by David Archer
Sarah grinned at her. “Are you kidding? We’re having pizza. I’m still recovering from the trip to get here; I don’t feel like doing a lot of cooking tonight.” She got up and opened the freezer, then pulled out four of the frozen pizzas that were inside. “I’ve got three supremes and one pepperoni. That cover everybody?”
“Works for me,” Neil said, and Kate echoed him. Sarah set the twin built-in ovens to preheat and started opening boxes. “Rex, I made iced tea. It’s in the fridge.”
Noah got up and grabbed her for a quick kiss, then searched through the cabinets until he found a glass. He turned around and looked at Kate before he opened the refrigerator. “Sis? Want some tea?”
She held up a glass that was sitting in front of her and rattled the ice cubes in it. “Already had some,” she said, “but I could use a refill.”
Noah got the pitcher out of the refrigerator and poured for her, then refilled Sarah’s glass, as well. Neil had a bottle of beer in front of him, so Noah poured himself a glass of tea before sitting back down at the table.
“So,” Neil said, “you said you know who all the lieutenants are?”
Noah nodded, then looked at him and started reciting the list of names. Neil had opened a notepad and typed them in as he rattled them off.
Kate’s eyebrows rose on a couple of the names. “Geez,” she said, “I never would have guessed they were involved with Morgan. This thing is even bigger than I imagined.” Her face took on a pained expression. “And do you—are you going to have to kill them all?”
Noah nodded. “I’m afraid those are my orders,” he said. “I can’t leave any of the lieutenants to try to rebuild the organization.”
Kate shook her head. “That’s a pity,” she said. “Leanne and Heather—they’ve got kids. If I wasn’t so sure you know exactly what you’re doing, I don’t think I could believe they were part of this mess. I’ve known both of them for, well, pretty much as long as I’ve been here. Heather recruited me to help run a benefit for a couple of local kids who were hurt in a car accident last fall. Until tonight, I would’ve said she was just your average housewife.”
“Average housewives can get sucked into something that makes a lot of money, too,” Sarah said. “I—I used to know this girl. She and her father were professional car thieves, but they were both pretty nice people as far as anybody else knew. You just never can tell, you know?”
“There have been pretty nice people,” Neil said solemnly, “who have murdered their friends because somebody found out what kind of weird stuff they were really into. Think about how many serial killers have been arrested, and the neighbors all say they can’t believe it, he was such a nice guy, all that crap.”
Noah nodded. “Unfortunately, they’re right. If your friend Heather knew who you were, she’d probably be one of the first to tell Morgan, and she’d be fully aware that she was signing your death warrant when she did it. These people will kill, or arrange for someone else to kill, in order to protect the secret of what they do, no matter how nice you might think they are in their public lives. That’s precisely why DOJ decided it was time to call us in. Too many people have already died so Jimmy Morgan can keep his secrets and his money, and far too many others have been threatened. Once I’m done here, I suspect you’ll see an awful lot of cops and prosecutors being rounded up.”
“Of course,” Kate said. “They won’t have Morgan to protect them anymore. And as much as I might not like seeing those kids become motherless, I completely understand why you have to do what you have to do.” She looked at her glass for a moment, then looked up at Noah again. “Can I ask how you’ll do it?”
“No. I’m afraid that goes higher than your clearance allows.”
Kate nodded, then took a big drink from her glass of tea. “No problem. Not sure I really want to know, anyway.”
They sat around the table and talked until the pizza was done, and then Sarah suggested they carry it into the living room and find a movie. Noah traded his glass for a bottle of beer on the way, and Sarah handed him the remote. He scrolled through the satellite channel selections and settled on an old Schwarzenegger film called Raw Deal.
The movie was about a small-town sheriff who was recruited by the government to infiltrate a Mafia organization in Chicago, where he had to pose as a hit man. Kate laughed when she figured out what was going on in the film and told Noah she thought it was rather appropriate.
“It’s one of my old favorites,” he replied. “I just never thought I’d have to play the part in real life.”
