Women's Murder Club [03] 3rd Degree

by James Patterson

  Yeah, it rang a bell, but it didn’t fill me with exhilaration. Just a sickening feeling.

  Frank T. Seymour was one of the people killed in the blast at the Rincon Center.

  Chapter 92

  IT WAS NIGHT NOW and Michelle liked the night. She could watch The Simpsons, reruns of Friends. Laugh a bit, like before everything had started, like when she was a kid in Eau Claire.

  They’d had to ditch the Oakland apartment where they had lived for the past six months. Now they’d moved into Julia’s house in the Berkeley flats.

  And they couldn’t go out much anymore. The situation was too tight. Sometimes on TV she saw a photograph of Mal, except the news reports called him Stephen Hardaway. Robert had moved in, too. It was the four of them now. And maybe Charles Danko would show up soon, too. Supposedly, he had the final plans, the endgame, which Mal promised would blow everybody’s mind. It was huge.

  Michelle turned off the TV and went downstairs. Mal was hunched over the wires, tinkering with the new device, the latest bomb. There was a plan, he said, how they were gonna get this baby inside. Just being in the same place with the damn thing freaked her out.

  She crept up behind him. “Mal, you want something to eat? I can fix you something.”

  “You can see I’m working, Michelle.” More of a snap than a reply. He was soldering a red wire into a wooden table leg that she knew encased the blasting cap.

  She put a hand on his shoulder. “I need to talk with you, Mal. I think I want to leave.”

  Mal stiffened up from the bomb. He pulled the lenses off his head, wiped the sweaty hair off of his face.

  “You’re going to leave?” Mal said, nodding in her face, as if he found this amusing. “And you’re going where? Hop on a bus and go home? Back to Geewhizconsin? Enroll in Geewhizconsin junior college, after blowing up a couple of kids in the big city?”

  Tears started in Michelle’s eyes. Telltale signs of weakness, she knew. Dreaded sentimentality.

  “Stop it, Mal.”

  “You’re a wanted killer, honey. The cute little nanny who blew up her kids. Did that slip your mind?”

  Suddenly she saw it clearly. Lots of things. That even if they did this job, this last one, Mal would never go away with her. When she closed her eyes at night she could see the Lightower kids. Sitting around at breakfast. Getting dressed for school. She knew she had done terrible things. No matter how much she wished otherwise, Mal was right, there was nowhere for her to go. She was the murderous au pair. She always would be.

  “Now come on,” Mal said, suddenly gentler. “As long as you’re here, you can help me, baby. I need that pretty finger of yours. On that wire. You remember, nothing to worry about.”

  He held up the phone. “No juice, no boost, right? We’re gonna be heroes, Michelle. We’re gonna save the world from the bad guys. They’re never ever going to forget us.”

  Chapter 93

  ONE A.M., but who could sleep?

  Molinari came into the squad room. I was watching the wires with Paul Chin. He looked at me and sighed. “Charles Danko.”

  He tossed a green folder on the desk across from me. It was marked PRIVILEGED INFORMATION, FBI. “They had to go deep in the cold files to find him.”

  I felt my blood rush. My skin prickled. Did this mean we were close to finding him?

  “He went to the University of Michigan,” Molinari said. “Arrested twice for disorderly conduct and inciting to riot. Picked up in New York in 1973 for illegal possession of firearms. A town house he lived in there just blew up one afternoon. Here one minute, gone the next.”

  “Sure sounds like our boy.”

  “He was being sought in connection with a bombing of the Pentagon in 1972. An expert in explosives. After that town house blew in New York, he disappeared. No one knew whether he was in the country or out. Charles Danko’s simply been missing for thirty years. No one’s even chasing him.”

  “A white rabbit,” I said.

  He laid out an old rap sheet dated 1974 and a faxed black-and-white FBI wanted poster. On it was a slightly older version of the boyish face I had seen in the family photo at the Danko house.

  “There’s our man,” Molinari said. “Now how the hell do we find him?”

  Chapter 94

  “LIEUTENANT!” I heard a loud knocking on my glass.

