I looked back at the front door. Regan and Tickner were both outside now. Regan had his arms folded across his chest, bouncing on the balls of his feet. Tickner did not move, his face the same placid pool. Were these men I could trust with my daughter's life? Would they put Tara first, or as Edgar had suggested, would they follow some unseen agenda?
The tick-tick grew louder, more insistent.
Someone had murdered my wife. Someone had taken my child. For the past few days, I had asked myself why--why us?--trying again to stay rational and not allowing myself extended forays in the deep end of the pity pool. But no answer came. I could see no motive and maybe that was most frightening of all. Maybe there was no reason. Maybe it was just pure bad luck.
Lenny stared straight ahead and waited. Tick, tick, tick.
"Let's tell them," I said.
Their reaction surprised me. They panicked.
Regan and Tickner tried to hide it, of course, but their body language was suddenly all wrong--the flutter in the eyes, the tightness at the corners of their mouths, the unduly modulated, FM-soft-rock timbre in their tones. The time frame was simply too close for them. Tickner quickly dialed up the FBI specialist on kidnapping negotiations to enlist his help. He cupped his hand around the mouthpiece while he spoke into it. Regan got hold of his police colleagues in Paramus.
When Tickner hung up, he said to me, "We'll get people to cover the mall. Discreetly, of course. We're going to try to get men in cars near every exit and on Route Seventeen in both directions. We'll have people inside the mall by all the entrances. But I want you to listen to me closely, Dr. Seidman. Our expert tells us that we should try to stall him. Maybe we can get the kidnapper to postpone--"
"No," I said.
"They won't just run away," Tickner said. "They want the money."
"My daughter has been with them for almost three weeks," I said. "I'm not putting this off."
He nodded, not liking it, trying to keep up with the placid. "Then I want to put a man in the car with you."
"No."
"He can duck down in the back."
"No," I said again.
Tickner tried another avenue. "Or better yet--we've done this before--we tell the kidnapper that you can't drive. Hell, you're just out of the hospital. We have one of our men drive instead. We say it's your cousin."
I frowned and looked at Regan. "Didn't you say you thought my sister might be involved?"
"It's possible, yes."
"Don't you think she'd know if this guy was a cousin or not?"
Tickner and Regan both hesitated and then nodded in unison. "Good point," Regan said.
Lenny and I exchanged a glance. These were the professionals I was trusting with Tara's life. The thought was not comforting. I started for the door.
Tickner put a hand on my shoulder. "Where are you going?"
"Where the hell do you think?"
"Sit down, Dr. Seidman."
"No time," I countered. "I have to start heading up there. There could be traffic."
"We can clear the traffic."
"Oh, and that won't look suspicious," I said.
"I highly doubt he's going to follow you from here."
I spun on him. "And you'd be willing to risk your child's life on that?"
He paused just long enough.
"You don't get it," I went on, in his face now. "I don't care about the money or if they get away. I just want my daughter back."
"We understand that," Tickner said, "but there is something you're forgetting."
"What?"
"Please," he said. "Sit down." "Look, do me a favor, okay? Just let me stand. I'm a doctor. I know the delivering-bad-news drill as well as anyone. Don't try to play me."
Tickner held his palms up and said, "Fair enough." He proceeded to take a long, lingering breath. Stall tactic. I was not in the mood.
"So what is it?" I said.
"Whoever did this," he began, "they shot you. They killed your wife."
"I understand that."
"No, I don't think you do. Think about it a second. We can't just let you go in on your own. Whoever did this tried to end your life. They shot you twice and left you for dead."
"Marc," Regan said, moving closer, "we threw some wild theories at you before. The problem is, that's all they are. Theories. We don't know what these guys are really after. Maybe this is just a simple kidnapping, but if it is, it's not like any we've seen before." His interrogation face was gone now, replaced with an aw-shucks, eyebrow-raised attempt at openness. "What we do know with certainty is that they tried to kill you. You don't try to kill the parents, if you're just after ransom."
"Maybe they planned on getting the money from my father-in-law," I said.
