So far the case was pretty much a bust. She had an unauthorized person entering the room ten minutes before the power failure, pulling some sort of kit on a trolley, then the murdered guard about five minutes later, and then just after the power failure, one person left, again pulling the kit. It was too much of a coincidence, and her theory that the two were connected was laughed out of the Captain’s office. There was no electrical in that room, it was heating and cooling only. And besides, less than a week later they had traced the problem to some damned vault nowhere near the room, the same problem that Entergy had claimed was fixed after the Super Bowl.
But it was just too damned big of a coincidence for her to buy that the two things weren’t connected. And now with that room almost definitely linked to the virus, she was sure of it. The kit he was carrying on the dolly must have had the cylinder inside. The power failure was obviously some sort of diversion, either triggered remotely or by an accomplice.
If only I had the resources the Feds have!
“Look!”
The chopper had finally left, and she saw Officer Macleod pointing up at the sky. Isabelle turned to look and gasped.
What the hell?
Five thousand feet over the Superdome, New Orleans, Louisiana
Special Agent Dylan Kane gripped the netting at the rear of the C-130J "Super" Hercules aircraft as the rear ramp descended, the air whipping about the cabin. The pilot had offered to land at Louis Armstrong airport, but there was no time. Kane had been sent instructions within thirty minutes of being activated—thirty fantastic minutes. He had hightailed it to the airport, chartered a jet on the Company credit card, landed at Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base New Orleans, then onto this Herc, all within eight hours.
Uncle Sam spares no expense when needed.
When he had left all he knew was he was needed in country. During the flight he had received the briefing notes on what was going on, and it had shocked him. His first instinct was to call his parents and tell them to get supplies and button up the house, but that would have been illegal, and unfair.
And hopefully unnecessary.
But as word of the containment failure reached him, he began to regret his earlier decision to not reach out. It wasn’t until he was on the ground at the Naval Air Station that he had received his final orders. The source of the virus had been found and he was to go into New Orleans itself to try and trace the origin of that canister.
At all costs.
There was a private communique from the National Clandestine Services Chief himself, Director Morrison, attached to the file.
Consider yourself unleashed.
His heart had skipped a beat at that. It was essentially code telling him that there were no rules. Any and all laws could be violated in carrying out his mission, including breaking and entering, assault, torture, even murder. Whatever it took.
And that was when he realized how serious the situation truly was.
They’re scared. Damned scared.
He stepped off the back of the ramp, hurtling through the air, his eyes quickly scanning the ground below. It only took a few moments to find the massive Superdome below him, and he aimed himself for the impressive structure while monitoring his altitude. At two thousand feet he pulled his cord, opening the chute above him, then gently coasted the rest of the way, looking for a good spot to land.
That’ll do.
A chopper had just taken off, leaving a clear area close to the building. Minutes later he was on the ground, hauling in his chute as dozens of police rushed him, their weapons drawn. His chute secure from dragging him away, he turned to the gathered throng.
“Is there a Detective Isabelle Laprise here?”
Sherbrooke, Québec, Canada
Agent Sherrie White sat parked in her black SUV, Québec plates, waiting for her targets to arrive home. A private plane had brought her from Langley to Montreal, Québec, Canada and her fake Canadian passport had her through customs in minutes. Her SUV had been prepositioned for her, and now she waited for Dr. Urban’s family to arrive home, it already confirmed they had left the school seven minutes ago.
This would be one of her more difficult assignments. She was a relatively junior agent. This was her first assignment out of country, and even though it was only Canada, hardly a country filled with people who wanted to kill American spies, it was still exciting. The clandestine feeling of sneaking across a border with false ID was exhilarating, but she had prepared herself for this particular assignment to be difficult.
After all, she was picking up a woman and her two kids, and taking them across the border back to the United States. If they were willing to cooperate, and they had passports, she’d simply drive them all across the border and she’d be done with it.
But if they didn’t have passports, she’d have to smuggle them across, and that most likely meant they wouldn’t cooperate.
She was prepared for that, but it wouldn’t be pleasant.
A silver Mercedes ML350 SUV rounded a corner and approached, pulling into the driveway of her target and entering the garage. She waited for the garage door to close, then backed herself in the driveway, right up to the garage door. She took one last look at the photos on her phone to confirm her targets, then exited her vehicle and approached the front door, her heart pounding in anticipation of what to expect. She rang the doorbell, and a few moments later the door opened, leaving Sherrie confused.
“Mrs. Urban?” she said in English, not bothering with the pretense of speaking French, knowing full well that the Urbans were native English speakers.
“Yes.”
“Mrs. Melissa Urban, wife of Dr. Victor Urban?”
The woman’s smile seemed to crack slightly. “Yes.”
“I’m Detective Sergeant Sherrie Waterford, Sûreté du Québec,” said Sherrie, pulling out her wallet and flipping it open to reveal Québec police identification. “May I come in?”
