by Jan Coffey
“That’s not confidential information. Not as far as you’re concerned.”
“Thank you,” she said, throwing her hands up in frustration. “I called my lawyer. She called someone in Hartford. I don’t know who. I don’t know if that was the reason for it or not, but Agent Luna stopped to see me again before they left with Juan. He said that as soon as Juan was checked in, they’d call me with the exact details of where he is and how I can get clearance to visit him.”
“He didn’t give you the name or location of the hospital?”
She shook her head. “He said he’d call me with that information. I gave him my cell number, which, by the way, is no good since my phone is totally dead. I also gave him my home number, but that doesn’t do me any good when I’m stuck here at the hospital.”
Bryan thought she was working herself up for good reason. There was no cause for Luna to be such a hard ass with her.
“My understanding is that Juan was flown to the Baltimore VA Rehabilitation and Extended Care Center. I’ll get you the street address and arrange for security clearances.”
She sent him a look that made him feel like a miracle worker. “Why can’t everyone be as agreeable as you and your partner?”
“Oh well, I’m known internationally as ‘Agent Agreeable.’”
She actually smiled momentarily.
“I’m very grateful for the way you and Agent Gardner have treated me.”
Throwing Hank in the pot with him was a good thing. It made everything less personal. Much better.
“Agent Luna is still a rookie. He’ll learn with time the best way to deal with people. I know you only want what’s best for your son.” He looked outside at the wind that was now whipping up the snow. “I don’t know how much success you’re going to have getting a cab take you anywhere. The storm is turning into a blizzard.”
“They took Juan in a helicopter. Do you think they’ve already arrived in Baltimore? Is there anyway to check to see if they’re there already? I don’t like the idea of him flying in this kind of weather.”
“These pilots wouldn’t fly if the weather was too bad, but I think they probably got out ahead of this. Seriously, I’m sure your son will be fine.” Seeing her anxious look, he added, “Luna is supposed to call me, too, as soon as they arrive. That should be any time now.”
She pushed her arms into her jacket and looked toward the guard’s station. “I need to look at a phone book. Maybe, there’s a car rental place near here that I can walk to.”
“At two-thirty in the morning, in the middle of a snowstorm, in downtown New Haven?”
“I need to go home, get my car, and be on the road to Baltimore.”
“What town do you live in?” Bryan couldn’t believe he’d asked the question. He knew she lived in Wickfield, and that was an hour away. He wasn’t going to offer her a ride.
“I live too far away,” she answered softly, an appreciative smile tugging at her lips. “That’s okay, Agent Atwood. I’ll find a way.” She headed for the guard’s station.
Bryan’s cell phone rang. Before he could reach for it, Lexi was back standing beside him.
“Maybe that’s Agent Luna,” she said hopefully.
He looked at the display. The call was from their headquarters. He answered the phone. On the other end was the agent whom he’d asked to trace the calls to Lexi’s house.
“The call you asked about originated in Reno. It was made from a public phone at the intersection of Arlington and Liberty.”
“Hold on,” Bryan said into the phone and turning to Lexi. “Do you know anyone in Reno?”
She thought about that for a couple of seconds and shook her head. “I don’t think so. At least, not anyone that I’m close to.”
Bryan spoke into the phone again. “Anything else?”
“One thing,” the agent at the other end continued. “Since 1:14 a.m. our time, someone at an Express Copy store in Sparks, Nevada, has been repeatedly trying to fax Lexi Bradley’s number some documents. Our assumption is that either they’re trying to send a very long document, or that it’s a programmed machine and it keeps encountering some kind of problem with her unit at home.”
Bryan turned to Lexi. “Do you have a fax machine at home?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Do you know if it has paper in it?”
“It did…the last time I was home,” she answered. “Why?”
“Do people often send faxes to you at home?” he asked instead.
“Not really. Everything is usually sent to my practice. I only have it there for emergencies.”
“Is anyone staying at your house? Could they be expecting a fax?”
“No. What’s going on?”
It was not such a long shot to think that whoever had called Lexi to leave that warning about Juan might now be trying to fax her something. If his memory served, Sparks and Reno were only about ten miles apart.
“Call back the copy place in Sparks and get an ID on whoever it was that requested the job,” he ordered the other agent. “Call me back when you have a name.”
“What’s this all about?” Lexi asked again.
Juan’s computer and the contents of his desk at home had been taken by the local detectives on Monday. Lexi, though, wasn’t under investigation. Without a proper court order, they had no right to enter her house and confiscate or even look at any of her documents. Still, she’d been cooperating so far. Bryan considered whether checking those faxes would be worth the two or three hours of his time that it would take to drive her home and get back.
“Before I change my opinion of you, Agent Atwood,” she said sternly, “I want you to tell me what’s going on.”
Bryan had no problem being honest with her. “We might be chasing nothing, but someone from the same vicinity as the person who called you with the warning about your son has been trying to fax you something. I’d like to drive you home and, if it’s okay with you, take a look at what was sent. Of course, you can look at it first.”