"Then why did they wait so long?"
I had no answer.
"Maybe," Tickner went on, "this isn't about kidnapping at all. At least, not at first. Maybe that's become a sideline. Maybe you and your wife were the targets all along. And maybe they want to finish the job."
"You think this is a setup?"
"It's a strong possibility, yes."
"So what are you advising?"
Tickner took that one. "Don't go alone. Buy us some time so we can prepare properly. Let them call you back."
I looked at Lenny. He saw it and nodded. "That's not possible," Lenny said.
Tickner turned at him hard. "'With all due respect, your client is in grave danger here."
"So is my daughter," I said. Simple words. This decision was a no brainer when you kept it simple. I pulled away and started toward my car. "Keep your people at a distance."
Chapter 5
ThPfP WdS (10 traffic, so I made it to the mall with plenty of time to spare. I turned the engine off and sat back. I glanced around. I figured that the feds and cops were probably still on me, but I couldn't see them. That was a good thing, I guess.
Now what?
No idea. I waited some more. I fiddled with the radio, but nothing caught my attention. I turned on the CD player/tape deck. When Donald Pagan of Steely Clan began singing "Black Cow," I felt a slight jerk. I had not listened to this particular tape since, what, my college days. Why did Monica have it? And then, with a renewed pang, I realized that Monica had been the last to use this car, that this may have been the last song she ever heard.
I watched the shoppers prepare for mall entry. I concentrated on the young mothers; the way they flipped open the back door of the mini van; the way they unfolded the baby strollers midair with a magician's flourish; the way they struggled to release their offspring from safety seats that reminded me of Buzz Aldrin's on Apollo 11; the way the mothers skirted forward, heads high, smartly pressing the remote control that slid the minivan door to a close.
The mothers, all of them, looked so blase. Their children were with them. Their safety, what with the five-star side-collision rating and NASA-sleek car seats, was a given. And here I sat with a bag of ransom money, hoping to get my daughter back. The thin line. I wanted to roll down the window and shout out a warning.
We were getting close to drop time. The sun beat down on my windshield. I reached for my sunglasses but then thought better of it. I don't know why. Would putting on my sunglasses somehow make the kidnapper uneasy? No, I don't think so. Or maybe it would. Better to just leave them off. Take no chances.
My shoulders bunched up. I kept trying to look around without, for some odd reason, looking conspicuous about it. Whenever someone parked near me or walked anywhere in the vicinity of my car, my stomach tightened and I wondered: Was Tara nearby?
We were at the two-hour mark now. I wanted this over. The next few minutes would decide everything. I knew that. Calm. I needed to stay calm. Tickner's warning reverberated in my head. Would someone simply walk up to my car and blow my brains out?
It was, I realized, a very real possibility.
When the cell phone rang, I started forward. I brought it to my ear and barked a too-quick hello.
The robotic voi
ce said, "Pull out by the west exit."
I was confused. "Which way is west?"
"Follow the signs for Route Four. Take the overpass. We're watching. If someone follows, we disappear. Keep the phone near your ear."
I obeyed with gusto; my right hand pressed the phone against my ear to the point where I started losing circulation. My left hand gripped the wheel as if preparing to tear it off.
"Get on Route Four heading west."
I took the right turn and jug-handled onto the highway. I looked in my rearview mirror to see if anyone was following me. Hard to tell.
The robotic voice said, "You'll see a strip mall."
"There's a million strip malls," I said.
"It's on the right, next to a store selling baby cribs. In front of the Paramus Road exit."
I saw it. "Okay."
"Pull in there. You'll see a driveway on the left. Take it to the back and kill the engine. Have the money ready for me."
I understood immediately why the kidnapper had picked this spot. There was only one way in. The stores were all for rent, except for the baby-crib place. That was on the far right. In other words, it was self contained and directly off a highway. There was no way anyone could come around back or even slow down without being noticed.
I hope the feds understood that.
