CHAPTER 1

The pharmacist gave them his medical opinion. He had told them, over the pounding sound of Jay-Z's "Run This Town," that some of the Rohypnol that Captain Liberatore had ingested was now in the puke on his chin and on his shirt; it was not in his brain. While the haunting vocals "Hey eh eh eh eh eh" pumped from singer Rhianna, and the accompanying rap artist spit out his rhymes from the small speakers of a Walmart CD player with a tin-sounding bass, Liberatore's cognitive abilities were returning.

Rocket Liberatore was beginning to judge that the men who had him were amateurs. A real professional seeking such valuable property would have already had him bloody, without one of his ears, and opened up, guts literally spilling the information forward.

The doctor had also told them that their technique wouldn't work. It was real pain and damage that would release the information he held. Doctor Fox had said that Rocket would just consider this beating a simple ass-whooping that he probably deserved. What they were doing wouldn't even give him reason to retaliate when he discovered who had punk'd him, and the doctor believed that he would learn that.

Rocket wasn't what you'd call a prayerful man. He would occasionally kneel and pray, but it was usually with a small measure of contempt. It would be that contempt, that feeling that he had no other option than to ask for God's help, that would make him shift his message in the middle of prayer. He'd likely tell his God that he had accepted this beating as a message from above. He'd likely tell his Father, Son, and Holy Spirit that he never enjoyed the violence they had placed in his life and that somehow, from the pinch on his leg by an ill-informed nurse helping him search for his first breath, he understood the nature of violence. He would tell his God that from the time he was placed in the arms of a father whose only disciplining skill was to whip a child's ass. From that to the beating he now endured, he understood how violence could be employed as a tactic. Finally, he would tell his God that violence was now a part of his deeper psyche.

Even in his sedated state, Rocket didn't allow any small measure of fear to show. He knew the nature of those who had sent these kidnappers, these abusers, on their mission. So he prepared for the next blow, knowing that his torturer would find and assault his solar plexus again with power and accuracy in an attempt to dislodge him of certain information that now rattled around in his brain.

The next fist came with a force that sent his diaphragm muscle into a spasm and pushed all the air up and out of Rocket's lungs without breaking any ribs that could puncture something vital inside him. Because of that, Rocket knew that he was needed alive. But the pain in his gut and the anxiety of not being able to breathe still crawled up his spine and grabbed his brain for a short-lived visit, staying only long enough for the oxygen he needed to remain conscious to return to his head. With that lack of air, the left side of his brain would direct him to panic and remind him that without breathing there was no life. Alarms of fight or flight would scream. The right side of his brain would balance that with laughter about the rookie mistakes that got him into this victim's chair, a condition he'd never cede to.

Captain D'Vaunte Liberatore enjoyed correcting people on the phonetic pronunciation -- Liberator, saying, "It's not Puerto Rican or Brazilian, muthafucka, it's black and Italian." But there was no correction in this exchange for now as he tried to suck the air back into his lungs. His diaphragm would not cooperate; the muscle so essential to living was temporarily in a painful lockdown. He gasped and struggled against his bindings to try to restart his breathing. He bounced around and wrestled with the duct tape that held his arms and wrists down at his side. His ankles were also bound to the legs of the wobbly, black-walnut kitchen chair crafted in the nineteenth century, placed neatly in the center of the room.

"Relax yourself. Breathe, man ... breathe," Panama Jordy whispered into his right ear. The jaundiced, dark-skinned man of West Indies ancestry rose back up to his five-foot-three stature to be out of the way of the next punch. He looked at his partners in crime and scratched his coarse mini-Afro, as if perplexed. Then he smiled broadly at the man across the room, revealing front teeth that carried a heavy load of tartar and an absence of molars. He shrugged and raised his eyebrows above facial skin that was pockmarked and had an unhealthy looking gray color to it. Yellow surrounded his brown eyes as they focused on his prisoner.

Panama Jordy was standing in his native Franklin County in southern Pennsylvania. He had never been away from his rural confines because he was always broke (or financially challenged, as he called it). He earned his nickname because he hid the needle tracks on both of his arms with long-sleeve Panama Jack shirts. His friends tagged him with the nickname as they joked that the Panama canals on his arms carried cargo to his head. Most of them had never seen the world either.

