The Abduction (29 page)

When Gracie woke, she was shivering. She had kicked the scratchy green blanket off. She sat up, reached down, and pulled the blanket up to her neck. They were on the highway again, but the car wasn’t making funny noises anymore. The blond man was driving; the big man was smoking and reading a newspaper. Outside, the ground was covered with snow. Distant mountains taller than those in Taos rose high into the sky. Her head finally felt clear.

“Where are we?” she asked. “What day is it?”

“Well, good morning to you, sleepyhead,” the blond man named Junior said. “We’re in Montana, Patty. It’s Thursday.”

“Okay, just so you know? That Patty thing is really starting to annoy me.”

In the rearview mirror, she saw a thin smile cross Junior’s lips. She coughed. The car was filled with cigarette smoke. (Does the big man ever stop smoking?) She tried to lower her window, but it was stuck. She waved her hand to clear the air around her so she could breathe. She said to the big man, “Those things are cancer sticks. They can kill you.”

Without looking back, the big man said, “So can a nagging woman. Shut up!”

She stared at the back of his big head. “Nice attitude.” She noticed another smile from Junior in the rearview. They rode in silence until she said, “He’s coming.”

The big man tossed his newspaper back to her. “Ain’t no one coming for you, girlie. Your case is closed.”

Gracie picked up the paper and spread it out on her lap like at home when she read the sports pages after school. Her picture was on the front page; next to her was the picture of a blond man. He looked sad.

“I know him. He works for my dad.”

“Not no more he don’t.”

She read about her abduction, the search for her, and Mom’s reward offer. “You two Einsteins are passing up twenty-five million dollars to keep
me?
That seems way dumb.”

“Way dumb is right,” the big man said, and Junior gave him a quick look.

Gracie continued reading about her case, the investigation—
hey, Dad’s IPO went through!—
the arrest of the abductor, the abductor’s suicide, and her soccer shorts.

“You left my shorts in the woods? So everyone thinks I’m running around in my Under Armour? That is like, so totally disgusting.”

“Everyone thinks you’re dead,” the big man said.

Gracie read more. “They found my jersey in this guy’s truck? And my blood?”

“From your elbows,” Junior said. “Pretty smart, huh? I thought of that myself.”

“Oh, yeah, real smart. This guy killed himself.”

“That was just lucky. We set him up pretty good, but we was only hoping for a couple days’ head start. Didn’t figure on him hanging hisself. Now we’re home free.”

The story said this Jennings guy had hung himself in his jail cell, and the police had closed her case. Gracie Ann Brice was presumed dead. Her body would probably never be found now that the abductor had killed himself. Gracie didn’t understand: Why didn’t Jennings just tell the police that he didn’t take her? Why would he kill himself? It didn’t make much sense to her, but it didn’t change what she knew.

“No, you’re not. He’s still coming.”

Junior was shaking his head. “That wimp ain’t coming to save you just like he didn’t save you from that fucking asshole yelling ‘panty check’ at the game. Was me, I’d’ve shot the son of a bitch. I about did.”

Ms. Fist made an appearance. Gracie wanted to pummel Junior just like she had the snot. “First of all, numb-nut”—she wasn’t sure what that word meant, but she had heard a boy call another boy that at school and he didn’t like it—“don’t call my dad a wimp. He may be a doofus, God bless him, but he’s a genius, smarter than you two meatbots put together.”

Junior: “The hell’s a meatbot?”

“And second of all, he didn’t even hear the big creep. He was multitasking. And third of all, do you really think that’s appropriate language to use in front of a child?”

“Aw shit, I’m sorry, honey,” Junior said like he really meant it. “I won’t say them words no more.”

The big man turned in his seat to face Gracie. He wasn’t smiling. “I will. Listen up, sweet cheeks. If that boy calls himself your daddy’s smart enough to figure out Jennings didn’t take you and stupid enough to come looking for you, I’m gonna take my Bowie”—he held up what looked like an oversized steak knife—“and gut his scrawny ass from his dick to his neck and use his innards for bear bait, you understand? So sit back, enjoy the trip, and shut the fuck up!”

