Blood Sport (11 page)

Thirty
-Five

Everything now was in the hands of the Feds. They’d completely sealed off the farmhouse and had removed everything from the secret room. It was all now being processed by specialists and high tech computer programs to see if any of it could shed any light on where Flint had gone. For now, though, Finn had a bit of spare time and he intended to put it to good use.

Switching on the garage light
, the mere sight of the car calmed him. He had put it off long enough; he needed to confront the issue with Kat and get his head around it once and for all; working on the car always helped him focus.

Over the years he’d imagined all kinds of reasons why Kat had left town all those years ago and yet he’d never considered that she might be pregnant. He’d thought that what they’d had had been good enough that she would have told him about something like that.

Sitting on that hill months ago after she’d returned, he hadn’t been prepared for the news that he had a son. She’d tried to explain, to tell him that she’d done it for his own good, but he hadn’t been able to get past the fact that she’d had a son; his son, and she’d kept it from him all these years.

At first he’d been angry
. Who did she think she was to make a decision like that without telling him? To give his son away to strangers without telling him? Those questions still remained but the anger had faded, giving way to an understanding of sorts. He wasn’t sure he would ever entirely be able to get past it, but he knew now he wanted to try. They’d been good together, and nearly had been again, so it would be a shame now to lose that friendship without trying to save it.

Thirty
-Six

He wasn’t expecting to find Callahan in his office when he arrived the next morning but he was there, casually sitting behind Finn’s desk.

“Do you mind? I think you’ll find that’s my desk.” Finn waited for him to stand up and step out of the way before sitting down. “What are you doing here
, anyway?”

“Well, I have some news and I thought you’d like to know
about.” He paused as if waiting for Finn to ask him what it was.
You’ll have a long wait before I give you that satisfaction,
Finn thought.

Obviously giving up on getting a response, Callahan continued. “It look
s like we may have a lead on Flint’s whereabouts.”

That got Finn’s attention. “Where?”

“On our doorstep, just an hour’s drive away. Our tech guys managed to identify quite a few of the faces on the videos using facial recognition software. Clever stuff. Anyway, comparing those names to a list of the numbers we got from his cell phone provider we found that he’d called one in particular several times on the day he locked Kat and Daniel in that dungeon.” He was smiling now. “I’ve just had a call from our local office out there and they’re about to carry out a raid on the premises.”

“That’s fantastic news. You didn’t have to drive all the way over here to tell me that
, though. You could have just called.”

“I know,
but I wanted to see if you wanted to tag along. They’re waiting for me to give the word.”

Finn was thrown
.
Maybe you’re not as bad as I thought you were.
“That’s really good of you and yes, I do want to.”

“Then let’s go. We’ll take my car.”

Not arguing, Finn followed him downstairs and they set off, the tires screeching and the back end of the car sliding out as they left the station lot. “Try not to kill us before we get there, would you?” he muttered.

“Was there any
thing else recovered from the house?” Finn asked through clenched teeth as he hung on to the strap dangling from the ceiling for dear life.

“
That safe under the rug? Well, it was filled with paperwork. It looks like Flint kept a record of all the dates and places when his men snatched a kid. We’re not sure why, but possibly to keep from hitting the same place twice.”

“At least that should make it easier to reunite any kids you do find with their families. How many were there?”

Callahan sighed. “Unbelievably, over fifty. We’ve managed to match all the dates and places with reported child disappearances but there was one thing that stood out. They were all boys except for one girl, one of the earlier victims.”

“Why on earth would he take a girl? If he was using all his victims in this ‘fight club’
, he would just want boys. It makes no sense.”

“Agreed. Just one of the many things we’ll be asking him when we get our hands on him.”

***

What should have been an hour
’s drive in fact only took them forty-five minutes and Finn was certain that Callahan hadn’t lifted his foot of the pedal once that whole time. The place they were headed was another innocuous looking farm that you wouldn’t look twice at if you were driving past, never suspecting what was happening there.

