10. Fast Track

by Fern Michaels

  “I can’t talk to you about FBI business, Jack, you know that.”

  “I understand that, Bert. Tell me this, does it affect the girls in any way?”

  “Hell yes. The situation itself, not the girls directly,” he clarified. “I’ll do what I can, that’s all I can tell you,” Bert said.

  “Thanks a lot, pal. I thought you were on our side.”

  “I am. Sorry, Jack, I gotta go. Director Cummings called a meeting of all us special agents. We’re being called in from our postings. Does that give you a clue that this is serious?”

  Jack ran alongside the black car Bert was driving. “Is it about the girls? Did someone figure it out?”

  “Yes and maybe yes,” Bert said, answering both questions. “I swear to God I’m going to run you over if you don’t get the hell out of my way, Jack.”

  His head buzzing with this latest development, Jack now knew his earlier gut instincts were right. Something was already wrong, and they hadn’t moved past square one. One thing he knew for certain, Bert Navarro was not an alarmist. He’d seen panic in the man’s eyes. Real panic.

  When he got back inside he found the women and Harry all clustered together in the kitchen, their eyes full of questions. He shrugged for their benefit, and said, “Bert won’t discuss FBI business with me or anyone else.” The words were no sooner out of his mouth when his cell phone rang. Charles.

  “Yes, Charles, what’s up?” He listened, his jaw dropping. When he could finally get his tongue to work he said, “That’s goddamn impossible!” He listened some more, then barked, “What the hell do you mean we don’t have a Plan B?” He listened again but didn’t say another word before he closed the cell phone.

  Harry swung his foot back and forth, his warning that Jack better speak quickly or he was going to get the brunt of that foot. “Charles told me why Bert just left. In a million years you aren’t going to believe this. Never, never, never!” Harry’s foot swung higher. “That meeting Bert is going to at the FBI building is about this building and the supposed rat infestation. There’s word on the street that terrorists are attacking us with the rats to set off a plague epidemic. Seems these supposed terrorists hate the Brits as much as they hate us Americans.”

  “But there aren’t any rats here! We made that up. Well, Charles made that up. Who…What…?” Kathryn sputtered.

  Annie’s voice rose to a hysterical pitch. “But Myra and I saw a whole swarm of rats chasing those men out front just a little while ago. There are rats here! We actually saw them!” She reached out to Myra to clutch at her arm.

  Myra’s hold on her pearls was a death grip. “We did see rats, Jack. We were too far away to see the men’s faces, but we did see the rats. Oh, dear God, now what are we going to do?”

  Jack stood rooted to the floor. He didn’t know what to do or think. For the first time in his life he felt witless and numb. “I don’t have a clue,” was all he said.

  “Did Charles say anything else?” Nikki asked.

  “Only that the CDC would become involved. Since they’re in Atlanta, it will take a few hours to get here. We have to wait for Charles to get back to us.”

  “We’ve been compromised,” Annie said, the hysteria still in her voice. “That’s spook-speak for we’ve been fingered.”

  Myra’s eyes rolled back in her head, but she didn’t relinquish her fierce hold on the pearls.

  Jack’s brain finally started to function. “And who do you think we have to blame for that if it turns out to be true? Robinson, that’s who! Myra, Annie, think now, is it possible the three men you saw out there were Robinson and his cronies?”

  Both women shook their heads. It was Myra who spoke first. “By the time I saw the rats, the men were running. I only saw their backs. It was so bizarre I just kept staring at the rats, wondering if it was a prophecy of some kind. Then Annie and I both started to scream. The rats were chasing the men, that’s certain.”

  Annie nodded. “They were on the other side of the yellow tape. It looked like there were hundreds of them. They swarmed!”

  Nikki, who was normally the voice of reason, frowned. “But rats are nocturnal. They only come out at night. Bright light does something to their eyes. I read that somewhere. So, if that’s true, what were rats doing outside in the bright sunshine midmorning?”

  No one had an answer.

  “Those exterminator trucks out there have our fingerprints all over them,” Isabelle said.

  No one moved.

