Max Dunne: Hunted Page 3

  As he stood the girl on the ground, he noticed a little note lying in his trunk. He picked it up immediately. There was an address written in the paper.

  1106 Oakland Drive

  Saint Patrick South

  He had never heard of Oakland Drive but he knew Saint Patrick South. It was popularly called SPS. It was a small city with an interesting history. In the 15th Century, a certain priest named Patrick had been burned at the stake for trying to preach the Gospel to the local indigenes. His preaching had not made sense to any of them at the time, and somehow, he had been accused of practicing voodoo, which was a crime punishable by death at the time. And so they had tied the missionary man to a stake and set it ablaze. And because while e was being cremated alive, the smoke of the fire blew southward, his charred remains had been displayed facing the south of the countryside to serve as a warning to any other people who might want to shove their beliefs down the throats of the free folks. Eventually, other Christians came into the country and other people got killed, but none of the deaths was as sensational as Saint Patrick’s. As a matter of fact, Saint Patrick had served as a motivation to other Christians. They had all heard about the barbaric lives the indigenes of the community lived and had always pitched their tents far away from there. But Saint Patrick had moved his gospel to this forbidden kingdom without any fear. His death had inspired other Christians too to continue preaching the gospel. Of course a lot of them were killed but the Christian association never relented in winning the souls of these savages. Eventually, they were able to convert a lot of them and thus named the town after the first Christian that was killed. They named it Saint Patrick South.

  “What is your name?” Max asked the little girl.

  The girl looked up at him in fear. “Emily,” she responded with a shaky voice.

  “Okay, Emily. Listen to me carefully, I’m not going to hurt you, okay?”

  The girl nodded, but he could see that she was still scared of him.

  “How did you get into my car?” He knew he asked a stupid question as soon as it escaped from his mouth, but Emily shook her head.

  “Okay, it’s fine. You have been kidnapped, Emily. I’m going to take you back to your parents. You have nothing to be scared of. Where do you live?”

  The girl stared at him. She said nothing.

  “Do you live in 1106 Oakland Drive?”

  She nodded.

  “Okay, enough questions.” He picked her up again and sat her in the passenger’s seat beside him. Then he went to the other side and sat behind the wheel. He hit the steering wheel in anger. Someone was messing with him and he didn’t like it; if it were Craig, he would make sure the bastard blamed the day he was born. But first things first; he had to return the girl to her family. Then it occurred to him. The address. Whoever had put her in his trunk had put the address there; they obviously wanted him to return the girl. Why? Why was he chosen? Why did the person never return the girl himself? Something did not seem right about this whole issue. Then he started to wonder if the people who lived in the address were truly Emily’s parents in the first place. He would find out the truth when he got to the address.

  He started the car and drove off. The time on the dashboard was 4pm by the time he drove into Oakland Drive; he spent another fifteen minutes locating house number 1106. When he stopped in front of the building, he had no doubt in his mind that this was the girl’s home, for she smiled for the first time since Max had met her.

  “Stay in the car,” he told her. He locked all the doors before stepping out. He walked briskly towards the door. He saw the brass knocker but ignored it. Instead he pressed on the doorbell.

  A woman opened the door.

  “Hi,” he greeted.

  “Hello,” she answered, appraising him and staring at him suspiciously at the same time.

  “My name is Max Dunne,” he said, “I’m a private investigator.”

  Her eyes opened widely. “Private investigator? Have you helped us find our baby?”

  Max chose not to answer the question. “I have to ask you some few questions if you don’t mind.” He saw the woman look toward his car. He didn’t worry that she might see Emily; the windows were tinted black. But surely, Emily would see her, and she might want to come down and join her mother – if this woman was truly her mother. That was unlikely, too; he had locked the doors.

  “Of course, oh please come in,” she replied and stepped aside for Max to enter.

  He looked around the house. Various pictures on the walls of the living room bore Emily’s image right from the time she was a toddler to the present. All indication pointed to the fact that they were her true parents.

  “Please have your seat.”

  A side door was opened and a tall man stepped into the living room. He seemed surprised to see Max. He looked at his wife. “Honey, who is this?”

  “That’s Detective Max Dunne. He’s a private investigator.”

  “But I thought we’d talked about this. Why did you have to call the police for crying out loud? Everything was supposed to be okay by now; you just had to complicate things, Vera!”

  “Complicate what?” Max was confused. What’s going on here?

  “I didn’t call him,” replied the woman. “He just appeared at the door.”

  “I’m not a policeman,” Max tried to vindicate himself. “I’m a private investigator. I found the address of this place in my trunk.

  “Oh, you’ve brought Emily!” Max could sense delight in the father’s voice.

