The Program tr-2

by Gregg Hurwitz

  Tim and Bear took Cottage Three, Leah's last-known, Thomas and Freed covering their rear. Most of the rooms were empty. In the kitchen Lorraine was bouncing up and down, rubbing her arm as if trying to erase a stain. She looked aged beyond her years.

  "Where's Leah?"

  She kept scrubbing, her voice a panicked whine. "Everything's falling apart."

  Tim left Bear to frisk her and headed down the hall. He let his muzzle lead as he shoved through doors. The first two rooms were empty.

  In the next, Don Stanford and Julie huddled together on an unmade bed. Tim lowered the MP5 and shuffle-stepped toward them, patting them down.

  Julie started to cry. "The Teacher said people were coming to kidnap us."

  "We're not here to harm you."

  Freed stepped in and asked them to move outside.

  Heart pounding, Tim headed to the final bedroom. Aside from a few raised voices, torn away in the wind, it was quiet outside. No gunshots.

  He saw two feet shadowed beneath the door gap, so he stood to the side of the jamb and shouted, "U.S. Marshals. Open up."

  No response.

  "Open the door now."

  He pivoted and kicked, the in-swinging door striking flesh and eliciting a pained grunt. Janie spilled on her ass, gripping a swollen wrist, a kitchen knife on the rug beside her. "Asshole."

  He kicked away the knife, and she scrambled for him, nails tearing against his bulletproof vest.

  Slinging the MP5, he flipped her, cinched flex-cuffs around her wrists and ankles, and frisked her. Beside one of the beds, a spray of wild-flowers leaned from a cone of cardboard.

  "Where is she?"

  Janie tossed her head to the side, laughing. "She got hers."

  Tim hauled her outside and handed her off to Haines. She was still struggling against the flex-cuffs, so he had to put her on her chest.

  About thirty Pros milled around on the lawn under Miller's watchful eye, looking dazed but compliant. Even Deano, the burly bouncer who'd tangled with Tim at the Radisson, was deferential in the face of the ART squad's authority. Weapons lowered, ART members were moving the last Pros and Protectors – save for Skate – from the cottages to the lawn. No struggles, no flex-cuffed suspects except Janie, no white tear-gas smoke seeping from doorways.

  The area was now cleared, the population safely contained. His dread growing, Tim moved among the scattered Pros, spinning a few of the girls around to peer at their faces.

  Palton cut in on the primary channel to declare the treatment wing and Growth Hall empty – that meant Leah was downslope in Skate's shed, TD's bedroom, or the woods. The thought drove Tim toward the trailhead. Bear met him at its brush-funneled entrance, Thomas and Freed falling in behind them. Guerrera, Maybeck, and Zimmer joined their wake from one side, Palton and Denley sweeping in from the other. Danner jogged to catch up, leaving slack in Cosmo's lead, and Roger Frisk from ESU brought up the rear.

  Elephant grass and chaparral crowded them at the shoulders. Tim tapped his belt to reacquaint himself with his can of pepper spray; they were entering Doberman country. The wind whipped upslope, carrying the reverberating wail of an opera singer.

  They broke into the clearing, which sat still and peaceful, bathed in an orchestral swell from TD's stereo. Save the smoke splitting the rain cap of the shed's chimney like languid steam, there were no signs of life. Denley started his preentry hum.

  "Seek, girl, seek." Danner unsnapped Cosmo's lead, and the German shepherd bounded off into the woods. Raising the shotgun across his chest, he lumbered after her.

  A blast of Italian reverberated off the trees. "…in Ispagna son gia mille e tre!"

  Tim and Bear stormed the shack first, kicking in the door.

  No Skate, no dogs, just the potbellied stove spewing sparks, the mail tub sitting empty before the open loading door.

  Bear keyed the portable to the primary channel. "Be advised assault dogs are unaccounted for."

  Maybeck shouldered his tear-gas shotgun, trading it for a crowbar he kept hooked in his belt. Moving swiftly toward the mod, he hand-signaled Denley, Palton, and Frisk, though the music would have drowned out a shouted command.

  Already Tim was moving across the clearing toward TD's porch. MP5s raised, Guerrera and Zimmer were spread on either side of the door. Freed held open the screen.

