B007GFGTIY EBOK (28 page)

James Lockhart emerged from the Cadillac. Lockhart had been named on TV as one of the victims in the BART station attack and Santiago had seen him with Bellis at Shane’s funeral. Lockhart spoke briefly to Hayden and Rebecca before they all got into his car.

“What the hell is going on?” Santiago murmured.

L
ockhart smiled as he pulled away. Finally, he had things under control. He put the recovery down to his contingency plans. Zeguang and his clients had thrown him a curveball when they wanted a demonstration of the device. He’d complied, but they weren’t happy with him according to Zeguang. They felt cheated. They’d expected a deadly demonstration, but they hadn’t been specific. He knew it was an underhanded move to use a harmless sedative, but there was no way he would let himself be implicated in an attack on US soil. But any hard feeling Zeguang’s clients harbored didn’t last. The media frenzy following the BART station attack showed them the potential of what they were buying, and the wire transfer hit his account without further delay.

The BART attack wasn’t just to satisfy his clients, but also to hook Hayden and Rebecca. They were the only people left who could cause him problems. It had been Beckerman’s idea to implicate them in the BART attack. He’d orchestrated a plan to lure them to the Powell Street BART. It not only disposed of them, it also blunted any investigation. With Hayden and Rebecca as obvious suspects, no one would care about looking any further.

He hadn’t expected them to be released so swiftly, even though he knew it was a possibility. No matter, he had contingencies for such an event and they’d worked perfectly. He now had Hayden, Rebecca, and the plans. Now it was time to tell them the lies that would keep them docile.

“Thanks for agreeing to this. I realize the chance you’ve taken by meeting me.”

“We’re fugitives now,” Hayden said.

And they were. Their fugitive status made them easier to control. Who could they run to now? Him and only him.

“I should have taken you into my confidence earlier.”

“Why didn’t you?” Hayden asked.

“I wasn’t sure I could trust you. People were dying at MDE and I didn’t know who was responsible. You were an outsider. You could have been the person threatening me.”

“Who was threatening you? What is going on?”

“A hate group. A terror cell. I don’t know. I was hoping to find out at the BART station. I was supposedly meeting with someone from the group with a conscience. Instead, we were part of a trap to demonstrate their power.”

Lockhart reached the freeway and pointed his Cadillac north toward the installation. He clung to the fast lane, the needle riding above eighty-five.

“Where are we going?” Rebecca asked.

“I’m taking you somewhere safe that will explain all this. I want you to see the work we’re doing and understand the situation we’re in. Hopefully, you can help shed some light on recent developments.”

“We?” Rebecca said. “Who’s we?”

“My team. I’ve put together a group of people to help combat what happened at the BART station.”

Lockhart eased off the gas. A quarter mile ahead, a bridge abutment partially hid a CHP speed trap. He drifted by the highway patrol unit at a legal sixty-five. He couldn’t afford to get pulled over with Hayden and Rebecca in the back.

“I’m trusting you today. You don’t mention anything you see or hear to anyone.”

“Of course,” Hayden said. “What can you tell us?”

Truth and lies.

For a deception to work, it needed to be loaded with as much of the truth as possible. Hayden’s question gave him the opportunity to skirt so close to telling the out-and-out truth that there was no lie.

“The world lives in fear of terrorist threats. Intelligence sources have assessed that the threat from terrorists and rogue nations isn’t going to come from nuclear weapons or complex explosives. Everyone cries dirty bomb, but it’s unlikely. Radioactive material is scarce and accessibility is limited. The greater danger comes from chemical and biological weapons. The Soviet Union may have collapsed long ago, but the technology hasn’t. There are a lot of unemployed technicians out there for hire. I’ve been working with Marin Design Engineering and a number of other private firms on countermeasures should a biological attack happen.”

“So, what went wrong?” Hayden asked.

“A leak is my guess. These people found out about the work I was doing and eliminated everyone at MDE to obtain the research.” Lockhart eyed Hayden and Rebecca from his rearview mirror. His comment had chilled them. He saw the fear in their expressions. “Any thoughts on who could have been working the inside?”

Hayden shook his head. Then a look of puzzlement crossed his face. “I’m confused. They used MDE’s design as the weapon in the BART station.”

Lockhart laughed bitterly. “MDE designed an excellent system for neutralizing a biological agent. The flipside of that is that it can be just as easily converted into a weapon for delivering the biological agent.”

“Talk about shooting yourself in the foot,” Hayden said.

“You’re not wrong,” Lockhart said.

