Play To Kill

by P. J. Tracy

  'Oh yeah, and guess who's there today. The National Library Association and about ten million boxes of books we're going to have to check one by one. Two more days and I could have gotten a free pass into the boat show, but no, it had to be today.'

  Magozzi took a step or two down the hall with him, which wasn't easy. The man had a stride like a race horse. 'Say, have we ever had two of these suspicious package calls in one day before?'

  Joe stopped and looked at him for a long second before answering. 'Sure we have, Leo. No sweat.'

  'Okay.'

  But after Joe hit the front doors and the hall was empty, Magozzi could hear phones ringing all over the building.

  * * *

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Barney Wollmeyer didn't feel that twist in his gut anymore when his squad was called to the airport. It had happened too many times, and it was starting to get boring. That was a bad sign. For this kind of duty you had to be calm, thorough, and methodical, but it didn't hurt to be a little scared shitless, either, and he was losing that. Time to turn over the lead to someone younger, someone less jaded, who still thought maybe there was a bomb in the Neiman Marcus bag, and not a birthday present for someone's grandkid.

  Bloomington PD's bomb squad had covered the airport from the beginning, and were arguably the best in the state. Best equipment, the best men - and absolutely the most experienced, since airports were primary targets, at least in the minds of those who ran Homeland Security. Barney never got that. Why was a bomb at the airport any more frightening than a bomb in the middle of a shopping center? Funny how people assigned different levels of fear to something as silly as location. Dead is dead, after all; didn't matter much where it happened, but get a suspicious package anywhere near an airplane and everybody's heart rate doubled.

  Everybody else on the squad hated the suit - the way you could hear your breath inside the hood, and the steady beat of your pulse in your ears. Barney loved it. At home he had six kids and a wife with a high-pitched voice that hit your ears like Chinese music. He loved them all more than life, but oh, God, the sound of his own breathing was soft and restful, and he only heard it in the suit.

  He looked over at his partner, toddling spread-legged across the last road between the parking lot and the doors to baggage claim. The kid wasn't used to walking distances in the heavy suit yet, in spite of all the practice. It was different when you were breathing hard because the adrenaline was pumping and it was about a hundred degrees outside on top of it.

  Aubrey would be one of the candidates Barney would tag to take his place as lead on the squad. He was old enough to have experience under his belt, young enough to have the strength and guts, and new enough to the duty to still be scared. Perfect. And Lord knew he needed it. What kind of sadistic parents named a kid 'Aubrey,' for crying out loud? You almost had to volunteer for bomb squad duty to live down a name like that.

  They'd shut off the power grid to baggage claim, and the lower level of the terminal was dim and gloomy with only the faint light creeping through the front windows. The carousels were still and quiet, luggage jammed onto the metal fins, going nowhere. He saw backpacks and garment bags, Louis Vuitton cases butted up against cheap black nylon marked with pink duct tape, and there he saw the commingling of a diverse society that flew together, shoulder to shoulder, went to the same places, and maybe came home to a safe place in the Midwest.

  Barney didn't like this part. Airports weren't supposed to be empty and quiet. He was used to seeing passengers crowded around the spinning circles, hearing the annoying announcements spit out almost nonstop over the public address system, dodging running kids and rolling suitcases that all seemed a lot more dangerous than some innocuous box sitting unattended. The best part of his job was making sure that all came back.

  The box was against an interior wall behind carousel number three. Heavy cardboard sealed with standard strapping tape, the same size as the boxes his wife used to store old tax files. Utterly unremarkable except for one thing: in a place where every single item had ID tags and addresses and routing labels slapped all over them, this box didn't have a mark on it.

  Barney took a little deeper breath than he had so far and set up the portable X-ray. It was real-time, but the viewer was small, and a little fuzzier than the big monsters upstairs at security check-in. He took a knee and leaned forward to bring his face closer to the screen.

