"Screw it," Liz said, her tone conspiratorial. "It's not like the MiBs don't know we're in Cheyenne anyhow. We're on the news\ Jesse may even have heard something. Maybe he can help us legally somehow. I don't know." Liz put her hand on top of Isabel's. "But I do know that you need to talk to your husband. “
Isabel sighed, then looked back toward the Microbus. "I just don't know…" She trailed off.
"Wait until Max and Kyle go for food," Liz said. "There's a phone booth a few blocks from here. I'll walk down there with you. It'll give Michael and Maria some 'alone time' together. You can call Jesse from there, and it will be our secret. “
Isabel swallowed hard and squeezed Liz's hand. "Thank you, Liz. “
Boston, Massachusetts Jesse Ramirez was dozing in an easy chair in front of the television when the phone rang. Startled, he sat up quickly, knocking the TV remote onto the floor. "Hello?" he said as he picked up the receiver.
"Hi. I need to talk to my attorney," the voice on the line said.
Jesse recognized it immediately. Isabel! His mind raced, and he stood up. "Can you call me right back, or are you on your one phone call? “
He heard confusion in her tone. "I can call back, Jesse, but… “
He interrupted her. "Call 617-555-3488. You got that? 617-555-3488. “
As soon as he heard her say "Yes," he hung up. Moments later, he was sprinting to the bedroom. He opened a box on a bedside table and grabbed a cell phone. Switching it on, he was gratified to see that it was still charged. A moment later, it vibrated in his hand, announcing an incoming call.
"Hello, thanks for calling me back," he said. Before Isabel could reply, he added, "Please hold while I get some paper for taking notes. “
Slipping his shoes back on, he exited the house and made his way out of the building and onto the street. He scanned the nearby cars, but didn't see anyone sitting in them.
"Isabel?" he asked, putting the phone back up to his ear.
"Yeah, it's me. What's all this about?" He heard the concern in her voice.
"Just precautions," Jesse said, still looking around the area. "I don't know whether they've still got my place under surveillance, or if they have a way to track my phone calls, but I don't want to risk it. This is a cell phone I got from a client, so the number's not registered to me. “
"Hey, you're pretty good at covering your tracks," Isabel said. A beat passed, then she added, "It's great to hear your voice. “
Jesse sat down on the front steps of a nearby apartment building. "You too, baby. It's been way too long. How are you? “
"I'm fine. We're all fine. Well, mostly fine. We had a bit of a run-in today with the police and some government guys. “
Jesse was shocked. "You're in Cheyenne? “
"Oh, no. It's on the news there, too?" Isabel sounded sick.
"Yeah, but they didn't release anyone's names or pictures," Jesse said quickly, hoping to reassure her. "I saw a quick blurb about it on one of the cable news channels. I heard the FBI is saying the incident's still being investigated as a possible terrorist action. “
"They cornered us in a mall somehow. I don't know how they found us. “
"Is there anything 1 can doT Jesse asked.
"Yes." Isabel hesitated a bit, then quietly said, "Tell me that you still love me. “
"Oh, baby, of course I do. I love you. I miss you. I want to be with you. “
"I was afraid you wanted to move on." He heard doubt in her voice.
The thought had crossed Jesse's mind almost every day over the last two months, but he'd tried to push it out as quickly as it had entered. "Iz, I tried to go with you guys. You wanted me to come to Boston instead. I'd still come with you if you wanted me to. There's nothing I want more than to be back with you. “
"Okay. Good. Because I love you, too," she said. "I don't know what's going to happen to us. They don't seem to have given up their search. Sometimes it feels like we're never going to find peace. “
He agreed, but didn't want to tell her that. The situation with the Feds had escalated in the time since he had found out his wife was half alien. First the shadowy government men had tried to force him to inform on his own wife, resulting in his being forced to kill an agent to defend her. And then, just when things seemed to be calming down, Tess came back to Earth with Max's baby and blew up Rogers Air Force Base. The assault the federal agents had launched at the West Roswell High graduation ceremony demonstrated how determined these men were to capture or kill Isabel and her friends.
Clearly, given today's actions against them in Wyoming, the government men had not abandoned the chase. What will make them finally give it up? Is there a way to help Isabel and Max and Michael find some kind oj peace? "You'll have peace, Iz. Well have peace. We'll be together again, and someday we'll tell our gray-skinned, big-eyed alien kids all about your misadventures after West Roswell High." He hoped she would hear the humor in his voice, and take heart in it.
"What makes you think the kids won't look like you!" she asked. Clearly he had lifted her spirits.
"Well, Max's baby was fully human, so I guess we can hope for the best," he said. But as he listened for a reply, he heard another voice over the line… Liz's voice, coming from somewhere near Isabel. She said something he couldn't make out, and then he heard a crackle on the line.
He heard Isabel cry out briefly, followed by the same from Liz. Next came a banging sound.
Then the line went dead.
1 he ride to the nondescript building in the outlying warehouse district took half an hour or so, during which time the three prisoners were kept closely guarded. The boy was still unconscious, and the two girls stayed very still, given the armed guards bracketing each of them.
Colonel Bertram rode in the front of the transport vehicle rather than take a chopper back to base; the Humvees didn't get second glances from the locals, but black helicopters might tend to attract more attention, so they were housed nearby. Besides, Bertram didn't want to let this group out of his sight.
He was convinced that at least one of the detainees was a fugitive the Special Unit was looking for. Bertram was not a part of the S.U., but he had served with Matthew Margolin back in Vietnam, and had stayed friends with him during the three decades since. The secrets both men carried of atrocities committed by their group during the war were binding enough, but in addition Bertram actually liked Margolin.
The colonel wasn't ultimately clear on what it was that the Special Unit did… other than covert ops… or why it wanted these kids, but the things he had seen this morning told him that whatever it was, it was something very unusual. The teenage boy had actually appeared to change his face, and he had knocked down several agents with a gesture of his hand. And then there were the strange ash-piles the troops had found in the warehouse, heaps of dusty residue that apparently had been human beings at some point not too long before.
Bertram wasn't sure whether the kids were some kind of psychics or experiments run amok. Sure, the idea sounded like some kind of science-fiction story or something. Hell, he had loved Stephen King's Firestarter, but he was reasonably certain that The Shop and Lot Six didn't actually exist. Though if it does, it's exactly the type of thing that Margolin would be involved with, he thought. And Matt does look a little like George C. Scott from the movie. He chuckled to himself.
Several minutes later, the caravan arrived at the underground "office," and the three captives were placed in solitary cells equipped with reinforced steel bars.