The Light at the End of the Tunnel (9 page)

Cassandra wouldn’t immediately comprehend
ooohhhs
and
ahhhs
anyway, but had the woman ever
made
the sounds Cassandra would have heard them, would then
have instinctively recognized the sounds and the smiling face and
the warm hands and arms as a good thing, and, eventually, would
have begun giving back everything she received.

But none of those things happened.

“Cassandra,” the woman said, “If you don’t
start doing something, and soon, I’m going to take you back to
family services….” She hesitated, and said lower, “I don’t think I
want you.” Then she added even lower, “I don’t think I even
like
you.”

Cassandra blinked. She hadn’t meant to, and
continued not looking at the woman.

“In fact,” the woman said, while turning
away, “I’ll ask my husband tonight. Maybe we’ll take you back right
away…tomorrow.” The woman stopped at the door and looked back at
the crib where the child lay silently. The child didn’t move.
Nothing, “Humpff…” The woman said, then stepped into the hall and
closed the door.

Chapter 17
For Graduation

A total of eight months had passed at the
training facility.

Even though all seven men showed utmost
professionalism, still it also felt to the chaplain that what went
on there was absolutely just inside the law. Riley of course had
told him that they sometimes did jobs for certain people. But still
the chaplain wondered where, exactly, two or three of the men went
at times, and what, exactly, they did while away from the facility.
But he never asked.

Nicole wondered too. They took their breaks
together and that was the main time they even got to see each
other, that and meals, where Sadie often took a lot of Nicole’s
attention. That didn’t bother the chaplain, though, He was glad
Nicole had somebody, besides himself.

He also asked about everybody’s history.
Riley Stokes was ex-navy SEAL. Tucker was ex-Underwater Demolition
Team or UDT, “A navy special forces unit developed during WWII and
re-designated around 1983,” Tucker explained, “It wasn’t the same
anymore. And then of course the SEALs came along back during
Vietnam.” He then grinned toward Stokes.

The other men were all ex-military, all
services represented except the Coast Guard, “In fact,” Riley said
at one of their end-of-day meals, “If you ever do run into any
Coast Guard personnel, give’em my phone number.”

With training in the shooting and cleaning of
several kinds of guns, self-defense including both Taekwondo and
Judo, both felt nearly ready to get back to the tracking of Les
Paul. The chaplain had drawn the line on explosives, but Nicole
would have liked it but then agreed: They probably would never have
need to blow anybody up. The months of training, though, had left
both the chaplain and Nicole with unsettling and confusing
feelings. All that to track a child approaching three years old?
But of course he wouldn’t always be only three. Still, their
training sometimes seemed somewhat unnecessary.

Their early evenings were spent in book
learning about private investigation. For questions they had Riley
himself and all the other men for answers. Finally, toward the end
of the eight months, Riley told them, “You can take your private
investigator test right here, as this is a bona fide school. I’m
recognized not only by the state of Arizona but by the US
government. And you’ll want to at least own a handgun—“

“Just one?” Nicole cut in, “I want my own
gun.”

Riley smiled, “Of course, and you should have
your own. What would you like?”

“I want a gun like Sean Connery used in the
James Bond movies.”

Riley increased his smile, “A Walther PPK. It
uses .380 ammunition and should fit your feminine hand quite
nicely.”

“Thank you.” She smiled at Riley, then
grasped the chaplain’s arm and smiled even bigger for him.

“Kind of an interesting story about that
little gun,” Riley said, “After WWII Europe kind of wanted to
believe in peace on earth, I guess, so Carl Walther, of Germany,
and later some company in France—I don’t know all the details, and
now they’re also manufactured here by Smith and Wesson—but, what I
was getting at, Europe wanted that gun to be tough, yet smaller
than what the military had. I guess they figured if the military
had the slightly bigger gun they could control the masses.” He
sobered, “Maybe in Europe they can pull that off, but good luck at
ever doing it here.”

Riley then turned his attention to, “And you,
Radford?”

