“Like I said, a nice toy. How much?”
“These things are like hen’s teeth, sir. The waiting list is a mile long, and how can you put a price on this kind of quality?” He stroked the barrel with one hand. “There are only two of them exactly like this in all the world.”
“Let’s try, shall we? How much?”
“Well, with our discount, a hair over five thousand dollars each.”
“That actually sounds pretty reasonable.” Then, knowing Julio for all the years he’d known him, he said, “A ‘hair over’ you said. How thick a hair we talking about?”
“Call it three thousand and change,” Julio said. He grinned.
“What? For eight thousand dollars, this beast had better dance and whistle ‘Dixie,’ Lieutenant!”
“Well, I wouldn’t know about that, sir. But EDM Arms guarantees one-minute-of-angle accuracy at a thousand meters right out of the box.”
Howard raised his eyebrows at that. “One MOA? Guaranteed?”
“Just as you see it. I thought that would get your attention. But that’s only to keep the lawyers happy. EDM Arms has got verified five-round groups at a thousand meters of one-half MOA. They say they got a couple groups that good at seventeen hundred meters, even a little longer.”
Howard looked at the weapon again. “Good Lord. That’s a tack-driver.”
“Yes, sir. And Bowens, our newly recruited ex-Army shooter, has been doing just that with this very piece, starting yesterday. Talking about a pie-plate-sized group from a mile away. He didn’t want to let me take it long enough to show it to you.”
Howard grinned.
“So, come next month, Net Force’s little piece of the National Guard is going to shoot the living asses off the Navy, the Marines, and the Army.”
“If one of them doesn’t get his hands on the other one,” Howard said.
Julio grinned real big.
Howard stared at him. “You didn’t.”
“Well, sir, yes, sir, I did. If something broke on this here weapon—highly unlikely, I know, given the fine, fine quality, but if something did break—we’d want proper backup, wouldn’t we?”
Howard shook his head. “I’ll have to beat the budget to cover this.”
“Not the way I figure it. We do it right, we can make our costs on side bets. I can get three to one against us, easy. I wouldn’t be surprised to even make a small profit.”
They both grinned at that.
“Anyway, I thought you might like to take it to the outdoor range and put a few through it. That is, if you aren’t too busy here.” He looked around.
“You missed your calling, Lieutenant. You should have been a comedian.”
“Yes, sir, I believe I could have sparkled in such a profession.”
Howard looked at the weapon. Why not? He didn’t have anything better to do.
“You coming along?”
“No, sir, I have diaper duty, starting in—” he looked at his watch “—forty-six minutes. Best I not be late.”
Howard chuckled. “No, I understand. It has been a while since I had such duty myself, but one cannot stress the importance of it enough.”
“If one’s wife is Lieutenant Joanna Winthrop Fernandez, one can sure as hell stress it high, wide, and repeatedly,” Julio said. “You want me to show you how to break it down? Where the cartridges go?”
“I believe I can manage on my own, thank you.”
“Have fun.”
“Oh, you, too.”
“Yeah, right.”
Howard looked at the rifle after Julio was gone. Well, why not? He was the commander of Net Force’s military, he ought to know how the hardware worked, right? It was training. He could justify that,
Besides, blowing holes in a target three-quarters of a mile away sure beat sitting here doing zip.
The Texas Panhandle, North of Amarillo
Jay Gridley walked along the trail, cutting sign. This was an exercise Saji had taught him when he’d been recovering from his electronically induced stroke, how to track somebody. A bent twig here, a blade of grass lying there, the signs were there if you knew how to look.
In the real world, he was backtracking e-sig, net and phone and globeSat connections, but here, he was after a bad man on foot, Hans, a notorious drug seller.
It was hot, and Jay paused to take a swig of tepid water from his canteen, the fabric of which was wet to allow some small cooling from evaporation. He thought that was a nice touch, even though he wasn’t sharing the scenario with anybody. Those little things counted. Anybody could plug off-the-shelf view- or feelware into their computer and walk through VR; a pro had higher standards.