  A swift peek ascertained that the front room was empty. The stereo volume was cranked so high that, even through the closed bedroom door, the crackle of interlyric static sounded like bubble wrap being crushed.

  Tim sidled in, Bear at his shoulder, Thomas and Freed riding their tail.

  Tim paused before the closed door and drew in a deep breath. Jamming the stock of the MP5 to his shoulder, he raised a steel-plated boot and kicked right beside the handle. The door splintered inward as they exploded into the room.

  TD jerked upright in his bed, bare chest slipping into view beneath a silk robe. A naked girl – maybe Leah – was on her knees on the floor before him, sobbing and covering her face.

  "Hands up! Hands up!"

  TD spun away from them, his hand sliding between the dark sheets. Tim crossed the room like a projectile, seizing him with two fistfuls of robe and hurling him. He hit the wall-mounted stereo at eye level, the sound cutting off in time to accent his crash to the floor.

  He'd come out of his robe, his bruised, naked body rendering a frisk unnecessary, but Tim kept the MP5 trained on him, his finger firm against the trigger.

  With a forearm, TD swiped blood from his split nose. Bear flipped back the sheets, revealing the stereo remote TD had been reaching for.

  The crying girl looked up at them. It took a moment for Tim to register her face as Shanna's. Freed picked her discarded T-shirt off the floor and handed it to her. Quivering, she pulled it on.

  TD was blinking hard, sucking air, his face warring between disbelief and burgeoning outrage. For months he hadn't so much as been bumped into, and now he lay sucking floor dust like a bitch-slapped socialite.

  "Get up." Tim tugged the arrest warrant from his pocket. "You're under arrest for destruction of the United States mails."

  Betters rolled to a sitting position, making no effort to cover himself. "Is that all?"

  "Where's Leah?"

  "Leah, Leah, Leah." TD shook his head. "Can't quite place the name."

  "If you hurt her…"

  "Well, I'm certain of one thing. If she was hurt, it certainly wouldn't have been me who did it." His eyes flicked from Tim's face to the MP5 pointed at his head. "Tempted to shoot me?"

  Tim's boots knocked twice against the wooden floor. TD looked up at him with something like amusement. Tim drove the blade edge of his hand into TD's upper lip, the pressure making him shriek and rise to his feet. Tim straight-armed him into the wall, freeing the metal handcuffs from his belt. They were loose on TD's girlish wrists, so Tim interlocked them to pick up the slack.

  "Tempted?" Tim said. "Not for a second. Not with where you're going."

  Bear threw the silk robe over TD's shoulders. "Maybe we book you in like this, see how they dig your Prince getup in the tank."

  "Actually, I hear mail offenders are greatly feared on the inside."

  Frisk's voice sputtered from the primary channel – "Fucking computer in here's got more levels of security than I've ever seen."

  TD grinned. "Good luck there, Neos."

  A howl sounded from deep in the woods.

  The first hint of unease crossed TD's face as he took in their expressions. "What? What?"

  Their portables all sputtered at the same time, and Danner's voice crackled through. "Cosmo just alerted on a fresh female cadaver. Looks like the rain washed away part of the grave. I've got visual on an exposed head and upper torso.

  A deep red bloomed beneath TD's cheeks, making his freckles disappear.

  "Does the name Nancy Kramer ring a bell?" Tim said.

  "Never heard it. We get trespassers – I order them removed. I don't keep track of the Protectors' r
ecreational activities. They could be dumping nuclear waste out there for all I know. You'll have to do better than that." TD cocked his head, studying Tim. "I'd never kill someone. I don't have to. You think I seek control from people? Not nearly as much as people want to give up control to me. That's why you'll never get me. I've never done anything to anyone they didn't want done to them." His eyes locked on Tim's. "Including you."

  Danner's voice cut in. "Hang on. We've got another body here."

  Tim felt his stomach drop out of his body. He thought of Will down at the staging point, no doubt privy to the same radio transmission. He thought of Ginny on the coroner's table, cold and firm, the wisp of hair in her mouth.

  Bear said, "Go make the ID. I got him."

  Tim shot past Guerrera and Zimmer at the door, shouting into the radio for Danner to give him his bearings.

  "- northeast about a half mile, just past a low run of granite."

  Tim crossed the clearing at a dead sprint, crashing into the woods.