About a mile away from their intended ta
rget, Callahan turned his car off the tarmacked road and onto a dirt side road. About half a mile down, he reached a parking area which was already full of emergency vehicles. There were several police cruisers, three ambulances and, of course, the FBI teams.

“Looks like you’ve got it well covered.” Finn was impressed.

“We’re not taking any chances. He’s not getting away this time.”

Finn went to open the car door but before he could he felt Callahan
’s hand on his arm. “You’re here as an observer only, okay?” Finn nodded. He knew this was an FBI operation; he was just glad that he was going to be there to see the bastard taken into custody.

“Don’t worry, I’m not going to do anything that’ll jeopardi
ze this bastard getting what’s coming to him.”

***

The plan was simple. The SWAT teams would surround the main farmhouse and the two barns stood nearby and, on a pre-arranged signal, would enter the building simultaneously taking anyone they found into custody. Everyone was aware that there were likely to be children present and that they didn’t know where, so their instructions were clear: go in hard and fast but don’t shoot unless you have to.

Finn and Callahan and all other non-SWAT personnel would remain at the rendezvous point and listen to the take
-down over the radio. Once it was clear, they would then be called in.

“You got a spare pair of those?” Finn asked eyeing the binocul
ars that Callahan held up to his eyes.

“Over there, in the back of the van.” Callahan indicated one of the FBI vans parked nearby.

Grabbing a pair, Finn took up position next to Callahan and together they watched in silence as the SWAT team moved in. The atmosphere was tense and there was no chatter at the RV point, everyone listening intently to the radio which was eerily silent.

The sudden burst of noise made Finn jump. They were in. For the next few minutes
, it seemed that the radio was full of shouting and screaming, with SWAT screaming at people to get on the ground and put down their weapons, but thankfully there were no sounds of gunfire. Just as suddenly as it had erupted, the noise suddenly stopped.

“All clear, premises secure.
All threats in custody,” the SWAT team commander announced.

“
Let’s go.” Callahan was already making his way to his car and Finn quickly followed, jumping into the passenger seat as the car started to move and barely having time to close the door before they left the dirt road and hit the tarmac, closely followed by the police cruisers and paramedics who had been waiting with them for the all clear.

As they pulled up to the farmhouse, the SWAT team w
as just leading their prisoners out of the house in handcuffs. Finn immediately recognized one of them as being the man they’d seen on the CCTV footage but there was no sign of Flint.

“Are there any more in there?” he asked the SWAT commander
, who was bringing up the rear holding his own prisoner.

“No
, this is all of them.”

He had to be there!
“There’s one missing. He’s got to be here.”

“We’ve cleared the premises
. There’s no one else in there.”

Turning away
, he saw that the farm hand was about to be loaded into the back of a prison van. Running over to him, he grabbed him by his shirt front and would have pulled him off his feet if he had hadn’t been held up by the officer holding him. “Where is he? Where’s Flint?” he yelled in his face.

“No comment
,” he answered, smirking.

Finn hadn’t reali
zed he’d pulled his arm back, prepared to take a punch, until he felt a hand on his arm. “I don’t think you want to do that.” Callahan pulled him away.

“Flint’s
not here.”

“I know, but we’ll find him. It’s over for them now
. There’s nowhere for him to hide. It’s only a matter of time before we track down everyone who took part in this operation. We’ll get him.”

“You’re right.” Finn took a deep breath, steadying himself. “I’ll
go and check the barns, see if they’ve found any of the kids yet.”

They’d assumed that it would be likely that the set
-up here would be similar to the set up at the Flint farm, so those waiting at the RV point had been told that their first priority was to check the barns. It had paid off. As Finn entered the first barn he could see that a trap door had been found and, as he watched, the first child was helped out of the depths and into the arms of a waiting paramedic.