He was big and ugly and scary and he smelled bad. Gracie’s chin began quivering and her eyes watered. Just as she was on the verge of blubbering uncontrollably, she thought of her mother, the toughest, strongest, meanest person she knew. Gracie wasn’t like her mother, but it was in her genes—she could be if she needed to be. She recalled more of her mother’s advice: curse. Unexpected profanity from a woman, she had advised, intimidates men. Gracie remembered that word her mother often used when she thought Gracie wasn’t around and sometimes even when she was. She jutted her jaw out, leaned forward toward the big ugly scary stinking man, and enunciated each letter deliberately, which would have made Ms. Bradley, her English teacher, very proud.

“Fuck you.”

The big man gave her a hard look like he wanted to backhand her into next week, but Gracie’s chin held its ground; he abruptly broke into loud laughter.

“Where’d you learn to talk like that, girl?”

“My mother. She’s a lawyer.”

The two men looked at each other and shrugged. “Oh.”

“And FYI, A-hole—”

The big man just shook his big head. “You’re a piece a work, girlie. Makes me glad I didn’t have no brats—except maybe with some whores in Saigon.”

He thought that was funny.

“Anyway, FYI, I’m not talking about my dad. I’m talking about Ben.”

“And who the hell’s Ben?”

“My grandpa.”

The big man laughed again, even louder, and slapped Junior on the arm. “Her gramps.” He sucked on his cigarette like Sam sucking on a Slurpee, then he started coughing smoke like he was choking and his face got all red. “Damn angina.” He bent over and dug around and came back up with a pill bottle. He put a little pill in his mouth.

Junior said, “No one’s coming for you, Patty. You’re dead.”

“Ben knows I’m alive.”

“How?”

“He just does.”

After a few minutes the red left the big man’s face. He threw his left arm over the seat back again and said, “Well, shit, Junior, gramps is coming to kill us all and save her sweet little ass. We might as well give her up right now.”

A stern voice, her best imitation of Elizabeth A. Brice, Attorney-At-Large: “Yes, you should. Because he’s on his way right now. And if you two idiots had the sense God gave dirt, you’d let me out of this car so he never catches up with you.”

“Well, sweet cheeks,” the big man said, “I ain’t gonna lose no sleep over your gramps coming after me.”

“You should. He’s got one of those, too.”

“One a what?”

He was looking right at her now. His eyes followed her hand as she extended it and pointed her finger at the big man’s tattoo, almost touching his gross arm.

“One of those.”

The big man’s eyebrows crunched down. “Your grandpa’s got a tattoo says ‘viper’?”

“Yep, he sure does.” She gestured behind her with her thumb. “And he’s somewhere back there right now, catching up fast.”

The big man’s eyes shot up; he stared out the back of the car, as if Ben were tailgating them. His face was different now.

Because Ben was coming.

“We’re never gonna get to Idaho in this piece of shit!”

“Try it again!” Ben yelled from under the raised hood of the Jeep. John turned the ignition and pumped the gas pedal, filling the engine well with the smell of gasoline; the image of a Vietnamese child drenched in napalm flashed through Ben’s mind.

The jet had arrived in Albuquerque at 0900 local time. They had retrieved their bags and located the old Jeep in the parking lot. But the damn thing wouldn’t start again. Ben was under the hood and tweaking the carburetor, which usually worked. John was sitting in the Jeep, impatient and annoyed and becoming more of both by the minute.

Ben slammed the hood shut and came around to the driver’s side. John climbed over to the passenger’s seat. Ben got in, determined that the Jeep would start this time. He turned the ignition and pushed the accelerator to the floorboard.

“Come on, you son of a—”

The engine coughed and wheezed like a two-pack-a-day smoker then turned over. Ben quickly shifted into reverse; the Jeep jerked itself back out of the parking space. Then it died.

“Cripes!” from the passenger’s seat.

Ben jammed his boot down on the accelerator again; the Jeep fired up again. He rammed the stick shift into first before the Jeep could change its mind. The vehicle lurched out of the airport, belching a cloud of black smoke.

