Cyclops One

Chapter 1

Howe listened to the windshield wipers slap as the driver made his way through the security checkpoint at the entrance to the Pentagon. The rain came in wind-driven sheets, as if it were pieces of plywood thrown down from the clouds. Like everything else around him for the last forty-eight hours, it seemed completely surreal.

The cease-fire that had been declared between India and Pakistan was holding, and both countries had corralled, at least temporarily, the radical elements that had driven them to the brink of nuclear winter. India’s army had booted out what the spokesmen called “a parcel of radicals”; Pakistan was talking about elections. Meanwhile a committee of diplomats from both sides was discussing Kashmir.

That was just the start. Israel and the Palestinians had scheduled a conference to focus on Jerusalem’s future, and there were rumors that the president of South Korea was planning a visit to North Korea to discuss unification.

To hear the talking heads on TV speak — and Howe had spent yesterday in a hotel room doing almost nothing but — the world was entering a new reality, a place where permanent peace was possible. America had stopped a war. That had never happened before. There was awe in people’s voices, deservedly so.

Howe, who’d been there — who’d not merely seen the results but actually was responsible for them — couldn’t quite process it. He thought of Megan, dead in Cyclops One: Why hadn’t she shot down the missile targeting her? It would have been child’s play, an easy shot.

Easy, maybe, if you weren’t there.

Why had she taken the plane in the first place? Why was she a traitor, a liar?

The questions were a numbness now; he didn’t really ask them, didn’t ponder them. At the moment no one was really sure she’d even been in the wreck; DNA analyses of the recovered remains had not been finished.

The car stopped. There were umbrellas outside. Howe saw the umbrellas but not the men holding them. He got out of the car; people were smiling at him, congratulating him. He started to walk with them. He forced himself to smile, laughed at a joke about being escorted into the Pentagon, not out. An admiral met him just inside the door, began pumping his hand. Howe fell into place, walking down the corridor. He’d been in the building many times before, but this was different, very, very different; it was almost like being plucked from the stands of a football game, hustled down to the locker room, and suited up to play quarterback.

Or rather, it was as though he’d already done that, and thrown the game-winning pass. He was a hero.

Hero.People actually used that word. Real people, not giddy girls. Admirals and generals and captains and majors and real people.

To Howe, a hero was somebody who jumped out of a foxhole and ran through a jungle as machine guns were firing and mortars exploding, picked up a guy on the ground, and hunkered back to the lines with him. A hero was a Marine, or a grunt, or maybe one of the Air Force Special Tactics guys, or the SF soldiers who’d snatched McIntyre from the ground fight.

A pilot who shot down ten or twelve or even one or two fighters, or went down against enemy ground fire to save a bunch of guys pinned down — who held his breath and his bowels while all hell broke loose — those guys were heroes.

He’d done that, he reminded himself.

“I want to thank you again, Colonel, for saving me.”

Howe smiled at the man standing before him, then belatedly realized that it was McIntyre.

Somehow, in new clothes and smelling like he’d just stepped from the shower, the NSC official seemed in worse shape than when they’d reached the base. He seemed to have shrunk, and clearly he’d lost weight, considerable weight, just in the past two days.

“You doing all right?” Howe asked.

McIntyre barely moved his head as he nodded, and pulled his arms tight to his body, forearms pitched outward as if they were the tucked wings of a bird. “Hard to get sleep.”

“Yeah, I know what you mean.”

Others pressed in behind McIntyre, trying to say hello, trying to add their personal congratulations.

“I’m glad we got you out,” said Howe.

“If I can do anything for you, I will,” said McIntyre.

Howe watched him recede into the background of the room as the knot of people swelled. They began moving from the reception to a small auditorium.

Megan would have eaten this sort of thing up in her sleek black dress, with her VIP smile. She was used to dealing with these kinds of people, movers and shakers. Why had she fallen in love with him, anyway? Just to use him?

No. He couldn’t let himself believe that — couldn’t let go of that last strand of respect maybe.

She did love him, even though she was a bitch and a traitor, and if that boot they’d found belonged to her, or if some of that charcoaled metal contained her remains, he’d spit on it.

Part of him would. The other part would just shake his head.

Belatedly, Howe realized everyone around him was rising. The President of the United States had come into the room and was approaching the podium.

Howe felt his face flushing, even before the President pointed him out in the front row. Then D’Amici launched into a short, punchy speech about how America had met the challenge and would continue to do so, thanks to the men and women in this building and the armed services beyond. It was a good, uplifting talk, punctuated by enthusiastic applause.

There was no mention of McIntyre: Doing so might embarrass the Indians at a delicate point. Nor, of course, was there any mention of Cyclops One.

There weren’t even any medals. Those would come later, undoubtedly as part of another media event.

Timmy sat a few chairs away from him, beaming like a lightbulb. He was a good kid, a fine aviator — a better pilot than Howe, really, though only time would tell if he had the stomach it took to get into the upper command ranks. Howe thought he did; Timmy even joked with the President when he shook his hand. Good for him.

Howe just smiled and nodded, smiled and nodded.

When the President had left, Bonham came over like a long-lost uncle, congratulating Howe and introducing him to several two-and three-star generals and admirals. He shook maybe three dozen hands, smiled a lot, nodded even more.

“You’re going to go far,” Bonham told him. “Very, very far. I told you. I told you.” The former general leaned close to him. “DNA preliminary result is in,” he said in a whisper. “Megan York’s on the flight jacket. Positive match.”

Bonham pulled back. “You’ll be head of the JCS one day. Maybe President.”

“Great,” was all Howe could think of answering.

Chapter 2

Some cases slammed shut, tight as a box, ten minutes after you looked at them.

Others had the look of a crumpled cellophane wrapper stomped on in the mud. They were like overpacked suitcases; no matter what you did to them, something always hung out.

As a general rule, Fisher’s cases fell into the latter category. It was the nature of his assignments. Oh, there had been a few easily solved kidnappings back in his salad days, and the murder of a federal judge that had taken all of two cigarettes to close. But these days he could consume half the tobacco grown in Georgia and still have a twenty-three-sided rectangle.

Not that Jemma Gorman wasn’t doing her best to lop off the extraneous corners.

