Trust Gone Wrong

Trust Gone Wrong

Chapter One

Death approached kidnapped victims like a bullet in slow motion. They prayed for a way out of its intended path. Hoped it impacted an intermediate target, ricocheted, or lost energy and dropped before it reached them. Abductors understood the concept. Targets didn’t. Few escaped the outcome.

No longer. Angus Asher’s skills transformed Kellen Koufax into an abducted victim’s intermediary. No negotiation necessary. Increased odds of survival via early detection. Identify the culprit and track and rescue the victim before it’s too late. Kidnapping to rescue time in Idaho and Wyoming shortened from days, weeks, or months to fewer than thirty-six hours.

Seconds ticked toward eleven o’clock Saturday evening. Kellen hunkered behind a toolshed on a wooded lot on the west side of Victor, Idaho, dressed in night camo. A balaclava covered his head and face.

The homeowner had agreed to disable her motion-sensor lights at her home’s rear in exchange for a fee. Kellen tossed an inflated ball across the backyard. The yard remained cloaked in darkness. He tossed another to confirm. The owner had complied. He crept to the adjoining property. English ivy covered the ground, bushes and trees. Seventy-three yards separated him and a casement window set in the rear wall a dozen feet from the near corner.

Thermal imagery confirmed two heat signals. Maren Burch, a sixteen-year-old honor student last seen by friends at a campground in Swan Valley. Witnesses labeled her abductor a fortyish male in a forest ranger’s uniform. The man had forced Maren into a vintage Mercedez headed toward Teton Scenic Byway and Big Hole Mountains.

Five hours ago.

A window lit on the second floor. Imagery showed back-and-forth motion in the room.

Whacks and thumps echoed ahead. A muffled voice. Female. Kellen followed the sounds to the outside wall between the corner and the window. He alternated thumps on the wall with the whacks inside. He moved to the window and tapped on the glass. Curtains parted. Maren stood backlit by a small table lamp. Kellen planted a gloved hand on the window. He held up one finger. Maren waved him away. Shackles clamped her wrists.

Kellen pushed against the window. He gestured Maren to move, waited for her to step aside and smashed the window with his elbow.

“Keep quiet, Maren.” Kellen climbed inside.

Footfalls pounded a stairway somewhere in the house. Kellen assumed an attack position on the far side of the door. The door swung inward. Kellen shouldered the door. The force vaulted a hefty man toward the outside wall. Kellen pounced and pinned the man against the floor. His chokehold incapacitated the man. He secured wrists and ankles in zip ties. He rolled the man on his back. Facial features, physique and clothing fit witnesses’ statements and video footage from two cell phones.

Maren pressed herself against the far wall. “Who are you?”

“My identity isn’t important.” Kellen searched the man’s pockets and found a key to unlock the shackles.

Maren shoved her hands forward in a defensive posture. “You’re working with him, otherwise you would show your face. It’s the only way you could’ve gotten here this soon.” She pulled her arms to her chest. “What are you going to do with me?”

Kellen presented the key on his palm. “Give back your freedom.”

“Will you show me your face?”

“Hold out your hands.”

Maren waited for Kellen to unlock the cuffs and dashed toward her captor. “No, Maren.” Kellen tugged her through the door into a large rec room. He spotted a cell phone on a narrow table next to a small cooler. A package for a disposable phone jutted above the lip of a trash can.

“Call your family. I’ll escort you to the neighbor. If anyone asks, you don’t know who I am. I will not be here when the police arrive.”

Maren shuffled forward, hesitated and threw her arms around his neck. “Thank you.”

Security light blinded them on approached to the neighbor’s front door. Kellen removed his balaclava to expose camo paint on his face.

“Who is it?” the neighbor asked through the door.

“We spoke on the phone an hour ago. I’m here with Maren Burch. You might have seen her photo on the news. Will you call the police?”

A deadbolt clacked. The neighbor opened the door. A Rottweiler puppy nosed into the opening followed by the neighbor, a woman in her forties holding a pistol in a two-handed grip.

Maren flinched.

“It’s okay, dear,” The neighbor said. “I work for the park service. Come inside and I’ll make the call.”

“This is for you.” Kellen handed off $2,500 in a brown envelope. “Gratitude for your cooperation.”

“Confidentiality?”

A spark of recognition in her eyes cautioned him. “Strict.”

The woman touched her phone’s screen and put the call on speaker. “Nine-one-one, what is your emergency?”

“My neighbor kidnapped a young woman.” She rattled off the man’s address and hers. “She was able to escape and is safe here with me.”

