by Drew Murray
Decker’s not without his gifts, and one of them is a staggering attention to detail. Hideously annoying if he’s reviewing your paperwork, it’s a critical talent when it comes to things like watching boring video on high speed. It’s a skill he would find very useful in Counter Intelligence where they’ll watch targets for days, weeks, and months on end.
One of the external cameras catches a view of the intersection at the corner. Playing back footage from the middle of the night revealed more people around than you might have expected, but nothing out of the ordinary to me. Not Decker. He caught something in the traffic. A city bus. At 4:00 a.m. by the time stamp. In a city this size, that’s long after transit’s been shut down. Unless someone stole a bus and took it for a joyride last night, the video’s been tampered with.
Whoever altered it was good. Me good. A brief hiccup in the building Wi-Fi after midnight didn’t disrupt the hardwired cameras, but it did temporarily drop the connection to the workstations in the office. Sometime after that, the looped video began.
When I last saw Decker, he was leaning even heavier on the guard to tell him who tampered with the system. There’s no way he’ll know anything about that, but with Decker’s attention focused on him, I slipped away.
Now that I’m back at the hotel with the first sips of coffee already easing my headache, I check in for the night. Also, something I’d rather do without Decker looking over my shoulder.
The front desk already has a reservation under my name. It appears Decker made it when he arrived in the morning.
I slip a folded $100 between my driver’s license and credit card before handing them over. How this plays out depends on geography. In a big city like New York, they check the amount openly, thank me, and then offer free Wi-Fi, breakfast, or a stack of coffee coupons. Here, the bubbly young clerk with a name tag that says Loretta slides the bill away quickly under the keyboard and hits me with a broad smile.
Typical Decker; embracing Bureau modesty has reserved a “traditional” something or other. I ask if she has a suite available. I left the Valley behind for a greater purpose, but that doesn’t mean I need to leave the comforts behind too. She glances at the $100 bill peeking out from under her keyboard, then taps around on the computer for a while.
“All we have left is the Presidential Suite. And with the hotel booked, the upgrade cost is pretty high, Agent Parker.”
Special Agent. Why is this so hard?
I ask her how much, and she drops a big number for being outside a big city. Waving it away, with a warm smile of my own, I tell her the rate is fine, and she can keep it.
Her face lights up like a ray of sunshine after a day of rain. From under the counter she produces a box of brand-new yoga mats. “These are from the wellness weekend package, but you can have one, if you want!”
Yoga sounds like just what the guru ordered. I pick a green one.
Loretta’s finishing up the paperwork when Storm Decker rolls into the lobby. He spots me immediately at the counter and blows over my way, arriving just in time to hear Loretta just explain where to find the Presidential Suite. It’s a measure of how tired he is that he leans on the counter. In order to lean, you have to bend your back. I wasn’t sure he could do that.
“Presidential Suite?” says Decker. “Bureau won’t pay for that.”
“Bureau doesn’t have to. I travel on my own dime.”
“Must be nice.”
“Yes. It is. Anything else from the guard?”
“Nothing,” says Decker with obvious disappointment on his face.
“Too bad,” I say, lifting up my brand-new roll of green foam. “I need to recharge my chakra. Loretta here just gave me this sweet new mat, so I’m going to do some yoga.”
This isn’t about my chakra, but some part of me can’t resist the urge to poke Decker.
Decker looks at me in horror as if I’d said I was going to rob a bank. “Did you say yoga? We’re on the clock, Parker. You’re the one that said this is over on Sunday.”
“The physical calm of yoga enhances clarity of mind,” is all I say to Decker. “It only takes a few minutes.”
My dad was an engineer at Hewlett-Packard. When I was really young, he told me the reason people often fail at a task is because they don’t place a high enough value on thought. He said one of the best things I could do to succeed, at anything, was to schedule time to think. This is that time.
“Where are you going to be doing this?” he asks. Good question.
“We’ve got a small gym,” offers Loretta, “but you know what? It’s a really nice night, and there’s a park right across the street that runs along the river. There’s plenty of room on the lawn, and the view is great. I go there after work sometimes.” She twirls her hair around her finger.