  The Racal coughed out the updates as the rest of the operation wrapped up.

  Denley in the mod – "We can't access the corresponding Dead Link computer files. The folders are useless on their own -"

  Tannino shouting, "Can you make a positive ID on the body as Leah Henning?"

  "- the face is messy with mud -"

  His right leg throbbing, Tim stumbled between trees, over rises. Behind him he heard Bear, Thomas, and Freed spreading out in the woods, shouting to one another.

  A gunshot came at him in surround sound – echoing through the trees and amplified on the portable – and then a flurry of barks and snarls.

  Bear's voice issued from the portable. "We're on the way."

  Tim accelerated, trying to ignore the screeching pain through his leg, radio pressed to his lips. "Danner. Danner. Danner."

  He'd just hit the granite hump when he heard the double whistle -Skate's release command. Before he could raise the MP5, a Doberman flew through the brush at him. He got an arm up in the jaws before he went down, and he rolled to a stop at a broad pair of boots, looking up past the slobbering jaws at the bore of a Sig Sauer and Skate's face.

  Skate's fingers snapped, and the dog released Tim's arm and sat. At the sloped root of an oak, Cosmo squared off over Danner's body, snarling at the other Doberman. Danner's hand, gripping his shoulder near the base of his neck, was slick with blood. He was breathing but weakly.

  Part of the hillside had slid away under the weight of the rain. Just past the oak, a half-exhumed corpse thrust up from the earth like a vomited secret. The female form was sticky with sheets of mud, like a tar-mired seagull. Ten feet to its left, a gnarled hand reached from the earth like a B-movie effect.

  The image of Leah carrying her own shovel to this spot made Tim cringe with grief. He flashed on a crime-scene photo of Ginny, the snow-angel imprint her torso had left in the muddy creek bank where it had been found.

  Skate stripped him of his weapons and said, "Git up."

  Tim found his feet. The sounds of the other deputies grew fainter – deputy marshals in the woods was like the start of a bad joke.

  Skate nodded at Cosmo. "A person, sure, but I couldn't shoot no dog."

  One of the Dobermans lunged for Danner, but Cosmo repelled him. Skate put his dogs on a sit-stay, his index finger pointing to the mud. They froze, black-marble eyes on Cosmo, licking their chops, the scent of Danner's blood driving them wild.

  Skate's cheeks were heavy, almost mournful. "You had to come poking around in paradise, didn't cha?"

  Tim held his hands up, loose, a feigned "keep cool" posture that kept them ready. The semiauto was double-action; Skate would want to cock it for a smoother pull.

  Skate took a step forward, a tear beading on the brink of his eyelid. The gun bucked slightly in his hand when he thumbed the hammer. Tim lunged for him, catching the barrel in the rising fork of his right thumb and index finger, his left hand chopping Skate's elbow, bending the arm. The gun snapped up and fired just below Skate's chin, sending off a mist of blood as it blew off his face.

  Skate staggered back, the Sig plunking into the mud, his dogs watching the flat sheet of his face with their heads cocked inquisitively. He let out a pained grunt, and his breath bubbled through his former mouth, emitting a faint double whistle.

  The release command.

  The Dobermans fell on him, snapping and tearing.

  Tim tugged the pepper spray from his belt and directed two blasts into the dogs' snouts and eyes. They whimpered and dropped, pawing their faces. Skate no longer moved. Tim could barely look at what was left of him.

  He shouted for Bear and tried to get at Danner, but Cosmo lowered her head and growled at him, driving him back. He was radioing Miller by the time Bear, Thomas, and Freed stumbled over the granite crest. Letting them take over, he ran to the first corpse, sliding on his knees through the sludge. His hands scrabbled over the bloated face, bending the mud-slick hair aside.

  Nancy Kramer.

  He'd seen TD give the command to march her into the woods. With the help of a forensic entomologist, a medical examiner could set the time of death, corroborate Tim's eyewitness account.

  Bear was squatting, murmuring to Cosmo until she came forward and licked his hand. Thomas stood over the Dobermans, can of pepper spray at the ready.

  Freed sat by Danner, who groaned and said, "Damnit."

  Tim trudged over to the other corpse. Only a slender, muddy hand was visible, shoved up from the moist earth.