Once they were on the access road leading to the interstate, Ben glanced over at his passenger. John was his mother’s son—the same sharply etched facial features, the same curly black hair, the same slender frame, the same brilliant mind. He was so unlike his father. Ben’s thoughts turned back again to that night when—

“Stop!” John shouted.

Ben slammed on the brakes. “What?”

John pointed. “Pull in there!” Then he started punching the buttons on his cell phone like he was calling 911 to report an emergency.

“Hi, this is Gracie. I can’t answer the phone right now ’cause I’m on a date with Orlando Bloom—
I wish!
Actually, I’m like, at school or soccer practice or Tae Kwon Do class or chasing E.T. around the house. Anyway, I’m not here to answer my phone,
duh
,
so leave a message or whatever. Bye.” The machine beeped.

Elizabeth was now sitting in Grace’s chair at Grace’s desk in Grace’s room listening to Grace’s voice. It was all she had left of her daughter. She reached over and hit the play button and listened again to her dead daughter’s voice.

Gracie said, “Ben Brice was a hero.”

The big man was shaking his head slowly like Mom did when Sam acted like a little butthead. “Ben Brice,” he said in a soft voice, almost like he was talking about someone who had died. “What are the odds, Junior? We drive halfway across the country to snatch this girl, turns out she’s Ben Brice’s grandkid. Same wave of His hand, God gives you her and me Ben Brice.”

Junior was now looking at the big man like he was from another planet. “The hell you babbling about, Jacko?”

The big man named Jacko said, “The major always said it ain’t no coincidence that the world’s oil is in the Middle East, same place the world’s three religions got started. He said, ‘God put that oil there, Jacko, ’cause one day it’s gonna bring the Jews, Muslims, and Christians back to the Middle East for the final conflict. Armageddon in the desert. God’s master plan.’ ”

“What’s all that got to do with her?”

“She’s my oil, Junior.” Jacko turned to Junior but pointed a gnarly thumb at Gracie. “She’s gonna bring Ben Brice back to me for the final conflict.”

“Who the hell’s Ben Brice?”

Gracie said again, “He was a hero.”

Jacko snorted smoke. “He was a traitor. The traitor got us court-martialed.”

Junior looked at him and frowned. “You mean—”

“Yeah, I mean. He’s the one betrayed the major.”

Junior’s eyes got wide, like Nanna’s that time she hit four numbers at the lottery and won six hundred dollars. He said, “He’s a dead man.”

“Not yet he ain’t,” Jacko said. “But he will be soon enough.”

“But how’re we gonna find him?”

“We ain’t. He’s gonna find us.”

“He ain’t never gonna find us on that mountain.”

“Yeah, Junior, he will. I don’t know how, but he will. ’Cause we took something belongs to him.”

“Now this is my kind of work,” John said as he and Ben entered the Range Rover showroom. A smiling salesman wearing a short-sleeve shirt and a clip-on tie appeared before the glass doors shut behind them.

“Morning, gentlemen. I’m Bob.”

A Range Rover dealership was like a second home to John R. Brice. When he had spotted it from the Jeep, his spirits had soared like a kid on Christmas morning: a new Rover would dang sure get them to Idaho! John walked over to a Land Rover on the showroom floor—Java black exterior—and opened the door—Alpaca beige leather interior. He had seen all he needed to see. He turned back to Bob.

“How much?”

“Fifty-seven,” Bob said. “That’s a steal for this baby.”

Certainly Bob didn’t think he was going to hose John R. Brice on the price of a Land Rover. Like most techno-nerds, John did not possess real world expertise requiring physical dexterity or social skills; he did not know how to lay tile or change the oil or fix a running toilet (don’t even think about a major appliance) or interface effectively with his kids’ teachers or his spousal unit. But he knew all the important things in life as defined by his generation: he knew how to write computer code; he knew how to buy stuff on the Internet; he knew how to make a billion dollars from intellectual property; he knew how to compare cell phone calling plans; and he knew the specs for a Land Rover.