by Dakota Banks
“I think so. Cameron will probably be back at his desk by then, unless his condition is worse than they’re saying,” Amaro said. “I wouldn’t expect the released medical condition to be completely truthful. There are appearances to keep up.”
Amaro came over and sat with her. She shared the contents of the envelope. He said he’d start putting together complete information on the locations.
“Hound said you wanted me to get field training,” Amaro said. “You didn’t have to try to trick me into it. I want the training.” He said it matter-of-factly, but she could tell he wasn’t happy with her method.
Humility lesson number nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine.
“Sorry. I should have just asked you. I’d like to go over the details of why you and Hound picked those three doctors.”
He narrowed his eyes at her.
She crossed her hands over her face to defend herself. “I trust you, I trust you. I want to know what the issues are. These doctors could still be involved, just keeping Yanmeng somewhere besides this building. A doctor who lives here would have an ideal way to bring in body parts from elsewhere and deliver them to my door. There would be no separate courier.”
“It would have to be a doctor with a sophisticated device for turning digital recordings into digital mush.”
“Agreed. Elizabeth should be capable of providing that. I’ve heard about some infrared LEDs you can wear on each side of eyeglasses, or on your collar. They’re emitting infrared light, but your eyes don’t respond to it, so it doesn’t bother you. Cameras see IR, though, and they have filters to block it. All you need is emitters that generate IR radiation with enough power to overwhelm the camera’s filters. The result is that on the recording, your head is a bright ball of light that blocks out your face. I’ve seen it in action. It’s highly effective, at least until all commercial cameras get high-power filters. If you’re concerned about your body or clothes revealing something about you on camera, you can put emitters all over. You’d look like a brilliant white ghost.”
“Cool, and so simple. Do you think that’s what our messenger is using?” Amaro said.
“I doubt it. The telltale white blobs weren’t on the film, just overall static. I’m just saying that someone with Elizabeth’s resources could do that. Now, about the three doctors?”
“One is selling drugs from her office, the next is in the throes of the world’s nastiest divorce and had a breakdown, and the third has an active malpractice suit that looks rock solid against her. That doctor’s attorney wants to settle out of court, the victim’s family wants a full-blown trial and a sympathy award from a jury.”
“Sounds promising. Tell me about it.”
“Dr. Jill Bakkum is a pediatric neuro-oncologist. She cuts cancerous tumors out of little kids’ brains. She has a profitable solo practice with an office in a medical building on Michigan Avenue.”
“Her office isn’t far away, then.”
“She uses a car service to and from her office and to hospitals. I see that light in your eyes. You’re thinking we could get the records from the car service and see where she’s been going. She does have her own car, though, a gray Mercedes CL550, so the car service records wouldn’t account for all of her movements.”
“Get the car service records anyway. What did Dr. Bakkum do to earn the malpractice suit?”
“Basically, she was too aggressive in treating a cancer. Weird. She removed a cancerous tumor from a delicate spot growing in the brainstem of a ten-year-old girl. So far, so good. Determined to remove a metastasized bit of the tumor that was beginning to spread into the girl’s spinal cord, Dr. Bakkum damaged the spinal cord. The girl ended up a quadriplegic and the metastasized tumor was later treated successfully—nonsurgically—with radiation and chemotherapy. Dr. Bakkum should have tried the conservative, nonsurgical treatment first rather than gone digging further down past the brainstem trying to get the last bit of tumor. It was a major error in judgment by the doctor.”
“Other specialists concur?”
Amaro nodded. “The hospital’s protocols agree, too, leaving the doctor high and dry. Not only that, staff in the operating room stated that she was hyper or wired during the surgery, which turned out to be due to prescription drugs she was taking to keep up with her workaholic schedule.”
“It seems hard to fault her for wanting to dig in and get all the cancerous tissue she could.”
