“Not yet.”
I lowered myself onto the bench and cradled my arm in my lap. Tried to calm my breathing.
She took out her radio and called for a paramedic-ASAP-then addressed me again. “That stunt you pulled at the press conference, oh, that was…” She shook her head in lieu of finishing her sentence, then added, “You have no idea how tenuous your job is right now.”
Firing someone with my seniority wasn’t easy, but Margaret was a resourceful woman, and with the congressman on her side it wouldn’t be a tough sell to Rodale. “I might,” I said.
“I will be writing an official reprimand to be placed in your personnel file.”
That wasn’t exactly at the top of my list of concerns at the moment. “Okay.”
“But, you led us here. You were close to catching the suspects, and you were wounded by adversarial action, so I won’t be submitting the reprimand. At this time.”
I blinked.
How about that.
“Thank you.”
“Tell me what happened.”
She listened carefully as I filled her in on the chase and the shooting. “Mollie Fischer must be somewhere in that hotel,” I concluded.
“Yes,” Margaret said vaguely. She was looking at Mrs. Rainey and her kids, who were still standing amidst the swirl of law enforcement activity. “You said those children saw something?”
Beyond her, at the end of the block, I saw an ambulance pulling to a stop at the hotel entrance.
“Just someone entering a taxi-I think. I’m not even sure about that. They’re not really excited about talking to strangers.”
“I’ll speak with them.”
“Um, I’m not sure that’s such a good idea.”
“I’m good with children,” she said, and before I could dissuade her, she’d paced over and knelt beside the twin girls.
35
“Hello. My name is Mrs. Weeeeeeellington.” Margaret drew out her name in a long, comical way. “That’s kind of a funny name, isn’t it?”
One of the girls nodded.
“What’s your name?” Margaret asked.
“Her name is Lizzie,” Mrs. Rainey answered before the girl had a chance to reply.
“I’ll bet you’re five years old, aren’t you?” said Margaret, keeping her eyes on the girl and sounding impressed.
Lizzie shook her head.
“Six?”
Lizzie held up four fingers.
Margaret dropped her jaw, widened her eyes. “No, you must be more than four! You’re seven, right?”
Lizzie shook her head. She was smiling.
“We’re both four,” her sister said.
Two EMTs in their early thirties-a stocky Caucasian man and a petite Persian woman-stepped out of the ambulance and began walking toward me. The woman carried a large paramedics response kit, the man was pushing a gurney. I had no intention of lying on the gurney, but I didn’t mind seeing that first aid kit.
“Wow.” Margaret was looking back and forth at the sisters. “You two look like you might be related.”
“We’re twins!” they shouted.
Fake surprise. “Really?”
Both girls nodded.
To the second girclass="underline" “So, is your name Lizzie too?”
“No!” The girls squealed in unison.
“I’m Jill,” Lizzie’s twin replied, then pointed to her brother. “And he’s Danny. He’s six.”
I could hardly believe my eyes. Margaret really was good with kids.
“You two are big girls,” Margaret said. “And smart too. I can tell. And it’s nice to meet you too, Stanley.”
He looked at her curiously. “It’s Danny.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, Mannie.”
“My name is Danny!” he said impatiently, but he was smiling.
“Frannie?”
“Danny!”
She hit her forehead with the heel of her hand. “Right. Yes. Oh, I’m so sorry, Granny.”
All three children laughed. He had his hands on his hips. “Danny, Danny, my name is Danny!”
“Hi, Danny,” she said. “Good to meet you.”
He groaned.
Margaret had those kids in the palm of her hand.
Amazing.
The paramedics saw where I was sitting and picked up the pace.
Margaret pointed to the alley. “Tell me about the people who came out of there.” She nodded toward me. “Before this silly-looking man showed up.”
I’m a silly-looking man. I see.
“Is he hurt bad?” Danny asked.
Their eyes shifted to my bloody shirt, and I turned in my seat to show them my good arm.
“Oh no,” she told them, then said to me, “Show them a funny face, Agent Bowers. Show them you’re not hurt badly.”
I did my best.
“See?” Margaret said.
I was so glad she was enjoying this.
Danny didn’t seem to buy it, but the girls laughed and Lizzie said, “They were in a hurry.”
The paramedics arrived, and the man, whose name tag read Neil Blane, said, “Sir, we need to have a look at that arm.”
I rose awkwardly, and the female paramedic, who introduced herself as Parvaneh Bihmardi and looked like she hadn’t gotten enough sleep last night, saw me wobble. “Wait. Sit back down.”
“No.” I shook my head, spoke softly, “Away from the children.”
Neil Blane gestured toward the gurney, but I declined. He reluctantly offered his arm to me; I declined that as well. They followed me toward a short concrete-barrier wall surrounding a treed-off area. The wall looked about a meter high, acceptable for me to sit on, and it appeared to be out of the sight-line of the Rainey family.
On the way there I heard Margaret ask, “So how many people were there? How many did you see?”
I glanced back and saw Lizzie holding up two fingers.
“A man and a woman?”
The girl nodded.
“Were they carrying anything?”
“The woman had a computer,” Danny offered. “The man had a big black bag.”
I paused.
Margaret asked, “What color was the computer?”
“White.”
If that was Mollie’s missing laptop, we could back trace its location as soon as they went online and, depending on the model, remotely turn on its video chat camera to catch a glimpse of the killers…
I phoned Doehring; he told me he would get on it, then I eased myself onto the concrete wall that encircled the trees, and Parvaneh pulled out large fabric shears. “All right, let’s get that shirt off and see what we’ve got here.”
36
Astrid waited impatiently as Brad finished breaking into the Honda Accord parked on Eisenhower Drive, across the highway from the Pentagon.
She hated that things had spun off in this direction, but they had, and now she would just have to deal with it.
“You were supposed to hack in, loop the video in the alley,” she said.
“I did.”
“Then how did they-”
“I don’t know.”
“Why did you shoot that agent?”
“I was afraid.”
The lock popped open. She was better at hot-wiring cars than he was, so after he got the doors open, she started the engine, then slid to the passenger seat to fix her hair.
“We need to get back to the house,” he said.
“No, I need to get back to work or it won’t look right. You know that.”
Silence.
“Drop me off, switch cars, then meet me later.”
Brad didn’t look happy to hear that, but she didn’t care.
He guided the car onto the street. “What about Wellington?” he said. “She’ll be at the scene.”
“Tomorrow. We’ll do that tomorrow, unless…” Astrid said. “Unless…”
“Unless?”
“Let’s just see how things play out.”
With gloved hands, she set the computer in the backseat. The FBI would find it later. And the plan would work. The timing would work.
Everything would sort itself out, as long as Brad didn’t screw things up any worse.
Neil and Parvaneh worked fast.
It took them only a couple minutes to clean the wound, pour on some QuickClot, and wrap my arm with a pressure bandage. While they tended to the gunshot wound, I tried to regroup, to think through all that I’d been through over the last two hours… the emotionally draining meeting with Missy Schuel… the revelation that the victim at the primate center was not Mollie Fischer… the confrontation with the congressman… the press conference… the chase through the hotel… getting shot.