  Aubrey stood patiently a few steps away, sweating in the suit, waiting for his look at the screen. He'd been on enough of these runs to know that this was where the scenario ended. Barney would step aside and give him a look at the X-ray of clothes or stuffed animals or whatever was inside, and then it was just a matter of procedure and time before he could strip off the hood and get a breath of good air, or at least as good as the air at the airport ever gets.

  Finally Barney pushed to his feet and stepped aside and

  Aubrey moved in and hunkered down in front of the machine. He looked for a few seconds, then remembered to breathe. 'Sweet Baby Jesus,' he murmured, and Barney nodded.

  'We're going to need the Hazmat suits.'

  * * *

  Chapter Thirty

  Magozzi was staring at the television screen, noticing only peripherally that the phones in Homicide weren't ringing. Apparently people postponed killing each other when there might be a larger, more all-encompassing threat. There was a Ph.D. thesis in here somewhere.

  'Okay, I got the list right here,' McLaren said, rattling a sheet of paper. 'Five bucks to pay, or you don't play. What's in the boxes, boys, what's in the boxes?'

  Gino raised a hand with a fiver. 'Nothing. They're empty.'

  "You sure you want to go that way, Rolseth? Four guys in Vice already bet that way, so if you're right, you have to split the pot. Try to be more creative.'

  'Okay. Porn.'

  'Nice one. And it's all yours. Leo? You in?'

  Yeah. I'm doubling down on a note.'

  'What kind of note?'

  You know, some "Ha-ha made you look" kind of thing'

  'Whoa. Another nice one. Tinker?'

  Tinker was still staring at the television. 'No thanks. Take a look. They've got the first one from the airport at the detonation site in Rosemount, and there goes the robot.'

  Magozzi closed his eyes. He'd been out to detonation sites with the squad - everybody in the department had after bomb threats had become all too common. He'd watched from behind the steel barrier while the remote-control robot whined up to the dummy bomb, its metallic arms busy, and every face behind the barrier, his own included, was gleaming with sweat. It wasn't a real threat. Everyone there knew there was no bomb inside that container; but the procedure itself was filled with tension, and every man and woman felt it as if it were the real thing.

  There's nothing in the damn boxes,' he grumbled. 'Probably just another stupid kid's prank, like at the mall the other day. The media just gets a hard-on from titillating the public. Makes for good ratings. Problem is, if they keep giving it airtime, it'll keep happening. They're creating a little culture of celebrity-starved psychopaths, just like Chelsea said.'

  Gino turned his head slowly to look at Magozzi. 'Titillating and hard-on in the same sentence, Leo? You're running off the rails.'

  Tinker Lewis had been a Homicide Detective for longer than he cared to remember; a cop for twice as long, and he'd seen this before. Every now and then there was a weird year - who knew why - too many mosquitoes, too few jobs, too many really hot and humid days, or maybe even something odd, like the alignment of the planets or some such crap. He never bothered to wonder why; he only knew that in those years strange things happened. A lot of vandalism, like two weeks ago when twenty cars on a side street in a pleasant neighborhood had all their windows broken out by something like a baseball bat wielded by someone who was really pissed. Kids, probably, raging for reasons you could never understand, using senseless violence as the pointer toward a society they thought had failed them.

  Th
en there had been the murders. Not a lot of them, over the past few weeks, but they hadn't been pretty. The domestics were more gruesome than usual; the robberies more vicious. And then there was this home-invasion thing. That phrase hadn't even been in his vocabulary a decade ago. What madness prompts your average burglar to intentionally break into a house where people are asleep in their beds? What sadism feeds the need to terrify people you never met while violating their property? What's the problem with doing it like it's always been done? Certainly there was far less risk in breaking into houses when people aren't home, taking what you want and walking away free? Something was changing. Something was different, and it pulled his sad eyes even further down on his face, because it spoke more of evil than simple criminality.

  Take your pension. Get out now, Tinker.

  His wife had been telling him that for some time.

  God knew, the pension was good after all these years, and it didn't hurt to be married to one of the country's top heart specialists, who made more money on surgery Monday than he did in a whole year.