He took off his broad-brimmed planter’s hat, wiped his sweaty forehead with a red bandanna, replaced the hat, and stuck the handkerchief back into his pocket.
There, just ahead, he saw something. Or rather, he didn’t see something. He bent and looked at the hot ground from only a few inches above it. There weren’t any real tracks, but the dry ground was too smooth. Carpet-walker, turned and headed that way.
Jay kept walking. Ahead and in a little declivity was a stand of cottonwood trees and what looked like willow. Water, a pond, or an underground stream come up to the surface, he figured. He could almost smell the moisture.
Sure enough, there was a small stream, maybe as wide as Jay was tall, clear water bubbling over a rocky bottom. The stream wound away, and Jay stepped into the water and started to follow it. A man looking to hide his tracks would use such cover, probably staying with it until he found a rocky enough spot to exit where he wouldn’t leave footprints.
Jay enjoyed the feel of the water around his ankles as he moved slowly along. Half a mile ahead, he paused. There, to the right, were six or eight big rocks leading to a patch of gravel. That’s where he’d leave the water, if he wanted to get back on his previous heading.
It took him more than a hundred yards before he spotted something. Another flat patch of dirt, too smooth. There were no wind riffle marks, no raindrop patterns, none of the natural weathering signs that ought to be there. Jay grinned. Bad man Hans had been here; he was sure of it.
In the distance, Jay saw a small village. That it had a Germanic look to it didn’t really fit the Texas panhandle, but it was okay to mix scenario now and then. It kept you from getting into a rut.
He’d bet diamonds against dog doo that Hans was in that village, smug in his belief that nobody could track him there.
Why didn’t these fools ever learn they couldn’t screw with Lonesome Jay Gridley? Must be some kind of genetic defect that ran in bad guys.
He picked up his pace a little. He didn’t need to worry about the signs now, he knew where Hans was. All he had to do was go and identify him. Once he was sure of that, the game would be over.
30
Washington, D.C.
Toni felt terrific. She and Alex had a great night together, and when she awakened this morning, she’d been rested and much refreshed. Being able to help him with the case he was working on, that had been something, too. For a few moments there, she hadn’t felt totally useless. She hadn’t lost all her chops. Maybe that was a good sign.
After Alex left for work, she felt creative. She decided to go and work on her scrimshaw for a while.
At the bench, she turned on the gooseneck lamp, gathered her tools, and was about to get started when she saw the purple capsule lying there where she’d put it and forgotten all about it.
She reached for the cap, looked at it, and decided what the hell, as long as she had it in hand ...
She put the cap on the table in her work field and adjusted the lamp to shine on it. Focused the stereoscope on it...
Ah. Here was a major discovery. It was a purple gelatin capsule with some kind of pale powder inside it. Oh, boy. Way to go, Sherlock.
Maybe something inside was more interesting. If she opened it very carefully ...
“Shit!” she said, as the powder, which was a kind of bubble gum pin
k, spilled all over the table. She dropped the halves of the cap and grabbed a little paint brush she used for dusting the ivory. She swept the pink powder into a little pile, then onto a sheet of paper. There it was.
As she picked up the larger of the now mostly empty capsule segments to reload the powder, she noticed an odd strip of coloration on one end, just inside the edge. Hmm. What was that?
She held the cap under the scope, couldn’t quite make it out. It looked almost like some kind of pattern. Well, we’ll see about that. She put the cap down, removed the auxiliary lens, and brought the scope’s magnification to 10X. Let’s have another look, shall we?
Jesus! What was that? She fiddled with the light, turned the cap this way, then that, and got the shadows just right so she could make it out.
Etched into the material of the cap were tiny words. “Hi, Feebs! Want to find me? Ask Frankie and Annette’s grandkids, they know where! Sincerely Yours, Thor.”
