Hotel Key

Chapter 34

Shane scrubbed his hand through his hair as he glanced back and forth between Daryl and his brother. They were putting on a good act. Pretending they were calm and done fighting each other. But their body postures told a different story. There was no doubt in Shane's mind that if he and Rick walked out of the apartment, the two men would be at each other's throats before he got the elevator door open. He let out a heavy sigh. This was not how Shane pictured his night going. He just about had Carol talked into letting Rick take Sophia with him for the night. The last thing he wanted to be doing right now was breaking up another fight between Daryl and his disturbance causing brother. He'd had very little interaction with Merle. Other than seeing him in passing a few times, Shane really only met him at the wedding. They never even had a conversation. But that small amount of contact was more than enough for Shane to deduce that the man was good for nothing but causing trouble.

"Would someone like to explain what's going on here? And why a pregnant woman got punched in the face?," Rick asked. When he got nothing but angry glares from both brothers, he decided to try another tactic, asking them if they'd like to talk with him down at the station instead.

"She didn't get punched. She got elbowed. And it was a fuckin' accident," Merle hissed. The last person he wanted to hurt was RickyJo. He was trying to get her to leave with him. Not knock her teeth in.

"You shouldn'ta come at me when she was right there!," Daryl said, his tone angry and full of accusation. "She coulda got hurt!"

"YOU FUCKIN' STARTED IT!," Merle hollered back.

"I started it?," Daryl repeated, his voice thick with sarcasm. He pointed at Merle. "You started this shit when you fucked my wife!"

"No!," Merle yelled. "You started it when ya married her knowing she was pregnant with my damn kid. And don't try ta tell me ya didn't know! Yer a fuckin' liar. Asshole!"

"Ya never should fucked her ta begin with!," Daryl hollered, his voice rising nearly to the volume of his brother's loud mouth. "She was my girlfriend! Yer the asshole!"

"Like hell!," Merle argued. "You broke up with her! That makes her fair game!"

Shane's eyes widened and he glanced at Rick, wondering if they should go ahead and escort Daryl's brother out of the building. Or if they ought to wait and see what else they were going to hear. Because this story was getting juicier by the minute. Shane was actually quite shocked by the information he just heard. He didn't really know Merle. But he's spent lots of time with Datyl and RickyJo. And they seemed completely enamored with each other. Either they were in love, or they both deserved an academy award for their acting. He was surprised to find out they were having marital troubles. And even more surprised to find out she'd been sleeping with another man. Especially this one.

"Hey!," Rick hollered, slapping his hands together and stepping between the brothers so they were forced to look at him instead of each other. "Y'all need ta get yer shit together. 'Cause yer up here fighting over a pregnant woman. And she's out on the street by herself bleeding from the mouth. If y'all care about her so much, start acting like it."

While Shane was waiting to hear what the mens' response to Rick's suggestion would be, he felt his phone vibrating in his pocket. He quickly pulled it out, assuming it was Carol calling him from downstairs to make sure he was alright. But instead, he saw the call was from RickyJo. He quickly answered the call, worried that she might have been more hurt than she let on after the hard fall she took.

"RickyJo?," Shane questioned, switching the call to speaker since Daryl started crowding in next to him the moment he heard her name mentioned. "Are you alright?" There was no answer right away. But Shane could hear heavy breathing and weird shuffling noises, like something was rubbing against the speaker of the phone. Shane wondered if maybe she accidentally pocket dialed him. He raised his voice, speaking louder into the phone. "RICKYJO. IT'S SHANE! ARE YOU THERE?" When she answered him, her voice was weird and muffled, like she was talking through a mouthful of cotton.

"Help," she gasped. "Someone grabbed me off the street. I'm in a van. I don't know where." That was all RickyJo got out before the phone was snatched away from her. Shane could hear several voices. It was hard to make them out. But there was a lot of cursing. And then an audible thump and a blood curdling scream that he hoped wasn't RickyJo even though it was easy to recognize her voice. The call was then abruptly cut off. The small group of men stared at each other in disbelief for a moment. Daryl recovered from his shock the fastest, grabbing the phone from Shane's hand and attempting to call RickyJo's phone back. It only rang once, the call going straight to voicemail after. Daryl tried her a few more times, each time with the same result.

"What the fuck should we do?," Daryl hollered, hoping that Rick and Shane had some suggestions on what the best course of action would be. Both Daryl and Merle were experienced trackers. But they couldn't track a van that took off in the middle of the city.

"Your phone," Shane hollered, pointing towards the kitchen where he could hear it ringing. "Put it on speaker," he instructed. "Everyone keep quiet."

Daryl grabbed the phone, feeling a bit of relief surge through him when he saw the call was coming from RickyJo's phone. He was holding out a small sliver of hope that the weird exchange they just heard through Shane's phone was some sort of badly timed prank or misunderstanding.

"RickyJo?" Daryl called her name the moment he answered the call. But it wasn't her voice on the other end. It was a man. And not someone that was familiar to him. Daryl didn't recognize his voice.

"Go to the cops and she's dead," the man hissed. Daryl glanced at Rick and Shane with some concern. It was a little late not to involve the cops. They were already here.