“With the identification of the remains and a review of the intercepts, we can reach certain conclusions,” said Gorman, holding forth via video from an Air Force base in Alaska. She’d gone there to coordinate the spy flights off the Russian Far East. Either the video reception was lousy or she had managed somehow to get a tan. “ ‘In a nutshell,’ ” she said, curling the first and middle fingers of her raised hands, “ ‘the plane was stolen by parties unknown, but undoubtedly linked to the Pakistani government. It was flown clandestinely to southern Asia, where it was intended to be used against the Indians. Unfortunately, it was shot down and its crew lost during the engagement.’ ”

“I have a question,” said Fisher, pressing the garish green button on the mike in front of his place. He had to hit the green button, then wait for a yellow light on the mike console before pressing a purple button to speak. The gear looked as if it had originally been intended for a Sony PlayStation rig.

“Mr. Fisher?”

“How come you do that quote thing with your fingers when you say in a nutshell?”

“Are there any serious questions?” asked Gorman.

“Yup.” Fisher pressed the button again. “Me again. Why would the original crew get involved?”

“Which?”

“Start with York.”

“We’ve called your agency in to prepare psychological profiles,” said Gorman. “Belatedly, I admit.”

“Yeah, but they’ll bullshit, don’t you think? And, uh, no offense, Colonel, but the FBI’s a bureau.”

“Money’s not a good enough motivator for you?” asked Kowalski, speaking from the Cyclops base.

“Oh, money’s good. I like money,” said Fisher. “I just haven’t seen any evidence of it. And York’s rich.”

“You can’t be too rich,” said Kowalski.

“Or dead,” said Fisher.

“Money is undoubtedly behind this. We’ll find it,” said Gorman. “We have forensic accountants hunting it down as we speak. Are there any real questions?”

Fisher took out a cigarette and lit it. Previous experience had shown that he could consume exactly 1.6 cigarettes in the secure videoconferencing center before setting off the alarm.

One of the CIA people asked about the Russian connection. Gorman handled it with her usual smooth aplomb: She changed the subject.

“There’s still a great deal of work to do. I’d like to reconvene our working groups at the base in three days. Agreed?”

Fisher looked at his watch as one by one the task force members voiced no objections. He was supposed to see Betty McDonald by eleven, but he wondered if he could talk to some of the lab people before then.

“Mr. Fisher, can you be at the base in three days?” asked Gorman.

“Kinda depends,” he said.

“Please try to make it.”

“Please? Did you say please? What happened, somebody gave you a dictionary?”

“Good afternoon, Andy.”

The screen went blank.

Chapter 3

Megan leaned against the side of the chair, reading the Web site news report on the computer screen. Still tired from the mission — she’d slept twelve hours straight after getting back — she felt a smug feeling of satisfaction curl around her as she thumbed through the reports.

Everything she’d believed, everything she’d envisioned, had been right.

Luck had played a hand — a large hand. If Cyclops One hadn’t been there, two of the Indian missiles would have gotten through.

Luck…or maybe the Almighty.

You could think in those terms; it was possible, wasn’t it, that God was playing a hand in all this? For surely he’d want the end of war.

There was still much further to go. The augmented ABM system. With or without Jolice, it would be built now.

Thanks to her, and thanks to the weapon. The development teams needed more time, just a little more time, which Congress and the other critics hadn’t been willing to give. They didn’t understand how weapons development, how research, worked. They weren’t willing to give the developers the time they needed to make truly revolutionary systems.

Now they would, assuaged by the first test results and buoyed by the intervention in Pakistan and India. Which had been the point in the first place. Jolice or another consortium, it was all the same to her in the end. Megan knew that for most of the others — for all of them, really — money had been the motivating factor. She didn’t care, though: Motives were not important; results were. Results.

Howe was getting a lot of play in the stories. He deserved it.

Maybe in ten years she’d see him again. In five?

In two, if she went ahead with the surgery. She hadn’t decided yet. There was time for that. For now, they had to get ready to dismantle the operation; they’d stayed here much longer than they’d anticipated, running all sorts of extra risks.

Risks that had paid off handsomely.

Something clunked behind her. Megan turned slowly from the chair in her room and saw Rogers standing in the doorway. He’d done an admirable job flying Cyclops One by remote control, and yet, uncharacteristically he hadn’t bragged about it.

Hope for him yet.

“What are you reading?” he asked.

“Just our reviews. We’re a rave. Packed yet?”

Rogers moved his hand from his side. He had a PDA in it. “There’s been a change in plans,” he said, handing it to her.

There was an E-mail screen and a message from Bonham:

Need you at new test. Details will follow. Sorry.

“This is crazy,” she said, thumbing back through it. “Why did he send it to you, not me?”

Rogers shrugged. “Maybe he thinks you’ll disagree.”

“It’s too risky to use the weapon again, and there’s no need.” Megan felt her face flushing. “I can’t believe it. We’re set to leave. I already sent half the security team away.”

“It’s no big deal,” he said, taking the PDA back.

“Screw you, it’s not a big deal.”

Rogers smiled as if he’d like to get the chance.

“I’m going to E-mail him myself,” Megan told him.

“Fine with me.”

“You think we can fly off here indefinitely?”

“I think if we haven’t been seen yet, we won’t be seen for a while. I wouldn’t worry,” Rogers added. “Segrest’ll add some stock to keep us happy.”

“How do you know that?”

“That’s how he is.” He put the handheld computer in his pants pocket and smiled.

Had the bastard talked to Segrest as well? There were no phones here, of course, but E-mail was a different story.

“You talked to Segrest?” she asked.

“No. But I know him.”

She couldn’t tell if this was just his usual blowhard BS or what. Maybe Bonham had told Segrest to pony up, anticipating there’d be a problem.

But why didn’t he come to her?

“This isn’t Segrest’s call,” said Megan.

“E-mail Bonham.”

“I’m not doing it.”

“You think you’re the only one who can fly the Blackjack?”

“Rogers, be realistic. We’re taking too much of a chance.”

“Flying all the way to India wasn’t too much of a chance? You wanted to do that, not me.”

“We did that so we could get out of here without them hounding us for the rest of our lives.”

“We didn’t do it for humanity?”

She ignored his sneer.

“I’m sorry,” said Rogers, suddenly contrite. “Listen, what’s one more mission, more or less?”

“I’m going to contact Bonham,” she said.

“Fine with me.”

“How are we going to feed the rest of the people on the island?”

“We’ll cash them out and tell them to leave once we take off. We blow the plane up with the hangar, just like we planned, and we leave. It’s just a few days later than we thought, that’s all,” said Rogers. “A few days later, and a lot richer.”

Megan shook her head. “You’re too greedy, Abe. Too greedy.”