Hello!
She reached for the phone on the end of the bench. She had to get Alex. He was going to want to hear about this.
Newport Beach, California
The restaurant, Claudia’s Grill, was half a block off the highway and slightly up the hill, so it had a nice view of the water. Drayne pulled his Mercedes into the parking lot, gave the key to the attendant and got a parking stub, then went inside. It was three minutes to seven, and the place was pretty full. They served a good breakfast here, and it was a great location.
His father sat alone in a booth, staring out through a wall of glass at the Pacific, the waters already changing from gray to blue as the sun began to burn off the morning fog.
“Hello, Dad.”
“Robert.”
Drayne slid into the booth. “What’s up?”
“Let’s order first.”
The waitress came by. Drayne ordered poached eggs, chicken apple sausage, and whole-grain pancakes. His father asked for white toast, corn flakes, and decaf coffee.
When she was gone to put their order in, his father cleared his throat. He said, “I’m glad your mother isn’t alive to see what you’ve become.”
Drayne stared at him as if his father had just sprouted fangs and fur and might start baying like a werewolf. “What?”
“How stupid do you think I am, Robert? Did it never occur to you that thirty years with the Bureau might have taught me something?”
“What are you talking about?”
“PolyChem Products,” his father said.
Drayne felt his belly spasm, as if he had just gone over the big drop on a roller coaster. “What about it?”
His father looked disgusted. “There is no ‘it.’ It’s a paper corporation, a phantom. The bank records, the history, none of it is any deeper than a postage stamp. You thought I might look at it, but not too closely, didn’t you? You are PolyChem Products.”
Drayne couldn’t think of anything to say. He was cold, as if he had suddenly found himself shoved headfirst into a refrigerator. He’d never expected this.
The old man looked away from him, out at the ocean again. He said, “I have friends, boy, people who owe me favors. I know where you live, and I know you live well, but I also know that you don’t have any visible way of earning money. So that means you are into something illegal or immoral. Probably both. From the way you talked about admiring that criminal who assaulted the agents and staff at HQ recently, I surmise it probably has something to do with drugs.”
“Dad—”
His old man turned back to face him, held up his hand to silence him, and in that moment, he was Special Agent in Charge Rickover Drayne of old, steely-eyed and fierce, one of the most stalwart protectors of the republic. “Don’t say anything. I don’t want to hear about it, I don’t want to know about it. You’re an adult; you can make your own choices. I expected better of you, that’s all.”
Drayne lost it: “You expected me to turn into a fucking robot without feelings who would grow up to be just like you.” He was amazed at the sudden venom in his voice. “You wanted a carbon copy of yourself to send forth, a grown-up Boy Scout who was trustworthy, loyal, friendly, obedient, who would cog his way into the system and stay there smiling until he wore out, just like you. You never once asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up or cared what I thought about anything.”
The old man blinked at him. “I wanted the best for you—”
“Your best! What you thought I should be! Face it, Dad, you were always too busy saving the country from the forces of evil to give a shit what I did, as long as I kept my grades up, my room clean, and I didn’t bother you.”
“Robert—”
“Jesus fucking Christ, listen to yourself! Everybody in the world calls me Bobby except for you! I asked you to do that a hundred times! You didn’t listen. You never listened.”
Nobody said anything for a long time. Finally, Drayne said, “So, what are you going to do? Give my name to your friends who owe you favors? Have them investigate me?”
The old man shook his head. “No.”
“No? Why? Because I’m your son and you love me? Or because you wouldn’t want your old FBI chums to know your son was anything less than the soul of respectability?”
The old man was spared whatever answer he might have made as the waitress returned with their breakfast. Drayne had never felt less like eating in his life, but both he and the old man smiled at her.
When she was gone, the old man said, “You can think whatever you want. You... You’re a brilliant man, son. Smarter than I ever was. I always knew that. You could have gone into legitimate business and made a fortune. You could have been somebody important.”
