by Ryan Parker
“Malcolm Finn, you sneaky fuck.”
“I get paid to be sneaky,” I said. “And let me remind you that you do as well. This stays between us.”
“No problem. I’m sure our fine Mr. McDowell knows?”
I was silent for a moment, drifting away in thought. I watched two cars go down the street. One was a real estate agent, the other a minivan with those little white stickers on the rear window indicating how many people were in their family. An exterminator truck rounded the corner, heading my way.
“You there, Finn?”
“Yeah, McDowell knows. He knows it all, just like he always does. And he doesn’t approve.”
“Fuck him.”
I didn’t respond. Instead, I watched a woman walking a dog down the sidewalk, letting the animal stop and squat in one of her neighbor’s yards. The woman had put her hand into a plastic bag and used it to pick up after the dog. Another woman, a younger one several doors down, walked down her driveway to the mailbox, talking on the phone as she went.
Just a normal day in suburban America. Nice lawns. People out for a walk and getting some exercise. Others in their cars on the way to the grocery store, perhaps. And a house full of Chechen terrorists right down the block. Jesus, the things people don’t know about their neighbors. Or anyone, really, which brought me back to Rachel.
“There’s more to this,” I said to Spencer. “She works at the FBI.”
Now there was silence on his end, but only long enough for him to come up with the question that I knew he would. “Are you using her for inside information?”
I laughed. “No. I knew you’d ask that, though, which is why I didn’t tell you what she does there.” I explained her job to him.
“That sounds boring as all hell, but I can see why McDowell’s pressing you. So what’s the plan? What are you going to do?”
I didn’t respond.
“Hello, hello? Damn cheap phones.”
I said, “I’m here. Hang on a second.”
I sank down in my seat, lifting the camera, zooming in to make sure I was really seeing what I thought I was. A Fed-Ex delivery guy rang the doorbell, then knocked, and got no response. He went back to his truck and stacked several boxes on the front porch.
“What’s going on?” Spencer asked. “Everything okay?”
“Give me a minute.”
I got out of the van with clipboard in hand, wearing work boots, navy blue pants, matching shirt and jacket and a baseball cap. If anyone tried to talk to me, I was prepared to launch into a sales pitch for satellite TV.
I had my shoulder holster concealed beneath a blue jacket, my gun ready.
I walked up the sidewalk to the front porch, got the name of the company off the label and returned to the van. I quickly Googled the company name and confirmed what I’d been thinking on the walk back.
I knew what was inside the boxes from their shape and the obvious weight of them from watching the Fed-Ex guy lift them.
“We’re not going to find any bomb-making materials in the house,” I said into the phone.
“What do you mean?”
The six boxes contained ammunition. “They’re not going to blow up anything. It’s going to be a mass shooting.”
“Christ,” Spencer said. “Two houses, and now this method? Your team is going to walk into a virtual ammunition depot. How complicated is this going to get?”
It didn’t have to get more complicated. Not if we acted faster than we had planned. We had talked about doing the job inside of a week. Now we were going to have to do it in a matter of days.
. . . . .
There wasn’t much action at the house, so I left about 3 a.m. and headed back to the hotel to get a few hours of sleep. Spencer said he was staying put outside the house he was watching.
I slept for about four hours, waking just before 8 a.m., and realized I had been so tired and so focused on the change in our mission that I’d forgotten to check my personal cell phone for messages. An odd thing, having Rachel slip my mind for more than a few minutes.
I read her texts and listened to her messages. She sounded stressed, and had been vague about why she needed to talk to me ASAP. I dialed her number.
She answered with: “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. What’s the matter?”
I heard her let out a deep sigh. “Oh, my God. I was so worried when I didn’t hear back from you. I don’t like that at all.”
“Rachel, I’m fine. What’s so urgent?”
She told me about the planned polygraph examinations.
I was barely awake. My eyelids were heavy, my mouth was dry, and my body ached from the few hours of tense sleep. “When is this happening?”
“I don’t know. I guess…it could be any time?”
I sat up on the edge of the bed. “Have you left for work yet?”
“No.”
“Well, you’re going to have to miss another Friday,” I said. “I’ll pick you up shortly.”
“Shortly? When? Where are you?”
“Just be ready in fifteen minutes.”
“Fifteen? You’re nearby?”
“I’ll see you in a few minutes, Rachel.”
We hung up and I called Spencer.
“I’m going to be away for the next day or so.” He was just as experienced as I was, and perfectly capable of watching the place alone for an extended period of time.
“Okay,” he said. “I got this.”
Chapter Twelve (Rachel)
Finn called fifteen minutes later and said he was waiting outside for me. I went down to meet him.
He had parked at the entrance to my building, standing there holding the passenger side door for me. He wore jeans and a t-shirt with a light jacket. His clothes were rumpled. He still had bed-head, the kind that was obviously splashed with water in an effort to get it under control, but failing. His eyes looked tired.
