Midnight by Anna Dove (books for new readers .TXT) 📕

         “Jack,” Haley whispered, “who’s gone?”

         The name barely escaped his lips, with a miserable shiver. Haley looked up, and her eyes met Elizabeth’s in disbelief.

26.  The Escape

“Your brain is your weapon.”

―

Louise Penny, A Great Reckoning

Katrin Van Gorben awoke to find herself bound and gagged, propped up in a corner of a concrete cell. Her gag tasted like a rag used to wipe up gasoline. The metal handcuffs chafed at her wrists, and as she tried to twist her arms, the metal dug into her wrists. This was not an amateur kidnapping.

She rested her arms, leaning against the wall, and looked around her. Six feet by eight feet, concrete floor, no windows. One door, with a square opening crossed with iron bars. This was an impenetrable place.

She had no indication of the time, the location, and she had no memory beyond the chloroformed rag pressed to her face. She would have to wait until someone came in.

Memories of being on the run in Europe flooded into her mind--the late nights, the clandestine rides in car trunks, the invisible network guiding her to safety. Jack. She remembered Jack, how he had been when she first met him, a young man with a hard heart, and she remembered finding him at the rally for Adela Gilman, he had become an older man with a hard heart but a love for her. Her throat tightened at the thought of him. He was alive, not dead! Her hands trembled.

She would have to escape. As long as Jack was alive in the world, she had to be with him. Too much of her life had been spent without him.

The lock on the door suddenly grated and Katrin’s head shot up as the door slid open. A man in a military uniform stepped in sharply. Another man followed with a chair and set it down; he then took the gag from her mouth. The first man sat.

“Katrin Van Gorben.”

Katrin looked at him and did not say a word.

He was leathery, with brown tanned skin and wrinkled face. His silver hair was cut very close to his head in sharp angles at his temples. He sat very straight with his hands on his knees, and his light blue eyes pierced into hers.

“I have questions for you. You will answer them. First, do you know a man by the name of Jack Hoffman?”

“Yes.” her tone was clear and steady.

“When did you meet him?”

“A long time ago.”

“Specifically, when?”

“I can’t remember, it was a long time ago.”

Katrin decided that it would be wise to portray herself as a weak, old woman whose memory was graying with her hair.

The man made a growling noise of exasperation under his breath.

“Ms. Van Gorben, I need you to help us. This man, Jack, is a very dangerous criminal.”

“My Jack?” Katrin feigned shock. “It can’t be. No, no, he’s not a criminal.”

“Ms. Van Gorben, you used to have a relationship with Jack a long time ago, as you say. And now we find that you are living with him. We needed to separate you two so that you wouldn’t get hurt, do you understand?”

“What has he done?”

“We suspect that he orchestrated a large part of the EMP attack.”

Katrin sat in silence for a moment, dropping her eyes to the ground. She strained her eyes so that a tears welled up, and then looked up at the officer.

“No,” she whispered. “Not Jack.”

“Yes,” said the man. “He learned this stuff very young. He was probably dangerous when he met you and you didn’t know it then either.”

“It can’t be true.”

“Ms. Van Gorben, please tell me how Jack found you the most recent time.”

“He and I found each other unexpectedly in the city. We just...ran into each other.”

“Where were you?”

“On the mall I believe it was--just taking a walk.”

“And why did you come here?”

“Just to visit. I hadn’t been in a long time. I just wanted to see the capitol again before I became too old to travel, which will be soon.”

“You didn’t come to find him?”

“I thought he was dead.”

“What?” said the man, slightly taken off guard.

“I thought he was dead. I had written him letters when we first met, and he never returned them. I thought he’d been killed overseas. He told me he had been on an operation without outside contact during that time.” (This was true).

“Well,” said the man, pondering this new information. “And do you know where he is now?”

“No.”

“Where was he yesterday?”

“Why, I don’t know. He left in the afternoon, he said he had business to attend to.”

“And you didn’t question what?”

“No, I never questioned him,” said Katrin, pretending to begin to distrust Jack. “Now that you mention it, no, he has never told me where he is going.” (This, of course, was a total lie.)

“Well, you see,” said the man, “he was orchestrating part of this madness.”

“I never would have imagined,” said Katrin, implying agreement. “My dear Jack...my poor Jack...the liquor must have turned his brain.”

“He drank?”

Katrin marveled that the so called ‘intelligence’ operation had failed to grasp this one major piece of Jack’s history.

“Like a fish,” lamented Katrin, pathetically hanging her head. “He would never stop--I mean, I loved him despite it of course, but he never did stop.”

The man took a few moments to sit and think. Then, he stood up.

“Get up,” he said abruptly. “That’s all. You understand the measures we had to take to get you here, of course, this is of the utmost secrecy and importance. We will let you go, but you’ll have two plainclothes officers following you at all times. We expect that if you hear anything of Jack’s whereabouts, you will let