‘So awful,’ Dr Oscar said. ‘But, no, she hasn’t said anything. She’s muttered a bit, but only babble. Nothing of consequence that we’ve been able to discern.’
‘Dr Oscar! Room 8!’ a yell came from down the hall.
Dr Oscar glanced at an orderly flagging her with big arms at the opposite end of the hall, then back at Jenna. ‘I’ll be right back. Sorry!’
She took off running.
Jenna turned back to the window, stared in. Margeaux East continued to rock, her lips moving. She was babbling something even now.
Damn it! Jenna needed that message! More lives were at stake!
And yet …
Jenna glanced around. No one else in the hallway. Margeaux wasn’t dangerous, and this wasn’t an asylum by any means. The door wouldn’t be locked …
The train of thought was jolted by her cell phone vibrating. Quickly and silently, she slipped her hand in her pocket and sent the call to voicemail, praying with everything in her it wasn’t to do with Ayana.
It couldn’t be. She has Charley, Victor, and Dad all watching. They’ve all been sending the right safe words on schedule.
And even if it is, this is the only chance. Now or never.
Jenna turned the knob.
Thirty-one
Jenna thudded down the staircase toward the main hospital’s entrance into the emergency department, heart thundering even harder than it had been when she’d snuck out of Margeaux East’s room and into a cramped alcove to avoid Dr Oscar until the coast was clear for her to sneak out of the psych ward entirely. She’d finally given in to her phone’s incessant vibrating, which turned out to be texts from Saleda – telling her to rush back to the ER ASAP, there was a new development – and Irv, clueing her in to what that development actually was.
As she’d read his texts, the yellow from exam room six flashed in again, only this time, she realized it hadn’t been just the khaki yellow of something seeming out of place she’d originally taken it for. The shade had been so similar, she hadn’t seen it for the sand yellow it was:
BS TURNED OVER FOOTAGE TO MEDIA. MEDIA FOOTAGE ALTERED. COMPARISON TO RAW FOOTAGE FROM BS SITE SHOWS THERE WEREN’T JUST 32 BODIES. THERE WERE 33. BLACK SHADOW OFFED ONE OF THEIR OWN.
At that moment, she didn’t care about Dr Oscar seeing her or even how ridiculously unethical it had been to sneak into Margeaux East’s room to question her, let alone decide to pull out her voice recorder to capture the witness’s babbling so she could try to make out what the woman was trying to say later.
Jenna had flown out of the alcove, her feet carrying her faster and faster toward the ER. The text hadn’t said where the extra murder had happened, but it didn’t have to. She knew where it was. It all made so much more sense. Why the Dad had died first. Why the son was closer to the door and then killed with a dagger. She hadn’t seen past it because of the sword wounds, but they hadn’t been the same swords.
The sand yellow represented the number two. A pair.
Jenna rounded the corner of the grisly inner portion of the emergency department from the main hospital entrance toward Hallway B – and room six – but all of the trains of thought and loaded questions she had for Saleda and the team died on her lips as she realized the latest guest had arrived to the party. It didn’t take long for Jenna to gather that he wasn’t happy about his literal lateness, either, and that it hadn’t been intended, fashionably or otherwise. A few feet away, Saleda was drawn to full height, Porter beside her, posture aggressive as they faced the group of uniforms before them.
Jenna’s gaze shifted to the arm of the officer Saleda was verbally sparring with, and the number of stars took Jenna aback. The man in the suit earlier had been a lackey sent from the Department of Homeland Security, but he had an Army general with him now.
Jenna strode forward, steeling herself to enter the mix.
‘Ah, Dr Ramey,’ Saleda said, noticing her approaching, seeming grateful for the interruption. ‘Perfect timing.’ She lanced tersely back toward the general, the police sergeant, and the man in the suit, then back to Jenna, holding her eyes fiercely as if trying to transmit something much more than simply the words she spoke. ‘These gentlemen and I have been discussing the developing situation. I was just saying to them that your expertise may prove instrumental in evaluating and assessing the risk profiles of certain tactical options on the table, given the profiles we’ve been able to piece together.’ She turned back toward the men, nodding to the general. ‘General Theodore Quintrell, Military Advisor to the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, this is Dr Jenna Ramey, Special Agent and acclaimed forensic psychiatrist.’
