Free In Sheep's Clothing by David Archer Page A

won't be left alone.”
    “Please, please, you don't understand,” the girl said. “The children, their mother and father, they will kill me.”
    Sarah shook her head sadly. “They won't,” she said. “I can guarantee you, they won't.” She pulled the door shut behind herself and slid the heavy-duty locking bolt home, then added the padlock they had installed for extra security.
    She walked over to where Noah and Neil were sitting by the computer and dropped into a chair. Noah was on the phone, speaking with Allison. He nodded into the phone and then ended the call.
    “Neil wiped out the security footage at the mall,” he said, “so we should be in the clear on that. Our people will be here for the girl and the kids in about four hours. Queen Allison is sending them in one of the jets. She wants those kids out of Missouri as soon as possible, and so do I.”
    Sarah nodded. “Okay, so now what? We just wait?”
    Noah picked up the nanny's cell phone from the table in front of him. “I don't think we want to wait,” he said. The phone was an older one, and it took him only a few moments to find Alejandra Gomez in the contact list. He handed the phone to Neil.
    Neil plugged a cord into its hands-free jack, tapped a few keys on the computer and then pushed the button to make the call. It was answered only seconds later.
    “Si, Margarita?” he heard.
    A voice emanated from the computer as Neil spoke into a microphone. “Mrs. Gomez,” he said in Spanish, “since I know you recognize this number, you'll understand that what I'm telling you is the truth. I have your children. They will be returned to you in exchange for ten million dollars. I will call you later tonight with instructions on where to bring the money.”
    He cut off the call even as Mrs. Gomez was demanding to speak to the nanny, and then Noah took the phone and smashed it on the concrete floor. When he was certain that it was broken, he tossed the pieces into a metal barrel that had a thin layer of oil in the bottom, then balled up some paper and lit it with a lighter from his pocket. When he tossed it into the barrel, there was a whoosh as the oil caught fire. It burned for only a couple of minutes, and Noah opened a nearby window to let the smoke out.
    “What did you think?” Neil said. “I probably rehearsed that at least a hundred times, you know.”
    “It was fine,” Noah said. He sat down beside the kid and reached over to turn on the scanner. Moose walked in a moment later and joined them as they waited.
    “Everything go okay, turning the car back in?” Noah asked.
    Moose grinned. “Went fine, except I think I got a salesman all pissed off at me. I told him Mom didn't like the car, so she was going with a Chevy instead.”
    “Yeah, that ought to do it,” Neil said. “Just hope he doesn't get in trouble for letting you take it out for so long.”
    “He shouldn't, not as long as they don't figure out it was used in a kidnapping.”
    “Hopefully no one will catch on to that,” Noah said. “The car had different tags on it, and any security video footage from the mall got erased by Mr. Wizard, here. I sincerely doubt anyone will connect that car to what happened, which means they won't connect back to Jimmy McCormick, either.”
    “So, now we just wait?” Moose asked.
    “Yep,” Noah said. “Neil used the nanny's phone to call Alejandra Gomez, so she's probably already sounded the alarm. That was a good ten minutes ago, and there's nothing on the police scanner yet. I have my doubts they'll even be called in, at least not yet. These people like to handle things on their own.”
    “You should have given me Old Lady Gomez's phone number,” Neil said. “I could have hacked it so we could listen in to her phone calls. I was going to suggest it, but you smashed the phone too fast.”
    Noah shrugged. “Just keep watching the cameras at her house, I'm pretty sure we’ll know when things hit the fan.”
    An hour passed by, and Neil