“Yeah,” Kate said, “I suppose not.”
They ate as they sat through the movie, and then Kate said she had to go home and get some sleep. Noah, Sarah, and Neil walked out onto the porch with her and then waved as she drove away.
“I got a message while the movie was playing,” Neil said. “Molly talked to Wally, and the phones will be ready in about four days, all of them. They’ll come in a big box, all at once, overnight shipment.”
Noah nodded. “That’ll be good. This thing is going a lot faster than I expected, but with everything going on with Monique, I think that might be a good thing. Did you relay up the list of names?”
“Yeah,” Neil said as they went back into the living room. “My only question is how big a mess it’s going to make if you blow them all up at once. It’s like you said, there’s enough conspiracy theories floating around as it is—do our bosses honestly think a couple dozen criminals can all die from an exploding cell phone without people wondering if the government wasn’t behind it?”
Noah thought for a moment, then looked at Neil. “Any idea what brand these phones are? I hate to ruin some phone company, and I know some of them have had issues with batteries blowing up and such in the past.”
Neil chuckled. “They were actually made in China, or at least the electronics are. Once they blow up, there’s not going to be enough left to identify, anyway, so it’s not likely anybody will realize they were all the same kind.”
“Some people will,” Noah said. “Some of these people have wives, girlfriends, husbands. They’ll know, but as long as there isn’t a particular brand on them, it shouldn’t make a lot of difference.”
“That’s a good point,” Neil said. “Let me send a message right now, suggesting that they have some phony brand marked on them.” He sat down and picked up his computer. A few minutes later, he looked up and grinned. “No worries,” he said. “It turns out, according to Wally, there won’t be enough left of anything to be able to determine where the explosion originated. Any leftover cell phone parts will be mixed up with pieces of guts and bone.”
Sarah rolled her eyes. “Geez, what a lovely thought.”
“As long as they get the job done,” Noah said.
Noah and Sarah sat down on the couch, with Noah keeping Sarah on his right side. She snuggled close and then looked around him at Neil.
“We’re all clear, now,” he said. “Tell him the other thing.”
Noah turned and looked at the skinny kid. “The other thing?”
“Yeah,” Neil said. “We may have a little solution to the problem of that nasty device in your armpit. Molly went out and talked to Wally about it directly, today, and he called in some of his evil geniuses for a brainstorming session. They came to the conclusion that the pressure sensor on that thing must have been activated after it was put in place. That means it read the pressure your tissues put on it at that moment, so as long as the pressure on it doesn’t go any lower, you’d be safe. Higher doesn’t matter—blood pressure, exertion, lots of things can make the pressure go higher—but only removing it from where it’s at could take it lower.”
Noah nodded. “Okay, that makes sense,” he said. “And they have a way to get it out?”
“Well, they’re pretty sure it would work,” Neil said. “What they have in mind is to put you inside one of those things they use to keep deep-sea divers under pressure when they come out of the water. They crank up the pressur
e, then take out the device and put it into a high-pressure canister filled with water. Since the pressure will be higher than what your tissues could normally put on it, it most likely won’t explode. They can keep it in the pressurized canister until they are ready to let it go off, but you come out of the chamber perfectly safe a few hours later.”
Noah sat there and looked at him for a moment, then nodded. “Sounds like it would work,” he said. “Did they give you the odds of success?”
Neil grimaced. “Well, they said it should work, and they’re giving it an eighty percent chance. That’s not perfect, but it beats the hell out of a one hundred percent chance you’ll die any other way they could think of.”
“Eighty percent,” Noah repeated. “You’re right, that’s not bad odds. Maybe once this mission is over, we can get it done.”
Neil’s grimace got bigger. “Yeah, well, that’s the other thing. Wally went ballistic and said he wants you back there right now so they can take care of this.”
Noah’s eyebrows went up. “I can’t go right now,” he said. “The mission has to come first—Wally knows that.”
