Path to Convergence
Copyright© 2025 by Vonalt
Chapter 11: Never in a Million Years
We had been back from our impromptu honeymoon for about three weeks when I got a call from Lawrence. He was direct, never one to waste time, and he didn’t mince words about why he was calling.
The cult that my mother and brother were involved with had been implicated in several kidnappings, all targeting the family members of wealthy individuals. Some of the victims were tragically later found dead.
Those who survived reported that their captors were abusive, and subjected them to intense indoctrination sessions. They were subjected to both mental and physical abuse when they rejected the cult’s doctrine. According to the FBI, it was this abuse that ultimately led to the deaths of several victims.
What frightened me most was learning that the older woman who had attempted to abduct our girls from school was identified as a member of the cult. I was relieved to find out that it wasn’t their grandmother, but another cult member possibly acting on her behalf. My emotions quickly turned to anger once I got over the initial shock. I couldn’t believe that my mother might have been involved in a conspiracy to abduct her own grandchildren. My brother? Yes, that I could believe, but my mother’s involvement was something that I couldn’t begin to understand.
The visit from my mother, brother, and Gus that night may have just been a way to test our security, according to Lawrence. While it was possible that my mother had simply come to ask for money, Lawrence believed that there was a darker, more sinister motive behind it.
There likely would have been another unannounced visit if our preparedness had been weak, and my daughters, and possibly Karen, could have been abducted this time. The goal would be to use them as leverage, forcing me to drain my financial holdings.
Lawrence believed that it was the dogs and the security team stationed at the house that ultimately discouraged them from going through with it.
Lawrence also informed me that my brother, along with several others, was wanted by the local police and the U.S. Marshals Service in connection with the deaths of my father and stepmother. He hadn’t been officially charged yet, but he was a person of interest who they were eager to question.
Lawrence ended the call, and I just sat there with the phone still pressed to my ear. I was completely stunned by what he had told me. Never in my life had I imagined that my family would end up like this.
I started to wonder if some of the evil from Ginny B rubbed off on my mother. It was true that she’d been controlling when I was a child, but nothing like this, at least not that I could recall ... not before Ginny.
The only explanation that I could come up with was that whatever darkness that had lived in Ginny had somehow jumped from her to become the resident evil now living in my mother and brother.
The cult was the catalyst, the spark that unleashed the evil. Even entertaining the thought sent chills down my spine, like a cold whisper brushing against something I didn’t want to admit might be true.
That phone call from Lawrence was so upsetting that it made me want to go straight home, gather my family around me, and never let any of them out of my sight.
Andi immediately asked what was wrong when she saw the look on my face. I told her that I wasn’t feeling well and that I was going to head home. Concerned, Andi said she would come with me and insisted on driving. She went up front and informed Molly that I was sick and that she was taking me home.
We left after I shut my computer down. I was so distracted by that phone call that I didn’t even complain about Andi’s driving, or the several close calls that we had on the way home.
I went into the living room when we got back to the house and tried to relax on the couch. Beast came over for his usual ear scratch and to greet me like he always did when I came home, but he noticed that something was off this time. Sensing that I wasn’t my usual self, he tried to climb up on the couch beside me like he wanted to say ‘I’m here If you need me’.
“That dog sure loves you,” Andi said. “He must sense that something’s wrong as he looks genuinely concerned. I don’t think that I’ve ever seen him do that before. You want to share what’s got you like this? Let him and me in on it?”
I didn’t want to tell her, but Andi kept after me until I finally shared what Lawrence had called to tell me. It all came out, my mother’s and brother’s possible involvement of in a series of kidnappings targeting family members for ransom, the disturbing changes that I’d seen in my mother after Ginny B came into her life, and worst of all, the possibility that my mother may have been involved in an attempt to kidnap her own grandchildren.
I told Andi about the night that they showed up at our house, demanding my mother’s share of my estate, believing that I was dead. That was the kicker.
Worried, Andi called Karen at work and asked her to come home.
It didn’t take long for Karen to get home. One look at me on the couch, with our big, goofy dog curled up beside me, trying his best to console me, was enough to raise her concern. She asked the same questions that Andi had, and I gave her the same answers.
Lawrence had called me at the office with devastating news. My mother and brother were wanted in connection with a series of ransom kidnappings. There was also a strong possibility that my brother had been involved in the deaths of our father and his new wife. Even worse, my mother may have played a role in the attempted kidnapping of her own grandchildren.
Karen’s expression shifted to a mix of fear, anger, and deep concern, when I explained how my mother had seemed to change after she got involved with Ginny. She left the living room for a few minutes without saying a word. She quietly told me to try and get some rest when she returned, then she and Andi left me there, stretched out on the couch, with a hundred-plus-pound, slightly smelly dog doing his best to console me.
I wasn’t sure how long I’d been lying there, maybe fifteen minutes, maybe an hour, when the doorbell rang. Someone went to answer it and Beast, always ready to play the role of family protector, got up to check things out. The two Dobermans followed close behind, their natural protectiveness kicking in, though, to be honest, I think that they were just like Beast, hoping for some attention from whoever was at the door.