The sturdy, albeit top-heavy, officer stretched out a worn, calloused hand and smiled jovially, showing off the sizable gap between his two front teeth. ‘Please, do call me Ted. Formalities are for state dinners and impressing the wife.’
Jenna shook his hand, returning his smile, but only to put him at ease. The light orange that had flashed in at his words didn’t jibe with the big ’ole teddy bear persona he seemed to want to impress upon her. The white hair and the double chin, rosy plump cheeks, and thick gut might’ve sold her that he was a military man softened in his old age if she’d met him on the street. But given the encounter she’d witnessed, the color told the real story. Funny, because she always thought of it as tiger orange, but the association actually reminded her of the orange of the black- and orange-striped Monarch butterfly. Or rather, its mimic, the Viceroy. It looked just like the Monarch – a trick to make predators afraid to eat it since Monarchs are poisonous. But Jenna’s association with the color was the exact opposite of that concept. It was a deceptive charm, one that looked innocent and even pleasant on the outside but harbored something more poisonous underneath. ‘How about General Ted?’
He grinned. ‘That’ll work fine.’
They released hands, and Saleda nodded to the other two men in turn. ‘And of course you’ve already met Sergeant Young and Mr Underwood.’
The two men nodded, as she did. ‘Nice to see you both. Please, tell me how I can be of assistance.’
‘Dr Ramey, I was just telling Agent Ovarez here that the Department of Homeland Security is increasingly worried, given the scale of these attacks, their randomness, and their brutality that with the promise of further violence from this group, our course should be swift and decisive. That’s why we’re working with local and state police to secure a perimeter, set up mobile command centers around and within a fifty-mile radius – thirty, if we can organize quickly enough – and through state police channels, are working with officials to issue an official shelter in place order to everyone living and working within that area. We plan to commence a door to door search by 1700 hours.’
Saleda’s nostrils flared. ‘What I have just been discussing with the general, however, is how such an aggressive tactic may affect the dynamics of this particular terroristic organization, given their specific extreme beliefs regarding governmental interference. I was informing him that it’s our team’s opinion that such a bold move would likely further antagonize them to escalate their violence, especially when such a manhunt has little chance of success. Based on the very few pieces of evidence we would have to identify the culprits, that is.’
The general laughed heartily. ‘Miss Ovarez, forgive me, but I do believe finding one guy with a machete here, another with a samurai sword there would be fairly tale-telling.’
‘None of the UNSUBs has wielded a samurai sword in these attacks,’ Porter mumbled, as, next to her, Jenna could feel the angry breaths rising and falling in Saleda’s chest as she fought to allow Porter’s interruption to suffice in lieu of correcting the general for calling her Miss.
The general turned to him. ‘What did you say, son?’
Porter cleared his throat, straightened his posture. ‘Forgive my interruption, sir. I was just clarifying that none of the Unidentified Subjects has been known to use a samurai sword as a weapon. To date, that is.’
>
The general stepped to Porter’s side, clapped a hand on his shoulder. ‘Well, then. Guess we’ll have to leave them masked men with the samurai swords be, hadn’t we son?’ He laughed heartily.
The acid green of disgust flashed in. Regardless of this man’s game or agenda, it didn’t change the fact that they were standing in the middle of a hospital emergency room turned mortuary, and here he was, laughing like he’d just told the best one-liner on the golf course.
Let’s cut the shit.