  I bolted up. My watch read 6:30 A.M. I must have dozed off waiting for Molinari to report with more news on Danko.

  Paul Chin was at my door. “Lieutenant, you better get on line three. Now…”

  “Danko?” I blinked myself awake.

  “Better. We got a woman from Wisconsin who thinks her daughter is tied up with Stephen Hardaway. I think she knows where she is!”

  In the seconds it took to knock the sleep out of my brain, Chin went back to his desk and got a backup recording going. I picked up the phone.

  “Lieutenant Lindsay Boxer,” I cleared my throat and said.

  The woman started in as if she had left off in mid-sentence with Chin, her voice upset, maybe not too educated. Midwestern.

  “I always told her something with this smart-ass guy didn’t add up. She said he was so brilliant. Brilliant, my ass… She always wanted to do good, my Michelle. She was easy to take advantage of. I said, ‘Just go to the state school. You can be anything you want.’”

  “Your daughter’s name is Michelle?” I picked up a pen. “Ms….?”

  “Fontieul. That’s right, Michelle Fontieul.”

  I scribbled down the name. “Why don’t you just tell me what you know?”

  “I seen him, you know,” the woman recounted. “That fellow on TV. The one everybody’s looking for. My Michelle’s hooked up with him.

  “Course his name wasn’t Stephen then. What’d she call him on the phone? Malcolm? Mal. They drove through here heading out west. I think he was from Portland or Washington. He got her into this ‘protesting’ thing. I didn’t even understand half of what it meant. I tried to warn her.”

  “You’re sure this was the same man you saw on TV?” I pressed.

  “I’m sure. Course, his hair’s different now. And he didn’t have no beard. I knew—”

  I interrupted. “When was the last time you spoke to your daughter, Ms. Fontieul?”

  “I don’t know, maybe three months. She always called. She’d never leave her numbers. This last time, though, she sounded a little strange. She said she was really doing some good for once. She comes out and tells me that I raised her well. That she loved me. I was thinking, maybe she’d got herself knocked up is all.”

  All this matched. What we knew about Hardaway and the description we’d gotten from the owner of the KGB Bar. “Do you have any way to contact your daughter? An address?”

  “I had some address, I think it was maybe a friend’s. I got this P.O. box. Michelle said I could always send something there if I needed to. Box three-three-three-eight. Care of Mail Boxes, Etc., on Broad Street, Oakland, California.”

  I glanced at Chin, both of us scribbling at the same time. The place wouldn’t open up for a couple of hours. We’d have to get the FBI out to her in Wisconsin. Get a photo of her daughter. In the meantime, I asked if she would describe her to me.

  “Blond. Blue eyes.” The woman hesitated. “Michelle was always pretty, I’ll grant her that. I don’t know if I’m doing the right thing. She’s just a kid, Lieutenant.”

  I thanked her for coming forward. And I told her I’d make sure her daughter was treated fairly, if she was mixed up in this, which I had no doubt she was.

  “I’m going to put you on with another officer,” I told her, “but before I do, I need to ask you one more thing.” A thought had crept into my head, going back to that first day. “Did your daughter have any breathing ailments?”

  “Why, yes,” she said, pausing, “she always did have asthma, Lieutenant. Been carrying around a puffer since she was ten years old.”

  I looked at Chin through the glass. “I think we just found Wendy Ra
ymore.”

  Chapter 95

  CINDY THOMAS headed into work on the Market Street bus, same as every morning, but that day with the gnawing premonition that something was going to break soon. One way or the other. August Spies had promised as much.

  The MUNI was crowded this morning, standing room only. It took two stops for her even to find a seat. She took out her Chronicle as she did every morning and scanned page one. A shot of Mayor Fiske, flanked by Deputy Director Molinari and Tracchio. The G-8 meetings were still a go. Her story, on the possible link to Billy Danko, was the right-hand column above the fold.

  A girl with cropped, dyed red hair in overalls and a crocheted sweater moved close by. Cindy looked up; something about her struck her as familiar. The girl had three earrings in her left ear and a barrette in the shape of a sixties peace symbol in her hair. Pretty, in a waiflike way.

