Blood of Angels (32 page)

Newton's finger freezes an inch above the mute button. I look up, not breathing. “What did you say?” Myers asks.

“I can turn the GPS in the phone on from here, sir. It gives an exact—”

“
Do
it, Kipling! For the love of God, just do it!”

“I just did, sir.”

Myers sprints to the speakerphone. “Are you saying you have him?”

“Yes, sir. The phone is at the intersection of Avondale and Middleton, moving north.”

The three of us stare at each other an electric second; the next we're heading to the door. “Call me on my cell line, Kipling,” Myers yells into the speakerphone. “We're moving.”

“Yes, sir.”

Newton, Myers, and I sprint down the stairs and pile into Myers's car. Myers spins a one-eighty and hauls out of President's Club. His phone rings at the gate, and he answers on speaker. “It's Blair Kipling, Agent Myers. I have you on GPS. You're about six miles from the target.”

“You're a damn genius, Kipling. Did anybody ever tell you that?”

“Thank you, sir. We pride ourselves on our service.”

Myers looks over at me and grins. “We're gonna get this bastard. He finally fucked up.”

“How about a roadblock?” Newton says from the backseat.

“No,” I answer. “I don't want him to panic while Jazz is still alive. We have the advantage as long as he doesn't know we're in pursuit.”

We pull onto Concord Road and head west towards I-65.

“Talk to me, Kipling,” Myers says. “Where is he now?”

“The phone has stopped, sir. It's at the intersection of Avondale and Walnut Grove.”

“Jesus,” Newton says, “we're less than four miles away.”

Myers rockets the Ford onto the highway toward the Moore's Lane exit. We screech down the exit ramp, blow through the stop sign, and turn left. Forty seconds later, Kipling's voice comes on the speaker phone. “It's moving again, sir. It's pulled onto Carothers Parkway and is proceeding south at thirty-eight miles per hour.”

“What's this guy doing?” Newton growls. “You think he's having car trouble? Maybe he's breaking down.”

I pull out my gun from my belt and check the safety. Myers glances over but says nothing. I stare out the window, counting the seconds before I get to Jazz. Three minutes later we turn onto Carothers, a commercial street which fortunately has light traffic; we scream unimpeded toward Cool Springs Boulevard. There are only five vehicles in sight, and one is some kind of delivery van.

“Three hundred yards straight ahead,” Kipling says. “But we're getting down to where I can't be sure about the accuracy of the readings.”

“Just tell me if we pass the guy,” Myers says. We drive up about sixty miles per hour, passing cars. I look up ahead and see a four-door Chevrolet, and although it's not tan, it's about the right year. There's a single figure in the driver's seat. He looks to be about Bridges's size. “Up there,” I say. “That Chevy.”

Myers floors it, and in a few seconds we're directly behind the car.

My heart is pounding. The figure might be Bridges—it's impossible to be sure—but I don't see anyone else.
Where is Jazz? Down in
the floorboards? Stuffed in the trunk?
I grip the pistol. “Pull up, on the right rear quarter panel. Let me get a look.”

Myers creeps up beside the Chevy. I lean forward, peering through the other car's rear window. “
Fuck.
It's not him.”

“What?” Myers says. “You sure?”

“Yeah. It's not him.”

“The phone just turned west, Agent Myers,” the voice says. “It's moving at fifteen miles an hour.”

“Where, dammit?” Myers yells.

I crane my neck around, and I see the delivery van heading west down a side street. “It's the van! Turn around!”

“You sure?” I ask.

“West, right? You said west?”

“That's right,” Kipling says. “Moving about fifteen miles an hour.”

Myers whips across oncoming traffic, narrowly missing a car. “It's the only vehicle that turned,” Myers says. “Hang on, little girl. We're almost there.”

We're fifty yards behind the van now, with a white Toyota between us. My hand is sweating on the gun. “Come up slow, so he doesn't panic,” I say.
Hang on, Jazz. Just a little longer.

Myers nods. “Next stop sign that comes, I'm giving him a California stop.”

“If she's in the back, she might get hurt,” I say. “Isn't there another way?”

Myers shakes his head. “If I get in front of that thing, he'll just drive straight through us. Then we've got a chase, and that's worse.” He looks over at me. “Agreed?”

I nod. “OK.”
Hold on, sweetie. It's going to be bumpy.

