Truth be told, Jack missed the BAU team. If Reid were here, even without traffic surveillance, he could have drawn a rough map and analyzed which locations might be suitable to hide something as large as a school bus and 26 kids.
If they had that kind of insight, at least the search efforts in Westchester County wouldn't feel so directionless.
Agent LaCroix shared Jack's sentiments. For someone to go to such lengths—kidnapping 26 elementary school students in one fell swoop—only to demand a ransom of $1 million, something about it felt deeply suspicious. It didn't add up.
The traffic wasn't too bad yet, with some time before rush hour, and Jack gave Hannah a heads-up as they neared their destination.
She immediately unbuckled her seatbelt and began changing out of her formal attire. Jack's current outfit—a sharp suit under a long coat—was formal enough to work but didn't impede mobility. Hannah's pencil skirt and high heels, on the other hand, were not exactly combat-ready.
The odds were high that they were just going to conduct a search, but if they did encounter hostiles, fighting in a skirt and heels wasn't exactly practical. Sure, kicking off high heels and fighting in a ripped skirt might make for a classic movie scene, but reality was a different story.
"This outfit might come in handy next time," Jack quipped with a sly grin. "Maybe we can try out something inspired by Secretary."
Hannah gave him an exaggerated eye-roll as she tugged on a pair of jeans over her stockings. "For the record, I was playing your boss earlier. So, unless you want to be the one on the receiving end of the whip, maybe keep those fantasies to yourself."
Jack's cheeky smirk instantly froze. Her mention of being the "boss" inadvertently conjured up an image of their actual boss, Dana Mosier, holding the whip. That mental picture sent a chill down his spine, and he hurriedly shook it off. Too far, Jack. Too far.
When they arrived, the pair exited the car and made their way up to the second floor of the apartment building. Jack pressed his ear to the door of the designated unit and, after confirming no one was inside, pulled out his lockpicking tools and went to work.
It was a small studio apartment with the bare minimum—a bedroom, a tiny bathroom, and nothing else. There was no living room or balcony. The moment they opened the door, a wave of warm, stale air, carrying an odd smell, hit them.
Typical American wastefulness was evident everywhere. Lights were left on, and the heating was running full blast, even though the occupant wasn't home. It was as if the concept of turning off switches was completely alien to them.
Still, the running heater and lights confirmed one thing: someone had been using this apartment recently. The stacks of empty pizza boxes on the desk suggested it belonged to someone who wasn't particularly concerned with cleanliness.
Jack closed the door quietly, and the two of them pinched their noses as they began to search. The room was cluttered, with random belongings and trash strewn everywhere. Their main focus was on the two overflowing garbage bins, which quickly yielded results.
"They definitely planned the attack here," Jack said, pulling out a crumpled piece of paper from the trash. It was a printed Google satellite map, with a squiggly red line drawn on it. The marked route matched the school bus's usual path.
Unfortunately, there were no additional markings to indicate the kidnappers' next steps or their final destination.
Hannah, rummaging through the other garbage bin, found something else: the box for an unregistered burner phone. The box still had its identification number, and she snapped a picture of it to send back to the operations center.
The response from the tech team was quick but disappointing. The phone was currently turned off.
However, even an unregistered burner phone wasn't entirely anonymous. When purchased, buyers were still required to provide identification, even if it wasn't always verified. If this phone was part of a bulk purchase, it might lead to other associated numbers that could be linked to the kidnappers.
After thoroughly combing through the apartment, the duo did their best to return everything to its original state before leaving. Jack locked the door behind them and called Danny, instructing him to send a team to keep the apartment under constant surveillance.
Manpower was in short supply at the FBI's New York office today. Earlier, Danny had been in charge of arresting Sam Givens' girlfriend, Teri Pratt. His current strategy was to delay her access to a lawyer as much as possible, using every excuse in the book. Should any legal issues arise later, the NYPD could simply claim they were assisting the FBI, and any backlash from the Justice Department would be pushed onto the federal agency. Both sides understood and accepted this unspoken arrangement.
Looking out from a window in the hallway, Jack noticed the building's courtyard—a typical feature of New York's older brownstone buildings. Two L-shaped rows of apartments surrounded a rectangular inner courtyard, which was perpetually in shadow and often used as a dumping ground for trash instead of the lush gardens the architects had envisioned.
The courtyard also had small doors leading to various stairwells. People rarely used these routes, as they were often home to shady characters—junkies, or worse, petty criminals up to no good.
As Jack leaned against the window, opening the rusty bars to light a small cigar while waiting for Danny's team, he happened to lock eyes with a tall white man standing in the courtyard below. Both froze for a moment, startled by the unexpected encounter.
Jack immediately recognized the man as Sam Givens. He tried to play it cool and look away while signaling Hannah, but Givens was incredibly sharp. The moment Jack moved, Givens spun around and bolted.
"Sam Givens! FBI! Stop right there!" Jack shouted, pulling out his Glock and aiming it through the iron bars of the window.
Hannah, ever quick on the uptake, didn't need any more clues. She drew her sidearm and dashed toward the stairwell. "I'll cut him off!" she shouted.
"Bang!" Jack fired a shot, his Glock aimed through the window. Strictly speaking, it was against protocol to fire in a residential area, but desperate times called for desperate measures. He'd argue later that he saw Givens reach for a weapon.
The shot hit Givens squarely in the back, near his right shoulder blade. Jack had intentionally avoided a fatal shot; Givens was too important a lead to risk killing.
Though injured, Givens managed to stumble through a doorway, letting out only a muffled groan. Jack cursed under his breath and instinctively grabbed the window's iron bars, as if he could rip them off and jump straight down.
"Ahhh!" Several residents in the hallway screamed in panic at the sound of gunfire, crouching down and staring at Jack. He hesitated, glancing at the welded steel bars on the window again, and realized such an outrageous stunt might not be the best idea. Instead, he turned and sprinted toward the stairs.
And then… he got lost.
Jack wasn't usually bad with directions. But the maze-like design of the old building's stairwell, combined with years of neglect, turned the escape routes into an obstacle course of junk and confusing graffiti-covered signs. He ran in circles twice before finally making it out into the alley.
By the time he arrived, all he saw was Hannah, bent over with her hands on her knees, trying to catch her breath. In the distance, the screech of tires signaled Givens' escape.
Without a word, Hannah called the operations center. "Sam Givens is fleeing south in a dark gray Chevrolet. He's injured—right shoulder shot!" she reported into her Bluetooth headset.
Back in the car, Jack slammed his fist against the steering wheel in frustration. "We were so close to catching him! I've never let a suspect slip away like this before."
Hannah, still catching her breath, rolled her eyes. "Well, congratulations. First time for everything."
Jack grumbled. "And why is it that traffic always clears up perfectly when the bad guys are trying to escape? What kind of cosmic joke is this?!"
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