by Larry Bond
“Jeez, I would’ve thought I wore her out.” Ferguson pulled out his map, trying to psych out where she was going. “She might be trying to make sure she’s not being followed,” he said finally. “Be careful.”
“We don’t need you to tell us our jobs,” snapped Thera.
“I’ll try to remember that,” said Ferguson, reaching for his shoes.
~ * ~
T
he more Arna Kerr walked, the more she sensed someone was following her. And yet, whether she turned suddenly or double-backed or used the mirror in her compact case, she couldn’t see anyone.
Subconsciously I’m expecting to be punished for having sex, she told herself. Like a schoolgirl who’s stayed out late.
The night had turned cold. Arna Kerr circled the block twice more; finally, failing to see anyone—and yet still not entirely free of the sensation of being watched—she went to the parking garage of the Hotel Borgia and found the small Ford she’d rented earlier in the day. She slipped the key into the trunk and opened the lid. Reaching to the side, she checked the small motion sensor, making sure the trunk hadn’t been opened. Then she took out the backpack, reset the alarm with her key code, and checked the interior of the car.
Upstairs in the hotel, she mussed up the bed in her room, and then she slipped out, this time taking the stairs to the lobby. Before going back out she pulled an American-style baseball cap over her head, tucking her hair up until it was hidden. The security cameras at the outside door would see her, but her face would stay in the shadows.
Outside, Arna Kerr walked quickly to the piazza three blocks away. When she reached it, she pulled a laser measuring device from her pocket, then stood against the wall and began taking the measurements she needed. She recorded the measurements on a small voice recorder, adding Ferguson’s driver’s license number.
It would take her an hour to get the measurements, and another half hour to check the security systems on the street. The rest of what she had to do could easily wait until daytime.
Plenty of time to go back to Ferguson’s hotel and slip back into bed with him.
A foolish thought, she told herself, pocketing the laser and walking to the next piazza.
~ * ~
F
erguson grabbed hold of the portico’s smooth stone pillar and pulled himself upward, wedging the sides of his sneakers against the stone and shimmying to the top of the archway. Bologna was filled with porticos and covered walkways: a climber’s paradise.
His grip slipped as he scrambled up onto the fake balustrade of the building. Ferguson grabbed the side of the window above and pushed himself up, trying to regain some balance. The building rose several more stories, and the climbing would be relatively easy—the blocks were spaced almost like ladders in a decorative pattern at the corner of the building—but first he had to get by the windows on the second floor. Fortunately the Bolognese—or at least these Bolognese—believed in sleeping with their windows open; Ferguson was able to get a grip between the window and the ledge and then swing his legs across to the next. A few minutes later, he was on top of the building.
Manually adjusting the magnification on his lightweight night glasses, Ferguson scanned the block, trying to see where Arna Kerr had gone. He spotted the light from her laser device before he saw her; when he finally saw her he thought she was being targeted by the infrared laser sight on a gun.
His heart jerked, his impulse to help. Then he realized that she was the one with the laser, and that she was taking measurements— maybe distances for a sniper. Ferguson settled down against the tiles, watching her continue her work.
Pretty, but not as beautiful as Thera. Thera had an attraction that other women couldn’t match.
Ferguson leaned back as Arna Kerr began walking up the street in his direction.
“She’s moving,” he said into the radio as she passed. Then he yawned.
“Tired, huh?” said Guns.
“She wore me out.” Ferguson laughed, then went to find a place to climb down.
~ * ~
9
SARATOV, RUSSIA
Artur Rostislawitch set the culture dish down next to the microscope, then reached for the tray with the slides. He could feel his hands starting to tremble inside the thick rubber gloves that were built into the protective glass case enclosing his work area.
Rostislawitch’s nervousness had nothing to do with the bacteria he was examining, even though the dish contained an extremely deadly and contagious form of E. coli—so dangerous, in fact, that the amount in the dish could kill hundreds of thousands if judiciously deployed. Handling it through the sealed work area, Rostislawitch knew he would not come into direct contact with it. Indeed, one of the bacteria’s assets was that it was relatively safe to handle if certain precautions were taken. Placed in a sealed glass container and suspended in the proper growth medium, the bacteria was essentially inert.
Rostislawitch was nervous because he intended on taking some of the material out of the lab. Getting the bacteria to this workstation without arousing suspicion had been difficult; he’d had to make it appear as if it were a harmless form of E. coli rather than the superbug he had created some years before. Creating a false paper trail, preparing the transit vessels, establishing plausible alibis, studying the security system—he had worked for weeks to get ready. Now he needed five more minutes’ worth of patience until the cameras watching the lab went off-line before he could proceed. The video system went offline every Tuesday at exactly 4:45 a.m. while the main computer that ran it backed itself up automatically. That would give him a ten-minute window to take the material without being seen.