“Listen, Megan, that’s easy for you to say. You were born rich. I just gave everything I have up to do this. Yeah, I agree, the ABM system makes a hell of a lot of sense, but you know and I know that the real reason this got done was because the people behind Jolice stand to gain billions.”

“Congress never would have voted to fund more development without the test,” said Megan. “We had to have good results.”

“I’m not disagreeing. I’m just saying that the motive for a lot of people happens to be money. I’m not arguing the results, but I don’t want to be criticized by you because I’m taking my share.”

Megan pressed her lips together. There was no arguing with that: Segrest and many of the others were going to profit. She would too. And Bonham — his motivation was political power. None of them were pure.

“I can fly the plane without you if I have to,” said Rogers. “I’ve already talked to the others. They want the money.”

“I’ll bet.” Megan sat in the chair, her eyes focused on the floor. The thing to do now was get out — out, out, out!

But Bonham must have thought the whole thing through. Rogers was probably right: It was highly unlikely they’d be spotted if they hadn’t been already.

Still.

“I’m going to E-mail him,” she said, spinning back in the chair.

“Be my guest. Let me know if the new plan comes in.”

Chapter 4

So he was a hero. Now what?

Colonel Thomas Howe, in civilian clothes, sat at the end of the small bar in Alexandria, Virginia. In front of him was a beer that had been poured roughly an hour before, the glass still half full. To his left was a small bowl of stale popcorn. Every so often he’d reach into the bowl and take a single kernel — always a single kernel — examine it, then put it in his mouth and chew deliberately. There was a baseball game on the screen above the bar; Howe stared at it intently, as if he actually cared who won or even knew the score.

He’d wanted to eat dinner by himself, but in the end had been swept up by Bonham with one of the contractors on the laser project and taken to a restaurant somewhere in the Washington suburbs. The parking lot was filled with Mercedes and BMWs, the waiters wore stiff tuxedos, and there were no prices on the menu. Howe had steak. It was very, very good steak, though in truth he would have been fine with a hamburger back in his room at the hotel. He’d practically had to beg to be taken back there, rather than the parties Bonham had lined up.

He had gone inside intending to sleep, but the light was blinking on the phone when he got into the room, and he decided he was better off making himself scarce for the night. He didn’t feel like talking any more today.

So he’d found his way here, a suburban bar with green felt paper on the walls and highly polished wood and flat-screen, wide-tube TVs, and beer that cost $7.50 a glass. The bartender, a woman in her mid-twenties with an hourglass figure, smiled in his direction every fifteen minutes or so, but otherwise left him alone. The place was about three-quarters full when he came in, but people had been slowly draining away; there were less than a dozen left now, including two parties in the leather-covered booths at the other end of the room.

He picked up another piece of popcorn.

“Orioles can’t hit. They don’t understand the value of taking pitches.”

Howe turned to his left, surprised by the voice. It belonged to Andy Fisher. The FBI agent pulled out his cigarettes.

“You’re a pretty good detective to figure out where I was,” said Howe.

“Not really. You’re driving a rental that uses a satellite locator.” Fisher ordered a beer from the bartender. “Put a head on his while you’re at it.”

“No, thanks,” said Howe.

“Want my theory?”

“On what? Baseball?”

“Cyclops One.”

“Probably not.” Howe picked up his glass and took a sip.

“You’re still hooked on York?”

Howe turned to him, said nothing, then turned back.

“Well, for what it’s worth, I think she’s alive.”

Howe laughed. “How do you fake DNA?”

“Oh, you can fake anything. Look at the bartender. Those aren’t real.”

Fisher took a long drag from his cigarette, held the smoke in his mouth, then exhaled slowly.

“They didn’t have to fake the DNA. There was no flesh in that partial boot. The hair on the flight suit — that’s real. Probably a bunch of those spread around. Plane’s real too. But the laser’s not there, not the inside works.”

“You know that for a fact?” asked Howe.

“Not yet. There’s going to be traces, just enough to convince us. Like the hair on the flight suit. Something else is going on. I’ll bet there was another plane.”

Howe’s frustration and anger burst past the last restraints. He spun, ready to slug Fisher.

The agent stopped speaking, but only for a second. “Ever hear of Jolice Missile Systems?”

Howe looked down at his fingers, curled into a fist on the bar. His hand was bright red.

“What about Jolice?”

“I have a theory. You want to hear it before you hit me, or after?”

In outline, the theory was simple: The laser plane had to be stolen to help Jolice do well in the augmented-ABM tests. Jolice’s performance there had been nothing short of amazing, especially considering that the company had never built an antimissile system before. There were all sorts of connections between the people who ran Jolice and Cyclops, Bonham being the focal point. One of the companies in the web of connections had purchased property in Canada six months before: an old hunter’s lodge that just happened to include a lake north of the search area.

But once the FBI agent began talking about the details, things got considerably murkier. Anything close to Cyclops One would have been detected if it had been in the sky during either the ABM tests or the action over Pakistan.

“Unless,” said Fisher, “it was something like your Velociraptor.”

Howe laughed so loudly the bartender looked over. Fisher held up his glass for a refill.

Howe shook his head. “You don’t know jack about Cyclops. The laser’s as big as the plane.”

“Can’t shrink it?”

“Not much.”

“What about another stealth plane? A B-2.”

“Not going to fit in a B-2.”

“No?” Fisher took out a fresh pack of cigarettes and pounded it into his palm. “Want one?”

“No.”

“You’re telling me it won’t fit no way, no how?”

“Well, if you made about a million changes to it and the plane.”

Fisher took a long drag on the cigarette. “A million changes? What about a B-1?”

“Still too short.”

“Not by that much. In fact, Firenze says the manufacturer proposed a scaled-down version for a stealth aircraft that was only a few feet longer than a B-1.”

Fisher put up his finger to quiet him as the bartender approached.

“There’s no way,” said Howe when she was gone. “You’re telling me they stole a B-1?”

“If they could steal Cyclops One, which obviously they did, they could steal anything.” Fisher sipped at the beer. “But I don’t know. All the B-1s are accounted for.”

“There goes your theory.”

“No. There goes the easy solution, that’s all.”

“Why would Megan York be involved? She wouldn’t be after the money.”

“You sure?”

“She wouldn’t be.” Howe took a sip of his beer. It tasted stale and bitter in his mouth.

“What do you know about her uncle?” asked Fisher.

“Which uncle?”

“The guy who dropped bombs on Tokyo. The congressman’s father.”

Howe pushed back from the bar and turned toward Fisher, looking at him as if for the first time. “Let’s get some coffee,” he told him.

