The Hidden

Chapter 1

Christmas lonely.

Melancholic lonely.

Red Jacket was quiet this time of year. While others had yuletide logs burning brightly for warmth, this season for me was guilt and anger.

When you lose a loved one -—a wife, daughter -—there is more than the mortician, the funeral procession, and the final resting place. There is the grief and resignation. I lost my child to abduction.

So, it was for me, Mike Stevens, a forty-year-old, part-time instructor in American History at Pinesville Community College in Red Jacket, Arizona. My loving wife, Renee, died two years ago from breast cancer. I had to let her go, to live again, to love again. My only child, Linda, a beautiful girl who excelled in volleyball, student government, and English.

Linda attended the college as an effervescent first-year student. On a Saturday in October, on her way to Moab, Utah, to visit her friends, she disappeared. Her car was found abandoned on a lonely stretch, a dirt road about fifteen miles off highway #456. The police made the usual investigations, dusted for prints, scanned for microbial DNA, interviewed relatives and friends for any leads on possible stalkers or enemies. The leads led nowhere. The local authorities had no answers. The case went cold.

I began to drink too much and was irresponsible. The college was about to fire me.

I moved out from home Renee and me had shared. A home in which our daughter, Linda, gave love and laughter. I could not sell it. Attachment to Renee and the vibrant life we lived was too strong. Instead, I rented the house to Jenny Meredith, a student in Health Services at the college, and her friends.

I moved into a small apartment. I had to get over my anguish over Linda's abduction and death from her assailants.

The Dean of Arts and Sciences at the college, Dr. Leonard Andros, assured me if I required any assistance with counseling and guidance the school would help me -—up to a point, you understand.

My wife’s death and daughter’s abduction were not what a normal husband and father was supposed to experience.

Chapter 2

The ringing phone woke me. Eight p.m. I had fallen asleep about five in the afternoon from too much alcohol. I forced myself awake at the phone’s insistence. I should have left the ringer off. The phone rang loudly. I turned on the lamp on the nightstand and struggled from the bed.

Wincing against the blare from the nightstand light, I made my way to the living room, where I had left the phone.

... hello ... I was annoyed.

Mr. Michael Stevens?

A man’s garrulous voice questioned cautiously.

... yes ...

Now, I was more than half-annoyed.

She's alive! the voice whispered urgently. Your daughter, she’s alive!

Who are you? I demanded, now fully awake. I wheeled around and turned on the living room lights. The sudden flash hurt my eyes.

Who are you and what are you talking about?

Your daughter is alive!

My anguish and guilt vanished. The mourning was over. This was the first hopeful news about my daughter in what felt like an eternity.

Listen carefully, the Voice said deliberately. Meet me by the lumber yards near the railroad tracks at the intersection of Phoenix Street and South San Francisco. It's near the hostel. You must get there in fifteen minutes. I'll tell you all you need to know about your daughter. The line went dead.

I, as if working on automatic pilot, went to the bedroom to dress -—t-shirt, flannel shirt, sweater, leather jacket, jeans, boots, and my Fedora: a favorite hat I had owned for five years.

I briefly thought about a weapon. I did not own a pistol or a rifle. I went to the kitchen and opened a shallow drawer and rummaged through the steak knives. I wouldn't need them. I had a large Swiss army knife in my rear pocket.

I zipped up my jacket and checked for my apartment and car keys in my pockets. I didn't bother turning off the lights as I left. I expected to be back shortly.

Eight thirty p.m. Red Jacket, Arizona. I did not feel threatened. The town, with about 15,000 people, was a safe place. Sure, there was an occasional murder, burglary, or vandalism. However, those crimes were confined to transients, juveniles who were more bored than mean spirited, or those who could not imagine any other way to live. I walked the streets in Red Jacket safely at all hours during the night when I couldn't sleep or when I just wanted to see the stars. The town was still a wonderful place to see the night sky. For the occasion, however, I was going to forgo walking and, instead, get to the rendezvous point in my pickup truck.

This was a Tuesday night. Thirty-five degrees Fahrenheit. Christmas had come and gone on Sunday. New Year’s Eve was next. Because this interim between two holidays, and because this was a college town, students, who were the economic life blood for the local businesses, were far away in familiar places with family and friends. Red Jacket was deserted and quiet.

I jumped into my vehicle, cranked over the engine, and drove. I only briefly considered the rules for driving. I didn’t come to complete stops at intersections. Were a hundred other parents out to save their daughters? I drove faster. I was tense.

What did the Voice mean by alive? Was she alive but physically maimed? Was she alive but hurt and suffering? I was pissed off for being put through the anguish to losing her only to find out my anguish was in vain.