“There you go,” I say looking at Decker. “Problem solved.”
“Yeah, well, while you’re sitting on the lawn,” he says, “I’m going upstairs to fill out our daily report.”
“Give my regards to Burke.”
“I’d really rather not.”
The park Loretta pointed me to overlooks a wide, shallow river. The water sparkles in the late afternoon sun, reflecting hints of green from beneath the surface. There’s enough current that you can hear it burble around large rocks in between the sounds of traffic.
A white railing follows the edge of the water, adjacent to a black tarmac path. To my right is a wide paved area, filled with concrete benches currently being attacked by kids on skateboards. There are a couple of food carts at the side: hot dogs and ice cream. A dozen or more people enjoy their snacks as they mill about, taking in the view. A few of them are from the Con, still dressed in their costumes, but there are a fair number of people in street clothes as well. To my left, the path disappears from view behind a stand of mature trees and neatly manicured greenery.
It’s a warm late-summer evening and while the sun is well past its peak for the day, it’s still shining brightly. In the center of a patch of lush green grass, I sit with my legs crossed on the yoga mat, dressed in a pair of loose Lululemon shorts and my favorite Under Armor t-shirt. I’ve just finished a yoga routine I’ve practiced many times before, and settle in to meditate, allowing my mind to relax, focusing on my breathing.
I believe my mind capable of doing just as much work subconsciously as consciously. When I reach a state of calm, new ideas and insights flow around me like the water in the river. First come the questions. Who killed Caplan? Where is the Fukushima Unicorn? Is it even really here? What if Dragoniis did get his hands on it? Is Hicks just a bidder or something more? How is Farber tied into the murder and theft? Who hacked the security system? For now, I push all of it from my conscious mind, trusting my subconscious to churn through it.
I breathe deeply. In. Out. In. Out. The traffic calms behind me, waiting at a red light. I hear the river flowing. A child’s laugh wafts into my ears from the direction of the ice cream cart.
My phone vibrates with a staccato pattern on my thigh. Something’s wrong. It’s unfamiliar; it’s just rapid short vibrations that don’t stop. That shouldn’t be. I always set my phone to do not disturb while I’m meditating. I know all the numbers allowed to pass through and their vibration patterns. This isn’t one of them.
Opening my eyes, I’m momentarily blinded by the afternoon sunlight. When my vision clears, I see a notification on my phone. The sender is “Caplan, R” followed by a phone number, and the message says, “DON’T LET THEM GET IT.”
Caplan? I’m about to reach down and unlock it when I hear a woman scream. For the length of a heartbeat I think of Kate Mason and the way Sterling silenced her.
Snapping my head toward the sound, I spot Loretta from the hotel. She’s dressed in casual clothes now, one hand covering her mouth in terror, and the other outstretched. A few yards ahead of her on the path from the road are Miller and Dana, headed my way. Miller’s holding the black Pelican case. Dana is pointing at me.
A tall, broad-shou
ldered man in a shiny gray suit and a black open-necked shirt is coming up behind them. Loretta’s finger points at the black semi-automatic in his right hand.
Miller and Dana don’t see him coming.
They’re turning toward Loretta’s scream, but too slowly. He’ll get to them first. I can’t stop whatever’s going to go down from happening. All I can do is be ready for what comes next. I scramble for the Glock I brought stashed in my hotel laundry bag, at the same time rolling up onto my knees.
The gunman grabs the handle of the Pelican case with his free hand, driving his shoulder into Miller’s chest. To his credit, Miller doesn’t let go. He jerks the case backwards, pulling the gunman with it. Dana pivots, taking a step back, reaching for her pistol.
The gunman doesn’t hesitate. He raises the semi-automatic and fires two rounds into Miller’s chest at point blank range. Miller lets go of the case, collapsing to the ground. The gunman slides his aim over to Dana. Her hand grasps her Smith and Wesson, but too late. He fires a single round into her chest.
