Alasdair, dressed in an orange jump suit and cuffed wrists and ankles, was escorted in to visitors section on the detention center where Frank was waiting. The guards seated Alasdair at the long table across from Frank, a ten-inch high partition ran down the center of the table. Frank dismissed the guards with a nod and they withdrew to a position twenty feet behind their detainee.
“When I mess up, I do it proper,” Alasdair said.
“Yeah, you do,” Frank said. “Why, Al?”
“One day, when you love again, you’ll find out what lengths you’ll go to to preserve that love.”
“All this is about Celine?”
“Eighty percent. The video company was failing. I looked into bankruptcy. Then Cezar Nicolai came along, renewing his relationship with Celine and throwing money at us. He wanted help with his quest for the Omega weapon. He had information from the Hapburgs in Michigan that your grandfather had all the answers he needed, but, since William was long passed, he wanted to question your father. I put him on to Dellarue. He said he just wanted to talk to him.”
“Joe’s death didn’t give you a clue about Nicolai’s ruthlessness?” Frank asked.
“I was told Joe died from natural causes. I never knew it was murder until you showed up.”
“You took me into that fallout shelter and I thought we were home free. Nicolai gave us a small fortune to work you for the information he wanted. Celine could barely control her emotions when she got the Omega film. Cezar knew then he was on the right track to get the weapon. Everyone was ecstatic, and Celine stopped nagging me about money.”
“She wasn’t kidnapped, was she?”
“No. She left me for Nicolai. How’d you know?””
“The purse. You said she was kidnapped and left her Gucci purse, but Braewyn saw she had it on Nicolai’s yacht.”
“I slipped up,” Alasdair said and dropped his eyes to his shackled hands.
“You slipped up all over the place. The bug you put on my lamp when I went out get coffee and donuts, then the exact same make and model bug was found in my cell phone in Vero. I traced their purchase to your company. You never put up those video cams at Elm Terrace. I’ll write that off to lack of money, but maybe you didn’t want me looking in on your activities there. And while I thank you for your ocean rescue, you sure knew your way around that Russian sub. Probably because you helped put my drugged body on it.
“My God, I got sloppy. Cezar swore to me he wouldn’t harm you.”
“He didn’t figure on my incredible submarine skills.”
“When I got the call from your sheriff, I knew what I had to do.”
“The list goes on,” Frank said. “Inspection of the Tresor Penthouse trash turned up an empty bottle of Laphroaig scotch, your brand of choice, I remembered. And the real topper: the ‘two goons’ who tried to kill me in Jensen Beach. I never mentioned them to you. How did you know about them?”
“They told me about the incident later. They were specifically ordered not to harm you. Even help you get back to your car. The last thing Nicolai wanted was for you to be dead. Who would lead him to the Omega weapon then?”
“In spite of that, Nicolai used them again?”
“Nicolai had them killed. Right in front of me. Wasn’t pretty.”
“I bet,” Frank said.
“Then Nicolai got Celine killed, and I do fully blame him for her death, not Braewyn Joyce. After that I knew my life was over.”
“You’ll get a fair trial. May not turn out as bad as you think.”
“A cop in the joint? Might as well shoot me now.”
“Braewyn can get you into a low security federal prison. You’ll think you’re at a country club.”
“That’s possible?” Alasdair asked.
“You have a big plus going for you. You never had anything to do directly with the killing and violence. And you even saved one life. Big points to keep you out of the max lock-ups.”
“Will you visit me on Christmas?”
“Well, I’ve crossed going to prison off my bucket list, but ... No power on earth could keep me away. I’m your friend…through the good times and the tough ones.”
Alasdair’s eyes filled and reddened, his manacled hands stretched across the table barrier. The guards rushed in, but Frank waved them off and clasped Alasdair’s hand.
“Do you know how to tell if a person is truly a friend?” Frank asked.
“No.”
“You’re always glad to see him.” Frank said. “Always.”
