A special thanks to "Aaroneous" for the great story suggestions and for all the time it took editing. I know how much patience and the length of time it takes to read through a story and pick out errors, that's why I normally choose not to do it.
😊
I felt the hot sweat dripping in my hand. The moisture made gripping the pistol even harder than I could ever imagine. The barrel moved off its target, but only slightly as my hand shook. Not in fear. More of an anxious nervousness. If this was going to be my new career, I would have to toughen up and not try to overthink the crime I was about to commit.
The word "crime" itself was enough to make me cringe. It turned out to be an act of absolute love and recovery, but in the end, it still started out as a crime.
Yes, in every single one of our glorious states, when you remove someone from their home, tie them up and unwillingly transport them across the country, it is a crime. It's called kidnapping and up until now, I've never done anything like it before in my life.
A little about myself. My name is Sam Robinson. I am 24-years old. My mother tells me that my square chin and solid frame has been handed down for many generations. All the men on my father's side are at least six feet tall and hover around the 200lb mark. Even in the latter years of their lives, they retained all their teeth and most of their hair. Good genes all around.
For most of my life I lived just outside of Arlington VA. and the FBI has been a part of my family's life for as long as anyone could remember.
Both my father and my brother are agents. Currently, my father works only special cases, and my brother is stationed in New York. When we get together with my uncles, we are a formidable group.
Enough about that. The interesting stuff is what happened over the Christmas holidays.
It was supposed to be some much-needed downtime for me. Get caught up on some of the randomly ignored paperwork that I had neglected. Eat and drink far too much. Read a book? Probably not. Play video games? More likely. Go through my Tinder profile and tweak it for the holidays so I could find another soul who was searching for something simple and dirty. Absolutely.
But, as they say...sometimes, the best laid plans tend to go for a shit.
On a cool December 19
th
morning, I rolled over and looked at my night table. The red numbers screamed "get out of bed, yah lazy asshole", but I just smiled and rolled over. It was already 1030 I had missed breakfast, so why not hang around until I could smell something that resembled lunch. I would have done exactly that, but the sounds of two men arguing with heated voices, and the sound of a house door slamming kept me awake. Finally, it was the car door slamming that made me move.
My mother was at the bottom of the wide oak staircase that was wrapped in a pinecone clustered garland. My father was at her side. His head was down in obvious anguish. Mom held his left arm with both of her hands. She was whispering words of encouragement that only he could hear. She was always the strength of our family, and when she saw me standing in only my underwear, she moved her head to let me know I wasn't needed or, perhaps at that point, wanted.
After my shower, I made my way downstairs to find out what the hell had happened, but just like the best vault ever made, my mother wouldn't give up even the slightest detail of what had transpired earlier. Instead, she handed me two plates - roast beef and Swiss on rye with chips and pickle on the side - and told me to give one to my father.
"Lunch." I walked into my father's home office. It was larger than his actual office. More law books than any normal human being would or could ever possibly want. I handed him the plate.
"Thanks Sammy." He barely looked up from the Contemporary Criminal Law Encyclopedia he was deep into. I sat across his huge desk from him and tried my best to read the upside-down print. My father pulled off his glasses and sat back in his chair, releasing a loud blow of expended oxygen.
"Tell me."
He rubbed the bridge of his nose with the thumb and finger of his left hand. "It's a tough one Sam. I probably shou..."
"Just tell me."
He looked at me, his youngest son. The son that he had put through college. The son that was following in his footsteps.
"Tricky as shit, Sam."
"Who was at the house this morning?"
My father wasn't very happy about the question, but he certainly wasn't about to lie about it.
"Ben Martin."
"Ohhhhhhhhh...I see."
The Martin family lived just down the street from our house. They had suffered an unthinkable tragedy four, maybe five years ago. Their only daughter, Cassie had been abducted by another family member. Ben's sister and her hippie husband picked Cassie up for a weekend outing. They had planned to take Cassie with them to Busch Gardens Williamsburg with their own children. Ben and Libby, his wife, had packed up everything that their teenaged daughter would need for a weekend. They gave her money and topped up the minutes on her cell phone, just in case. With a smile and a hug, they smiled and waved goodbye. It was the last time they saw their daughter.
This case had haunted my father since the first day that he took it over, eighteen months ago. It was a case close to home for us. Cassie was the little girl next door, and she was always nearby. She was the daughter my mother never had. The little girl that had a huge crush on me. The one that followed my brother and I around like a puppy. She was so adorable that our family took it just as hard as her own when she was stolen away.
My father looked wary, but he started talking.
"We found her Sam. We know where she is."
"When are you getting her back?"
