The Wrong Hostage

24

ALL SAINTS SCHOOL

SUNDAY AFTERNOON

THE SUN WAS HIDDEN behind a seething silver mass of clouds. Waves humped up man high, higher, then exploded on the beach in a boil of sand and froth. The wind whipped wave tops into a salty mist. Onshore, the wind stripped fine sand from the beach and scored unprotected skin.

Faroe spotted Grace and Lane sitting together, watching the wild waves. The boy’s shoulders were hunched in fatigue, his mother’s in tension. Neither seemed to notice the seagulls wheeling and keening above them, begging for scraps.

The armed guards lounged twenty yards up the beach, smoking and waiting, watching, always watching.

Grace sensed Faroe’s approach and turned to look at him. Her face was smooth, expressionless. She was working hard to keep her fears under control.

Good for you, woman, Faroe thought, even if Lane reads you like a billboard. Both of you get points for trying to help each other.

“Time to go,” Faroe said to Grace.

She started to object, then swallowed it.

Lane stood up, disappointed but not surprised.

They walked back across the beach together. Sand peppered cloth and skin. Pretending to turn from a gust of stinging wind, Faroe checked the guards’ position.

They couldn’t overhear.

“Listen to me,” Faroe said in a low voice to Lane. “You can trust Father Rafael, but only up to a point. Don’t tell him about the phone or the computer. But if you believe it’s all going from sugar to shit, make sure he knows.”

Lane nodded.

“Lay off the orange juice,” Faroe said. “Pour it down the drain when nobody’s looking, act zoned if you want to, but keep a clear head. It’s your best weapon. You can help us, but only if you’re in control of yourself.”

Lane nodded again and gave Faroe an uncertain smile. “Thanks.”

“We’re going to get you out of this,” Grace said tightly. “I promise.”

“I’m okay,” the boy said. “I just wish…” His voice died.

“Go ahead,” she said.

“I just wish I knew what Dad’s doing in all this.”

Sweet bugger all, thought Faroe.

“So do I,” Grace said.

When they reached the cottage, mother and son went in. Faroe stayed outside, letting them have their private good-bye. Several minutes later Grace walked out looking furious and frightened.

“He’s fine,” she hissed under her breath. “He got it hidden.” Beneath her fear, there was a bitter kind of anger in her voice.

Faroe didn’t say anything until they were back in the Mercedes and leaving the campus. Then he dragged the satellite cell phone out of his bag and punched up a number out of its memory.

When the call was answered, he spoke quickly. “Get me technical support.” He only had to wait a few seconds. “This is Faroe. Search the tech inventory. I had an experimental Motorola checked out about a year ago. I didn’t bother to return it when I bailed last week. Do me a favor. Activate the GPS pinger on it and get me a lat-lon reading.”

“Hold, please.”

“Holding,” Faroe said.

Grace looked over. “What are you doing?”

Faroe waved off her question. A few seconds later, St. Kilda tech support came back on the line. Faroe listened and memorized.

“One seventeen by thirty-two ten,” Faroe said. “Good, it’s working fine. Now set an alarm perimeter on it. If the damn thing moves more than two nautical miles, let me know ASAP.”

“Twenty-four/seven monitoring?”

“Yes. I know it costs a lot. Call Steele if you have to, but mount that watch now. After the monitor is in place, tell research to find out who owns the Encantamar hotel and Cancion restaurant in Ensenada. Got that?”

“Yes.”

Faroe punched the call off and turned to Grace. “You were saying?”

“What are you doing?” she repeated.

“Just what it sounded like-setting up a passive surveillance on your son. As long as he can keep the phone within arm’s reach, we’ll know where he is.”

“That’s too dangerous. What if they find out?”

Faroe turned onto the toll road and headed south, toward Ensenada. “What are they going to do, spank him? Come on, Your Honor, get serious.”

“I am,” she shot back. “You might as well have given him a loaded gun.”

“Hell of an idea. Did you have one handy?” Faroe gave her a hard sideways look. “I didn’t think so.”

“You’re crazy! If they find that phone, they’ll know that I-”

“Look,” Faroe cut across her words, telling himself to be patient, she was under a hellish strain. “All they’ll know is that someone gave him a way to communicate with Mom. What’s important is that Lane feels like he’s connected, not cut off, not so much a prisoner.”

“But-”

“Despair is the prisoner’s worst enemy,” Faroe said flatly. “Right now, Lane feels like he has a way of controlling his own fate. We need him level, not panicked or shut down.”

“You didn’t see how scared he was underneath the drugs and the don’t-worry-Mom talk.”

“Your son is a tough, savvy kid. Let him use that. It could make the difference between getting free and getting dead.”

“He’s barely fifteen!”

“A lot of kids don’t make it that long. Life’s only money-back guarantee is that you die.”

Grace simply stared at Faroe and bit back all the words she wanted to scream.

You don’t understand! Would you be so damned calm if you knew Lane was your son?

Or is it different for men? Don’t they get the importance of children? Sex, yes, that’s important to men.

But not babies.

Even their own.

Yet part of Grace was afraid that Faroe would be different. He would care, and in caring, hate her for what he’d never known.

Damned if I do and damned if I don’t. So don’t.

Don’t think about it.

Any of it.

You can’t change the past. You can’t foresee the future. You can only live now, this moment.

And don’t scream.

Whatever you do, don’t scream.

But she wanted to scream so much she felt like she was being strangled.

Grace turned away and stared out the window so that Faroe wouldn’t somehow sense the bleak warfare pulsing beneath her silence.