“What makes you think I can’t do that now?”
“Oh, you could. I don’t think you want to. You were always more interested in pulling my chain than anything else, weren’t you?”
And I still am, Drayne was smart enough to realize. But he didn’t want the old man to walk away with any kind of victory, no way, so he said, “No. All I wanted was to get your attention. Any attention, good or bad, was better than indifference. That’s what you gave me, Dad. Indifference. So now you finally notice me, enough to bust my balls. Thank you so fucking much. You want to turn me in for being a criminal, go ahead. I don’t care.” And if you do turn me in, I win, he thought.
Drayne stood, dropped a fifty on the table, and said, “I’m not hungry, but you enjoy your breakfast. It’s a long drive back to Arizona. Give my regards to the dog.”
Drayne turned and stalked off. Dramatic, but he’d made worse exits. Let the old bastard chew on that for a while.
Once he was in his car, he realized how shaken he was. Even after all the years of layering scar tissue and callus over it, on some level, he still cared what the old man thought of him. Amazing to realize that.
Tad couldn’t sleep. He was topped off with enough drugs to put a stadium full of rabid football fans into a trance, but his mind wouldn’t go down.
He had taken a hot shower. He had tried to blank his mind. He had gotten up and eaten another phenobarb, and while he was so stoned he could hardly move, he was no way about to sleep, and he needed that, bad.
Bobby had told him about the new operations plan, the safe house, moving the money, and wanting to hire some armed muscle to ride shotgun. Tad had shrugged that off. Whatever Bobby wanted was fine. Tad had made some calls. Some guys were coming by to see Bobby later, shooters who didn’t care who they cooked, long as the money was good. It wouldn’t cramp things here, they had five bedrooms, plenty of space. Bobby was thinking he could post one as a lookout, have him watching the road, scanning police radios, shit like that. Somebody came calling, they’d hit the beach before the visitors got to the door, jog a ways down to the parking lot where his car was already parked, ready to roll. Could maybe leave another ride in the opposite direction, at the bed-and-breakfast place, slip the owner a few bucks for parking. Maybe even have a jet ski or something, take to the ocean. Maybe rig a bomb to the front
gate or something.
Bobby got into the details of stuff like this, and once he did, he covered it pretty fine.
Tad didn’t think it was gonna come to that, but that last biz had put the fear of God into Bobby a little, so that was cool, whatever.
Tad went out on the deck, sprawled in the padded lounge chair, lit a cigarette, and blew smoke at the ocean. The wind blew it back in his face, and he smiled at that. Bunnies in thong bikinis jogged past, guys with tans dark as walnuts, all going about their boring lives. Tad waved at them, some of them waved back. Jesus.
A helicopter zipped by a few hundred feet up, probably looking for people caught in the rip and pulled out beyond the surf. Welcome to the Promised Land, folks. Sun, water, beautiful people, even airborne lifeguards to make sure you don’t venture too far away from paradise by accident.
Tad finished the cigarette, ground the butt out on the arm of the chair, then snapped it out toward the water using his thumb and middle finger. This was what his life had come to: There was the Hammer, and then there was waiting for a chance to grab the Hammer; that was it.
Except for the waiting part, it was okay.
He leaned back and watched the seagulls wheel and work the uncertain air currents over the beach, diving and rolling, sometimes hovering almost still against the force of the wind. Some real intricate patterns there, those flights.
The aerobatic dance of the gulls was what finally lulled him to sleep.
31
Net Force HQ, Quantico, Virginia
Michaels said, “Mean anything to you?”
Jay shook his head. “Nope, not right off, but I’ve turned the searchbots loose on it. I should be getting a first-hit list any moment.”
Howard came into the conference room. “Sorry I’m late. I had to park in the secured lot. There’s some, ah, hardware I was checking out locked in the trunk of my agency car I didn’t have time to return yet. I wouldn’t want to lose it.”