The woman nodded, stepping aside. Sherrie entered the home, quickly sweeping the area with her eyes, keeping her back directed at the wall so she could see the woman who had answered at all times.
Because the woman who claimed to be Melissa Urban, wife of Dr. Victor Urban, other than being blonde and petite, didn’t at all resemble the file photos she had been provided with.
“Is this about my husband?”
Sherrie slowly stepped farther into the house, listening for any hints of others. She could hear kids upstairs, but no evidence of any other adults.
Which meant nothing if they were hiding.
“Yes it is,” replied Sherrie.
“Have you found him?”
The woman’s expression looked hopeful, if not genuine. Sherrie felt like she was seeing a bad play, the woman pretending to be Melissa Urban the understudy for the real thing. Sherrie casually reached for her weapon tucked into her back belt.
“No, we were hoping you might know where he was.”
The woman shrugged her shoulders. “He went to work almost two years ago and never came home. I haven’t heard from him since.”
“Yet you moved.”
Again the woman shrugged. “I had a job offer, I took it. I need to move on with my life.”
Sherrie’s hand was now gripping the gun. She whipped it around and to her surprise the woman knocked it out of her hand with a round house kick, then followed that up with a jab to the nose that had Sherrie seeing stars. She stumbled backward, dropping her clutch to the ground and raising her hands in defense as she blinked to clear her vision.
A blur came at her, fast, and she struck out at the center of it with a quick snap kick. She was rewarded with a grunt, then a backhand to the side of her head that sent her to the floor and into a table with a crash. Cries from upstairs were answered with a curt reply.
“Stay up stairs, kids, Mommy’s busy.”
Busy kicking my ass!
Sherrie sucked in a deep breath, holding it for a five count as she tried to calm herself. She had never been
in this situation before. In training she always knew she would walk away in the end, perhaps bruised and humiliated, but not dead.
And today could be her last day. She backed away from the rapidly clearing blur, fists raised, and found herself in the kitchen. Her eyes darted around, looking for a weapon, and spotted the knife block to her right. She grabbed the biggest blade and whipped it overhand at the imposter. The women grabbed the door of the fridge, yanking it open, the blade embedding itself in the stainless steel.
Sherrie stepped forward, kicking back the door. It slammed into the woman, sending her back several feet as Sherrie ripped the knife free and pressed her first advantage, snap kicking the woman in the left breast, the pain obvious on her face, and with her vision finally cleared, Sherrie could see the fear in her opponent’s eyes for the first time.
She’s just as scared as I am!
She hacked at the air with the knife, forcing the woman back into the living room, her eyes scanning the floor for her weapon. Spotting the grip just under the nearby loveseat, she swung at the air again, rounding toward the weapon, then kicked the loveseat aside, exposing the gun. In a desperation move her opponent leapt for the gun and Sherrie plunged the knife down, catching the woman in the shoulder, embedding the blade a good two to three inches. She screamed out in pain as she collapsed to the floor, blood staining her white blouse as Sherrie stepped on the shoulder, pulling the knife out and grabbing her gun off the floor.
She backed away, leaving the bleeding woman on the floor, whimpering as Sherrie whipped the knife at the far wall, it embedding itself far out of reach. With her weapon trained on her now downed opponent, she returned to the hallway and retrieved her clutch. Reaching in, she pulled out a hypodermic and tossed it to the woman. It clattered on the hardwood and rolled to a stop near her right hand.
“Inject yourself.”
“Go to hell!”
“Inject yourself or I kill your kids.”
“You wouldn’t.”
“Do you have any idea what’s going on here?”
The woman just glared at her.
“People are dying, and if we can’t stop it, it could be the end of everything.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“Haven’t you been watching the news? New Orleans?”
“What about it? Some sort of flu outbreak.”
“Do you seriously think the President would quarantine a city of half a million people with shoot to kill orders for a flu?”
The woman blanched, looking upstairs, the stifled sobs of the children echoing down the stairs. “Listen, I was just hired to do a job, that’s it. They’re paying me two hundred grand a year to just pretend I’m this guy’s wife. I don’t know anything beyond that.”
“And the kids?”
“They’re hers. But, please don’t hurt them.”
“I won’t if you inject yourself.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re coming back with me.”
“What about my shoulder?”
“I’ll dress it as soon as you inject yourself.”
“And the kids?”
“As soon as we’re across the border, I’ll have the authorities contacted.” Sherrie flicked the gun at her. “Now pick up the damned needle and jam it in your thigh.”
The woman picked up the needle, hesitating for a moment, then did as she was told, wincing as the needle pierced her skin. She pushed the plunger, and within seconds collapsed to the ground, out cold.
Now the hard part.
Superdome, New Orleans, Louisiana
Detective Isabelle Laprise couldn’t believe her eyes. Some jackhole was skydiving into the Superdome parking lot. She looked up and it appeared to be some sort of military transport that had dropped the fool into the city despite the quarantine.
What kind of moron would want to enter New Orleans now?
