The Wrong Hostage

22

ALL SAINTS SCHOOL

SUNDAY AFTERNOON

GRACE GLANCED QUICKLY AT Faroe, not knowing how much to tell Lane.

“How bad do you think it is?” Faroe asked the boy.

Lane was silent for a moment, but he was thinking hard. In the ocean air he seemed more alert. He looked at his mother, then at the hard-faced man she’d brought with her.

“I’m really a prisoner, right?” the boy asked.

Grace wanted to soften Lane’s words.

Faroe stopped her.

“I know this is tough,” he said, touching her hair gently, “but we won’t get anywhere by sugarcoating it.”

Faroe looked at the boy, who was only a few inches shorter than himself, and said bluntly, “You’re a hostage.”

Lane blinked. Then he raked his fingers through his hair and yanked, trying to force himself to focus. “I can’t think!”

“They’re drugging you,” Faroe said. “Probably only in the orange juice.”

“What?” Lane said sharply.

“Keep your voice down,” Faroe said. “It’s probably a sedative. It’s a common tactic for controlling hostages. They don’t want to hurt you. They just want to keep you fuzzy.”

“Okay,” Lane said. “Okay. That’s good. I was thinking I was getting really sick or going crazy or something. The nightmares…Jesus. I can’t believe people spend money to feel like crap.”

“You’re not crazy,” Grace said quickly, squeezing his shoulders with her arm. “You’re the sanest person in a crazy mess.”

“Hostage,” Lane said, tasting the word, testing the reality. “So what am I hostage for? What do they want? Money from Dad?”

“We don’t know for sure,” Faroe said. “We should know more in the next day.”

“But if you don’t know, how can-”

“Honey, Joe’s a professional at this sort of thing,” Grace cut in, reaching over to smooth the hair out of her son’s eyes. “He’s the best there is. But he’s only been on the job a few hours. He needs more time to investigate.”

Lane glanced at Faroe with new interest. “A professional? Really?”

“That just means people pay me money. But yeah, I’ve dealt with hostiles like your Chicharrones Brigade. They’re just dumb soldiers. We need to find out who the generals are.”

That triggered something in Lane’s drugged mind. He turned to his mother. “Where’s Dad?” he asked urgently.

“I-I’ve-” Grace began, but her voice cracked.

“We haven’t been able to reach him,” Faroe said. “Why do you ask?”

“Because Mr. Calderon came to see me yesterday, today too. I think. It’s all kind of…fuzzy. He brought juice and food and asked me where Dad was.”

“Carlos Calderon?” Grace asked.

Lane fought to call up the memory. Like a lot of reality since his mother had left, memory was slippery. He frowned, remembering the past twenty-four hours in bits and pieces, flashes of light and darkness. “Yeah, Mr. Calderon was kind of pissed, uh, mad when I told him I didn’t know where Dad was. Like he thought I was lying. I think he hit me a couple of times. Can’t really remember. Nightmare…”

Grace’s hand clenched hard around Lane’s shoulder and she bit back every word she wanted to scream.

“Why isn’t Dad here?” Lane asked. “Calderon said I could go home if Dad came down to sign me out.”

Grace looked away, hiding the tears and rage and fear in her eyes.

“Your mom’s pretty upset about this,” Faroe said calmly. “She hasn’t been able to contact your dad. It’s one of our top priorities.”

Lane stared at the sand.

“Do you have any idea where your dad might be?” Faroe asked.

Lane’s answer was a shake of the head. Then he looked up at Faroe. “I haven’t heard from him in weeks. He used to come down on a helicopter once every three or four weeks, supposedly to drop in to say hi to me, but he spent hours talking with somebody at the school office and barely waved at me.”

Grace’s heart turned over. No matter how tall Lane was, how fast he was growing, he was only a few months past being fourteen. He was a boy whose world had been turned upside down.