  He was thinking of all these things as he watched the television; watched the number of boxes adding up. It's just kids, he thought. Getting their rocks off terrorising the whole damn city, just because they could; just because they raged and raged. These days they smashed the windows in twenty cars, broke into houses to scare sleeping families, or maybe, just maybe, they stashed a few suspicious boxes in places that would send a whole city into panic mode. That's what it was. That's what it had to be, because the alternative was unthinkable.

  * * *

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Joe Gebeke was at one of the bathroom sinks splashing water on his face when Magozzi walked in.

  'That was fast. False alarm at the Convention Center?' Magozzi asked, then did a double take when Joe glanced up at him in the mirror. He didn't look so good.

  'We're not finished yet. Not by a long shot.'

  'And they let you come back?'

  Joe braced his arms on the sink and looked at the drain. Water dripped from his chin and made tiny sounds on the porcelain. Finally he straightened, looked around the room, then stepped closer and almost whispered, They sent me back because I haven't finished my recertification for Hazmat yet.'

  Magozzi felt like he was missing something. Between meth labs and chemical spills, Hazmat had gotten a lot of press time, and almost everyone had seen the rigs on the road at one time or another. Leave behind a can of hairspray or a case of wine at the airport, Hazmat was likely to show up, just like it had this morning. Even the media didn't try to hype it up anymore, because eventually the thing that looked like a can of hairspray tested out to be a can of hairspray, leaving a lot of reporters looking like the boy who cried wolf, and a lot of other people pissed because so-called 'breaking news' made them miss their favorite show.

  'Okay…he said to Joe. 'You've got something questionable in the Convention Center box, just like they did at the airport, and Hazmat comes in. Happens all the time. Better safe than sorry, right? So why are you whispering?'

  Joe got red in the face. 'It isn't two boxes, Leo. It's five. At least, it was five the last time I heard. There's a new one at the Mall of America; two more at the Metrodome. Every single box is absolutely identical, and every one of them has a Mason jar in it, you know those things your mom used for pickles and shit?'

  Magozzi nodded.

  'Well, they're all filled with some kind of liquid. Could be water - some sicko's idea of a joke - or it could be nitro, or something a hell of a lot worse. It's going to take a while to find out, because there's something under each jar. Something they took the trouble to wrap in lead sheeting so the X-ray can't penetrate. It's creeping a lot of us out.'

  Magozzi felt his fingers go numb, and wondered where his blood was headed.

  Down the hall in Homicide, Gino switched channels when the one they were watching broke away to a commercial. This one had amped up the coverage, with a split screen of live feeds from the package sites, and a female anchor who looked suitably concerned as she interviewed a terrorism expert.

  'How the hell do you get to be a terrorism expert?' McLaren asked.

  Gino shrugged. 'They're probably all retired spooks.'

  'Oh yeah? Seems like it'd be a good gig. Play James Bond for a while, then get a nice, fat contract to show up on TV whenever the shit hits the fan.'

  'Sign up now, McLaren. I heard they're looking for orange- haired agents with borderline albinism to plant in the Middle East.'

  'Do the words "Miss Clairol" and "spray-on tan" mean anything to you, Rolseth?' Johnny returned his attention to the terrorism expert, who was clearly his new idol.

  Gino was shaking his head in disgust. 'They just always have to jump right to the doomsday scenario every frigging time, don't they? I mean, this is probably just a sick, twisted prank, but oh no, it's Muhammed Muhammed Whoever, blowing up the Heartland. I'm telling you, it's just like the weather warnings. Remember last Sunday, when they were crowing about how this summer was going to be the worst drought in recorded history, how the crops were going to die on the vine, food prices were going to skyrocket, and by August, we'd all be rioting over the last can of corn on earth? And what happens the next day? We get five inches of rain in two hours, and suddenly the rivers are going to crest and the entire Midwest is going to get wiped off the face of the map in biblical floods. Jesus. If there are any terrorists, it's those gel-haired assholes on TV who tell you every raindrop's a tornado and every mugging is the end of Western civilization.' He stopped for a breath and looked at Tinker, who was gaping at him, absolutely speechless.

