Backfire

by Catherine Coulter

  Dane said, “Or a pretty average female. But I agree, the walk makes you think man. But who knows? He never took off his hoodie and sunglasses.”

  Savich said, “We’ll get the DVD to Operations Technology at Quantico. They’ll enlarge, enhance, depixelate the face, do some reconstruction for us. The lab at Quantico can work on the audio recording.”

  There was a knock on the conference room door. It was an audio tech, Chuck Manson, who swore every single week he would have his name changed, but he never did. Savich suspected it was because he really enjoyed the attention. “Ninety-eight percent chance it’s a man, and under thirty,” Manson said, and disappeared.

  “Okay, if Chuck says it’s a guy, I’ll take his word for it,” Roper said. “I’ve asked for possible brands on the pants and hoodie, we’ll see.”

  Lucy Carlyle said, “He has to look up when he speaks to Briggs, then his head goes down again. He knows he’s on camera. It’s a giveaway.”

  Savich’s second-in-command, Ollie Hamish, said, “Denny, did you speak to the other security guard behind the Plexiglas? His name’s Brady, right?”

  Roper nodded. “Brady remembers the guy, what with the envelope delivery, but neither Brady nor Briggs can tell us much that’s helpful.”

  “I’d like to speak to both Briggs and Brady myself later,” Savich said as he stood.

  Roper nodded. “I’ll send both of them up.”

  Savich shook his head. “No, let me come down to the mezzanine to your turf.”

  Cooper McKnight sat forward. “Unless this guy’s a loon, he’s got to be from one of our cases. We could start with the most recent gnarly one—Bundy’s daughter. Even though Comafield’s close relatives seemed normal as apple pie, who knows? Maybe there’s a nutso in there.”

  Roper looked at Savich. “I’ll leave the video. Let me know when you want to speak to my people.” He paused in the conference room doorway, a big man, built like a thick, knotted rope, Savich had always thought, and added, “I don’t like this punk coming into our house like that. There are a lot of brains in this room, so take care of this for us.”

  Sherlock read the note again. “For what you did you deserve this. Something you did specifically, Dillon, so it’s got to be a case you were personally involved with. There’s Lissy Smiley, for example—that was up close and personal. But it could take weeks to make sure there’s no one, absolutely no one, who would care enough about any of the dozens of perps we’ve brought down to do something this nuts.”

  Dane Carver said, “I wonder what the threat is, exactly? For what you did you deserve this. What is this? Is he targeting someone specific?”

  All eyes turned to Sherlock.

  Sherlock splayed her hands in front of her. “It doesn’t have to be me. All right, all right, I’ll be really careful. We’ve got the guy on camera, we’ll get a good facial reconstruction. It’s our best lead.”

  Savich saw everyone was looking at him now. He tried to keep his face blank, but it was hard. He realized he was clutching his pen too tightly. It was Sherlock, he simply knew the threat was directed at Sherlock. Who else? He wanted to say something, but nothing came out. He couldn’t stand himself. Get it together. He said, his voice sounding calm and in control, “If any of you come up with anything we haven’t mentioned, let me know. I’m going down to the security section, speak to Briggs and Brady. Sherlock, you and Dane start work on this.”

  On the elevator ride to the mezzanine, Savich remembered the shoot-out in Mr. Patil’s Shop ’n Go in Georgetown. Was it only three weeks ago? The woman he’d had to shoot, her name was Elsa Heinz. Who else knew Savich had shot her? Everyone, of course. It was in the papers, his name included. Was someone who knew her out for revenge against him? A loved one for a loved one?

  He put her out of his head. Threats were part of the job. Both he and Sherlock knew that. They and the CAU would deal with it.

  Georgetown

  Washington, D.C.

  Friday morning

  Five a.m.

  Sean leapt impossibly high, caught the football from his mother, and took off toward the end of a park that was really a baseball field, with Savich on his heels. Savich couldn’t catch him because Sean’s legs were stilt-long, eating up huge swathes of ground, and he was rounding bases for some reason, clutching the football tight to his chest, heading for home, and John Lennon was suddenly singing into Savich’s left ear in his flat whiny-smooth voice about imagining people getting along, like that would ever happen.