They found a diner not too far away. Fisher noted that it was too upscale to call itself a diner — the walls in the foyer were made of shiny vinyl and looked only moderately tacky — but was somewhat mollified by the coffee, which he said tasted as if it had been made in a garbage can four days before and boiled ever since.

In other words, perfect.

They also allowed smoking.

“Megan was involved in Cyclops and the laser program because she truly wanted to end war,” Howe said. “I know it sounds strange, but I’m positive; she could have done anything she wanted. She didn’t have to work — she was educated up the yin-yang — but she chose to do this because she believed it. Like a religion.”

“You think a laser weapon’s going to end war?”

“As part of a global defense system, sure.” Howe stared into Fisher’s face; he didn’t react. “Look what we did in India.”

Fisher still said nothing.

“I don’t know. It can change things, strategies, make some weapons obsolete. Look, I’m not a peace freak, okay? I just think it’ll change things. It already has. A lot of people owe their lives to it.”

“What about the new ABM system?” asked Fisher. “What’s the deal there?”

“Same thing. The whole system works together. You need a lot of interlocking layers. The augmented ABM system allows us to deal with things we don’t have advance warning on. We could strike cruise missiles over the sea: You see, the standard ABM system, the one Congress already approved, can’t hit cruise missiles. This is a big improvement.” He sipped the coffee. “You don’t think it will work, do you?”

“I think most of the things that happen in the world happen because of one of two things,” said Fisher, pulling on his cigarette. “Greed and lust. Plenty of greed involved here, if the project goes through.”

“Megan wasn’t like that.”

Fisher shrugged. “She didn’t have to be.” He picked up his coffee cup, debating whether to ask for another cup. When you found sewage swill like this, you really wanted to load up. But they were running a little late.

“What motivates Bonham?” he asked the pilot.

Howe shrugged. “I don’t know. He buys into it, I guess. We don’t really discuss philosophy.”

“Not money?”

“He wants to be defense secretary someday,” said Howe.

“What do you think about talking to him?”

“When? Now? It’s after eleven.”

“Yeah. If we’re lucky we can catch him in his jammies.”

Chapter 5

Bonham turned on the TV and flipped over to ESPN as he pulled off his jacket and tie. The swirl of parties and receptions over the past forty-eight hours — the whole hail-fellow-well-met routine — was an intoxicating diversion, but it was only that. Segrest and a number of the others were determined to use the weapon for the second stage of augmented-ABM tests, set to begin in a few days. They were trying to isolate him, maneuvering behind his back.

He’d sent Megan York a long, coded E-mail telling her to carry through with the dismantling of the weapon immediately. Her one-word acknowledgment had been uncharacteristically short. There was no way, however, to safely contact her or the others on the island.

ESPN cut to a commercial; he’d have to wait for the scores.

Bonham slipped off his shoes. His paranoia was starting to get the better of him. Things had gone incredibly well, and his idea to set up the Cyclops One crash in India had worked out even better than he had hoped. The satellites had been able to definitively identify the strike on the Indian missiles as a laser discharge, and the investigators would spend months if not years trying to somehow connect the Pakistanis to the theft. In the meantime NADT was getting all the credit for Cyclops Two’s performance, and despite the tarnish of the theft Bonham’s stock was rising proportionately.

He would have preferred burying the plane in the lake by remote control as planned. But this was the next best thing. The loss of the Velociraptor and the delays in the ABM tests had complicated everything.

Segrest was being greedy. They had achieved so much — why did some people always want even more?

ESPN SportsCenter came on, leading with a story Bonham didn’t want to hear: The Red Sox had lost again. They now trailed the hated Yankees by two games.

The doorbell relieved his anguish.

At this hour the security people at the gate ordinarily would insist on a visitor calling ahead. But there were several people they knew well enough to send right through, and Bonham indulged in a brief fantasy that one had decided on delivering a midnight pick-me-up in person.

Colonel Howe’s voice punctured the fantasy as Bonham reached the door.

“General Bonham, this is Tom Howe. I need to talk to you.”

“Tom.”

Bonham pulled open the door. Next to Howe was the annoying FBI agent, Andrew Fisher.

“Come in,” Bonham said, trying to remain the gracious host. “Why didn’t you call ahead?”

“We didn’t want to wake you if you were sleeping,” said Fisher.

A lie, obviously. But why?

Pain-in-the-ass Fisher — why hadn’t he been reassigned yet?

Bonham led them back up to the den, killing the TV and offering drinks. They declined but he got a Scotch for himself, retrieving a few cubes of ice from the kitchen.

Howe sat ramrod straight in one of the chairs. Fisher sprawled against the corner of the sofa, his feet up on the table.

“Do you know where the Cyclops laser weapon is?” asked Fisher.

Bonham took a sip from his drink. “Is that a trick question?”

“Mr. Fisher’s not convinced that the weapon from Cyclops One was destroyed in the crash,” said Howe.

Bonham felt a twinge of panic. It was hard enough dealing with Fisher, who at least had a reputation as an eccentric and maverick. Howe not only was smart but had access to people who would listen to what he said. Bonham steadied himself with a sip of the Scotch, letting the bitterness sting at the insides of his mouth. He sat back down and closed his eyes momentarily, as if fighting off fatigue.

“As far as I know,” said Bonham, “the preliminary findings from the task force assigned to the disappearance of the plane is going to reflect — well, it’s going to say that it crashed in China after a fire aboard, which blew up the laser fuel.”

“There’s no evidence of that,” said Fisher.

“No?” Bonham knew that there was — they had very carefully worked out what the crash would “look” like — but it was not difficult to act surprised. “Did the Chinese get there first? Or the Indians?”

“Maybe the laser wasn’t there to begin with,” said Fisher.

Bonham looked at Howe and smiled, as if they were in on the joke together. “Well, I guess the satellites and Cyclops Two’s sensors were wrong, then.”

Bonham walked over to the chair and sat down. The more he heard of Fisher’s theory, the easier it would be to discredit it, though the agent had already given him more than enough ammunition.

“There was definitely another laser fired,” said Howe. He looked at Fisher, who was still staring at Bonham.

“So, was there another plane?” asked Bonham. “Chinese? Russian? I guess Russian wouldn’t work, because they’re allies of the Indians. Unless they were being altruistic. Possible, I guess.We were.”

Howe looked over at Fisher. Fisher, suddenly seeming very reluctant to talk, shrugged again.