“Surgeons tend to think with their scalpels and sometimes discount the nonsurgical approaches. She could have been thinking at the time that radiation and chemo wouldn’t do the job and the girl would lose her life to cancer,” Amaro said. “Surgeon to the rescue. Besides, she was later proven to be making decisions with her self-confidence and focus boosted by Dexedrine. Maybe she recognized the risk and thought she could handle it.”
“It’s only a matter of time before Dr. Bakkum loses everything, including her ability to get malpractice insurance and suspension of her medical license while she undergoes drug rehab and stays verifiably clean for a long time. A person with a lot to lose will jump at any chance of preserving the status quo,” Maliha said. “Cameron and Elizabeth could entice her with the prospect of making all her problems disappear.”
“More likely they plan to make her disappear when they’re done. There’s plenty here to warrant surveillance on this doctor.”
“Do you really think a doctor’s oath would allow her to cut off body parts unnecessarily?” Amaro said.
“You’d think not, but the Dexedrine probably helped along the decision. At least Yanmeng’s probably not in pain. Not even aware of what’s going on, would be my guess. I have to get ready to go to Phoenix for the president’s appearance. You and Hound can do the surveillance. Let me know right away if you come up with anything.”
“Is Jake officially part of the team?”
Amaro agreed that I’m swayed too easily by Jake. What if it’s true, and I’m letting the wolf in with the chickens?
Maliha hesitated just a moment. Amaro didn’t notice. “Yes,” she said.
“Good enough for me. So we can talk with him while you’re gone. Are you really going to blow away the president?”
“Probably not.”
“Probably?”
If Cameron ends up in power, many lives will be lost—so many that the resetting of my scales administered by Anu might be so bad that I can never rebalance. I could be expendable after the assassination. The world will not be a better place. With Elizabeth guarding him, I might not be able take out Cameron. On top of that, there’s no clear way out for Yanmeng.
Maliha shrugged. “I’m making it up as I go.”
Maliha had three days to get to Phoenix, so she decided to take her Zonda for another road trip. She’d driven it home from New York, but she’d been injured and barely paid attention to her new vehicle. This time, her knife wound was well on the mend, and she was determined to make the drive as enjoyable as she could under the circumstances. Eliu was safe. Amaro was helping with the advance work for the assassination attempt. Hound was surveilling Dr. Bakkum, and Maliha hoped there would be news about Yanmeng’s location and Arnie’s fate when she returned home. The Zonda’s trunk was stuffed with weapons. She had a bag of jellybeans to snack on while on the road, and a lot of time to think, with eighteen hundred miles to go and six states to cross.
There was some snow on the first day, but when she got into southern Missouri, the highway was clean and dry. The Zonda was an effortless ride, quiet and powerful on the straightaways, tight and fast on the turns.
The night was cold and clear when she rose. The full moon lighted her way back to the McLaren. Moving from country road to country highway to interstate, Maliha headed home to Chicago, over eight hundred miles away. She intended to be in her condo before lunchtime. The McLaren was in its element, flying through the night. She rode with the windows down, drowning out her memories with the white noise of wind rushing past the car.
Pain st
reaked across the side of her neck, and then sliced across her left temple. She put a hand to her neck and it came away bloody. Maliha braked hard for an upcoming turn and struggled for control of the car. She felt the impact as the car scraped along the roadside barrier and then punched through it. When the tires left the road, there was a heart-stopping moment when the McLaren seemed to hang in midair before gravity took charge.
She stayed in a hotel in Springfield, Missouri, and left before dawn, heading for Amarillo. She hadn’t been in the Texas Panhandle for a long time, and was surprised to see the huge wind farms bordering the highway. There was brown grass from horizon to horizon and lines of spinning windmills as far as she could see. The wind swept across these plains for miles, unbroken by tall buildings or mountains. Pulling over to the side of the road, she lowered the window. She could hear the whoosh of nearby blades turning. It seemed like an alien landscape with an army of giant beings marching.
