The Debt Collectors War

Chapter 44

They found an empty factory. There seemed to be a lot of them around. Ellie looked at a satellite image of the area on her tablet, and found a large building with weeds growing in the carparks around it, then told Joe where to go.

It might have been something agricultural, once, she decided. There were what looked like grain silos out the back, and a lot of plastic sacks lying about. The gate was closed, but someone had cut the chain years ago. So long ago that the cut end had rusted and crumbled, Ellie noticed, as she opened the gate.

The drove in, drove right inside through a loading dock, and then all got out the SUV. Ellie pulled Mark out too, and made him kneel.

Kneel, because then he’d be scared, and more co-operative.

She needed Mark scared. Scared and confused, rather than angry. He’d had time to think, and time to worry, but he’d also had time to remember he was a big bad tough guy and in a militia and everything. And Ellie being kind to him at his house might encourage him to make trouble now, too. Her kindness, and then nothing awful happening to him as they drove around, that might make him think he was safe.

Ellie needed him not to feel safe. She needed to scare him all over again.

So she did.

She pulled him out the car, and kicked his leg out from under him so he fell to his knees. She held his collar so he didn’t actually fall over and hit his face on the ground and knock himself out, or anything silly like that.

Then she looked at him for a moment, thinking.

Mark was sniffing, which was a good sign. He’d been sobbing earlier, too, but a little before that he’d been angry and kicking the back of Ellie’s seat, so she wasn’t sure what state of mind he was in right now. The sniffing might only be because he was having to breathe through his nose, she supposed. But the abandoned factory was fairly creepy, and he had to know being brought here, away from people, and not to a debt-recovery authority base was a very bad sign.

She let him look around for a moment, and work that out, and then she reached down, and pulled the tape away from his face, and pulled his gag out, too. Then she held out her tablet, and showed Mark a photo of the missing kid.

“Do you know him?” Ellie said.

Mark looked at her, thinking. He was trying to think, trying to work out what to do. He tried, but he didn’t seem to be thinking the right things. Instead of being sensibly scared, and helping them, and then being let go, he seemed to have decided he was going to be difficult.

Difficult really wasn’t Ellie needed right now.

She drew her sidearm, and pointed it at his face. “Don’t be an asshole,” she said. “Just answer.”

He swallowed, and started to rethink being difficult.

“Hey,” Sameh said. She had climbed out of the SUV after Mark, through the same door. She was behind him. She slapped the top of his head, hard enough it made a dull wet sound. Mark jumped, and looked around at her.

“Hi,” Sameh said. “I’m here too, remember. Really don’t be an asshole.”

“Do you know this kid?” Ellie said again.

Mark swallowed, and changed his mind. He changed it quite suddenly. That was what being scared and uncertain did to people.

“Please don’t hurt me,” he said.

“We won’t,” Ellie said. “It’s fine. Just answer.”

Ellie sounded reasonable. Reasonable enough that Mark could still hope she was his friend, unlike Sameh.

Mark decided to answer. He was scared, so he didn’t think. People never thought, Ellie had noticed. Ellie sounded reasonable, so Mark didn’t wonder why Ellie would kidnap him and take him off into the middle of nowhere and ask him who someone was. He didn’t wonder why she would go to all this trouble, just to ask a question, or what she might do if he didn’t help. Or what he might gain by keeping quiet.

Ellie would have paid him. She would have a done a deal on behalf of the company. She didn’t care how she found out what she needed to know. She would have paid a lot, but she didn’t need to.

Instead, she just stood there while Mark talked at her.

He opened his mouth, and said things, and gave away far more than he probably meant to.

He gave away enough.

“Maybe I know him,” Mark said. “But fuck, you didn’t need to get so rough. I…”

“Maybe you know him?” Ellie said.

“Yeah maybe, but…”

Ellie nodded. That was all she needed. The maybe was enough. Everything from here would just be scaring Mark and hurting Mark until he told her what she wanted to know.