He eyed Hayden and Rebecca more closely, searching them for cracks. He felt he had them. They were buying what he was selling. Rebecca looked relaxed and docile enough. He hadn’t done anything to tip her off. He couldn’t say the same of Hayden. He was frowning. Had something clicked? Lockhart replayed everything he’d said for something that could have tipped Hayden off, but came up short. He had to play it carefully. He just needed their trust for a few more hours.

“Something wrong, Hayden?”

“Shane’s last words. Before he killed himself, he said he’d done something terrible.”

Lockhart saw the pain in Rebecca’s expression.

“The news reported that Sundip Chaudhary admitted something similar before his death. It implies they were aware of what they’d done, but you’re saying the opposite. You’re saying someone infiltrated MDE.”

Rebecca turned on Hayden. “Shane didn’t sell out MDE. He wouldn’t help these people develop a weapon.”

“I’m not saying that. What Shane said to me doesn’t make sense now.”

“It does to me,” Lockhart said. He liked it when he was forced to think on his feet. “I’ve been thinking long and hard about Sundip’s and Shane’s last words. At first, I thought Sundip was confessing, but nothing proved Sundip was involved with the people behind the attack. The same goes for Shane. Their last words do make sense if they’d unearthed the truth. I believe they found that they were being used and the shame was too much for them.”

Neither Hayden nor Rebecca said anything.

“Hayden, I have some things that need clearing up. You’ve created some very hot water for yourself when it comes to MDE’s confidentiality agreement. You could be sued.”

“But who would? MDE is finished.”

“Not quite. It still exists as a legal entity, but I want to help you. Surrender all documentation to me today and I’ll ensure that no legal action is brought against you.”

“Thank you, Mr. Lockhart,” Rebecca said. “That’s great.”

“You’re welcome.”

Hayden said thanks, but his gratitude was less than overwhelming. Lockhart didn’t let it worry him too much. He put it down to Hayden having to give up some of his power. He should have had the sense to realize it wasn’t his power in the first place.

“I have to give you credit for guts, Hayden,” Lockhart said. “Not everyone would have copied the designs with that legal threat pending. Kenneth Eskdale unnerved me when he told me you had them.”

“What is Eskdale to you?” Rebecca asked.

“A brilliant man—his background in genetics and chemistry is astonishing. He prefers obscurity, but I convinced him to help me. For the last few years he’s been advising me on my projects. He has done amazing things.” Lockhart hardened. “You two scared the life out of him. He thought you were going to kill him. I want to know why you had copies of MDE’s designs.”

“Shane sent me a password-protected file the night he died and asked me not to open it. So I backed up the attachment and all of MDE’s drawings to an online storage account and copied the data to a flash drive.” Hayden produced the drive from his pocket.

Lockhart feigned shock for appearances’ sake. He liked how well he took to acting. He put it down to his business dealings over the years. There was a lot of performance in closing a deal. “Have you read the file?” he asked.

“No, I tried, but I couldn’t work out the password.”

Thanks to Beckerman
.

“I have a question for you,” Hayden said.

“Shoot.”

“When the FBI picked us up, why didn’t you help us? One word from you would have made a lot of difference. If it wasn’t for Detective Santiago, we wouldn’t have gotten out of there.”

“I wish it was that easy. These perpetrators have put me in a tight spot. Not only have they weaponized MDE’s work, they’ve used it to leave a nasty trail of evidence leading to me. The moment I go to the authorities and they investigate, they’ll go after me as an accomplice. And that won’t do any of us any good.”

“You could have done something to help us.”

“I did what I could.” He injected a sorrowful note for effect. “Just know that I was monitoring the situation. I wouldn’t have let it get out of hand.”

“This isn’t out of hand?” Hayden gestured around him. “We’re fugitives. We skipped out on the cops.”

“Hayden, Rebecca, I appreciate the position you two are in. It’s not a lot different than mine. Give me a couple of hours and I’ll have this all cleared up. You’ll be free of this. Will you do that?”

Both Hayden and Rebecca nodded after a long pause. They lapsed into an uncomfortable silence after that.

Lockhart didn’t like the turn in the conversation. He felt his grip on Hayden and Rebecca slipping. He needed to distract them. It didn’t matter if they didn’t believe him. He only needed to keep their faith until they reached the facility. He asked Hayden about his involvement since receiving Shane’s e-mail. Hayden talked him through the fire at MDE, Malcolm Fuller’s clandestine meeting, their heavy-handed interrogation of Eskdale, and Tony Mason’s murder attempt. Lockhart listened as his Cadillac ate up the miles.

