by DB Carpenter
Pell cupped his hands under the spout and splashed the water on his face.
"This'll only last for a week or so," Chris said. "Drying out's tough."
Pell wiped his hands on his pants and said, "I hope you're right."
Chris didn't have the heart to tell him that it would get much worse before it started to get better, and would most certainly take longer than a week – probably more like a month. They stared at the mountain in silence for a minute before Chris said, "I was thinking about that report that we got last night and I think I might have come up with something."
Some color had returned to Pell's face, his eyes clearer as he said, "What's that?"
"The last paragraph about Ngamy. I think it makes perfect sense that they would pick a place like that."
"What do you mean?"
"Think about it. If they were going to test this virus out, what better place to do it? It's pure speculation, but there's probably no organized medical infrastructure there to piece this sort of thing together. I bet there is a population there that could be one big laboratory – a human guinea pig farm."
The thoughts hadn't been completely organized in Chris' mind, but as he spoke, it all came together. The more he heard himself talk, the better it sounded.
Pell stared off in the distance. A last drop of water fell from his chin and he idly traced his jaw with his thumb and forefinger. His head nodded in time to his caress.
"It sounds kind of far-fetched. I mean, it's possible, but like you said, it's all speculation."
"Maybe so," Chris replied. "It's going to be difficult to check out without having someone in the area verify it for us. With it being overseas it's going to be out of the FBI's jurisdiction."
"Not necessarily," Pell said. "We do actually operate outside of the US. We have Legal Attachés attached to most US embassies doing training and information gathering. They get involved in investigating crimes and terror threats in the country as well. I have no idea if we have anyone in that area of Africa but we can check. Let me think about it for a bit. Let's get going."
They rode in silence for the next hour until Chris said, "We're coming up on the Wild Bear lodge."
They came around a turn in the road, and Pell slowed the car down. All that was left of the Wild Bear was a burnt-out shell of the building.
"What the...?" Pell said as he whipped the car into the driveway.
"Jesus Christ. Did they say anything about this to you on the phone this morning?" Chris asked as he stared at what was left of the building that was surrounded by yellow crime scene tape. He had been in there just two short days ago.
"Not a thing."
"It's for real."
"Yeah," Pell said quietly as he backed out of the driveway, and sped down the road.
Fifteen minutes later they turned off Route eleven and wound down some dirt roads until they came to their second fire scene of the day. A couple of state troopers' vehicles, a game warden's pickup and a hearse sat in the middle of the driveway.
As they stopped the car and got out, a tall state cop came over to meet them.
"Agent Pelletier?" He asked.
"Yes," Pell said as they shook hands.
"I'm Detective Martin," he said and turned to Chris. "And you are?"
"Chris Foster."
"You with the FBI too?" Detective Martin asked.
"No he's not but he's good though. He's with me and I can vouch for him. So what have you got here?" Pell asked.
"Like I told you this morning on the phone, it would appear that we've got a dead officer, Bert Nadeau. The only reason I even called you was because Peter Clemens, the commander up in Houlton, suggested that I do it."
"Appreciate it," Pell replied. "So what do we have? Can we look around?"
"This whole place is a crime scene now," the detective cautioned. I can show you around but we are still waiting for the crime scene investigators and forensics team so I will need to ask you to respect that."
They walked over to the closest burnt-out building – a charred foundation, heaps of ash and not much else.
"Is the other building in the same shape?" Pell asked studying the scene.
"Yes. There's nothing left of it either. Must have been some sort of a chemical fire – something real hot. We've got a technician from the crime lab in Augusta flying up this afternoon to do some testing. Whoever set this knew how to make one hot fire."
Pell nodded.
He walked out onto the slab foundation to where the middle of the room would have been and cleaned off a small section of concrete with his shoe. He pulled out his pistol. Aiming it at an angle away from himself and into the woods, he fired a bullet at the slab.
"What the hell are you doing?" The detective asked. "This is a crime scene. You can't be doing this."
Pell glanced at him briefly as he bent down and touched the concrete around where his bullet had hit. Chris walked over to him and stared at it. The bullet had created concentric rings in the cement, and Pell's hand running over the surface caused it to crumble as if it were just packed-down sand.
"This was one hot fire all right," Pell said as he stood up. "A couple of thousand degrees at least; definitely not an accident. How'd you guys find this?"
"A ranger in a fire tower down in Baxter State Park saw it. He said it went up around three-thirty this morning. Only burned for half an hour though. He sent someone down to investigate, and they found this mess and that state police vehicle." He pointed to a cop car across the lawn. "And Bert Nadeau is no place to be found."
"So you think he was in one of these buildings?" Chris asked.
The detective nodded.
"Why do you think that?" Pell asked him.
"I can't prove it, but he was working on a double homicide that happened day before yesterday. Someone blew up the Wild Bear lodge. Killed the owner and his wife."
Chris shot Pell a glance.
Detective Martin continued, "I think in the course of his investigation he somehow ended up down here, and then this place gets torched just like the Wild Bear and Bert is nowhere to be found."