“I’d like a Colt .45, just like the one I
learned on.”

“Good choice, my man, and good choice for you
too, young lady. You both have quite often filled that target with
entire loads, so you’re both qualified. I can also take care of
your gun licenses right here too. And now I have an offer to make
you.”

Both the chaplain and Nicole perked right
up.

“As I told you earlier, we do certain jobs
here for certain people, and right now there’s a really rich guy
down in Phoenix—one of the suburbs—who wants us to have a talk with
a certain drug dealer. It’s worth $20,000 each for you two, just
to—mainly—tag along.” He hesitated, obviously waiting for some kind
of response.

“‘
Mainly?’
” Nicole asked.

“Well, of course, you both will do something
that will guarantee you both graduate.” Then he added, “And that
$20,000 will take care of your training here, your guns and both
licenses, plus you’ll have quite a bit left over.”

“A
‘talk’
though? ” the chaplain
finally asked.

“Yes. A
‘talk.’
The rich guy wants
this puke to stop shipping drugs up to the local kids, and to stop
selling, period, and even to leave town if he has a mind to, but of
course we can’t just stop the guy on the street and tell him
that.”

“Because he won’t listen….” Nicole said, her
eyes wide.

“That’s correct. So we have to…for lack of a
better word, kidnap him. Sadie will make the first contact.”

“Sadie?” Nicole asked, “Won’t that be
dangerous for her?”

Riley nodded and sent a sober smile, “Sadie
has decided to join our trainers here, and, she’s tougher than most
of us realized. At least as tough as you, Nicole, but yes, it’ll be
dangerous for her, but at least two of us will have her in sight at
all times.”

“‘
Kidnap’
…him, though?” the chaplain
barely mouthed the three words, “Isn’t that…against the law?” He
kind of chuckled.

“Yes. We could go to prison, but this guy
isn’t likely to run to the law after we have our talk, and of
course, you two, just by being along, well…as the old saying goes,
and I believe in it: you two would be guilty by association.” Riley
hesitated for a few seconds, appearing to contemplate, then, “One
last thing. You remember I said sometimes we do these jobs for poor
people, well, this one is for free. The rich guy, though, he’ll pay
all right. He’ll pay you two, but my crew and I are doing it for
free. You see, a fourteen-year-old girl died of a drug overdose
last week, and those drugs were—unofficially—traced directly to the
guy we’re going to talk to.”

“‘
Unofficially?’”
asked the
chaplain.

“No proof, so the guy was back on the street
in an hour. So, are you in?”

The chaplain looked at his woman. She smiled
and nodded positively.

“We’re in,” he said.

****

After the conversation, Riley left and the
chaplain and Nicole remained at the table.

“For the time being, Nicole, I think we
should lock our guns in their cases and store them under the front
seats.” Then he waited.

“I agree, Radford, but, of course, if we ever
need one in a hurry we’ll be at quite a disadvantage. Of course,
since we likely will be crossing many state lines…well, we don’t
want to be—as you said—banging heads with the local law.” She sent
her bright smile, “I imagine the laws are head-bangingly
different.”

“We’ll ask Riley about that. Maybe your small
gun could hide in that purse you sometimes carry, and of course,
after we leave here we aren’t exactly chasing a hardened
criminal.”

“I don’t know about that, Radford.” She got
up and went to another table along the wall, where various
magazines and newspapers lay, searched for a moment, grasped one,
returned and laid it down showing the front page.

The chaplain quickly read the main headline,
and the minors, then asked, “What am I looking at?”

Nicole pointed to a sidebar headline.

He read
‘Woman falls to her death at the
Grand Canyon.’

“Look at the family members,” she added.

He looked again, began moving his finger down
the column and reading to himself,
‘…father, daughter, son, and
a foster son two years old, who was with the mother when she
fell…’
—My God!”

“It’s possible, Radford. The family was
vacationing from Nebraska, and the article later says the
two-year-old was big for his age, as if the journalist was even
suggesting
…foul play.”