  “How is the background check going to work on Reston Exterminating?” Nikki asked.

  “It should work like a charm. Bids were sent out giving each company twenty-four hours to quote a price. I understand they all came in extremely high except for Reston, which is supposedly a new start-up company eager for business. According to the incorporation papers, they’ve only been in business for three weeks,” Jack said.

  “With a fleet of six trucks?” Alexis asked.

  “Small-business loan. A mom-and-pop operation. Five kids working the business. That’s the background. Anyone fishing for information isn’t going to get a thing out of the Brits. Those stiff upper lips know when to clamp shut,” Jack said.

  Harry stepped forward. “Is Homeland Security going to get involved?”

  “Count on it. They’re probably gearing up as we speak,” Jack said.

  “Then don’t we need to get out of here? This place is no longer secure or safe.”

  “Tell me something I don’t already know,” Jack said. His cell phone rang and he answered it. It was his ex–FBI friend Mark Lane.

  “Articulate,” Jack said coolly. He listened. “Ha! I thought you were going to tell me something I didn’t know. I’m standing inside the premises right now talking to you. C’mon, Lane, make me proud and tell me something that’s going to help me.” He listened, then closed the cell phone.

  Jack waved his hands. “Guess the story is all over town by now. Before the end of the day, this whole town has a good chance of being quarantined if the gossip mill takes over. Normal people will become irrational out of fear. And here we sit.”

  “Those jackasses at HS will be our worst nightmare,” Harry said. “Somehow or other, they’ll get the Brits to agree to allow them to come in here in their Hazmat suits and take over. They might even barrel their way in without permission even though this is British soil and doing so is technically invading another country. We need to get out of here, Jack. Hey, I have an idea, why don’t we all go to the World Bank and hide out?”

  Jack shot him such a disgusted look, Harry clamped his lips shut.

  “It was my attempt at humor,” Harry said lamely. Yoko patted his arm in sympathy. “So, what are we supposed to do now?”

  “Wait,” Jack said succinctly.

  Liam Sullivan walked out into the newsroom and was pleased to see his former star reporter busily tapping away. It was a relief to get away from the phone even if only for a few minutes. His head pounded with the news he’d been getting for the past two hours.

  “So, Robinson, how is it you didn’t see fit to call in the latest news here in town? It would seem to me that bubonic plague and terrorism would make for headline news. Why did I have to hear it from a competitor? You’re damn well running amuck on me.”

  Oh shit! Either Ellis or Monroe must have jumped the gun in an effort to get a headline above the fold. Which just went to prove you couldn’t trust anyone, not even a colleague you drank beer with. “I’m writing it up right now. Give me five minutes, Chief. Personally, I think it’s bullshit even though those pictures of the rats are real. Those things multiply faster than rabbits. Five minutes, Chief.”

  “If it’s bullshit, then why did close to a thousand people evacuate? There’s going to be a panic in this town by sundown. We’re going with a late-afternoon special edition. So, snap to it, Robinson.”

  Ted suddenly felt sick and dizzy. He’d never manufactured a story in his life. Well, there was a first time for everything. He fell to
it and was finished in the self-allotted five minutes. He printed out his story and carried it into Sullivan’s office. He was getting sicker by the minute as he watched his boss read the article twice before he nodded, and said, “Good reporting, Robinson. Real good. Those pictures are damn ugly, but I guess you know that.”

  “Yes, sir, rats are ugly. Do you think the Sentinel and the News are going to go with afternoon editions?”

  “They’d be fools not to. We’ll beat them by an hour, that’s all I care about. We’re doing a double circulation.”

  Oh, shit! Ted’s hand itched to snatch his cell phone out of his pocket so he could call Ellis and Monroe.

  When the EIC looked up at him, he said, “Get out of here, Robinson. Lunch is on the Post today. Ten bucks’ worth.”

  Ted snorted to show what he thought of the generous offer, but at least he could get out of the office. The minute he got to his desk he called Monroe, who sounded as sick as he felt. Ellis sounded even sicker. Ted offered to buy a picnic lunch and told both reporters precisely where to meet him at the National Zoo. Both men accepted, and the meet was on in sixty minutes.

