"Shh. You can choose not to do what I'm going to ask. But if you don't, you'll stay here until you starve to death. And there'll be other consequences. Your parents and brother will die too. There's somebody outside their house right now."
"Is my brother okay?" Travis asked in a frantic whisper.
"He's fine. For now."
"Don't hurt them! You can't hurt them!"
"I can hurt them and I will. Oh, believe me, Travis. I will."
"What do you want me to do?"
The man looked him over carefully. "I want you to kill somebody."
A joke?
But the kidnapper wasn't smiling.
"What do you mean?" Travis whispered.
"Kill somebody, just like in that game you play. DimensionQuest."
"Why?"
"That doesn't matter, not to you. All you need to know is if you don't do what I'm asking, you'll starve to death here, and my associate will kill your family. Simple as that. Now's your chance. Yes or no?"
"But I don't know how to kill anybody."
The man reached into the paper bag and took out a pistol wrapped in a Baggie. He dropped it on the bed.
"Wait! That's my father's! Where did you get it?"
"From his truck."
"You said my family's fine."
"They are, Travis. I didn't hurt him. I stole it a couple of days ago, when they were asleep. Can you shoot it?"
He nodded. In fact, he'd never fired a real gun. But he'd played shooting games in arcades. And he watched TV. Anybody who watched The Wire or The Sopranos knew enough about guns to use one. He muttered, "But if I do what you want, you'll just kill me. And then my family."
"No, I won't. It's better for me if you're alive. You kill who I tell you to, drop the gun and run. Go wherever you want. Then I'll call my friend and tell him to leave your family alone."
There was a lot about this that didn't make sense. But Travis's mind was numb. He was afraid to say yes, he was afraid to say no.
Travis thought of his brother. Then his mother. An image of his father smiling even came to mind. Smiling when he looked at Sammy, never at Travis. But it was a smile nonetheless and seemed to make Sammy happy. That was the important thing.
Travis, did you bring me M's?
Sammy . . .
Travis Brigham blinked tears from his eyes and whispered, "Okay. I'll do it."
Chapter 42
EVEN WITHOUT THE benefit of excessive lunch time Chardonnay, Donald Hawken was feeling maudlin.
But he didn't care.
He rose from the couch where he'd been sitting with Lily and embraced James Chilton, who was entering the living room of his vacation house in Hollister, carrying several more bottles of white wine.