“We’ll find your dad, get this thing straightened out,” Faroe said. “Don’t worry.” He reached over and gave the boy a poke on the shoulder, man-to-man stuff that was cover for a quick glance back toward the guards.

They were smoking and laughing. Forty feet away, maybe more.

With the skill of a pickpocket, Faroe pulled a flat, compact cell phone out of his jeans. He palmed the phone and gave it to Lane, shielding the exchange with his body.

“Hide this in your room,” Faroe said in a low, intent voice. “We need to stay in touch in a way that the Chicharrones Brigade can’t monitor.”

Lane looked down at the phone in his hand. “Cool.”

“Don’t look at it,” Faroe said. “Don’t look at them. Look at me. Don’t look away from me when you put the phone in your shorts.”

The boy turned his body slightly, slipped the phone into one of the many pockets in his cargo shorts, and never stopped looking at Faroe.

“Good,” Faroe said. “The battery is fully charged, but I didn’t have time to get fresh batteries brought in. We have to decide on a communications schedule.”

The boy put his hands in his pockets and tried to match Faroe’s relaxed stance. “Gotcha.”

Faroe smiled. Once the drugs got out of the kid’s system, he’d be a pistol.

“Every night, at one A.M.,” Faroe said, “pull out the antenna and turn on the phone. It’s set to vibrate, not ring, so they won’t hear it outside the cottage. If I haven’t called you by five minutes after one, shut down and power up again at five in the morning. Can you do that?”

Lane thought a moment. “One might be a little tough but I’m used to getting up early for the twice-a-day workouts. I’ll figure something out.”

“Set an alarm and put it under your pillow so the guards can’t hear it.”

“You do sneak around for a living, don’t you?” Lane said with genuine admiration.

“The first thing I ever needed to hide was a Playboy magazine. I know all the teenager tricks.”

Lane flushed and gave his mother a quick sideways glance.

Grace didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “It’s okay, baby-Lane. It comes with age and the Y gene.”

The boy looked relieved and embarrassed at the same time. He glanced back to Faroe. “Can I call you?”

“Only if you’re certain you’re in immediate danger, the kind of situation my boss-ex-boss-calls a matter of extreme urgency.”

Grace flinched, remembering how Dwayne had defined it: A terrorist with a gun held against a hostage’s head.

“But I don’t think that will happen,” Faroe said. “The negotiations haven’t really opened yet.”

Swallowing hard, Lane nodded.

“The other reason to call me is if you hear from your dad,” Faroe added. “Just hit the speed dialer. There’s only one number in the memory. It will ring in New York, but whoever answers will always know how to get hold of me and your mom. If they can’t reach us for some reason, ask for James Steele. You have all that?”

Lane nodded and touched the pocket where he’d concealed the phone. He grinned at Faroe.

“Thanks,” he said. “I already know where I’m going to hide it.”

Faroe tapped him on the shoulder. “Good. If I’m going to make burros of the bad guys, I need your help.”

Grace saw a sudden proud smile spread across her son’s face. He was in charge of his own fate now, in a way he hadn’t been when she and Joe arrived.

He understands Lane better than Ted ever did. Or ever wanted to.

A familiar mixture of sadness and anger swept through her. She crushed it. Lane needed her focused on helping him, not on her past mistakes.

Faroe gripped Lane’s shoulder gently. “Okay. Now I want you and your mom to kill twenty minutes looking at the gulls and the waves and talking about soccer and grades and the girls you never see anymore. If I’m not back by then, go to your cottage. I’ll meet you there. And don’t worry about the guards. They’re on a short leash.” For now.

“Where are you going?” Grace asked.

Faroe didn’t answer. He just headed with long strides toward the chapel.

Grace started talking about soccer.

One of the guards braced Faroe as he walked past.

“Where do you go?” the guard demanded.

“Church,” Faroe said. “To pray for the boy’s safety.”

The guard’s smile was as thin as a new moon. “You are wise.”