Page 2 of Endangered Species
“Call the police. My family’s in big trouble,” was all he could think to say.
“Herald, call the police. Right now.”
A blanket came around his shoulders, but he didn’t acknowledge it. He didn’t acknowledge anything. He just stood and stared at his house across the cornfield. Was Cy dead? Was Phoebe? What would happen to him now? What would happen to Cy?
He slid down the wall, clutching the blanket tighter over his slight shoulders, pulling his knees to his chest, letting all thoughts disappear until everything seemed far away and hazy. Nicky didn’t want to think anymore. So, he didn’t.
Nicholas Webster flinched as an alarm blared air horn loud, and then the door buzzed, signaling it was unlocked. The guard pushed Webster through the steel barred doors, almost causing him to trip. He hated this place. Jail was a never-ending cacophony of noises. Men shouting, people fighting, metal doors slamming, whispered murmurs, and the slapping of skin on skin behind the makeshift curtains that separated the bathroom from the front of the cells.
It wasn’t just the noise; the fluorescent lighting hurt his eyes. They’d ‘accidentally’ broken his glasses when they arrested him, and without the coating on the lenses to block some of the light, his migraines were back. He’d tried to tell them this was all some misunderstanding. He’d asked to make his one phone call, which they’d eventually allowed twenty-four hours later, but only after he’d been strip-searched and thrown into an ugly pair of navy scrubs stamped with DOJ on the back.
Webster didn’t know what was happening, but with each passing minute, it was becoming clearer that these people thought he was somebody he wasn’t. He wasn’t imagining their hostility. People were overtly aggressive at every turn, stopping just short of actual violence, unless he counted the man who’d done his strip search. He certainly hadn’t been gentle.
When they reached a solid metal door almost at the end of the long bright hallway, the guard used his set of keys to open it and guided Webster inside. The lights were dimmer in the room with its dirty gray walls, peeling linoleum, and solid steel table bolted to the floor. Relief flooded Webster’s system as he saw his boss, Lincoln Hudson, and a woman in a jacket the same gray as the rest of the room, her hair pulled up into a tight bun that seemed like it would hurt.
The guard shoved him forward, unhooking the cuff on his left wrist and threading it through a metal loop on the table before reattaching the shackle to Webster once more, this time, tighter than before.
“Why do I feel like you’re not here to take me home, man?” Webster asked, looking at the haggard face of his employer.
Linc pushed a hand through his dark strands. “What the fuck have you gotten yourself into, Nicky?”
The use of his nickname caused a hollow feeling in his stomach. He was always Webster to Linc, unless he was in trouble or something bad happened. “Nothing. I don’t even know why I’m fucking here.”
Linc looked to the woman, who said, “Kelly Chao. I’ll be your attorney for the proceedings. Right now, they’re charging you with a number of things, but the one you need to worry about is the terrorism charge. It’s a class B felony that can cost you up to twenty years in a federal prison.”
“Terrorism?” Webster shouted before wincing, closing his eyes in an attempt to combat the throbbing in his head. “What are you talking about? Me? Who would I terrorize? The barista constantly fucking up my coffee order?”
Webster’s head was spinning. Terrorism? How? That would explain the hostility he’d experienced in the last forty-eight hours, he supposed, but not why people thought he was guilty.
“They claim they have proof you hacked into the FBI and threatened to distribute confidential information that could cause grievous harm,” Linc said.
“Thankfully, they’re not charging you with espionage. I’d be lucky to keep you out of supermax,” Ms. Chao added, all business.
“Linc, come on,” Webster said. “You know I’d never hack the FBI. Why would I? There’s nothing I can’t get my hands on with the people we know.”
“I didn’t hear that,” Ms. Chao said.
Webster ignored the woman, needing Linc to believe him. “I’m being set up, man.”
Linc nodded, rubbing his hand over his bearded chin. “Okay, but why? Who would want to set you up?”
That was a great question. Who would want to set him up? He wasn’t working on anything new. He hadn’t taken on any new side projects. Things had been so quiet lately, he’d started working on old cases. Well, one old case. But he’d been working on that off and on for years, almost since he was old enough to know his way around a computer.
“Fuck, man. I don’t know. I just know I definitely didn’t hack the FBI.”
“They’re offering you fifteen years if you agree to never use a computer again,” Ms. Chao said. “And I have to say, considering what they claim they have, they’re being generous.”
“What?” Webster asked. “No. No way. I can’t be without a computer. That’s my whole life.”
“We’ve got bigger problems than computers, Nicky. They’re offering you fifteen years as a bargain. If you’re being set up, they don’t just want to silence you, they want to fucking bury you.”
“Burying me would’ve been kinder,” Webster said. “I fucking hate this place.”
“You won’t be here long. They’re transferring you,” the attorney said, her face pinched.
Webster swallowed audibly, his mouth bone dry. “What? How? Where?” he heard himself asking, embarrassed at the panic in his voice.
“CSD,” Ms. Chao said.
