Run: An Emma Caldridge Novella: The Final Episode (3 page)

Consalvo peered at the bullhorn to see if it was powered up. He flicked the switch and its ready light failed.

“You’d think a guy who went through college on a full ride scholarship would know enough to check the charge on his equipment,” he said to Sumner. “Steinberg!” he yelled.

Steinberg loped back to them, with another bullhorn in his hand. “This one’s charged,” he said. “Got them mixed up. Sorry, boss.”

The men switched equipment.

“And you should know that some guy named Banner called saying that he received a tip that a group of cult members are hunting a woman named Yoder along with a young girl named Carolyn Brink and a man named Leon Smelting. Seems Yoder and Smelting are harboring the Brink girl after someone named Emma Caldridge sprung the girl from the compound.”

“Who’s the someone named Banner?” Consalvo asked.

“I don’t know,” Steinberg replied.

“I know who he is,” Sumner said. Both men looked at him in surprise. “He owns a contract security company. Strictly international. I’ve worked with his company before.”

“Contract security? Like mercenaries?” Steinberg said.

“Like experts in their individual fields who are called on when a project requires their special talents,” Sumner replied.

“Huh.” Consalvo flicked the switch on the latest bullhorn. “And what’s your particular expertise?”

“You didn’t ask about that when they added me to this mission?” Sumner raised an eyebrow at Consalvo, who shook his head.

“There are ten men on this project. I don’t have the time to interview them all. So tell me.”

“I can fly a plane, helicopter, parasail, hang glider, glider, anything with wings that will float in the air. And I can shoot.”

“And this Caldridge? She a family member of Brink’s and decided to get her out of there?”

“She’s not,” Sumner said. “I know her too. She’s a chemist and takes part-time contract security work for Banner. She’s here looking for a man named Ryan, who she believes the cult kidnapped.”

“You know where we can find her?”

“I spoke to her last about an hour ago, and she said a posse was chasing her.”

Both Consalvo and Steinberg gazed at Sumner with varying degrees of incredulity in their expressions.

“Did you say posse?” Consalvo asked.

“I did,” Sumner said. “It was the term she used.”

Consalvo inhaled deeply and blew the breath back out. “God, I hate this western shit. It’s like cowboys and Indians out here. Crazier than hell. I need to get back to New York where there are no posses. Only gangs. You don’t seem too worried about Ms. Caldridge.”

Sumner shook his head. “I think the posse should be worried about her.”

“Really?” Steinberg sounded excited at the idea.

Consalvo gave him a quelling glance. “Don’t you have enough girlfriends? Sounds like this one would run circles around you.”

Steinberg smiled. “I like a challenge.”

Consalvo rolled his eyes, faced the compound once again and put the bullhorn to his lips.

“This is Special Agent Consalvo of the FBI. We’re here to execute a warrant against Emmet Shaw. Mr. Shaw, you have fifteen minutes to surrender yourself. If not, we will be required to arrest you by any means necessary.” Consalvo lowered the bullhorn.

Steinberg looked at him. “That true? Even with the civilians in there?”

Consalvo nodded. “We’ve been given the green light on this one.”

“What if he refuses?”

“Well, we can’t back down now, can we? The power and reputation of the United States government is on the line. Besides, this guy’s a sick puppy.”

“What’s the backup plan?” Sumner asked.

“We arrange to communicate. There’s a trained negotiator with the advance team. We’ll try to establish a connection and see what we can do,” Consalvo said. “First thing we’ll demand is that he release the women and children.”

Sumner watched the compound through his binoculars. He didn’t think they’d see Shaw anytime soon.

E
MMA HEARD
C
ONSALVO’S
message to Shaw. Shaw did too, and he snatched a glass off a nearby counter and flung it against a far wall.

“Get everyone in here,” he said. “I want some breakfast and I want it now.”

Within minutes five women entered the kitchen. All wore long prairie dresses and their hair up. All were blond and all looked frightened.

“I want breakfast,” Shaw said to the group. “And Carl, get one of the boys in here. We’ll have them deliver a little explosive message to the FBI.”

The women looked alarmed. One opened a cabinet and pulled out a skillet, and another, the youngest of the group, stepped up to Shaw.

“Don’t do that,” she said, standing in front of him with her hands clasped together. “They could shoot the boy.”

