Finding North (17 page)

“
No, you won’t,” Detective
Batista said.

“
Yes, actually, we will,”
Vince said. “A United States citizen has been abducted on US soil.
We are the President’s team.”

Trece patted Detective
Batista’s chest with the letter giving them authority.

“
You’d better call in,”
Joseph said. “We’ll wait.”

“
How did
you . . . get here?” Detective Williams asked. “We
kept this entire situation silent — no radios, no telephones. It’s
not even on the computer!”

“
They belong to me,” Alex
said.

Detective Williams looked
at Alex, and Alex smiled. Alex nodded to Colin, and he went to
Joseph to get his assignment. Leena brought Alex a travel mug of
coffee and her thick Fey jacket. Alex took a drink and gave the mug
to Raz. He smiled his thanks and finished the coffee. When
Detective Williams moved away, Alex took out the pocket computer
Sergeant Dusty had tucked into the pocket of her jacket. She read
his notes and took a few steps down the block. Raz followed. They
were free of police intervention for the first time in
hours.

“
What is it?” Alex
asked.

Raz gave her an intimate
smile. She stepped right next to him, and he leaned his head down
so that they were pressed against each other.

“
Dex said that he thought
someone was trying to kill him,” Raz said in a low tone. Alex
reacted as if he’d said something sweet by caressing his face. “He
said it wasn’t anything obvious or specific — just too many close
calls. After yesterday, and then seeing how blasé the perps
were . . .”

“
Blasé?” Alex
asked.

“
According to them, they
were just driving too fast,” Raz said. “It happens.”

“
I noticed that, too,”
Alex said.

“
He said the perps’
statements were like the cynic in his head.” Raz put his arm around
her waist and pulled her a little closer. His lips barely moving,
he said, “‘That car didn’t just hit me’, ‘You’re so paranoid’,
‘Dex; that wasn’t what was going on’. ‘That’s crazy — no one’s
trying to kill you’, ‘You were just lucky to be wearing the vest
when that bullet came out of nowhere,’ stuff like that. He realized
that some of those voices were things people around him had said.
Which made him wonder — Who was involved? Why did they want him
dead? It scared him.”

“
You think he’s dead,”
Alex said.

Raz touched his heart.
Alex put her hand over his hand.

“
I’m sorry,” Alex
said.

“
I rediscovered my best
friend last night. I loved Dex, love, and . . .”
Raz’s eyes echoed with pain. “And now . . . If you
hadn’t scheduled this trip . . .”

Raz shook his head. She
put her head on his shoulder.

“
Okay, break it up,” Colin
said.

Alex stepped back from Raz
to see Colin grinning at them.

“
Was that a loving
intervention, or were you plotting to take over the world?” Colin
asked. “You’re terrifying. Really.”

Alex and Raz
smiled.

“
Joseph ordered us back to
the apartment and get some shuteye,” Colin said. “The FBI just
showed up, and there’s some kind of a jurisdiction showdown. We can
sleep for a few hours. The team will come to get us around noon.
Orchid is over there.”

Colin nodded. Alex
groaned. They looked over. The young agent smiled and waved to
them.

“
She was actually nice,”
Colin said. “She told me that the police were way out of line. She
said she understood why we didn’t call her, but she could have
gotten us out. I guess we’re her first surveillance assignment.
She’s ready to take us to the Warehouse.”

Alex and Raz followed
Colin to where Orchid was standing. Orchid was surprisingly nice.
She apologized for getting angry and even commiserated with their
terrible morning. They were back in the apartment in no time, where
Orchid insisted on waiting for them in the living area of the
apartment.

Alex was too tired to
care. After Orchid promised to wake them at noon, Alex closed and
locked their bedroom door. She took a quick shower after Raz. He
was asleep by the time she got out of the shower. She turned off
their phones, made sure the blinds were down, and crawled into bed
next to Raz.

Feeling someone near, she
opened her eyes.

“
Alex!” Colin whispered.
“You have to get up.”

“
What time is it?” Alex
asked.

“
After two,” Colin
said.

“
Orchid was supposed to
get us up at noon.” Alex sat up in bed.

“
Oh, God.” Colin put his
hand to his heart.

“
What is it?” Alex
asked.

“
You’re wearing pajamas,”
Colin said.

“
What’s going on?” Raz
asked. He turned on the bedside lamp.

“
You too. If you were
naked, I’d . . .” Colin pointed at Raz. “That’s my
sister.”

“
Duly noted,” Raz
said.

“
What’s going on, Colin?”
Alex asked.

“
I’m trying to tell you,”
Colin said. “It’s after two. The team couldn’t get into the
apartment building, and our cells are turned off.”

“
Where’s Orchid?” Alex
asked.

“
Orchid is dead,” Colin
said.

F

Chapter
Thirteen

Tuesday evening

May 17 — 5:11 p.m.
EDT

New York City, New
York

“
I just have one
question,” Alex said. She gave the FBI agent-in-charge a hard look.
“We were told that all of this glass was bullet resistant. That was
the point of staying here. How was
Orchid . . .”

“
Stephanie Hong,” the
agent-in-charge said.

This agent-in-charge was
so particular about the specifics that it was hard to get a
sentence out without him correcting something. His manner was so
practiced and peculiar that she was sure his corrections were not
personal. This was his everyday annoying manner of dealing with
people.

“
Stephanie Hong,” Alex
said. “How was Agent Hong shot through the bullet-resistant glass?
These floors are rated sniper proof.”

“
Highest rating possible,”
the agent-in-charge said.

