If Angels Fall by Rick Mofina

caller’s address in seconds. The phone rang again.
    “Nob Hill!” Someone shouted the address of the call.
    Tape recorders were rolling, a SFPD hostage negotiator put on a
headset to listen in. He had a clipboard and pen, ready to jot instructions to
Nathan. The room was silent. Nathan looked at the negotiator. He nodded, and
Nathan answered on the third ring.
    “Hello...” He swallowed. “Oh. Hello Mr. Brooker.” Nathan shook his
head.
    Sydowski went to the bank of telephones, slipped on a headset and
listened to the call. An officer, already listening in, had scribbled the
caller’s name on a pad: Elroy Brooker, Nor-Tec’s CEO.
    “I just heard what happened, Nathan. Two FBI agents just left my
home. I’m so sorry. How are you and Maggie holding up?”
    “We’re praying,” Nathan sniffed.
    “Be strong, Nathan. Never give up hope.”
    “Did the agents tell you anything?”
    “They asked a lot of questions about you and the project. If you
were a gambler, or ran up debts you couldn’t repay, if you were capable of
selling information about the project.”
    “Yeah?” His voice wavered between anger and disbelief.
    “I told them to go to hell and find your boy. You’re one of our top
people. Outstanding in every way.”
    Nathan had regarded Brooker as a bumbling, spineless relic.
    “Listen, Nathan, I won’t tie up your line. I’m going to call the
board now. I think we can pull thirty, maybe fifty thousand from our corporate
donations account. It’ll be at your disposal, a reward, ransom, whatever it
takes to see your son is returned safely. As you know, Ruth and I have nine
grandchildren. Our prayers are for Danny, Maggie, and you.”
    “Thank you, Mr. Brooker.” Nathan hung up. The recorders stopped. He
put his face in his hands.
    “Mr. Becker, we should work on the composite.” Mikelson said.
    Nathan moved his jaw to speak, looking into his empty hand.
    “It’s my fault. It’s all my fault. I should have been watching him.
He’s our little boy. He’s the same age as that murdered little girl. What
if...what if... Oh please, I have to go and find my son.”
    Nathan bolted for the door. Ditmire grabbed him. Sydowski helped,
and they held Nathan until he finally broke down and wept.
     
    During the night, an oppressive silence fell on the Becker home.
Sydowski picked up a Giants’ ball cap he spotted peeking from under the sofa. Child-size.
Danny’s cap? He noticed the fine strands of blond hair caught in the weave. In
Victorian Europe, parents would cut and cherish locks of hair from their dead
children before burying them.
    One of the police phones rang. Ditmire grabbed it and said, “One
second,” then passed it to Sydowski.
    “Give me the score, Walt.” It was Lieutenant Leo Gonzales. Sydowski
told him everything, while peering through the living room curtains at the half
dozen police cars, the unmarked surveillance van, and the news cruisers out
front.
    “What about Donner, Walt? We got a serial here?”
    “It’s too soon, Leo.”
    “Probably. Can the father ID the bad guy?”
    `Don’t know. We’re working on a composite.”
    “We got people canvassing all night in Balboa and Jordan Park. We’ll
get vice and robbery to help,” Gonzales said. “We’ll shake down the registry
and see what falls out. We’re also checking prisons and mental hospitals for
escapees, walk-aways, recent discharges, and complaints. Halfway houses.”
Gonzales promised a grid of the park and neighborhood at dawn and bodies to hit
the bars, porn, and peep clubs. “The mayor called the chief. We need this one,
Walt.”
    “You’re talking in obvious terms, Leo.”
    “Sorry about your new partner. That was supposed to be official at
the hall on Monday.”
    “Well, shit happens, Leo.”
    “I love you too, dear. Keep in touch.”
     
    Later, Ditmire was in the study with Nathan and the sketch artist.
Turgeon was with Maggie upstairs. Rust was reviewing reports. Sydowski borrowed
his cellular phone.