Total Control

by David Baldacci

  ugliest bag I could find at the time. Of course, as it turned out, he loved it."

  She abruptly looked up and caught the officer's surprised look.

  "I... I saw it on the TV. It didn't even look damaged. Is there any way I could see it?"

  "I'm sorry, Ms. Archer. Whatever's been collected has already been taken away. The truck came just about an hour ago to take away the last shipment for the day."

  "Do you know where it goes?"

  The officer shook his head. "It wouldn't matter if I did. They wouldn't let you near it. After the investigation is complete, they'll return it, I expect. But from the looks of this one, that could be years. Again, I'm sorry."

  The patrol car finally stopped a few feet away from another uniformed policeman. The officer got out of the car and conferred briefly with his colleague, pointing twice in the direction of the police cruiser while Sidney sat there, unable to take her eyes off the lights.

  She was startled when the officer leaned his head in the car. "Ms. Archer, you can get out here."

  Sidney opened the car door and got out. She briefly looked at the other officer and he nervously nodded toward her, pain in his eyes.

  There was pain, apparently, everywhere. These men too would have rather been home with their families. Here there was death; it was everywhere. It seemed to cling to her clothes, much like the snowfall.

  "Ms. Archer, when you're ready to leave, you tell Billy over there and he'll radio me. I'll come right up and get you."

  As he started to get back in his cruiser, she called to him. "What's your name?"

  The officer looked back. "Eugene, ma'am. Deputy Eugene McKenna."

  "Thank you, Eugene."

  He nodded and touched the brim of his cap. "Please don't stay too long, Ms. Archer."

  As the car drove away, Billy led her toward the lights. He kept his eyes straight ahead. Sidney didn't know how much Officer McKenna had told his partner, but she could feel the distress emanating from his body. He was a slender straw of a man, young, barely twenty-five, she thought, and he looked sickened and nervous.

  He finally stopped walking. Up ahead Sidney could see people moving slowly across the property. Barricades and yellow police tape were everywhere. Under the artificial daylight, Sidney could see the utter devastation. It resembled a battlefield, the earth seemingly inflicted with a terrible surface wound.

  The young police officer touched her arm. "Ma'am, you oughta stay back around here. Those folk from Washington are real particular about people messing around up here. They're afraid somebody might stumble over... you know, mess up stuff." He took a deep breath. "There's just things everywhere, ma'am. Everywhere! ! ain't never seen anything like it and I hope I never do again so long as I live." He looked off in the distance again. "When you're ready, I'll be down there." He pointed in the direction from which they had come and then headed back down.

  Sidney wrapped her coat around her and brushed the snow from her hair. She unconsciously moved forward, then stopped, then started advancing again. Directly under the umbrella of light, mounds of dirt had been thrown up. She had seen that on the news now countless times. The impact crater. They said the entire plane was in there, and though she knew it to be true, she could not believe it was possible.

  The impact crater. Jason was in there too. It was a thought that had become so deep, so wrenching, that instead of sending her into hysterics, it simply incapacitated her. She clenched her eyes shut and then reopened them. Thick tears rolled down her cheeks, and she did not bother to wipe them away.

  She did not expect to ever smile again.

  Even when she forced herself to think of Amy, of the wonderful little girl Jason had left her, not a trace of happiness was able to break through her utter sorrow. She stared ahead as cold winds buffeted her, her long hair swirling around her head.

  While she continued to watch, several large pieces of equipment headed over to the crater, engines whining, black, smoky exhaust gushing up from their bowels. Steam shovels and earth movers attacked the pit with great force, lifting up huge mouthfuls of earth and depositing them in waiting dump trucks, which headed out on special routes over terrain that had already been searched. Speed was the overriding concern, even paramount to the risk of further damaging the aircraft's remains. What everyone wanted desperately to uncover was the FDR. That was more important than worrying about turning a quarter-inch fragment into something smaller by the accelerated excavation work.

  Sidney noticed the snow was adhering to the ground--an obvious concern to the investigators, she assumed, as she saw a number of them racing around with searchlights, only stopping long enough to stick small flags in the rapidly whitening earth. When she moved closer, she made out the green-clad figures of the National Guardsmen as they patrolled their sectors, rifles slung over their shoulders, their heads turning constantly in the direction of the crater. Like an omnipotent magnet, the crash site seemed inexorably to demand everyone's attention. The price to be paid for the innumerable joys of life, it seemed, was the constant threat of swift, inexplicable death.

  As Sidney moved forward again, her foot caught on something covered by the snow. She bent down to see what it was, and the words of the young policeman came back to her. There are things everywhere. Every where. She froze, but then continued to search with the innate curiosity of human beings. A moment later she was running down the dirt road, her feet fumbling and slipping in the snow, her arms jerking awkwardly forward, violent sobs exploding from her lungs.

  She never saw the man until she collided headlong into him, buckling his legs. They both went down, he as surprised as she, perhaps even more so.

