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Suddenly, I felt hands pulling my arms behind my back. It was Gloria, handcuffing my wrists behind me. Her lips at my ear.

  “I am so goddamn sorry about this, Danny.”

  I stiffened. Instinctively closed my hands into fists.

  The big man said, “I’d let her finish, Doc. I have the gun pointed at her pretty little head.”

  I felt the snap of the cuffs, then started to turn back.

  “Did I say turn around again? Shit.”

  I froze where I stood. And heard a sharp gasp of pain behind me. The big man had obviously grabbed Gloria again.

  “The gun’s back at her throat, Doc. So don’t do nothin’ stupid or she starts gushin’ blood like a geyser. Got it?”

  I nodded.

  “Good. Now start walkin’…”

  I did, the back of my neck prickling. Feeling the presence of our captor and Gloria right on my heels.

  ***

  Two blocks from Noah’s Ark, a nondescript van stood with its rear doors open. As we approached, I could make out the faint glow of an interior ceiling light.

  “Get in,” said the big man. “Slowly.”

  I climbed up on the fender and stepped inside, wobbling slightly. With my hands behind my back, my balance was off. Once inside the empty, windowless compartment, I finally turned around. Just in time to see the big man shove Gloria roughly inside. She fell to the ribbed canvas floor.

  As he started to close the van doors, I shouted out. “What the hell’s going on?”

  He paused, that same easy smile creasing his face.

  “Boss wants to talk to you.” He aimed his gaze at Gloria. “As for you, honey…Gosh, I’ll think o’ somethin’…” He gave a short laugh, then slammed the doors shut.

  Immediately, Gloria went to the doors and tried them.“Locked, of course,” she said.

  She came back and found a place on the van floor, next to where I’d awkwardly managed to sit. She glanced behind my back.

  “He kept the keys to my cuffs.” A long, deep exhalation of breath. “Shit, I’m so mad at myself I want to scream.”

  “Don’t blame yourself, Gloria. He had a gun on you.”

  Suddenly, I heard the sound of a motor starting up. Then felt the van sway, lurch forward. We were moving. She acknowledged this with a nod. Pulling her knees up to her chest, she hugged them. Eyes narrowed with frustration.

  “What happened, anyway?” I asked.

  She wouldn’t look at me. “Prick must’ve followed me when I left Harland’s place tonight. Pulled into the Federal Building garage right after I did. I’d just parked, and was locking the door, when suddenly I felt a gun pressed against the back of my neck. I mean, damn! Caught flat-footed like some stupid rookie.”

  “It happens, Gloria. You were probably preoccupied with the Harland case, and…”

  “Save it, will you? I screwed up.” She looked off. “I tried to struggle, to scream, but he clamps this big hand over my mouth. Digs the gun harder into my skull. Then he drags me over to his vehicle—this van—and makes me get in. Orders me to tell him where you are. Me and my smart mouth, I said, the Doc’s done shrinking heads for the day. He could be anywhere. For which I get slapped in the face. Hard. Creep’s strong as a bull.”

  As if for emphasis, she rubbed her cheek.

  “Then how did you know where I was?”

  She turned to face me. “You have to understand, Danny. He had the gun at my head. I…I had to keep doing what he said. I just thought, sooner or later he’d be distracted. Make a mistake. Then I’d get a chance at him.”

  “He doesn’t strike me as that kind of guy.”

  A rueful frown. “Tell me. Anyway, the only thing I could think of was to check your file. The Bureau has a detailed one on you, and I was able to access the data from my cell. Friends, family, known places you frequent.”

  “Like Noah’s Ark.”

  “Neal Alcott had flagged it, so I figured there was a decent chance you’d be there.”

  “Good ol’ Neal. Then what happened?”

  “He pulls out into the street. But first, using my own handcuffs, he hooks me to the inside passenger door grip. So there was no way I could get to him as he drove. And if I tried to jump out, I’d be dragged along the street outside the van.”

  “Jesus, he is good.”

  She tilted her head. “Do you have to keep saying that? I feel bad enough already.”

