“I was in shock after Myrna Ransom died. I was too slow to grasp what she was afraid of…what she was talking about.”
Cinnamon kept quiet and stared into her coffee cup, a move she’d learned from her business partner and one time lover, the famous Dr. Connor Montana: Keep quiet and listen when you want to hear more. The one speaking will often fill that uncomfortable silence.
Constance, on the other hand was fearful that what was unfolding could lead to losing the man with whom she was head-over-heels in love. “How could you have known what Myrna was talking about? I mean, I’m in the middle of it and I still don’t believe it. They said they would make you so sorry if you took action against them. They said they would kill you.” She reached for him. “They had you so out flanked. Don’t beat yourself up in there, buddy. You are attacking a friend of mine.”
“Connie, for the first time since those terrible days with Myrna Ransom, I can actually strike back. There is a way for me to keep them from hurting those I care about. And I know this doesn’t sound like a law enforcement officer, but it would feel so good to hurt them back.”
“But honey, didn’t we just put the hurt to them last night? I think they paid a price for the attack on the house.”
“We paid a pretty high price too. We didn’t all escape uninjured.”
“I didn’t mean….” Constance began.
“They’ll come back with more firepower and more people to use it. They won’t stop. They’ll never stop. But I would like to trip them up, give them something to think about…give that smug confidence reason to look over its shoulder.
41
Frank Lucas did not park in his usual spot. There was no telling the extent of the efforts being made to monitor him, but he knew he was being watched most of the time. His conclusion wasn’t from the school of paranoia. Paranoia would be a luxury right now. No, his conclusion stemmed from a physical examination he had initiated outside of the usual FBI-provided medical benefits. Frank had suspected he was tagged somehow and his suspicions had proven true. There had been something with an appearance like a mole or even a fine tattoo attached to him. It was very sophisticated. Mike Bonneville, the technician had never seen anything like it. And he was at the top of his game. Certainly this put some credence into what Enos Lancaster had been saying about the Lorn, as he had referred to them.
Once his body and his vehicle had been de-loused, Frank worked to find a way to get over the creepy feeling that he had been spied upon. He didn’t know how long he had been under surveillance or how much information had been gained, but he was still staggering from the revelation that his workplace wasn’t safe. Enos had tried to tell him but Frank had been methodical and somewhat doubtful that one or more of his staff had been tampering with evidence. Not that he was shocked, he’d seen many weird occurrences from his position at the agency. But this was so much worse than messing with data. Someone had marked him and had been keeping track of his whereabouts, and as Lancaster had pointed out, there was a certain fearlessness about it, a cocky playfulness. It was boastful, self-assured and powerful. Those traits had all the markings of the Lorn. Suddenly calling upon his supervisor or the rest of the chain of command for advice on how to proceed was suspect. It made him want to go into hiding and stay lost. But that’s what the Lorn expected him to do, high tail it and then keep a low profile for the rest of his days. If he did that, he might be allowed to live. But Frank didn’t want to live or die by someone else’s leave. And he didn’t like the prospect of being monitored for the rest of his life, or worrying when he might feel a knife in his back. He didn’t want this kind of life for anyone else either.
He didn’t have a fully worked-out plan but Frank decided to go into work and behave as if there was nothing wrong. Although it seemed as though a year had gone by since he was last in the office, making an appearance there would be unexpected and become all the more curious by behaving as if nothing was wrong and it was a normal work day. The person tampering with case evidence would be stunned, and it was safe to assume that they weren’t working alone.
Frank didn’t want to arrive alone at the security door. To pass through in a group would be less noticeable than approaching by himself where he could be refused admission based on a trumped-up reason and this delay might allow a chance to prepare for him before Frank reached the office. He wanted to time his approach so that his arrival would come when co-workers were gathering. When he saw some of them making their way, Frank left his car and ambled up to the entry door. Frank watched their faces for a read as he approached. Poke Munson and Rich LaFevre were there, and when they looked up, their expressions portrayed curiosity.