"You're telling me that there was a double murder here this week, too?" Pell asked. "How do you know that the fire at the Wild Bear wasn't an accident? What makes you think it was murder?"
The lanky Detective's face flushed and his pitch rose up a notch. "I know it was a murder because there was residue from plastic explosives at the scene. Someone used some kick-ass explosives – C4 to be exact – to blow Annie and Stu into little itty-bitty pieces, and now we've most likely got another homicide, of a state trooper no less, on our hands right here."
"It looks like you've been doing a thorough investigation," Pell said. "Do you know who owned this property?"
"We're trying to get that information now. It could take a while."
"Why's that?"
"This is Great Northern land. Look around, and for as far as you can see in any direction, the land is all owned by a consortium of timber companies. They let people lease plots from them, and figuring out who is leasing what can be a big pain in the ass – people sell their leases or die. Christ, I've even seen people lose them in card games. It's a big mess"
"You've got people working on that now?" Pell asked.
The detective nodded.
As Chris listened to their conversation, he swept his foot through the fine ashes on the floor. Something ground under his shoe. He bent down and picked it up. After cleaning it off, to his disgust, he saw that it was a human tooth – charred but undeniably a tooth.
"Jesus Christ," he muttered.
"You guys are going to get me fired. Stop messing around. This is a crime scene. What have you picked up there? Jesus, you can't be fiddling with the evidence," the detective said.
Chris handed the tooth to Pell who studied it before passing it to the detective. "I think we just found Bert Nadeau."
Detective Martin stared at the tooth. He was visibly shaken as he pulled an evidence bag out of his p
ocket and dropped the tooth in it. After a moment of silence, he cleared his throat and said, "Why did Commander Clemens want you to get involved? What do you know about this?"
Pell's face was hard, his expression cold as he studied the Detective. "I don't know anything about any of these murders specifically. Bert's name came up in another investigation. I couldn't prove it right now, but my gut says that you're right, the murders here and at the Wild Bear are connected. We've got to comb this entire area for evidence. We're going to need more manpower. Can you get some?"
"That shouldn't be a problem."
"Good. We also need to know who owned these buildings. Has anyone talked to neighbors?"
The detective laughed and said, "Neighbors? There isn't another year-round residence within ten miles of here. There're plenty of hunting camps, but you won't find anyone in those this time of year."
"We need to find out who these people were. Someone around here knows who they were. They had to eat, right? Check the stores." Pell pulled out his mobile phone, no signal. "Can you get me in touch with Commander Clemens?"
"Sure," Detective Martin said. "I'm going to have to ask you to accompany me back up the driveway and off the crime scene while I do that."
Pell and Chris followed him up the driveway and as he walked over to his cruiser to track down his boss Pell said, "We'll get these guys started, and then we're out of here. We've got to get down to Boston to properly escalate this."
"Sounds good to me," Chris replied. Seeing Pell in action was more impressive than he had expected. He exuded much more force than Chris would have thought him capable of.
"I've got the commander on the radio," the detective yelled from his cruiser.
"Excellent," Pell said. "Let's get the wheels turning." He jogged over to the cruiser, leaving Chris alone to ponder the scene. This was just further confirmation that the people responsible for these deaths didn't mess around. He looked down at his hand and saw thin ash lines from the tooth crisscrossed his palm. He reflexively wiped it on his pants. A crow cawed from the lowest branch of an enormous pine tree. He looked at the large black bird. It stared back at him defiantly before letting out another chilling screech that echoed in the woods.
Pell had everything under control now. They didn't need him anymore. After all, this was their job, not his. But he wanted to be involved. He had built TeaNet from the ground up and it had provided him with incredible professional experience and challenges, but it was no match for this sort of thing. The past few days had been the most exciting of his life. He felt alive, reborn – as if he had molted – shedding the aches, pains and drudgery of middle-age back on the banks of the St. Croix River.
He thought fleetingly about trying to reach Karen but if things kept up at this pace, he'd be home on time and he could explain it all to her then. He had been toying with the idea of making a change anyway and this conversation could open the discussion. Karen wouldn't like it. She liked stability, security but she also enjoyed the nice things in life that came with being married to a successful entrepreneur – the country club membership, the social events, the convertible sports car.
When his accountant told him three years ago that he was a millionaire, they had celebrated, Karen more than he. Becoming a millionaire was a milestone. He had purposefully not told her about the meetings he'd had over the past few weeks. He was being courted for a buyout. They were offering eight million in cash and eight more in their company stock, which was abysmally low but would undoubtedly go up.
It was tempting. But he didn't want to get Karen over-excited. He liked burgers on the grill and beer in a can, she liked designer handbags, sporty cars and cocktails at the most expensive restaurants with her girlfriends. He didn't begrudge his wife her shopping and lifestyle habits, after all she was a good wife and he loved her deeply. But he would prefer to think about how to invest the money and what he really wanted to do next before talking to Karen about it.
Pell said, "We're all set. They're bringing in twenty men to comb the entire area. They're also sending in a chopper to get us back down to Bangor, and we're going to hop a plane to Boston. We'll be there around four this afternoon."
