7
Ted
By the time the kids were loaded in the van, I yanked open the driver ’ s side door of the white airport shuttle and pulled the pantyhose off my face for a breather, I was sweating buckets.
I knew today was going to be intense. I knew Andy was going to get intense. But I told myself I ’ d practiced every line, every step, so many times that it would be like acting out a play. No real feeling of danger.
That wasn ’ t the case.
I made myself take three big breaths, in and out, like that guy in the jail rehab group was always telling everybody to do.
Focus on your breath. It ’ s that simple. You’ll feel calmer.
I ’ d thought it was sort of bullshit at the time, but turned out that shithead was onto something.
My head cleared a bit, and my heartbeat started to slow down. A breeze carried through the open window, cooling the back of my sweaty neck.
For the first time, I was glad I was the one driving the airport shuttle that stank like Andy ’ s cologne. It was finally quiet. Nobody crying, nobody making little snuffling sounds when I pulled the zip ties tight, nobody looking at me like I was some kind of demon.
Seeing the kids freak out had messed me up a lot more than I thought it would.
I ran my fingers through my damp hair and studied the rearview mirror. My face was red and blotchy like I ’ d just taken a lava-hot shower, but besides that I looked fine. My dark brown hair was short enough that it never got that messy, unlike Andy ’ s. Maybe an angry porcupine, but that was different.
Ahead of me, the daycare bus ’ s tail lights lit up.
I watched as Andy slowly maneuvered the Bright Beginnings bus right into the orchard, through dense rows of trees. The branches were so close, they scraped the sides of the bus like nails on a chalkboard, but he pushed the bus through anyway.
The sight of it made me laugh out loud. It looked like he was off-roading in the dumbest, slowest ride ever. The sides of the faded blue-and-white bus scratched against more tree limbs, some of them making a high-pitched squealing sound as they hit the metal.
He didn ’ t get very far before a cluster of trees blocked him good enough that he would ’ ve had to run them down.
The brake lights went on. Wasn ’ t worth the time to get any farther into the orchard, though. After the harvest was done, this road hardly got used at all. Even if somebody did come down this way, they ’ d have to know exactly what they were looking for.
I watched Andy open up the bus door, run down the steps, and dash past me through the orchard. He ’ d taken off his pantyhose too, although his long, poofy mouse-brown hair and ratty beard didn ’ t look that much different than usual. Andy always looked like he ’ d just rolled out of bed. But the intense, focused look in his eyes gave him away. Andy was dialed in.
As he jumped into the driver ’ s seat of the gray van, I shoved the key into the ignition and started up the airport shuttle.
Part one was done. We had everybody locked and loaded—literally.
A burst of relief and adrenaline zipped through me and I let out a nervous laugh.
Before I shifted into drive and followed Andy back toward the main road, I unlatched the glovebox and set my gun inside, then carefully pulled out the piece of paper I ’ d tucked in there earlier.
It had thirteen names typed on it. The bus driver ’ s at the top, then a list of the twelve kids who rode this bus regularly, along with their ages.
Jessa Landon, 38 Ava Johnson, Bonnie Halverson, Crosby Neville, Kasia Berger, Mindy Gamel, Charlotte Nelson, 8 Evelyn Marks, 8 Ked Bledsoe, 8 Norah Katz, 8 Rose Carlton, 9 Ben Whitlock, 9 Sage Halverson, 12
I cross-referenced the typed list with the barely legible written list I ’ d just made when we boarded the bus, then drew a Sharpie through the names Kasia Berger and Norah Katz, who were lucky enough to be sick today or something.
Minus the two who were missing, that was ten kids plus the bus driver. That would make the ransom around two-hundred thousand dollars per kid. I doubted anybody cared that much about the driver to pay her ransom. As far as I could tell, she was a nobody.
I scanned over the rest of the pre-typed ransom note, feeling some of the sick churn in my stomach give way to anticipation.
The note was perfect. This was going to work like we ’ d planned.
Then I shoved the crumpled, handwritten list into my pants pocket so I could burn it later.
I couldn ’ t see Andy and the gray van anymore, but that was fine. I had a quick stop to make before we met up again, anyway.
Back when we ’ d planned everything out, I ’ d complained about getting stuck with this task. The idea of going into the city right after what we ’ d done and showing my face—well, sort of—felt like the riskiest part of the whole plan. All Andy had to do was kill time, driving around with the kids for a while until they were good and mixed up about where we were taking them.
But now, I was honestly just glad that Andy was the one stuck with the kids for a little longer.
I was already dreading unloading them.
Just focus, Ted, I told myself again . You ’ ve got this, buddy.