  “What makes you so sure?”

  “We were told she would be returned to us alive if we cooperated.”

  “Really?” Max was interested. “Tell me the full story.

  “Well, three days ago, Emily was taken from her school by a person unknown. But before we could call the police we received a phone call from an anonymous person. The man told us Emily was fine. He explained to us quite frankly that he had abducted her and will only release her until we pay a certain amount of money. The amount was ridiculous.”

  “How much?” Surely, the kidnapper must have requested an amount they could not afford to pay. The family would have to go borrowing, or get the money from an illegitimate means, for them to pay up the ransom. Max was expecting at least half a million dollars ransom.

  “It’s ridiculous!” said Emily’s mom.

  “Tell me.”

  “$100,” the husband revealed.

  Max thought he was hearing things. “Come again.”

  “The kidnapper demanded a ransom of just $100. We thought he was joking with us. But apparently, he was serious. He told us to wire a hundred dollars to a certain account number he sent to us within the next twenty-four hours or we would never see our Emily again. And of course we sent the money immediately. We were told afterward that our child will be returned to us, but we must not get the police involved.”

  “I see,” Max had begun to think deeply. What kind of twisted psychopath was he dealing with? he wondered. He had not only been psychologically manipulating Max; he had also been playing some twisted games of his own with innocent people. He could suspect no other person but Craig himself to be behind all these nonsense.

  “The person is right,” Max said with assurance, “I have brought your daughter to you.” The couple hugged each other joyfully. “But I need you to do me one favor.”

  The spouses shared a glance. Worry lines creased their foreheads. They began to stare at Max as if he was a dangerous person – or at least someone who knew the kidnapper, like Max was someone capable of unleashing the most brutal terror if his demands were not met. Max was sure that, right now, they believed he was the kidnapper. He had only asked them for a single favor, he had not even stated what he wanted. He didn’t blame them; the kidnapper – Craig most probably – had scared the living daylight out of them.

  “You have nothing to be scared of,” spoke Max, “I did not come here to do you any harm.”

  “Please don’t hurt our dau
ghter, we beg of you,” the gorgeous woman had started crying.

  “I’m not the bad guy, trust me,” his assurance meant nothing to them at this moment. “I just want to find out the root of everything. Your daughter was placed in my trunk, I want to know why. You are the only people who can help me. I need to investigate this thing; the police have to know about it.”

  “No, no, no, no!” begged the husband. “We were warned not to get the police involved. Please don’t call the police. Our daughter will be killed if you do. We beg of you.”

  “Okay, okay. I promise not to call the police. But still you have to do me this favor.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Show me the account number you sent the $100 to.”

  The man reached into a drawer and brought out a sheet of paper on which he had jotted the number. Max knew what it contained before he read it. The kidnapper was a sick bastard.

  The account number belonged to Max Dunne.

  Fortune 8

  After finally uniting little Emily with her family, Max entered his car and drove off. He hoped he would never have any reason to come back to this place; for if he did, he might have to see something horrible. And somehow, he felt like he was now responsible for the safety of that family. Max desperately wanted to get the police involved. With the help of the police, the bastard would be caught very fast. But he knew he couldn’t go back on his words. He had promised the family that he would never involve the police. Besides, he had no doubt that the kidnapper would do what he promised if he found out what Max had been doing. Somehow, the person knew him very much; and he would find out no matter how Max tried to hide his investigation.

  Something told him that the man was testing him, testing him to test him. He was daring Max to investigate so that he would have a reason to kill the little girl. He would visit the family and before their very eyes murder their daughter and tell them that Max had not kept his promise, that they should not blame him but blame the man who had reneged on his promise to them. He would make the family hate Max and do everything they could to bring him down. If the sick bastard playing a game with Max wanted him to die, he would not have to kill him; he would just convince the bereaved father to pick up a good and do the deeds for him. That way, the villain would win from both sides.

  Max knew he was entirely powerless. Craig – or whoever the villain might be – was ten steps ahead of him. Before Max would think about it, the person had dwelt on the thought hour before then and had created a psychological back door. It seemed to Max like a bizarre game of chess where only the better player would win no matter how the underdog tried. Max was the underdog. As he drove off, he thought about the next course of action. He thought about what other strategy he needed to employ to take the villain unaware.

  Unknown to him, a car followed behind.