Dana goes down.
I leap to my feet, leveling my Glock at the gunman, but I’m too far away. There’s movement behind him. Cars. Pedestrians. Too many people. I can’t fire. I’ll miss. I’ll kill someone.
“FBI, freeze!” I shout as loud as I can without letting my voice slip into a scream, just as I’ve been trained. I run toward them, pistol in front of me.
The gunman jerks around and looks in my direction, lifting his arm. I can’t return fire, so I dodge, diving and rolling to my right behind a steel garbage can.
Two rounds slam into it, the sharp sound of their impacts followed by a reverberating gong. When no more shots follow, I lean out to look around. The gunman’s broken into a sprint, racing toward the path that disappears downriver, beyond a stand of trees. I still have no shot. There are just too many people around. If I couldn’t hit him before when he was standing still, I’m definitely not going to hit him now.
I take two strides in pursuit and then stop. Miller and Dana.
Do I help them, or do I go after the case and the shooter? This is why I wanted the case. This is the lead I was looking for. The closest I’ve been to the Unicorn since the tsunami.
I can’t leave Lopez and Miller.
I shout an obscenity, lowering my gun and running toward where Dana and Miller lie on the ground. Already a pool of blood is forming under Miller. A bad sign. But Dana is moving, rolling over onto her stomach and propping herself up on her elbows. She sees me coming and waves me off. I can’t hear her, but I see her mouth the word “go.”
I pivot again, and take off full speed toward where the gunman vanished down the path. I’m fast and it only takes me seconds to reach the tarmac. Spotting him ahead, I put the hammer down, running hard, gun at my side for safety. The tall man isn’t as fast, especially not with the bulky case swinging off his hand.
He glances back, seeing me on his tail. The path is crawling with people taking in the clear weather and scenic view. He shoulders his way into a group of soft, middle-aged men, knocking one of them down. The others stop to tend to him, blocking the path.
I shout at them to get out of the way, but they don’t move, braying like donkeys until I yell “FBI!” That, combined with the gun at my side, convinces them to part, clearing a path for me to leap over the one on the ground.
The gunman cuts left into the woods, disappearing quickly into the dense brush. I lean in, bringing out every last ounce of speed I have, my bare feet pounding the pavement.
Reaching where he turned off, I plow right in after him. This is a mistake. The ground is old leaves and spiked twigs covering sharp rocks. My bare feet immediately betray me, throwing off my balance.
The gunman’s waiting for me behind a tree. Fortunately, I’m already mid-fall when he fires and I feel the shot go over my head. Hitting the ground, the Glock slips out of my hand.
I’m not out of surprises yet. After giving up on the Fukushima Unicorn, fate led me to the dojo of an old grand-master of Okinawa-te karate. For the next eight months, I trained all out, every day. I may not have found atonement, but I did learn how to fight. Hand-to-hand is my wheelhouse.
From a coiled position on the ground, I leap up at the gunman, raining a rapid flurry of blows on his head and shoulders. Instinctively, he raises his hands. Exactly what I wanted. I grab the hand holding the gun, adjusting my grip as I wrench it to the side. When I find the right place, I squeeze as hard as I can, my fingers clamping down like narrow vice-grips on a nerve center. Opening against his will, his hand drops the semi-auto to the ground.
I lower my attack, slamming my open hand into the side of his rib cage, following through with my shoulders, to put my entire upper body weight into it. But he’s a big guy, and he takes the punch with a stoic “oomph,” raising his knee to kick. Turning my hips, I lift my leg to block, but it never connects. His knee was a ruse, and he stomps down instead on my bare foot, crushing it between his boot and a rock.
The pain is intense. The shock of it distracts me for a second, and that’s all he needs. He leans forward, slamming me with his chest. My foot still pinned under his, I can’t readjust my stance and I fall. Pulling my shoulder in, I manage to roll without hitting another of those sharp rocks. I brace for a follow-up attack that never comes. Instead, he makes a run for it with the case. Scrambling up, I chase after him.