Suspicion filled me as I drove to meet the man behind the Voice. Suspicion I was walking into a trap. I mean, why would someone call me about a breakthrough in this abduction case almost two months after it happened? Why not call the authorities first and have them contact me? I was suspicious because the Voice did not sound confident but hurried. Why?

Suspicion forced me to park my pickup blocks away from where the Voice said to meet him. I parked on Cottage Street, close to the quaint restaurant there, and walked toward the narrow streets of Phoenix and South San Francisco. The neighborhood was dark and silent like other neighborhood streets in Red Jacket. Even Main Street was empty.

With my hands in the pockets of my leather jacket, I walked quickly. As I got close to the rendezvous point, however, I slowed my pace. My eyes searched every shadow, every space where a man could hide. Then I stopped a half block from the agreed-on intersection. For the first time since the call, I was in danger.

Chapter 3

Red Jacket had vintage buildings from an earlier era when narrow streets were the norm. During daylight hours, the designs and diverse colors on the buildings were a delight for tourists and natives alike. But at that dread hour, the structures loomed black and forbidding against the night sky. Their architecture askew, their lines and perspective disorienting.

I did not know how long I stood on the sidewalk in a neighborhood as silent as a coma. I did not hear even the faintest sound from a car's engine in any direction. I ducked into a driveway and leaned against the brick wall to a closed book shop. Something was wrong but I did not know what. Yet, I had to meet the Voice. I had to find out about Linda.

I stepped onto the sidewalk and went toward the intersection. I was no more than ten yards away when a man in an overcoat and suit ran around the corner. I caught my breath. My heart skipped a beat. Then a sudden injection from adrenalin made my stomach tighten. I took my hands from my pockets to defend myself.

The man grabbed my arms. A face pushed itself out from the shadows and into the weak illumination from the streetlamp. The man's eyes were wild with exertion and expectancy. Strenuous breathing flushed from his nose and mouth. The Voice now had a face. Shallow, slender, skull-like. Gray hair. Gray eyes. Nose like a condor's beak. Thin lips.

Stevens? The Voice demanded. The same voice I heard on the phone, only more strained, urgent.

Yes.

The Voice spoke in a harsh whisper. Your daughter is not dead. She was abducted. She's alive. The authorities are either involved or they were duped. There is a conspiracy to take people—- The skull implored with wild and crazy eyes. "Listen to me! He gripped me more forcefully. It's what they want! Do you understand me? It's what they want!"

"Who are they?"

The electro-magnetic-pulse from the old man's obsession made the hair rise on the nape of my neck.

Your daughter's truck was intentionally placed where it was found. She was not kidnaped from there! She was abducted elsewhere!

Where? And who are you?

Instead of answering, the now-embodied Voice stared in stark raving terror toward the intersection from which he had come.

Why are they doing this? I demanded.

-—pray she's still alive—-

The Voice, this stranger, staggered back as if being pulled by a wire. He reached out to me as if begging for help.

"-—Genetic Agriculture -—she’s there with the Devil! The Devil!"

I was about to hold out my hand to help him when I heard the squeal from tires on a high-speeding car on the street. The glare from high-beam headlights revealed the stranger's ghastly pale face in all its horrid angularity, anguish, and fear.

I quickly, I stepped back into the shadows. When I heard the first pops from gunfire, I was already hurdling the first fence.

Chapter 4

I ran down Jackson Street toward Butler Avenue. I was never one for jogging but under those circumstances, sprinting became easy. I sped by houses could have been refuges, a place to call for help. But I could not bang on doors because those within would awaken, believing a madman was on the loose, then they would call the police on me.

In the distance, beneath the weak illumination on the street from where I ran, I saw the silhouettes of two men. If they were the ones in the speeding car who were after the Voice, then they were after me, too.

I bolted from my position. I ran as hard as I could to my truck. I climbed in. From my cab window, I could still see the main boulevard. There were now more than the two men who originally began their hunt for me. Now there were at least a half dozen -—or were there eight? They were moving slowly, talking into walkie-talkies. I quickly drove away.

I mentally flashed back to when I was a youngster playing hide-n-seek. The thrill of hiding. The terror of being found. Cat and mouse. But this experience right then was not innocence. This was grown-up stuff with real killers. If my predators found me, they would not tag me out and want to take turns hiding. Instead, they would eliminate me from this game with a well-placed bullet through my skull or a knife lodged into my heart.

>>>  >>>

I had to decide. Should I contact Amy Liston whom I dated casually? Should I call Lester Keegler, my friend? Should I awaken Jenny Meredith? Jenny was a student who was now renting the house me and my deceased wife, Renee, once shared.

Amy Liston, a newspaper reporter for the Red Jacket Gazette, interviewed me for an article about the ratio between faculty and students, and the benefits derived therefrom for the community. I liked her in-your-face energy. I liked her directness. This interview was six months after my wife’s death. My thinking had been fuzzy. I was feeling reckless. Whatever the source of my audacity, I asked her out on a date, the first of several. I was exhilarated with her. She must not have been too badly impressed with me because she accepted my subsequent invitations. I liked to think there were emotional and spiritual possibilities for us.