Rostislawitch pretended to be studying a specimen, twitching in his seat. He’d waited so long for this day; surely he could wait for a few more minutes.
He rehearsed what he would do—separate two grams of the material, insert it into the medium dishes he’d positioned on the left. Return the material to its safe. Dispose of the other dishes by putting them into the incinerator bin.
Put everything away. Go downstairs, retrieve the dishes from the bin, which he had disabled earlier.
Remove his ID from the security lock. Punch the sequence to erase it.
All within fifteen minutes.
After that—the train, the conference in Bologna, the Iranian.
Freedom.
Rostislawitch knew he could do it. He had rehearsed it several times.
He glanced at the clock. Four more minutes.
~ * ~
10
BOLOGNA, ITALY
Arna Kerr didn’t go back to her hotel until close to eleven a.m. Since she didn’t sleep, the team didn’t sleep. It didn’t bother Ferguson, but Guns’ eyes were sagging when they met at the Café Apollo just down the block. Thera felt stiff and was noticeably cranky. Rankin just frowned at everyone, one hand over his ear. He was monitoring the bugged transmissions from Arna Kerr’s hotel room, listening to the capture from the mike he’d planted on the opposite roof. All he could hear was the sound of drawers being slammed and then the shower being started in the bath.
“So she takes the measurements of three public squares, and visits three different buildings belonging to the University of Bologna,” said Guns, trying to prop his eyes open with a long sip of coffee. “What’s the target?”
“Movie star,” said Thera. “The university is hosting a film festival next month. She went to a theater.”
“Who kills movie stars?” said Rankin.
“There’s too much time in between,” said Ferguson. “It has to be within a few days. Maybe even tomorrow. The cars were rented for two weeks.”
“I think he’s going after some Italian politician,” said Rankin. “Maybe the mayor.”
“T Rex costs too much money to bump off a mayor,” said Ferguson. “Besides, nobody takes politicians seriously in Italy.”
“Like you know how much he charges, right?” said Rankin.
“Has to be a lot if h
e’s got an advance man. Last I heard, taking down a CIA officer cost a million.”
“I’ll do it for half,” said Rankin, locking eyes with Ferguson. “Free, if I can pick the target.”
Ferguson laughed.
“All the spots she checked out were tourist spots,” said Thera.
“Not all,” said Guns. “There was the university art building.”
“Maybe some kid who flunked out of the university figures he got a bad deal,” said Rankin.
Ferguson put his coffee cup down as the waiter approached with a fresh one.
“Why don’t they just refill the cup?” said Guns.
“The dishwasher’s a union guy and gets paid on a per-cup rate,” said Ferguson.
“Did Corrigan get anything from the fingerprints?” asked Rankin.
“Nada,” said Thera. “They were narrowing down the credit card information when I last talked to him, but they hadn’t come up with anything significant. They have that address in Stockholm, but nothing else.”
“How does T Rex contact her?” asked Guns.
Thera shook her head.
Rankin realized the shower had been turned off in the room and pressed his hand against his ear. He heard some shuffling, and then Arna Kerr began speaking.
“It’s Italian,” Rankin said, handing the earphone to Ferguson.
“She’s getting a taxi to the airport,” Ferguson told them, getting up. “Pardon me while I go bid her a tearful good-bye.”
~ * ~
11
BOLOGNA, ITALY
Arna Kerr was just putting her bag into the back of the cab when she heard Bob Ferguson calling her.
“You,” she said, before even turning to look at him.
“They say you’re checking out.”
He took her in his arms, kissing her gently. She resisted, but only for a moment.
“On your way over to my hotel, I hope,” said Ferguson.
“I have to go.”
“Didn’t sell enough drugs?”
“Plenty.”
“Stick around, you’ll sell some more. Maybe I’ll buy a few.”
He really was cute, she thought, cute enough to change her plans—a few more hours here wouldn’t bother anyone.
Or better, she could suggest they go down to Rome, or somewhere farther south, some little village somewhere that was still warm and sunny.
She had to go. He was too tempting.
“Duty calls,” she said, pushing him away gently.
“It’s almost lunchtime. Come get something to eat.”
“I have to go. I’m sorry.” She put her hand on the car door.
“A little vino?”
“No, grazie.”
“Your Italian’s getting better.”
“Prego. Another time, Bob.” She started to get into the cab.
“Well, give me your card and tell where you’re going to be,” said Ferguson.
