"Crying doesn't help."
"We should pray." A man across the circle rocked gently back and forth. "We should put our faith in the Lord."
"Can't hurt." But Ma was putting a good chunk of her faith in the men outside with guns. "Hush now," she repeated. "Patsy, isn't it? Hush up now, Patsy. That woman he's talking to? She's smart."
"How do you know?"
Loo squeezed her mother-in-law's hand fiercely, gave a quick shake of her head. "She sounds smart. She'll find out what he wants, and everything's going to be fine."
They circled each other for more than an hour before he broke communications again. "He's stalling. He wants to string this out, make it last.
There's something he wants to make me do, but he's not ready yet. It's under there, I can hear it under there."
"He's enjoying it," Duncan told her. "He likes telling you no. No food, no water, no medical supplies. He's cruising on it."
"Agreed, for now."
"He's not going to let any of them out." Sykes sat down beside Phoebe. "He doesn't want anything in exchange, and if he did, he knows that releasing any of the hostages is our advantage. They can give us inside intel, make it simpler to shut this down."
"They can't get a shot." Vince walked over to the situation board, gestured to the sketch of the interior of the store. "He's in this corner, northeast corner, and there's no shot. That's why he's there."
"He's been on the other side," Phoebe concurred. "He's familiarized himself with the layout, with the angles."
"They need to go in. Back door's the only way. A frontal assault gives him too much time. They need to deal with the explosives on the rear door."
"And if they make a mistake, if he's got an alarm on it, and it goes or blows, he'll end it."
"You have to get him out of the corner," Duncan said, and Phoebe turned to him.
"Yes, I do."
"If they can't get an angle on him, he doesn't have one on them."
"That's right." Phoebe closed her hand briefly over Duncan's. "That's exactly right. I need to talk to the commander. I need to know where to move him, if possible." She signaled to Sykes to make the call. "They have to let me know when they're going to take him. I know that's not how it's usually done, but they can trust me not to let him know it's coming. I have to move him; they have to know that's coming."
"Got it." Sykes turned with his radio to signal the command post. Shoving her hair off her damp neck, Phoebe paced, tried to put herself inside the shop. "He's going to have to let them use the bathroom at some point, unless he wants a big mess on his hands. And he doesn't. One bathroom, employees', right in the back room." She narrowed her eyes at the sketch. "How does he plan to work this? He'd have thought it through already, have a system ready. That's why he doesn't have all the hostages in the circle. Holding one back to release another. He doesn't have to move or interact with them to handle the basic function. But it's going to be distracting, and he'll have to be alert. He won't want to talk to me while that's going on."
She nodded. "And we're not giving him what he wants."
Time, she thought, to start playing him. She picked up the phone, called.
"Better be you, bitch."
"It's always going to be me, Jerry. You know how this goes. No lying to a hostage-taker, it puts the hostages at risk. No saying no to a hostage-taker, it pisses them off, and puts the hostages at risk. I'm supposed to empathize with you, be supportive of your feelings, listen to your demands and complaints."
"Yeah, you were damn sympathetic with the bastards who shot Angie."
"Angela was a beautiful woman. She loved you."
"Fuck you. You don't care about her."
"You've made me care, Jerry. I'm in love with someone, maybe you don't feel I deserve to be, but I'm in love. So I understand how Angela felt about you. I understand something of what you're feeling, because if anything happened to him, I don't know what I'd do."
"You don't know what we had."
"You had something special, something once in a lifetime. She was wearing your ring, Jerry. She was wearing it when she died."
"What?"
"The ring you bought her in the store where you are now. She must've treasured it. She must have been thrilled to wear it. I wanted you to know that, Jerry. I called to tell you because it proves to everyone she was yours."
"Everyone can go to hell."
"If something like this had happened to me, I'd want everyone to know what we meant to each other. How much we loved each other. I think you want that, too, Jerry. I want to tell you that I do know it."
There was a long beat of silence where she could only hear him breathing. "Roy never loved me, did you know that? He never loved me or the child we made together. Can you imagine? Now that I have someone who does…"
She looked over at Duncan, met his eyes, so she'd feel it only stronger, so it would come into her voice. "Now that I do, everything in the world is different. It's stronger and brighter and clearer. Was it like that for you?"
"She made it beautiful. And bright. Now it's black."
Grief, she wrote. Tears. Careful, careful, she thought. If she tipped him too deeply into grief, he could end it all now. "She wouldn't want the black for you, Jerry. Someone who loved you the way Angela loved you wouldn't want you in the black."
"You put her there. I'm not leaving her there alone."
"She-"
"You shut up! You shut up about her."
"Okay, Jerry. I hear that I've upset you. I'm sorry. You know it's not my purpose here to upset you."
"No, it's your fucking purpose to talk to me like I'm an idiot until
I come out crying with my hands in the air. You think you can play me? You think I'm going out that way after I've come this far?"
"I think you're preparing to commit suicide, and take those people with you."
"Is that what you think?" he said, and she noted the smug satisfaction in his tone.
"That's a big statement, Jerry. And a big black mark on my record. But we could spin it, you know how it goes. It's overkill. Seventeen's our count. A lot of people for you to deal with, and a lot to take down. Now, if you were to let the women out-"
"Come on, Phoebe. That's a lame pass."
"It might seem like a lame pass to you, but I've got to do my job here. I guess we both know it's time for me to ask how everyone's doing in there."
She rubbed the back of her neck as they took each other through the dance-requests and refusals for food, water, medical attention. And the clock ticked off another hour.
Chapter 31
Duncan stood outside with Phin, a few feet away from the rest of the family. "They're okay. Nobody's been hurt. She keeps him talking, keeps working him around. I swear to God, I don't know how she does it."
"It's been nearly four hours now."
"I know." He could see the snipers from where he stood, see them on rooftops, in windows, doorways. What if they opened up? What if Ma or Loo got in the way of a bullet?
The idea of it had him lowering to a crouch on legs that had gone to water. "If it was money-God, why isn't it about money? I'd-"
"I know." Phin hunkered down beside him. "I know, Dune."
"Phoebe, she… She keeps bringing him back to the hostages. Asking how they're doing, talking to him about letting some of them go.
She asked if we could have their names, but he doesn't know, doesn't care. I don't know if that's good or bad. I just don't know."
"It's taking too long."
"I don't know that either." He laid a hand over Phin's, linked their fingers. "Take care of the family. You take care of the family, and I'll go back in, see if there's anything else I can find out, anything I can do." Despite the air-conditioning, the air in the boutique hung hot and thick. The door opened and closed countless times as cops pushed in and out, so the steamy heat crawled in and set up shop. Sweat gleamed on Phoebe's skin as she studied the situation board, read over her own notes, made more. In a desperate attempt to keep some part of her cool, she'd snagged a tortoiseshell clip from a display to yank her hair up. She chugged down water as she stared at the red X's marked on the layout of the jewelry store. Kill marks, she thought. Move him to any of those locations, and Tactical had the green light.