by John Locke
“What’s this guy’s title?”
“Tyson Phillips? He’s an FBI attorney.”
“Shut up!”
“Sir?”
“Do you mean to stand there and tell me your dynamic Willow Pointe police force is sucking hind tit to an FBI attorney?”
“Willow Lake, sir. And yes, they said he’s in charge. I mean, he’s FBI, and all.”
“Did he show you his ankle holster?”
The deputy looks confused. “How’d you know?”
“They’re awfully proud of that ankle holster. Never miss a chance to let you know they’re packing. ”
The deputy looks at Callie and Joe Penny, then back at me. “Who are you guys?”
“Homeland Security. And before you go all FBI on me again, you should know that the droppings in my parakeet cage outrank Agent Phillips. He and the Feebs can take their photos and soil samples and core borings and all the other cluster fuck bullshit we pay them to do. If they stay out of my way, I’ll even let them take the credit for solving the case. But the three of us are here to determine two things: Was this a terrorist act? And if so, is the country in danger?”
“You think it is?”
“I don’t know, but I intend to find out.”
He looks like he’s about to trust us. Then a funny look crosses his face. He says, “You’re not reporters, are you?”
“Do we look like reporters?”
“You look like movie stars. You and her, anyway.”
Joe Penny says, “Not me?”
Callie says, “Mr. Creed already told you we’re with Homeland Security. Up to now, we’ve been polite. But you need to let us do our jobs.”
The deputy looks skeptical. “Do you have any credentials?”
I briefly consider killing him, but he’s a young guy, just doing his job. I respect that. But I can tell Callie’s itching to snuff him, so I ask her to show him our paperwork. She does, and he finally turns and starts trotting back to his post. Callie, Joe, and I head south, to the blast site. As we begin picking our way through the rubble, FBI Agent Tyson Phillips shouts, “Halt! Do not take another step!”
Callie says, “I’ll get this.”
She peeks into her handbag, then strolls over to him, shows him our paperwork. Unfortunately, he’s having none of it, so she kicks him in the nuts, clubs the back of his neck, and he goes down face first. She puts a knee in the center of his back, pulls his arms toward her, and handcuffs him with two plastic zip ties. He starts hollering his disapproval, so she rolls him over and knocks him unconscious. Then removes his shoes and socks and stuffs the socks in his mouth and tapes his lips shut. While waiting for him to regain consciousness, she tapes his ankles together.
Then she walks back to where we’re standing and says, “That ought to hold him.”
“What type of tape did you use?”
“Filament.”
Joe says, “Are we gonna get in trouble for this?”
“Probably,” I say. “But it couldn’t be helped. He wasn’t going to give us access, and Callie saved him from getting shot.”
“You would’ve shot him?”
“He probably would have shot himself, trying to grab his gun. But yeah, I would’ve shot him. If this is the first wave of a terrorist attack we need to put jets in the air. We can’t fuck around with these paper-pushers.”
Joe Penny’s my bomb-builder and expert of choice. But lately I’ve noticed serious flaws in his character, like compassion and empathy. Not to mention he’s questioned my judgment several times on this trip. Worst of all, he’s crushing on Callie, big time.
On the plus side, Joe’s an artist. He builds special-purpose bombs that distract or kill with surgical precision. When it comes to tactical work, he’s the best.
I use other bomb-builders, of course. You know, for mass-murdering. When I need massive explosions, I don’t require a specialist like Joe. I simply look for a guy with goats in his yard.
If Joe wants to keep breathing for an extended period of time he’ll have to find a way to overcome his lust for Callie. In the meantime, he’s on my payroll. In fact, he’s the only munitions expert I keep on salary. The balance of my staff is comprised of assassins and researchers, and I’ve got the best of both.
The assassins are exactly what you’d expect, including Maybe Taylor, who happens to be my daughter. But my research team would surprise you. It’s comprised of three celibate males, Curly, Larry, and C.H., who are, respectively, a midget, a dwarf, and an elf.
These three vertically-challenged geniuses work and live in Geek City, a protected area of the Sensory Resources complex. My offices are in the same complex, different annex. Sensory Resources is a clandestine branch of Homeland Security, whose prime directive is identifying domestic terrorists and killing them before they have a chance to carry out attacks. Ninety-nine percent of our work is done quietly, behind the scenes, so I don’t normally require clearance. When I do, it’s hard to come by, since only a handful of people know about Sensory Resources, and even fewer know I’m the newly-appointed director of the agency. Since we don’t technically exist, we have to pose as Homeland Security bigwigs.
Now, at ground zero, I’m impressed by the extent of the damage. Portions of doors, toilets, appliances, flooring, and sections of staircases are still intact, but nothing—from walls to fireplaces—remains vertical. The target and the surrounding homes are basically rubble.
“I can’t believe no one was killed,” I say.
“What do we know about the survivors?” Callie asks.
“Sheriff Cox will have to brief us.”
Joe says, “You’d think the place would be crawling with cops and gawkers by now.”