  Savich reared up in bed and automatically looked at the clock. Five a.m. Not good. No telephone call was ever good at five a.m.

  He picked up his cell. “Savich.”

  “Dillon, you’ve got to come, quickly, it’s bad, it’s really bad, I’m afraid—” Molly Hunt’s voice, choking and thick with tears and fear. Dillon thought, Not little Emma, who’d survived so much—

  “I’m putting you on speakerphone so Sherlock can hear you. Tell us what’s happened, Molly.”

  Sherlock was leaning up beside him, her face pale in the predawn, her hair tangled wildly around her face.

  “Someone shot Ramsey in the back. I don’t know if he’s going to make it; he’s in surgery. Everyone’s here, but I need you and Sherlock. You’ve got to come and find out who did this to him. Please, please, come quickly.”

  Ramsey shot? Savich couldn’t get his brain around it. He hadn’t seen Ramsey for six months, since he, Sherlock, and Sean last visited San Francisco. It had been more than five years, he realized now, since Ramsey had saved six-year-old Emma’s life and hooked up with her mother, Molly.

  Ramsey shot?

  “Molly, take a deep breath. That’s right. Now slow down and tell us exactly what happened.” But he was thinking, Why Ramsey? He’s a federal judge, removed from that sort of violence—but a man who judged others was a man who gathered enemies.

  “He’s in surgery,” Molly said again. “The nurses say they don’t know anything yet, but I know it can’t be good. He was shot in the back—” she said, and broke off. He heard her breathing, harsh and fast, and then her voice, choked, frantic: “Please, Dillon, you and Sherlock, you’ve got to come.”

  Savich and Sherlock both asked questions and let her ramble, knowing she was trying to get it together. She told them Lieutenant Virginia Trolley was there with her, and they realized she was probably listening to their questions and Molly’s answers. They’d met Virginia and her husband a couple of times when they’d visited San Francisco over the past five years.

  “Molly, let me speak to Virginia.” Virginia came on the line. “Dillon, the SFPD responded and arrived at Ramsey’s house right after midnight. I arrived ten minutes later. Since it was dark, we didn’t bother to look for footprints while I was there. No one wanted to mess up the crime scene bumbling around with flashlights.”

  “Have you spoken to Cheney?”

  Virginia said, “Cheney arrived at Ramsey’s house when I was leaving. He called me a couple minutes ago, told me he’s assigned Special Agent Harry Christoff to lead the case, but he, Cheney, will be monitoring every detail. He wondered if shooting Ramsey was a revenge deal. It’s too soon to know, but I’ll tell you, it sure feels like it.” Virginia’s voice dropped lower. “Molly needs you guys. Can you come out here?”

  “We’ll be there as soon as we can.”

  When he punched off, he took Sherlock in his arms and held her close, stroking his hand up and down her back.

  “He’ll make it,” Sherlock said against his neck. “Ramsey’s got to make it. He’s one of the good guys, Dillon. He will make it. How could this happen, and right on top of this threat to you?”

  No, the threat’s not aimed at me, it’s aimed at you. Or Sean.

  Cheney Stone called back as Savich was stepping out of the shower. He’d made it back to the hospital
and learned that Ramsey had survived surgery and was in the surgical ICU. Molly, though, was a mess. “I asked the doc to give her Valium to calm her. You know what? He did. It seems to have helped her.

  “Ah, here’s Virginia. Let’s go to speakerphone.”

  “Is Emma all right?” Savich asked.

  Virginia said, “She was bordering on shock at first, with everything that was happening, but Emma’s a tough little nut, she’ll hold it together. When I was at the house I heard her tell her brother Cal she’d play him the theme from Harry Potter on the piano this morning—with variations—if he stopped shining a flashlight into Gage’s eyes. Cal said he wanted to see if it would cause seizures.” Virginia’s voice hitched. “Where’d a three-year-old kid hear about lights and seizures?”

  Savich said, “Don’t ask. Our flight gets in this afternoon. You playing nice with Cheney? And Harry Christoff?”