When I reached the back of the building, I saw a man standing by a van. He wore a red-and-black flannel shirt with black jeans, dark sunglasses, and a Yankee baseball cap. I tried to find something distinct, but the word that came to mind was average. Average height, average build. The only thing was his nose. Even from this distance I could see it was misshapen, like an ex-boxer's. But was that real or some kind of disguise? I didn't know.
I checked out the van. There was a sign for "B & The Electricians" of Ridgewood, New Jersey. No phone number or address. The license plate was from New Jersey. I memorized it.
The man raised a cell phone to his lips walkie-talkie style, and I heard the mechanical voice say, "I'm going to approach. Pass the money through the window. Do not get out of the car. Do not say a word to me. When we're safely away with the money, I'll call and tell you where to pick up your daughter."
The man in red flannel and black jeans lowered the phone and approached. His shirt was untucked. Did he have a gun? I couldn't tell. And even if he did, what could I do about it now? I hit the button to open the windows. They didn't budge. The key needed to be turned. The man was getting closer. The Yankee cap Was pulled down until the brim touched the sunglasses. I reached for the key and gave it a tiny twist. The lights on the dashboard sprung to life. I pressed the button again. The window slid down.
Again I tried to find something about the man that was distinct. His walk was slightly off balance, as though maybe he'd had a drink or two, but he didn't look nervous. His face was unshaven and patchy. His hands were dirty. His black jeans were ripped in the right knee. His sneakers, canvas high-tops from Converse, had seen better days.
When the man was only two steps from the car, I pushed the bag up to the window and braced myself. I held my breath. Without breaking stride, the man took the money and swirled toward the van. He hurried his step now. The van's back doors opened and he leapt in, the door immediately closing behind him. It was as if the van had swallowed him whole.
The driver gunned the engine. The van sped off and now, for the first time, I realized that there was a back entrance onto a side road. The van shot down it and was gone.
I was alone.
I stayed where I was and waited for the cell phone to ring. My heart pounded. My shirt was drenched in sweat. No other car traveled back here. The pavement was cracked. Cardboard boxes jutted out of the garbage Dumpster. Broken bottles littered the ground. My eyes stared hard at the ground, trying to make out the words on faded beer labels.
Fifteen minutes passed.
I kept picturing my reunion with my daughter, how I would find her and pick her up and cradle her and hush her with gentle sounds. The cell phone. The cell phone was supposed to ring. That was part of what I was picturing. The phone ringing, the robotic voice giving me instructions. Those were parts one and two. Why wasn't the damn phone cooperating?
A Buick Le Sabre pulled into the lot, keeping a decent distance away from me. I did not recognize the driver, but Tickner was in the passenger seat. Our eyes met. I tried to read something in his expression, but he was still pure stoic.
I stared now at the cell phone, not daring to look away. The tick-tick was back, this time slow and thudding.
Ten more minutes passed before the phone grudgingly issued its tinny song. I had it to my ear before the sound had a chance to travel.
"Hello?" I said.
Nothing.
Tickner watched me closely. He gave me a slight nod, though I had no idea why. His driver still had both hands on the wheel at ten and two o'clock.
"Hello? "I tried again.
The robotic voice said, "I warned you about contacting the cops."
Ice flooded my veins.
"."
And then the phone went dead.
Chapter 6
There was no escape.
I longed for the numb. I longed for the comatose state of the hospital. I longed for that IV bag and the free flow of anesthetics. My skin had been torn off. My nerve endings were exposed now. I could feel everything.
Fear and helplessness overwhelmed me. The fear locked me in a room, while the helplessness--the awful knowing that I had blown it and could do nothing to alleviate my child's pain--wrapped me in a straitjacket and turned out the lights. I may very well have been losing my mind.
Days passed in a syrupy haze. Most of the time I sat by the phone-- by several phones, actually. My home phone, my cell phone, and the kidnapper's cell phone. I bought a charger for the kidnapper's cell, so I could keep it working. I stayed on the couch. The phones sat on my right. I tried to look away, to watch television even, because I remembered that old saying about a watched kettle never boiling. I still stole glances at those damn phones, fearing that they, might somehow flee, willing them to ring.