  Cindy kept one eye on the route, which she knew just from the stores on Market Street. The man next to her got up at Van Ness.

  The girl in the overalls squeezed into the seat beside her. Cindy smiled and turned the page. More articles on the G-8 thing. The girl in the overalls seemed to be reading over her shoulder.

  Then she met Cindy’s eyes. “They’re not going to stop, you know.”

  Cindy smiled halfheartedly; conversation wasn’t something she needed before eight A.M. This time the girl wouldn’t let her gaze go.

  “They’re not going to stop, Miss Thomas. I did try. I did like you said, and tried.”

  Cindy froze. Everything inside her seemed to come to a stop.

  She looked into the girl’s face. She was older than she had seemed—maybe mid-twenties. Cindy thought to ask how she knew her name, but then in that same instant, it all came clear.

  This was the person she’d been talking to on the Internet. This was the girl who had a hand in killing Jill. Possibly, the au pair.

  “Listen to me. I snuck out, they don’t know I’m here. Something terrible is going to happen,” the girl said. “At the G-8 meeting. Another bomb. Or worse. I don’t know exactly where, but it’s gonna be big, the biggest one. A lot of people will die. Now you try to stop it.”

  Every muscle in Cindy’s body tensed. She didn’t know what she should do. Grab her, shout, stop the bus? Every law-enforcement agent in town was looking for this girl. But something held Cindy back. “Why are you telling me this?” she asked.

  “I’m sorry, Miss Thomas.” The girl touched Cindy’s arm. “I’m sorry about all of them, Eric, Caitlin. That lawyer, your friend. I know we’ve done some terrible things…. I wish I could undo them. I can’t.”

  “You’ve got to turn yourself in.” Cindy stared at her. She glanced around, petrified that one of the other passengers would hear. “It’s over. They know who you are.”

  “I have something for you.” The girl ignored her pleas. She pressed a folded-up piece of paper into Cindy’s hand. “I don’t know any way to stop it now. Except this. It’s better if I stay with them. Just in case the plans change.”

  The bus came to a stop near the Metro Civic Center. Cindy unfolded the paper the girl had given her.

  She read: 722 Seventh Street Berkeley.

  “Oh my God,” Cindy gasped. The girl was telling her where they were hiding.

  Suddenly the girl was standing up, heading for the exit. The rear door hissed open.

  “You can’t go back there!” Cindy hollered.

  The girl turned, but she kept walking.

  “Wait!” she shouted. “Don’t go back there.”

  The girl seemed surprised, and lost. She hesitated for a second. “I’m sorry,” she mouthed. “I need to do it this way.” Then she hurried off the bus.

  Cindy leaped up as the doors closed, yanking the cord, shouting to the driver to open them again. It was an emergency! By the time she jumped out onto the platform, Michelle Fontieul had disappeared into the early-morning crowd.

  Cindy got on the phone to Lindsay. “I know where they are! I have an address.”

  Part Five

  Chapter 96

  THE LARGEST ASSAULT TEAM in the city’s history was building up around the run-down white house at 722 Seventh Street in Berkeley. San Francisco SWAT details, Berkeley and Oakland contingents, federal agents from the FBI and the DHS.

  The area was completely blocked off from traffic. Neighboring houses were quietly cleared one by one. The Bomb Squad was readied. EMS vans were pulled into place.

  A gray Chevy van had pulled into the driveway twenty minutes earlier. Somebody was home.

  I was able to station myself close to Molinari, who was in phone contact with Washington. A Special Operations captain, Joe Szerbiak, was in charge of the assault team.

  “Here’s what we do,” Molinari said, kneeling behind the barricade of a black patrol car maybe thirty yards away from the house. “We make one call. Give them a chance to surrender. If they don’t”—he nodded to Szerbiak—“it’s yours.”

  The plan was to shoot in tear gas canisters and force whoever was in the house out. If they came out cool, meaning voluntarily, we would force them to the ground, pick them up.

  “And if they come out hot?” Joe Szerbiak asked, putting on his bulletproof vest.

