Stolen Omnibus – Small Town Abduction (13 page)

Jake pulled her close, and Lena allowed herself the moment of weakness. There were only a few quick sobs, and once it was out of her system, once she let herself feel it, she felt better. But the peaceful moment was short lived.

A few of the officers by the cluster of squad cars suddenly sprinted across the lawn toward Jake. “Sheriff, I think we have a hit on one of the Amber Alerts.”

Lena grabbed the deputy by the collar, nearly wringing his neck. “Who?”

The deputy glanced between Jake and Lena, his voice slightly trembling. “A girl matching Kaley’s description was seen ten miles away in Loredo, coming out of a gas station. The guy didn’t get a good look at the car but said it was a sedan, which matches the description of the car that took the Foreman girl.”

Lena let the deputy go and started marching toward Jake’s truck. “I’m coming with you.”

“Lena, you can’t—”

“If you want me to stop, then you’ll have to handcuff me to the house.” Jake’s hesitation made her think he considered it, but when she watched the hard lines creased in his forehead soften, she relaxed.

“You do not get out of the car,” Jake said, the two jogging to the truck amid the cluster of deputies heading for their vehicles. “And you do everything I tell you to.”

“Whatever gets my daughter back.” Lena found Gwen on the way over and kissed her daughter one last time. “I’ll be back soon. Stay at the house.” The truck door rattled when she slammed it shut. She rolled down the window, her eyes still locked on Gwen. “I love you.”

But before she heard a response Jake peeled out of the front yard, speeding down the dirt road that led to the highway, flipping on the lights. Her heart skipped a beat when he turned on the siren, which scattered the reporters still camped out on the side of the road, and her mind and heart were suddenly flooded with something that she hadn’t felt in a very long time, probably since before she was elected into the state assembly. It was hope.

Chapter 12 – 24 Hours Left

Jake’s rearview and both of his side mirrors reflected the blue and red lights of the dozen squad cars that were behind him. The landscape passed in a blur, and when Lena looked at the speedometer of his truck she saw the needle tip past one hundred miles per hour. She squirmed in her seat, unable to sit still, scanning the night horizon, but saw nothing except the black asphalt that blended seamlessly into the night sky. “How much farther?”

“We’re only a few miles from the town.” Jake pivoted the GPS stand on his dash toward Lena and pointed to an approaching east-west highway that intersected their path. “The gas attendant said that the car with the girl turned west here. The call came in ten minutes ago, so with their head start they’re probably somewhere around here.” His finger barely moved, but the half inch in lateral position looked to be ten to fifteen miles. “I’ve got Stark County setting up a road block thirty miles out, so if they see anything, we’ll know about it soon enough.”

The large red dot on the screen that represented their position pulsed and crawled much slower along the map than their actual speed suggested. Lena looked to the horizon once more and saw the faint glow of a town up the road. She wondered what Kaley was wearing, if the kidnapper made her change, or cut her hair, or—
Stop it.
She shook the thoughts out of her mind.

The radio crackled, and a grainy voice echoed through the speaker. Jake snatched the receiver up and clicked the talk button. “Say again?”

“Stark County officers have a car that spun around when it saw the road block. It’s a light-blue Ford Taurus heading east on Highway 9.”

The intersection to the highway was ahead, and Lena watched the same car speed past in a blur, followed by a large cluster of police vehicles in pursuit just a few seconds later.

“Copy that!” Jake tossed the radio’s receiver down and turned the steering wheel hard left. Lena’s shoulder slammed into the inside of the door paneling, and she clawed the dashboard to pull herself forward.

The engine to Jake’s truck revved loudly as he passed the squad cars. The dotted lines that separated the sides of the road blurred beneath them in a single yellow line in the glow of the headlights and passed beneath them quickly to the left, then to the right, Jake swerving to get to the front of the pack.

It didn’t take long before they saw the taillights of the light-blue sedan, the vehicle dented and dirty. Headlights shined off the license plate, and Lena squinted, swiveling her head to try and get a better look into the fleeing car’s rear windshield. But despite her efforts, she saw nothing. She slammed her palm on the dash once they reached the front of the pack. “Can’t we blow the tires?”

Jake had both arms locked tight and rigid from wrist to shoulder, with his palms pressed hard against the wheel, trying to keep them steady at their dangerously high speeds. “We try and pull out the spikes on them, or run them off the road at this speed, and we could seriously hurt the people inside.”