LaFevre spoke up. “Yes sir, can I help you?”
This inquiry was made in a way that made Frank feel a stranger, as if Rich hadn’t recognized him. He was momentarily confused and at a loss for words. As he began to respond, somebody behind him was already talking and it took a few seconds for Frank to realize that Rich LaFevre hadn’t been addressing him in the first place. Frank turned around, and as he was doing so, he replayed the response from the person in back of him.
“Yes, sir. Blake Stollard…. I’m sorry, I’m agent Blake Stollard from Interoffice. I’m here to do a sweep. I’m not supposed to let you know when these audits are coming, but today’s the day. I know these are a pain, but I’m gonna back-end it with some upgrades and that might make the hassle worthwhile.”
They stepped through as a group. Speaking and joking with the security officers as they stepped around the metal detectors aimed at the general public doing business in the building. Blake had to go through and his briefcase and support equipment was scanned. Frank waited to further accompany Stollard. When they arrived at the office, Jeanie, the receptionist/secretary was crouched at her desk in a way that Frank had seen before. Her hand was on her gun on the top right drawer.
“Frank, facial recognition shows this man as an imposter.”
People stopped, heads turned, the situation became less jovial.
“It says, I’m Hunter Williams.” Stollard said. “And so it looks as though facial recognition is working just fine.”
“Not fully.” Jeanie said. “It also says you are retired.”
“I wish….” Said Stollard, who was indeed Hunter Williams. “They feed just enough truth in there to trip you up. But not you, you caught it. Nice snag.”
Frank wanted to move ahead before closer scrutiny was made. Turning to Williams, yet speaking to anyone listening, he said, “If we have any say with this, start in my office. I’ve been away and I don’t want the interference, so let’s get it over with now.”
Williams followed Frank into his office carrying his parcels. The door was left open to the outer office, hopefully giving the appearance of normalcy. Neither of them talked. Williams had smuggled in a sensing device that Frank had stolen from Mike Bonneville and Mongrel Security Systems. Frank had appropriated it then and was now going to put it to use. Bonneville had successfully detected the monitoring tracker on Frank with this item. Frank hoped to use this technology to his advantage. Using the security audit as a ruse, He hoped to go through everyone in the office in search of trackers like the one that was found on him. Frank felt that anyone in the office with a tracker on them, was probably not the enemy, but he couldn’t be certain of this. It was all he had to work with at the moment.
Williams began scanning Frank’s office in earnest to make certain, as much as possible, that any conversation they held would truly be their own. Only a handful of hours previously, he was deep in the land of retirement and a stereotypic picture of it--out on a lake, fishing. But it was on the lake that he’d met Frank Lucas and the reason for that meeting was compelling. Frank had related his story and Williams was not without his resources to do some checking. Except it was possible, if Frank was to be believed, that Williams’ resources weren’t secure…that the FBI had been infiltrated. In fact, it had reached a point where no one was secure. Conspiracy theorists
must be celebrating everywhere…privately.
The stolen and smuggled item had a wand which, when brought close, could pick up on the kind of tracker that wasn’t to be found with the FBI’s standard equipment. Williams ran his tests and nodded to Frank when his check was complete. Leaving Williams where he was, Frank stepped out of his office and began to amble through the maze of cubicles, stopping to catch up with people and current projects. He Chatted with Jeanie at the front desk, and came back down the far aisle making momentary stops at cubicle entrances. He returned to his office again, “Here comes the first one. Be ready.” Frank mumbled under his breath as Williams came through the office door.
Frank hadn’t even made it behind his desk before Rich LaFevre appeared at the doorway. Frank decided he didn’t have time to sit, so he greeted LaFevre and approached.
“Are you armed, Rich?”
“Huh?”
“Your service pistol. Are you wearing it?” Frank had chosen LaFevre to be examined first, because his gut told him Rich was the guy they were looking for.
“Huh? Well, yes.”
“Give it to me, now! No funny business! Hand me your weapon!”
“What’s going on here?”