  The long road to Leah had ended here – four fingers and a thumb sprouting from the ground.

  Tannino might want to call Judge Seitel for a telephonic warrant before digging; Tim didn't want to take any chances.

  His breath caught in his chest. He crouched over the small hand.

  A metal ring glinted through the grime on one of the fingers. A gold signet, inscribed with the letters DK.

  The initials floated through Tim's head before striking chimes. Danny Katanga. The first investigator Will had hired.

  Short little nervous guy, the PI was.

  He moved back to Bear – already he could hear backup crashing through the growth.

  Bear's stubbled face was heavy. "That her?"

  Tim shook his head.

  "We'll get more dogs out here, sweep some more."

  Tim turned away, but he had nothing to look at behind him except the glittery remains of Skate's face, the thread of a necklace embedded in the meat of his neck.

  He stared at the little silver key.

  He pivoted on his heel, raising the portable to his lips. "Frankie, did you clear all the rooms in the treatment wing?"

  A sputter of static, then Palton's voice – "Negative. We just peeked in the windows, confirmed they were empty. We didn't want to step on the warrant."

  Tim reached down, grabbing the chain against Skate's torn-open Adam's apple and twisting. The key pulled loose.

  He moved through the woods, barely hearing Bear's shouts behind him.

  Branches whipped at his chest. Leaves tore his face.

  He passed a sheriff's deputy carrying a come-along pole, two fire-department medics hustling with a stretcher. Deputy marshals filled the clearing now, bagging evidence and muttering into portables.

  On the step, Denley scowled and said, "Computer's got Frisk all in a tangle."

  Tannino's voice through the Racal – "Bring me something to link Betters to those bodies."

  Tim's breath burned as he charged up the trail. The other deputies were chatting up the Pros like old friends. Tim blew by, handing off his MP5 to Miller, who called after him, puzzled, as he trotted up the hill.

  Tim kicked down the treatment wing's door, the sound traveling down the tiled corridors and coming back at him. He made ragged progress now, his limp more pronounced.

  He called out her name once, twice, but heard nothing save the hum of electric clocks and the tired refrigerator in DevRoom C.

  The tiny square of glass a
top the Growth Room door looked in only on darkness, and he felt the optimism whoosh out of him, leaving him breathless. He fumbled the key, dropping it, and finally found the lock. The door stuck, so he kicked it open.

  A triangle of light fell over his shoulders, his shadowed outline stretching across the floor and her crumpled form.

  She stirred, shook her head as if to clear it.

  The lightbulb blinked on, throwing an aquarium-blue glow that lent her flesh a pale, cadaverous tint. Her lips were cracked – white, rectangular segments of peeling skin. They moved soundlessly, then moved again.

  Her voice was hoarse, little more than a whisper. "I knew you'd come."

  He went to her. She was shivering, so he wrapped her in his raid jacket.

  The Racal sputtered, and Denley said, "Aside from the mail stuff, we're drawing a blank in here."

  Frisk's voice – "I can't determine what's on the computer -everything's unreadable. I can see files and folders, but they're PGP-encrypted."

  Leah pulled herself to her feet. "All the good stuff is encrypted on the C drive…" She paused, leaning against the wall, catching her breath. Her voice was weak but clear. "I built a passphrase generator that creates hex values to reverse-engineer the hashing strings of the PGP. I hid it in the system file."

  "I don't know what that means."

  She reached for the portable. Tim keyed it to the right channel and handed it over. Leah walked Frisk through a few simple steps, and then he gave an excited bark of a laugh and said, "I'm in."

  Leah clicked off, and Tim holstered the radio.

  "I would have sent you all the stuff out, but I didn't want to keep dinging the access log, and encrypted files have too many megs to upload quickly anyway." Leah staggered a bit, and Tim threw an arm around her back to steady her. Her eyes were rimmed black with stress and exhaustion.

  "How'd you get a phone cord to send out the e-mails?"

  "I snuck in Skate's shed when he was sleeping, slid his necklace off. I took the copper wires out, twisted them to minimize inductance." A faint smile. "A makeshift phone cord. He caught me later." She shuddered.

  Frisk's voice – "Pay dirt. We've got the Dead Link files. And financials, surveillance shots -"

  Tim eased down the radio volume.