“No! No way. I’m not talking to them. Uh-uh.” He waved the rifle at her and she had to swallow a gasp. “You talk to ’em.”
She slowly brought the phone back to her ear. “He doesn’t want to speak with you.”
“Okay, okay. That’s all right for now, but eventually, I’ll need to talk to him. If he changes his mind and wants to speak to me, all you have to do is pick up the phone. It’s been reprogrammed to ring me automatically. Understand?”
His voice was so reassuring and confident Jennifer felt her shoulders ease just a tad. Here was help, she thought. She added a pair of warm brown eyes to the image of the officer she’d made in her mind. “Y-yes. I—I understand,” she answered.
“Good. Now answer my questions and don’t say anything else. We don’t want to upset him any more than he already is. How many people are there, including you and Howard French? Does he have a weapon? Is anyone hurt? Where are the kids?”
Jennifer glanced at the terrified students, then spoke. “Fifteen. Yes. No. At the back of the room.”
“All right.” She could hear him writing something down, a pen scratching on paper, then the sound stopped. “I’m going to ask you some more questions but first, no matter what happens, keep those kids where they are, okay? We have to know they’re in the same location and staying there. Understand?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. Now, does he have a gun?”
“Yes.”
“A rifle or pistol?”
“The first.” She licked her suddenly dry lips. “A .22.”
A second passed, as if he were surprised by her recognition of the weapon. She found herself wishing she didn’t know.
“Is he calm?”
“For the moment.”
“Scared?”
“Yes.”
“Violent?”
“No, absolutely not.” She dropped her voice. “Howard isn’t like that at all. You don’t understand. Something must have happened to upset him. Something really bad—”
“Yes, ma’am, something bad happened. He’s come into your classroom, taken hostages and has a weapon.” He didn’t give her time to reply. “Our first priority is you and those children, though. We want everyone in there to come out alive and that’s our main goal. We want Mr. French to stay cool. We’ve got nothing but time, okay? But I’ve got to talk to him. That’s paramount. I can’t do my job if I can’t talk to him.”
“Well, I’m sure he’ll talk to you as soon as—”
The moment Jennifer spoke, Howard’s eyes flew open and his whole body stiffened. With a practiced movement, he brought the rifle to his shoulder and looked through the sight. “Put down the phone!” he screamed. “Put it down right now or I’ll shoot!”
CHAPTER TWO
“JENNIFER! Jennifer…Shit!”
Beck slammed down the phone and wiped his brow. The Winnebago’s air-conditioning was cranked all the way up but it didn’t seem to matter. The ever present humidity, a damp and sticky gift from the nearby Gulf of Mexico, still managed to creep through the sealed windows. He watched an errant breeze kick up a small cloud of dirt at the center of the deserted playground and cursed again. A month later and there wouldn’t have been any kids or teachers in that classroom. “I lost ’em.”
“Move him to the end of the classroom. I can set a shot if she gets him by the window.”
Randy Tamirisa’s voice sounded inside Beck’s head, coming through the tiny earpiece he wore. The whole team communicated with each other via a complicated system of earphones and wraparound microphones. As Randy spoke, Lena raised her hand to her ear and Beck knew she’d heard the sniper as well.
“It’s way too early—”
“Not yet, Randy—”
Lena and Beck spoke at the same time, but Lena immediately hushed him with a hand motion and answered the sniper herself.
“Randy, we’re not ready for that yet. Stay cool, all right?”
“There’re kids in that room.”
Beck bit his tongue.
“I know that,” Lena said patiently, “but I’ll let you know when it’s time to set the shot, not the other way around.”
Silence filled their earphones and Beck knew that was all the answer she’d get from her rebuke. He spoke anyway, pulling his microphone closer as if he and Randy were the only ones hearing the conversation. “I haven’t even talked to the suspect yet, Tamirisa. I need to establish communications before you get trigger-happy.”
Again, Randy didn’t answer.
“I need an acknowledgment, Officer.” Beck’s voice was icy.
Nothing but an absence of sound, then finally—“Ten-four, Officer.”
A pointed stick of pain stabbed Beck between his eyes. He resisted the urge to lift his hand and massage the bridge of his nose. The tension headaches were getting worse with each situation.
Showing no outward sign of discomfort, he picked up the phone with an unhurried movement and redialed the number.
Jennifer Barclay answered after the fifteenth ring. She spoke before Beck could. “He won’t talk to you, okay? The only reason he let me answer is because I promised I wouldn’t make him talk.”
She sounded remarkably collected, and Beck suspected that was for the children’s benefit. She didn’t want them more scared than they already were, but deep down she had to be terrified. Every hostage was. When someone had total control over your life…you were terrified.
“I understand,” Beck answered. “I can work with that. Like I told you before, we’ve got all the time in the world. There’s no hurry. We can wait him out, but ask him this…will he at least listen to me? He doesn’t have to answer, okay?”
“Let me see.”
Beck heard her put the question to Howard French, then a moment later, she spoke into the phone. “He said he’ll listen, but that’s all.”
“Great. Let me talk with him.”
Harsh breathing sounded in Beck’s ear. “Howard? I can call you Howard, can’t I?”
Silence.
“Listen, Howard, you doing okay in there? Everybody all right? You need anything?” This time, without waiting for an answer, he continued. “I want to help you, Howard. I’m here just for you, but you have to tell us what you want, buddy. We can help you out with almost anything. There’s one rule, though,