Frank drew his gun and quickly put the barrel to LeFevre’s mouth. “Now, you listen to me, Dick! Not another word, do you hear me? Do you understand the seriousness of your situation?”
LeFevre nodded.
“Give me your gun right now. Ever so slowly or I swear I will drop you where you are. Do you understand?”
He nodded again and began to reach toward his shoulder holster but Frank’s hand on his arm stayed him again.
“I’m just not feeling comfortable. Freeze just as you are and I will remove it. Frank did and then backed around his desk and sat down in his chair, while still keeping a gun on Rich LeFevre. Williams came over with a wand and hesitated for Frank to say something.
“There is great suspicion that a mole is alive and well in our little unit. We’re analyzing everyone here. The thought was, you are the least likely to be the traitor, so sit your candy ass down and keep your mouth shut. We need your help but as you can see there is a sound suppressor at the end of this barrel which means I could drop you here and your co-workers would not hear a thing. So just relax and prove to me I can trust you.”
Rich LeFevre was the model of cooperation. Williams began to scan with the wand, staying out of the way of Frank’s line of fire. Eventually, Rich had to stand up for a more complete examination which revealed something on his thigh. His protest was kept in check with a glance toward Frank. Anesthetic spray was applied and the tracker was removed with less trauma than Frank had experienced. Afterward, Frank smoothed Rich’s ruffled feathers. “Take your gun and go back to what you were doing, as long as you don’t speak or... touch anyone else. Everyone is being put through this. Be at the ready but show no sign of it. The entire unit is closed up. I expect there could be trouble or an attempt to escape. Your cube is the closest to the front, a window on the world. Make me glad you’re there.”
Poke Munson was next and during his scan a tracking attachment was found and removed. Lucas and Williams continued going through the staff as subtly as possible, with one agent after another being perused. In order to keep up the pretense of Williams being an auditor, he left Frank’s office for short parcels of time, checking phones and computers, but was always within sight. Eventually, those who had been checked, outnumbered those that hadn’t, and though efforts were made to run these scans in a casual, routine way, stress in the office was increasing…and so was suspicion.
The barrage of muzzled gunfire sounded like fireworks being heard from a few miles out. The impact of the bullets slamming into walls, people and furniture, let Frank know that those putt…putt…putt sounds were occurring close by. Munson blew back against the office wall and then slid to the floor, leaving blood trails on the way down. Hunter Williams seemed to leap from where he had been standing. But to Frank’s immediate dismay, Williams was further propelled from hits he’d taken. This made him lurch and crash to the floor. Rich was returning fire from his cubicle, and then the gunfire increased from whoever had been shooting in the first place. Frank could hear now that at least two people were returning Rich’s counter attack. Then the bullets came back to Frank’s office and they were fired in a manner that hit high and low, seeking places where he might hide while he hugged the floor. Rich had reloaded during the time holes were again being made in Frank’s walls, and he opened fire once again. Frank used this time to pull his own gun and send his first shots back toward those who had started the bullet volley to begin with.
Frank understood he was being targeted but having his gun in his hand emboldened him. He got to a low crouch, and duck-walked through his office door into the rat maze of temporary walls and hallways. He did a quick up and down to take a look at the situation and saw that Secretary Jeannie Watson and Agent Evelyn Rhodes were standing by the escape door. When his eyes met Evelyn’s, she lobbed something resembling an egg, plunking it expertly and terrifyingly close. In fractions of a second Frank recognized it to be a grenade and made to move out of the way, but was unable to coordinate the effort with any speed or agility. He closed his eyes expecting a loud sound concussion and shrapnel thrown about in a wild frenzy. Though he reactively prepared for the worst, he hesitated only briefly and pushed himself to move away from the area, resigned that this would be too little too late.
