Gallows Pole, page 19
Bishop leaned down and scooped up one of the machine guns. “Let’s move then,” he said as he slung it on his back. “Lanier’s got his car, right outside the entrance, and Felix is a couple of blocks away in the B.O.T..” He started walking backwards, towards the sloping ramp that led to the exit. He kept his shotgun pointed at the men on the ground. Melissa reached down, picked up another of the machine guns, and paused for a moment to shove the fallen pistols across the floor with the side of her foot. She had to jog a few steps to catch up with Bishop.
“What the hell’s going on?” she said. “There’s supposed to be security guards down here. Where are they?”
“Cleared out,” Bishop said. “Sent on an extended coffee break, so your pals there could take you in. You were set up.”
She shook her head. “Are you saying that the director of the FBI…”
“He’s not running the show,” Bishop said. “He never was, really, but now Campbell‘s stopped even pretending. He’s cutting his losses.”
“Including you,” Sims said. He was still propping Collette up, but the bigger man was steadier now. “And I think he’s found some way to make your boss his bitch.”
“Let go of me,” Collette said. “I can walk.”
“Good,” Sims said. “Cause your big ass is gettin‘ heavy.” He stepped away. Collette wobbled for a moment, then straightened up. “And no offense, Agent Collette,” Sims said, “but you might consider an unscented deodorant from now on.” He turned without waiting for an answer as Bishop unslung the machine gun strapped across his back and handed it to him.
Melissa looked around. She could see daylight at the exit to the garage. The security kiosk where an armed guard usually waited was empty. A white Lincoln Navigator idled at the curb. As they came out into the light, the Bag of Tricks pulled up behind it. Melissa looked up and down the street. It was empty of traffic, just a few cars parked in spaces along the narrow side street.
“Where is everyone?” she asked.
“Parked at stoplights,” Bishop said. “And probably pissed off.” She must have looked baffled, because Bishop smiled. “Major Lanier hacked the traffic system,” he said. “Actually, he did it years ago, but he left a back door in case he needed it. Every car in a twelve block radius is sitting at a red light. Except us. And them.” He gestured at a black passenger van sitting across the street. It took a second for her to register the driver slumped over the wheel. She couldn’t tell if he was dead or unconscious.
The passenger side door swung open and Bishop jumped up into the cab. “All aboard,” he said. She hadn’t seen him like this before. He sounded almost merry, as if he was having the time of his life. “It’s going to be a mite crowded in the back, but we’re all friends now, right?” He disappeared into the truck. Sims trotted over to the Navigator and got in.
Melissa looked at Collette. “Our own people just tried to kidnap us.”
“Worse,” Collette said. “They were going to let someone else do it. There’s no way those guys were OPR. That’s…” he stopped.
“Seriously wrong,” she finished. “And these,” she gestured at the big white truck, “are the only people we can trust.”
“Great,” Collette said. He followed her as she climbed in.
CHAPTER FIFTY
It wasn’t particularly cramped in the back, but they had to sit on the floor. Felix had switched off driving with Bishop. Felix was seated on one of the stools, looking up at the bank of monitors. They had what looked like a giant satellite view of Washington, DC spread across them.
“Is that what I think it is?” Collette asked.
“It is if you think it’s Google Maps,” Felix said.
“Oh.” Collette sounded disappointed.
Felix touched one of the screens and it changed to a quickly scrolling field of text. He touched his headset to key the mike. “Doesn’t look like there’s any local involvement,” he said, “But take a left. There’s a wreck on the KeyBridge.” He touched another screen and it changed as well. “Sims, Colonel Bishop,” he said. “Upload the pics you took, if you would be so kind.” There was a moment’s pause, and the faces of the men who’d tried to kidnap them appeared on the screen. All of them looked the worse for wear and tear. Felix sighed. “Guys,” he said, “It would make things a lot easier for my software if you didn’t mess up their faces quite so badly.” He touched a button on the screen and each of the faces slid to its own monitor, minimized to half of the screen, each one with a square below it. In each square, other faces began flickering past, very quickly.
