There was a pause on the other end, and the man replied, a trace of his accent evident for the first time in the conversation, a fact that Griffin chalked up to the stress of the situation. He’d met more than one operative in his time who subconsciously slipped back into his native tongue under extreme duress. His buyer, while powerful and backed by a small fortune, was no different. “Very well. Call me as soon as you have an update.”

Griffin responded with a question, a mannerism he detested in other people, which only emphasized the gravity of the situation. “You’re absolutely positive, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the laptop is still in the neighborhood?”

A reluctant and frustrated sigh met his query. “As I told you before, there is a motion-activated GPS inside the laptop. It’s concealed to look like a component of the motherboard and draws power from it. We lost the signal, for whatever reason—could’ve been a technical issue, the computer was jarred, who knows—but our tech people tell me it will reactivate without question. Just between us, if it were still working as it should, we never would have lost it, but we have to assume it’s still there—for both our sakes.”

“Okay. Then, we’ll get it back to you before the end of the night.”

“Good, but know this: if you fail, you don’t just fail me. You fail my employer. And they are not tolerant of failure—not in the least.” The call ended, the not-so-subtle threat lingering long after the connection was lost.

Griffin breathed deeply once again, his pulse decreasing by a few beats, and his thoughts turned to the events that had transpired thus far. Something had gone wrong, but things never went wrong without a good reason.

Griffin moved away from the wall and toward the doors to the gymnasium. He needed to see something for himself, if only to ease his mind. What did you miss, Barrett? What did you miss?

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter
EIGHTEEN

“Mr. C., what are we going to do? That monster just told us he’s going to kill someone, one of our friends, our neighbors. While our families are safe, we can’t let that happen. It could be Ben. Please. You have to do something,” Sam pleaded.

The two of them stood outside on the deck, the lights of the central hub magnified by the parked vehicles and the vans, flashes flickering through the woods. She was right. His babysitter continued to impress on all counts—maturity, bravery, and intelligence. Sam Hawkins was going to be a formidable woman someday. Zack just needed to keep her alive for the rest of the night so she could survive being a teenager first.