  "Damn," Lee Sawyer grunted as he landed on a clod of dirt, the wind knocked out of him. Sidney, however, was on her feet in a second and continued sprinting down the twisting path. Sawyer started to go after her until his knee locked, a recurring condition compliments of his chasing down an athletic bank robber on hard pavement for twenty long blocks many years before. "Hey," he yelled after her as he awkwardly hopped around on one foot, rubbing at his knee. He shone his flashlight in her direction.

  When Sidney Archer turned her head, he caught her profile in the arc of the light. A second later he snatched a glimpse of her horror-filled eyes. Then she was gone. He gingerly stepped over to the area where he had first spotted her. He shone his flashlight on the ground. Who the hell was she and what was she doing up here?

  Then he shrugged. Probably a curious area resident who had seen something she wished she hadn't. A minute later Sawyer's light confirmed his suspicions. He bent down and picked up the small shoe.

  It looked tiny and helpless in his big paw. Sawyer looked back in Sidney Archer's direction and sighed deeply in the darkness. His large body began to tremble in almost uncontrollable rage as he stared at the terrible hole in the earth dead ahead. He fought back an urge to scream at the top of his lungs. There had only been a handful of times in his career with the FBI that Lee Sawyer wanted to deny the persons he had run to ground the opportunity of a trial by their peers. This was one of those times. He silently prayed that when he did find those responsible for this horrendous act of violence, they would try something, anything that would provide him with the tiniest fraction of an opening, allowing him to spare the country the cost and media circus any such trial would entail. He slipped the shoe into his coat pocket and, nursing his injured knee, walked off to check in with Kaplan. Then he would head back to town. He had an appointment in Washington that afternoon. His investigation of Arthur Lieberman would now start in earnest.

  A few minutes later, Officer McKenna looked anxiously at Sidney as he helped her out of the patrol car. "Ms. Archer, are you sure you don't want me to call somebody to come get you?"

  Sidney, eggshell pale, limbs convulsing, her hands and clothes dirty from where she had fallen, shook her head hard. "No! No! I'm all right." She leaned up against the cruiser. Her arms and shoulders still twitched involuntarily, but at least her bala
nce had somewhat stabilized. She closed the door of the police cruiser and started to walk unsteadily toward her Ford. She hesitated and then turned around. Officer McKenna was beside his cruiser, watching her closely.

  "Eugene?"

  "Yes, ma'am?"

  "You were right .... It's not a place where you should stay too long." The words were said in the hollow tone of one entirely vacant of spirit. She turned and slowly walked toward the Ford and got in.

  Deputy Eugene McKenna.slowly nodded, his prominent Adam's apple sliding quickly up and down as he briefly fought the tears welling in his eyes. He opened the door of the police cruiser and fell rather than sat in the front seat. He closed the door so the sounds he was about to make would go no farther.

  As Sidney retraced her route back, the cellular phone in her car buzzed. The totally unexpected sound made her jerk so badly she almost lost control of the Explorer. She looked down at the phone as complete disbelief spread over her features. No one knew where she was. She looked around at the darkness as if someone were watching her. The shorn trees were the only witnesses to her journey back home. As far as she could tell, she was the only living person around.

  Her hand slowly reached down to pick up the phone.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  My God, Quentin, it's three in the morning."

  "I wouldn't be calling unless it was really important."

  'Tm not sure what you want me to say." Sidney's-hand slightly trembled as she held the cellular phone. Sidney slowed the car; her foot had steadily pressed down on the accelerator as the conversation continued, until she was traveling at a dangerous rate of speed on the narrow roadway.

  "Like I said, I heard you and Gamble talking on the trip back from New York. I thought you would have come to me, Sidney, not Gamble." The voice was soft but contained a certain edge.

  "I'm sorry, Quentin, but he asked questions. You didn't."

  "I was trying to give you some space."

  "I appreciate that, I really do. It's just that Gamble confronted me. I mean he was nice about it, but I had to tell him something."

  "And so you told him you didn't know why Jason was on that plane? That was your answer? That you had no idea he was even on the plane?" She could discern certain unspoken thoughts in his words. How could she tell Rowe something different from what she had told Gamble? And even if she revealed Jason's story for going to Los Angeles, how could she tell Rowe that she now knew Jason hadn't gone to interview with another company? She was in an impossible situation and right now there seemed to be no way out of it. She decided, instead, to change the subject.

  "How did you think to call me in the car, Quentin?" It made her feel slightly creepy that he had been able to trace her.

  "I tried the house, then the office. Only place left was the car," he said simply. "To tell you the truth, I was kind of worried about you.

  And--" His voice abruptly stopped, as if he had decided an instant too late not to communicate the thought.

  "And what?"

  Rowe was hesitant on the line, but then he quickly finished his thought. "Sidney, you don't have to be a genius to figure out the question we all want answered. Why was Jason going to L.A.?"

  Rowe's tone was clear enough. He wanted an answer to that question.

  "Why would Triton care what he does on his own time?"

  Rowe let out a deep sigh. "Sid, everything Triton does is highly proprietary. There are whole industries out there who spend all day long trying to steal our techriology and people. You know that."