Chapter 59
The pleasant voice of the pilot announced calmly over the plane’s intercom:
“We’ve had to return to Washington-Dulles International because of an unsecured piece of baggage in our rear cargo bay. Nothing serious, but a bit noisy. Our apologies for the delay in getting you to Miami. We’ll get it properly secured and be back in the air in a few minutes.”
Cezar Nicolai didn’t think the pilot’s voice was pleasant. The danger it portended could be felt in his core. He cursed the luck that his usual method of flight, his Learjet, was in for routine maintenance. He hated commercial flying, and was certain the forced return was for an entirely different reason than a cargo problem. He was sure it was for a problem with his alias, Mr. Evans.
The Boeing 777 landed and taxied into its docking area and wound its whining engines down to a low murmur. The passengers in first class stayed in their seats and rubbernecked out the windows to look for the maintenance people dealing with the problem cargo bay. Three substantial men, all younger than forty, entered the first class section and filed down the aisle directly to the shoulder of Vlad Torok. Two other air marshals rose from their coach seats and positioned themselves in the doorway separating first class from the rest of the passengers.
“I need you gentlemen to unfasten your seat belts and come with us,” one of the trio of men in airport security windbreakers said, and displayed a wallet ID.
Cezar nodded to Vlad to do as they were instructed without incident. The seven men exited the plane through the docking tunnel where Cezar and Vlad were closely escorted down the empty passageway leading to the boarding corridor. They marched the 5-yard distance without speaking. The two air marshals ended their escort at the terminal side of the tunnel, closed its accordion curtain, and returned to the plane.
The jet engines of the 777 spooled up and the Boeing pulled away from the dock. Cezar took the noisy departure of the plane as a good backdrop for a little self-made drama. He exhaled a loud, rasping breath, clutched his left forearm and collapsed onto the corridor’s carpeting. Two of the security officers followed him to the floor and knelt to offer him help. With the speed of a young Mohamed Ali, Vlad slammed his ham-size fist into the face of the standing marshal. The security man hit the floor hard, unable to respond with a defense.
Cezar shot a karate blow into the throat of one of his attending marshals who rolled onto his back, gasping to clear his collapsed airway. The remaining marshal attempted to get to his feet and draw his sidearm, but Vlad was directly behind him and yanked the pistol from his hand. Cezar removed the pistols from the two downed men, while Vlad held all three at bay with the gun he’d taken.
“Get your IDs and radios out and on the floor and take off your jackets,” Cezar said, gesturing with the pistols.
“You won’t get far,” the standing marshal said.
“All of you get up and head back to the end of the dock,” Cezar said as the two downed men recovered enough to stand.
“Your plane’s gone,” a marshal said.
“Move,” Cezar said.
The men did as they were told and marched back to the accordion curtain that covered the tunnel doorway. Cezar ordered them to reopen the curtain, which they did without question. The retracted tunnel now only extended a few feet to open air and was nearly twenty feet off the ground.
“Jump,” Cezar said.
Two of the security officers jumped right away, the last one hesitated enough for Vlad to step in and shov
e him out with his foot and reclose the curtain.
Cezar and Vlad donned two of the security jackets and picked up the IDs that most closely fit their descriptions. Vlad struggled to get the largest of the jackets to fit around his massive shoulders. Engaging the zipper was impossible.
Cezar took two of the radios, and Vlad shoved the rest to the side. The pair stuck their newly-acquired weapons inside their pants and snugged them under their belts, hidden by the jackets. That done, they calmly walked out into the boarding area, through the passageways, and down the escalator and outside to a line of waiting cabs.
Vlad flagged the nearest cab and both men climbed in.
“Get us to Parking Lot C,” Cezar said to the driver. “I’ll direct you from there.”
The cabbie drove the short distance to the C lot where Cezar led the driver to a row of parked cars on the back side of the lot.
“It’s right there. The Blue Toyota Corolla,” Cezar said.
