Time was always the friend of the negotiator, wearing down kidnappers, stretching their resources, lowering their expectations. But for the hostages and their friends and family, every second of every hour had to be torturous, not knowing if their loved ones were alive and suffering, or already dead.
Dominic got on the phone to the State Department before everyone went home for the day. As he waited to be connected, he thought again about Ava Kanas, the way she’d flinched away from him when he’d gone to touch the injury on her cheek.
At some point someone had hit her hard enough to scar her. Was it an old injury from her childhood or something more recent? It made him furious, but she didn’t seem like the sort of woman who would want his sympathy or his pity.
He clasped the back of his neck as State put him on hold. There was definitely something about her that intrigued him. Maybe it was seeing that vulnerability combined with her bravery…not only when going after the shooter but in voicing her opinion in front of the director. That took balls.
Did she have a Charlotte in her life to make her feel better? Would her boss make sure she didn’t suffer any ill-effects from the shooting? Make her visit the Bureau shrink?
Van would’ve.
Would Aldrich?
Dominic tossed down his pen and rubbed his eyes as he was passed from person to person in Washington. There was probably a boyfriend on the scene to hold Kanas’s hand if she needed comfort. The idea sat sourly. Which was stupid. It wasn’t like he’d see her again and even if he did, he never dated agents and that went double for younger agents.
He laughed at his own ego. Who the hell said she’d look at him twice? She was a beautiful woman and might not even be into guys.
He pushed her out of his mind as he finished with State and then called Savage with an update. Then his cell rang and Dominic looked at the caller ID.
The Governor of Vermont was on the line.
He stared at the screen until eventually the call went to voicemail. Then he stood and grabbed his jacket. Maybe he needed that drink after all.
Chapter Three
The piece of paper on the table contained a list of ten names. Two had died of natural causes. One man’s cancer traced to his work at Ground Zero. Sad, yes, but only because he’d gotten off easy. Three names had already been crossed out this year. Each death had been deemed natural or accidental, including Van Stamos, whose suicide had been perfectly staged and made gratifyingly ugly.
A thick green marker was dragged over the name “Calvin Mortimer” with a sense of grim satisfaction. It had been a tossup, who to shoot. Only three names remained on the list, the most important being Dominic Sheridan. It had been tempting to put a bullet in him today, but like the man who’d succumbed to cancer, that would be letting him off easy. Sheridan deserved to suffer the most. The prospect of the slowly dawning horror he’d feel once he realized he was being hunted was extremely satisfying.
Carefully, the green marker was capped, the piece of paper folded and slipped into a desk drawer. Then the drawer was locked.
A phone rang in the distance. Revenge needed to be total, complete. A veritable masterclass in murder. Peter would be so proud.
Chapter Four
“Make Jennifer McCredie out of the San Francisco Field Office your lead negotiator, but don’t put her in first.” Dominic was talking to a police chief of a small town outside Sacramento where a man had holed himself up with his ex-wife, young son, and a smorgasbord of semi-automatic weapons. “Get one of the other negotiators to do some of the preliminary leg work. Get the man talking. Make him feel like you’re listening to his problems and that you care about what’s happening to him and no one is going to get hurt. After a few hours let Jennifer talk to him.” It would take her that long to arrive on scene anyway.
There was a pause on the other end of the line. “The guy shot a waitress at a fast food joint and seems to have a raging hatred of women. What makes you think he’ll want to talk to this Jennifer person?”
Because Jennifer is the top negotiator on the west coast?
Dominic rubbed his face, glad he wasn’t on video. He didn’t indulge very often but after yesterday’s debacle he’d allowed himself a few beers with the others and had woken up with a hangover. Charlotte had poured him into a taxi at midnight.
The woman was a saint.
Dominic drank from a bottle of water he kept on his desk. “My experience is that getting a woman to really listen to him is exactly what this guy craves.” The waitress had insisted the hostage-taker leave the restaurant when he made a scene with the ex-wife. The waitress had threatened to call the police when he’d refused to go quietly. So, he’d shot her. “Jennifer can get him talking, provide an empathetic ear.”
Over the years, Dominic had noted that many of the people who took hostages were men who felt like they were losing control of what they saw as their property. Their wives left them or simply wanted some independence, and the men couldn’t handle it.
The police chief grunted. “I asked his old boss and brother to come down here to talk to him. Was that a mistake?”
Dominic squeezed the bridge of his nose. “It’s great that you interview them, but don’t let them talk to the hostage-taker.”
“Why not?”
“Because you’ve no idea the type of relationship they have or what resentments the husband might harbor. If the hostage-taker is the suspicious type he might think one of them is involved with the ex-wife. Trust me, it’s happened.” With deadly consequences.
The chief made a frustrated noise.