“Facial recognition software,” Collette said. “We have that, too.” As he finished speaking, there was a soft beep from the console, then another. Suddenly, the screens on the walls showed large head shots of the four men. All were in uniform. The pictures looked as if they’d been taken for military ID cards.
“Well,” Collette said, “Ours isn’t quite that fast.”
“Not nearly,” Felix said absently. He keyed his mike again. “Looks like two of our hitters were former Marines,” he said. “Force Recon, then MARSOC and…” he touched the screen and another column of words came up in front of him, “You called it. Calibre Security. And the others….yep. All former SF, all working for Dayton.” He listened for a moment, then nodded. “Roger that.” He brushed his fingers across the screen, as if wiping something away, and the faces vanished, leaving behind the default image of the cartoon cat in the center of each screen. He turned to Melissa and Collette. “Do you have a favorite charity?” he asked.
The question was so random, Melissa thought she’d heard wrong. “What?”
“When we get to Mr. Lanier’s home,” Felix said, “He and I are going to sit down and make life very uncomfortable for those four gentlemen, and while we’re at it, for their boss. Their bank accounts will be emptied, and their hard drives will suddenly be full of child pornography and violent Islamist propaganda, which will have the added advantage of keeping some of your friends at the FBI busy for a spell, once we inform them. Anonymously, of course. But all that money needs to go somewhere. So if you have a favorite charity, let me know, and I’ll arrange for them to receive the cash. Also anonymously.”
“I’m not sure I can agree to that…” Melissa began. Collette interrupted her. “Silver Sprin g RapeCrisis Center,” he said. Felix nodded. He turned to Melissa, who was gaping at Collette.
“Agent Saxon,” he said, “No one fucks with us, or those under our protection, and walks away from it. Examples will be made.”
“You sound more like the Mafia than soldiers,” she said. She expected the barb to sting, but Felix just smiled. “There are some similarities. But we have better toys.” He turned back to the screen. “Ah,” he said, as they felt the truck begin to slow, “We’re here.”
“And where’s here?” Collette said.
“Major Lanier’s house.”
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
Lanier’s “house” was an enormous condominium, high in an exclusive building near the Potomac River. The elevator was paneled in walnut trimmed with brass, and gentle New Age music played on the way up. To Melissa’s jangled nerves. the whole thing felt slightly surreal.
Melissa tried not to gasp as they trooped through the door. The tiled foyer opened into a large living room, furnished in leather and chrome. Floor-to-ceiling picture windows looked out over the river and towards Georgetown. She had seen ads for condos like this, and she knew the price ran into the low seven figures.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Lanier said as he saw the look on her face. “How do I afford this on a Captain’s salary?”
“I’m not sure I want to know,” she murmured.
“Captain Lanier,” Sims said as the threw himself down on a leather sectional sofa that looked as if it cost a month of Melissa’s salary, “is very, very good at investments.”
Collette looked at Lanier, who held up his hands defensively. “All legal,” he said. “I promise.”
“Well, sort of,” Sims said, grinning.
Lanier turned to him. “I developed that computer program myself,” he said. “I can adapt it however I want.” It had the sound of a long-running argument, one Sims enjoyed starting up. Bishop broke into the conversation with the air of one who was used to settling squabbles.
“Captain Lanier developed a data-mining program for us,” he said. “It looked for patterns, key words, recurring phrases. We used it to scan electronic traffic.”
“You read people’s e-mails,” Melissa said.
“Among other things,” he agreed. “Then,” he put his hand on Lanier’s shoulder like a proud father, “he adapted it to look for trends in the markets.”
“And got dirty, filthy, stinking rich,” Sims said.
“You could have, too,” Lanier said. “If you’d listened to me.”