‘General Ted, I applaud your resolve and willingness to muster the manpower needed to put out such a strong show of effort to take back control of this situation, because the public is certainly frightened right now. No doubt their fears are on your mind, and your plan is a both a bold maneuver to capture the perpetrators of these attacks as well as an urgent display to those very scared citizens that steps are being taken to ensure their safety. But if I may speak candidly, sir, while such a strategy has its merits – it was clearly effective in Boston – based on my knowledge of this case and the profiling I have done on the UNSUBs as individuals and as a group, I must strongly encourage a different tactic be considered. Please, sir, don’t waste valuable resources on trying to find the UNSUBs in a brute force, door-to-door manhunt. We can’t risk antagonizing these bastards. Especially not when we have the new lead we do,’ Jenna said, looking to Saleda as if to confirm she’d mentioned the information Irv had dropped on them.
‘Yes, Miss Ovarez told me about your technical analyst’s theory that one of the terrorists killed another right over from where we’re standing,’ the general said, glancing in the direction of where the body of a fifty-something female lab technician was now covered in a white sheet in the middle of the hallway directly between Restroom A and Exam Room Six. ‘But our people have analyzed the video footage, and the area in question is so chaotic and blurred, the incident can hardly be seen at all in the whir of activity, much less be used to corroborate the wild theory of one assassin killing another, then removing the body from the crime scene. Never mind the fact that there is a body right where this incident supposedly occurred.’
That’s the footage your people have seen. But while Jenna knew they could fight, show the raw footage from the Black Shadow site, this guy and everything he stood for wouldn’t care. He’d made up his mind. After all, he might be a general, but he had orders, too. Make his boss look good.
‘But, sir,’ Saleda said through clenched teeth, trying to maintain a polite expression, ‘if they took that body it is because they didn’t want it identified. That has to mean that the identity of the victim could link it to the other perpetrators. Put the priority on finding that missing body, general, and I assure you, you will expedite rounding up the culprits in ways manpower and riot gear never could.’
‘Young lady,’ General Ted said, still smiling, but not quite as good-natured and cheerful as before, ‘if there’s a missing dead body out there to be found, I’m positive our men will run across it in their travels. But there are twelve terrorists who have killed over fifty people in mere days, and the time for giving them a head start to escape our clutches is over. We are putting out the shelter in place order and will be finalizing a lockdown of this city until the perpetrators are caught or dead. That is what I was sent here to do, and that is what I will be doing. We appreciate your consult and your candor, but we have a job to do, and I caution anyone who may think we should do otherwise to remain out of our way.’
He gave a final nod, then turned to Jenna and smiled wide, slipping right back into his grandfatherly, teddy-bear persona that Jenna was sure had gotten him many places in life. He again offered her a hand.
‘Lovely to have met you, Doctor, and please, now that it looks like you folks will get to take the evening off a little early tonight, do drive safely home to your family. I bet they’ll be just thrilled to have some extra time with ya.’
Jenna smiled, tight-lipped. ‘They will, of course. Always fun to have a movie night with the fam.’
You know nothing about my family, asshole. And unless you’re too intimidated, address my supervising officer with the title and respect she deserves.
With a curt nod to Saleda and Porter, General Ted Quintrell strolled with Sergeant Young and Mr Underwood toward the ER’s exit door. The team followed, trading glances and raised eyebrows.
As they reached the exit to the street, Sergeant Young held the door open for them. After they’d each passed through, the thud behind them let them know the cop was gone.
‘I’ll take that as kicking us out,’ Porter said. ‘Fucking morons.’
‘It won’t smoke them out. All it’ll do is cause mass hysteria. Locking people in their homes, cops in riot gear banging on doors. It’s exactly what Black Shadow wants. And they’ll use it to incite every bit of fear of the government they can. Try to turn even more normal citizens to terrorism,’ Saleda ranted, kicking at the curb before sitting down on it, collapsing her head in her hands.
The shade of dull blue Jenna kept missing by a hair today returned. This time, Jenna caught it, because Saleda had just said the word. Normal.
Jenna shook her head, pacing back and forth. ‘You’re right. It’s just what they want. More sympathizers for their cause, reason to fear those in authority to help them rise up. They planned this in hopes this would be the outcome, which is exactly why they won’t be found by brute search, either. They’re too smart for that …’ Jenna stilled as jungle green flashed in. Her heart rate picked up. Planning.