"YOU BRING MY WIFE BACK HERE RIGHT FUCKIN' NOW!," Daryl screamed into his phone. "...OR YER THE ONE THAT'S GONNA BE DEAD!" The man on the other end of the call chuckled into the phone. His laugh gave Daryl a chill.

"I don't think I will," the man told him. Daryl glanced at Shane. He was mouthing what he wanted Daryl to ask the man. Because threatening to beat his ass wasn't going to get them anywhere.

"What do you want?," Daryl asked.

"Well isn't that the million dollar question," the man quipped. He laughed into the phone again. "That's what I want. A million dollars. And if you ever want to see your wife alive again, you're going to give it to me."

"Okay," Daryl agreed. "Bring her back right now and I'll pay you whatever you want."

"I'M IN CHARGE HERE NOT YOU, YOU WORTHLESS REDNECK TRASH!," the man hollered. Shane narrowed his eyes. The man was acting like this was a kidnapping for ransom at first. But the way he was insulting Daryl, it sounded like it might be personal. That wasn't a good sign. "I'll call you tomorrow to tell you where to bring the money," the man said. And before Daryl could say anything else, the man ended the call.

Rick was on his phone the minute the call ended. He started speaking to a woman on the other end, asking her to trace RickyJo's cell phone for him. The woman put him on hold. They were really only waiting for her to come back on the line for a minute or two. But it felt like hours. Daryl's heart was pounding so hard in his chest that he could hear it in whooshing in his ears. The room felt like it was spinning around him. Someone shoved a glass of whiskey into his hand and Daryl took a hard gulp, feeling the calming burn as it went down. As quickly as the glass was thrust at him, Merle snatched it back, drinking down the rest of the contents before he disappeared down the hall towards the bedroom. He returned a moment later with RickyJo's duffle bag from under the bed. Flopping it on the table, he began pulling out the stacks of cash that were inside, counting the money out on the table top. He got about halfway through when the woman Rick called came back on the line.

"The phone was shut off," the woman explained. Daryl cursed under his breath. "I got one ping before that. Heading west on highway twenty." Rick thanked the woman. And asked her to put a hold on the number, so that it would notify them when and if the phone was turned back on. The woman assured him that she would notify him as soon as they got anything further on the phone. Rick tried not to show it. But he wasn't hopeful about getting anything else from the phone. If the people that took RickyJo had even half a brain to rub between them, they probably already smashed the phone and threw it out the car window.

"I'm going to get some tracking equipment from the station. We'll hook your phone up and then no matter what phone they call from we can ping them when they call back and get their location," Rick said.

"They probably have someone watching the building," Shane said. If he was kidnapping someone for ransom, he would definitely have someone watching the building. To make sure they don't call the police. Rick nodded.

"I'll take Carl with me, like we're going out for ice cream. I can stick the equipment in his backpack so it doesn't look suspicious," Rick said. As quick as those people grabbed her, they had to have been watching the building for some time. But he and Shane came and went all the time. So neither of them would arouse suspicion. "I'm gonna have to loop the sergeant in on this," Rick admitted. There was no way around it. They couldn't do this off the books. Not if they wanted access to the department's resources.

"HOLD ON!," Daryl said, putting his hands up. "Wait for him to call back. I can't wait for this asshole to call back. I need to get RickyJo back now. She's pregnant. We can't just sit and wait on a phone call. Who knows what that sick fuck is doin' ta her right now!"

It was obvious that Daryl was on the verge of losing his shit. Shane was taken aback when Daryl's brother, who had been ready to beat him nearly to death only minutes before, wrapped his arm around him and led him over to the table where he guided him down into a chair. There was a stack of pictures strewn out on the table top. Merle gathered them up and deposited them in the kitchen trash. Then he returned with a full glass of whiskey and set it in front of his brother before he returned to the duffel bag and began counting the rest of the money inside it.

"Try not ta think about it," Merle suggested to his brother. "We'll get her back. They want money. They won't hurt her as long as we pay." While Merle wasn't sure if this was true. He knew it was what Daryl needed to hear to keep himself from losing it completely.

Rick hurried out of the apartment. He took his son with him and stopped for ice cream before he headed down to the station. Carl wanted ice cream. But mainly, Rick just wanted to make sure he wasn't being followed. Back in the apartment, Shane moved in and poked through the stacks of cash, looking at Merle with a questioning glance.

"She keeps cash around in case she's gotta bail me out," Merle said as if he sensed the man's question before it was even asked. "There's about 400 thousand here," Merle announced. He lifted his hand, setting it down gently on Daryl's shoulder to get his attention without startling him. "Can ya get the rest?," Merle asked. Daryl nodded.

"There's money in a safety deposit box downtown." Daryl said. "A lot of money. RickyJo stashed the keys in her jewelry box so they wouldn't get lost. Poppa left it ta me. There was a note in there. He told me ta take care of her." With that Daryl buried his face in his hands. Merle's hand was still resting on his shoulder. And he gave him one brief reassuring squeeze before he headed back down the hall to dig through RickyJo's disaster of a jewelry box. He wasn't sure if they were going to have to pay the ransom. Or if these cops were going to be able to get RickyJo back without handing the money over. But Merle decided the best thing to do was just be ready for either scenario. And no matter if they paid them or not, he was going to hunt every single one of them down and make sure they died slow. No one fucked with his family and got away with it.