Point of No Return (16 page)

Tomic clicked his tongue and sighed. "As you can see, we've had to restrain his feet. He's a feisty one."

"You leave him the fuck alone!" The words were out before I could stop them.

"Or you'll what?" Tomic leered at the screen.

Before I could answer, Berkman stood in front of me. "I am Ross Berkman, the officer in charge. What are your demands?"

Tomic looked at Berkman and grinned. "Thought you'd never ask," he smirked cheerfully. "My brother, five million dollars, and a plane to Dubrovnik, with clearance to take off and land." He smiled like he'd just ordered lunch.

"It's simple mathematics. Four things for me, four things for you." He looked back at the four hostages. "If I don't get one of my requests, you don't get one of yours."

My stomach twisted in knots.

"So, Detectives," Tomic called out. "If you fail to deliver, their blood is on your hands." He smiled excitedly, and the screen went black.

Again the room flew into action. There were

analysts, negotiators, psychologists, expert after expert, all talking, buzzing. I blinked in the white noise, trying not to think about what Kira just went through. I pulled at my hair and grabbed my stomach, ignoring the need to throw up.

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"They're torturing him." My words were barely a whisper in a room full of noise, but Berkman heard me just fine. He nodded sadly. Bile rose in my throat, but Cortez burst into the room.

"We got footage!" he yelled. "No audio, but watch this!"

On another screen the footage started to play and we saw the familiar gym, people finishing up, talking. Kira walked onto the screen, smiling. He bumped fists with another guy. "That's Officer Sanchez," Cortez explained.

"He left at eight forty-seven."

We watched Kira on screen, setting up equipment, tidying, finishing off paperwork. Two minutes later, although he'd turned off some lights, we could still see the three men who ran into the room.

Kira spun around as the first guy struck at him. He blocked defensively, instinctively, and retaliated with swift hit-kick combinations.

The second attacker lunged at him, and Kira took him down with one kick to the head. The attacker hit the floor and didn't move.

"Jesus," someone behind me muttered. I didn't see who. "He's good."

The third attacker struck at him and was joined by the first attacker. It was now two against one. Kira held his

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own, this time taking out the third man with another hit-kick sequence.

But when the original attacker grabbed him, a

fourth man walked on screen, hitting Kira in the ribs with a stun gun.

I watched as Kira's body arched and jerked before giving out, like some bad late-night movie in slow motion.

The man behind him pushed him to the floor and proceeded to kick him in the ribs and stomach once, twice, three times.

Then he grabbed his arms, twisting them behind his back and taping them together. The third attacker stumbled over and punched him in the head twice, before they lifted him to his feet. The fourth man, who we could now see was Tomic, proceeded to hit him again with the stun gun.

My heart broke and bile rose in my throat.

The two thugs dragged Kira off screen, presumably out the front door. Tomic looked at the unconscious man on the floor, pulled out a pistol, and shot him in the head.

Right there, without a second thought.

The whole ordeal took less than two minutes.

Seeing it, watching it, knowing what they did to Kira, burned in my stomach and lungs, and I felt like I was going to be sick.

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"Homicide's got the gym covered," Cortez said quietly. "The place was wide open, body still on the floor."

Berkman looked at me. "I'm sorry you had to watch that."

The room spun, and there didn't seem to be enough air.

Berkman looked at me concerned. "You okay?"

I nodded, unable to stop seeing in my head how they hit him, kicked him, hurt him. I shook my head. "I think I'm gonna be sick," I admitted out loud.

Mitch picked me up by the tops of my shoulders like I was six years old and led me to the bathroom. I walked, somehow, and as soon as I was in the men's room, I couldn't hold it in. The horror, anger, and fear bubbled in my stomach, and I threw up.

When I couldn't be sick anymore, I washed my face and rinsed out my mouth and stared at the unrecognizable man in the mirror. He was pale, scared. The man he loved had been kidnapped and beaten, he'd just been kicked out of the closet, and one of his partners had called him a
fag
. I stared at my reflection. "How did it come to this?"

"Matt?" Mitch's voice startled me.

I jumped, turning around to see him behind me. I didn't realize he'd stayed. He looked as scared and helpless as I felt. "Mitch?" I croaked. "I'm sorry."

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He shook his head, and without making eye contact, he said, "Not now. We need to get back." He turned and walked out on me.

I walked robotically back to the office. Berkman was busy with some suit, and amid the noise and commotion, the four of us sat in silence.

The next time Tomic appeared on screen, he was ranting about his brother, how he was the brains of the operation but too soft, how they were chalk and cheese, yet so very alike. His accent was thicker when he rambled, and my mind had trouble keeping up. He ranted about their childhoods, how they grew up, how when they were boys if one was naughty, they'd both be punished. Rajko told us how Pavao, sweet, quiet little Pavao, never did anything wrong, but he'd happily take punishments for his brother.

He didn't mention the hostages, though we could see them behind him, still sitting together on the floor. I couldn't see any noticeable changes in Kira's injuries, and I hoped he'd gone these last ten minutes without being beaten. I spent the entire transmission looking at his face, trying to see if they'd hit him again. His cheek looked a little bruised, though if it was a result from a previous beating or a new injury, I just couldn't tell.

When it seemed Tomic was winding down his little speech, Berkman asked if we could speak to one of the

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hostages. Tomic replied with a simple and cold, "No," and the connection was cut off again.

Kurt pushed a chair with his foot, sending it

crashing into a desk. "We're meeting his demands, aren't we?" he asked, looking at Berkman. "Please tell me the whole, 'we don't negotiate with criminals' doesn't apply here…"

Berkman's face twitched. His lack of answer was an answer itself.