Arna Kerr hesitated. “I don’t think so.”
“No?” Ferguson ran his hand along the back of her arm. Even though she was wearing a winter coat, she felt a tingle all the way through to her spine. “Come on. Hang around.”
“If you give me your card,” she said, “maybe I’ll call you.”
“Didn’t I give you one already?” Ferguson asked.
She cocked her hand slightly, gesturing that if he had, she had lost it. Ferguson pulled one from his pocket.
“Call me,” he said, sliding her the card. “It’s a service. But they’ll get in touch.”
She took the card and smiled, then got in the cab. Ferguson gave it a friendly pat as it left—placing a small global positioning device on its rear fender to make it easier to follow.
~ * ~
12
CIA BUILDING 24-442
Thomas Ciello paced back and forth in his small office on the second floor of Building 24-442. It was a relatively large office—thirteen paces by eleven and a quarter paces—and he had arranged the furniture so that he could stride in more or less a straight line. Building 24-442 was primarily located underground, so being on the second floor meant he had no windows. But this wasn’t a drawback as far as Thomas Ciello was concerned. On the contrary. The very blankness of the walls helped him focus.
Thomas Ciello was the chief analyst for Special Demands, a somewhat nebulous job title that matched his somewhat nebulous job description. In theory, he liaisoned between the team and the CIA’s “regular” research and analysis side, digging up background and other information necessary for missions. The reality was considerably more complicated, as Ciello often found himself gathering information on his own, through whatever source he could think of.
But analysts liked to say that the problem wasn’t so much obtaining information as making sense of it. Ciello was living that saying right now, as he tried to puzzle out what Arna Kerr’s work in Bologna meant.
She’d left vehicles and taken rooms in several parts of the center city; obviously T Rex’s target was there. Most interestingly, she’d taken measurements of three public squares in the city of Bologna. From what the First Team had reported, she had documented the distances between the buildings as well as their heights.
Why?
A sniper would want to know distances. But Ciello thought it was unlikely a sniper would plan an assassination in the public squares; the buildings that surrounded them were mostly open to the public, which meant there would be a lot of people who might see him coming in and out. It would certainly be possible—Ciello had to admit that T Rex might know much more about the buildings and the business of assassination than he did—but he thought it unlikely.
Besides the public squares, Arna Kerr had visited three university school buildings, math, computer science, and the Art School Annex, a temporary building being used while the main art buildings were renovated. None of them seemed likely to attract the sort of high-profile victim T Rex was generally hired to target.
After a search of their faculty and student lists failed to turn up anything interesting, Ciello had set out to compile a list of conferences and lectures they were hosting. Getting information on the mathematics school was easy; it posted a calendar online. But the public lectures it listed weren’t exactly major hints: “The Evolution of Euclid” and “String Theory” were the highlights. “Computer Science” was equally esoteric; the focus seemed to be on graphic compression routines and video. The Art School Annex listed no guest lectures or conferences until after the Christmas break, when “Fresh Thoughts on Medieval Brushstroke Techniques” would start the new year off with a bang.
Ciello put his thought process on hold and lay down on the floor. The ceiling tiles had a very interesting pattern. Probably they involved a code, but not being a cryptologist, he couldn’t decipher it.
That wasn’t an excuse, though, was it? Cryptologists were just mathematicians, and everyone knew mathematicians were crazy.
“Thomas, what are you doing?”
Ciello looked up and saw Debra Wu, his executive assistant, standing by the door. She made a show of putting her hands over her dress, as if he were trying to look up it. A faint odor of perfume wafted from her. It tickled his nose and he stifled a sneeze.
“Mr. Slott needs to talk to you,” said Wu, shaking her head. “He’s having a conference call with Ms. Alston.”
Wu continued to talk, but Ciello had stopped listening. His mind was back at the piazzas.
Arna Kerr was making a scale model of them.
“Thomas, are you listening to me? Mr. Slott needs that report. Mr. Slott. The DDO. Your boss’s boss. Thomas?”
“Uh-huh.”
T Rex’s preparer was measuring the space between the buildings, which was another way of saying she was measuring the air.
Air.
Hadn’t the UFO sighting in San Diego in 1953 involved some sort of similar measuring devices? No one had figured out what that meant, either.
Bad example.
In his spare time, Thomas Ciell
o was working on a book that would be the definitive study of UFOs in the twentieth century So far, he hadn’t worked on a case where UFOs were part of the solution— though there was always hope.
“Thomas, are you going to have something or not?” she said finally.
“Don’t know,” mumbled Ciello.
She turned in disgust. Her sharp twist sent a fresh whiff of perfume in Ciello’s direction.