The Hidden Man

I hit “send” as I sped down the highway. I held the cell phone in front of me, in the event Pete would respond with another text. The text message was optimal from the sender’s perspective because it avoided a conversation. And it was anonymous. It didn’t have to be Pete making the communication. It was just Pete’s phone.

I called the number of the hotel where he was staying, asked for his room, and got nothing but a half-dozen rings and then a voice mail. “Dammit,” I said into the phone. I redialed the hotel and this time asked for any information on Pete Kolarich. The front desk had nothing in the system to indicate that Pete had checked out.

But I knew that he had.

45

I DROVE TO THE HOTEL, with the dawning realization that Pete wouldn’t be there, that I had made a fundamental mistake, that Smith’s goons could have found him any number of ways, including the same way I found Pete’s supplier, J.D.-by triangulating his cell phone calls.

They even had a plausible cover for the abduction. Pete was facing a stiff prison sentence, and the text message made sense on a superficial level. He was running. He couldn’t handle prison. Hell, I’d made it easy for them. Pete had taken a leave from his job and he was hiding in a hotel, having cut off contact with everyone. He had already isolated himself. Nobody would wonder where he was, why he hadn’t shown up for work. Nobody would notice his absence.

I had underestimated Smith. I had miscalculated his desperation. I had backed Smith and his friends into a corner, and now they had my brother. They had taken a step that was irreversible. Until now, they could remain fairly anonymous, working behind the scenes to frame my brother on drug and gun charges. And they could reverse it. The same people who helped frame my brother could recant, or disappear. But abducting Pete? There was no retreating from that.

I’d long suspected that once Sammy’s trial was over, Pete and I would have bull’s-eyes on our chests. Smith and company would come after us. I’d hoped to wrap up everything before then to prevent it from happening.

But now they’d taken the first step down that road. They had my brother, and they’d use him for leverage against me-to drop the motion for DNA testing, to follow their game plan for the trial, to do whatever they wanted-but they’d never let Pete go now.

I left the hotel, having talked the management into letting me look briefly in his room, confirming, by the presence of his suitcase, his toiletries, that Pete had not willingly checked out of the hotel.

My body went cold. I drove in silence back to my office, where I expected to receive the call. I knew Smith would freeze me for a while, let my fear and imagination get the better of me. I turned to the stack of files in the corner of my office, devoted to the investigation into Audrey Cutler from way back when. If there had been any doubt that Smith’s mysterious client had murdered Audrey and those other girls, there wasn’t anymore.

I read through everything I could in the file, forcing out images of Pete and what they might be doing to him. When my intercom buzzed, I jumped from my seated position on the floor, revealing the extent of my nerves.

“Mr. Smith for you on 4407.”

I punched the button and didn’t speak.

“Your brother’s alive,” Smith said. “Whether he stays that way is up to you.”

I didn’t answer.

“Drop that motion. Forget about DNA testing or delays. Use the guy we gave you-Sanders-and stick to the goddamn script.”

I took a deep breath, then another, before answering, the same answer I gave to Father Ben recently. “Or what?” I asked.

“What do you mean, ‘or what?’ You know what.”

“My brother might as well be dead already. You’ll never let him go.”

“You have to trust that we will,” he said. “What’s the alternative?”

I could do this. If there was one thing I learned from my childhood, it was how to act tough when I was scared. This guy had my brother and me by the balls, but I could keep my voice strong, I could play the hard-ass. I had no other choice.

“The alternative is that I make you pay, Smith, starting tomorrow. The judge is going to allow my request for DNA testing. We both know that.”

He paused. I had him thinking.

“Let Pete go right now,” I said, “and I drop that DNA request. It’s your only option.”

“Hey, asshole, I’m the one with the options. You know what I have to do to keep my guys from tearing your brother from limb to limb right now? They want to take a razor blade to the guy.”

I closed my eyes, shutting out the images. I felt like I was spinning out of control, full-throttle panic, just at the time that I had to retain control. My body began to shake uncontrollably. My brother was in their hands, and there was nothing I could do. I wanted to capitulate right there, cry uncle, offer to drop the DNA and go along with whatever they wanted, as long as they let Pete go. But what I had said to Smith was true-they’d never let him go. Not now. My game of poker had backfired.

“They’re telling me, starting tomorrow, it’s one finger a day, every day, until they’re satisfied that you’ve fallen in line. I can’t stop this, Jason. Only you can.”

Time passed, what felt like an hour, though it was only a matter of minutes. We were both silent, save for our labored breathing. I wasn’t the only one who was scared. I could hear it in Smith’s voice. We’d taken this game too far, beyond the point of return. Neither of us was having fun.

“Okay, Smith, this is a one-time-only offer,” I said. “Are you listening?”

I knew that he was. He was a wounded animal, just like me. No matter how much he had me over a barrel, it was clear that I had him by the shorthairs, too.

“My hearing is tomorrow at one P.M. That gives you a short window of time to do as I say. I want signed affidavits from the people who helped pinch Pete on that arrest. I know one of them is his supplier, J.D. I don’t know who the other guy is.”

I did know, of course-it was Marcus Mason, the notorious “Mace.” Joel Lightner had delivered me a rather voluminous file on that gentleman. But I didn’t need to share that with Smith.

“J.D., and the other guy,” I continued. “They will swear in their affidavits that Pete was only there to make a small purchase of powder cocaine. He wasn’t a drug dealer, and he wasn’t a gunrunner. He was in the wrong place at the wrong time. They will deliver those signed affidavits to the detective who arrested Pete, a guy by the name of Denny DePrizio. I think he works a regular day shift, so he shouldn’t be hard to find.”

He didn’t need to know that I had connected DePrizio with him. Maybe he’d figured it out already, but I wasn’t going to tell him. I needed to be as much of a question mark to him as he was to me.

“No chance,” Smith said.

“You have my brother,” I said. “And you’re not letting him go until the trial is over, if ever. You’ve got the leverage on me, Smith. You win. But if you really mean what you say about letting him go when this is over, and clearing him of the charges-well, then, you have to do part of that now. Clear the charges now, show me that you’re serious. And then I’ll drop that request for the DNA testing. If that hasn’t happened by one o’clock tomorrow, then I go forward with that motion.”

“No deal,” Smith said. He must have enjoyed that, throwing my oft-repeated line back at me.

“Then I have to assume you’re just going to kill Pete, anyway. I have nothing left to lose. That’s DePrizio, D-E- P-R-I-Z-I-O. He better have affidavits in his hand before my one o’clock hearing. You know me well enough to know I’m not bluffing, Smith.”

I hung up the phone and held my breath. I fought it as best I could, any thought of what might happen to Pete. I couldn’t rule out, much less control, anything they might do to Pete to make his stay with them less enjoyable. If I showed weakness, it would only get worse for him. They had to see me as a forceful adversary. It was the only way to get Pete back.