  Sidney flushed. "Are you accusing Jason of selling Triton's technology to the highest bidder? That's absurd and you know it." Her husband was not here to defend himself and she damned sure wasn't going to let that insinuation go by.

  Rowe sounded hurt. "I didn't say I was thinking it, but others here are."

  "Jason would never, ever do anything like that. He worked his butt off for that company. You were his friend. How could you even make that allegation?"

  "Okay, explain what he was doing on a plane to L.A. instead of painting the kitchen, because I'm about to make the one acquisition that will allow Triton to lead the world into the twenty-first century and I cannot allow anything or anyone to destroy that opportunity.

  It will never be repeated."

  The tone in his voice was just enough to ignite every molecule of rage in Sidney Archer's body.

  "I can't explain it. I'm not even going to try to explain it. I don't know what the hell's going on. I just lost my husband, goddammit!

  There's no body, there's no clothes. There's nothing left of him and you're sitting there telling me you think he was ripping you off?

  Damn you." The Ford swerved slightly off the road and she had to struggle to bring it back on. She slowed down once again as the vehicle hit a major rut. The jolt went through her entire body. It was getting harder to see in the swirling snow.

  "Sid, please, please calm down." Rowe's voice was suddenly panicked.

  "Listen, I didn't mean to upset you further. I'm sorry." He paused, then quickly added, "Can I do anything for you?"

  "Yeah, you can tell every friggin' person at Triton to drop dead.

  Why don't you go first?" She clicked the off button and tossed the phone down. The tears were pouring so fast she finally had to pull off the road. Shaking as if she had just been plunged into ice, Sidney finally undid her seat restraint and lay across the front seat, one arm covering her face for several minutes. Then she put the Ford back into gear and took to the road once more. Despite her evident exhaustion, her thoughts moved as fast as the V-6-powered Explorer.

  Jason had been terrified of her upcoming meeting with Triton.

  He probably had the job interview story ready in case of an emergency. Her meeting with Nathan Gamble and company had qualified as such. But why? What could he possibly have been involved in? All those late nights? His reticence? What had he been doing?

  She looked at the dashboard clock and noted the time creeping relentlessly toward four A.M. While her mind was functioning in high gear, the rest of her wasn't. Her eyes would now barely stay open, and she had to address the obvious concern of where she would spend what was left of the night. She was coming up to Route 29.

  When she turned onto the highway, she went south instead of retracing her route north. A half hour later Sidney cruised through the empty streets of Charlottesville. She drove past the Holiday Inn and other possibilities for lodging and finally turned off Route 29 onto Ivy Road. She soon entered the parking lot of the Boar's Head Inn, one of the area's best-known resorts.

  Within twenty minutes she had signed in and was slowly pushing her near-immobile limbs between the sheets in a well-appointed room with beautiful vistas that at the moment she cared nothing about. What a day of nightmares, all of them absolutely real. It was her last conscious thought. Two hours before dawn, Sidney Archer finally fell asleep.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  At three o'clock in the morning, Seattle time, the thick clouds spilled open and delivered still more rain to the area. The guard huddled in the small guard shack, his feet and hands close to the floor heater. In one corner of the structure a steady stream of water trickled down the wall, forming a puddle on the ragged green carpet.

  The guard wearily checked the time. Four hours to go before his watch was over. He poured out the last of the hot coffee from his thermos and longed for a warm bed. Each building was leased by different companies. Some of the buildings simply stood empty, but all were secure regardless of their contents, with armed guards on-site twenty-four hours a day. The high metal fence had barbed wire at the top, although not the deadly razor wire favored at prison facilities.

  Video monitors were discreetly placed throughout the area.

  It would be a difficult place to break into.

  Difficult, but far from impossible.

  The figure was clad head to foot in black. It took him less than a minute to climb the fence in the back of the warehouse facility, expe
rtly avoiding the sharp wire. Once over the fence, he slipped in and out of the shadows as the rain continued to pour down, completely covering the slight sounds that his quick-moving feet made.

  On his left sleeve was a miniature electronic jamming device. He passed three video cameras on the way to his destination; none of them captured his image.

  Reaching the side door of Building 22, he pulled a slender' wire-like device from his knapsack and inserted it in the sturdy padlock.

  Ten seconds later the lock hung loose.

  He took the metal steps two at a time after making a visual sweep of the building's interior with his night-vision goggles. He opened the door to a room, illuminating the small space with his flashlight.

  He unlocked the filing cabinet and removed the surveillance camera.

  He placed the videotape in one part of his knapsack, reloaded the camera and replaced it in the cabinet. Five minutes later, the area was once again quiet. The guard had not yet finished his last cup of coffee.

  At the crack of dawn, a Gulfstream V lifted off from the Seattle airport. The black-clad figure was now dressed in jeans and a sweat-shirt and was fast asleep in one of the luxurious cabin chairs, his dark hair falling into his youthful face. Across the aisle, Frank Hardy, head of a firm specializing' in corporate security, and counter-industrial espionage, intently read every page of a lengthy report as the plane soared through the now clear morning sky; the last vestiges of the previous night's storm system