Plink! Whoosh! Something smoky was coming out from this would-be grenade, which as it turned out, wasn’t a grenade at all. It was too small. The smoke or dust was being expelled under pressure and coming out rapidly. As he began to move, a barrage of bullets penetrated the both sides of the support beam he was hiding behind. They had anticipated he would be moving away from this smoky thing and had aimed on either side of his current position. Bullets were making holes in the wall designed to cut him down if he moved. Frank rolled away from his current spot and rose, with gun ready but above the cubicles he saw the escape door closing. He approached, keeping low but knew the cubicle walls were inadequate to stop a bullet. Frank rushed to give the women little time to prepare, yet he was aware that the closing door did not necessarily mean they had gone through it, so he advanced, cautious to every sound.
LeFevre approached from the front of the office, reaching the back at nearly the same time.
“They’re gone, Frank.”
“Not gone enough, I’m opening the door. Get to the side.”
Frank quickly knelt and turned the handle, wanting to throw open the door but it was heavy and reinforced strength, so it was not easy to be quick with it. It didn’t matter anyhow, there was no bombardment of bullets to suppress Frank and Rich LeFevre’s pursuit. The hall to the outside was a downward ramp, unencumbered with corners or stairs, for speedy departure. It was a straight shot if someone wanted to take it. Frank and Rich would be easily silhouetted in the lighted frame of the doorway. Jeannie and Evelyn had rendered the hallway dark. The light provided by the opened doorway where he stood reached only so far and even then it was faint. Frank knew that those he pursued would not have traversed the escape route to the other end, even on a run. Several shots were fired and the two agents pressed to the floor, diving for the only cover they had. The gunfire was not muzzled which made the reports sound even louder. In fact, they realized the shots were not aimed at them.
At the other end, a door opened up and the light from the world outside provided backdrop for the form silhouetted cautiously at one side of the door frame.
“Frank! It’s Enos Lancaster. Don’t shoot.”
“What the hell?” Rich LeFevre whispered.
Frank crouched next to him in the long dark corridor, lit only by the openings at the two ends. The light behind the two agents was duller and came from the temporary FBI office set up. It now lay in tatters with agents felled, and walls, cubicles and equipment sporting holes, chips and cracks. Before them, at the other end of the e
scape hall where they now squatted, special agent Enos Lancaster, adjunct to the FBI, stepped hurriedly out of the way.
“Where’d he come from?” Rich added more explanation to his previous remark.
“Frank! It’s Enos” The man lingering at the terminal end of the escape route stepped across the rectangular opening, slow enough to be recognized but fast enough so that a pistol couldn’t be aimed and fired. Though he again disappeared from view, Enos kept talking.
“Keep your gun, but keep your head. I’ve been under attack…and on the run. That’s why I’m here. I have a surefire way of knowing whether there is a Lorn present in anyone. I could have stayed away and maybe I should’ve but that’s just what they like. If they need us, they take us and if they don’t we’re eliminated or scared into hiding which keeps us out of their way. When we do that, Frank, we’re contributing to their cause and the eventual end of our species. And they have eliminated many species. But, I now have a surefire way of knowing whether there is a Lorn present in anyone.”
Frank side-stepped forward with his back just off the wall as if he was on a ledge on a high cliff. He could hear Rich moving along behind him. Apparently Enos could detect they were nearing the entrance because he spoke again in a more normal volume.
“I put my gun away, Frank. You’re in no danger from me. Let’s take it real slow…run our tests and see if we are who we say we are.”
Frank cautiously stepped out into the light. He saw Enos standing out in the open. He was offering views of his empty hands.
“Is it just you, Frank?”
“No, Lefevre’s with me.” Frank swept his hand to indicate his fellow agent, but Rich was not there. That meant either Rich was dead or injured or had turned and gone the other way.
“Look out, Frank! Don’t stand in the doorway!” Enos gave warning but Frank was slow in the uptake. He ducked as if something was falling on him, raising his gun at the same time, then slowly moving out of the way from being in the line of fire. No shots were heard nor fired down that long straightaway from the office. But as Frank and Enos were ascending toward what had housed the FBI, an explosion shook them to their knees.
The Blood In Between (The Safe Haven Trilogy Book 3) Page 23