Soft Targets Read Online Free PDF Page A

kind of case that would galvanize every agent in the country to avenge the harm that had befallen one of their own.
    I will know and I will kill them.
    The words terrified her. Instinctively, intuitively, she knew that the kidnapper was bluffing—how could he possibly know what was going on inside of the closed sphere that defined the law enforcement community?—but Jennings had shown a disturbing level of cunning and cleverness. Would he state something so dogmatically if it were not true? She sensed not.
    Irene tried to corral her thoughts, bring order to the blooming panic. It was obvious what she should do, what she would tell the person on the other end of a phone call to do. But this was real. This was first person , and deep in her soul, she knew that Jennings—the author of the note—was telling the truth.
    So, what was she supposed to do with that? Was she supposed to just trust this asshole with the lives of her daughters? That was as nonstarting as any nonstarter could be. Was she supposed to pretend that none of this had happened, and pray that it would come to a happy ending? Surely Jennings knew that that would never happen.
    Maybe he was expecting her to go to the police, and as soon as she did, he would use that as an excuse to kill Ashley and Kelly. She had to assume that was the case.
    Irene stepped back into the foyer and pushed the door closed. When she was confident that she was invisible to the outside world, she sat down on a patch of tile floor and read the note again. And again. It was all too much to process. What was that monster—?
    No. She couldn’t go there. That was a trip from which there could be no happy return. Once you started to imagine the harm that could befall a loved one, no scenario but the worst could possibly resonate.
    She needed to remain positive. Or, if not positive, then optimistic. Not pessimistic. There was a way to solve this.
    But how?
    Irene needed help, but all of the standard avenues for assistance—the ones who carried badges and guns—were out of the question, at least for the time being.
    I will know and I will kill them .
    Jesus.
    Jesus. Exactly. In that moment, in that single rush of clarity, she knew exactly what she needed to do.

Chapter 3
    It turned out that driving to Fisherman’s Cove, Virginia, was a hell of a lot easier than finding it on the map. Irene’s AAA map of the Commonwealth showed it as a tiny speck on the banks of the Potomac River, but to get reliable driving directions, she had to buy an ADC map from a 7-Eleven in Colonial Beach.
    The ninety-minute drive helped to soothe her nerves—to prioritize her options—and as she finally drove down Church Street on her way toward the water, she was struck by just how charming a place it was. By all appearances, it was a fishing village, but unlike most such villages in the final decade of the twentieth century, this one still appeared to thrive. On the corner where you would expect to see a big-name chain drugstore, she noted Hamilton Pharmacy, and just from the looks of the place, she knew there had to be a soda fountain in the back corner.
    The streets weren’t crowded, exactly, at this hour of a weekday afternoon, but they weren’t empty, either. In fact, as she drove past the Cricket Shop, a throwback haberdasher, she witnessed a handshake between a customer and the man she presumed to be the proprietor as the former left with a plastic bag draped over a hanger. From the size and shape, Irene assumed it was a suit, and from the look of satisfaction on the customer’s face, she assumed that it was a nice one.
    Everyone seemed so damned contented. It was like entering a world that had somehow insulated itself from the cruelties that savaged the rest of the planet, and she at once admired and pitied them. It was the burden of the life she’d chosen to know the terrible facts that the rest of the world was shielded from. She was among the few who anguished so that the rest of the population