“Are you okay?” I said, throwing my arms around his waist, so glad to see him. I felt something press against my chest. I figured it was a gun, but didn’t say anything.
“I’m fine. Just a little tired.” He kissed my cheek. “You smell so good. It’s waking me up a little. Come on, get in. We’re going to my house.” He pulled away from me and put his hand on the car door.
It was then that I noticed what he was driving. I’d been so glad to see him that I hadn’t noticed. “Where’s your car?”
“I’m driving this rental for a few days,” he said, shrugging it off. I figured it had to do with his work, so I didn’t ask any follow-ups.
During the hour drive, he explained to me what we’d be doing once we got there.
At one point I asked, “Why were you so close when I called?”
He kept his eyes straight ahead. “You don’t want to know.”
“Work stuff?”
He nodded. “I can’t give you any details. It just puts you in more danger, especially now that you’re going to face a polygraph.”
“Do you think it’s really that random or….?”
“I don’t know,” Finn said. “I would think if they suspected anybody for anything, they would go directly to them and not conduct widespread testing like this. But we can’t be too careful.”
We drove in silence for several minutes and I thought about what he’d told me Tuesday morning—the dangers I faced, the decision I had to make, all of it. I knew he wasn’t making any of it up, but now that I was feeling the pressure it was more real than ever.
None of the emotions I felt from that realization made me second-guess my wanting to be with Finn. And as I sat there in the passenger seat, watching him drive, I realized that’s exactly where I wanted to be. Not there in the car, specifically. Not anywhere in particular, in fact. The place didn’t matter. Where I wanted to be, now and forever, was next to Finn, no matter where we were.
. . . . .
“Good morning, Andrew,” the voice came from his next-door neighbor’s porch. I looked up as I got out of the c
ar and saw an elderly woman sitting in a wooden rocking chair.
Finn had come around to my side of the car and opened the door for me. He was closing it as he replied, “Morning, Mrs. Woodall.”
“Nice day not to be working,” she said.
Finn placed a hand on my elbow, leading me, almost pushing me toward the front steps to his townhouse.
“Perfect day,” he said. “Enjoy it.”
“Are you having a daytime date?” she asked. “This is the first time I’ve seen you with a woman. Is that right or have I forgotten?”
Wow, this woman didn’t hold back at all. As secretive as Finn had always been, it surprised me that he lived next to someone who sat on her front porch blurting out questions about his personal life.
Finn slipped the key into his front door and turned it. The door swung open.
I felt kind of bad for the lady. She clearly meant no harm. Still, it was a bit unnerving for me, and probably a hundred times more so for Finn.
“This is Allison,” he said, surprising me more than a little, my head snapping toward his direction. “You’ll probably be seeing a lot of her in the future.”
I waved. “Hi.”
The woman waved back. “Well, that’s good to know. You two enjoy your day.”
“And you as well, Mrs. Woodall.”
I waved to her again and smiled as I entered Finn’s house.
He closed the door and locked up, shaking his head.
“She seems nice,” I said. “And why the hell am I Allison?”
He emptied his pockets into a small bowl on a table next to the front door. “She is. She’s just a little too nice sometimes. Trust me, she doesn’t need to know anything about you, and especially about us.”
“Doesn’t respect the ‘privacy code’?” I said in jest.
Finn cut his eyes at me. “Doesn’t know about the code.”
“Then that’s your fault.”
He smiled for the first time all morning. “I know it’s hard for you to turn it off, but now is not the time to be all cute and flirty with me. We have some work to do.”
“Hey,” I said, forcing a disappointed and rejected look on my face. “I’m trying to lighten the mood here. Blow off a little steam.”
“There will be plenty of time for blowing things later.” His crooked smile almost made me drop to my knees right there in his foyer.
. . . . .
He led me down to his basement where he told me to take a seat in an uncomfortable, old wooden chair that was next to a desk. Finn went over to a large metal cabinet and pulled out a canvas bag. He placed it on the desk and unzipped it, then looked at me as I looked up from the bag to meet his eyes.
“Polygraph machine,” he said.
“I’ve taken one before.”
He smiled. “Well, now you’re about to do it again.”
For several minutes, he hooked me up to the machine and explained as he went.
“I assume you know what this is,” he said, placing a blood pressure cuff around my left bicep.
“Yes.”
He took two rubber tubes out of the canvas bag and placed them around my lower chest, just below my breasts. “These measure the rate and depth of your respiration.”
Then two plastic clips on two fingers. “These measure your skin moisture. When you’re nervous, you sweat, and it conducts electricity.”
I was silent as he switched on the machine on the desk, until a question struck me. “Why do you have this?”
Without looking at me, he said, “When I first got here, a lot of what we did—what I did—involved detaining and questioning suspects. I haven’t used this in years, though.”
“Why not?”
He sat down. “Intel gathering has changed. At least for us, it has.”
