call during your last shift from a young man who reported a kidnapping. Do you remember that?”
Stacy physically reeled at the question. Her eyes grew wide and her mouth dropped a little. Her lips seemed to want to say something, but no words came out.
“Let’s sit down, Stacy,” Jonathan offered, gesturing to her living room with its sofa and two chairs. They no doubt had been sold as a set, all three of them sharing identical beige fabric that reminded Jonathan of an old sport coat in his closet back home.
He led the way and she followed, with Gail bringing up the rear. She chose the sofa and seemed startled when Gail joined her on the adjacent cushion.
Jonathan said, “In answering Agent Nichols’s questions, please remember that it’s a felony to lie to a federal officer. If you do that, I won’t hesitate to put you in handcuffs and take you out of here.” Since he was playing the bad cop-another gambit that always worked, despite the cliche-he figured he might as well get into character early.
“We have no interest in arresting you, Stacy,” Gail said. “But Agent Harris is right. We’ll do what we have to do. Now about that phone call.”
“Who told you?” Stacy looked as if she was living her worst nightmare. Exactly as Jonathan had hoped.
“You need to ask less and answer more,” Gail said. “A young man named Ryan Nasbe called at roughly one- twelve this morning asking to be rescued. Do you remember that?”
Stacy’s head twitched.
“Please answer verbally for me,” Gail said.
“Yes,” she said. “I remember.”
“Thank you. What came of that call?”
Stacy broke gaze and shifted in her seat. This was a woman who should never play poker. “What do you mean, what came of it?”
“Is this the way it’s going to be, Stacy?” Jonathan said. “You’re going to make us re-ask every question so that you can buy time to make up a lie?”
Terror. “No, I swear. I’m not doing that.”
“Stacy, look at me,” Gail said. “Just tell us what happened.”
“I-I don’t want any trouble.”
“Of course you don’t. Neither do we. All we want to do is gather information. There’s nothing wrong with that, is there?”
“I-I suppose not.”
“There’s no trouble to be caused by the truth, is there?” Gail pressed. “The truth will set you free.”
“And a lie will get your butt thrown in jail,” Jonathan said, drawing an impatient look from Gail. Okay, maybe he was laying it on a little thick.
“What happened after you received that call?” Gail asked. She gently touched Stacy’s knee to draw attention away from Jonathan and signal that she was trustworthy.
Stacy’s lip trembled. Her hands, too. Tears balanced on her lids as her eyes searched the room for something to look at other than her visitors.
“Stacy?”
She bolted to her feet, startling them both. Jonathan’s hand moved toward his. 45. Right away, though, it was obvious she meant no harm. She just couldn’t sit. “I knew this would happen,” Stacy said. “I am so sorry that I ever got involved in any of it.”
Gail shot a quick look to Jonathan that said, Now this is interesting.
“Please sit down, Stacy,” Gail said. “You make us nervous when you jump up like that.”
“I knew it, knew it, knew it.”
“Knew what, Stacy?” The rule book said it was important to use the other person’s name as often as possible in a negotiation. It was a trick that salesmen have known since the beginning of time. “Tell us what you knew.”
“What do you think?” she spat. She brought her hands to her head, her fingers lost in her twisted hair. “I knew that someone would catch on.”
“Catch on to what?”
“What do you think? To the Army.”
Gail checked silently with Jonathan to see if any of this made sense to him. It didn’t.
“Sit, Stacy,” Gail said, more forcefully this time. It was the command you’d use for a dog. “Sit, settle down, and start from the beginning.”
Stacy just stood there, her right hand in her hair, the other on her hip, staring out the front window. Jonathan recognized it as a posture of angst. She was trying to decide between doing right or wrong. Gail started to say something, but Jonathan raised a hand. They needed to give her a minute.
Her right hand dropped to her hip. “Screw it,” Stacy said. “Fine. This is long overdue anyway.”
As she started back to the sofa, she froze in her tracks and craned her neck. “There’s a huge man in my backyard,” she said. “He’s armed.”
“He’s with us,” Jonathan said. He pressed the transmit button that was located just out of sight up his left sleeve-his non-gun hand. “We’re secure here, Big Guy. You can come in.”
“You’re secure?” Stacy repeated. She seemed aghast. “Secure from what?”
“Focus, Stacy,” Gail said. “Come. Sit. Start from the beginning. What is it that is coming apart?”
Stacy retook her seat next to Gail. Exactly per the plan, she was hopelessly confused. None of her world made sense right now, and confusion always played to the benefit of interrogators.
“You said something about the Army. Are you talking about the United States Army?”
“The Army of God. It’s a nutso group of paramilitary types here in the county. They’re like all the groups you hear about in the news. I don’t know that they do any harm, but they’re just creepy. Every now and then, one of the soldiers-that’s what they call themselves-tries to get away. Not often, but occasionally.”
Boxers entered the home without knocking, and effectively filled the opening. Stacy drew an inch or two closer to Gail, who again put a reassuring hand on her leg. “Really, he’s okay,” Gail said. “So what happens when they try to get away?”
“If they call us, we’re instructed to tell the sheriff right away.”
Gail produced her speckled composition notebook from a pouch pocket in her cammies and opened it. “What is the sheriff’s name?”
“Neen. Kendig Neen.” She brought her hands to her face. “Oh, God, I’m going to be in so much trouble for this.”
“And what does Sheriff Neen do with the information?” Stacy wiped away a tear. “It’s not as if he reports to me, you know? I mean, it’s the other way around.”
“I understand.”
“I don’t know the details. All I know is I tell him, and then the problem seems to go away.”
Jonathan leaned in closer. “What does ‘go away’ mean?”
The longer the interview went, the smaller Stacy seemed to become. “I mean that I just never hear any more about them. The problem just. .. goes away.” Clearly, it was the only way she knew to phrase it.
“Does that mean that the children also went away?” Gail asked.
Stacy’s eyes darted up. “Oh, they weren’t all children. In fact, this is the first one who was a child. That’s why I thought it was so, well, sad.”
Jonathan was confused. “You mean to tell me that you get calls from adults seeking help from a kidnapping, and you routinely do nothing to stop it?”
“No, no. Not at all. Not children and not kidnapping. Just people who want to get away and need help doing it.”
Boxers growled, “And you just hang them out to dry.” He had a way of making the floor move with his voice when he was pissed.
“It’s not like that,” Stacy said. Her voice showed deep frustration at not being able to get her point across. “They’re all adults over there. Or adults with children. It’s like a closed community. As far as I know, no one’s kept against their will. It’s just that sometimes, I guess, people want to be somewhere else.
“When we get the call, we turn it over to Sheriff Neen, who himself is pretty active in the Army-or at least he