“I have officers on the way. Where is the neighbor now? Is he armed?”

“Unarmed and waiting for your officers to arrive.” She ended the call. “I’m guessing you have a vehicle nearby.” She led Kellen through the house to the back door, unlocked it and pulled it open. “Say hello to your aunt Trina for me.”

Chapter Two

Sonja Cortez gasped from the passenger’s seat at a motorcycle’s fishtail and the operator’s attempt to control it outside of Killeen, Texas. Smoke roiled from the rear tire. The motorcycle’s flip on the shoulder dumped the rider like a bucking bull. He leapt to his feet, flailed arms and kicked the bike.

The van’s driver braked and stopped alongside a red-faced male in his early twenties. Sonja lowered her window. “I’m guessing you’re not hurt other than your pride by the looks of your rant.”

“I just got it out of the shop. They told me they fixed it.”

“Need a ride?” Sonja asked.

“What do you think?” He brushed grass from his hair and gestured to the bike. “I ain’t going nowhere on this piece of junk. The rear wheel locked up.”

“How far to the shop?” the driver asked.

“Couple miles.” He paused a beat. “Sorry for snaping at y’all. I’d really appreciate a ride. They close at eight. No way I can get there in time if I hoof it on foot.”

“What’s your name?” Sonja asked.

“Seth.”

“Hop in the back, Seth. I’m Sonja. You’re not the only one who needed a ride. Courtney here offered to drive me to the base after I had to have my car towed.”

“Not to the same shop, I hope.”

Sonja laughed. “No. They’re taking it to a new car dealership.”

Seth reached for the side door handle. He cringed and cradled his arm. Blood oozed across his forearm.

“Let me help you.” The driver shoved open her door and rounded the front to where Seth stood. He had pushed his sleeve up to expose a two-inch gash surrounded by road rash. She opened the side door, reached into her overnight case bearing an FBI seal and took out a travel emergency kit.

“FBI?”

The woman opened the kit as if she did not hear him.

Seth pulled himself inside the cargo area and sat while she cleaned and bandaged his arm.

“Sorry about the blood back here. I’ll clean it up if you have something I can use?”

“No worry,” the woman said. “It needs a good cleaning. I’ll take care of it tomorrow.” She stowed the kit and climbed onto the driver’s seat.

Seth motioned to a wheelchair. “Yours?”

“Mine,” Sonja said.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked.”

“It’s okay. I hurt my back in a helicopter crash.”

“Paralyzed?”

“No, thank God.”

“I guess I should thank Him, too. I could’ve been near killed and I wouldn’t be here having this chat with you. You said you’re going to the base. Are you a soldier?”

“I am,” Sonja said.

“I think I’ve said enough. There’s the shop up on the right.” Seth thanked them for their help and hopped out the moment the van rolled to a stop.

“Seems like a nice kid,” Sonja said.

“A rare find in my world.”

“What is it you do?”

“I’m on my way to confront someone who victimized a family member,” the driver said.

“Anyone around here?”

“Idaho.”

“Long way. Must’ve been serious for you to be going that far.”

“It is. My family member is serving time because of it. He was associated with the guilty party. Not an active participant. There’s a difference. Like statistics. Twist them to make them fit.”

“Will what you have planned not endanger your career with the FBI? I suggest you reconsider your actions. Why throw it away?”

The woman tightened her grip on the steering wheel. “You don’t know me, Sonja whatever your name is. I suggest you stop with all the questions before your nosiness grows into something you’ll regret.”

Sonja looked at the woman as if she had lost her mind. “Over a minor difference of opinion?”

“Minor? None of this is minor to me. I’ll risk everything for justice.”

“What you’re talking about ain’t justice. It’s revenge and I suggest you rid yourself of any thoughts of doing whatever it is you plan to do.”

“I didn’t ask for your opinion or your approval.”

“Do it and you’ll leave me no choice. I’ll—”

The woman jerked the steering wheel.

Sonja whipped her arm leftward. Momentum flexed her across her shoulder belt. The van jumped a curb and fishtailed on the intersecting street. She planted her right hand against her lower back. Face contorted. She righted herself.

They drove toward south Killeen.

“Where are you going?”

“We,” said the driver.

“Stop.”

The van surged to an intersection. A left turn. A right turn. Sped along Stan Schlueter Loop. Around a long warehouse into twilight’s ominous obscurity.