  Gloria hugged her knees tighter. “You know the rest. He pulls me into the doorway of that empty store. Says he’d kill me if I didn’t do exactly what he said. And he…I looked into his eyes and knew he meant it. That he wanted to do it.”

  “I have no doubt.”

  “With his gun at my throat, he made me call your cell and tell you that Julian had contacted the house again. And that he wanted you to deliver the ransom. Like before.”

  I sighed. “He knew I’d come…”

  “That’s why I feel so terrible, Danny. So did I. Remember, I saw what you were like last winter. The Jessup thing. Some kind of hero complex.” A wan smile. “You really ought to see someone about it.”

  “Yeah, I get that a lot.”

  I shifted position, trying to ease the growing pain shooting up my arms. Soon, I knew, they’d go numb.

  “Listen, Gloria. Did this guy say anything the whole time you were together? Something that might tell us who he is. Or what’s going on?”

  She shook her head. “No, nothing. He just gave orders. Though I sure wish I knew who his boss is.” She’d no sooner said this than I felt the van begin to slow down. The tires below us bumping on gravel.

  “I have a feeling we’re about to find out.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Moments after the van came to a stop, the doors opened just enough for the big man to throw what looked like a couple of rags in the compartment. Then he locked us in again.

  Gloria quickly snatched them up, showed me what they were. Two cloth hoods. Black. Eyeless.

  Our captor’s sharp voice came through the doors. “Listen up, slut…put one of the hoods on the Doc. Then the other on you.”

  Gloria and I exchanged guarded looks. Then, reluctantly, she pulled the hood over my head. The cloth weave was just porous enough for breathing, but I was swathed in total darkness. Then I heard a rustle of movement beside me. Gloria putting the other hood over her own head.

  “Okay,” she called out, her tone strained.

  I realized again the effort it was taking to keep herself together. To stay resolved. Focused. And if the relentless pounding in my temples was any indication, the same was true for me.

  Once more the doors opened, all the way this time. I could tell by the squeak of the hinges, the inrush of air.

  “All right.” The big man’s voice. “Time to get out.”

  Suddenly the van floor shifted beneath us, bounced. The weight of a man, maybe two, climbing inside.

  Good guess. A huge pair of hands grabbed my shoulders, pulling me up, guiding me toward the van doors. Gloria’s slight gasp told me a second pair of hands had done the same with her. Stepping carefully on the rear fender, I got out. The hands at my back tightened their grip.

  The big man spoke again.

  “Just so we’re clear, Doc, I got hold of the bitch and my buddy’s got you. And I still got my gun. Maybe I’m pointin’ it at your head, maybe at hers. Either way, you both better stay cool or things’ll go really bad, really fast. Got it?”

  “Got it.” My words a dry murmur, muffled by the hood.

  “Okay, then. Let’s go.”

  I felt a shove at my back and started walking, my guy’s fingers welded to my shoulders. From the sound of their breathing, I could tell that Gloria and the big man were right beside us.

  I tried to get a sense of my surroundings. The floor beneath my feet felt like concre
te. And the air was icy cold. But there wasn’t a trace of wind. The van had been driven inside some kind of structure. Garage, maybe.

  No, it was too big. Spacious. The way our footsteps echoed, the length of our march. I could also make out the smell of oil or engine grease. Machinery, perhaps. Equipment? Cars being serviced? Were we in a some huge auto repair place? Or, more likely, a chop shop?

  Regardless, I didn’t hear any other voices as we crossed the cavernous room. No sounds of workmen. Or tools being used. Maybe the place was deserted, abandoned.

  I was aware the whole time of Gloria’s measured breathing beside me. Like me, she’d decided not to struggle or make some kind of move. Hooded, outgunned, we didn’t stand any kind of a chance with these guys. Not at the moment.

  Suddenly, the hands gripping my shoulders pulled me back with a jerk. The scrape of shoes on concrete next to me ceased as well.

  “This is where we stop,” the big man said. “Thanks for walking yourselves here. We coulda knocked you out back at the van, but then me and my buddy woulda had to carry your sorry asses all this way. And, fuck, neither one of us is gettin’ any younger.”

  The guy behind me snorted.