“Newton and I will handle the driver,” Myers says. “You go to the back and get your daughter away from the van.” I nod. “Everybody ready?”

“Yeah.”

“Hell, yeah,” Newton says from the back. A hundred yards later, the little convoy approaches a stop sign. The van's brake lights come on, and all three vehicles begin to slow. “Hang on,” Myers says, and he floors the throttle. He snaps around the Toyota, expertly puts his left bumper just behind the van's right rear tire, and steers left. The van spins halfway around on a tight axis, tires squealing. It lurches to a stop, sliding left on all four tires as its wheels lock up. Our car doors open simultaneously as we sprint toward it. I run to the rear door to try to get the passenger compartment open. Myers has the driver's-side door open, and he's got his gun pointed at the driver. He screams, “Don't you fucking move!”

The rear door is locked, and I pound on the door. “Jazz! I'm here, baby! We're gonna get you out!” I run around to the side, where Myers and Newton have the driver on the street, lying on his stomach. Newton reaches down, cuffs him with plastic strips, and kicks him over on his side. Myers drops to a knee and puts his gun to the man's chin. “Where's the girl, you fucking asshole?”

I take a step toward them and stop cold.
It's not him. Jesus, it's not Bridges.
I look back at the van, then back at the man. “What the fuck? Is he inside or something?”

Myers looks up. “This isn't the guy?”

“No. It's not him.”

Myers waves his gun toward the van, and Newton and I advance slowly toward the driver's door, weapons raised. I step inside and peer into the back. It's nearly empty; there's nothing more than a handful of packages in a jumble, toppled after the spin. “She's not here. It's just boxes.”

Myers looks down at the driver. “Then what the fuck is he doing with Bridges's phone?” The driver, a skinny kid about twenty years old, is trembling, panicked out of his mind. “Jesus,” Myers says. “He wet himself.”

A wet spot spreads down the driver's leg.

I turn away. “He doesn't know anything,” I say. “Dammit!”

Myers reaches down and picks the man up off the street a few inches by his jacket. “Where's the fucking phone?”

“What phone? I don't have any phone. I don't know what you're talking about.” The driver breaks into tears. “I didn't do anything!”

Myers stares at him a second, then releases him in disgust. “Shit! What's going on?”

Exhausted and frustrated, I drop to my knees. I suck in some air, trying to get control of myself. I turn my head to the left. “My God.”

Myers walks over. “What?”

I point. “That.”

Myers walks to the van and drops down to see. “Son of a bitch.” He reaches under the bumper of the van and rips off a strip of duct tape. He pulls a cell phone from underneath the van. “The motherfucker set us up.”

I see black and cough up something from deep in my throat. I lean forward until I'm on all fours, and I think I might throw up.
I'm trying, Jazz. Hang on.
Myers stands up and lets out a long string of expletives.

“The driver doesn't know anything,” Newton says, walking over. “He was on his regular route. Bridges must have waited for him to come by, pushed “send,” and taped the phone while the guy was inside a building making a delivery.”

Myers nods. “So wherever the truck was fifteen minutes ago, that's where Bridges was.”

“Which means he could be twenty miles away by now.”

I pull myself to my feet. “You're missing the point.”

Myers looks at me. “What?”

“This means Bridges and Jazz probably aren't even in the same location anymore.” I look away. “He could have taken all these pictures hours ago, and he's just letting them out as a game. She could already be dead.”

The agents stand silently. Myers looks west, toward Franklin. “We're gonna get this guy. I swear to God, we're gonna get him.”

Newton and I walk over to the driver of the truck. He's on his back, sniffling. Newton gets him on his feet, and the man stands helplessly, a dark, wet stain covering his left leg. “I'm sorry,” I say. “I thought you were the man who kidnapped my daughter.”

The man stares back at me. “I didn't do anything. I don't have anybody's phone.”

I nod and walk off. “Let's get back,” I say, heading toward the car. “Apparently, the bastard isn't done yet.”

 

MYERS CALLS HIS DISPATCHER
, and when a couple of agents arrive to make sure the driver is OK, we pull back into traffic. A dozen agents and police swarm the area where the delivery van was when the call was placed, but nobody in our car thinks for a moment that Bridges would be stupid enough to hang around.

“You know how much evidence there is linking Bridges to any of these crimes?” I say.

Myers looks over. “How much?”

“None. None to his parole officer. None to Carl. And so far, none to Jazz. Stolen cell phone calls. Digital photographs. None of it physically connects to him.”

