Blake was racing through the dark and empty streets. I’ll admit that I was a bit scared; emotional and driving do not mix well. His hands were sweating and grabbed onto the wheel tightly. His entire body was rigid, the only way for him to release energy was tapping his feet.

For the record, none of this was my idea. It would’ve been better for the authorities to deal with this. Hell, even her father would’ve been ideal. But for Blake’s sake, I took matters into our old hands.

I had several different windows opened on my laptop. I looked for every piece of information there was to find about our little kidnapper. The information was extremely sparse.

My eyes narrowed as I found out an interesting piece of evidence. “His father is deceased, mother is missing.”

Blake only nodded his head. “That doesn’t excuse his behavior.”

I chuckled at the irony. Blake, however, was much more serious than me. His suit made him look even older in addition to the folds on his head.

The car took a sudden left, throwing my laptop to the side. I quickly grabbed onto it before it could fall. Blake’s phone was also thrown, but when he had tried to catch it, he completely missed. He closed his hand into a fist and grabbed the wheel.

“By the way,” I began. “I know you usually do negotiations for sales, but I think I’m better suited to do it this time.”

“You don’t trust me?” Blake asked. “You’ve been doing a lot of the work; I can help out too.”

“I trust you, but I don’t trust your emotions,” I replied. “I’m the most level-headed right now.”

“My emotions won’t be a problem. You know how good I am.”

“You just saying that proves my point,” I said respectfully as I looked at his fallen phone. “I’ve learned from watching you. So you play support. Listen and tell me if I missed anything and research him.”

He opened his mouth before closing it. His silence was acceptance of my proposal. The more he thought about it, the better it seemed.

I continued to research as Blake continued to drive. It took us five minutes before we were in front of the woods. “Stop here,” I ordered.

The woods were densely packed with trees. There was a small path that you could walk through, but other than that, visibility was poor. Not ideal for a tactical team as they could easily mix up the Leah and the kidnapper. The space also wasn’t ideal, allowing an easy way for them to flee. It’s even worse for an individual going in.

The more I looked in, the more I felt my stomach dropped. Despite still being warm, I shivered and gained goosebumps. I felt my body froze up momentarily, an odd premonition passing through me coldly. And as suddenly as it came, it passed.

I took a small gulp as my muscles began to move.

“Are you ready?” I asked Blake. He looked at me with a saddened expression. He was shaking despite wearing a suit. I gave him a friendly and supportive smile.

“Yeah,” he said softly. “I guess I am.”

I put my laptop on top of the dashboard. I setup the calling software, allowing both of us to put on earphones to hear it and to record it. All my notes were on the left side of the screen to allow me to quickly reference it.

It didn’t look as sophisticated as the movies but messy and improvised. As we put on our headphones, I looked through the list of phone numbers that also went through the repeaters before finding the one associated with our dear friend. I put in the number and, with great anticipation, rang it.

RING.

RING.

RING.

The ringing stopped. No sound came out of the phone. I could feel my heart race as I waited for an answer. He was no doubt experiencing the same feeling.

“Hello?” I finally asked. “Are you there?”

“Zack,” the voice sounded surprised.

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I had two choices here; choices that would either ruin negotiations or help them along. The choice to be serious or joking.

Negotiations are built on top of rapport. The more you have, the higher it could go. Typically, you don’t know the other side well enough to be comfortable joking, so you have to adopt a more serious approach. Show the other side that you have empathy.

But the game changes when you're acquainted with the other side. While the goal stays the same, suddenly, the I’ll listen like a therapist and be on your side approach gets patched. The method proven to work is now a maybe.

If I asked Blake, he would answer the safe approach. But to me, that simply wasn’t an option.

“Hehe, weren’t expecting me, were you?” I teased.

“How did you find me?” he asked. It wasn’t relevant to the issue. But I couldn’t ignore it; that would make him feel like I wasn’t listening to his demands.