The door opened and I heard a bit of commotion, soft voices, people speaking in hushed tones. It turns out that I wasn’t as tired as I thought. Curiosity got the best of me, so I got up and went to see who our visitors were. It was the whole crew from the office; Johannes, Randy, Scotty, Jean, and Molly, to my surprise. They had all come by to offer their support and find out what was going on.
I didn’t go into all the details. I simply told them that the cult my mother and brother were involved in was suspected of trying to kidnap my daughters. That revelation stunned them. They immediately asked how they could help. I told them to just keep their eyes open, and not to hesitate to call the police if they saw anything unusual. I didn’t believe that my mother or my disturbed brother were still in the DC area, but that didn’t mean that some of the other cult members weren’t lurking nearby.
My friends only stayed a short while before heading back to the office. I didn’t feel tired anymore after their visit. I felt like a walk might help me clear my head instead. I went upstairs to change clothes and made sure that I had my Walther pistol and a spare magazine with me, carried in a way that I could quickly reach it if I needed to.
Beast was on a leash at my side, and my Walther holstered on my belt, rested under my jacket when I left. We walked to the corner and followed the short side of the block to the alley that ran behind my property. The first outlet on the left was Auction Alley, the historic path that once led to the slave auction building behind our home. It was no longer the dumping ground that it used to be, as my repeated complaints to the city had finally paid off. The police now made regular patrols back there.
I walked along my property’s back wall trying to see where the intruder might have climbed over near the carriage house. Any trace of anything that had been left there was long gone by now, likely cleaned up and removed by the city.
There was nothing in the alley except the back entrances to the businesses that now occupied the buildings, places that had been empty when we first moved in that now feels like a lifetime ago, but actually was just a few years. The new tenants were mostly specialty boutiques and designer shops, catering to the city’s up-and-coming professionals. I was glad that Karen and Andi had moved past that phase, or at least I hoped that they had.
We turned around and made our way back to the main street, though Beast had to make his mark on every dumpster lining the alley, of course. I remembered the last time that he and I came down this path as we walked. He had suddenly alerted and went nuts, trying to get at whatever he sensed. It scared the hell out of me. I thought that there was a KGB assassin hiding behind every dumpster for a moment. It really was just an old alley cat.
We turned right when we reached the street and walked to the corner. We passed the Breakfast Nook, the fruit market, and our insurance agent’s office after crossing over. I paused for a moment as memories from the past surfaced.
The Breakfast Nook was where I used to meet some of the neighborhood’s early risers back when we first moved here. We’d share breakfast and try to solve the world’s problems over an egg bagel.
The fruit market brought back a different kind of memory, one that still stirred anger. That was where a group of hoodlums once attacked Grandma Jorgenson. Beast had rushed to her defense without hesitation. Those thugs paid a heavy price for laying a hand on her. I remember one of the officers who came by the house a few weeks ago mentioning that one of them still walked with a cane courtesy of Beast.
Beast was getting impatient, tugging at his leash to let me know that he was ready to keep moving. I gave in and we continued our walk. We must have been out for a good two hours, though I had no idea how far we’d actually gone.
Someone was starting to get hungry. I could tell by the way that he kept eyeing the squirrels that scolded us from the safety of the upper tree branches. Taking the hint, we turned and headed for home.
We had just reached the corner where our cul-de-sac began when two cars came racing by, speeding toward the end of the street before looping back around. They returned fast, one screeching to a halt on my left, the other cutting me off on the right. A classic snatch-and-grab maneuver.
I immediately recognized the tactic and dropped behind the nearest lamppost, drawing my Walther in one smooth motion. Two men jumped out of the car on my left, one of them armed, and started toward me. Three more piled out from the other car, two with handguns drawn.
I was glad that we had recently practiced this very scenario at the retreat just a few weeks ago. My training kicked in, and it was all instinct and muscle memory from that moment on. I would’ve been the perfect victim, shoved into a car trunk, while the kidnappers sped away if I hadn’t been trained.
I reacted as I had been trained instead. I picked the armed man on my left as my first target and snapped off two rounds into his midsection, then I swung toward the other two coming at me. I got a couple of shots off at the first armed one before he could return fire. The other raised his weapon, and I felt a sudden, searing burn in my left thigh as I fired.
I didn’t need anyone to tell me that I’d been shot.
The remaining guy hesitated before continuing in my direction. I was positive that he was going to finish me and I was in a panic while trying to fish my spare magazine out of my pants pocket. My left hand was wet from touching the wound in my thigh. I brought it up to see how bad it was, and there was a lot of blood. I started getting woozy, a combination of the shock from being shot and my mind racing a million thoughts a minute. I tried to take a shot at the last shooter, but then I realized that the Walther was empty as the slide was locked back.
I tried to fish my spare magazine out of my left front pants pocket, but it kept slipping from my blood-covered fingers. I finally managed to get it into the Walther and released the slide to slingshot it home. The pistol now had a fresh mag and was loaded. I brought it up to aim, and that’s when a huge black flash flew past me, launching itself at the guy who was about to shoot me.