“This is a small, secluded town. A resort area. Most of these lake homes are vacant. When terrorists attack, people tend to hide till they know it’s safe to come out. The blast occurred hours ago, but if you heard a terrorist bombed a small town in Arkansas, wouldn’t you stay away?”
“Not me!” Joe says.
“Well, me either. But most people would.”
It takes us thirteen minutes to conclude three things: One, the blast was the result of a domestic terrorist attack featuring a two-step bombing. Two, the main target was the second home on the block, which we already know was owned by a man named Jack Russell, the alias of bounty hunter Jack Tallow. Three, Tallow’s lake house had a secret room.
Callie says, “Bingo.”
She holds up a chunk of wood.
“What’s that?”
“Top piece of an interior door.”
“And that’s significant because?”
She smiles. “There’s a phone number written on it.”
“What?” “A phone number. Written by a woman. Now tell me I’m good.”
“You’re damn good!”
I pick my way over to her and study the chunk of wood. Joe follows me and says, “Why would someone write a phone number on the top edge of a door?”
“Because no one would think to look for it there.”
“But you did.”
“Yeah, but I’m good.”
“How do you know it was written by a woman?”
“It’s distinctively feminine.”
“Maybe Agent Phillips wrote it,” I say.
Callie laughs.
Joe says, “That phone number could be ten years old.”
“It could be an old number,” I say. “But according to Jack’s toilet, the message is less than a year old.”
“You talk to toilets?” Joe says, giving Callie a wink.
There it is again. Like every man on earth, Joe finds Callie impossibly attractive. When men see good-looking women their first thought is I wonder if she might be interested in me. Joe’s testing the water. He’s thinking he and Callie are young, I’m older. Maybe that’s an angle he can exploit. Needling the boss a bit, putting me down in front of Callie makes him appear cool. He probably hopes they’ll get some banter going at my expense.
I can’t blame the kid for trying, but Callie’s way out of his league. And if he’s trying to impress her he’s going about it the wrong way, because Callie respects me. By poking fun at me, arguing with me, questioning my judgment, he’s coming dangerously close to disrespecting me. Callie would never tolerate that. It’s the sort of thing that would cause her to rise to my defense. Joe doesn’t get that, but again, he’s young. He might be skilled with conventional explosives, but in my experience nothing’s more combustible than a strong-willed woman. And Callie’s more explosive than any bomb Joe will ever create. I expect she’ll deal with his impertinence, if he crosses the line. In the meantime, maybe I can work in a little bit of teaching.
I say, “All houses talk, Joe. You just have to know how to listen. We stepped over a toilet lid a minute ago.”
“So?”
“Toilet lids are stamped with the date of manufacture.”
“Maybe it was a new toilet lid.”
Callie and I look at each other. She says, “If he’s getting on your nerves, I’ve got plenty of tape left.”
Joe looks at her with wounded surprise.
Callie and I type the phone number into our cell phones and walk to an area free from debris.
“What about Agent Phillips?” Joe says.
“He’ll be fine.”
“Won’t the FBI be pissed when they find him bound and gagged?”
“I hope so.”
I dial my research team at Sensory. Larry, the dwarf answers. I tell him to turn down the music that’s blaring in the background. When he does, I give him the number Callie found on the door and tell him to locate the signal.
Four minutes later he calls me back and says the phone in question is at or beside a hotel in Memphis, Tennessee, less than a mile from the international airport.
“How long has it been there?”
Larry puts me on hold. A few minutes later he puts me on speaker and says, “Nine hours, give or take.”
“And before that?”
“I bet the others fifty dollars you already know.”
“Willow Lake.”
“Come to papa!”
“Not so fast!” C.H. says. “Ask him who it belongs to!”
I say, “Right now all I’ve got is the belief it belongs to a woman.”
“Crap!” Larry says.
In the background I hear C.H. and Curly laughing heartily, which means they’re probably dancing a jig. It’s absurd, I know, but when you’re dealing with the world’s greatest researchers, that’s what you have to do: deal with them.
“Call the hotel,” I say. “Find out who checked in nine hours ago. There won’t be many at that time of the morning, and probably just our lady. I want her name and room number.”
“They won’t want to give us that information.”
“Use your imagination.”
“Can we threaten the front desk lady with bodily harm? Like in the movies?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“You won’t scare her. No offense, but you’re elves.”
“One elf. At most.”
“Nevertheless, your voices aren’t threatening. I know you wish they were, but they’re not. On the other hand, you’re government elves. Threaten her with a tax audit. After you get her name and room number, call one of our Memphis agents and have him stand outside her hotel room door. No one leaves the room till I say so.”
“Mr. Creed?”
“What?”
“We don’t have any agents in Memphis.”
“Why not?”
“You haven’t recruited any.”
“We’ve got drivers there, right?”
“Several.”
“Good. Get the biggest, toughest, most intimidating guy we’ve got, and tell him to get there immediately. Tell him she can’t leave the room under any circumstances. When everything’s in place, give me a call.”
“What if she’s already gone?”
“Keep an eye on the tracer. If the phone moves, I want the driver close behind.”
7.
