Michael laughed, but it sounded mirthless. "Yeah, with our luck, we'll end up on America 's Most Wanted. “
"Okay, let's just chill out for a minute," Isabel said, raising her hands level with her head, palms out. "That's not the only thing we need to worry about. “
Maria sighed. "You mean the people who were in the accident Kyle caused? “
"Hey, I did not cause that accident," Kyle said, pointing his finger angrily at Maria. He felt bad enough about what had happened without any of his friends rubbing his nose in it. "I was trying to save all our lives. “
Michael stepped in front of Kyle's finger, his face clouded with emotion. "Step back, Valenti," he growled.
Max put his hand on Michael's shoulder. "Hey, you step back too, Michael. Snapping at each other isn't going to get us anywhere." He sighed, then continued. "Liz, what exactly did that report say about the accident? “
"It said the driver of one of the cars involved and a teenage passenger in another car were both in critical condition," Liz said soberly. "Apparently, the cops or government guys who were chasing us weren't badly hurt at all. “
Michael snorted again. "Yeah, that's just our luck. “
It occurred to Kyle that there was a way to salve his mounting guilt. "So, we should go help those people," he said. "Let Max do his alien faith-healing thing. “
"Too risky," Liz said.
Maria blanched and looked at her friend. "You say it's too risky? You always want to help the helpless. “
"Of course I want to help, but we might put ourselves in even more danger," Liz said. "And if it comes down to a choice between saving all of us, or some people who got hurt because the government wouldn't leave us alone, I'm going to pick all of us. “
No one said anything for a moment, and the only sounds nearby were the leaves on an oak tree as they rustled in the gentle afternoon breeze.
Then Kyle decided he didn't accept Liz's us-or-them choice. There had to be a better way.
"Who's going to expect us to sneak into a hospitall “
Topeka, Kansas Special Agent Suzanne Duff moved through the hallway gracefully, despite the large number of dark-suited men and conservatively dressed women who clogged the area. The legislative session was breaking for the day, and the various assistants, pages, and press people milled about the foyer of the capitol.
Touching her earpiece, Duff heard one of her fellow agents confirm that Senator McNeil was leaving the chamber. She made her way to an appropriate spot and waited. A few seconds later the murmur of the mob changed, and McNeil strode forward, flanked by a pair of Secret Service men… or reasonable bodyguard facsimiles thereof… and trailed by a pack of reporters.
Duff watched them all closely as they walked by. The senator had been receiving death threats for the last two weeks, and although the vast majority of such threats were harmless, the FBI profilers had been alarmed by the frequency and specificity of these angry missives.
One of the so-called news crewmen was actually an FBI agent who was recording everyone who had any contact with the senator in public. Each of the images was fed into facial recognition software and compared to the federal databases. So far, none of those scanned since her agents had come on board had come up with even a single flag of potential trouble.
The senator was not without his enemies, which made this particular hunt even more difficult. His stance on abortion angered the right-to-lifers, while his recent negative comments about the state's gay community had gotten him into even more hot water. Can't please the right or the left, Duff thought. McNeil is perfect water-cooler discussion material. Everyone has an opinion about him.
Personally, Duff didn't particularly like McNeil. Certainly, he had treated her with respect when she and her staff had interviewed him about the threat-letters, but she had expected that. She wondered what he would feel about her privately… and what he might say publicly… if he knew the truth about her. He could see that she was African-American and a woman easily enough, but he wouldn't have known she was a lesbian just by looking at her. The trijecta for bigots, she thought with a rueful smile. A black gay woman. She suspected that McNeil would have rather had a married white male agent heading up his case. Fortunately for Duff, one didn't always get to pick one's protectors.
As McNeil neared the elevator, Duff felt the tiny hairs on the back of her neck stand up. Directing her voice down to her collar microphone, she said, "Watch the woman in the blue coat approaching to the senator's left. She's got something in her hand. Doesn't feel… “
Before she had finished, the woman made her move. Her hand flashed out, crimson liquid spraying outward from it all over the senator, his aide, and a reporter from Channel 6 news.
The woman started to yell, "This is the blood of the unborn…," but in less than a second, two FBI agents had tackled her. The Secret Service men drew their guns and stepped in front of McNeil, forming a human shield around him.
"Step back! Everybody step back!" Duff yelled, pushing the reporters and everyone else away from the immediate vicinity. Amazingly, they obeyed her. Perhaps it was because of the already-drawn guns that backed up Duff's warning, or maybe in the shock of the moment they were merely happy to be told what to do.
The woman was screaming as the agents held her down. One had drawn her hands up behind her back and was kneeling on her neck, while the other was efficiently frisking her. Duff knelt to retrieve the item the woman had dropped, being careful to grab it with a handkerchief so as not to disturb any fingerprints. The item was a large coffee cup, its insides coated in a viscous red liquid. Blood. Or something like it. She sniffed it. No, not blood.
She stood and faced McNeil, whose aide was busy wiping the spatters off the senators face. "Are you all right, sir?" Duff asked.
"Yeah, just a little red in the face," McNeil said, cracking a weak smile. Duff knew that the self-deprecating sense of humor had gone far in getting him votes, further proof that theater was as important on the Beltway as were political platforms.
"It smells like syrup of some sort," Duff said, keeping her voice low enough that the press couldn't hear her across the foyer. "Probably watered down. “
"Hmmm, well, it's going to stain this marvelous suit," McNeil's aide said.
"It's all right, Delroy. Quit fussing," McNeil said. "So, you think this is my stalker? “
Duff shook her head. "We won't really know for a while yet. She could be the one, or she could be just a random member of the unhappy public. “
McNeil grunted and nodded. As the elevator door opened in front of him, he looked back toward Duff. "Yes, well, I'll expect a report soon." It wasn't a question.
It took almost an hour to process the woman to the point where Duff could take a break from the thick of things. She sat down with a thump into the chair behind her temporary desk and toggled the computer on.
A flashing icon told her she had new mail, and she clicked on it to initiate the program. Once there, she entered her federal I.D. number, her password, and a secondary password.
She scanned the subject headings, then clicked on one that said "XMA94… Cheyenne, Wyoming." XMA- 94 was the code for unusual altercations, often related to suspected homeland terrorist cells, white supremacist splinter factions, or other armed groups.
Duff read through the file quickly, noting the amount of information that wasn't included in it. Something's being covered up here, she thought. There were too many nonspecific terms, and the clearance codes for the initial strike orders were high-level ones. She had seen this kind of thing before.