Howe rose abruptly. He was angry, though characteristically he controlled his emotion so well that only someone like Bonham, who’d dealt with him for a while, recognized it. “I’m sorry we bothered you, General.”

“No, no, listen, I want to hear what you think,” said Bonham. “Have a drink.”

“It’s late,” said Howe.

Fisher remained on the couch.

“Tell me your theory,” Bonham told him. “Where is the laser if it didn’t crash?”

The FBI agent pulled out a pack of cigarettes. “Mind if I smoke?”

Bonham hesitated, but only for a moment. He had clearly discredited Fisher in Howe’s eyes, but it would still be useful to know what Fisher was thinking. He balanced that against his growing revulsion of the agent.

“Go ahead,” he told him.

“Maybe I better not,” said Fisher. He unfolded himself from the couch. “Probably bother your wife.”

“I’ve been divorced from number two for five years,” Bonham told him.

Howe was already at the hall to the door.

“He’s got my ride,” said Fisher. “But thanks anyway.”

“Now listen, if you boys have something solid, I want to know what’s going on. I know Jemma Gorman is competent, but maybe there’s something that’s been overlooked.”

“I’ll let you know,” said Fisher, shambling out.

Chapter 6

Howe didn’t talk until they were back in the car.

“What the hell was that about? We looked like a couple of assholes.”

“Pretty much,” said Fisher. “What do you figure a condo here goes for?”

“Maybe you like looking like an asshole,” said Howe. “I don’t.”

“According to his financial disclosure, he spent under two-fifty on the place when he bought it two years ago. Just from what I saw, there had to be three bedrooms, I’m going to guess a formal dining room on the other side of that living room, the den we were in, at least two baths plus the master bath. Gated community, yada yada yada — what, million? Million and a half? Tall ceilings, though, so probably even more. TV setup, furniture, paintings, that Chinese vase in the corner? Wasn’t Crate & Barrel.”

“You blew smoke up my ass, didn’t you?” said Howe. “Why did you want to see Bonham? Just to check his condo out?”

“Relax, Colonel. You’re too high-strung. Wave at the guards and smile. They did us a favor.”

Howe tightened his hands on the steering wheel as he passed out of the condo property.

“The general wouldn’t have seen you if you had come alone, is that it?” Howe asked.

“Part of it.”

“You should have just said that without bullshiting me about another plane, then. I don’t like being bullshitted.”

“I ain’t bullshitting you, Howe. Unlike everybody else.”

“Fuck you.” The traffic light ahead was turning yellow. Howe stopped at the intersection and turned to Fisher, who was sitting slumped against the door, his thumb pressed against his lips watching him.

“What’s the real story here? Was the laser destroyed or not?” asked Howe.

“Not,” said Fisher. “I think.”

“You think?”

“If I knew for sure, I wouldn’t be here, Colonel. I’m sure Bonham has a lot to hide. Maybe just money, maybe more. Whether it’s related or not, I don’t know. Everybody hides things.”

“You think he was paid off to steal the laser?”

“I think that would’ve come later, once he’s involved. Or not: Maybe these guys just figure they can do whatever the fuck they want. Just from what I can see, they control a lot.”

“They stole the laser so they could rig the ABM tests.”

“Yup.” Fisher squirmed in the seat. The light had turned green. “Listen, you didn’t expect him to drop to his knees and confess, did you? Of course not. He wouldn’t have gotten where he is, much less pulled this off, if he was like that. Hell, kid who breaks into a house isn’t even like that. You got some cars back of you.”

Howe stepped on the gas. “Why him?”

Fisher shrugged. “Had to be somebody pretty high up. I don’t have York, I trust you, so that leaves Bonham.”

“Why do you trust me?”

“There was a virus thing in your plane’s environmental system that nearly caused you to crash. Firenze compared what was left of it to the system in the plane that crashed and it’s identical. Doesn’t totally let you off the hook, I know, but it’s all I got to go on at the moment.”

“There was a virus in my plane?”

“They have a more technical explanation.” Fisher took out one of his cigarettes. “You think I operate by gut, huh? I look at you and decide you’re honest?”

Howe felt so unsure of so many things now that he didn’t know what to feel, much less to say. Bonham and Megan traitors?

“You go by your gut, bad chili dog can throw you off,” said Fisher.

“Bonham wouldn’t have fooled with that plane,” said Howe.

“Not himself, no. May not have been meant to kill anybody; your wingman went a little lower than he was supposed to, and maybe that got him nailed.” Fisher shrugged. “I may never know for sure, though. The people who did the controls won’t talk to me, which is a hopeful sign.”

The entrance ramp to the Beltway was just ahead. Howe put on his blinker, figuring he’d dump Fisher off and go back to the hotel and sleep, maybe for a month.

“I do have another idea,” said Fisher, rolling down the window and throwing the cigarette away. “If you’re interested.”

Chapter 7

This time the kid was sitting on a park bench, waiting for him. McIntyre tried to stop himself from moving forward, but it was hopeless: He had as little power to change the dream as he had to change what had happened in Kashmir.

The sky began to change color, subtly shading from deep blue to a greenish gray. Tinges of red appeared near the horizon. McIntyre tried to concentrate on them but his eyes were inevitably drawn to the boy sitting on the bench.

A bell began to ring. At first he didn’t know where it was coming from; he thought it was part of the dream. Then he realized it was the doorbell. He threw off the covers, grabbing anxiously for the light at the side of the bed. He wasn’t fully awake, but he was thankful for the interruption, glad to be spared the nightmare.

By the time McIntyre pulled on his bathrobe and slippers, he was almost completely awake. The bell continued to sound at regular intervals. His relief faded as he glanced at the clock on the night table. It was just past two o’clock in the morning.

“Yes?” he said when he reached the door to the condo. “Who is it?”

“Colonel Howe,” said the voice.

“Howe?” He hesitated for a second, not sure whether it might be some sort of gag or a trick or something. He unlocked the dead bolt but left the chain, pulling the door open a crack before reaching to turn on the light.

“McIntyre, we have to talk to you.”

It was Howe. There was someone else with him, though McIntyre couldn’t see who it was.

“Colonel…it’s a little late.”

“I know.”

Had he heard about the kid and his mother? Maybe he was here to warn him.

McIntyre pushed the door closed, then undid the chain.

The FBI agent, Fisher, was with Howe.

They must know.

He nodded to them both without saying anything, then led them inside. They trailed him to the kitchen. The overhead fluorescents stung his eyes when he snapped them on.

“I’m going to make some coffee,” said McIntyre. “Sit down.”