Amarillo was bright lights, music, and steaks. Eating out, she was approached by friendly Texans who wanted her company for a meal and more. She turned them away with good humor, and it made her smile. There were people out there who were living lives that left them free to pursue pleasure, not dark, tangled lives like hers. She walked, sat, and ate among them, but her life would never be without deep issues. She had purpose, friends, and now love.
I am a lucky woman.
It had been a good idea to drive, and by the end of the second day she knew she was not going to kill the president in Phoenix.
Crossing New Mexico was like driving through an old western movie. Red rock formations, mesas, buttes, gulches. It was horse territory, and Maliha had traveled extensively here on horseback in the 1800s, sleeping under the stars.
I’d like to do that again someday with Jake. So many places I’d like to visit with him. I want to have time for everything.
Climbing in elevation to Flagstaff, she tried to design a plan that would allow her to look as though she’d made a good effort at the assassination, but put Millhouse in no danger.
Elizabeth is likely to have a backup, in case I don’t take the opportunity when it presents. She’s running her own agenda here, in addition to Project Hammer. What to do about a secondary shooter?
She let her mind work on the problem while her eyes appreciated the drive down from Flagstaff to Phoenix, a six-thousand-foot drop from ponderosa pine forest to the Sonoran Desert, from ski resorts to saguaro cacti, some of them a hundred and fifty years old.
After settling in her hotel, Maliha contacted Amaro.
“I have the perfect situation for you,” he said. “A woman named Victoria Blake is attending the speech and the fund-raiser dinner afterward by herself. Her husband, Norman, is in London and not returning until the morning after the event. They moved here from London just two weeks ago and don’t have a network of friends yet, just Norman’s business associates, and he’s gone. She’s not happy attending by herself but Norman thinks it’s important. She’s about your age—your apparent age—and build, though you’re going to have to do an English accent if anyone talks with you.”
“Flower girl or Professor Higgins?”
“Huh?”
“Never mind. I can handle it. How do you find these situations, Amaro?”
“It’s better if you don’t know the details. When the government goons interrogate you, I’ll be safe.”
“Hey!”
“Just kidding. I’ll send you the details. The admission ticket has a photo on it. You can leave Victoria’s on there and hope for the best or put your own photo on it.”
“Thanks. I’ll use my own photo.”
“The venue is Comerica Theater, downtown. Victoria lives in Carefree, somewhere out in the desert. Homes blending in with nature. Sounds like hippie stuff.”
“Hound?”
“Is planning to have a talk with the good Dr. Jill this evening. He also thought you might need some help and he wanted you to talk with a guy he knows in Phoenix.”
“What’s special about this guy?”
“He’s a decorated Vietnam vet. He and Hound go way back. His name is Mickey Deer and he’s a sniper.”
“A sniper about sixty years old.”
“I wouldn’t raise the age issue with Hound if I were you. Hound says Mickey’s sharp, in shape, and bored with sitting around. He wants to see some action.”
“I can’t bring him in as a sniper. I’d have to get to know him a lot better.” An idea occurred to her. “Since Hound trusts him, though, I might have a role for him. Can you get him a ticket to the president’s appearance?”
“Sold out way in advance. That’s why you need Victoria Blake’s ticket. She’s got a reserved seat in the first row near the fire exit.”
“Nice. Most of the tickets aren’t reserved seating, though, right?”
“Only the ones that include the fund-raiser dinner afterward. Five thousand dollars a plate.”
“The tickets probably have bar codes on them,” Maliha said, “so they can be swiped, keeping track of who’s there. What happens if you make a duplicate ticket for Mickey with the same bar code as an existing ticket?”
“It would give an error when swiped . . . unless . . .” Amaro was quiet for a minute. “Unless the database record for that ticket ID is overwritten by the second swipe. Yeah, I can do that. Ninety percent chance, at least. The real ticket holder would have to get there first.”
The delights of having a world-class hacker on your team.