She didn’t even take a second to mull over his request. “Where are you parked?”
~~~~
Chapter 18
Thursday January 17
West Seventy-sixth Street, New York
Curtis woke up with the cell phone vibrating under his pillow. His hand found the device, and he looked at the clock on the bedside table. It was 3:14 a.m.
He slid from under the covers and looked over his shoulder at his wife. She was turned away from him and snoring softly in her sleep. The phone stopped its vibration.
There was no voice mail setup for this one. There were no documents anywhere tracing it to him. The disposable phone was used only for one purpose.
He padded barefoot to the bathroom and closed the door. As he’d expected the phone started with its vibration again. Curtis didn’t bother with the light, but turned on the fan and sat on the edge of the tub.
“Yes?”
“The Nevada account is closed.”
He didn’t need a translator to tell him what that meant. The pang of sadness was unexpected. Mitch’s face, the way he remembered him some fifteen years ago, ran across his mind’s eye. His old partner was truly a genius, and those had been his best years. Those were the days when the man had poured his heart and soul into the project. Mitch had truly believed in what they were doing. He thought their experiments would begin a new chapter in the shaping of human intelligence. Their advances would expose a dimension that no one knew existed.
“Was there any paperwork?” Curtis asked.
“Boxes. He’d left them in a motel room. They were all destroyed per your instructions.”
It was not like Curtis to second-guess himself, but a thought occurred to him that perhaps it would have been better not to destroy the files. At least, not until he had a chance to look through them. It would have been a good thing to see what it was exactly that Mitch had saved. Also, how did he know that this constituted all of the remaining files?
; “How about the storage facility?” Curtis asked. “Could there be anything left?”
“We couldn’t get in. But I’m sorry to say there was a terrible accident at that facility. It’s burning to the ground as we speak.”
Curtis rubbed his forehead. His eyes were getting used to the dark. He stared at his image in the full-length mirror on the far wall. His back was bent. He looked like an old man. He cleared his voice and forced himself to focus.
“Any other instructions?” the voice asked.
“How about the clean up? You didn’t leave anybody behind, did you?”
“All taken care of. He was replaced with a…a clerk who happened to be available.”
“That’s good work,” Curtis said. They couldn’t find Mitch’s body on any murder scene. There was too much that tied the two of them together. “No short cuts. Is that clear?”
“You’re the boss.”
“What about the Connecticut account?” Curtis asked.
“We’re working on it as we speak.”
“Any leaks?”
“Nothing that we can’t take care of,” the man on the phone said confidently. “Everything should be cleared up by morning.”
This all sounded too easy to believe. It was far too good to be true.
“How about the Connecticut personnel?”
There was a pause on the line. Curtis cursed silently. He’d been right to assume that everything couldn’t be buried so tidily.
“The personnel there is being relocated.”
“Where to? And how the hell are you going to take care of it? That was part of the deal. We had…”
“Easy does it,” the other man warned.
Curtis didn’t appreciate the sharp tone.
“We’ll have a location as soon as they complete the move.”
“And then?” Curtis asked.
“I thought you told me you don’t want to know,” the man replied snidely.
Curtis Wells decided he didn’t like this man. There was a growing arrogance that was coming across loud and clear. He stood up.
“Just finish the job you’re being paid to do. I want all accounts settled by tomorrow.”
Ending the call, Curtis stood in the darkness and stared for a long time at the old man in the mirror across the bathroom.
~~~~
Chapter 19
Wickfield, Connecticut
The plows were clearly not keeping up with the heavy, wind-driven snow. Drifts were beginning to pile up, and visibility was minimal. It was like looking through a swirling black sea.
No one except them appeared to be crazy enough to be on the road. Lexi had given up her white knuckle hold of the door handle while they were still traveling west on Route 34, a winding road that passed alternately by wooded watershed areas, strip malls and old industrial-era neighborhoods. Bryan Atwood was a competent driver, and the SUV he was driving was practically a tank. He was also taking his time.
Neither of them talked. Sometime before they reached Route 8, Lexi started dozing off. He’d flipped on the switch for the heated car seat, and she felt the warmth seeping into her. This was the most comfortable she’d been since the last time she’d slept in a bed.
He was right. She was exhausted. Still, she couldn’t let her mind shut down for too long. Even as she dozed, nightmares about Juan haunted her.
In her mind’s eye, Lexi could see a teenager firing a gun at his classmates. But not even in the state of half sleep could she force herself to see her son’s face as the killer’s. In the next second, she was going through door after door in the hospital in pursuit of Juan’s gurney. But he was always just out of reach. Then, in the next instant, she was back at her house. Juan was there, lying in a bed in the corner of the living room. He was in a coma.