With the highway flat and straight and the sedan’s speed topped out at 110 miles per hour, there was little they could do but either wait for the car to stop, or have them run out of gas. But when Lena felt her chest tug against the seat belt she looked to Jake. “They’re slowing down?”

“Yeah.” Jake reached for the radio, the color of his hands and knuckles drained from the prolonged grip on the steering wheel. “All units, be advised the suspect is slowing. I repeat, suspect is—”

When he cut himself off Lena furrowed her brow. “What is it?” He was staring at something ahead, and when Lena followed his line of sight she saw it too.

“There is a structure ahead, looks like an old barn,” Jake said.

The sedan veered left and pulled onto the grass, bouncing wildly over the uneven earth on its projection toward the dilapidated building. Jake pulled off the road in pursuit, evading the blinding dust kicked up from the sedan’s tires.

Lena clutched the door handle with her right hand and the dash with her left as she tried to steady herself from the harsh vibrations of the rough terrain. The barn doors were open slightly, and when Lena noticed the car wasn’t slowing she lunged forward, the seat belt stopping her advances. “No!”

Wood splintered and dust erupted in the collision as the sedan burst inside the barn. Jake slammed on the brakes, and the truck skidded to a stop less than twenty yards from where the sedan entered. He reached for his seat belt and unbuckled it. “Stay in the truck.” The hinges rattled when he opened the door, but despite the order and her agreement to do exactly what he said, Lena unbuckled as well.

Dust swirled in the glow of the dozens of headlights from the police vehicles that surrounded the barn on all sides. Deputies drew their pistols and sought cover behind their car doors. Lena felt hands on her shoulders yank her back to the truck, and though she resisted, the arms overpowered her.

Jake pinned her against the side of the truck and thrust a finger in her face. “Don’t. Move.” He let her go and reached for the radio inside his truck. “Get air support out here immediately in case they decide to make another run. I want to be able to track them. And no one shoots unless I give the order.” A series of confirmations echoed back, and he tossed the radio aside, pulling his own weapon.

Lena wiped the sweat from her eyes, an overwhelming heat consuming her body. She paced frantically, watching the barn and listening to the sporadic radio chatter echo through the open doors of the squad cars. She tried squinting through the warped wooden boards of the barn walls to see inside, but she was just too far away.

After a few minutes of no movement, Lena watched Jake reach for the radio once more, and his voice blared from the PA system of his truck. “This is Sheriff Jake Cooley of Dunn County. You are surrounded. We have air support en route. All we want is a peaceful resolution to this. And in order for that to happen I need everyone to come out of that building, unarmed, with their hands in the air.” He clicked the radio off, and a quick burst of feedback squealed into the night air.

Lena stepped next to Jake, her eyes glued to the broken entrance of the barn doors. The silence after the announcement eroded what was left of Lena’s patience, and she snatched the radio from Jake’s hand. “This is Lena Hayes.” The radio blared her voice, and she winced from the volume. “If you have my daughter, please, let her go.” Jake tried to take the radio from her hands, but she blocked his arms, and he eventually let her be. “If you’re so concerned about the bill, then take me in her place. I’m more valuable. I’m the one who created it. I’m the one who helped get it to pass in the town hall. It’s my responsibility. Please.” Her hand ached from the prolonged tight grip, her fingers curled around the small black receiver. The longer the silence from the barn lingered, the deeper Lena’s heart sank. Her shoulders sagged, and her arms hung limp at her sides.

“Lena comes in!” The voice was faint and was quickly swallowed up by the night sky, but it was there. “She comes in alone! No one else!”

Without a word Lena stepped forward, but Jake pulled her back. “No, I’m not letting you go in there alone.” He glanced around to the deputies that surrounded them. “There isn’t anyone here that wants this to end in a bloodbath. We find another way.”

“By the time you find another way Kaley might be dead.”

“And what if it’s not Kaley?” Jake asked. “What if it’s the Foreman girl, or someone else altogether? You don’t know what you’re walking into, Lena.”

“I don’t care what I’m walking into.” Lena spit the words through gritted teeth. The nerves and butterflies, the hesitation and fear, all of it was shoved aside. “If there is a one percent chance that my daughter is in that building, then I’m going to do whatever I need to in order to get her back. Now you can either let me go in, or shoot me, because that’s the only way you’re going to stop me!”

