“Yes, but…”
“We’ll put on the masks. Don’t worry, it’ll be okay. It was just a glimpse.”
“What’d she do?” Cal asked. “Get the blindfold off?”
“I opened the closet, she was looking at me with her eyes wide open,” Kellie said, nodding.
“We’ll wear the masks from now on,” Avery said. “You want some pizza?”
“Is it any good?”
“It’s delicious,” Cal said. “Did she look scared?”
“She looked angry.”
“She’s supposed to look scared. I’ll go scare her when I finish my pizza here. I’ll put on my mask and scare the shit out of her.”
“You keep away from her,” Avery said.
“Why’d you open the closet, anyway?” Cal asked.
“See if she wanted anything to eat. We’re not supposed to starve her to death, are we?”
“We’re supposed to get two hundred and fifty thousand bucks, is what we’re supposed to do,” Avery said. “And then we’re supposed to return her safe and sound, end of story.”
“That’s what I’m saying, safe and sound,” Kellie said. “That means feeding her, am I right?”
“We’ll feed her, don’t worry,” Avery said.
“Oh, we’ll take very good care of her, don’t worry,” Cal said, and bit into his pizza. Avery gave him a look. “What?” Cal asked.
“Just stay away from her.”
“Was Kellie went near her, not me.”
“I’ll talk to her later,” Avery said. “When I finish here. Make her understand nobody’s going to hurt her.”
“She sure looked mad.”
“Needs a little scare, is what she needs,” Cal said.
Avery looked at him again.
“Just kidding,” Cal said, and held up his hands defensively.
“Have some pizza,” Avery told Kellie.
He seemed very calm, she thought.
Maybe too calm.
The girl had seen her face.
CHANNEL FOUR’Soffices were in a skyscraper on Moody Street, just off Jefferson Avenue. Hawes approached the imposing glass and stainless steel structure through a small pocket park with a waterfall flowing over its rear granite wall. Sitting at round metal tables in bright Sunday afternoon sunshine, half a dozen elderly people drank their cappuccinos or munched on their sandwiches. Hawes wondered what it was like to be old like that, fifty, sixty years or so.
Security was tight here.
A square-shield uniformed guard was standing alongside another man checking names at a lectern-sized desk. Hawes had called ahead, and so Honey Blair was expecting him. But the guy behind the podium asked him to sign in, and then he opened the manila envelope to check the video inside (even though the envelope was imprinted with the wordsPOLICE DEPARTMENT —EVIDENCE) and then he called upstairs before allowing Hawes to proceed to the elevators.
Honey was waiting in the seventh-floor hallway for him.
She was wearing tan tailored slacks and a green cotton knit sweater. Apparently, she favored the short skirts and revealing tops only on camera. She took the evidence envelope from him, and unclasped it to check on the video inside, just the way the guard had. Satisfied, she nodded curtly, said, “Thanks, I appreciate it,” and was turning to go when Hawes said, “Hey.”
She stopped.
“We’re sorry,” he said. “We were doing our job.”
“By stopping me from doing mine,” she said. “You cost me…” She looked at her watch. “It’s three o’clock. This tape should’ve aired at eleven last night. Now it won’t go out till the Five O’Clock News. That’s seventeen hours you cost me. My scoop went right down the drain.”
“It’ll still…”
“Be old news by the time anybody sees it.”
“It’ll still get a lot of attention. It’s a very good tape.”
“Oh, you watched it, huh?”
“Evidence,” he said, and shrugged somewhat boyishly.
“You probably shouldn’t have done that.”
“I probably shouldn’t have told you I did that.”
Honey nodded. Looked at him.
“Want to watch it again?” she asked.
AVERY HANESknocked on the closet door.
“I’m going to open the door,” he said. “Don’t do anything foolish. No one’s going to hurt you. Okay? I know you can’t talk, but if you understand me, just kick the door, okay? We’re going to let you out of the closet, okay? So kick the door if you understand.”
There was a sharp kick on the door.
Then another one.
Then several in succession.
Sharp angry kicks.
“I’m not sure you’re ready for this,” Avery said.
Another series of kicks.
“I’m not sure at all,” he said.
And waited.
There were no further kicks.
He took the key Kellie had given him, inserted it into the hanging lock, twisted it, and then removed the lock from its hasp. He picked up the AK-47 from where he’d momentarily placed it on the floor, and cautiously opened the door.
She was sitting on the floor with her back to the rear wall of the closet, knees bent, long legs tucked under her, skirt tattered, panties showing. Her brown eyes were wide at first. She blinked them against the sudden light that flooded in.
“Nothing stupid now,” he said.
She opened her eyes again.
He was still wearing a dumb Halloween mask. One of those rubber things you pulled over your entire head. He was Yasir Arafat. She looked straight into the mask. Tried to read the eyes in the holes of the mask.
“Take a good look,” he said. “They’re brown. Like yours.”
She craned her neck, lifted her chin, shook her head violently from side to side, telling him she wanted the gag removed.
“You’ll scream,” he said.
She shook her head no.
“If you scream, I’ll have to hurt you,” he said.
She kept shaking her head no.
“Are you hungry?”
She nodded. Then shook her head strenuously again and again and again, asking him to please remove the goddamn gag.
“Promise me you won’t scream.”
She nodded. Rolled her brown eyes heavenward in solemn promise. He smiled.
Reaching behind her head, he felt for the knot in the twisted rag, found it.
“Turn,” he said.
She turned her head.
He put down the rifle for a moment, started plucking at the knot with the fingers and thumbs of both hands. She spit out the gag the moment she felt it coming loose. Kept coughing. He was afraid she might scream. He was ready to hit her if she screamed. He didn’t want to hit her, but he would if she screamed.
“You okay?” he asked.
She nodded.
“Hungry?”
She nodded again.
“I’ll untie your feet,” he said.
She nodded.
“You won’t try to run, will you?” he asked.
Not until you untie my hands, too, she thought.
“I won’t try to run,” she said.
Her throat felt dry, the gag in it all that time.
“If you scream, remember…”
“I won’t scream.”
“I’ll hit you.”
“I remember.”
“Good. So let me untie your feet now.”
Good, she thought. One step at a time.
She stretched her legs out toward him. Suddenly realized she was half-naked in the tattered costume. Almost pulled her legs back. He seemed not to notice. He took a sling blade knife from his pocket, snapped open the blade. It cut through the duct tape like water. She was more afraid of the knife than the rifle.
“Want to stand now?”
“Yes.”
“Want to try standing?”
He closed the knife, put it back in his pocket. She wondered all at once how they’d known where to find her last night. There hadn’t been any publicity about the cruise…well, she supposed anyone who’d been invited might have talked about it. It occurred to her that someone who’d worked on the video might be in on this. She started running faces through her mind. The grips, the stage hands, the prop guy, the lighting people, the sound technicians. Was one of them an accomplice here?