CALLIE, JOE, AND I make our way to the roadblock, south of the blast site, where 20 men have gathered around the sheriff. I don’t know if they came to protect him, or the crime scene, or if they just wanted to be here when the FBI taskforce shows up. But whatever their reason, it’s been forgotten, now that Callie’s in their presence.
All eyes are on her like maggots on a corpse.
I flash my badge at Sheriff Cox, but he says that’s not good enough. It could be a fake. I won’t argue the point, because in fact, it is a fake. Sensory Resources doesn’t issue badges. But we do have valid credentials, and Callie produces them. Sheriff Cox pretends to study them carefully before answering my questions, but what he’s really studying is the lower half of Callie’s anatomy.
Now that we’re dating, and planning to live together, I need to ask her to stop wearing camel-toe jean tights, or leggings, or whatever the hell they’re called.
When he’s done ogling her, I ask, “Was a woman staying at Jack’s house?”
“How’d you know?”
“We’ve got a top-flight research team.”
“You’ve seen her picture?”
“No.”
“She’s damn good-looking.” He gives Callie another quick mental undressing and adds, “Not compared to you, Miss Carpenter.”
Callie shows him a smile so radiant it catches him off-guard. His knees buckle. He nearly goes down.
I get it.
She’s dazzling.
Normally I’d let Callie’s flirting work its magic, but right now I’m not in the mood.
I’m pissed.
Not only that, but I’m pissed that I’m pissed. What I’m saying, I’m shocked to realize it matters to me that this jackass is molesting my girlfriend with his eyes. And I’m furious at myself for having this weakness. When you’re in my business, playing at my level, the thing that kills you is your soft spot. Your weakness. You simply can’t survive long when they learn about your weakness.
“The woman’s name?” I say, making an effort to hold my temper.
He answers me while staring at Callie. “She was going by Emma Wilson, but when I ran her ID it came up identity theft. The real Emma died twenty-one years ago in a car crash. I don’t know if the phony Emma killed Jack Russell, or was just using him, but she had his house key, credit card, and a stack of cash that likely belonged to him. She took off shortly before the blast.”
“Who saw her last?”
“Millie Reston.”
“Where’s she?”
“In there with the others,” he says, pointing to a nearby tent.
“What others?”
“The BWC’s.”
Callie looks at me, then says, “We’re not familiar with that term.”
“Normally I’d keep this confidential,” Sheriff Cox says. “But we’re a small town, and I’m not the one who found them. So basically, the whole town knows the story.”
“Except for us,” Callie says.
His eyes go straight to the swell of Callie’s breasts, and eventually her face. “You’re that movie star, right?”
“You know I’m not. You’ve seen my papers. But thanks for the compliment. What’s a BWC?”
“We don’t know. It was written on the asses—pardon my French—of the three victims.”
“Victims?” I say. “We were told there were no casualties.”
“You were told right. No one died. But a young man and two women were in the general blast area. They were knocked down, disoriented. Some fella came running up from the lake, pulled their pants down, and wrote BWC on their asses with a grease pen.”
“Makes sense.”
“It does?”
“No, of course not.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Let’s just say comedy ain’t easy, and leave it at that. So what does BWC stand for?”
“We don’t know.”
�
�You’ve had hours to think about it.”
“Maybe it’s the bomber’s initials.”
“That’d be pretty stupid, don’t you think?”
He shrugs.
Callie says. “What else can you tell us?”
“There was a homicide a few hours before the blast. Local guy named Darryl Rhodes. Jack Russell had been banging Darryl’s wife, Abbey.”
“Abbey Roads?” Callie says. “Like the Beatles?”
“What beetles?”
Callie stares at him blankly.
He says, “Emma was staying at Jack’s house, posing as his fiancée. Darryl came over with the intention of raping her.”
“Why?”
“Because of Jack’s affair with Abbey.”
“Charming.”
“Darryl was about to get violent when someone—not Emma—shot him from the hill across the street.”
I try to piece it together. “The bombing occurred several hours after the homicide?”
“That’s right. We spent hours working the Darryl Rhodes homicide. When we’d done all we could, we cordoned off the area and everyone went home. Moments later, the bombs went off. It was like he was waiting for everyone to leave.”
“The grease pen guy?”
“Yeah.”
“Anyone get a good look at him?”
“No. It was dark, and like I said, the three that may have seen him were disoriented.”
“You think the grease pen guy had something to do with the bombs?”
“I do. But he wasn’t flying the crop duster.”
“You’ve lost me.”
“Witnesses saw a crop duster flying over the lake, heading toward Leeds Road. That’s rare for nighttime, so they kept watching and saw the pilot drop some sort of dust bomb. Then a missile of some kind flew up from the lake and exploded in the middle of the first bomb.”
“Then what happened?”
“All hell broke loose.”
“Anyone seen Jack?”
“We haven’t been able to locate him, but it turns out he was using an alias, too. His real name is—”
“Jack Tallow. I know. Thanks, Sheriff.”
“Where are you going?”
“To the tent.”
“The FBI told us to wait till they get here before questioning the BWC’s.”
“Sounds like good advice.”