She moved along with the crowd of officers surrounding what appeared would be the person’s landing zone, the area recently left clear by the helicopter that had picked up the canister. All eyes were on the sky as the person expertly guided their chute then executed an easy two foot landing with a final flare of his chute. Spinning around, the man grabbed his chute, pulling it in and folding it up as half the police force aimed their weapons at him.
He turned to face the front of the Superdome and said the one set of words that couldn’t stun her more.
“Is there a Detective Isabelle Laprise here?”
Her eyes shot wide open and her heart pounded a little harder in her chest. She pushed through the crowd and out into the open, her hand on her pistol grip, still holstered.
“Right here. Who the hell are you?”
The man removed his helmet revealing a stunningly attractive face framed with a matted down mane of hair. His well-tanned face put him in his late twenties, his chiseled features she imagined extended to his entire body, and she felt herself tingle at the thought of this hero dropping from the sky, despite the chaos surrounding them, and asking for her specifically.
If this isn’t the start of some over the top romance novel, then I don’t know what is.
His smile of greeting nearly took out her knees as he walked toward her, the swagger reminiscent of something from Top Gun. But this guy’s features were all Iceman. Tanned and light.
And about ten years too young for her fantasies.
Okay, five.
She laughed to herself as a chant of Cougar! Cougar! erupted in her head.
“I’m Special Agent Dylan Black, FBI.” He held out his credentials and she glanced at them, figuring there was no way he was bullshitting her. He extended a hand and gave her a firm handshake, his warm but dry skin setting her palm on fire.
“Detective Laprise. Just what the hell are you doing here, Special Agent Black?”
“Call me Dylan. You should be hearing from your supervisor any second now.”
As if the man had sent the message himself, her phone buzzed on her hip. She took the call, holding the phone to her ear.
“Laprise here.”
“This is Captain Enright. Has he arrived?”
“If you’re talking about our FBI parachutist, then yes.”
“Good. You’re to cooperate with him fully. He’s taking over your case—”
“But, Captain!”
“No buts, you know what’s going on. He’s got access to resources we can only dream of. Take advantage of him”—her mind darted to a shower scene as their new arrival stripped out of his jumpsuit—“in any way you can. This murder is the only lead we have.”
“Fine.”
“Good luck.”
The call ended and she clipped her phone back on her hip, waving off the crowd surrounding them. “He’s okay,” she said, the officers holstering their weapons and returning to what they had been doing, which was milling around since the canister had been found so quickly. She turned to her guest.
“So, you’re in charge, what do you want to do?”
“Let’s backtrack our killer.”
“Just like that?” She felt her blood boil a bit at the arrogance of the man’s statement. “What the hell do you think we’ve been trying to do for the past week?”
He smiled, the flash of his teeth completely disarming.
“You don’t have access to the cool toys I do.” He pointed at a massive mobile command center with FBI emblazoned across the side as it pulled up not a hundred feet away.
Very cool toys!
Approaching Stanstead, Québec, Canada
Sherrie White’s heart was slamming in her chest. She knew they were on to her, one of the damned kids having called 9-1-1 just as she had been taught. She had barely left the house before the police arrived, their flashing cherries in her rear view mirror as she had turned off the street. Her imposter wife was in the back, covered in a blanket, her wrists and ankles zip tied, her mouth taped over with duct tape.
But none of that would matter if she were caught. She knew
she was essentially unleashed on this mission, but she still couldn’t see herself crossing certain lines. She was allowed to kill the kids, but she’d never do that. Never. And she was allowed to kill anybody who got in her way, including Canadian police. But she couldn’t see herself doing that either.
And the tail she had picked up ten minutes ago told her they were on to her, and most likely setting up a road block to catch her. Which is why she was patched into Langley right now on the car’s Bluetooth.
“You’ve got my position?”
“Affirmative.”
“I’ve picked up a tail I need to know what’s ahead.”
“Roger that,” came the disembodied voice of a satellite surveillance specialist in some secret bunker somewhere in the continental US. “I’m showing a police roadblock two miles from your position.”
“Recommended alternate routes.”
“Take your next left now.”
The voice was calm on the other end, but Sherrie was forced to slam her brakes on then crank her wheel as she released them halfway, sending her SUV careening around the turn and down what appeared to be a farmer’s road, crops high on either side of the dirt lane. Regaining her speed, she glanced in her rearview mirror and saw her tail turn in.
She pressed a little harder, the vehicle threatening to fishtail her into the ditch lining either side of the road. “Tail still in pursuit.”
“Take the next right. If you step on it you’ll get ahead of them setting up a new roadblock.”
“Roger that.” She gripped the steering wheel hard, and as soon as pavement came into sight she cranked the wheel to the right, skidding onto the road, nearly taking it on two wheels as horns honked at her. She immediately floored it, manually shifting the large vehicle to make up precious seconds as she blasted down the two lane highway, traffic fortunately light.
Containment Failure (A Special Agent Dylan Kane Thriller, Book #2) Page 9