Sonja opened her door and unbuckled her seat belt. She tumbled out the passenger side. Hooked her arm on the window frame. The driver darted between the front seats and out the side door. Sonja hung on the door. The woman stabbed Sonja’s armpit. Sonja slid down the door. The woman spun, slashed Sonja’s leg behind her knee and anterior thigh as Sonja dropped.

Her head pressed on the lower door panel. She wasn’t sure how long. Dazed from the blood loss, Sonja’s eyes widened at the sight of someone crawling from behind the van. “Nell?”

“How bad is it?” Noelle Brumby asked.

“How did you find me?”

“I saw you in the van and followed it here.”

“I’m cold. I can’t feel my arm or leg. Where did she go?”

Noelle said, “Don’t worry about her. She’s gone. You’ve lost a lot of blood. I need to try to stop it.”

“You’re bleeding.”

“I’ll be fine. It’s you I’m concerned about.” Noelle grabbed Sonja’s phone and called nine-one-one. She put the call on speaker and talked with a police dispatcher while she snatched a bag laundry from behind the driver’s seat, removed a shirt, ripped it and wrapped a section around Sonja’s leg and thigh. Noelle cringed and pressed a hand against her left side. She grabbed another shirt from the bag, cinched and tied its sleeves inches above her waist.

The dispatched gave an ETA of four minutes.

“Anonymous?” Sonja looked puzzled as Noelle wiped the phone with the shirt sleeve and placed it on the ground beyond her reach.

“I have no choice, Sonja. I’m sorry. There’s nothing I can do for you and the police can’t know I was here.”

“Don’t leave …” Sonja’s voice wavered. Her chest rattled. Her last breath escaped in a lengthened exhale. Darkness shrouded Noelle in the distance.

Chapter Three

No good news ever resulted from a knock on the door at five-thirty in the morning. Kellen pictured his uncle and aunt, Marlon and Trina Covell, trapped in final-moment memories. A recall of life’s events gathered by their souls for the trip to the afterlife. Departure from majestic scenery near Snake River in Hoback, Wyoming, between one and two a.m. Another Monday Kellen would never forget.

“Trina fought her attacker,” said Teton County Deputy Brad Cole. “We found blood through the house and across the front porch.”

“Security alarm?” Kellen asked.

“The time received was 2:40 a.m.”

Kellen glanced at the clock on the mantel. Almost three hours. The alarm should have triggered earlier if the attack occurred between one and two. “Has the ME removed their bodies?”

“She was on her way there when I left to come here.”

He gazed at Brad, whom he thought of as a friend-in-the-balance. “I want to see them.” Kellen buttoned his shirt and tugged on a pair of hiking boots. He sprang off the armchair and grabbed a mid-weight jacket.

Brad seized Kellen’s arm. “Don’t. Your aunt and uncle were good people. Remember them in the life and time you shared. Help me out here, will you?”

Kellen stared at Brad’s hand on his forearm until the man backed off. He tossed the jacket on the sofa and gazed at a photo of his aunt, uncle and cousin Larkyn on the mantel. Their German Shepherd sat at attention in the foreground. Their smiles filled his mind with memories, but their deaths emptied his heart a second time. The first one came on his seventeenth birthday when lost his parents.

He pressed the photo to his chest and rested his forehead on the mantle. “Larkyn?”

“She wasn’t there when the first units arrived. We have no clue where she is. I didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary in her bedroom.”

Kellen’s gaze followed the prized photo up to its resting place. “Nothing?”

“Nada. No signs of a struggle. No blood. The bed covers were thrown back on one side. The bottom sheet was rumpled like she’d been in bed. An officer found a Brighton crossbody bag in the back of a nightstand drawer along with a small clutch purse. Larkyn’s phone and driver’s license are missing, but her debit card and two credit cards were in the clutch. No cash. No keys.”

“She never carried cash and took the Brighton bag with her on special occasions. What about her car?”

“It wasn’t there.”

Kellen shook his head and pulled out his phone. “She would’ve called me.” Her voice came through her voice mail. He waited for the beep. “Call me.”

“The sheriff issued a bulletin for the car and her.”

Kellen grasped law enforcement’s mentality in murder cases. Justified or not, they focused on the next of kin above anyone else. Find and question Larkyn Covell would become top priority outside the crime scene if it hadn’t already. Kellen’s mindset predetermined Larkyn committed no murder. He had lived with her long enough to witness her behavior in certain situations and could predict her responses within a calculated degree of accuracy.

“What about the dog? Is someone taking care of Thierry?”

“Nobody’s seen it.”

“Any paw prints in Trina’s bedroom?”

“No.”