital Sunday night and why he pushed so hard to get Roni released from jail when Brett went off the grid.
I wondered how he found me until my cell phone rang. I’d turned it back on a couple of hours ago, long enough for him to have picked up the signal and tracked me down. It was Joy.
“Give me the phone,” Jennings said.
I threw the phone across the floor, skipping it like a stone on a pond into the room with the duffel bags. Jennings motioned to Alvaro, who retrieved the phone as he launched a roundhouse punch to my gut, folding me in half and forcing me to my knees.
I clenched my jaw, seeing stars, sucking hard to find my breath as he grabbed me by the hair and pressed the barrel of his gun against my temple, the click of the hammer being pulled back echoing in my ear.
“You’re a piece of work, Jennings. How much is Nuestra paying you?”
“A helluva lot more than my pension, and that’s all you need to know.”
“Too many people know that Roni and I are here. You won’t be able to cover your tracks.”
“You’d be surprised what a remodeling fire will do.”
“Look at this,” Mendez said from the top of the stairs, the shotgun resting on his shoulder, aimed behind him and at the ceiling.
Evan and Cara were standing in front of him, quivering, crying silently, Mendez grinning like a wolf that had found his dinner. I knew there would be no negotiations, no keeping them talking while I thought of something