“Good enough for me. That should put some excitement in Mickey’s life right there.”
“You’re going to put me out of business if you keep thinking up this stuff.”
“Thinking and doing are far apart. Your job’s secure. Send me everything you have on Victoria, the theater, and whatever you can learn about the security arrangements. I need Mickey’s phone number, too.”
Maliha spent the evening planning and having a long talk with Mickey. She liked him, but there was no substitute for an aura check that told her things people didn’t put into words. She went to bed with the full moon shining through her sheer curtains, painting the room in a ghostly light.
Nothing like a home invasion to start tomorrow off right.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Dr. Jill Bakkum had rounds at the hospital, her second time that day seeing her small patients. She was good with the kids and their parents, striking the right balance of infusing hope and determination yet remaining honest.
A hard thing to do when you’re talking to a bald eight-year-old with brown eyes the size of saucers.
Hound thought she was an excellent doctor who’d stepped into quicksand of her own creation, a step that would soon prevent her from doing the work she loved. He didn’t detect any definite signs of Dexedrine usage, although the doctor was a little irritable and it seemed like she’d lost weight lately. The loss on her small frame made her look almost gaunt. Both of those were possible side effects of Dexedrine abuse, but they could also have been caused by stress, something the doctor had in abundance on a daily basis.
I can’t imagine her taking a saw to an innocent man’s limbs. There could be some hidden mental problem here.
When she left the hospital, a Mercedes from the car service picked her up and took her home. Hound followed her to Harbor Point Towers, keeping his distance at first, closing in when she walked down the hallway to her condo door. When she opened her door, he rushed her and pushed her inside. Slamming the door behind them, he grabbed both of her hands and held them in one of his large ones, careful not to break any bones. She looked fragile. The next thing he knew, he was flat on his back, his gun was missing from his shoulder holster, and he was looking down the barrel of it.
Fuck. I’ve just been taken down by a woman half my size.
“Appearances can be deceptive,” she said. “I hold black belts in several forms of martial arts. Why have you been following me all day? Or shall I just pull the trigger and not bother with any questio
ns?”
Hound sat up and stretched his legs out in front of him as she watched closely. “I’d prefer we go with the questions,” he said.
“Who are you?”
“Good start. I’m a private investigator, hired to find a man named Xia Yanmeng. He also happens to be a very good friend of mine. You wouldn’t know where he is, would you?”
She ignored his question. “Who hired you?”
“Not at liberty to say.”
Her foot hit his chin and he toppled backward onto the floor again.
I’ve had enough of this. And I want my damn gun back.
“Who hired you?” she said again. Her voice was calm, as though she held a gun on large men on a regular basis.
“The woman who has been on the receiving end of those body parts belonging to Yanmeng.”
“Oh. Miss Winters. Get up into the chair, please.” She gestured with his gun.
She’d gotten close, too close for a man with a good reach. He just had to make sure she didn’t use his weight against him.
Stay on the ground. No leverage with fancy-schmancy martial arts.
He sat up again, as if to follow her order to get on the chair, then lunged at her feet instead, pulling her ankles toward him. She went over backward and he threw himself on top of her like a wrestler going for the pin. She gasped with the pressure of his weight. He locked her hands over her head and spread her legs wide with his so she couldn’t flip him. He knew that in this position, rape would be screaming in her mind and he hoped it would scream a little while longer. Pounding her wrist into the floor, he made her release the gun. He grabbed it and rolled away fast, ending up ten feet across the room pointing the gun at her.
“Get up into the chair, doctor,” he said. “Don’t try anything dumb. I have a black belt in shooting.”
For the first time, a bit of fear showed in the doctor’s face. Her eyes darted around the room, no doubt trying to figure out if she could get to him or a hidden weapon before he could fire. Giving up on that, she sat in the chair and gripped the wooden arms tightly. Hound was careful to stay far enough away from her. He sat in a chair across the room.
