Every Second. Rick Mofina

      “Shut up!” Vic said. “Focus on what you need to do.”

      Dan’s eyes went around the garage, taking quick inventory. Suddenly the everyday items took on a new and desperate significance, a reflection of their lives before the attack. Billy’s bicycle, his goal net, his bats and hockey sticks, and up in one corner, his old tricycle.

      Stacked on the bench were cardboard boxes of clothes Lori was preparing to donate to the church. Nearby were her clay planters, her gardening tools and her flower-printed gardening gloves. Looped neatly on a hook was the hose and, near it, Dan’s John Deere mower. He did his best thinking and problem-solving when he mowed the lawn.

      I’ve got to do something.

      Vic nudged him. Dan opened the door to his Ford Taurus and got in alone. As he sat behind the wheel, he glanced at Lori’s Dodge Dart, parked next to him.

      “Step it up!” Vic said.

      Dan inserted the key and started his car. Vic tapped the window with his gun. Dan lowered it and Vic leaned into the driver’s door, resting his gun on the frame. For an instant Dan contemplated grabbing it, but he was distracted when he saw that Percy had vanished.

      They must’ve parked their vehicle nearby.

      “Remember,” Vic said, “all you have to do is follow our instructions. You’re doing good so far. It’ll be over before you know it, so don’t mess this up. We’re watching you every step of the way. Now get going.”

      As Vic stepped away from the car, Dan backed out of the driveway and wheeled down the street. The vest was hot and cumbersome. His skin tingled with each bump and pothole for fear the thing might go off.

      On the console he saw the receipts from the recent weekend he and Lori had spent in Boston. His chief worries then had been finding good parking and the price of gas. Dan adjusted his grip on the wheel.

      What the hell’s happening?

      He rolled through their corner of Roseoak, a middle-class community of tree-lined streets with Tudor, ranch and Colonial houses. Flanked by Douglaston, Little Neck and Oakland Gardens and bordered by the Long Island Expressway and Grand Central Parkway, Roseoak Park was a desirable enclave of Queens. With good schools and no crime, it was considered a safe place to live.

      A clear radio voice sounded in his ear.

      “Looking good, Dan.”

      He checked his mirrors in an effort to spot their vehicle. But there was nothing to see. It was futile.

      “Stick to the plan and no one gets hurt, Dan.”

      Dan prayed that Lori and Billy were still safe—or as safe as they could be wrapped with a bomb—and racked his brain for a way out.

      Glancing in vain in his rearview mirror, he wondered again who they were—and why they’d chosen him. He crawled through traffic, knowing he had little time to act.

      I could drive to the police—go right to the 111th Precinct in Bayside. Tell them everything!

      He thought of Lori and Bill, and how Vic had vowed to kill them.

      If I go to the police I could save them.

      Sweat trickled from his temple, nearing his eye.

      Or...I could kill us all.

       6

      Manhattan, New York

      Kate Page stood on the southbound platform of the 125th Street subway station.

      Waiting for the next train to get her to Midtown and Newslead, the global news service where she was a reporter, she reviewed the messages on her phone again and let out a long breath.

      She hadn’t even set foot in the newsroom, but her exchange a few minutes ago with Reeka Beck, her editor, had already set the stage for a bad day.

      You’re covering the conference of security experts at the Grand Hyatt for us today, Reeka had texted her.

      But Chuck told me I was clear to enterprise today.

      Change of plan. A lot going on today. Randy Kent’s wife went into labor, so you’re going to the Hyatt this afternoon.

      What about Hugh? He’s backup on security?

      It’s you, today. End of discussion.

      The tunnel grumbled with distant vibrations of the approaching train. Its bright headlights shot from darkness as it rattled into the station. With a rush of hot, dank air, the brakes squealed and the train came to a stop. The doors opened. Kate boarded and found a seat under the large MTA subway map and ads for the addictions hotline and STD awareness.

      As the train rolled south, Kate resumed panning for a story. For the past few weeks she’d been trying to nail down some long-shot leads, one about stolen satellite technology and one on human trafficking. She didn’t have much on either of them, and she’d wanted to pursue them today, unless something fresh broke. She’d sent out some notes to a few trusted sources to see if anything new was going on, but the messages that trickled back were not promising. Kate looked up from her silent phone, wishing for a good story.

      It’s Deadsville out there.

      She could not escape the fact that times were tough in the news business. More and more newspapers were shedding jobs. Newslead was losing subscribers, and rumors of cutbacks were swirling. But as the train grated and swayed, she did her best to stay positive. Whatever happened, she would survive.

      I made it this far.

      Kate stared at her translucent reflection in the window as the drab tunnel walls rushed by, pulling her back through her life. She was a thirty-one-year-old single mom with an eight-year-old daughter. Kate had been seven years old when her mother and father died in a hotel fire. After the tragedy, Kate and her little sister, Vanessa, had lived with relatives and then in foster homes. A couple of years later, Kate and Vanessa’s foster parents had taken them on a vacation to Canada. They were in British Columbia, driving through the Canadian Rockies, when their car spun out, flipped over and crashed into a river.

      The images of that moment were seared in Kate’s mind.

      The car sinking...the windows breaking...the icy water...grabbing Vanessa’s hand...pulling her free...to the surface...the frigid current numbing her body...fingers loosening...Vanessa slipping away...disappearing...

      Kate was the only one who’d survived.

      They’d found the bodies of Kate’s foster parents, but Vanessa’s body was never recovered. The search team reasoned that it got wedged in the rocks downriver, but Kate never gave up believing that Vanessa had somehow escaped the rushing water.

      She never gave up searching for her.

      After the tragedy, Kate had bounced through foster homes, eventually running away for good. She spent her teen years on the street, taking any job she could find to put herself through college, where she’d studied journalism. She’d worked in newsrooms across the country. Then, in San Francisco, she’d had a baby girl by a man who’d lied to her about being married and had written her off when he’d found out she was pregnant.

      Kate named her daughter Grace and raised her on her own in Ohio where she’d worked at a newspaper in Canton, before downsizing cost her that job. But she hung on. She found a short-term reporting position in Dallas, and now here she was: a national correspondent at one of the world’s largest news organizations.

      I’ve come a long way, and I never, ever, give up.

      The proof smiled back at her from the photo on her phone’s screen.

      Grace and Vanessa.

      Kate blinked at them.

      It nearly cost her everything, but eventually she’d found Vanessa.