“I know we’re disturbing you,” said Howe.

“That’s all right.” McIntyre measured out three scoops of Maxwell House into the filter.

“Hit it again,” said Fisher.

McIntyre froze. It took a second to figure out that the FBI agent wanted him to make the coffee stronger.

“Mr. Fisher has a theory,” said Howe.

McIntyre’s fingers trembled and he dropped the scoop.

“Let me do that,” said Fisher, getting up. “Have a seat.”

McIntyre’s robe fell open as he pulled out the chair. He fussed at it in slow motion, pulling it together, feeling suddenly cold in the room. Howe began to talk as he tightened it.

He was talking about the laser, about Cyclops One — not what had happened on the ground.

Fisher thought the laser had been put into another aircraft to be used during the augmented-ABM trials.

McIntyre couldn’t believe that was why they were here. He hoped it was, though — he wanted it to be, wanted the boy back alive, back before him, breathing or even crying, but alive.

“It would take a lot of people to pull it off,” said Howe.

“Just the right people,” said Fisher.

He put the coffee down in front of McIntyre. It was stronger than he was used to; the aroma alone was enough to jar McIntyre’s senses. It helped drive the dream away.

“There were traces of the chemicals used in the laser system at the site,” McIntyre told them. “I was briefed on the preliminary findings by Gorman.”

“Yeah.” Fisher took a gulp of the coffee. “There’s traces but no real volume. Lab people pointed that out. Unfortunately, we don’t have anything to compare it to. I suggested we blow up the other plane but nobody went for that.”

He didn’t seem to be joking.

“I have another idea,” said Fisher. “We watch the ABM test and see what happens.”

“They’ll know we’re watching,” said McIntyre. The coffee was good for his head, but what was it doing to his stomach?

“Yeah, you’re right,” said Fisher. “Probably it’s just a wild goose chase.”

“I think we ought to do it,” said Howe.

McIntyre didn’t know if the theory made any sense or not; he just knew he didn’t want to be alone, fearing the nightmare might return.

“Tell me more about your theory,” he said.

“There’s not much more to it,” said Fisher.

Howe glanced at him, frowning as if he knew he were lying, but the Air Force officer said nothing himself.

“Another time,” said Fisher, getting up.

“Wait.” McIntyre looked toward the doorway, as if he expected the child to appear. “It wouldn’t be too hard to set up, but I’d have to talk to Dr. Blitz about it.”

“Good,” said Fisher. “Where’s your phone?”

An hour and ten minutes after being woken by McIntyre’s phone call, Dr. Blitz sat behind his desk in the West Wing of the White House, trying to run the fatigue from his eyes. McIntyre still looked shell-shocked from his experience in India, and Colonel Howe just looked exhausted. But the FBI agent, Andy Fisher, smirked in a way that suggested he didn’t need the coffee he was chugging. His offhand manner was difficult to decipher; Blitz couldn’t tell if he was trying to provoke a response or was just naturally a jerk.

“I don’t believe any of this,” Blitz told Fisher after he outlined his theory.

“Yeah, it is pretty far-fetched,” said the FBI agent. “It’s out there.”

“So why are you here?”

Fisher leaned his face forward as if he were going to say something utterly profound. Instead he scratched his ear. “You came to D.C. from teaching, right?”

“What does that have to do with anything?” Blitz had the distinct impression that Fisher was examining him as he spoke, watching his reactions the way a miner panned through sediment, looking for gold.

“Nothing.” Fisher leaned back against the chair, resuming his slump. Blitz knew the agent had been involved in high-level espionage and technology cases before, and assumed he wasn’t the dummy he pretended to be.

And then suddenly he realized the import of the question he had just been asked.

“You think I’m involved, don’t you?”

“Are you?” answered Fisher.

“I ought to throw you out of here.”

“It’s happened before.”

Blitz locked his eyes with the FBI agent.

“Don’t be a wiseass, Mr. Fisher.” Blitz turned to McIntyre. “The launch-surveillance satellites can’t pick up the laser discharge except under very specific circumstances.”

“I’m aware of that,” said McIntyre. “But we could use the test monitoring plane, the RC-135.”

“It’ll tip them off.” He looked over toward Fisher.

“Probably,” said the agent.

“It won’t matter if they know,” said McIntyre. “That’s the point, isn’t it? You want them to know you’re watching, because you’re hoping they’ll do something you can trace. And if they don’t and you’re right, their missile will miss and that’ll be evidence anyway.”

Everybody looked at Fisher.

“Anybody mind if I smoke in here?” he asked.

Chapter 8

Bonham knew he had convinced Howe that Fisher was crazy, but that didn’t completely eliminate the FBI agent as a threat. Before going to bed, he sent another E-mail to Megan emphasizing the importance of carrying out the dismantling program and in the morning picked up where he had left off in his campaign to reassure himself that the others weren’t stepping around him. Bonham decided he could use Fisher to his advantage and discreetly mentioned the FBI agent’s visit during several phone calls. He also decided he would have it out personally with Segrest, and so arranged to have lunch with him. Segrest suggested a Chinese restaurant well out of town; Bonham didn’t particularly care for Chinese food but he decided to go there anyway, since the setting would give them freer rein to talk.

At twelve-thirty in the afternoon he left his office and drove farther out into rural Virginia, passing green hills divided into horse paddocks by thick, flat rails of white pine. If he hadn’t been following the directions carefully, he would have missed the turn, and if he hadn’t known about the restaurant, he never would have seen it. It was an old farmhouse marked only by a small wooden sign near the driveway.

Inside, the two-hundred-year-old structure had been gutted and given a sophisticated sheen. Wide chestnut planks with thick varnish greeted him in the foyer, along with a very short and thin Asian-American who bent nearly to the waist. The man led him into a large room whose far wall was now old brick; spotlights played on the empty fireplace, and two waiters stood in the corners, though there were no other guests at the small tables.

Bonham told him he was waiting for someone and opted for water rather than a drink.

Eric Hovanek walked in a few minutes later, towering over his host as he was shown to the table.

“Where’s Segrest?” demanded Bonham.

“Relax, General. Something came up.” Hovanek ordered a martini. “They don’t have menus,” he told Bonham. “You can ask for anything you want or just let them feed you.”

“Why isn’t Segrest here?” Bonham thought of leaving: Hovanek was just a sophisticated gofer, a former stockbroker whom Segrest had befriended. After a short stint as Segrest’s personal “moneyman,” he had taken on the role of clone, sitting on boards and attending meetings the wealthy young bastard was too lazy to attend.