The cabbie stopped the car and Cezar paid him with a twenty. He waited until the cab drove out of sight, then darted between parked cars to a space on the opposite side of the row.
Parked there was the rented Mercedes-Benz CLS sedan.
The two men climbed into the car and casually drove out of the airport without a single police encounter, which surprised Cezar and elated Vlad.
“No cops,” Vlad said.
“When plans fail, embrace the luck,” Cezar said.
* * * * *
The highway patterns of passing cities and quilted patches of farmland could be seen in the clear morning air 35,000 feet below the plane as it made its way to Maryland. The seat next to Frank was empty so he put his briefcase there and reviewed the copies in Simon Hapburg’s file taken from Nicolai’s yacht. Braewyn Joyce and Tom Gardner had looked over the file at the sheriff’s station in Stuart, but had found nothing that revealed anything useful regarding an Omega weapon. A set of the file documents were also sent to FBI headquarters for further analysis.
The Tresor Penthouse trash turned up DNA and fingerprints, but nothing that told him anything he didn’t already know about Cezar Nicolai. There was a second person’s DNA and other prints that couldn’t be matched to anyone in government files. All the trouble Frank went through to obtain the Tresor’s trash was basically a bust, except for one item that confirmed a hunch he’d already classified as factual. It saddened Frank to find it. It was the empty Laphroaig scotch bottle he knew connected Alasdair to Nicolai.
The Hapburg file added only one new item to what Frank already knew. It had to do with the delivery explosive used to propel the Omega formula’s unidentified pulse or shock wave that supposedly killed whatever was within its effective radius. According to the document, the explosive was unusual in that it had to be brewed and left to mature before it could be used. The maturation process took exactly 11 days and purportedly caused the propellant to activate and release the deadly invisible pulse. While all this new information was important, it still did nothing to reveal anything about the business end of the formula. How that delivery system could be incorporated into something as complex as Doctor Dekler’s equation, Frank had no clue.
The trip to Maryland was partly to enlist the help of a reputable realtor and set up the sale of the house. Frank wanted to get the Reo back from Alasdair’s and put it somewhere safe, especially since no one would be at the MacGowan home to watch it. Keeping his pursuers where he wanted them was most important now. Leaving Orlando and flying to Kansas would have them nipping at his heels, but diverting through Baltimore-Washington International would keep the hounds guessing.
He put the Hapburg papers back in their file jacket and spied a folded paper stuck in the bottom of one of the other files. He opened it and skimmed its brief message. It was a memo from William to Simon that Frank hadn’t seen in the batch from the fallout shelter.
October 16, 1962
Simon,
Early intel has confirmed Russian missiles being installed in Cuba, which may necessitate the re-deployment of the Omega Formula to active duty. To be safe, start putting together the delivery components. I’ll take care of the rest.
Pray that Kennedy can back down Khrushchev.
Best regards,
W
Frank reclined his seat back a few inches and closed his eyes. He now was certain the Omega weapon was real. That chilling thought ramped up the danger to the exosphere.
There also was a more terrestrial concern:
Who else knew what he now knew?
Chapter 60
The house on Elm Terrace was as Frank had left it weeks ago, with the exception of its newly painted exterior and trimmed landscape that were striking in the strong afternoon sun of mid-August. Alasdair had brought in experts who had made the old place sparkle.
Frank parked his rented Tahoe in the garage space once occupied by the Reo and jumped out. He wiped his hand across the shiny fender of the Corvette in the next bay like a schoolboy caressing his first car. He locked the garage and went directly into the house without clearing the front porch of flyers and free newspapers. He shot a glance toward the mailbox back at the curb, and allowed that its pile of junk mail could wait until he got settled.
The inside of the house was stifling hot and the air smelled of baked walnut and mahogany, but the odor of neglect and garbage was gratefully absent.
Frank immediately switched on the air conditioning and turned on the overhead fans in three downstairs rooms. He made himself a drink, clicked on the television, and sprawled on the parlor sofa. It had been a trying week and his brain begged him to rest.
