Chapter Forty-Four #2
And then, more reflexively than anything else, Zack Hightower reached under his coat, pulled his pistol, and leveled it at the man.
The radio lowered. Delaney stared at the gun. “What’s going on?”
Zack said, “Brother, I know it’s gonna be a hard sell for me convincing you of this…but I’m on your side here. I just need to talk to you a second.”
Snow fell all around them. Delaney said nothing. Finally, Zack said, “Sit in my truck with me. I’m going to explain everything and then you’ll understand what’s going on.”
“Talk, then. Right here, because I’m not getting in your fucking truck.”
“Yeah…okay. Well…Andie has been kidnapped by some people who will know immediately if you report it. They’re professionals, they’ll be listening to all the emergency frequencies.
If you get on that radio, or call someone in the police and it gets out over traffic, then they will move her somewhere we can’t find her.
Or they will…they will do something worse. ”
“What do they want with her?”
“It’s…it’s nothing she’s done. It’s—”
“Of course it’s nothing she’s done!” Delaney snapped. “She’s fifteen, what could she have done?”
“It’s…I guess the truth is…it’s something I’ve done.”
A momentary look of utter confusion on Pete Delaney’s face melted away, slowly but obviously to Zack. He had a feeling he knew some version of what the man was about to say before he even said it.
Delaney said, “Jen swore this day would never come.”
Zack nodded slowly.
“You’re him, aren’t you? You’re…the guy Jen was married to before. The CIA guy.”
Hightower nodded again now. He had no idea what Tiffany had or had not told her second husband, but it didn’t surprise him at all that she’d told him everything.
“And you’re pointing a gun at me now?” Delaney said.
Zack lowered it immediately. “Andie’s life depends on you taking a beat and listening to me. I’m just trying to do what’s right.”
“Okay.” Delaney put the radio back on his belt. “Talk.”
Zack holstered his weapon, then moved to the front of Delaney’s emergency vehicle and leaned against it, taking weight off his injured leg. “Tiffany and Stacy. Jennifer and Andrea. Their names got out.”
“Fuck. Fuck!” Delaney stomped the snow-covered ground. “To who?”
“An enemy. A dangerous enemy. I can’t tell you any more than that.”
“Your enemy, you mean.”
“Well…I guess he’s yours now, too.”
“So…why is anyone after my daughter?”
“I…It’s complicated.”
“Well, why don’t you try simplifying it for me?”
“Their mission is to get to me. We’ve tracked them to a cabin about a mile back to the east. She’s there, I’m sure of it, and I’ve got assets inbound that are going to help me take care of this situation.”
“Assets inbound? The fuck are you talking about?” Before Zack could answer, Delaney said, “How did they even find her?”
Zack looked up at the snow falling all around them.
Said, “That’s, unfortunately, on me. I found out what happened to Tiffany and Stacy.
Their new names, where they were living.
I found out and I came here, not to see my ex-wife but to see…
I went to Cara’s. I got tracked by the opposition.
From that they must have figured out that—”
“You motherfucker,” Delaney said, balling his fists and moving closer. “I’m going to beat the shit out of you.”
Pete was big, but not bigger than Zack. And Pete looked like he could handle himself, but Zack knew, even with the knife wound to his leg, the deputy fire chief was not going to take him down in hand-to-hand combat.
But he understood the man’s sentiment. He said, “I get it. But can you do that after we get your daughter back?”
Delaney stopped his advance. He seemed to think it over a moment. He said, “And…if I pull out my radio or my phone to call the police, you’re saying…they’ll kill her?”
“The guy who has her. His name is Scott Kincaid. He’s an assassin. A good one. And an absolutely ruthless one. He’s got at least two other men with him. Their names are Maybus and Winter. I don’t know much about them. We also think there might be more.
“Kincaid wants my neck, and the neck of an associate of mine, an associate who is on the way here right now. I promise you that if I thought for one second that if we drove up to that cabin and traded ourselves for her that she would walk away, we would both do it, but that’s not how this kind of thing works. ”
Delaney gave Zack a long, hard look. “You know how this kind of thing works?”
Zack sighed; steam poured from his mouth. “Intimately, I’m afraid.” He brightened a little. “But Kincaid doesn’t know that we know where he is, and that’s to our advantage. When my friend gets here, we’re going to go up there and we’re going to get Andie out.”
“How are you going to do that?”
“You might not want to know.”
Delaney stared at him a long moment. “Oh, I most definitely do want to know.”
“My friend and I are going to kill the people holding her.”
Delaney put his hands on his head. Turned and walked away a few steps. It was a lot to take in, Zack understood.
He turned back to Zack. “Can you show me some kind of ID that says you’re CIA? Something so I know you’re not just bullshitting me right now?”
Zack shook his head. “My real name is Zack Hightower. I can show you ID that says my name is something other than Zack Hightower, so that’s not going to help.” After a second, he said, “The killings at the MRI center?”
Pete cocked his head. Of course he would be aware of the double homicide just hours earlier. “What about them?”
“That was Kincaid’s plan A. It didn’t work. I killed the two men who came after me this morning. Andie…she is plan B.”
“Christ.” He did not move.
Finally, Zack said, “I can’t be standing out next to this road any longer.
I saw a driveway a little closer to their cabin.
Maybe there’s another cabin up there, seven or eight hundred yards to the west of where Andie is.
I saw no tire tracks in the snow, so I think it’s abandoned.
Maybe we can go there to stage for this. ”
Delaney said, “Jennifer told me what you did. How you did some mission you couldn’t tell her about, but then Al Qaeda found out about you. How you saved her and Andie down in San Diego. Killed a bunch of terrorists.”
Zack said, “Just three.”
Delaney continued staring Zack down. “Just tell me that you can do it again.”
“I can. With help, I definitely can.”
Delaney nodded, then moved towards his vehicle, but Zack said, “Hey, what do you carry in this truck?”
“Just first aid, rescue equipment, my turnout gear, stuff like that.”
“What’s turnout gear?”
“Fireproof jacket, boots, stuff I need to wear to respond to a fire.”
Zack thought a moment. “You have a tank? A mask? That kind of thing?”
“Of course. Two of each. Why?”
“Just trying to figure out a plan. What about weapons?”
“Not unless you count bear spray.”
Zack nodded slowly. “I’ve got some in my truck, too.”
Delaney was confused. “You don’t have any other weapons?”
“I have a pistol, and my friend is bringing more. I’m just thinking things through.
Kincaid is going to be taking measures. We might have to get creative here.
” Zack began to climb into his truck, and then he pointed at Delaney.
“Listen, I promise you…we can fix this, but the second Kincaid and his people hear that their location has been discovered, it’s over. ”
“You said that already,” Delaney responded angrily. “I’m not going to communicate this to anybody.”
The two men climbed into their vehicles, and Pete Delaney followed Zack Hightower back in the direction of the cabin holding his daughter.