When Jake reached around to his back she shuddered, thinking the handcuffs were near. But when he extended the small revolver to her, she froze.

“Take it.” Jake grabbed her hand and forced the pistol’s grip into her palm. “Keep it tucked under your shirt. Don’t let them get close enough to pat you down. And
only
take a shot if it’s the last resort. Understand?”

Lena stared at the silver pistol, which was heavier than she expected it to be. She nodded and slowly tucked it in the back of her waistband as instructed.

“Keep them talking. It’ll give our shooters time to find an open spot. But the moment we hear any gunshots or screams, we’re coming inside.” Jake wrapped his thick fingers around her shoulders, and she felt him shaking, or that could have been her. She couldn’t tell. He hugged her and kissed her cheek.

Lena smiled nervously and then stepped around the truck’s open door and toward the barn. Despite her racing pulse, she found that her feet were slow to move. The headlights from the squad cars cast her shadow long and tall over the front of the barn, and it grew larger with each step. She knew the size was only a trick of the light, but she hoped that it frightened whoever was inside.

The pistol was bulky and awkward and dug into her back every time she swung her hips, but she drew a small amount of courage from its presence. When she finally reached the barn door’s entrance, she hesitated. The moment she stepped inside her life would change, and it would either get better or worse. There was no middle ground here. Fear, hate, anger, despair, every bad thought and feeling she’d ever had flooded her mind. But despite what she was afraid of finding, she stepped through the door.

The light from the police cars flooded the cracks of the old barn and revealed small snippets of what was inside. Bales of hay, a rusted tractor, empty wooden stalls, and in the middle of the floor the light-blue sedan, which still had its parking lights on and was puffing exhaust. All four car doors were open, but from where she stood she couldn’t see anyone inside.

“I’m here.” Lena placed one foot in front of the other, scanning the darkness. She crunched over decaying bits of hay and the loose topsoil. She kept her hands close to her sides, wanting to reach for the pistol and the security it provided, but denied herself the reprieve.

“Stop!” The voice was shrill and panicked, but Lena complied, freezing in place as if the next step would be her last.

Lena tried to pinpoint the voice’s origin but lost it in the darkness. “Just come out, and no one has to get hurt.” She remained frozen, craning her neck, and her vision sweeping across the barn. “Just let my daughter go.”

Feet shuffled to her left, and when Lena turned she stared down the barrel of a pistol. She followed the hand to the shoulder and then examined the face of the woman staring back at her. It took her a second in the dark of the barn, but eventually her eyes adjusted. “Carla?”

The sweat on Carla Knox’s face shimmered from what light penetrated through the cracks in the barn walls. Her right arm held the pistol, and her left held the neck of Emily Foreman. “They can’t get away with it, Lena.” Dark circles rested under her eyes, but her glare was alert and wild. “They hurt my family. And now I’m going to hurt theirs.” She pulled the little girl, who sobbed quietly, closer to her and put the gun to her head.

Lena held up her hands, keeping them both where Carla could see. She moved slowly, afraid that any jerk or movement would trigger an event that neither would be able to undo. “Carla, you need to let the girl go.”

“What about my daughter, Lena? Are the tumors that are killing her kidneys and liver going to let her go? Is my husband going to wake up from his coma? Are the burns he received from the rig explosion going to disappear?” Carla shook her head. “We tried talking to them. We tried doing it the right way, and look where it got us.” She pressed the end of the pistol harder into the girl’s head. “Look what happened to you. They took your daughter.” She smiled. “So I took one of theirs.”

Despite the lunacy dripping in Carla’s tone, those same thoughts had crossed Lena’s mind as well. An eye for an eye. A tooth for a tooth.
A daughter for a daughter.
Wasn’t this the daughter of the same man that led a coup to kill her and what remained of her family less than an hour ago? Didn’t this girl’s mother publicly denounce every attempt that she made to bring New Energy to justice? It was. But those injustices lay with her parents. Not the girl. “Carla, Emily had nothing to do with what happened to your daughter, or your husband. And she most certainly didn’t have anything to do with what happened to my daughter.” She looked down to Emily’s face and saw the steady stream of tears flowing down the girl’s cheeks. “This isn’t going to help anyone.”