“
Her wound indicates
something smaller than a high-powered rifle or an armor piercing
bullet,” Alex continued. “Exactly how was she shot in the living
room of our apartment?”

“
No idea,” the
agent-in-charge said.

“
Why didn’t we hear it?”
Alex asked. “My brother sleeps very lightly; so do I, for that
matter. Why didn’t we hear her murder? Surely she didn’t kill
herself.”

“
She did not kill
herself,” the agent-in-charge said.

He gave Alex a little bow
and walked away. Alex was about to follow him when Raz held her
back.

“
He can’t help you,” Raz
said in a low tone.

She looked at him and
scowled.

“
I feel awful,” she
said.

He nodded in agreement.
She followed Raz back to the kitchen area. They had agreed that
Colin should call Detective Williams. Given that Orchid was a
Homeland Security Agent killed in a CIA safe house, Detective
Williams had called the FBI. Alex, Colin, and Raz had been
relegated to the kitchen until the physical investigation of the
scene was completed. Colin looked up when they came into the small
area.

“
Any luck?” Colin
asked.

“
None,” Alex said. She sat
down next to him at the little kitchen table. “Any word from the
team?”

Colin shook his head. He
turned his laptop in her direction. She watched the apartment’s
security video again. After they went to bed, Orchid had turned on
the television. So as to not make too much noise, Orchid used a
wireless headset that came with the apartment. She got up a few
times to use the restroom or make a snack, but, otherwise, she sat
on the couch, watching television.

At 11:47 a.m., she was
shot in the head.

The video showed a
projectile moving at an angle, seemingly through the window.
However, the windows were in perfect condition when they’d entered
the living room. There was nothing of interest on any of the other
security cameras. The audio recording picked up a pop, possibly the
sound of a projectile moving through the glass a second before
Orchid was hit. Satellite imaging of the building showed that there
were no window washers or other human beings clinging to the
outside of the building.

Somehow, Orchid had been
shot with a relatively small-caliber bullet through
bullet-resistant glass on the fourth floor of a building by an
invisible person.

“
I don’t see anything,”
Alex shrugged.

“
I don’t, either,” Colin
said.

Alex stood up so Raz could
sit in front of the computer. He sat down to watch the videos
again.

“
Any word on Erin and
Matthew?” Alex asked.

“
They’ve checked out of
the hotel,” Colin said. “Julie picked them up and took them home.
Mattie’s on base, and I think Erin went into the lab. You guys
really bought them a long weekend in Hawaii?”

“
John,” Alex said. “They
leave Thursday night. So they’ll have most of Friday, Saturday,
Sunday, and Monday. We were going to keep Grace, but they wanted
her to go with them.”

“
I was hoping your husband
remembers Uncle Colin on his birthday,” Colin grinned. “I’d love to
spend a weekend in Hawaii.”

“
Especially right this
moment,” Alex smiled.

“
No doubt,” Colin
said.

Alex glanced at Raz. His
finger was on the computer screen, and he was running a piece of
tape back and forth.

“
Is there a way to enhance
this further?” Raz asked.

“
Not with what I have
here,” Colin said. “You can upload it to the service and use the
programs there, but that means giving the tapes to DHS.”

Raz nodded.

“
What do you see?” Alex
asked.

“
It’s more like what I
don’t see,” Raz said.

Alex stood right behind
him, and Colin moved his chair over.

“
First, listen to this
sound,” Raz said. “What does it sound like?”

He gave Alex the headset
and played the tape. She nodded and gave it to Colin.

“
Sounds like a round going
through glass,” Alex said. “Colin?”

“
That’s what I hear, too,”
Colin said.

“
In this
video . . .” Raz pulled up the security camera from
the east wall of the apartment. They could see the dining area, the
back of the television, and Orchid’s feet. He pointed. “If any of
these windows were broken, you should see a spray of glass to match
the sound.”

He rewound the tape and
played it again. His finger rested on the second
counter.

“
Maybe you wouldn’t see
the spray of glass from that angle,” Raz said. “You should see it
from here.”

He played the tape that
showed Orchid’s murder. He enlarged the area where the bullet came
from.

“
Not one shard of glass,
mist of fragments, nothing,” Raz said. “There’s nothing but the
sound. And check this out . . .”

Raz flipped to the
satellite video of the time Orchid was killed.

“
Nothing on the glass,
right?” Raz said. “But look at
that . . .”

“
I
saw
that,” Colin said. “I thought it
was a shadow.”

“
The shadow didn’t exist
yesterday morning at the same time.” Raz flipped to the satellite
video of the day before. “Or the day before that.”

“
You think someone was in
the apartment,” Alex said.

“
Someone
was
in the apartment,”
Raz said. He looked at Colin and asked, “Did you lock your
door?”

“
Yes,” Colin said. “I knew
Alex would kill me if I didn’t. I used my key to get in your
door.”

“
They could have come for
us,” Raz said. “The door locks are the best in their class. It’s
one of the features of these apartments.”

“
The flyer for the
apartments says, ‘Give your security team the night off,’” Alex
said.

“
Right,” Raz said. “The
locks are to allow agents to get some rest when their target is
secure in their room.”

“
The shadow doesn’t try
our doors,” Alex said. “We would have seen him or her on the other
security feed.”

“
Right,” Raz said. “That’s
the other weird thing. Shadow seems to get into the apartment from
the north end of the building and disappear the same
way.”

“
Is there another door?”
Alex asked.

“
Not that I’ve seen,”
Colin said. “There’s supposed to be only one door. That’s part of
the security.”