Thirty minutes later, in the Jordan’s hotel suite at the Palace, Joshua’s Allfone was ringing again. He picked it up and put it on speaker. He heard the distorted, digital voice of the kidnapper again.
“Your son is a little weakling,” the voice said. “He doesn’t handle pain very well. I hope for his sake that you decide to cooperate with me.”
“I hope for your sake,” Joshua bulleted back, “I don’t get you alone in a room.”
“You are such a big American hero. How about I kill your son right now, Mr. Hero? Would that be good? Would you like to hear him scream some more?”
Abigail frantically waved her hands at Joshua and mouthed the words no, no, no.
Zimler continued. “Now, let’s talk business. You will produce your design documents on the RTS system. And make sure they explain two things. First, the mirror-image method that the laser uses to capture the flight-trajectory pattern on the inboard guidance computer of the incoming missile. And second, I want to see the system for remotely reprogramming that trajectory one hundred and eighty degrees.”
“How am I supposed to get this to you?” Joshua asked.
“You will email all of them to me at an encrypted address I will give you. When my experts analyze them and tell me that they are complete, I will release your son.”
Joshua didn’t hesitate a second. He blasted back.
“I can’t do that.”
“I have your son. Remember that. You have no choice.”
“No,” Joshua snapped, “you’ve got it wrong. The files are too big for email. If you want the RTS documents, we arrange a meeting place. An exchange. That’s how it’s going to be done.”
Abigail was dumbfounded, and her eyes widened in astonishment.
But Rocky Bridger was nodding.
Then there was silence. And the silence on the other end lasted so long that everyone feared that the caller had dropped off the line.
A sense of panic started to rise up in Joshua. What if he had just torpedoed the negotiations? What if the kidnapper had decided to call it all off? Then Cal’s life would have no value to the hostage taker. Which meant that Joshua had just moved Cal one step closer to an execution.
Suddenly the silence was broken with the sound of Cal screaming in the background.
That is when the digital voice came back on.
“Your son is crying because I have just broken one of his fingers with a pair of pliers. I thought about cutting it off, but I didn’t want to bother changing into my butcher shop outfit.”
Joshua steeled himself. Hold it together man. We’ve got to outsmart this guy.
Abigail was covering her face as she sobbed silently.
“If you try to play the tough guy again and make demands of me, then I will start cutting off body parts. Now you listen to me…this is what we will do. You will save the documents on a flash drive and put that in a metal fireproof briefcase and come to Grand Central Station in exactly two hours and thirty minutes. When you are there, I will call you and give you more instructions.”
“What about my son?”
“You’ll get proof that he is still alive. But you’ll also see exactly how he’s going to die if you don’t obey me…”
Then Zimler added. “But before anything else, you are going to prove that you can deliver what I want. So get a pen and get ready to write.”
“I’m waiting.”
Then Zimler gave him an email address. “You are going to email a couple of the RTS documents to that address. If you don’t convince me you’ve got what I want, then I’ll let you know where you can find your son’s body, and I disappear.”
Then he hung up.
Rocky turned to Abigail and said, “Josh played it exactly right. I know you were concerned…”
“What just went on?” she asked sharply.
“Abby, I had to,” Joshua shot back. “We can’t risk it with some remote, electronic delivery…”
“You start giving up everything by email,” Rocky said, “and Cal doesn’t have a chance. The only hope is keeping this creep cornered. Keep him in close quarters. Within eyesight. Force him to make an exchange. The closer we stay to this guy the closer we are to Cal.”
Joshua dialed Agent Gallagher again on Rocky’s cell, and when he picked up he bulleted out, “The kidnapper just called. He wanted everything by email. I said no…demanded a face-to-face exchange. The RTS stuff for my son.”
“Good move on your part. Smart…”
“So he said that the drop-off is to happen at Grand Central Station. I’m supposed to be there in two-and-a-half hours with the RTS documents. Then I get further instructions. But it seemed like he already had that drop-off idea in his head…”
“Two steps ahead. That’s exactly the way this guy works…”
“You know him?”
Gallagher didn’t bite at that, but asked, “Anything else?”
“Yeah. He wants me to email a couple of RTS documents just to prove I can deliver what he wants.”
Joshua gave him the encrypted email address, and Gallagher wrote it down.
“So are you going to send the email?” the agent asked.
“Do I have a choice?”
Gallagher didn’t bother to say the obvious. That any RTS documents that Joshua might send would probably be classified.
“Okay. I’m going to do what I can,” Gallagher said.
“I need to hear more than that,” Joshua snapped back.
“I would too if I were in your shoes,” he replied. “You’re going to have to trust me. Just know that I’ll be looking over your shoulder. Don’t ask me to explain.”
After hanging up, Joshua had the sinking feeling that maybe Cal was just beyond his reach, outside his ability to rescue. But he had one more call to make, and he didn’t hesitate for a second.
When he dialed the number, the man on the other end simply answered, “Patriot.”
“Pack McHenry?”
“Who’s calling?”
“Joshua Jordan.”
“Sounded like you.”
“I need help. We’ve got an emergency…”
“Interesting. Because we were just going to call you,” McHenry said.
“Why?”
“We’ve just received some solid intel that federal marshals are on their way over to your hotel. They’re probably already there in fact.”
“Marshals?”
“Yeah, to take you into custody. They’ve got an arrest warrant from a federal judge.”
“This can’t be happening.”
Joshua said. “I’ve got a situation with my son. Life and death. He’s been taken hostage…I’ve got to get out of this hotel…”
“No way. You’ll run right into them. I’m sure they’re crawling all over the grounds of the hotel.”
“I can’t afford to get arrested. My son needs me—”
“You said…taken hostage?”
“I’ll explain everything.”
“First give me your room number at the hotel.”
Joshua gave it to him and McHenry told him to call him back in exactly two minutes.
Then he asked, “By the way, what floor are you on?”
“We’re on the twenty-fifth floor…”
“I think that’ll work…”
“What?”
“Just stay in your room. Don’t answer the door for anyone…unless it’s a delivery guy with a box who says the words, ‘Airmail delivery for Mr. Jordan.’ If it is, answer it, take the box, and open it. And about your son…”
“Yes, what?”
“We’ll see what we can do to help.”
While Joshua was finishing up his conversation with McHenry, downstairs in the lavish lobby of the Palace, two armed federal marshals, wearing conspicuous blue jackets with the words U.S. Marshal printed on the back, were at the front desk. Three other marshals were spreading out around the premises.
“I’m sorry,” the man at the front desk said. “No one has checked in under the name of Joshua Jordan.”
“I’m sure the room is under a different name,” the marshal said. “I want to see all of the recent check-ins.”
Then he spotted the head bellman. The marshal called him over and pulled out a photograph of Joshua.
“Have you seen this man here at the hotel in the last few days?”
The bellman studied the picture for a moment; then he nodded his head and said, “Saw him when he came in. Maybe up on one of the floors…”
“Can you tell me on what floor of the hotel you may have seen him?”
“I think so…”
Just then a man in a brown delivery uniform, carrying a box, entered the hotel lobby and strode up to the elevators.
Then he waited for the doors to open. When they did, the delivery man walked into the elevator and punched the button for Joshua’s floor. The marshal who was still with the bellman glanced over just in time to see the elevator doors close.