Lockhart’s cell phone rang. He examined the caller ID and took the call.

“Am I on speaker?” Beckerman asked.

“No.”

“Bad news. You’re being followed by two Marin Sheriff’s detectives in a green Toyota Camry three hundred yards behind you.”

Lockhart glanced in his rearview mirror and picked out the Toyota rounding a curve. He kept his gaze in the rearview short so as not to alert Hayden and Rebecca. He didn’t want them turning around and spotting the cops.

“Yes, I see. I thought you had taken care of that issue. What happened?”

“I underestimated their resourcefulness.”

“Obviously.”

“Do I have a green light?”

He’d hoped to keep this final stage of the operation clean, but “clean” had gone out the window the day Sundip Chaudhary connected the dots. Now it was about how little mess he could leave behind. Sadly, his mess was about to get a little messier. He didn’t like killing cops. It always complicated matters, but it couldn’t be avoided now.

“Of course. What do you want me to do?”

“Nothing for now. The detectives have had ample opportunity to stop you. They want to see where you’re heading. They won’t attempt anything until you arrive at the facility. I can’t try anything on the freeway, so I want you to get off at Santa Rosa and take Highway 12 toward the coast, then make your move. Put some distance between you and them, and I’ll take care of the rest.”

“Don’t disappoint me,” Lockhart said and hung up.

“Problems?” Rebecca asked.

“Oh no.” Lockhart smiled into the rearview mirror at her. “None whatsoever.”

A road sign flashed by. He was getting off at the next exit.

S
antiago watched Lockhart guide his Cadillac off the freeway and pick up Highway 12, where he led a procession of vehicles. The narrow highway was busier than Santiago would have liked. It forced him to bunch up on Lockhart. If the guy was observant, he’d spot the tail. Santiago slotted himself behind a pickup, giving him a two-vehicle gap for cover.

Lockhart barreled along at a steady fifty-five, but it didn’t last when he caught up with an RV crawling along in front of him. Santiago cursed the RV. It forced all the vehicles to follow nose to tail. Two car lengths separated him from Lockhart. He took comfort from the fact Lockhart would be more interested in the ponderous RV than the daisy chain following in his wake.

Then it happened. Lockhart looked into his rearview mirror. His gaze cut through the two vehicles between them and focused directly on Santiago. Lockhart only looked at him for a second, but that was long enough. He stamped on the gas and jerked the Cadillac into the oncoming lane.

“Shit, he’s seen us,” Santiago cursed.

“Are you sure?” Rice said.

Yeah, he was sure. Santiago jerked his car out onto the left side of the road. He didn’t want Lockhart getting the drop on him. He wouldn’t make it past the RV, but he could make it into the gap left by Lockhart. One thing was working against him. He was in his wife’s car, not his unmarked. He didn’t have his lights and sirens and he didn’t have the horsepower, which meant he wouldn’t get the cooperation from the other motorists. To everyone on the road, he was an impatient dick.

What Santiago lacked in acceleration, he gained in surprise. The two vehicles ahead of him didn’t expect him to pull a brain-dead stunt, and he shouldered his way into the gap left by Lockhart behind the RV.

Lockhart didn’t have it so easy. He ramped up the Cadillac’s speed. Santiago estimated he was pushing sixty miles an hour. A USPS truck lumbered toward the Cadillac in the oncoming lane. The gap for passing the RV shrank as the vehicles closed in on each other on a collision course.

The USPS truck flashed his high beams at Lockhart. Lockhart was committed now. There was no room for backing down. Santiago was in his spot and had no intention of giving it back to him. The son of a bitch fought it out and snuck back onto the right side of the road seconds before the mail truck shot by.

A thick line of vehicles trailed in the USPS truck’s wake, killing Santiago’s chance to overtake. He cursed, flashed his lights, and leaned on his horn to get the RV out of his way. Its driver stuck steadfastly to his speed and course.

“
Culero
,” Santiago murmured.

A horn blared from behind. Santiago ignored the driver’s sour grapes.

Rice glanced in a side mirror and groaned. “Behind us. We’ve got company.”

Santiago checked his rearview and saw the familiar dark blue Dodge Charger had squeezed in behind them.

“Get backup,” Santiago said. “I want this son of a bitch off my ass, but no one touches Lockhart. They’re to follow but not to engage. I want to see where he’s going.”

Rice nodded and punched a number into his cell.