  ***

  The time was 6pm already. He needed a drink badly. He was driving towards his favorite bar when he spotted a park and stopped. He parked his car somewhere relatively safe, got out and walked to a small shop selling drinks. He bought a bottle of whisky and paid with his credit card. He had the cash to pay but intentionally chose to pay with his credit card. The bastard had made him $100 richer and he intended to spend it. He had offered the money back to the couple but they had blatantly refused to take it. They had seen Max as a messenger of doom; someone who had come to tempt them into doing the wrong thing so that their daughter could be killed. They had politely begged him to bring their daughter to them instead, and afterward asked him to leave. As soon as he stepped out of the house after returning Emily to them, the family had instantly bolted their door behind him. Now that they had had their child back, there was no way they would answer Max if he knocked again.

  He collected the whisky gratefully and went to sit on a bench in the park, watching the children and their parents have some good time. He uncorked the bottle and took a deep swig. A million thoughts were running through his mind. Everything had begun from the weird phone call he received that very early morning; everything had been downhill since then. And truly, he had never known deep rest since that moment he decided to crawl out of bed to respond to a wife in distress. Surely, the person stalking him, putting him on his toes, deceiving him, had had everything planned to the smallest details. He was playing a game with Max, and the private investigator realized that he was playing back, albeit very reluctantly. Some things would happen that he would not just be able to resist interfering. Even some men had provoked him to a fight in a bar; he felt that someone had probably paid those huge men to pick fight with him, to put him in a hospital bed for days – perhaps so that the evil man would be able to further his evil plans while Max received treatments in the hospital – and those men had disappeared as soon as they had done what was requested of them. They had been used and discarded like torn rags. Max was sure that they were lying in the bottom of some oceans. At first when Max heard about their disappearance, it had seemed like the anonymous fellow watching him had fought for him and made them disappear. But on discovering how crafty the person he was dealing with could be, Max knew the villain had started and had ended the bar fight. He was both the arsonist and the fireman.

  A man he had never seen before suddenly sat beside him. Max paid him no attention and continued drinking his whisky and watching the playing children. It was a public bench; the stranger had the right to sit on it as much as Max did.

  “Aren’t those little creatures delightful?” said the stranger.

  Max’s metal gears suddenly shifted as he heard those words. Even though the words were innocent enough, Max was able to discern the vileness that came with the voice saying them. “Who the hell are you?” he suddenly asked the man. “Tell me you are the one behind everything. Tell me! Be a man for once and tell me, you bastard!”

  The shock on the stranger’s face was genuine. “What are you talking about?”

  “You are behind everything! Come on, admit it!”

  “Please I know nothing about what you’re talking about.”

  “Is this where you came to pick Emily? Have you not tormented the family enough?”

  “What family? Who is Emily? I don’t understand anything you’re saying.”

  “Are you planning to kidnap another child?”

  “Oh my God!” wailed the stranger, “I’m not a kidnapper for Christ’s sake!”

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I brought my son here. Look, that’s my son right there,” he called out, “Nick, be careful out there!”

  “Okay Dad,” the child responded from afar.

  Max realized that he was merely making a mountain out of a molehill. The man was an innocent person. The events of the past few days had made him too suspicious of people around him.

  “I’m so sorry. I thought you were someone else.”

  The stranger stared at him with concerned expression. “Are you sure you’re alright?”

  “I’m okay. Just forget about everything I say.” He took another big swig from his bottle; he had forgotten about the man sitting beside him. He was now busy with his own thoughts.

  After ten minutes, he decided that he had had enough. He left the half-empty bottle of whisky on the grassy ground and walked away toward his car. This was also when most of the people at the park were also having their departures. Max cursed himself as he waded through the crowd of people. I should have left earlier, he thought. The crowd was blocking his paths and slowing him down tremendously. All he needed now was to drive home, have some sandwich, take his bath and have a long sleep. He would sleep as long as he could; he needed it. When he woke up, he would have a clearer head and make a good plan to nail the bastard playing some macabre game with him.

  He suddenly felt a hand grab him and turn him around. He was staring in the face of the stranger who had sat beside him in the park.

  “I know who you are. Please don’t hurt my family.” He carried a frightened expression. He immediately placed an envelope in
Max’s palm and disappeared among the crowd. Max would have wanted to hold him and demand to know what he meant by his words, or who had sent him to deliver the envelope to him. But the man had disappeared; he had no chance of locating him among the hundreds of unfamiliar faces that came and went all around him.

  He stared at the envelope. The first thought that occurred to Max was that the envelope was a bomb that would detonate if opened. After a while of staring at it, he doubted that it was anything dangerous. It most probably contained a message. He would have liked to open it right there and see its content but Max was a careful man; he was not ready to take any chance. He might be wrong; the envelope might actually be a bomb. The sender, he was sure, was sick enough to cause the death of hundreds of people just to make a statement, or simply to finally get rid of Max in a grand style. No, he would not grant the bastard’s wish if that was what he intended.