Shaw punched her in the face. The speed and violence of his response made Emma gasp and she made an instinctive move to help, but stopped when Carl put the muzzle of his gun against her head above her ear.

“Stay put,” he said.

The woman dropped, and the other women froze, staring down at her. The one on the wooden floor moaned. Emma watched the reaction of the others, waiting to see if they would fight back. She would have hammered Shaw to the ground and perhaps grabbed his hair and smashed his head into a cabinet pull if she hadn’t had a gun to her head. The women, though, did nothing, and Emma realized that they’d been living with this violence for a long time and perhaps feared worse would follow if they retaliated. In light of the massive arms buildup that Emma had seen outside, maybe the women were right to be frightened. It seemed that being married to Shaw conferred no safety from him. Two looked frightened, but the other two seemed satisfied. As if Shaw’s actions were justified.

One of the group, an older woman with an angelic face and a round body, stepped closer to the moaning woman and gave her an angry look.

“We’ll start breakfast,” she said to Shaw in a placating voice, her glance at the collected women warning. While the other women seemed cowed by Shaw, this one appeared to think of herself as the leader. “Don’t worry. She won’t bother you again.” Then she said to the woman on the floor, “Get up and help us,” and her voice held an angry edge.

You’ll be the first I’ll tell the FBI to arrest, Emma thought.

Carl said nothing either. Emma glanced at him, and a muscle twitched in his face. Emma couldn’t tell if it was from the sight of the woman being hit or the stress of having to remain outside the violence. She thought it likely was stress, since Carl seemed the type of man who liked violence.

“Go get her kid,” Shaw said. “The dark-haired one.”

“Jimmy?” Carl asked.

Shaw nodded. “Yeah.”

The woman on the floor started to weep.

“And get her,” Shaw pointed to Emma, “out of my sight.”

“You want me to put her in the bullpen?” Carl asked.

Shaw shook his head. “She doesn’t deserve it. Take her to the root cellar.”

Carl waved his gun and Emma rose. He grabbed her by the arm and pulled her past the staring women. They walked through a hallway to a mudroom with an exit door to the backyard. Opposite that door was another, which Carl opened. He flicked a light switch on the wall and Emma saw a long narrow stairway and smelled the damp, musty air that she associated with a basement.

“Move,” Carl said.

“What’s the bullpen?” Emma asked.

“Where the girls are kept before they marry Shaw.”

“You mean before Shaw rapes them,” Emma said flatly.

Carl shoved her, and Emma grabbed the handrail. She started down. Her running shoes were quiet, but she heard Carl’s boot heels on the wooden steps behind her. She reached the cement floor and moved into the basement.

Exposed conduit pipe and metal ventilation shafts ran across the ceiling, and a single bulb in a white receptacle provided the only illumination. The dank air and smell of dust and cement was strong. To Emma’s left was a sturdy wooden door secured with a padlock, and to the right as you faced the door a collection of gardening tools leaned against the wall; a heavy rake, long-handled shears, and a push broom. Carl walked over to the wooden door, removed a set of keys from his pocket and applied one to the padlock.

It swung open on creaking hinges, revealing a small room, perhaps eight by eight, with a cement floor and matching walls. The single bulb threw a fitful glow into it. A small bundle in the corner that looked like discarded clothing lay against the far wall. As Emma watched, it twitched, then moved, and formed into shape of a man. He rolled over, and in the wan light she saw his face. It was Sebastian Ryan.

Carl shoved her and she stumbled inside. Ryan met her gaze, and the hope that washed across his face was the last thing imprinted in her mind before the door slammed shut behind her and they were plunged into darkness.

“
S
UMNER, YOUR BUDDY
Banner’s on the phone.” Steinberg handed a cell phone to Sumner, who was leaning against an FBI issue black sedan and watching the compound through his binoculars.

“I hope you have good news for me,” Sumner said, “because this situation is starting to take on a Jim Jones quality that I don’t like.”

“We’ve located Ryan,” Banner replied. “The app was broadcasting after all, and the last known location was from coordinates that matched the compound’s. It also seems that someone’s been accessing the phone for a while. There was a request from law enforcement in Utah—my contact can’t get me any more specifics—to track him some weeks ago. It matched the period that Caldridge and Ryan were at Vanderlock’s. It explains how they were followed there.”