Myers grips the steering wheel. “Yeah. I know.”

“I'm saying that even if we somehow caught him, with the right lawyer, it's not inconceivable he would walk.” I stare out the window. “The ultimate irony.”

“It ain't over,” Myers says. “You got to hang in there as long as there's hope.”

Ten minutes later we're back at Sarandokos's subdivision, but when we drive in, there are police at the gate. Myers rolls down his window and shows his ID. “What's going on?”

The cop looks in the car and nods. “A couple of news vans slipped in behind cars when the gates were up,” he says. “We got called to control access.”

Myers looks at me. “I told you Sarandokos going on TV was gonna make trouble for us,” he says, gritting his teeth. “A bunch of reporters is the last thing we need.”

We drive down Wentworth Place and park in front of Sarandokos's house. Bec is waiting in the doorway. She finds my eyes, and I shake my head.
I'm sorry, baby.
She looks at me silently a moment, then disappears back into the fortress of her grief. I drag myself up the stairs and go after her. Not that I have any idea what to say. The adrenaline rush pulled me out of my blackness for a moment, but now I'm drowning inside again. I find her in the master bedroom, alone, sitting on the edge of the bed. The room is large—at least twenty by twenty—with a fireplace and sitting room at one end. She looks up when I enter, then stares back down at her hands. It's so quiet I can hear a clock ticking on the nightstand beside her. I walk slowly up to her and sit down on the bed a foot away. “I'm sorry,” I say, quietly. “I thought we had him. He's had a long time to plan this out.”

“I can't cry anymore,” she says, her voice distant. “It's like I'm already dead. Even if we get her back, I won't be the same.” In spite of her words, a single tear falls to her hand, and it sits glistening on her beautiful, slender finger. Without looking up, she says, “You'll kill him if you can, won't you, Thomas? If you get the chance?” The clock ticks away seconds.
Five. Ten. Fifteen.

“Yes,” I whisper. “I'll kill him if I can.”

“Swear it, Thomas. Swear to me you'll kill him.”

“I swear.”

She reaches her hand across the space between us and takes my fingers in her own. Her hand is warm and soft, and the feel of it brings a rush of memories flooding back through me. “I don't want him to go to jail, Thomas. I want him to die.”

 

MYERS RECONNECTS WITH
Kipling at Sprint, but the waiting is different now. It's different because we know the pictures Bridges sends may be hours old, and because we know that he and Jazz may be separated by miles. Newton's studious expression has grown detached, like he's already preparing himself for defeat; even Myers's slick, professional demeanor has grown edgier. Sarandokos, who stands fifteen feet or so apart in the living room, has finally given up answering the freak phone calls and stares absently out of a window. Every one of us is a man of action at our core; even Sarandokos, with his slicing off of extraneous fat and wife stealing, isn't a man to stand around and watch. And every one of us is being forced to wait on a brilliant psychopath who, unable to cope with his own failed life, has decided to extract his revenge with grand strokes of cruel irony.

At 6:00 p.m., Maria brings in dinner.
The meals mark time,
I think.
Breakfast. Lunch. Dinner. Sooner or later, days will pass.
I catch myself wondering if we'll ever find Jazz, and even—self-revulsion filling me—hoping we don't, if what he's done to her is too despicable. I try to eat but give up and walk into Sarandokos's sunroom. The agents have finished examining it, and in its emptiness it seems almost innocent, as though nothing were different about this horror of a day. Light streams in through a north-facing wall of glass, and the brilliant light reflects off a floor of spotless Mexican tile. Plants grow in hanging pots and stately, oversized urns. A fountain sends water down a geometric gathering of stones until it gathers a few feet away from me in a clear, spreading pool. Large, orange fish move serenely through the pool, endlessly circling their small environs. I lean back into a flowered, upholstered chair and close my eyes.
I understand Bec leaving me. It's not just the money, although God knows she loved that. It's this—this hermetically sealed life, protected by wealth—that she really wanted. No mess. No criminals climbing into her backyard. No death threats. But my past caught up with her, and she couldn't make her escape.
Exhaustion creeps over me, now plainly impossible to forestall. The fountain sends its soothing song across to me, and the hazy, dimming light from outside bathes the room. I settle into the chair and feel my breathing slow. My eyes get heavy.
Just a minute. I have to check out for just a minute.