Jordy nodded his approval, and the boxer stepped forward. Rocket's skills as an observer, the ones that were slowly returning just like the pharmacist said, would allow him to discern that three men held him in the musty, dirt-floor room where a single lightbulb moved above his head. The foul odor coming from such a friendly mouth, noticeable even over the stench of his vomit on his chest, would surely give Rocket other things to remember if he were ever to be released.

CHAPTER 2

As rain pelted on the tin roof for a few seconds, Rocket Liberatore must have imagined a century-old house that was in a serious stage of disrepair. The faint smell of salt pork and hickory smoke rose around him and his captors, seeming to emanate from the floor and the walls. And, not to be over shadowed, the smell of an old and unused kerosene lamp with some leftover soot added to the aromatic stimuli speaking to him.

The dirt floor under Rocket's feet was not the soft type you would find in a barn. It was compacted and had been swept clean. Any loose dirt had seemingly been carried away long ago. The musty smell of dampness swirled about like he was in an old basement, cave, or smokehouse. These were the kinds of locations that Rocket had imagined as a kid, learning about his home and how it had been used 150 years earlier during the height of activity by the Underground Railroad. He loved how his people had participated in the network of safe havens. His favorite history lessons were those that involved that system of hideaways used by the abolitionists to move runaway slaves through his hometown. He enjoyed hearing the stories of those seeking freedom at all costs ... freedom that could be found only outside his country to the north. Those history lessons were all around him in Whitetail Village, as it was just three miles north of the Mason-Dixon border, the famous border that separated Maryland from Pennsylvania — where Quakers refused to return runaway slaves to their slave owners. At every opportunity and in each assignment from elementary school to graduating as high school valedictorian, he researched and presented some aspect of the abolitionist movement.

Those were likely his last observations about his surroundings before he was once again distracted by a fist crashing into his gut. He didn't see it coming. The bandana they had placed over his eyes made his sight observations take a backseat to the smorgasbord that was feeding him information. So the blow came as a surprise, one that he couldn't tense up for.

"Come on, easy," Jordy said, whispering his encouragement again. Rocket heard him shuffle to a position directly in front of him as he tried to regain his breath. Then he heard the whisperer shuffle back into position at his right.

"Relax your gut so you can breathe," Jordy said so closely that his lips nearly touched Rocket's ear.

This time, as Rocket's breathing settled and the fog of his drug-induced stupor continued to abate, he took the opportunity to seek his freedom. With a swift but powerful movement, he pounded the ridge of his head just above his ear into the face of his whisperer. A sharp pain ran through Rocket's head but he still heard what sounded like a man stumbling back into some chairs and some bottles. Rocket was somewhat dazed by his act.

With the intermittent rain stopping and everyone quieted by the surprise blow (even the music paused as if a collective gasp filled the room), a curious rumble could be heard from the distance. It seemed to be the sound of a single diesel engine, like the steady, continuous running of a truck at a Denny's restaurant or some other all-night eatery.

Over the humming engine sound, Rocket could sense movement to his left. Another voice came at him. A different man spoke to him. His speech was slow and deliberate and with an accent that was ever so slight. Having lived in South Texas most of his adult life, Rocket recognized it as Latino. His host slightly rolled his R when he pronounced the word "three."

"Oh, three minutes to live, and he's a tough guy. Okay, asshole, one more time, I want you to tell me, where were you a couple months ago on a special day, you know, like on Valentine's Day, vato? Couldn't stay away from her on lover's day, could you, huh? You ... you like to fuck other people's wives, huh?"

He leaned in close. "The hell with two months ago, where were you last night? Whose wife were you fornicating with? Did she have a lot of money? Or was it my broke-ass wife you were with yesterday morning while I was busy? You seem to like to be with other people's women, huh? Is that your hobby, asshole?" he asked as he slugged him with what seemed to be a rolled up magazine or several magazines. He struck Rocket's forehead which snapped his head backward.

When he spoke of his wife, who was a beautiful woman, you could hear the temporarily suppressed anger of a husband who suspected she had been in the bed of the private detective more than once.

"Nah," he continued. "I think maybe you weren't with someone's wife last night. Maybe you were with someone's husband, heh?" He laughed while Rocket struggled with his bindings.

"What is this shit?" Rocket managed to cough out while he struggled against his bindings to buy time to allow his head to clear.

"I don't know what you're talking about." He shifted around in an attempt to tactically delay the next abuse. "Who the hell are you, and what the hell is this bullshit anyway?" For delay, he hocked up a wad of mucus and vomit and spit it down to his left, showing his defiant nature as he jerked his head up proudly.