“What about Caldridge?” Sumner directed his attention to Consalvo as he spoke. Shaw’s fifteen minutes had expired ten minutes ago, and the FBI team leader was conferring with the negotiator about the next step.

“She gave her GPS watch to the Yoder girl,” Banner said. “I have no idea where she is, but Yoder said that the last she’d seen her, Caldridge was on the run from a posse. And I use that term advisedly. She actually said posse.”

Sumner gave a small smile. “We’re not in D.C.”

“That much is clear. You should know that the FBI’s been receiving tips on and off for years, but the tipsters were universally unwilling to sign any real complaint or testify in court. Apparently, Shaw’s also managed to get the local law enforcement to keep most of the complaints from ever reaching them, so there was never much to act on. But now someone called the FBI and was willing to sign a complaint. It seems the local population is finally done protecting him.”

“My concern,” Sumner said, “is that they’ve caught Caldridge and she’s being kept under wraps. She knew that I was an hour away, and if she was still free I think she’d be here.” He watched as Consalvo finished his conversation with the negotiator and started back toward the sedan. “I’ll call you back. The lead agent is on his way over.”

“Call me with any developments. I’ve got some operatives nearby I can send if you need backup, but I hate to step on an FBI mission. If you do decide to use them, I’d appreciate you doing it without FBI input.”

“Got it. I’m out,” Sumner said just as Consalvo reached him.

“Negotiator is going to try to open a dialogue,” Consalvo said. “We’ve been calling the house, but no one is answering, so we’ll use the bullhorn. Any news from Banner?”

Sumner gave him a short version of the conversation.

“You think Ryan’s alive?”

Sumner shrugged. “Hard to say. I’m not too hopeful, because if he was, why haven’t they made a ransom demand?” He raised the binoculars and scanned the compound. He saw a boy, about ten years old, walking slowly toward a gate that opened out onto the back. Strapped to his body was a crude device. Sumner noted the electric wires that ran to a bundle of some sort. “You’ve got trouble,” he told Consalvo. “Look.” He handed the other man the binoculars.

“Oh shit, is that an IED?” Consalvo sounded shocked.

“Looks that way.”

Before Consalvo responded, his cell phone began ringing. He stared at the screen. “It’s Shaw,” he told Sumner, and clicked on a separate walkie-talkie. “Steinberg, I got Shaw calling through. Get over here and bring Pringles.” Then Consalvo answered the phone.

“Agent Consalvo here,” he said. Sumner watched. Consalvo remained silent while Shaw spoke, then told the cult leader: “Tell that boy to return to the house and remove the explosive. Using an innocent child isn’t going to advance your case. You turn yourself in voluntarily and I’m sure the judge will take your cooperation into account, but anything happens to the child, and then it’s capital murder. You don’t want that.” Consalvo listened, then said, “I don’t think—”

He stopped abruptly and looked at Sumner. “Damn, he hung up. He wants a helicopter escort to the Canadian border and assurances that when he leaves the chopper he won’t be followed.”

“Can you assure that?”

“Not a chance,” Consalvo said. “Steinberg!” he yelled.

Steinberg jogged up to them.

“Shaw says we don’t get the chopper here in thirty minutes he’ll trigger the IED and kill the boy. Find a chopper ASAP and get the governor on the line. Tell him this thing is heading south fast.”

Sumner felt the gorge rise in his throat. The boy was standing at the gate’s edge but remained inside the compound. When he glanced at him through the binoculars, he could see tears running down his face.

“We have to get inside that compound,” he said. “Undercover. And then we have to kill Shaw quietly before he can trigger the IED. You got any SEAL teams that can handle that?”

Consalvo nodded. “I’m pretty sure we do, but they won’t get here in time. The real question is how to get close without being detected.”

“Cut the electric,” Sumner said. “If that IED can be triggered by a wireless device, it should kill the router. Might buy you some time.”

“Might also kill the phones, though,” Steinberg said. “We’re calling him on a landline. Most now require electricity to work.”

“We have his cell number?” Consalvo asked.

Steinberg shook his head. “Nothing on record.”

“You should kill the cell signal anyhow,” Sumner said, “because the explosive may be using a cell phone as a detonator. It’s okay, you can still use the bullhorn. But if cutting the electric will stop the trigger signal, I think it’s the best thing to do right now.”