  “Oh, yeah, Cheney’s a nice guy”—pause—“he’ll throw us some crumbs, even though you FBI guys are going to have jurisdiction. All I hear about Christoff is that he came off an ugly divorce a year and a half ago, and he’s been a nasty git ever since.”

  Savich heard Cheney say in the background, “Crumbs? You know what we know. Hey, and Harry’s not a nasty git any longer, he’s just nasty.”

  Virginia said, “And you, Mr. SAC? You’re newly married. That means you’re stupid happy all the time. Wait till you’re married a few years, then I’ll check back in with you. My guess is you’ll still be stupid, but the happy part isn’t a given.”

  Cheney said, “I’ll be sure to pass that along to Julia.”

  Stupid happy? Savich liked the sound of that.

  —

  Savich said to Virginia, “Since you’ve known Ramsey for a long time, you know his habits, his friends. Cheney and Agent Christoff will see you as a valued resource.”

  Virginia gave a curiously charming snort. “Sure, like I’ll expect to see that from any of his precious special agents.” She sighed. “Every single cop in San Francisco wants to help get this crazy craphead, Dillon. You know Ramsey’s a hero, even after five years, he’s still Judge Dredd to all of us.”

  Savich remembered how Ramsey had been dubbed Judge Dredd by local and world media after he’d jumped down from the bench, black robes flying, and single-handedly took out the three gunmen who’d invaded his courtroom with guns and violence and death.

  He said, “Keep repeating that to Cheney and Christoff.”

  “Just saying, Dillon. This is tough, really tough. It’s personal, not only for me but for most of the force.”

  “We’ll get the crazy craphead together, then, Virginia,” Sherlock said. “See you later today.”

  Ramsey, Savich thought, who did you push over the edge? And then he realized he and Sherlock would be three thousand miles away from the guy who’d written the letter to him. And they could take Sean with them, to stay at his grandparents’. That was a relief.

  —

  Cheney called again when they were on their way to Dulles. “Here’s what I know so far. Ramsey postponed a hearing at a trial yesterday morning because he believed the federal prosecutor wasn’t conducting the case properly, that he might have been threatened. He met with the federal marshal and the U.S. attorney, who are all in the same building with us, as you know.

  “Now the prosecutor is a twelve-year veteran, Assistant U.S. Attorney Mickey O’Rourke. Ramsey had asked to speak to him in chambers, naturally, after he came to suspect Mickey might be purposefully jeopardizing the case. Mickey made an excuse. According to Olivia, Ramsey’s secretary, Ramsey told O’Rourke he wanted him and his people at the meeting he was calling. Mickey didn’t show, and none of his staff had any clue where he was. They hadn’t seen him since Ramsey adjourned the hearing, and they were worried about him. His second chair said Mickey seemed off. But this? No one could believe it. In any case, we can’t find O’Rourke. He’s now officially missing. There’s quite an uproar, as you can imagine.”

  “The name of the defendant?”

  “There are two co-defendants, Clive and Cindy Cahill, up for the murder of a rich software geek here in Silicon Valley. Either the Cahills have lots of money stashed offshore or they have some rich friends, because they have hired a first-rate counsel.”

  But once the prosecutor was suspected, Savich thought, what would it matter which judge presided anymore? And O’Rourke’s disappearance would mean only a delay. None of it made sense yet to Savich.

  He asked, “Why are the Cahills a federal case?”

  Cheney said, “Because there’s espionage involved, that’s why. The murder victim, Mark Lindy, was working on a top-secret project for the government, and was probably murdered because of it. That’s why the FBI handled the case and not local law enforcement. We’ve got the Cahills pretty cold on the murder, but we could never find out the particulars of the project Lindy was into, because it involved national security. You know the CIA—they refused to tell us anything at all, even with CIA operations officers out here digging around.

  “Even if a foreign government did set the Cahills on Mark Lindy, I don’t know which one. I’ll be speaking to O’Rourke’s team again while you’re in the air, see exactly what they have, if anything, that might help us find him.”

  “All right, Cheney, see you this afternoon,” Savich said. He and his laptop MAX had a lot of reading to do about the Cahills on their way to California.

  And flying with Sean was always a treat.