I was becoming accustomed to his vague answers regarding his work, and was learning fast not to ask any follow-up questions.
He placed a roll of paper on the prongs and fed it through, under the little needles that scrawled the resulting lines on the paper.
Finn’s face was serious, his eyes searching mine. “Ready?”
I nodded.
“I need you to look straight ahead. First question: Is your name Rachel Marie Holt.”
“Yes.” I couldn’t help but let my eyes dart over to his face.
“Interesting,” he said. “That’s a lie but this indicates that you’re telling the truth.”
“It’s who I really am,” I said.
Finn nodded and smiled. “I know.”
He went on to ask me a series of questions that were simply factual: how old was I, did I live in D.C., do I drive a 2002 Volkswagen Jetta, questions he knew the answers to so that he could calibrate the machine.
Then he turned quickly to the difficult ones.
“Are you associated with anyone who is not a U.S. citizen?”
“No.”
“Have you been outside the United States in the last ten years?”
“Yes.”
He paused for a moment, then asked, “The last two times you missed work, were you really ill?”
“Yes.”
I looked at Finn again, quickly glancing at his reaction. He was looking at the needles on the paper and grinning at my response.
“Are you currently involved in a romantic and/or sexual relationship with anyone?”
I hesitated longer than I had wanted to, but got my answer out as quickly as I could. “No.” I was curious as hell what the readout was saying, but Finn wasn’t telling me. I looked at him and his eyes shot to mine, but he didn’t say anything. I asked him, “What did that one say?”
“Can’t tell you just yet,” Finn replied flatly, and moved on to the next question. “Have you ever known anyone who committed a felony?”
“No.”
“Have you ever stolen anything other than office supplies from work?”
“No.”
“Have you ever stolen office supplies from work?”
I hesitated, thinking, Who hasn’t? But I lied: “No.”
“Have you ever known, or do you now know, anyone who has taken the life of another human being?”
“No.”
I heard Finn’s breathing change, but detected none in mine.
“Are you nervous right now?” he asked.
“No,” I lied.
“Are you currently sitting in a basement?”
“Yes.”
“Have you ever used another name?”
“No.”
“Do you have any children?”
“No.”
“Do you enjoy reading fiction?”
“Yes.”
Finn paused for a long time. It seemed like more than a minute, which is a long time to sit in silence. I resisted looking over at him.
“Are you in possession of any information that the FBI would find useful in solving crimes relating to the security of the United States?”
“No.”
He stood. My eyes flitted toward him, looking up at him, wondering what was coming next.
“You passed,” he said, and I smiled. Stepping around me he said, “I’ll be right back.” Behind me, I heard him climb the stairs. I heard him walking around above me, his footsteps sounding quick and hard.
Several minutes passed until he finally came back down to the basement. I didn’t see him, just heard him coming down the stairs and toward me from behind.
Then everything went black as I felt him place a blindfold over my eyes.
“It’s a sleep mask,” Finn said. “Don’t worry.”
I felt my heart rate pick up and wondered if it showed on the polygraph. Finn didn’t say.
“One of two things is going on,” he continued. “Either my machine is broken, or you are an impeccable liar. No offense. It’ll come in handy. Of course there’s a third option. Maybe you’re just good at controlling your emotions when you want to. When you need to.”
No doubt about that. I had self-trained to control my e
motions for twenty-six years. Almost all of my emotions, anyway. I knew it was healthy to express them sometimes, whether they were good ones or bad ones. And sometimes it was impossible to control them. Especially when it came to the emotions I felt about Finn.
I heard what sounded like a dinner plate being placed down on the desk.
“I have an idea which one of those is true,” he said. “Now we’re going to test my theory.”
When darkness filled my field of vision, a bolt of nervous anticipation had skittered through my body. Now it had turned into impatient desire.
Chapter Thirteen (Finn)
Rachel’s polygraph results astounded me. Not a single lie was detected, even though I knew the majority of her answers were untrue. Amazing. My curiosity was piqued and I couldn’t resist playing with her.
“Do you trust me?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“You know I’m not going to hurt you, correct?”
“Yes.”
The polygraph indicated she was telling the truth, but at this point, how could I know if that was accurate?
I stood before her with a view of the machine’s readout, and I noticed her breathing had already changed. It was shallow and slightly more rapid.
I touched her cheek with the back of my hand, rubbing it lightly. The polygraph needles jumped for the first time that day—first drawing a quick spike on the chart, then small ones, before evening out again.
Pulling my hand away from her, she moved her head a little. A simple, natural reflex. She was trying to see what was about to happen next but with the sleep mask on, she was sightless and completely vulnerable to me.
I ran my hands down her arms, taking her wrists and raising her hands carefully to my face so the electrodes on her fingers would stay put. I kissed her palms, glancing over at the machine and seeing another reaction. I placed her hands back down on the arms of the chair.
I let about thirty seconds pass with no physical contact and no words. In that time, her breathing increased and her pulse quickened a little.