Chris nodded. "How're you doing? You look better."
"Good. This has really got me fired up. I'm starting to think David Rose really was telling the truth, and each little bit of evidence that we have been able to put together is confirming it. This could be huge." He slapped Chris' shoulder. "Let's talk a little more about your Africa theory."
10:30 am PDT Malibu, California
Camilla and Sarah sat on the terrace in the garden. Albert had prepared an amazing breakfast that they should have been savoring but neither of them was particularly hungry. Sarah's smartphone sat in the middle of the wrought iron table, and both of them kept glancing at it. Sarah had a real bad feeling about this. Seth was almost six hours late with his call. It wasn't like him.
They had been silent for most of the meal until Camilla said, "Why hasn't he called yet?"
Sarah pushed the eggs Benedict to one side of her plate and put her knife and fork down. "I don't know. The only thing I can think of is that the phones are out up there, there's no signal or something. That wouldn't be uncommon at all. I mean that's the whole reason we chose that location. It's in the middle of nowhere, no-one around for miles and limited network coverage."
"Something went wrong, and I bet it's all related to David Rose," Camilla said.
Sarah was about to try to put some sort of a positive spin on it when the phone emitted a shrill chirp. Both women jumped.
"This must be him," Sarah said as she picked up.
"Seth, is that you? Thank goodness, where have you been?" A smile spread across her face. She had been thinking the worst. At least he was alive. Across the table Camilla nodded – her face essentially emotionless except for a deep crease in her usually smooth brow.
"We ran into some problems."
"What happened?" Sarah asked.
Camilla walked around the table, leaned down, and listened to the conversation from right next to Sarah's head.
"Alby Fournier showed up at the lodge."
"Alby Fournier?" Sarah muttered, running the name over in her mind. She had heard it in the past, but couldn't associate a face with it.
"He was a guide down at the Wild Bear. It's a long story. What's important is we got everything out. We're heading west right now. I'm calling you from Burlington, Vermont."
The two women exchanged concerned glances. He was holding something back.
"What about Bert?"
"Taken care of as planned," Seth said.
"Is everyone else okay?" Sarah asked.
Seth paused. "Curtis and Wendel are dead."
"Dead! What happened?"
"Alby shot them. He turned up all crazy saying he knew what we were doing and talking about the bible and God and stuff. He shot Wendel and Curtis before we could get to him. "
"And just how did this Alby character know what was going on?" Sarah demanded. Her voice was low.
"I've no idea. I'm not sure if he actually did know anything. He was going on about apparitions and god talking to him. He's always been a bit crazy. I think he might have just flipped and come down shooting up the place on some fantasy crusade. It all happened so fast. I'm just happy we got out of there with what we did. If it weren't for Alby, it would have been a textbook operation."
"Well, it wasn't textbook, was it? How long before you get to the new operation center?"
"Tomorrow night. We're going straight through as much as possible. We'll need to take a few breaks. When will you be there?"
"I'll be waiting for you. Are you telling us everything? I need to know the truth here. Does anyone else know about this? Did anything else happen up there that you're keeping from me?"
"No that's it. I've told you everything. Is Camilla on the phone?"
"She's listening right next to me."
"Trust me, both of you; it could have been
much worse. It could very easily have been all of us that got it back there. Then where would you be? Things are going to work out. I've got all of the data, and Mark has all of the stuff from the lab and lodge in the van. He'll be there in three days."
Sarah was furious and wanted to lash out at him but she needed him – especially now that Curtis and Wendel were both dead. Three men dead in four days – an ominous sign. At this rate they wouldn't make it through the week.
"I'll see you tomorrow night," Sarah said as she hung up the phone.
Camilla walked back to her seat. She sat silently, tapping her fork against her empty plate for a minute before slamming her hands on the table, rattling the settings. Sarah said, "This doesn't change anything. You heard him. They got what they were supposed to and are on their way. We're just two men short now."
"Two? And David makes three." Camilla said. "This is a major problem."
"Not really. Now that we're out of Maine we don't need as many people."
"That may be, but what am I going to tell Phillip? It's bad news at the worst possible time."
Sarah nodded her head. There was no disputing that fact. He would not take the news well.
"Do we even have to tell him?" Sarah asked. "What good would it do?"
Camilla leaned back in her chair and stared at the deep blue sky. Her full lips moved gently as she muttered something to herself.
"Things have got to start going better," Camilla said as she rose and walked toward the house, leaving Sarah standing there alone cursing Seth under her breath. How could he have screwed up like this?
4:00 pm FBI Northeast Regional Office, Boston, Massachusetts
Pell had been right on when he said they'd be in Boston by four. Their plane touched down at Logan just before three-thirty and they were standing in the impressive marble lobby of a building on State Street in downtown Boston at four o'clock on the nose.
They waited for an elevator to the twenty-eighth floor in silence. Pell vibrated with nervous energy as he pressed the already illuminated Up button again.
They were alone in the elevator as they rode up; most people were going down at this time of day, and Chris said, "Why are you so nervous?"