  I tensed, waiting for the blow that was coming.

  It never came.

  Instead, a huge paw of a hand clamped around my mouth. Even through the hood’s fabric I could tell that the hand had something in it. A sponge, or thick cloth.

  And the smell. The fumes. Chloroform.

  I struggled, impotent, my hands still cuffed behind me. But all my movements did was make the hand press harder, as a kind of panic seized me. I gasped, choked. Even as I inhaled the fumes, I could make out the sounds of Gloria’s equally panicked struggle. Her strangled cries.

  Then I felt myself spinning, free-falling in a deep, gaping darkness. And stopped hearing anything at all….

  ***

  When I came to, groggy from the effects of the chloroform, I found myself sitting up in a wooden chair. My arms were still held behind me, the hard slats of the chair-back between them and my cuffed wrists. While unconscious, I’d been un-cuffed, then re-cuffed to the chair.

  The hood had been removed.

  Blinking myself into full wakefulness, I looked around me. The first thing I saw was Gloria Reese, similarly bound to a chair with electrical tape. Still unconscious, her head lolled to one side, ponytail draped over a shoulder.

  Jesus, I thought, she looks so young.

  “Hey, you’re awake.”

  I swiveled my head around. The voice belonged to a grungy, long-haired man. Late twenties, maybe. Standard-issue denim jacket and jeans. Medium build, but with large, rough-hewn hands. Obviously the ones that had guided me here.

  Wherever that was.

  He was sitting on one end of a long couch, playing a video game on his cell. I could tell by the cheery rings and beeps.

  As soon as our eyes locked, he got to his feet, stretched, and hurried out of the room. Giving me my first chance to survey the place.

  It was a big room, walls hung with black crepe. No windows, a single opened doorway leading out. The one Long-Hair had used. The couch, some stuffed chairs. The only illumination came from twin floor lamps, on either side of the room.

  But it was what stood in a far corner, barely discernible in the dim light, that caught my eye. A tripod with a video camera atop. Plus a rack of lights, unlit, upended like a broom in a closet. And a fold-out bed.

  Finally, I glanced down at the floor. It was covered from wall to wall with thick padding, the kind furniture movers use. Old, spotted with stains, bunched at the corners.

  Just then, I heard Gloria stir. When I turned, I saw her doing neck circles, trying to relieve the kinks.

  “You okay?” I said.

  She nodded. “Just glad not to be wearing that damned hood.”

  I watched her rouse herself into full consciousness. After which, she rolled her shoulders. More kinks.

  I almost envied her. After being held behind my back so long, my arms had pretty much gone numb. And my shoulders weren’t much better.

  “How about you?” she said. “You okay?”

  “I’ll live.”

  Another voice made me snap my head around.

  “That remains to be seen, Dr. Rinaldi.”

  A man stood in the open doorway. Tall, gaunt. Grotesquely thin. Balding, no more than forty, though his features were hard to make out in the dim light. He wore a white shirt and tie but no jacket. Both the shirt and his trousers hung loosely, in folds, as though his limbs were made of sticks.

  He stepped into the room, eyes roaming to find Gloria. “I see you’re both awake. Excellent.”

  She glared at him, defiant. “You know I’m an FBI agent, right, dirtbag?”

  The man turned to me, smiling. One guy to another.

  “Reminds me of Nancy Drew, this one. Small and pretty and plucky. Very plucky.”

  Gloria pulled against the tape binding her. “Let me loose, asshole, and I’ll show you how plucky I can be.”

  “Relax, Agent Reese. You’ll live longer.” He shrugged. “Though that, too, remains to be seen.”

  I’d had enough of this prick’s attitude.

  “Who the fuck are you?”

  He casually pulled up a chair and sat facing Gloria and me.

  At this distance, I could see his face more clearly. The narrow jaw. Pencil-thin mustache. Sleepy, cunning eyes.

  “Well, since you asked nicely, my name is—”

  “I know damned well what your name is.” Gloria’s voice was like ice. She gave me a sidelong glance. “Meet Raymond Sykes. AKA “Splinter” Sykes. The Bureau’s had a line on him for years. But we’ve never had enough solid evidence to get him.”