‘What?’ Porter asked from where he stood on the grassy median strip. ‘What’re you thinking?’
Jenna smiled despite the grim scenario, her breath catching. ‘Because they did plan it. This whole thing, almost to a fault. They had this scenario in mind, planned to use it to win support from everyday citizens. They didn’t just plan it half-ass. To win a battle like the one they’re waging – to win government change – you have to plan on the kind of heat General Teddy Boozer in there’s cooking up. That way, when it does, you can use it. Which means you also have to plan for its ramifications and risks, because your target isn’t to blow up a building and make a statement. Your target is an end goal. A movement. And to inspire a movement, you have to stay in sight …’
‘What are you getting at, Jenna? I’m sorry to be a complete ass, but if this is some of your Color Wonder “You can see it but only with my special markers kit” crap … Please forgive me, but I bought a six pack of Corona last night with the money you gave me for the box,’ Porter said.
Jenna half-laughed, shook her head. ‘I’m just saying they figured out more than just the plan to get viewers and the plan to escape. They also figured out how to deal if something like what happened in there today went wrong. If they could take and hide the body of anyone whose identity would mean revealing their identities, too, they could keep their covers longer. Live their normal, everyday lives longer. Because if the movement does take, they’ll need to be out there with it. Visible.’
‘You think they planned to kill each other all along?’ Saleda asked.
Jenna bit her lip. She hadn’t ruled it out, but it felt wrong. ‘No, not necessarily. I think it’s more likely that with that many people flinging blades around in crowded places, they were smart enough to be ready for the very real possibility that one of their own could get hurt. Especially considering they recruited clumsy, untrained fighters like Hester,’ Jenna said.
‘True. She almost got in trouble at the bank and had to be saved,’ Porter said. ‘So you’re thinking they come to every attack prepared to get rid of one of their own as part of their escape plan? Just in case?’
‘Yep. I think that’s exactly what they did here, and I think they’d have been ready to do it at the bank, too,’ Jenna said, the ballet slipper pink she associated with patterns flashing in. ‘And I think that bank plan is exactly how we’re going to figure out what they had in mind for their worst case scenario today.’
Thirty-two
‘Shh!’ Porter hissed as Saleda grunted.
‘That was my toe,’ Saleda said in a low growl.
‘Sorry,’ Jenna said, taking a large step into the darkness of the hallway. It was creepy, but stepping all over each other wasn’t going to make it any less so. ‘How close do you think we are, Porter? Can you feel anything yet?’
Porter’s steady, even breathing was about the only moving air. Damn, a flashlight would have been nice. Or, you know, the ability to use their badges and investigate a place of interest like they would if General Fluff-n-Stuff hadn’t set his beady black eyes on the Black Shadow investigation.
‘From what Irv’s saying, we should be about ten paces from the door,’ Porter relayed. Porter was their ears; Irv had hooked the team up with a Bluetooth-like earpiece, but smaller, with no glow so it wouldn’t give them away in the dark. Irv had hacked into the surveillance systems at Mt. Olive Medical Center – almost forty miles away from where the bloodbath in the emergency department at Fountains of Mercy Hospital had destroyed families and incited such palpable terror in the community. This way, Irv could guide them through the dark corridors in parts of the hospital not normally visited at this hour. Even open some doors when possible.
Jenna shivered, rubbed her arms. So many goosebumps. Man, it seemed forever since they’d sat in the warm SUV in the parking lot of the little diner across the road from Fountains of Mercy, trying to regroup. She’d sipped warm coffee – awful but warm coffee – as they waited for Irv to tap into the surveillance videos outside the bank, its parking lots, and even those of buildings nearby. They’d scanned the footage plenty of times before, trying to peg down a lead to chase, but this time, Irv was looking for something else.
Jenna had been wearing the earpiece at the time and had just taken a bite of a stale biscuit when Irv’s voice hit her ear. ‘There. Got something. They all escaped in the same vehicle outside the bank, which we all know dead-ended us at the parking garage at Fifth and Link four blocks away.’
Flash Point Page 20