“You know that, and I know that, but Wally went screaming to the Dragon Lady. Her response was that you will get your ass back to Kirtland at the first possible moment and report to R&D. Now, she didn’t say tomorrow, so I’m assuming she’s going to let you interpret when the first possible moment might be, but me and sis, here, we’re both on Wally’s side. We think you should go right now.”
Noah shook his head. “I can’t,” he said. “Ducking out right now, for any reason, could blow the inroads I’ve made with Morgan. I don’t see how I can ask for any time off…”
His eyes suddenly went wide, and the flicker of a grin started to form on his face before vanishing. “Unless,” he said slowly, “Morgan were to tell me to go. Hang on just a moment.” He took out his phone and glanced at the time. It was almost seven, and he quickly tapped the contact for Jimmy Morgan and put the phone to his ear. He listened for a moment, then smiled into the phone.
“Boss? It’s Rex. Listen, I’m sorry to bother you tonight… Okay, yes, sir, I understand. The reason I was calling was that I got hold of my buddy Wally, the guy with the phones. He says I can have as many as I want, but he wants cash and he wants me to come pick them up. He’s in Colorado, not too far from Denver.” He paused and listened for several seconds, then began nodding into the phone. “Yes, sir,” he said a moment later. “Like I said, they normally go for about fifteen hundred each, but I can get them for seven a pop, with cash.” He listened again, then nodded once more. “Yes, sir, I’ll be there first thing in the morning.”
He cut off the call and smiled at Sarah and Neil, his genuine smile that had only recently begun appearing on his face. “It worked,” he said. “Morgan wants these phones as soon as possible, so I made it sound like the only way we could get them quick was if I go pick them up. He wants me to come get the money in the morning and get on the road.”
“Yes!” Neil said, pumping his fist up and down. “Road trip!”
Noah held up a hand. “Hold on,” he said. “You guys are staying here. One of the things we haven’t considered was whether this thing might have a GPS chip in it. If I had designed such a thing, I’d probably want to include one so that I knew where it was at all times. If Monique and her people thought of that, it’s always possible that seeing me headed back toward Kirtland would be enough to make her think I was canceling our deal, so she’d set it off. I’m not going to take a risk of either of you getting hurt if that happens.”
Sarah and Neil tried to talk over one another, but Neil was smart enough to give up the floor. “There is no way,” Sarah said, “that you are going to take that trip without me. I don’t care how stubborn you get, I don’t care how illogical it may seem to you, I’m going with you. You might as well just get that through your head, right now.”
“Sarah…” Noah began, but Neil cut him off.
“Hey, remember me? I got a suggestion!”
Noah and Sarah both turned to him. “What is it?” Noah asked.
“Try calling that last number you had for Monique. I’ll bet she has it set up like before so it lets her know you’re trying to get hold of her. Then all you have to do is tell her you have to make a fast trip back to Neverland, part of the current mission. Hell, you can even tell her what it’s about. She’ll probably get a laugh out of it.”
Sarah started laughing. “See? You really are smarter than Molly.” She turned to Noah. “I bet he’s right, and I’ll bet it will work. Then we can go with you, and we don’t have to worry about her deciding to blow you up on the way.”
Noah looked at her for another moment, took out his phone and scrolled through it until the found the last number that Monique had used to call him, then tapped it twice. The dialer appeared, and the line began to ring. A moment later he heard a recording telling him that the number was no longer in service, and hung up.
CHAPTER THREE
It was only thirty seconds later when his phone rang. He answered it on the second ring. “Hello?”
“You tried to reach me?” Monique asked. Her voice was clear this time, without the distortion software she had used previously.
“Yes. I’ve got a situation, and I didn’t want to take a chance that it might be misinterpreted. You’re aware of my current mission, right?”
“I am,” she said with an odd chuckle. “What’s the situation?”