Sims lay back and closed his eyes, waving his hand dismissively. “I’ll stick to poker,” he said. “That, I understand.”
Melissa rubbed her temples. There was apparently no end to the things she was going to have to overlook ff she was going to work with these people. It was making her head hurt.
“Won’t this be one of the first places they look?” Collette asked.
“It might be,” Lanier said, “If my name was connected to it in any way. It’s owned by a corporation, which was formed by an LLC, which is part of a larger…”
“Lanier,” Felix interrupted. “Catch.” He tossed his BlackBerry to Lanier. “All the data I could get on the way in is in there. It’ll be enough for a start.”
Lanier looked at Bishop, who nodded. “Take them down. Hard.” Lanier nodded back and disappeared down the hall.
“Colonel Bishop,” Melissa said.
“Mark,” he said, and smiled at her. If she’d thought he was charismatic before, it was nothing compared to this. This was the face he wore into battle, she thought. He was totally in command, and it gave him a magnetism that was hard to resist. Before she could speak, he broke in. “You don’t approve, I know.”
“No,” she said. “That’s not it. I need to make a phone call.”
The smile vanished. He nodded. “Your son. And ex-husband.”
“Yes,” she said. She pulled her cell phone from her jacket. “If…whoever that was…starts looking for me, they may go there.”
“Don’t use that,” Felix broke in. He walked over to her and held out his hand. “It’s probably fried anyway. But we can’t be too careful. Give it to me, please.”
“What?”
“Give me the cell phone. Please.”
Reluctantly, she handed it over. He dropped it on the floor and stepped on it, hard.
“Hey!” she yelled.
He turned to Collette. “And yours.”
Collette looked dubious. “You afraid of tracking devices?”
“As you should be,” Felix said. “They’re built into most cell phones. Except ours. Our enemies may not be operating at our level, but they’re getting better.”
“Yeah,” Sims said without opening his eyes. “They’re bringing in a better class of morons.”
“Still,” Felix said. “Agent Collette, I need that phone. Now.”
Collette handed the phone over. Felix dropped it, too, on the floor and smashed it. “From now on,” he said. “No communications in the clear. I’ll replace your phones with some of ours.” He grinned. “I think you’ll find them an improvement. Unlimited text and minutes, for one thing. And not just nights and weekends.”
“First you’ll clean up that mess you just made,” Sims murmured, his eyes still closed. “Broom’s in the kitchen closet.”
“What about my phone call?” Melissa said.
Bishop pointed down the hall. “Second door on the right. Knock first. And take your computer. He’ll combine your information on Heineman with ours.”
Lanier’s voice answered her knock. “Come.”
She didn’t know what she expected to find when she entered. After the gear she’d seen the former Iron Horse operatives using so far, she wouldn’t have been surprised to walk onto something resembling the bridge of a starship. But Lanier was seated behind a simply designed chrome and glass desk, in front of what looked like an ordinary flat-screen monitor. The only other object in the room was a desktop phone that looked equally standard. He looked up at her. She unslung the computer and handed the case across the desk to him.
“Colonel Bishop says you might be able to merge some of our information with yours.”
He nodded as he took the bag. “Thanks. Your son’s birthday is November 14, 1994, right?”
The question took her by surprise. “Yes,” she said. “Why?”
“Because I’ll bet it’s your password,” he said. “Am I right?”
She looked at the floor. “Yes. You’re right.”
He shook his head. “You, of all people,” he said sadly, “Need to be more paranoid. You make life too easy for people like me.”
“On that subject,” she said, “I need to call my ex. I need to warn him that people are looking for me.”
He nodded at the phone on the desk. “Give me the number.” She told him and picked up the handset.
“Felix seems concerned that someone might trace back a cell phone call,” she said. “Wouldn’t it be even easier to trace a landline?”
Lanier typed something on the keyboard. “Normally, yes,” he said. “But if anyone tries to trace this call, it’ll lead them to a used-car dealership in Boca Raton, Florida.”