  Molinari shrugged. “If they come out shooting, we have to take them down.”

  The wild card in the siege was the explosives. We knew they had bombs. What had taken place at the Rincon Center two days before was in the front of everybody’s mind.

  The assault team was readied. Several marksmen were in place. The team that was going in assembled inside an armored van, ready to swing into place. Cindy Thomas was with us. A girl inside seemed to trust her. Michelle. Who might be Wendy Raymore, the au pair.

  I was nervous and agitated. I wanted this over. No more bloodshed, just over.

  “You think they know we’re out here?” Tracchio surveyed the house from behind the hood of a radio car.

  “If they don’t,” Molinari said, “they’re about to.” He looked at Szerbiak. “Captain,” he said with a nod, “you can make that call.”

  Chapter 97

  INSIDE 722 SEVENTH STREET, everyone and everything was going crazy.

  Robert, the vet, had grabbed an automatic rifle and was crouched below one of the front windows, sizing up the scene outside. “There’s an army out there! Cops everywhere I look!”

  Julia was screaming and acting like a crazy woman. “I told you to get out of my house! I told you to get out!” She looked toward Mal. “What are we going to do now? What are we going to do?”

  Mal seemed calm. He went over to the window, peeked through the curtains. Then he headed into the other room and came back wheeling a black case. “Probably die,” he answered.

  Michelle’s heart seemed to be beating a thousand beats per second. Any moment, armed, uniformed men could burst in. Part of her was gripped with fear, part was ashamed. She knew she had let down her friends. Ended everything they had fought for. But she had helped murder women and children, and now maybe she could stop the killing.

  Suddenly the phone rang. For a second everyone turned, eyes fixed on the phone. The rings were like alarm bells going off.

  “Pick it up,” Robert said to Mal. “You want to be the leader. Pick it up.”

  Mal walked over. Four, five rings. Finally he lifted the phone.

  He listened for a second. His face didn’t register fear or surprise. He even told them his name. “Stephen Hardaway,” he said proudly.

  Then he listened for a long time. “I hear you,” he answered. He put down the receiver, swallowed, and looked around. “They say we have this one chance. Anyone who wants to leave, you’d better go now.”

  The room was deathly quiet. Robert at the window. Julia, her back pressed up against the wall. Mal, finally seeming shocked and out of answers. Michelle wanted to cry that she had brought this upon them.

  “Well, they ain’t putting their hands on me,” Robert said. He picked up his automatic rifle, his back to the k
itchen door, eyeing the van parked in the driveway.

  He winked, a sort of silent farewell. Then he yanked open the door and ran out of the house.

  About four feet from the van he raised the gun, squeezing off a long burst in the direction of the police. There were two loud cracks. Just two. Robert stopped in his tracks. He spun around, a surprised look on his face, crimson stains widening on his chest.

  “Robert!” Julia screamed. She smashed the barrel of her gun through the front window and started shooting wildly. Then she was hurled backward and didn’t move again.

  Suddenly a black canister sailed through the front window. Gas started to leak out. Then another black canister. A stinging, bitter cloud began to envelop the room, clawing at Michelle’s lungs.

  “Oh, Mal,” she cried. She looked toward him. He was standing there, no fear on his face now.

  In his hands he held a portable phone.

  “I’m not going out there,” he said.

  “I’m not, either.” She shook her head.

  “You really are a brave little girl.” Mal smiled.

  She watched him punch in a four-digit number. A second later she heard a ring. It came from the suitcase.

  Then a second ring.

  A third…

  “Remember”—Mal took a breath—“no juice, no boost. Right, Michelle?”

  Chapter 98

  WHEN THE HOUSE BLEW we were crouched behind the cover of a black-and-white, barely a hundred feet away.

  There were bold orange flashes as the windows exploded. Then the house seemed to lift off its foundation, a fiery cloud ripping the whole thing apart through the roof.

  “Get down!” Molinari yelled. “Everybody down!”

  The blast hurled us backward. I took Cindy, who’d been standing next to me, down to the ground, shielding her from the force of the blast and the shower of debris.