  Ted was emptying the heavy carton of food: double pastrami and corn beef sandwiches on rye with tons of mustard, pickles, potato salad, chips, brownies for dessert, and a six-pack of Heineken. He was laying everything out on the picnic table complete with paper tablecloth and plastic utensils, just the way Maggie would have, when his two friends joined him, both their faces glum and wary. Ted wanted to demand to know which one of his friends started the rumor, but he bit down on his tongue. On second thought, maybe it was better that he didn’t know.

  “We’re in some deep shit here, fellas,” Monroe said.

  “Only if that guy in the pet store remembers you. What are the chances of that happening?” Ellis asked as he straddled the bench. He eyed the food with approval. Two sandwiches each. Two was good. The Post had a better expense account than his paper had.

  “Nada. He was an old geezer, and his eyes looked kind of milky. I think he might have cataracts. I told him I was a biology teacher from Sacred Heart. He bought it.”

  “I think we should worry, if we agree to worry, about me calling both of you on my cell phone right after I turned in my column. You guys going with afternoon editions?”

  “Hell yes!” both reporters said.

  Ted waved his pickle upward. “How…how do you feel about it? You know…what we did?”

  Both reporters shrugged.

  “Too late now,” Ellis said. “The story is out there. We need to agree never to mention this. We met there by accident. You called us to go to lunch to celebrate, not the event but a late-afternoon edition. That’s it. Period. Do we all agree?”

  “Yeah,” Ted said.

  “Yeah,” Monroe said.

  “Good sandwiches,” Ellis said.

  Ted wondered why he still felt sick. The thought of having to eat both sandwiches was enough to make him want to run to the nearest bush.

  Chapter 11

  It was a pleasant enough oversized waiting room in the embassy, with real leather chairs, teak tables, luscious green plants, and copies of all the latest magazines. There was even a bowl of hard candies on one of the tables. The room was big enough to accommodate a large plasma television. The Sisters were all seated in the leather chairs, their eyes glued to the Fox News Channel as they waited for updates on the current situation involving the embassy.

  “It’s getting late, we should have heard something by now. The clock is ticking,” Kathryn said ominously. To make her point, she wagged her finger in the direction of an antique clock on the wall; the time read 5:10 PM.

  “I can’t believe this is happening. How do you go from a rumor about exterminators and rats to terrorists and bubonic plague? Charles must be pulling out his hair,” Myra said.

  “This is Washington,” Nikki said, as if those few words explained it all. “We all know this place is pretty much dead during the summer months, which means little or no news worth printing. This is news! The wrong kind, of course, but it’s front and center. Even Charles couldn’t have anticipated this happening. I agree, though, that he should have called us by now.”

  Myra continued to fiddle with the pearls at her neck. “Would you like me to try calling him again, dear?”

  “Yes, Myra, I would,” Nikki responded.

  They all watched as Myra punched in the digits that would connect her to Charles. “It’s going straight to voice mail. I assume that has to mean he is otherwise occupied.”

  The women continued to stare glumly at one another until they heard the chirp of Jack’s cell phone. All eyes were on him when he flipped it open to take the call.

  “It’s Bert, Jack. Get the hell out of there right now! The boys and girls from CDC and Homeland Security are on the way. The president himself got the British ambassador to approve the incursion. Sorry about the short notice. You have less than eight minutes. Go!” he said and then hung up.

  “We have to get out of here. Bert says we have eight minutes. That means five! Head for Rock Creek Park. We’ll all meet there! You girls sure you wiped everything down?” Jack roared in frustration and anger.

  Nikki held up her hands to show they’d all been wearing latex gloves since their arrival. “No prints, Jack!” she called over her shoulder as she ran from the room back through a series of corridors to the kitchen. Two minutes later the Econolines’ tires were screeching and smoking as all five vehicles hit the street at full throttle.

  Jack looked around, his eyes wild. “Let’s go, Harry. I’m going to ride with you, so burn rubber, pal. We don’t want to be anywhere near this place when those people in the Hazmat suits arrive. Thank God for Navarro.”