She arched an eyebrow quizzically as she heard the phone begin to ring on the other end.
“They sold me a Jeep Cherokee,” Lanier explained. “Worst piece of shit I ever drove. Finally caught fire in the driveway and burned right down to the wheels. And the bastards wouldn’t give me my money back. So I make trouble for them whenever I can.”
The phone kept ringing. No answer. “Try the cell phone,” she said, and gave him the number.
No answer there either. She glanced at her watch. Nils would be in school, but Roger would normally be home at this time of day. She felt the sensation of cold fingers curling around her heart.
“Call the school,” she said. She gave him that number as well.
“Hello,” she said. “I’m trying to see if Nils Petterson came to school today. This is his mother.”
The voice on the other end sighed. “And your name?”
“Melissa Saxon.”
“Hold, please.”
The fingers tightened as the wait seemed to stretch forever. She looked at her watch again and she could swear the second hand was moving at half speed. She looked at Lanier. “I took back my maiden name.” It was an inane thing to say, but it broke the silence.
He smiled politely. “I know.”
“Of course you do,” she said. Finally the voice came back. “Nils isn’t here today.”
The fingers squeezed, hard. “What do you mean, he’s not there?”
“I mean he didn’t answer when they called the roll. We’re going to need a note if he doesn’t want to get an unexcused…” Melissa hung up. She tried to keep the fear out of her voice as she spoke to Lanier. “He didn’t show up for school. And Roger doesn’t answer the house phone or the cell. He never turns his cell off. Ever.”
“Okay,” Lanier said. “Wait one.” He typed, moved the mouse, scowled at the screen. When he looked up at Melissa, the look in his eyes caused the fingers around her heart to clench in a grip hard enough to turn coal to diamond. “What?”
“I’m checking police calls in the area,” Lanier said. “The cops were called to the address linked to that number.”
“What for?”
“Shots fired.”
She was halfway to the front door before Bishop stopped her.
“Whoa, whoa,” he said. “What’s going on?”
“My son,’” she said. “He’s not in school.”
Lanier was right behind her. “And the cops are reporting shots fired at their home address.”
Sims came up off the couch. Felix came out of the kitchen, holding a broom. They both looked to Bishop. He nodded.
“Saddle up,” he said.
CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO
The drive seemed interminable. She sat up front with Bishop as they wound their way through crowded D.C. traffic into the suburbs. The rest of the team, with Collette, rode in back. Melissa wore a Kevlar vest which was lighter than any she’d ever seen, but which Felix assured her had more stopping capability than anything currently available, even for law enforcement. “SFT,” he’d said, as if it explained everything. She’d stared at him to let him know it didn’t. “Shear thickening fluid,” he said with his usual loopy grin. “It’s a liquid till something hits it. Then it hardens in a millisecond. Soak the fabric of a Kevlar vest in it and you’ve got something light and flexible, but it’ll still stop a bullet, or a knife.” The grin widened. “Right now you still need a bunch of layers, but we’re working on some stuff that’ll turn a Gucci suit or an evening gown into armor. The Secret Service is very interested.”
“I’ll bet,” she said.
She carried a Glock .40 caliber, a close match to her usual duty weapon, in a shoulder rig. The pistol, as well as the vests she and the team wore, had come out of a cabinet in one of the spare bedrooms in Lanier’s condo. The cabinet was only one of many in what looked like a private arsenal. She’d carefully refrained from asking questions about it.
“Two units on the scene,” Lanier’s voice spoke in her ear. She was still trying to get used to the tiny earphone/transmitter that hooked over her right ear. The clarity was phenomenal; it sounded as if Lanier were standing right behind her. “And one, apparently very agitated male subject.”
“Roger?” she said.
“Don’t know,” Lanier said. “Want me to break in and ask?”
“Best not,” Bishop said. “It tends to startle people. We’ll be there in a few.”