"Who we are isn't important," the Mexican declared. "You just need to know why we're prepared to fuck you up real bad. I told you three times that we need to know where she is, and we need to have that information the two of you stole. Also, there's the matter of some stolen money," he said.

"I don't have any information," Rocket professed. "I don't have no flash drive, no disk drive, or any other kind of notebook you're looking for," Rocket slurred. "And, you got to know by now that I don't have no goddamn money," he said, momentarily losing the slur.

Rocket shifted in his seat, trying to peer out beneath the blindfold. "And, more than that," he continued, "I don't know nothin' about anyone's wife."

He shook his head. "Look, you got me wrong here. I'm up here for one reason, and that's to help my family honor my mother." With that, Rocket mistakenly thought the matter was settled.

CHAPTER 3

"Shut the hell up!" The shout came with an open-hand slap to the side of Rocket's head near the ear, leaving a flush mark on the side of his head and no doubt a ringing noise in his left ear. The slap nearly dislodged the blindfold. But Rocket received it nicely and was probably arrogant enough to think that a punch to the face, breaking his nose, would have been a more powerful persuader. After all, he understood the employment of violence. His old man taught him those things years ago.

"You ain't shit, so shut your fuckin' mouth," his interrogator ordered. "All I want to hear about is where the notes are and whose wife you've been screwing, because you see, that's all my boss wants to know. He don't give a shit about you, your family, or the bitches you've been humping while you're here to 'bury your mother,'" he mocked. "He just cares about important information you took from him and getting his wife and his money back. That was you, right? You that's been making her sneak around late at night, early in the morning, three o'clock in the middle of the fuckin' afternoon ... stealing shit?"

Rocket relaxed his posture and gave up his struggle against the bindings. He remained silent as if to hear the shuffle of feet repositioning by his right knee or the distant engine noise. Maybe he was trying to gauge the distance of both. Maybe he was trying to anticipate the next blow from the right hander so that he could brace for it this time.

The punch exploded in his gut again. His flexed abdominals may have helped a little this time, but the air still rushed from his lungs as he lurched forward. He couldn't stand because of the bindings at his ankles. He couldn't move about to recapture his breath. All he could do was pitch sideways to make the chair fall over. He tried to find some relief in that.

For a moment, he lay on the floor gasping for air and waiting to be righted. When they sat him up again, his gasping for air had eased, and their mumbled discussion stopped. In another moment, the voice came at him again.

"Listen, Liberatore." He pronounced it correctly. "Did you meet a woman named Corrie yesterday?"

"No, I haven't seen her in months since my mother quit her chemotherapy."

"Oh, you know what Corrie we're talking about. Did she give you information about Dr. Fox's computer?"

"I don't know what you're talking about, but the only Corrie I knew was a nurse at the hospital's oncology department."

"Did you meet Fox's wife for sexy fun, you know, for fucking and shit like that? Did you take her to the Millhouse Inn for cocktails and find a room? Did you screw her for that information?"

Rocket knew that once you told a lie in interrogation, never ... never change the lie. No matter what direction they come at you from. Keep the lie. Keep the details of the lie in order. Make the lie become your truth, he used to teach the rookies at the academy.

"No. You have things wrong. I know who she is, but I don't have a personal relationship with the woman. I work for her husband," he managed to slur out for the fifth time between the lines of drool now slobbering down his chin.

But the man wanted to know more and continued with the questions. "Then why do you have so much interest in Mr. Fox? Do you always investigate your employers?"

Rocket remained silent as another barrage of questions and threats came at him. His inquisitor became more frustrated with each question.

"Why do you keep asking so many questions around this little-ass town?" he asked. "Why do you keep sneaking around the back alleys and in back doors and whoring around? Do you think you're a player? Do you think the men here can't satisfy their own wives?" He revealed that some of his rough play was personal and not limited to the business of finding his boss's possessions.

"Don't you know how badly we can hurt your family, or is it that you just don't care?"

The crew boss wanted to find a way to make Rocket reveal what he knew about Corrie Fox and the money. He wanted to find the stolen information that had put so many at risk, and he knew Rocket well.

"I bet your pops doesn't know what you've been up to here. I bet your sisters don't know either. We know them. We know where they're at. We know you, and that's why you're here with us."

Saul paused in his pressing interrogation. Then he leaned back into it. "You know, that's why you don't know how you got here," he said.

"And that's why you don't know how you're going get back. That's why you don't know if you're even going to get back to that comfortable hotel."