His intense relief that they had found the kids was tinged with horror.
How many more places were there like this? How many more kids?
There was nothing he could do there; they had everything in hand. The barn, the yard, everywhere he looked was a hive of activity with people milling about, talking into radios.

About
five hundred yards from the back of the barn he could see a small outbuilding, no more than a hut really, that no one seemed to be paying any attention to. The hut was small, no more than five yards wide and a couple of yards tall. It seemed like a fairly new structure, the wood still being in good condition with no sign of rot, but Finn struggled to understand what it could be used for. It was too small for farm animals or machinery, so something about it struck him as strange.

“Hey!” he called out to one of the SWAT team waiting to load his prisoner into the back of the van. “Anyone check that hut out?”

His prisoner picked that moment to try and head-butt him. Stepping out of the way, he shouted back, “Everything’s been cleared,” before taking his prisoner to the ground.

Finn decided to check it out for himself. The noise from the activity taking place at the farmhouse dimmed as he moved further away and closer to the hut
, until eventually he could hardly hear it at all. Walking around the outside, he couldn’t find any windows and there was only one door. A padlock hung from it, but it was open and unlocked.

Finn was curious but had no sense of danger as he opened the door. He’d barely put one foot inside before he was stopped in his tracks.

“One more move and I’m putting a bullet in your brain.”

The voice came from his right. Looking out of t
he corner of his eye, he saw Flint step from the shadows holding a gun pointed directly at his head.

“Raise your hands.”

Finn did as he was told, his mind racing.
The building was supposed to be clear!

“Now ste
p inside.” He stood stock still, barely breathing as Flint moved behind him and closed the door before coming to stand in front of him.

“Hello
, Finn. I wish I could say it was nice to see you but under the circumstances, I’d be lying.”

“You know there’s no way out
, don’t you?”

He nodded. “Yes, it would seem that way. But there’s no reason why I can’t take a couple of you with me.”

“What is this place?” Finn looked around, trying to distract him.

“T
his? Ah well, this is where my colleague sends his boys when they’ve been very naughty. He sometimes forgets they’re out here, unfortunately. He’s lost a couple that way.” He chuckled

Finn felt sick. “So what’s your plan? They’re going to notice I’m not around very soon and come looking for me.”

“And they’ll find you. They’ll just be too late to save you.”

Everything seemed magnified in
that moment as Finn watched Flint’s finger start to squeeze the trigger. Everything else in the room lost focus and all he could see was the trigger start to move under the pressure.

In that millisecond
, he had time to be surprised that his life wasn’t flashing before his eyes. Wasn’t that what was supposed to happen?

“Get down!”
The shout took him by surprise, but he instantly dropped to his knees as the door behind him flung open at the same time a shot was fired. He watched as Flint was knocked off his feet by a shot to the shoulder, crying out in pain as the impact sent him twisting as he fell, his gun flying out of his hand.

“I thought I told you
, you were here as an observer only?”

Finn got to his feet
as Callahan retrieved Flint’s gun from the floor.

“What took you so long?”  Finn took his cuf
fs from his belt and secured Flint’s hands as Callahan called for someone to come and take him into custody.

“You’ll never get us all
. We’re everywhere,” Flint panted as he lay on the floor, bleeding.

“Make sure you tell that to your cellmate
,” Finn tossed over his shoulder as he walked out the door. “I’m sure he’ll enjoy trying to wipe you all out, starting with you.”

***

“How did you know I was in there?” Finn asked as they made their way back to the main farmhouse behind them.

“I heard you ask about the hut. I did shout and tell you to wait but you didn’t hear me
, I guess. When I saw the door close it seemed odd. Why would you need to close the door? So I thought I’d check it out.”

“Well I’m glad you did, but how on earth did you know he had a gun to my head?”

“I heard the voices when I got close and there was a small hole in the wall, just big enough for me to be able to figure out what was going on.”

“Well, thank you
. It would seem I owe you one.” Finn shook his hand. “Maybe you’re not as bad as I thought you were after all.”