Free The Hunted by Alan Jacobson Page A

put his feet up on the wood chair opposite him, grabbed the unopened mail from this morning that his wife had left on the table for him, and put the coffee mug to his lips.
    He started to tear open the edges of the envelopes: cable and electric bills. A postcard from his sister who had been vacationing in Hawaii—she had called him a couple of days ago, so why she’d even bothered to send the card in the first place didn’t—
    The next letter caught him by the throat:
HARPER PAYNE. DEAD OR ALIVE, YOUR CHOICE. FAIL TO DELIVER HIM AND YOU’LL PLACE CERTAIN PEOPLE IN YOUR LIFE AT RISK. WE KNOW WHERE SYLVIA SHOPS. WE KNOW SHE GETS HER HAIR DONE AT MARCEL’S ON THE SECOND THURSDAY OF EVERY MONTH. WE KNOW SHE BOUGHT THE PINK NIGHTGOWN SHE WEARS TO BED AT THE BOUTIQUE ON FIFTH. AND WE KNOW A LOT MORE. LOOK OUTSIDE YOUR BACK DOOR AND YOU’LL FIND AN EXAMPLE OF OUR HANDIWORK. YOU HAVE SEVEN DAYS.

NOTE: THIS WAS PRINTED ON AN H-P LASERJET WITH HAMMERMILL PAPER BOUGHT AT STAPLES OFFICE SUPPLY IN THE EASTERN UNITED STATES. THOUGHT WE’D SAVE YOU THE TIME OF RUNNING IT THROUGH YOUR LAB. BUT DO WHAT YOU HAVE TO, BECAUSE WE DEFINITELY WILL. HARPER PAYNE, SEVEN DAYS.

    Knox dropped the letter on the table. He walked toward the back door, not knowing what he was going to find—if anything. Were they watching to see if he went there to look? And if they were, was he inadvertently signaling them he was taking their threat seriously? He stood with his hand on the knob, then decided against opening it. He flipped on the porch light and separated the honey-colored curtain. Lying there on the stoop was Cocoa, the cat’s fur parted along her stomach, her intestines splayed out beside her body.
    “Son of a bitch,” he said under his breath.
How the hell did these people find out where I live?
    A remnant of his days as a member of the Army Special Forces—then as the chief legal counsel for the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence—paranoia was as much a part of his personality as his compulsion for neatness, with one exception: the former was learned, while the latter was an inborn psychopathology inherited from his father. The result was that he had his security-detail driver take a circuitous route home every evening, all the while carefully surveying the rearview mirror for any suspicious vehicles following them. A sensor disguised as a compass mounted beside the stereo was designed to alert them if an electronic tracking device had been unknowingly installed on his car.
    He rummaged through the kitchen drawers to find a Ziploc bag. Using a tissue, he slipped the letter and envelope inside the protective plastic covering, then sealed it. He was suddenly aware of the cold perspiration lining the inside of his sweatshirt.
    Just then, his eighteen-year-old daughter, dressed in an oversize FBI Academy T-shirt that extended down below her knees, walked into the kitchen. “Hey, Dad. How was your run?” She opened the refrigerator, withdrew a carton of orange juice, and poured it into a glass. She started to leave the kitchen, but apparently realizing that she had never received an answer, hesitated. “Dad. You okay?”
    Knox was staring at the letter and thinking about Cocoa. “Fine, honey. The run was just fine.”
    Melissa shrugged. “Whatever,” she said, and walked out.
    Knox stood up from the table, ground his molars, and reached for the phone. “Fuck you, whoever you are,” he said under his breath as he punched numbers into the keypad.
    This was not a good day for this. Not a good day at all.

9
    Lauren was shivering by the time she arrived back at her car. It was not that far of a walk from the gymnasium, but the temperature had dropped again and the wind had picked up. She sat down and started the engine, cranked the heater to its hottest setting, and disengaged the emergency brake.
    Or tried to.
    “What the hell?” She pushed in the release button and attempted to pull up on the hand brake. It was ratcheted to the