  Staff from several of the other embassies were leaving work and observed the activity at the British Embassy. Cell phones went to their ears at the speed of light. Jack saw it all in some kind of weird slow motion. “Fly, Harry, we’ve been spotted.”

  “Like they can see through these helmets and visors. I-don’t-think-so! I put mud over the license plate before I came out here. Relax, Jack. I’ll get you to your destination so you can meet up with your brothers and sisters.”

  “Shut up, Harry, I don’t have any brothers and sisters.”

  “I was referring to all the apes and monkeys at the zoo, Jack. Oops, sorry, I forgot, we’re going to the park and not the zoo. Shut up now so I can concentrate on my driving.”

  Jack much preferred to be the one giving the orders, not the other way around. He knew if he opened his mouth again, Harry would do a wheelie and buck him off.

  The rush hour traffic was horrendous, but the Ducati was made for weaving in and out of tight spaces. Harry took every advantage, and the duo arrived at the park in forty minutes. They were the first ones to arrive. Breathless with the wild ride, Jack called Nikki, who told him she was six minutes away, the others right behind her.

  When his breathing was somewhat normal, Jack tried calling Charles again, but his call also went straight to voice mail. He tried Bert, who barked a greeting and simply said, “This is not a good time, Monica. I’ll call you back.”

  Jack broke the connection so fast he thought his finger was on fire. He looked over at a brooding Harry, and said, “I think we’re on our own for the moment. You got any ideas?”

  “There’s always the dojo.”

  Jack looked glum. “It might come to that. Just to be on the safe side, set the wheels in motion.”

  Jack was about to call Charles again when his cell rang. It was Mark Lane. “Hey, buddy, Homeland Security is on the way, and so are the guys from CDC. Get your asses out of there. Like now, Jack.”

  “We’re out, Mark. Navarro called me a little while ago, but thanks for the tip. By any chance do you know any safe houses that aren’t in use?”

  “I do, but they won’t help you. They’re all wired. With all the shit you’re involved in, are you telling me you don’t have a place to hole up?”

  �
��That’s what I’m telling you,” Jack almost shouted. “Look, I’m sorry, I’m a little uptight right now.” Out of the corner of his eye he saw Nikki pulling into a parking space.

  “Well, off the top of my head I’d say you have a few options. No one knows the girls are here. So that leaves Myra’s farmhouse. Then you have Judge Easter’s place, not to mention Chief Justice Barnes’s estate and Lizzie Fox’s house. Take your pick, big guy.”

  Jack slapped at his head. He hadn’t been thinking clearly. “You know, for a private eye, you ain’t half-bad, Mark. Thanks. I owe you another one.”

  “And don’t think for a minute I’m not keeping score. When this is all over, we’ll grab a beer and talk it to death, okay?”

  “You got it!”

  Nikki ran over to him the minute he slipped his cell phone into his pocket. Jack wrapped her in his arms. The few people leaving the park to return to their hotels or home smiled indulgently. If they only knew, Jack thought. “Have you heard anything?” she asked.

  “Charles still isn’t answering. That’s starting to worry me. He always picks up. Mark Lane called after Bert did with the same information. Guess his snitches aren’t as high up the food chain as Bert is. Anyway, he called. Hey, did you take those magnetic IDs off the truck?”

  “The minute I parked. It just looks like a white van now. There are thousands of white vans in town. We talked among ourselves on the way here. The girls know what to do. Kathryn has the government license plates, so we can put those on as soon as we get someplace safe and can get other plates. How the hell did this happen, Jack?”

  “I honestly don’t have a clue, Nik. I also don’t have any idea as to what we should or shouldn’t be doing. Mark did come up with a suggestion. Seems, if we have the guts, we have a variety of places to hole up. Myra’s farmhouse, Judge Easter’s, or even Lizzie Fox’s house. He also suggested Chief Justice Barnes’s estate. We just have to make a decision,” Jack said, his eyes turning toward the parking lot just in time to see Kathryn and Yoko parking their vans. In the blink of an eye, they had the colorful logos identifying the vans as Reston Exterminating safely pulled off.