Suddenly fully awake, she stared at the wipers moving back and forth on the windshield. Lexi had been so wound up about what had taken place at Wickfield High School and how Juan was doing now, that she’d spent no time really contemplating their future. Life would never be the same as it had been for them. She was knowledgeable and realistic enough to know that if, by some miracle, he were found innocent of all crimes, she’d still never have Juan back the way he’d been. His mind, his motor skills, his level of activity—in addition to everything he’d accomplished socially and in the community—would be different. They would both have to cope with the changes, learn to live some new way of life.
She closed her eyes and fought back the new surge of emotions. This new layer of reality was as terrifying as all the rest of it.
Lexi forced herself to focus when she sensed the car was slowing down. They were stopping at Morris township, just south of Wickfield. He’d gotten off the highway somewhere and come up through Watertown. She’d missed that entirely. She looked at the dashboard clock, amazed how she’d lost track of time.
“I must have slept more than I thought,” she whispered.
“You really needed it.”
He’d shed his jacket. His tie was gone, and his shirt was rolled up to his elbows. She was surprised to find his missing jacket draped over her. She hadn’t really had anyone looking after her in the past…how many years? Probably never. The men in her life had mostly been in the “pre-Juan” days, and even then she’d always been able to take care of herself.
“Thank you,” she said, straightening her car seat more to an upright position and carefully folding his jacket.
“Don’t mention it.”
She looked over at him. Sitting behind the wheel, with the soft glow of lights from the dash displays on his face, he wasn’t as imposing as he’d been in the hospital. With his hair standing up in spots from running his hand through it, he looked far less fierce, though not exactly domesticated. Lexi remembered what he’d told her earlier about having children, so she forced her thoughts not to wander too far into the area of the personal. It was hard to imagine him with a family.
“I didn’t miss a call from Agent Luna, did I?” she asked.
“No. Not great cell service here. I’ll call him when we get to your house.”
“You guys don’t have super-duper, good anywhere, satellite service phones?”
He glanced at her, and she raised an eyebrow.
“Of course,” he replied, straight-faced. “But I left that phone and my laser weapon in my other jacket.”
She smiled and looked at the road ahead. “Seriously, I appreciate you calling for me.”
“Seriously, it’s no problem.”
She gave him the directions to where she lived. The roads were not good as they drove the last few miles to Wickfield. The SUV skidded once going down a steep hill, but he managed the corrections easily. Lexi lived at the end of a cul-de-sac not too close to anything and on top of a hill overlooking the town. She wondered if the SUV would be able to make it into the neighborhood.
The nap, if it could count as that, had done her a world of good. She’d learned during her residency after med school the value of a power nap. Lexi found herself thinking more clearly. The sense of desperation she’d been fighting was less now. She was already planning on a few things that needed to be done as soon as she got home. Calling Allan was at the top of her list. She needed to check on her sister-in-law Donna. It didn’t matter what time it was. Allan was used to his crazy sister calling him at all hours of the night.
Her stomach growled. Lexi couldn’t believe it. She was actually hungry.
He glanced at her. “Do you have any food at your house?”
“I’m a mother of a teenager. There’s always plenty to eat.”
As they approached the outskirts of town, she saw the flashing yellow lights of a township plow moving some hundred yards ahead. The road was clear here because of it.
They drove by her office, next to the Post Office. She didn’t point it out. They were at the height of the cold and flu season. Even on regular days and with Lexi there, they needed to overbook the appointments. She couldn’t even imagine how overworked every
one at the practice must have been this week.
She pushed that part of her life away, though, and focused on her son.
“Did Agent Gardner tell you about what we thought we saw on Juan’s MRI?” she asked him.
“Yes, he did.”
“They were going to run some more imaging tests on him at Yale-New-Haven to see what exactly we were looking at. Hopefully, they’ll do that in Baltimore.”
“I’m sure they will. They’ll give him the best care possible.”
Lexi couldn’t believe she’d thought poorly of Agent Atwood at first. “Thank you for saying that. It’s hard for me to think of him so far away, even for tonight.”
He sent her a sideways glance.
“I believe whatever it is that we could see in Juan’s brain is the cause for the way he acted this past Monday,” she told him.
He neither agreed nor denied her claim, and Lexi thought that was a very positive step. Perhaps she wasn’t grasping at straws. Perhaps they were already considering that themselves.
“Have you run across any cases of illegal experiments being done on young children?”
He stopped at a stop sign at the green. This was the very center of town. He turned to look at her. “What makes you think what he has implanted in his brain was done illegally?”
“It had to be. Why they would hide it?” She looked into his eyes. “And it did happen before I got him.”
“I believe you.”
“Turn right here.”
The plow had gone straight, and even though this road was a main thoroughfare, it didn’t appear to have been plowed in some time. The SUV powered its way through.
“Look, Agent Atwood, something is very strange. I’m a doctor; I looked at Juan’s medical records with a fine tooth comb during and after the adoption process. There was nothing about it anywhere. There was no record of any hospitalization immediately after birth. He’s had no surgery, whatsoever, since the adoption. That means whatever they did to him before was never documented. Now, why would someone do that?”