Chapter 28
Twelve years ago
Max grabbed the sniper rifle and duffel bag out of his trunk, slammed it shut, and ran toward the other Medford SWAT team members.
So far all he knew was that this was a callout for an armed and barricaded man with a hostage.
When his pager had gone off, Max had been painting the bathroom.
He’d hammered the lid back on the paint can, thrown on his tactical gear, and reached the site within twenty minutes.
The team commander nodded at Max as he joined the group and continued his briefing.
A teenager had stabbed his mother during a fight and then locked himself in a bedroom with a younger cousin, threatening to kill the girl.
Officers had been called out and tried unsuccessfully to convince the teen to leave the house or let the cousin go.
The teen had turned off his cell phone, and there were no landlines in the home.
As Max listened, an officer thrust a sketch of the property’s layout at him.
He immediately committed the two-story home’s details to memory and studied the surrounding area for the best location for him to get eyes on the subject.
It was one of his jobs as a sniper to relay visual intel to the team.
With his high-powered scope and binoculars, the command center and the entry team relied on his observations, sometimes the only information available about what was occurring in the home.
Finding a good vantage point was vital for the operation’s success.
It was only 10:00 a.m., but Max saw waves of heat rising off the home’s roof. The forecast stated the temperature would reach 107 degrees that day, and Max was already sweating in his dark, heavy gear.
“We broke a window and put a throw phone through on the second floor,” said the commander. “Negotiators have been calling it for the last five minutes. The teen is believed to have the hostage in the second-floor southwest bedroom, which belongs to his parents.”
“What’s this?” Max asked the officer next to him, pointing at a square on the property sketch.
“Shed in the backyard. Like for a lawn mower and such.”
Strong enough to hold me?
Ideally Max wanted a slightly elevated position where he could watch the suspect. Another option besides the shed roof could be one of the homes next door. Either a roof or one of their windows.
“Suspect is highly agitated,” said the commander.
“His name is Jacob and he’s eighteen. His parents said they believe he stopped taking his medication.
He threw an empty vodka bottle at his father before police arrived, and the father said the bottle previously had several inches of alcohol in it, so he may also be intoxicated.
The hostage is his cousin Eleanor. She’s twelve. ”
“Other weapons?” asked one of the officers.
“Parents own two handguns and one long gun. The weapons are locked in a safe in the parents’ bedroom, but Jacob knows the combination and has taken several gun use classes.
The knife used on the mother was from the kitchen.
She’s on her way to the ER. He aggressively slashed her in the face and neck. ”
“Jesus,” muttered someone.
Anything could happen.
That was why the Medford SWAT team trained every month.
Why Max and the other team members left thousands and thousands of shells on the practice range every year.
Why he and other snipers spent hours on advanced training until their rifles were extensions of their limbs.
Why he’d developed the ability to put a round in a single square inch.
When the shit hit the fan, they had to be ready to protect lives.
The commander was assigning perimeter positions in the home and outside.
The original responding officers had cleared the house except where the teen was barricaded in the parents’ bedroom, which had an attached bath and walk-in closet.
The teen had refused their pleas for him to come out and then threatened to kill the cousin if they came through the bedroom door.
The SWAT team had then been activated.
The commander looked at Max. “Pick your spot,” he told him. “There are two windows to the parents’ bedroom on the second level. One was broken for the negotiators to throw in the phone.”
Several yards away, a burst of conversation and energy came from the mobile command unit, pulling the team’s attention.
“The negotiators made contact,” said the commander, a sliver of hope in his voice.
“In positions. Now.” Three of the SWAT officers went inside the house, and the other five, including Max, headed for the back of the home.
The Medford SWAT team had a total of seventeen officers, including the two negotiators in the van and the commander.
If they were available, more team members would show up.
But Max was pleased with the number who had been able to respond to the callout so far.
Max ran to check the shed in the backyard and then swore as it came into sight.
It was a rickety affair, guaranteed to collapse if he tried to climb on top.
He scouted for another option and decided on the neighboring home to the west. The house had a second-story deck with stairs.
