Tom feels like the concrete cube has closed about him, squeezing his shoulders and torso. No escape. He tries not to stare at the small and familiar metal object in the man’s right hand.
“What do you mean…my family?” he asks.
Pelayo gives a slight shrug. “You and your Army wife, don’t you think you have blood on your clean and soft hands? Your wife…she’s in the Army, but I don’t have to say anymore. But you, Tom Cornwall, you have killed with your words, your stories.”
“Impossible,” Tom whispers, knowing with a hard kernel inside of him that this tough yet soft-spoken man before him is even more dangerous than he can imagine.
“Oh, no, quite possible,” his captor says. “You think you can rest comfortably in what’s known as the Western world, write your stories, your opinion pieces, using unnamed sources or receiving leaks, not caring who or what might be feeding you information. Information that once is in print, under your name, can be used as a weapon and used to threaten, bribe, or kill others in far distant lands.”
Tom keeps on staring at the metal object. “Please don’t hurt Denise. Please. She’s only ten.”
Pelayo’s voice gets sharp. “And you think your wife’s actions and your crafted words haven’t killed ten-year-old girls over the years? Really?”
“Please…”
“Enough, then. I will leave you with this choice, here and now. We depart this room and leave Hamid with your daughter, after I tell him what your family has done to his family. I tell him not to cause permanent damage…but we return thirty minutes later. Or…”
Pelayo holds up the small metal contraption. Tom sees it and remembers a dinner party last year, the husband of a prominent DC journalist was in attendance and insisted on preparing his own homemade desserts for all the guests…
“Not Hamid,” Tom says.
“A good father, then. Are you left-handed or right?”
“Right.”
“Then extend your left hand and roll up your sleeve.”
Denise sees what’s going on and says, “Daddy? Daddy?”
Tom tries to keep his voice even for his daughter’s sake. “Can you take her out for a moment? I don’t want her to see this.”
Pelayo goes tsk-tsk. “That is not possible, my friend. Even at her age, she must suffer the actions of her family.”
Tom’s mouth is dry and his legs are shaking. The thick man named Tonton comes around and grabs his left arm by the elbow and wrist, holding it stretched out and still.
Tom tries to be brave. “That’s not necessary.”
Pelayo says, “Trust me, I know from experience. It is necessary.”
Tom yells out, “Denise! Don’t look!”
With that, Pelayo switches on the small crème brûlée torch, and gently runs the 2,700-degree flame up the length of Tom’s exposed arm. The sizzling noise and smell of burnt hair and skin makes him yell until his throat is hoarse.
CHAPTER 40
I DON’T slow down until I cross the Georgia border into eastern Alabama, and then I get a good case of the shakes once again when I’m on US Highway 59, heading southwest. I’m still not sure why that Tennessee state trooper was interested in me, because I really doubt that my boss, Lieutenant Colonel Denton, would have listed me as AWOL after less than twenty-four hours, and then put my name and vehicle ID into the NCIC.
Unless he got pressure from someone to do so.
Who?
The people behind the kidnapping of Tom and Denise? Why? They would want me to get to Three Rivers. Why throw up a roadblock by listing me in the NCIC?
I squeeze my hands on the Wrangler’s steering wheel. Look at the evidence, I think. Look at the data points. The trooper didn’t pull me over in traffic. No, he made a routine traffic stop when he saw a Jeep with Virginia license plates pulled over to the side.
Routine, then.
All right.
If I wasn’t in the NCIC, then what triggered him? Was it something I said? Something that he spotted that got his suspicious-cop mind working? I understand cops and their “gut feelings.” Once you’ve performed hundreds of traffic stops, your subconscious and muscle memory work together to warn you when something doesn’t feel right.
I take a deep breath, check the time.
I need something to eat.
I’m not hungry, but I need fuel to keep me going all the way to Texas.
I spot a sign for a truck stop called Love’s, up ahead off exit 174. This interstate is really a narrow two-lane blacktop, with woods and flat farmland extending on each side, and a wide and grassy tree-covered median separating me from the northbound lanes. Back home in Virginia, serious commuters would laugh at calling this an interstate.
I come to the exit, make a right, and then turn left at the bottom, going a hundred or so yards on Steele Station Road. This Love’s Travel Stop is part of a large, national chain, and it almost gives me a bit of comfort as I drive into the fuel pump area, step out, and start gassing up my Wrangler. With the pump running, I quickly walk to a Subway to the left of the truck stop, which is a wide, one-story building with a brick facade. It looks cute and homey.
A few minutes later I emerge with a steak-and-cheese sub, a bag of Lay’s chips, and a Diet Coke, and after putting the nozzle back in the pump, I drive to the side of the parking lot, step out, and decide to have a quick little picnic on the hood of my Wrangler. I take out my maps and road atlases, start gauging distances and times, run some rough figures, check my watch.
I lost some additional time due to road work, but according to my figures, it will take me about fourteen hours to get to Three Rivers, Texas. I have plenty of time to stop for the night and arrive on time and fully rested.
The steak-and-cheese sandwich is probably tasty as hell, but I can’t really taste it. I just chew, swallow, chew, swallow. It’s an overcast day, with low clouds.
An Alabama state police cruiser slowly glides into the parking lot, parks in front of the brick building. I give the cruiser a quick glance, go back to my meal. A female trooper emerges, goes into the store. I finish up my sandwich, devour the chips, and take another good, long acid swallow of the Diet Coke.
Once I get to Three Rivers, I can scope out the address and then…well, come up with a perfect plan to seize somebody I don’t know and toss him into my Jeep, to exchange later for my loved ones.
And where will the exchange take place? And how can I guarantee the safety of Tom and Denise?
Later, I think. Later. Focus on the job in front of you. Drive to Texas with no delays, no problems.
The trooper goes back to the cruiser, and I spot something I hadn’t noticed before. The Love’s Travel Stop has a logo consisting of three overlapping hearts, colored red, peach, and yellow.
Three symbols of love.
Tom, Denise, and me.
I try to take another swallow of the Diet Coke and I just can’t. I burst into tears and sob, and bring up a paper napkin just as the Alabama State Police cruiser makes a wide turn and stops beside me.
The window rolls down. A young trooper, with her light-blond hair pulled tight in a bun at the back of her head, calls out, “Everything all right, ma’am?”
I know better than to bullshit her, because my last bullshit attempt with a member of law enforcement didn’t go well. I wipe at my eyes and say, “My husband…and my daughter. I’m worried about them, that’s all.”