Even in the best case, backup was a good ten minutes away. That was ten minutes too long. Santiago needed to lose Mr. Dodge—and now.

The shoulder wasn’t quite wide enough, but it would have to do. He stamped on the gas and lunged around the RV. His door mirror snapped off and disappeared behind him.

“Jesus Christ,” Rice said.

“Grow a set, Rice.”

He leaned on his horn. A startled face appeared in the RV side mirror and it inched over to let him pass. The Toyota bucked on the shoulder’s poor surface. Twice it grazed the RV’s side. He tried not to think about the damage he was incurring. It wouldn’t matter once he shouldered his way past.

A clear road stretched ahead and Santiago ramped up the speed. Lockhart’s Cadillac was still in sight. His lead was considerable, but he wouldn’t be impossible to catch. Santiago kept the accelerator pressed to the floor.

Horn blasts filled the air from behind. Santiago checked his mirrors in time to see the Dodge driver shove the RV aside. It looked as if the RV driver had attempted to block anyone else from passing him, but the Dodge driver had turned it into a futile gesture by shredding the side of the RV.

“Our friend is through,” Santiago said. “You watch our rear.”

“OK.”

Lockhart’s Cadillac crested a rise and disappeared from view. Santiago prayed it would still be there when he cleared the rise.

“He’s closing,” Rice said.

The Charger filled Santiago’s rearview mirror. It was obvious what was coming. Mr. Dodge was going to take them out. If it got past them, it was over. Santiago moved to the center of the road, straddling both lanes. He weaved left and right to block Mr. Dodge.

He braced himself for an impact from the rear. He’d taken the Dodge driver’s options away.

“He’s dropping back,” Rice said.

In his mirror, Santiago watched the Charger drop a hundred feet behind, then hold position.

They crested the rise. Lockhart was still in view. His Cadillac turned left off Highway 1 toward the coast. Santiago followed, ever fearful of the Charger looming behind, waiting to strike.

“Oh shit. This is it.” Rice sat forward in his seat and checked his seat belt.

Santiago watched the Dodge build up a head of steam in his mirrors. It didn’t look like backup would be arriving in time. He had the gas pedal floored, yet the Dodge was reeling him in. The car accelerated at a frightening rate. It kept coming until it slammed into the Toyota’s rear.

The impact shook the car, and Santiago and Rice were thrown against the seat belts. The Toyota slithered on the asphalt, but Santiago kept it on the road.

The Dodge dropped back and Santiago wrung every drop of speed out of his vehicle to escape the attack. It wasn’t enough. The car slammed them again, this time with more force.

The Toyota fishtailed from the impact. Santiago wrestled with the wheel for control, but the roadway took the decision out of his hands. The car danced and struck the undulating road the wrong way. It bucked, ripping the wheel from his grasp, veered right, and rode the grass verge. The Dodge went in for the death blow and clipped the Toyota’s right rear corner. The Toyota left the road, launched itself off a grass rise, and ripped through a barbed-wire fence.

The car’s nose dug into the plowed earth. The hood crumpled, the windshield split, and airbags detonated. Momentum grabbed the Toyota and tossed it end over end before it finished up on its roof.

Santiago’s neck tingled. The roof had buckled and swiped the back of his head. Although his car had stopped spinning, it took a moment before the world did the same.

The sound of the Dodge skidding to a halt on the road snapped the world back into place for him. He unclasped his seat belt and dropped onto the roof liner.

Rice moaned. Blood dripped from somewhere in his hairline.

“Out my side. C’mon, out.”

Santiago’s door opened after a kick. He clambered out on all fours, his fingers digging into the dirt. He got to his feet and looked for his assailant.

“Sir, I can’t move.”

Gasoline trickled from the ruptured gas tank and pitter-pattered on the earth.

Mr. Dodge jumped down the slope. The sound of him clicking off the safety on his pistol was unmistakable.

Lockhart turned the Cadillac off the road onto a disused airstrip somewhere in Mendocino County. A cracked service road ran parallel to an inoperable runway. Every window in the air-traffic-control tower was busted and graffiti marred the stucco. Lockhart followed the service road to an aircraft hangar large enough to house a medium-sized jetliner. The lack of people and activity added to the desolation.

The sight of it all disappointed Hayden. He hadn’t felt safe for a long time. Lockhart had changed that. He’d provided warmth in the form of safety and experience. He had all the bases covered—security, experience, technology, and resources. The decommissioned airfield robbed Hayden of his faith.

“Are we in the right place?” Rebecca asked, echoing Hayden’s thoughts.