  Sykes grunted. “And what is this ‘line’ you have on me?”

  “Upper-class kid gone bad. Ambitious but smart. You don’t challenge the East Coast families or the Russians. Limit your operation to the tri-state area. Big-fish-small-pond type.”

  “What kind of operation?” I asked.

  “Drugs. Porn. Human trafficking.”

  Sykes laughed, shaking his head.

  “Barely human, Agent Reese. Young, poor, female. Street people, mostly. Looking for a better life. Which I provide.”

  I stirred. “About the porn. Is that what you ‘provide’ in this room? I notice the camera, the lights.”

  “I prefer to think of what happens in this room as an experiment in human relations. Mutually consenting adults exploring the boundaries of their sexuality.”

  “Except I’d bet most of the females aren’t adults. Or consenting.”

  “You’re mixing apples with oranges, Doctor. This room has nothing to do with what Agent Reese calls ‘trafficking.’ That’s a whole separate enterprise, conducted elsewhere. This room is for paying customers only.”

  “Which paying customers?”

  “The rich kind.”

  “Right,” Gloria said sharply. “In this shitty room?”

  I stared at Sykes. “We are in some kind of warehouse or auto shop, right? Unused, abandoned…”

  “Something like that. Very out-of-the-way. In fact, in a particularly dicey neighborhood. Scares me at times.”

  “That’s just it,” I said. “If the area’s so bad—”

  “But that’s the point, Doctor. Some of our most prominent citizens do their slumming here. They go totally ‘ghetto,’ away from their fancy friends and colleagues, and do as much blow and booze as they want. Then, in this very room, get their gold-plated rocks off. And we offer a full range of services. Fantasy role-play. BDSM. SST. Trannies. Whatever the customer wants.”

  “And it’s all on video.”

  “For viewing later, if they wish. I assure you, there are no hidden cameras in here. Just the one video camera. My val
ued customers know full well that they’re being filmed.”

  Gloria scowled. “But I bet you keep a copy.”

  “Only for my own protection. Blackmail is a fool’s game. Too much personal interaction with the victims. The threats, the pleading, the one-in-a-hundred guilt-ridden husband who might call in the police. Trust me, it’s not worth the grief.”

  “Look, Sykes,” I said, “as much as I’m enjoying this little journey though the criminal mind, I’d like to know why you brought us here.”

  “Yes,” Gloria added. “If you wanted to know how much the Bureau had on you, you could’ve had your muscle just bring me in. To threaten me, torture me, whatever. But why Dr. Rinaldi? He has no connection to you.”

  Sykes slowly clasped his hands behind his head.

  “Well, well, Agent Reese. Quite the ego, eh? The only reason I had you grabbed was so that you’d lead us to Rinaldi. You’re just the side dish in this meal, young lady. The Doc here’s the entrée.”

  Despite acting like the villain in a James Bond movie, he was clearly growing impatient. Voice gone hard, flat.

  “Okay, Sykes,” I said suddenly. “If I’m the one you wanted to see, why not let Agent Reese go? There were no windows in the van. We were hooded ’til we were brought here. She can’t know where we are. Which means she can’t tell anyone anything.”

  “True. But that doesn’t mean she can’t serve a purpose.”

  Sykes turned his head toward the open door.

  “Griffin! Your presence is required.”

  Within moments, the big man from before strode into the room. Same black jacket and jeans, same towering build. But no dark glasses or cap this time. Nothing to shield his cold, empty stare.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Griffin stood beside his boss, arms folded across his chest. His unzipped jacket flared at his sides, like fins.

  Sykes said, “I have a few questions for you, Dr. Rinaldi, and Griffin is here to provide the proper motivation. He got his training in Iraq, you know. Same as I did.”

  I smiled at Sykes. “Somehow I can’t see you lugging an M-16 and picking sand out of your teeth.”

  “Neither could I. So I gave orders to the stupid bastards who did. I jumped straight up the ranks to first lieutenant, courtesy of Harvard and a relative on the Joint Chiefs. I was there, I assure you. But let’s say I was combat-adjacent.”