one he’d memorized but kept referring to, anyway—said that James had always wanted a dog.
There was no answer from inside.
The compilation of facts about the teenager had been written by James’s teachers, but his mother had been one of the main contributors. She knew her son well. Too bad she hadn’t done anything with that knowledge. Like to understand what drove him, what made him so unhappy—so desperate. Try to help him.
These were the cases that sickened Jack the most. The parents who were so shocked to find their son or daughter capable of terrorism. Parents who only knew their kids in superficial ways, who didn’t recognize the misery or the rage.
“James? You like dogs?”
“Maybe.” The tone was belligerent, but Jack smiled, anyway. James had just come down a step.
“So, you know why the poor dog chased its tail?”
Nothing.
“He was trying to make ends meet.”
The ground was hard beneath his butt, but Jack pretended not to notice. He was just there for a chat. For as long as it took.
“You ready to tell me what you want?” he asked in a casual voice.
“A dog. Can you get me a dog?”
“I’ll work on it.” Jack waited. “That’s all you want?” he asked, leaning back against the stucco wall of the building.
The fifteen-year-old didn’t answer.
“You ready to come out, then?” he called easily. “Or to send Marissa out, at least?”
“We got a picture!” The exclamation was a whisper—from the bearded, longhaired police officer working closest to Jack. He rolled a television monitor into Jack’s line of vision.
The boy with the deep sullen voice wasn’t even five feet tall. He was skinnier than a girl. He wore clean, stylishly baggy slacks and a pullover. His blond hair was cut short. James Talmadge looked like every mother’s dream.
Sweat dripped down the back of Jack’s neck.
The dream ended where James’s right hand held a gun to a four-year-old girl’s throat. Marissa was lying on the floor, shaking, her eyes wide, unfocused.
Goddammit!
What was it with high schools and guns, anyway? High-school terrorism had happened enough times you’d think someone would do something about teenage anger before it got to this point.
Jack suddenly heard a painful wail. The little girl’s mother had just seen the television. On the monitor the child jerked, probably recognizing her mother’s voice.
“Get her out of here,” Jack said, pointing to the mother as, on the screen, James pushed the end of his handgun against the child’s throat.
Marissa’s mother wasn’t leaving without a fight. A female officer spoke to her, telling her that for Marissa’s sake she had to at least move back and be quiet. Hearing her mother’s voice, knowing that her mother was right outside the window, could make the child do something rash that would get her killed.
Jack saw the young mother nod, her shoulders racked with sobs as she allowed herself to be led several feet away.
The mother’s anguish singed his nerve endings. It had been a long time since he’d felt that particular blistering. Usually he managed to distance himself from the pain of others. It was the only way he could do his job.
“James, we’re working on the dog,” he said, maintaining his patience. He stared at the laces of his tennis shoes and the hem of his jeans, which rode half an inch up his ankle. “You can trust me. Just toss me the gun and it’ll all be over. You’ll be safe,” he finished calmly, as though he were encouraging the boy to throw a baseball.
There was no answer.
“You know what happened when the dog went to the flea market?” he asked, his nonchalant tone belying the intensity with which he studied the screen. “He stole the show.”
Timing was the key to survival. The longer he could stall the harried boy, the more chance he had of talking him down. Or at least getting little Marissa out of there.
Though he could see the two kids, he still listened attentively. The little girl’s unnatural quiet bothered him. The resiliency and adaptability of children was amazing, but Marissa’s mind was going to catch up with her eventually.
Maybe today. Maybe ten years from now.
And it was going to be hell for her when it did.
“Tell me what you want, James.”
“You got that dog?”
“Like I said, I’m working on it.” Turning to the officer on his right, Jack whispered, “Get me a dog.”
Nodding, the young man took off at a trot.
“What else?” he asked. A dog was not the reason the kid had barged into a classroom brandishing a gun. Jack would bet his life it wasn’t the reason he’d cleared out everyone but the four-year-old child he now held hostage.
“I want my little sister back,” James said. He still had the gun on the child, but he’d turned toward the window. Looking for Jack?
“Where is she?’
“In a foster home.”
Jack scanned the paper he’d been given. There was nothing about a broken family there. With raised brows, he glanced around at the officers surrounding him. They shrugged, shook their heads. The school principal was there. When Jack met his eye, he nodded.
Shit. It was information he should’ve had an hour ago.
“So, Mr. Hotshot Cop, you gonna make the trade? You gonna bring me my sister?”
Chances were he couldn’t. But Jack wasn’t going to tell the kid no. Number-one rule of engagement—never tell the perpetrator no. The word signified endings.
“I’ll see what I can do,” he said, instead.
“Yeah, you do that.”
Marissa was crying. Jack couldn’t hear her, but he saw a tear drip off her chin.
James saw it, too. The boy stared at the teardrop for a long moment. And bent down to wipe the little girl’s cheeks.
She glanced up at her captor, terror on her face, before her expression once again went blank.
Jack took a deep breath. Calmed the shudders rushing through him. “Hey, James, you ready to come out?” he asked. “We’ll do everything we can to get your sister back, I promise.”
“Yeah, right.” There was no mistaking the boy’s bitterness. “I’ve heard that before. I’ve waited almost a year.”
“But