Frank surfed through several programs on the TV and stopped at a documentary on the Smithsonian Channel that caught his attention. The show was about the discovery of the Spanish ship Atocha and its bounty of gold, jewels, and other historical artifacts discovered off the west side of the Florida keys by long-time treasure hunter Mel Fisher. The narrator described the long legal battles Fisher had undergone with the state of Florida over the ownership of what he’d uncovered and brought to the surface.
When the documentary ended, he changed channels. A breaking news banner silently scrolled across the screen informing viewers of the recent security activity at Dulles International, but Frank paid little attention to it until a black and white video began to play. Frank recognized the people men centered in the clip. Cezar Nicolai and Vlad Torok were two men one never forgot.
Frank was pleased that Nicolai had taken the bait and went to see the Enola Gay. From the looks of all the cops in video, it appeared he’d done considerably more.
* * * * *
Through a filthy window, Cezar scanned the area where Vlad had parked the Mercedes and noted that the car looked out of place sitting near the beat-up International pickup truck and the 1950 Oldsmobile rusting on cinder blocks in the back of the rundown farmhouse. The place had looked trashy the night before, but in the afternoon light it was hard to believe it was habitable. Cezar considered the fact that the lone octogenarian who had called the place home would no longer need to concern himself with any of its desperately needed improvements, even if he would’ve been so inclined.
Vlad Torok shoved his way through the sticking front door of the house and stepped onto the screened-in porch. Cezar followed and focused his gaze on the pot-holed dirt road that ran from the front yard to a secondary road almost a half a mile away.
“What do you think?” Cezar said.
“Quiet. Not a car out there.”
“Good. We’ll take that county road to the highway,” Cezar said. “Where did you put Farmer Brown?”
“Buried him in the compost pit out back. He won’t put out a noticeable smell there.”
“You’re a thoughtful man.”
“Get the car?” Vlad asked.
“Not yet. Wait until nightfall,” Cezar said. “Darkness can be a useful ally.”
* * * * *
The sun had set more than an hour before Cezar directed Vlad to drive
around the DC beltway and take 95 north toward Baltimore. Vlad kept the high beams off, maintained an acceptable speed, and stayed out of the fast lane where state police cruisers concentrated attention. Cezar studied the signs announcing the approaching exits to Columbia, Maryland and the Baltimore beltway beyond.
“I called the marina people and had them check the Viking for Celine,” Cezar said. “They said the FBI has it cordoned off as a crime scene. They didn’t get a lot of details from the agents. Celine’s nowhere to be found. She may have had to dispose of Braewyn and run for it. Not good.”
“Celine should’ve contacted you by now.”
“True,” Cezar said working the car’s GPS system in the dashboard. “We need to get rid of this car. It has a LoJack system, and by now, they may have traced us through the rental agency.”
“What’s our plan, sir?”
“I know a place nearby where there may be an important document I could use. Take the 195 west exit up ahead.”
“Where will that take us?”
“To a tiny place I was told about. In Catonsville.”
* * * * *
The ring of the cell phone startled Frank from his short nod-off. He grimaced and fumbled in his pocket to pull out the offending phone. He squinted to read the phone’s display, but didn’t recognize the number.
“Yes?”
“Detective Dugan, it’s David Hapburg.”
“Hey, guy,” Frank said and rose from the sofa. “How the hell are you?”
“Okay, I guess. I didn’t get a chance to tell you everything when we talked before. I was beating it out of my house and just wanted to get away.”
“Your place is a shithouse, by the way. Nicolai and his buddy, King Kong, tore it apart. And the sonofabitch beat me to Simon’s file.”
“Sorry to hear that. God, I hate knowing he got more information about the formula.”
“I now have the file. No big deal. Nothing he can use, really.”
The Omega Formula: Power to Die For (Detective Frank Dugan) Page 27