After a moment of deliberation, I came up with my response. “If you knew, would that change anything?” I gave him the illusion of control, but really he would see the only response would be the one I wanted. When I looked over to Blake, he gave me a nod.

“No,” he responded. I heard his footsteps hit a wooden floor. “Zack, just get out of here.”

“I would, but you kidnapped by friend’s date,” I responded. I suppressed the disdain in my voice, opting for a more neutral one. “I’m not going to let you extort her parents, so I’ll be negotiating here, Oliver.”

“Extort?” Oliver repeated in a loud voice. He said it as if it were some joke. “Is that what you think this is about?”

Me and Blake looked at each other in confusion. A demand should’ve been given by now. “Help me understand what this is about then?”

“No, even you’d never believe me,” Oliver mumbled morosely, almost like he was thinking to himself.

“I’m s-” I began to speak before Blake pressed the mute button, cutting me off.

“What did you hear?” I asked.

“Even you’d never believe me,” Blake repeated as he emphasized the word. “He used ‘you’d’ implying you're something special to him.”

I considered his words. “Even if we’re good friends, you wouldn’t use ‘you’d’.”

“Right, he sees some connection with you,” Blake said. “You can use that.”

The mind can usually only focus on one subject at a time. Having another person with different goals will undoubtedly help you catch things you’d miss. With a grateful nod, I unmuted the call.

“It seems like you’re feeling stressed out,” I said gently.

“No way, I didn’t notice,” he deadpanned. I gave a friendly chuckle, making sure he could hear it.

“It also seems like you're worried about law enforcement getting involved,” I began. “However, I’d like to give you my personal assurance that that won’t happen. It’d be bad for all of us.”

“If they go in, we’re both dead,” Oliver said.

“Exactly,” I said. “And we don’t want that to happen.”

The only sound that played throughout was the sound of footsteps. He seemed deep in thought. No talking from either side. A standstill.

“Did that feel better?” I asked gently, breaking the silence. His footsteps suddenly stopped. “Yes,” he admitted.

“To tell you the truth, I’m very stressed out too,” I said in a friendly manner. “So do you feel comfortable enough to tell me why you think I wouldn’t understand?”

“I can’t be sure after no one believed me,” he said cryptically. I heard something creak, maybe a chair, before he spoke again. “Ten million.”

“Your request is certainly interesting,” I affirmed after a short silence. “But how am I supposed to do that?”

“Wh-what do you mean?” he asked.

“Well, how am I supposed to pay you ten million when I don’t know that Leah’s still alive? I mean, I haven’t heard her.”

I let silence follow. Unlike the awkward ones from earlier, this one was deliberate. It forced him to think about the issue. The cold air and cricketing outside surrounded us as we waited for his response.

“She’s currently sedated, so the only way to know is to come in person.”

“And how am I supposed to do that as well?” I asked. “What’s stopping you from taking me as well?”

“You’re going to have to just trust my word,” he said.

“Okay,” I said, making it sound like I agreed with him. “And now, how am I supposed to pay you? How can I scramble ten million dollars on short notice?”

“Doesn’t Blake own a diamond shop?” Oliver asked. “Just sell all the jewels there.”

“And even if we accomplished that,” I began. “How am I supposed to give it to you?”

The questions had no obvious answer. I had presented him with some glaring issues with his idea. The only realistic way for me to pay him was to give him the diamonds, but than that brings us back to the trust issue.

“Perhaps we can come to some sort of agreement,” I said. “What was it that you wanted to tell me? Maybe it’ll help us resolve some issues.”

“You wouldn’t believe me,” he repeated.

“I think you’ll find that I’m more open-minded.”

As soon as I said that sentence, it seemed that the atmosphere had completely shifted. His breath became more steady. He stopped pacing around, the line completely going silent now. One continuous breath was released before it stopped. When he spoke, his voice took on a confident quality.

“Of course a criminal would be,” he said as if he had the best hand. Blake and I snapped our heads towards each other. No words were exchanged, but the message was clear.

He knows.