“Something came up. You said the meeting was important, and so he sent me instead of canceling at the last minute.”

Hovanek’s cell phone rang before he could say anything, and Bonham found himself staring at the thick layers of cloth on the table, which alternated between white and mauve. The host soon returned with Hovanek’s martini; Bonham asked for a Glenfiddich. Hovanek was still on the phone when a young waiter appeared with a dish of pickled sprouts.

“Cash flow problems,” said Hovanek, his voice shaded toward an apology after he snapped the phone closed. He pointed to the sprouts.

The waiter appeared with a plate of noodles slathered in sesame sauce and topped by a row of shrimp and cucumbers.

“This is to get us in the mood,” said Hovanek. He took his chopsticks and sampled the food. “Excellent.”

“I want to talk about the FBI agent, Fisher,” said Bonham.

“Why?”

The host appeared with the Scotch. Hovanek told the man to go ahead and feed them with whatever the chef decided they should have.

“You worry too much, General,” said Hovanek. “Everything is fine. You yourself are doing well. I heard your name mentioned for assistant defense secretary the other day.”

“Fisher wants them to watch the tests for a laser,” said Bonham.

“Is that a fact?” Hovanek was neither surprised nor, from what Bonham could see, concerned in the least.

“All right,” said Bonham. He pushed his seat away from the table. “Make sure everyone knows. My way or no way.”

“General, you haven’t eaten. You really should.” Hovanek smiled up at him. “Mr. Young will think you don’t like his food.”

Bonham drove around for a while, trying to seperate his distaste for Hovanek from what the lackey had said. He hadn’t actually said anything meaningful, Bonham finally decided, but whether that meant Segrest really was up to something or not, he couldn’t tell. Exhausted and finally hungry, Bonham pulled off at a McDonald’s around three to get something to eat. It was the last place anyone would look for him, but as soon as he stepped through the doors and approached the overlit front counter, he felt comfortable, a teenager again slipping away from high school to grab a burger after school.

Bonham ordered a Big Mac Meal, declined the super-size option, and walked with his tray to the back. He started to grab for a newspaper along the way, then thought better of it. He needed a break from everything for at least a few minutes more. He was getting too paranoid to function.

A young father was fussing over his four-year-old son in the next booth, dabbing his chin with a napkin. Bonham gave the guy a smile, watching the pair as he ate. The kid was reasonably cute, and the father was attentive; they would have made a decent commercial as they walked out the door hand in hand.

It was a bit pathetic that a grown man had to play baby-sitter in the middle of the day, Bonham thought. But what the hell.

The food put him in a better mood. Bonham listened to an old Johnny Cash CD on the way back to his office. Once there, he whipped through some paperwork BS and returned a few phone calls, including a backgrounder for a Washington Post reporter, who traded a bit of gossip about one of the senators on the Intelligence Committee. The bad taste of Hovanek gradually washed away, and by the time he walked into his condo a little after eight, Bonham was in an expansive mood. The Red Sox were on the tube: They had a 3–0 lead over Baltimore. Bonham jacked up the volume and pulled off his jacket and tie, walking to the bathroom. As he turned on the light, something moved behind him. Before he could react, the back portion of his skull seemed to implode.

Chapter 9

Fisher hated murder scenes, not because he didn’t like looking at dead bodies, but because the forensics people went ape shit if you disturbed something, which in their eyes you did simply by breathing in the air. Poke your head inside wearing anything less than a hermetically sealed body bootie, and they ran out to their vans to plunge pins into their voodoo dolls.

Fisher put little stock in voodoo, and cared even less who he pissed off, but he did nonetheless strain to put himself on his best behavior, since getting a report without the usual red tape depended on it. The crime scene guys — state police, though he wouldn’t hold that against them — working Bonham’s condo were relatively low key, once he put out his cigarette. Still, they said flat out they wouldn’t let him in the bathroom where Bonham had died until they finished their work there; at the rate they were going, that seemed likely to happen sometime next winter.

Fisher contented himself with booting the general’s computer in the den, examining its browser and E-mail programs for anything of note.

The history folder was completely clean, and Fisher couldn’t find anything in the trash folder, either. Bonham obviously had an industrial-strength scrubber program loaded. Fisher looked over the program list; there were two different baseball games, but otherwise nothing that didn’t come stock on the machine, a relatively new Dell.

“What are you doing?” demanded one of the investigators as she walked in behind him.

“What the FBI always does,” said Fisher, keying up the hidden directories. “Screwing up the crime scene.”

“Well, I’m glad you admit it.”

“Got a scrubber program in here I can’t find. Probably want to send it over to our lab.” Fisher leaned away from the machine, pointing to the screen.

“Who exactly are you?” asked the woman detective.

“Andy Fisher, FBI.”

“Why are you here?”

“Oh.” Fisher leaned back from his chair. “One of the uniform guys figured out who Bonham was and called us, and for some inexplicable reason the person who got the call actually knew how to follow the right procedure and tell me about it. Lightning has to strike somewhere, as improbable as it sounds.”

“You’re a wiseass.”

“Yeah, actually, the guys in the field office are usually pretty sharp. It’s when you get to headquarters that you get the lobotomy.”

“I’m Susan Doar,” said the woman, holding her hand out to him. She was in her mid-thirties, with just enough of a cynical smile to hint that this wasn’t her first murder case, nor the first time she’d dealt with the FBI.

“Andy Fisher. Mind if I smoke?”

“You can’t smoke in here.”

“Everybody says that.” Fisher got up. “Seriously, we want the computer. If you send it to the Secret Service or, God forbid, the NSA, you’ll never find out what’s on it. Those guys are close to unbribable.”

“Someone from the Defense Department is on his way over,” said Doar.

“They’re not so bad,” said Fisher. “Except they tend to lose stuff. I think they actually end up using it for target practice.”

“I’ll use my own lab, thanks,” said Doar.

“You got a time of death?”

“Autopsy hasn’t been done.”

“I never trusted those doctor types.”

“Neighbor heard the TV blaring last night about eleven, called over to complain, banged on the door, got worried,” said Doar.

“Nosy-neighbor type?”

“I think he was pissed off because he couldn’t get to sleep,” said Doar. “Left a nasty message. Then maybe he felt guilty.”

“How did our hero die?” asked Fisher.

“Hit the back of his head in the bathroom. Slipped getting out of the tub.”

“Can I take a look?”

“If they’re done with the pictures. He’s not wearing anything.”