He then jabbed his finger on the masthead,
“This paper is several months old! Why haven’t you mentioned it
before?”

“Mainly,” Nicole said, “I didn’t even find
the paper for several months—I guess the boys just buy some copies
when they’re out in the world—and for another thing, it took me
awhile to read it all. It was sometimes hard to read, too, as it
went on for several days. It took them several days just for the
rescue team to even get down to that poor woman—I guess she was
caught on a really tiny ledge—and then to get her broken body out
of the canyon—that little bastard!—I thought about telling you, but
I didn’t want anything to interfere with our training. We needed
this training, Radford, and now we have it.”

“You really think it’s him, don’t you?”

“Yes! Don’t you?”

The chaplain shook his head positively, then
reached for and squeezed her arm. She took his hand and inserted
her own into it, then they just sat there holding hands,
appreciating and needing each other more than ever, as their search
had now—likely—taken on a new urgency.

Chapter 18
More Murder

Les Paul, approaching three years old, was
still with the same foster family, nearly a full year, a record
long time—for
him
—with one family. He remembered the funeral
for his foster mother. Closed casket, but he had no trouble
picturing what was inside. He remembered being held in the warm
arms of his dear foster sister, Chloe, that day. How he enjoyed
having her arms around him.

He also remembered the several looks his
foster brother, Tyler, gave to him that day. After making sure
nobody else would see his face, he always looked right back, and
then wrapped his arms even tighter around Chloe’s neck. His foster
father that day just bugged him. The man, his head always hanging,
didn’t say much, just kind of moped around, always hugging Chloe
especially, and himself, and even Tyler, and Tyler would always
look at him when the father gave those hugs, and Les Paul would
look right back!

Several months had passed since that day, but
of course he yet had very little concept of time. He had long
forgotten the kindness his foster mother had shown him, if he even
had a comprehension of kindness. What he missed was the good food
she produced. The father usually fed them pizza, or often took them
out to the local Burger King. That he didn’t mind. The food
actually tasted worse than what the father prepared, but it was the
idea of going out that impressed him.

Presently he was in Tyler’s room playing on
his foster brother’s computer. He had no understanding about
computers but he did know how to make the little blipper run around
on the screen. He also knew how to land the blipper on the colored
parts and then click the mouse, both the left side and the right
side. If one side-click didn’t do something he would click the
other side, and usually got something on the screen to change.

****

The changes were enough that Tyler knew
somebody—most likely Baby Boy—was playing with his computer, but as
yet had not been able to catch him.

Tyler also knew that accusing Baby Boy would
do no good, maybe even cause punishment for himself. Because, since
the death of his mother, his dad had lavished a great amount of
love on his sister, Chloe, and, seemingly, an even greater amount
of love on Baby Boy. Many times his dad had reminded him and his
sister that Baby Boy had been with their mother when she fell, and
had to have been severely traumatized by the experience.

But Tyler was pretty sure Baby Boy was not
traumatized. If anything it was the opposite, but he couldn’t put
his finger on it. He watched Baby Boy though, and
figured—
hoped
—that eventually the little bastard would
eventually screw up. But whenever they were all present, together,
Baby Boy displayed angelic behavior, always smiling at his dad and
saying cute things with his few words, always gushing love on
Chloe, and the babysitter too, what Tyler considered as totally
fake—it made him so
mad
!

Because when it was just the two of them the
little bastard never smiled, never said anything, and always sent
that stupid look. Tyler had heard the word
‘smirk’
but
really wasn’t yet sure, exactly, how to use it. What he did know,
he was pretty sure that’s what the little bastard was sending him
when nobody else was looking: a
smirk
!

Things might soon change. Tyler was home from
school early, a half hour early, and he was going to catch the
little bastard playing with his computer. Even though all he could
do was catch him—there would be no punishment—but at least he could
catch him, and maybe convince his dad to let him lock his door
during the day. He sometimes wondered if the babysitter even
watched
the little bastard!