  McLaren, on the other hand, who always appreciated a good rant, was beaming at him. 'Man, two snaps up…

  Hey, Magozzi, long time in the can. We thought you fell in.'

  Gino looked up at his partner's rigid face and felt his insides go cold.

  * * *

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Red hair or not, Johnny McLaren had one of those pale faces you never associated with the Irish. Neither round and rosy nor dark and haunted, his was one hundred percent affable, and, as the ladies were fond of noticing and slow to respond to, boyish. It hadn't looked boyish since Magozzi told them what he'd learned in the bathroom.

  It took the media about five minutes longer to learn about the Mason jars, and now the coverage was nonstop, and about as close to grim as Minneapolis television ever got, which meant the anchors weren't smiling. Magozzi and Gino had gone back to their desks, but McLaren and Tinker were hooked to the TV like dogs on a leash.

  Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,' McLaren murmured, and for the first time Magozzi heard Ireland in the lilt. 'They found another one. How many is that?'

  'Seven,' Tinker said.

  'And how many bomb squads have we got?'

  'Last time I checked, we had four. In the whole state.'

  Magozzi looked across the desk at Gino, whose eyes were fixed on the TV. The sound was muted, but the picture was bad enough. They had a graphic of the city up, with seven blinking red dots, marking the location of each suspect box. While they watched, three more lights popped up in the center of the city.

  'Shit.' Gino pushed speed dial on his cell. 'Angela. Where are you? What library? Okay, that's okay. Where are the kids?'

  Angela's irritated voice came through loud and clear when Gino held the phone away from his ear. 'Oh, gee, Gino, I don't know. Was I supposed to be watching them?'

  Gino winced. 'All right, all right, I'm sorry, okay?' And then he told her what was going on, listened for a long time before turning toward the wall and murmuring some things Magozzi couldn't hear before hanging up.

  'Everything okay?' Magozzi asked his partner.

  Gino looked miserable. 'I told her to pick up the kids and take them on a little field trip.'

  'Where to?'

  Gino took a breath. 'Out of the city. Wisconsin, maybe.'

  'Christ, Gino…'

  But Gino didn't hear him. He'd raised hi
s eyes to the television, where at least half a dozen new red lights were blinking.

  Things were getting out of hand. Most Minnesotans watched the news coverage, decided for themselves whether the threat was real or exaggerated, and the only measure of the majority decision was the number of cars on the freeway heading for Wisconsin, because nobody wanted to attack Wisconsin. Ever.

  'Lot of cars on the bridge to Hudson,' Gino commented, his eyes on the television.

  Magozzi nodded. 'Where're Angela and the kids?'

  'Somerset. She got the last room at a great bed-and- breakfast near the Apple River.'

  'Feel better now?'

  Gino nodded. 'Big time.'

  Magozzi glanced at the caller ID when his cell rang, then picked up. 'You're watching this, right?'

  Grace never worried about anything, except the bag boy at Whole Foods pulling out an AK-47 and shooting her dead. 'Of course we're watching it, Magozzi. We have been, since seven a.m., when we got a pre-post. You need to check the messages on your cell more often, especially when your switchboard is jammed.'

  Magozzi thought about that for a minute. He always checked for messages, hoping one of them would be from Grace. But not this morning. This morning things had started to happen really fast, and his heart did a little flip- flop at the thought that he'd lost precious time on a potential murder. You're calling me, so I assume it's local. Did the post give you any ideas on the potential victim or location?'

  'It's not another murder, Magozzi. We think the pre-post was about the boxes.'

  'What?'

  'All it said was "City of Lakes, Many, Everywhere." Half an hour later the TV was nonstop boxes. The post was untraceable, like the murder posts, but it didn't follow the same routing as the others. Your profiler friend, Chelsea, is in the know, according to John, and she says it's something else entirely.'