Shady Cross by James Hankins Read Free Book Online Page B

ago. He’d already missed one call. Who knew whether they had made good on their threat. Who knew what they would do if he missed another?
    Would they even call again at all?
    Or would they just . . . ?
    He skidded to a stop at the trash can, bent over it, and found a candy wrapper and an empty Pepsi can. That was it. No other garbage. No cell phone. Someone had emptied the trash since he’d thrown out the phone. Oh, shit.
    As he stood, catching his breath, wondering if he was disappointed or relieved—after all, he’d tried now, right?—he became aware of a faint ringing. Definitely a cell phone. He looked around. Most of the people were still looking at him. None was reaching into a pocket or purse for a phone. Where was the ringing coming from?
    The men’s room door opened, and a gray plastic trash can on wheels rolled out, pushed by a sweaty guy in navy coveralls. The ringing grew louder as the janitor wheeled the trash can away from the men’s room and closer to where Stokes was standing. Stokes covered the distance to the can in four long strides, wondering as he did why the hell the janitor wasn’t more curious about the phone ringing in the trash can he was wheeling around. Stokes stopped the can and began pawing frantically through the garbage. The janitor looked surprised for a moment before shrugging and taking a seat in a row of nearby chairs, where he could watch from a safe distance.
    The ringing continued as Stokes rooted through the trash, literally holding his breath as he pushed aside a half-eaten apple, old newspapers, cardboard toilet paper rolls, empty Styrofoam coffee cups, disgustingly moist paper towels, and a lot of unidentifiable nasty things until his hand finally closed around the smooth plastic of the cell phone. It had just finished another ring when Stokes flipped it open and raised it to his face. He tried not to think about where it had just been and why it was so sticky as he said, “Hello? Hello?”
    The phone was silent a moment and Stokes thought he was too late. Finally, a man said, “You trying to kill your daughter? Where the hell have you been? We called you at four, like we said we would, then we tried you every fifteen minutes. We were about to give up and tie up the loose ends here, if you follow me.” The voice sounded a little different than before. There was clearly more than one kidnapper; maybe they shared phone duty.
    “Sorry,” Stokes said, “sorry.” Realizing that if he were truly the girl’s father, he’d sound sorrier than he just had, he added, “Really, I’m so, so sorry.”
    “I thought you knew we were serious. I thought you said you watched the first video.”
    Video?
    “You saw it, right?”
    “Uh, yeah.”
    “You didn’t like it, did you?”
    It didn’t sound like he would have, if he’d seen it, so he said, “No, I didn’t.”
    “So how the hell can you make us send you a second one? My God, what’s wrong with you? You watch that one yet?”
    Second one? Oh, no.
    “You don’t think we’re serious, Paul? Did you watch the second video?”
    “I know you’re serious.”
    “Did you watch the second video we sent?”
    “No.”
    “Hang up and watch it. I’ll call back in five minutes.”
    The line went dead. Stokes hesitated, then examined the phone for a moment. They said they sent two videos. Stokes’s own cell phone was a relatively Stone Age model, without any bells and with, at most, one whistle, but he knew enough to know that the videos likely came in attached to either a text or an e-mail. Thankfully, there was a little button with the word “text” on it, so he pressed that and saw two texts in the in-box. Both had little icons of paper clips next to them. One had a time stamp of 10:09 a.m., and the other apparently came in at 4:12 p.m. . . . just under an hour ago, mere minutes after he missed the four o’clock call. He drew a breath and clicked on the first video.
    The chubby kid, wearing a pink shirt with a