Chapter 16 - The Last Hostage
Maya stopped breathing.
"My mother is in Baton Rouge."
Price shook his head.
"Not anymore. Landry's people picked her up at 4:30. Traffic camera caught his vehicle heading toward the old river courthouse."
Thomas lifted his cuffed hands.
"Take these off."
Price stared at him.
"Absolutely not."
"Landry knows me. He will talk to me."
"He also knows you just helped destroy him."
"Exactly."
Maya stepped between them.
"Thomas is right."
Price looked at her as if betrayal had become contagious.
"You cannot be serious."
"My mother is seventy-one. Landry will not negotiate with agents. He will negotiate with the man he blames."
Twenty minutes later, Thomas entered the abandoned river courthouse wearing a federal vest over blood-soaked clothes.
His hands were uncuffed.
A microphone was taped beneath his collar.
Maya waited in the command van with Rosa.
"This family is terrible at staying where they are told," Price muttered.
Rosa nodded. "Yes."
Inside the courthouse, Judge Malcolm Landry stood in the old courtroom with a revolver pressed to Evelyn Bennett's neck.
Maya's mother looked furious rather than afraid.
"You look terrible," Evelyn told Thomas.
"Good morning to you too."
Landry jerked the gun.
"Shut up."
Evelyn rolled her eyes.
Thomas almost admired her.
Landry's suit was soaked. His hair hung across his forehead. Without the robe and courtroom, he looked smaller.
"You ruined everything," Landry said.
"No. We documented everything. You ruined it years ago."
"You think the federal government will protect your daughter?"
Thomas went still.
"Do not say her name."
Landry smiled.
"Rosa Rousseau. That is a headline, isn't it?"
Thomas took one step forward.
"Take me instead."
"Why would I trade leverage?"
"Because I know where Celeste's original microcassette is."
Landry's eyes changed.
There it was.
Fear.
"The tape was in the safe?"
"Yes."
"What is on it?"
"Your voice."
Landry's face drained.
Thomas was bluffing.
He had not listened to the tape yet.
But Landry's reaction told him enough.
"You were there when my mother died," Thomas said.
Landry's grip tightened.
"Your mother was a foolish woman."
In the command van, Price looked at Maya.
"We got him."
Maya did not blink.
Inside, Thomas took another step.
"She trusted you."
"She trusted the law. That was her mistake."
"And my father's?"
Landry laughed shakily.
"Your father paid us. Henri cut the brake line. I signed the accident report."
Thomas felt something inside him go quiet.
Not rage.
Something older.
A wound finally given a name.
Evelyn suddenly stomped Landry's foot.
He flinched.
Thomas moved.
The gun fired.
Evelyn fell.
Maya screamed in the van.
Thomas slammed Landry into the judge's bench.
Federal agents stormed the room.
Landry disappeared beneath bodies.
Thomas dropped beside Evelyn.
Blood spread across her sleeve.
She opened one eye.
"Shoulder," she said. "Stop looking so dramatic."
Thomas laughed once, almost a sob.
Then Price entered holding a small evidence bag.
Inside was the microcassette from Celeste's safe.
"We played it," he said.
Thomas looked up.
Price's expression was grim.
"Your mother named one more person. Someone nobody expected."
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