One side of the deck appeared to have a good view of both of the parents’ bedroom windows.
A six-foot fence divided the properties, so Max jogged back out front to find the gate, knowing the surrounding homes had already been evacuated.
He relayed his plan into his mic, receiving a “Copy” through his earpiece from the team leader. He found the gate to the neighbor’s yard and then ran along the side of the house to the stairs, quickly moving up to the deck.
He shoved an outdoor table against the deck’s railing, pulled up a cushioned deck chair, and set up his rifle, thankful there was an awning that blocked the sun.
But he couldn’t ignore the heat in the air; it radiated from the house’s siding and deck boards.
Max opened his duffel and set out two water bottles, several PowerBars, and his binoculars, estimating that the windows to the bedroom next door were a comfortable fifty yards away.
He wasn’t a military sniper who had trained at a thousand yards or more, but Max was confident at two hundred yards and under.
He settled into the chair and put the butt of the rifle into the perfect spot in front of his shoulder, his cheek on the stock and his eye at the scope.
There he is.
The rest of the world faded away as he locked his gaze on the teen through the broken window.
“This is Red-one,” said Max. “I’m on the second-story deck of the home to the west. Suspect is in view. Teen is pacing in the bedroom. Has phone at his ear. I don’t currently see a weapon.”
“Copy, Red-one,” said the commander. “Negotiations are in progress. Can you see the hostage?”
Max moved the rifle a fraction to check the other window. “Negative.”
Shit. Where is she?
He scanned what he could see of the floor and bed, looking for blood or anything that could indicate the hostage’s location. Max returned to the window with the view of the teen. He was barefoot, wearing baggy shorts and an oversize tee.
“Red-one. Suspect has blood on his shirt,” said Max, his voice tight.
“Copy, Red-one. Officers said blood was already on his shirt when they responded. Most likely from the mother.”
“His right hand is bloody, and he keeps wiping it on a towel,” said Max, following the teen’s movements. “May have injured himself during that attack.”
“Copy.”
Everything receded except for the occasional voices in his earpiece and the view through his scope. Max sat motionless, watching the teen yell at the negotiators. He could faintly hear him but couldn’t make out the exact words. He lip-read a lot of fuck offs and no ways.
Where’s the cousin?
“A nightstand has been dragged in front of the bedroom door,” Max relayed through his mic.
“But it doesn’t look too heavy. It’s more of a small table, maybe two feet by eighteen inches, with shelves below.
The bed is directly across from the door.
Walk-in closet on the east side of the room, and attached bath is north of the room along the home’s west wall.
There is privacy glass on the window to the bathroom. ”
Through the broken window, Max could see the bedroom’s door to the hall, the moved nightstand, and part of the bed.
Through the other window, he saw an open sliding barn door to the walk-in closet with clothes hanging in the background.
The teen was walking in circles, primarily visible through the first window.
He’d occasionally appear in the second window and pause in front of the closet, looking inside.
That’s got to be where the cousin is.
Did he already hurt her?
The teen wiped his hand with the towel on the bed, and this time Max spotted a knife next to it. “Red-one. Knife is on the bed. No other weapons visible.”
“Copy.”
“Red-one,” said Max. “Where is the location of the gun safe?”
There was a long moment of silence. “Gun safe is in the walk-in closet,” the commander finally replied. Then he added, “Suspect’s mother is in surgery. Prognosis is guarded.”
Shit. His mother may die.
Does he know that?
The teen stopped and threw the phone down on the bed, rage in his face.
Max relayed the location of the phone. “Was he told about his mother?”
“Negative,” said the commander. “Negotiations have stalled. Suspect refuses to release his cousin.”
Max continued to watch the teen. He was tall and lanky in his baggy clothes with a mop of blond hair that he frequently brushed out of his eyes, leaving a smear of darkening blood in his hair. Max’s crosshairs centered on the suspect’s forehead over and over as he waited and watched.
The suspect was eighteen, but in Max’s mind he was still a child.
He didn’t want to shoot a child.