I tried to mine that supernatural father-daughter connection again, the one that had insisted earlier that Tara was still alive. The pulse was still there, I thought (or at least, made myself believe), beating faintly, the connection now tenuous at best.
"..."
To add to my guilt, I had dreamt last night of a woman other than Monica--my old love, Rachel. It was one of those time-and-reality warp dreams, the ones where the world is totally alien and even contradictory and yet you don't question any of it. Rachel and I were together. We had never broken up yet we had been apart all these years. I was still thirty-four, but she hadn't aged since the day she left me. Tara was still my daughter in the dream--she had, in fact, never been kidnapped-- but somehow she was also Rachel's, though Rachel wasn't the mother. You've probably had dreams like this. Nothing really makes sense, but you don't challenge what you see. When I woke up, the dream faded into smoke the way dreams always do. I was left with an aftertaste and a longing that pulled with unexpected force.
My mother hung around too much. She had just plopped another tray of food in front of me. I ignored it and for the millionth time, Mom repeated her mantra: "You have to keep up your strength for Tara."
"Right, Mom, strength is the key here. Maybe if I do enough bench presses, that'll bring her back."
Mom shook her head, refusing to rise to the bait. It was a cruel thing to say. She was hurting too. Her granddaughter was missing and her son was in horrific shape. I watched her sigh and head back to the kitchen. I didn't apologize.
Tickner and Regan visited frequently. They reminded me of Shakespeare's sound and fury signifying nothing. They told me about all the technological wonders that were being utilized in the quest to find Tara--stuff involving DNA and latent prints and security cameras and airports and tollbooths and train stations and tracers and surveillance and labs. They trotted out the tried-and-true cop cli
ches like "no stone unturned" and "every possible avenue." I nodded at them. They had me look at mug shots, but the bagman in flannel was not in any of the books.
"We ran a trace on B and The Electricians," Regan told me that first night. "The company exists, but they use magnetic signs, the kind you can just peel off a truck. Someone stole one two months ago. They never thought it was worth reporting."
"What about the license plate?" I asked.
"The number you gave us doesn't exist."
"How can that be?"
"They used two old license plates," Regan explained. "See, what they do is, they cut the license plates in half and then they weld the left half of one with the right half of the other."
I just stared at him.
"There is something of a bright side to that," Regan added.
"Oh?"
"It means we're dealing with professionals. They knew that if you contacted us, we'd be set up at the mall. They found a drop spot that we couldn't get to without being seen. They have us tracking down useless leads with the fake sign and welded license plates. Like I said, they're pros."
"And that's good because . . . ?"
"Pros usually aren't bloodthirsty."
"So what are they doing?"
"Our theory," Regan said, "is that they're softening you up, so they can ask for more money."
Softening me up. It was working.
My father-in-law called after the ransom fiasco. I could hear the disappointment in Edgar's voice. I don't want to sound unkind here-- Edgar was the one who provided the money and made it clear he would do so again--but the disappointment sounded more aimed at me, at the fact that I had not taken his advice about not contacting the police, than at the final outcome.
Of course, he was right about that. I had messed up big time.
I tried to participate in the investigation, but the police were far from encouraging. In the movies the authorities cooperate and share information with the victim. I naturally asked Tickner and Regan a lot of questions about the case. They didn't answer. They never discussed specifics with me. They treated my interrogatories with near disdain. I wanted to know, for example, more about how my wife was found, about why she'd been naked. They stonewalled.
Lenny was at the house a lot. He had trouble meeting my eye because he, too, blamed himself for encouraging me to come forward. The faces of Regan and Tickner fluctuated between guilt because everything had gone so wrong and guilt of another kind, like maybe I, the grieving husband and father, had been behind this from the get-go. They wanted to know about my shaky marriage to Monica. They wanted to know about my missing gun. It was exactly as Lenny had predicted. The more time passed, the more the authorities aimed their sights on the only available suspect.