Using his size and brute force to clear a path, he crashes through the brush. Branches, some as wide around as my wrist, snap back behind him, slapping me in the face. I dodge and weave as best I can, but he still breaks out of the trees ahead of me.
A horn blares as we emerge down the street from the hotel. A big black Mercedes idles at the curb, back door open. A man leans out, waving to the gunman, shouting something I don’t understand. I recognize his face from the hotel security video. It’s the man that followed Caplan up to his room.
Normally I’d have no trouble chasing down this guy on open ground. But my crushed, bare foot is roaring in pain with each stride. I can only ignore so much. The limp slows me down. He’s going to make it to the car.
A figure streaks in from the left, blindsiding the gunman with a flying tackle. As they tumble to the ground, I realize it’s Dana. Having followed the commotion of our chase from the street, she must have anticipated his escape route.
“Out of the car, now!” I shout at the Mercedes. “FBI! Get out of that car!”
The man from the video reaches forward and shouts something else I can’t make out. With a roar from the V8 engine, the Mercedes leaps ahead, door still open, tires chirping on the pavement as the traction control kicks in. I catch a glimpse of one of those tinted plastic covers obscuring the license plate before the car shoots off down the road, weaving around a city bus and vanishing from view.
Dana is wrestling with the gunman, who’s still trying to get to his feet. I drop my knee into his back, and with our combined weight, he stays down. Dana grabs his arms, producing handcuffs and snapping them into place with the smooth grace of someone who’s done it hundreds of times before. She grabs a handful of hair at the back of his head, jerking it back and eliciting a choked cry from her captive.
“What the fuck is your deal?” she demands. “You’re under arrest.”
The gunman is gasping, like he’s trying to say something. Dana eases her grip.
“Lawyer,” he coughs out.
“Eat shit,” says Dana, releasing her grip and letting his head slam forward into the ground.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
At the police station, faces are grim, including my own, as the consequences of the shooting by the river unfold. My reason for getting the Pelican case was to use it as a decoy, but I hadn’t expected the response to be that immediate, or violent. I should have had Dana keep it under wraps, but if I’d told her my plan, she might not have let me have it. Now Miller and Dana have paid the price for my mistake.
Miller’s one lucky dude. Crime techs in this city, like most
, don’t wear body armor in the field. Why would they? They don’t show up until the shooting’s done.
Three factors put him in the ICU instead of the morgue: the shooter missed his heart; the round was a non-expanding, full metal jacket; and the first person at his side was an Emergency Room doctor who’d been at the food carts enjoying the river park after work.
Dana, on the other hand, was wearing a vest, which stopped the bullet. Even so, there’s enough energy in a 9mm to bruise ribs, despite the armor. Word from the hospital is that she popped a couple of Tylenol before forcefully insisting on getting back to work.
If I’d been able to warn them even a few seconds earlier, things might have been different. But there wasn’t time, even with the mysterious message appearing on my phone.
The message came in with Caplan’s name. Since I don’t have Caplan in my contacts, that means it was sent with SMS spoofing. Whoever sent it has strong tech skills. They must have been there, watching me as I went through my yoga routine in the park. When they saw the gunman arrive, they sent the warning.
Any serious bidder for the Unicorn knows its history, and knows I’m connected to it by the deal at CastorNet. I’m not exactly a low-profile person, but it makes me uncomfortable to know someone was following me. For the moment, I don’t have to worry about that, here in the station.
It troubles me that the message came in on my iPhone. How did they find my number? My Bureau phone number’s out there, printed right on my business cards. My personal number, on the other hand, I only share with known contacts.
Until I know how that happened, I’m not going to say anything about the message. The last thing I need is Decker not letting me out of his sight, even if it’s for my own safety. Though, I am going to have to keep looking over my shoulder.
When Dana comes in, I’m trapped in a conference room with Decker, on the phone with FBI Headquarters in Washington. She’s wearing the same shirt she had on this afternoon, complete with a bullet hole and scorch marks. She looks pissed. Cops part in front of her like a school of tuna in front of a shark.