“It’s all about camouflage.” Lockhart stopped the car in front of the hangar. “People see a disused airstrip, they think nothing of it.”

Lockhart removed a garage door remote from its holder and pressed the button. The hangar doors slid back and he drove inside. He pressed the remote again, and Hayden watched the world disappear from sight.

Lockhart wasn’t wrong. The inside of the hangar was a world apart from its exterior appearance. Arc lamps illuminated a freestanding building fabricated from aluminum. The single-story structure was windowless and somewhere in the region of a thousand square feet. An overelaborate double-door entrance provided the only way in. The place looked like a prototype space station.

Lockhart led the way. Their footfalls, like their words, echoed throughout the hangar, rebounding off every surface.

“Impressive, don’t you think?” Lockhart said.

“Certainly well camouflaged,” Hayden said.

Lockhart pressed a button on the intercom to the left of the doors. “We’re here,” he said.

He produced a card key and swiped it through the slot. The doors drew back with a pneumatic hiss, and they stepped into an air lock. The inner doors opened when the outer doors closed. Hayden’s ears popped from the difference in air pressure.

“Please,” Lockhart said and pointed inside.

Hayden followed Rebecca inside and the inner doors closed behind him. The main lab accounted for more than half the floor space. Diffused fluorescent lighting rebounded off the polished stainless-steel lab benches and white plastic fixtures. Three smaller labs ran the width of the main lab, with huge Plexiglas viewing windows in the rear. One of the small labs held eight caged beagles. The dogs showed no excitement at the sight of visitors.

Kenneth Eskdale emerged from a small office. He scowled at Rebecca and Hayden.

The feeling’s mutual.

“Don’t be like that, Kenneth,” Lockhart said. “We’re all friends now.”

“I don’t see why they need to be here.” Eskdale’s rat features twitched.

“I’ve told you, we need their help.”

Eskdale snorted.

“May I have the drawings and the flash drive?” Lockhart requested.

Rebecca handed over the drawings and Hayden offered up the flash drive after fishing in his jacket. Lockhart placed the items on the lab bench next to him.

“Is that everything?”

“Yes,” Hayden replied.

Lockhart raised an eyebrow. “The truth, please. I can’t have other copies, paper, electronic or otherwise.”

“That’s everything,” Hayden insisted.

“Good.” Lockhart tossed the drawings at Eskdale. The professor caught them clumsily. “Shred them.”

“No. Wait,” Hayden protested. People had been murdered for producing those designs. Destroying their work would be blasphemy.

Lockhart put out his arm, stopping Hayden from reaching Eskdale. “Hayden, it doesn’t matter. Manufacture has begun. Uncontrolled documents such as these can fall into the wrong hands.”

It made sense, but it hurt to see Eskdale feeding the drawings into the shredder.

“I can’t afford for those plans to become public. Our security has been breached already.”

A crunching sound tore Hayden’s focus from the shredder. Lockhart had dropped the flash drive onto the floor and had stamped down on it, splitting it in two.

Lockhart came over and slipped an arm around Hayden’s shoulders. “Come with me. Let me show you what we do here.”

Lockhart unfurled his arm, but kept a comforting hand on Hayden’s shoulder. Rebecca came close and Hayden took her hand. Lockhart guided them to the back of the facility, toward the small labs.

“Our focus here is the bubonic plague. We’ve cracked its genetic code. That means we can counteract it on a genetic level. Should a biological attack be launched, we’d have a far more efficient vaccine to fight infection. You see the dogs?”

The beagles shuffled in their cramped cages, scratching themselves or staring at their captors.

“They’ve been contaminated with the plague and cured. They’re quarantined at the moment, but that’s a precaution. We just have to follow procedure.”

“Unbelievable,” Rebecca said.

“But it’s fact. These will look familiar to you?”

They stood in front of the middle lab, the largest of the three. On the stainless-steel benches sat three of the canisters, identical to the one from the Powell Street BART station. Hayden’s mouth went dry.

Lockhart swiped his card key through the electronic lock and opened the door.

“Don’t worry,” Lockhart said. “These devices aren’t harmful. Marin Design Engineering designed these aerosol devices for mass dispersal. If people were infected with a disease on a mass scale like with the Tokyo subway attack, we’d be able to fight back with these.”

Lockhart led them into the small anteroom. Environmental suits hung on hooks. There was barely room for all three of them. He closed the outer door and opened the inner one before leading them into the lab.

“Shouldn’t we be wearing those suits?” Rebecca asked.