I met Lester Keegler through a mutual friend. He is a computer expert and he also like weapons, even illegal. Our comfort level with each other from the get-go made us feel as if we had been friends for years.

Jenny Meredith was a student renting the house Renee and me had lived in. I liked Jenny simply because she was an enjoyable human being. I liked Jenny because she was trustworthy.

I had to plan.

I was not on the streets doing brave battle with thugs who were after me. Instead, I was running and hiding and frightened. I could do nothing against men who were armed and coordinated in a sweep-and-destroy mode with an overall plan. I was alone and unarmed. I needed weapons to counter weapons. I needed others to help me.

Chapter 5

I was on the highway leading from town. My destination was the isolated road where the authorities found my daughter's abandoned car.

My shoulders were mildly sore. Where the skeletal fingers from the panicked man gripped me, imploring me to understand, to hear him. The anguish in his voice, the terror in his eyes as he saw his imminent death from the blazing guns in the streaking car.

>>>  >>>

The long road was empty in both directions. I was the lone traveler. With the desert all around, the highway may as well have been on the moon’s dark side. The interminable stretches of desert throughways in the Southwest have no lights on poles to lead the way. The truck's headlights were unable to pierce the night effectively. Yet I knew exactly where my daughter's automobile had been found. I needed no signpost.

I pulled off to the side of the highway, turned off the lights and engine. I grabbed a flashlight and put it into my pocket. I stepped out into the desert.

The truck's engine was still hot. An occasional ping rang out as it cooled. The odor from my pickup’s gasoline wafted in the air. I walked farther onto this plain and stopped.

I turned on the flashlight to guide me the last few steps where I had left flowers in the wake to my daughter's abduction. I swept the beam back and forth across the scrub. The harsh illumination created monstrous and grotesque shadows. Within moments, I found the makeshift cross. I knelt and prayed awkwardly, imploring God to hear me as the Voice implored me to listen to him.

I canceled my supplication and stood up. I went back to my truck, my flashlight working to guide me. I climbed back into my vehicle and without hesitation drove farther down the highway.

I drove about five miles at a high speed. The tires thumped on the highway's tar-filled cracks as they bounced past. On the left was a long chain-linked fence. I slowed quickly, pulling off the highway on the opposite side as I did so. I then circled back in the direction from which I had come and parked about a hundred yards -—the length of a football field -—away from this fenced enclosure. I shut off the headlights, turned off the motor to my truck, and locked the door. From the bed, I retrieved the only weapon I had: a foot-and-a-half-long five-pound stainless steel crescent wrench. I tucked this into my belt. I did likewise with the flashlight. These were my Neanderthal tools: club and light.

Within moments, I reached the front gate to this vast and sprawling property. I turned on the flashlight. There was a small weather-beaten sign next to the entrance.

GENET-AG

GENETIC AGRICULTURE

BIO-AGRICULTURAL FACILITY

PRIVATE PROPERTY

Genetic Agriculture -—the Devil. Those were the last words the old man said before the gunfire.

I swept the beam back and forth around the sage and mesquite bushes at the pad-locked entrance in the fence. I was about to leave when something caught my eye. A glitter. A reflection from the light. I walked toward the curiosity, expecting to find a flattened soda can or windswept cellophane from a long-ago eaten package of cupcakes. I walked closer to the mesquite bush and its tangled branches.

Keeping the light on the glitter, I pushed my hand into the thick wild growth. With finger tips, I carefully retrieved what had caught my eye. I put the light beam onto what I held. I moved the light over and around the gold wristlet in my palm.

-—this jewelry was my daughter’s -—a high school graduation gift I had given her—- Linda had been here—-

My throat tightened. Tears flooded my eyes, blurring the view to the wonderful memento in my hand. I was emotional because my daughter proudly wore my gift while she was a college student. I was overcome by having a loving connection close to me.

I tightened my hand around the wristlet and slipped it into my pocket. I now knew what really happened. My daughter was not abducted from where I parked earlier and had laid flowers to rest in her memory and respect. Instead, she was kidnaped here where I stood. She was taken by force, through a struggle, and the wristlet flew or fell from her arm into the mesquite bush. Then someone drove her car to where the authorities found it five miles away.

Like the Voice told me.

I flashed the light onto the Genet-Ag sign and the entrance.

I decided to hop the fence.

Chapter 6

I climbed the ten-foot high chain-linked fence, swung my leg over, and clamored down. In the distance, starlight revealed the silhouette, a large warehouse. Farther beyond were rows, dimly lit green houses. There was nothing else on the sprawling property.