  Before they left for the coast on the 8:19 a.m. United flight out of Dulles, Sherlock called her parents in San Francisco. “Lacey, you’re flying into a real mess here,” her father, Judge Corman Sherlock, said. “Ramsey’s shooting is all over local TV, and everyone is out for blood. What with his martial arts heroics in his own courtroom five years ago, you’d think most of the media around here would imply he’s unevolved and uncivilized. Go figure.

  “There’s lots of speculation, as you’d expect, but no one knows a thing yet, and the FBI hasn’t said a word.

  “The police commissioner’s got a press conference scheduled at noon. We’ll see if she’s going to try to squeeze the SFPD into bed with the FBI. It would be a good career move.

  “I saw Ramsey yesterday. He was on his way out to meet his family to go listen to Emma practice with the symphony at Davies Hall.” He paused. “I told him I’d heard he’d postponed the murder trial, but he didn’t tell me anything, only shook his head, said it was too sensitive and too soon to talk about.

  “We’re looking forward to seeing all of you. Your mother and I will get to take good care of Sean, of course, while the two of you are out finding the people responsible. I know you’ll nail whoever did this.”

  From Dad’s mouth to God’s ears, Sherlock thought.

  “This is an awful thing, Lacey, an awful thing. I’m wondering if it has anything to do with the trial he postponed. Do you think that’s possible?”

  —

  By the end of the very long flight, Sherlock and Savich agreed they would rather eat week-old frozen artichoke dip than compete against Sean in another computer-based adventure of Atoc the Incan Wizard, a young Incan boy who used numbers, magic, and nerve to unravel the knottiest arithmetic problems and bring down an endless number of villains. Sherlock called Atoc the Harry Potter of Machu Picchu. During most of the flight, she played with Sean while Dillon read files on MAX and Skyped Cheney, working out what the Criminal Apprehension Unit could do. Cheney said, “It would help us for MAX to work on trying to locate any offshore stash the Cahills might have, and what talent they could have called in on short notice. We’ve had no luck as of yet.”

  “Eggs all in the Cahill basket, Cheney?”

  “No, but it makes more sense than some sort of foreign government conspiracy to shoot Ramsey. I mean, if a foreign government was paying th
e Cahills for Mark Lindy’s top-secret materials, and they threatened to talk if they weren’t somehow found innocent, said government would more likely have them eliminated, not a federal judge or a federal prosecutor. There could be too much hell to pay for that.”

  Savich said, “The Cahills are the obvious suspects, but what would it gain them to kill Judge Hunt?”

  “Maybe they were afraid O’Rourke had already told Ramsey too much,” Cheney said. “But you’re right. We’re being thorough. We’re looking at mail threats to Judge Hunt, letters and emails going back three years, and we’ve started a review of his cases going back even further. I’m making sure the SFPD is in the loop, passing along some assignments to them. We can use the manpower.” He sighed, then added, “There are already endless complications, since Ramsey isn’t an anonymous federal judge like most of his confederates. Nope, he’s Judge Dredd, superhero. The mayor, the police commissioner, the major news outlets, even the conductor for the San Francisco Symphony have called me, wanting to know what progress we’ve made. The police commissioner is pushing for a task force, composed of the SFPD, the FBI, and the federal marshals, with the commissioner herself in charge. As if that’s going to happen. I’m already getting an ulcer.”

  Savich asked, “Any progress on the missing federal prosecutor yet? Mickey O’Rourke?”

  The answer was no.

  When Savich ended the call, Sherlock said, “A federal prosecutor missing—it sounds like a spy novel. I’m very grateful my father wasn’t the one judging the Cahill case.”

  “Mama, you weren’t paying attention. I got you!”

  Savich smiled, listening to Sherlock wail. “Oh, dear, Sean, how am I going to save myself this time? Atoc’s shoved me in a pit of purple-headed Amazonian hippo snakes. Ah, here’s what I’ll do,” and Sherlock walloped one of the writhing hippo snakes with a canoe paddle. Since she was the master Incan mathematician, Professor Pahuac, and rotten to the bone, she knew her end probably wouldn’t be a good one.