"Oh, you are kidding me!" Tony cried. "Give him whatever the hell he wants."

"You know we can't do that," Berkman said quietly.

"What the hell are we supposed to do?" Mitch snapped.

"I know what we're supposed to do," I told them.

All eyes turned to me. "We find him first."

"Matt," Berkman warned. "You're all too close to this."

"We're the ones who should be in there!" I told him, speaking a little louder than I intended to. "We're the best chance we've got at getting them out alive. Let us do what we do best." I could see Berkman was considering it, so I added, "We're sitting here doing
fucking
nothing. We
know
this man. He's all we've studied for weeks."

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Berkman looked at me, then at the other three men, and after a long moment, he sighed and nodded.

I stood up. "Right. I want a map of the city, some whiteboards. I want to speak to the brother. I want my files on Tomic—"

Mitch, Kurt, and Tony all looked at me, so I

stopped talking and took a breath. Then quietly, I told them, "You can hate me for being gay tomorrow, but right now, we've got a job to do." The three of them stared at me.

Maybe my comment about being gay shocked them. I didn't care. Right then, there were more important things. I pointed to the blank screen. "You can either watch me or help me, but I'm gonna find this son-of-a-bitch, and then I'm gonna skin him alive."

I looked at their faces, and when my eyes met

Mitch's, he smiled.

* * * *

We cleared the conference room and set everything up on the same wall as the video linkup so when Tomic saw the room on screen, he couldn't see any of what we were doing.

Kurt calculated that the calls were coming at ten minute intervals. "One forty-seven. One fifty-four. One

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fifty-two," he said out loud. "He's keeping all calls under two minutes."

"What does that mean?" Tony asked, rhetorically.

"Is that some tracking buffer?"

Kurt frowned and admitted quietly, "I'm not sure."

Tony drew a radius of the target area of the city, using the gym as the center. Given it was the last point of contact at nine o'clock and the first video contact was barely half an hour later, taking into account traffic flow, Tony could calculate the maximum distances Tomic could have traveled in that time.

Mitch was working on the video footage with traffic control CCTV, trying to follow any possible suspect vehicles leaving the vicinity of the gym just before nine.

I worked on replayed footage of the hostage scene, studying the room they were in, looking for clues, hints, anything. I purposely didn't look at Kira. I knew he was there, but I needed to focus. I needed to focus on anything but his cut face, his swollen eye, his rapid breathing, or what he'd been through. What he was going through.

So instead, I zoomed the footage in on the walls, the windows. It was a warehouse of some sort. Nondescript, no visible markers, and the windows were blackened by the night outside. By the time Tomic's face blinked onto the screen, I was none the wiser about where they were.

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Tomic addressed Berkman, demanding to know if

his deal was being met. He wanted to see his brother.

Berkman countered this demand with his own. "Show us the hostages."

When Tomic moved from in front of the screen, we could see the four of them sitting on the floor. The women had been crying. Kira was still on his knees, but he was leaning a little to one side. He was breathing hard, and his face was etched in pain.

"What did you do to him?" I yelled at the screen.

Tomic spun to look at the screen, to look at me.

"Your boyfriend really should mind his own business."

Tomic looked back at Kira, then back to me. "He's so gallant. It really is… admirable."

Then Tomic called out off screen and one of his thugs, the guy from the docks with the tattooed neck, appeared. He slinked down next to the three women on the floor and slowly reached his hand out, grabbing Evie, Tony's wife, by the arm.

Tony was suddenly beside me, and we stood,

shoulder to shoulder, in front of the screen.

Evie cried out, and Kira leapt from his knees to his feet. He charged at the man, but with his hands behind his back and his feet taped together, he didn't stand a chance.

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The thug punched Kira hard in the stomach,

connecting with a dull thump. We could hear the air leave Kira's lungs as he slumped back to his knees. It was like watching a nightmare play out in slow motion right in front of me.

The women shrieked, and Tomic's face appeared on screen, covering most of our view. "See? He just won't stay down. He won't let my men touch the women."

"Untie his hands and feet, you son-of-a-bitch!" I yelled at the screen. "Make it a fair fight!"

Tomic smiled. "I am many things, Detective Elliott," he said. "Stupid is
not
one of them." Then his smile died abruptly, and he looked at Berkman. "My brother. Ten minutes."

Once again, the screen went black.

Berkman was back on his phone, trying to get

Pavao Tomic cleared to be brought up to our office, while I stared at the screen. My heart was hammering, pounding against my ribs. All I could think about, all I could see in my mind, was how they hit him, how they were torturing him. Acid burned in my stomach, and if I hadn't already been sick, I would have been then.

I felt a hand on my arm, and looked up. I expected to see Mitch or Berkman, but it wasn't. It was Tony.

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He was scared. I could see it clear on his face, in his eyes, and he was sorry for calling me a fag. He was thankful for Kira. I could see it.

He saw what I saw, how Kira was willing to try to save his wife from God only knows what. "He's protecting them," he said. Then he squeezed my arm and gave me a nod. "We'll find them."

Before I could answer, there was a knock at the door and a woman walked in. "Detective Elliott," she addressed me. "Can I ask you something?"

She was one of the experts who'd been in and out a dozen times. I stared at her, waiting for her to continue.

"Ah," she hesitated, looking around at the men in the room, "It's about Kira."

I blinked. "What about him?"

She turned to the computer tech guy who'd been helping me with the analysis of the videos. "Can you bring the footage up on screen?" When the familiar hostage scene appeared, she asked him to zoom in on Kira.

She looked at me and said, "At first I thought he was struggling with the feeling or the circulation in his hands, being they're tied behind his back…" She trailed off.

"But now I'm not sure."