“In this mission, I’ve got to take out a number of targets all at once. I devised a way to do that, by using explosive cell phones. To make that possible, I convinced the head guy here that we need some special phones with signal-scrambling capability, and I’m having them made with explosive cases back at Neverland. The problem is that the boss guy here wants me to go get them as soon as possible, so I need to make a quick trip back there. I didn’t want to take the chance you might think I was trying to weasel out of our deal.”
There was silence on the line for a few seconds, but then she came back. “I take it the phones are being produced at your R&D facility?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Well, if anybody could do it, Wally can. All right, go get them. Just bear in mind that I have a lot of people in that organization. If you start talking, I’ll know it.”
“Hell, there’s no chance of that,” Noah said. “I want the deal you offered me. This is our only chance to get out of that life, and I want it for all of us.”
“Then we have no problem,” Monique said. “Don’t let me down, Camelot.” The line went dead, and Noah put the phone back into his pocket.
“Okay,” he said. “Let’s go pack for an overnight trip.”
Sarah jumped up with a smile and hurried to the bedroom, while Neil headed for his own. Noah got up and followed Sarah, entering the room in time to find her throwing an overnight bag she had just unpacked onto the bed.
“If it’s just for overnight,” she said, “we don’t need much. We can stay at the house when we get there, so we don’t need to take clothes. I’ll pack your shaving gear—anything else?”
Noah simply looked at her for a moment, then walked over to her closet and took out one of the negligees she had worn on their honeymoon. “Pack this,” he said. “You won’t be needing it tonight.”
* * * * *
The Charger rolled up to Morgan’s house at a few minutes after seven the following morning, and Noah told Sarah and Neil to simply wait in the car. Neil was in the back seat, his lanky frame stretched across so that he could be comfortable.
The security guys out front gave him a wave as he walked past them, and he tapped gently on the door. Marlene opened it just a moment later and smiled, then stood aside and let him in. “They’re at the table,” she said and led the way.
It took only a moment for Morgan to get up and go to his office, where he already had fifty thousand dollars in cash packed into a briefcase. “I threw in enough to cover the trip,” he said with a grin,
“and a little bonus for you. Just don’t be gone too long; I’m starting to like having you around.”
“It’s a fairly long drive,” Noah said, “so if I don’t make it back by tomorrow night, I’ll be back the next day. I’ll give you a call when I know for sure.”
Morgan slapped him on the shoulder. “No problem,” he said. “Take a couple extra days if you need to. We lasted this long without those phones.” He lowered his voice. “On the other hand, I understand why you think they’re necessary, and I agree. Some of these guys don’t know how to be careful what they say.”
“That’s exactly why I thought of it,” Noah said. He shook Morgan’s hand and was back in the car only a moment later.
The GPS suggested that he could save time by going up into Missouri and taking Highway 65 up to Interstate 44, so he turned north when he got out to the highway. The road crossed into Missouri a few minutes later, and then the GPS told him to turn right onto Highway 86.
“Noah,” Sarah said sweetly, “you do realize that if you don’t let me drive this thing, I’m going to make your life miserable for a week, right?”
Noah glanced over at her, then turned his eyes back to the road. A moment later, he came to a gas station and pulled into its lot. “Fine by me,” he said. “You’re a better driver than I am, anyway.”
Sarah let out a squeal of delight as she opened her door and ran around the car. Noah got out and grabbed her for a kiss, then walked around himself and got into the passenger seat. Sarah took a minute to get the seat adjusted properly for her smaller build, fastened her seat belt, and grabbed the floor shifter.
She drove out of the lot sedately, then eased into the throttle. The road had a lot of curves and hills, but the car seemed to hold on to it as if by magic. “Oh, my gosh,” Sarah said, her eyes gleaming. “I don’t think I’ve ever driven anything as perfect as this car.”
This route took them through some scenic areas and then cut across Table Rock Lake. The rickety old iron bridge was narrow, but the mountains and the water made it an enjoyable ride. As early as it was, there was very little traffic on the road. Sarah shot across the bridge at over a hundred and twenty miles per hour, and the tires squealed as she rocketed through the S-curve that was waiting off the east end of the bridge.