“I knew there was some reason I came.”

“That’s what I said.”

The downstairs bathroom was bigger than Fisher’s apartment. The general lay sprawled faceup on the floor, a trickle of blood coming from his ear. He seemed to have slipped coming out of the whirlpool bath, smacked his head on the side of the marble wall where the bath was recessed, then pirouetted down and smacked the back of his head again.

“We took hair and some skin off the wall,” said Doar pointing. “Probably open and shut.”

“Bathrooms are very dangerous places,” said Fisher.

“Yeah.”

Fisher knelt near the door. The scene was laid out perfectly, the distances precise, soap in the bottom of the tub, water almost but not quite turned off, a towel pulled cock-eyed off the corner of the rack as if Bonham had started to grab for it.

He rose and went back into the den. They’d hit the mute on the TV, but otherwise had left it on, just as they’d found it. Fisher looked around, re-creating the scene from the other night when he and Howe had come over, comparing it to now. Bonham had thrown his jacket down, as though he’d just come in.

“Was he drinking?” Fisher asked.

“It’s not obvious,” said the investigator. “No glass or anything.”

Fisher walked back to the bathroom. There was a small TV in the corner. It was off.

“What?” asked Doar as he started to leave.

“Open and shut,” said Fisher.

Chapter 10

Howe heard about Bonham’s death just as he was suiting up to fly out to Alaska. The lieutenant who brought the information had it third- or fourthhand and couldn’t add anything beyond the simple fact that the general had died in an accident.

Howe didn’t know what to feel or even think. Away from Fisher, he’d started to doubt the FBI agent’s theory, though he couldn’t really dismiss it. He nodded to the lieutenant, then continued getting ready; he had to be in Alaska by nightfall to help prepare the monitoring mission. He went out to the planes with Timmy feeling a little numb; he could focus on the plane and his job well enough, but could only manage a grunt or two as his wingman made his usual jokes about anything and everything.

They were finished with the preflights and about to strap in when a Humvee flew around the corner and nearly crashed into one of the small tractors standing on the apron. The lieutenant who had told Howe about Bonham jumped from the truck, running toward the planes and waving his arms like a madman. Howe leaned over the side of the aircraft; the lieutenant spotted him and began gesturing madly that he should come down. He produced a cell phone from his pocket, holding it up toward Howe.

“FBI wants you,” said the lieutenant when he reached the tarmac.

“FBI?” asked Howe as he took the phone. “Fisher?”

“Last time I checked,” answered the agent.

“This better be important.”

“Tell me something: How big a sports fan was Bonham?”

Chapter 11

“The whole idea of offshore banks, Andy, is that they make it almost impossible to get access.”

“Yeah, but not for you, Betty.” Fisher fed another cigarette into the forensic accountant’s fat fingers.

Betty lit the new cigarette off the one in her other hand. “You’re right about that condo. Worth a hell of a lot more than he said. But the transactions are there to back up the price.”

“Have to be offshore accounts.”

“I need account numbers. At least banks.”

“They’re not on the computer, not according to the state police lab guys. I sent Bartolomo over to help them.”

“Oh, that was smart.”

“Hey, for a computer geek, he’s almost human,” said Fisher. “I had this other brainstorm while I was talking to him.”

“Spare me.”

“He says you can track whether inquiries are made on bank accounts from ATMs and phones and things, because their networks log all the contacts.”

“What’s the point?”

“Well, see, if the four people who were supposed to have died in Cyclops One aren’t dead, then they’re probably checking their bank accounts. We just look at the statements, right?”

“I don’t know if we can come up with those kinds of records,” said Betty. “Besides, not everybody’s as paranoid about their money as you, Andy.”

“I’m not paranoid about money.”

“Excuse me.Cheap was the word I was looking for. You have the companies laid out.” Betty suddenly put on her motherly voice, the one she usually used before telling Fisher to hit the road. “Put some pressure on the officers and board members, things will start to open up.”

“Or maybe a few more people will slip in their bathrooms,” said Fisher. He rose.

“We’ll do what we can,” she told him. “No promises.”

“Thanks, babe. Get ahold of me if you think of something else, okay? I’m counting on you to break this sucker open.”

“Where you going?”

“Alaska. I hear it’s almost warm this time of year.”

Fisher got about halfway to Dulles Airport when he realized he was being followed. It was the sort of break you couldn’t pray for, but the agent managed to contain his glee, unholstering his revolver — the two hideaways were small automatics — and putting it on his lap. He got off the highway and drove a bit farther; when he was sure he hadn’t succumbed to wishful thinking, he started hunting for a bank. Finally he spotted one on the wrong side of the highway; he veered across traffic and pulled into the ATM lane around the back.

His pursuer was obviously driving his own car, because rather than chancing the traffic he drove down the road, turned, and then came back, pulling in front as if he intended to use a teller inside. Fisher, about three vehicles from the machine, jumped out of his car, cell phone in one hand, gun in the other.

He had to dial with his finger through the trigger guard. Doar picked up on the second ring.

“Listen, Doar, this is Andy Fisher, FBI.”

“Mr. Fisher—”

“I have your murder suspect in view, parking lot of FirstWay Bank out here in Taylorville.”

“Murder suspect? Who?”

“Bonham was a Boston Red Sox nut. If he was having a bath, he would have had the TV on in the bathroom and probably been drinking a Scotch. And don’t buy the justifiable-homicide play.”

“But—”

“Gotta go.”

Fisher threw himself down maybe a half of a half of a half-second before the bullet hit the side of the bank where he’d been peering through the window toward the front. The next three shots chipped the sidewalk, sending chips ricocheting everywhere but not actually hitting him. He rolled to his feet, gun in hand, but whoever had fired at him had already retreated. Fisher scooped up his phone and gave a little wave at an old lady staring at him from her car.

Doar was gasping on the other end of the line.

“Yeah, I’m okay,” said Fisher. He walked over to the wall, looking to see if he could find a bullet. “I’m thinking the idea was more to get my attention than to hit me, but they wouldn’t have cried about that, either.”

Fisher walked over to where the gunman had fired from, stooping down to see if he could find any shells. He could hear sirens in the distance.

“Tell me why Bonham is a homicide,” said Doar.

“I told you, he didn’t have the Red Sox on in the bathroom,” Fisher told her. “I checked: They were on national TV that night until after midnight because the game went fifteen innings. I have a plate number I need you to run. You might want to tell the uniform guys about it too.”

“But—”

“Yeah, a pro wouldn’t have been so inept, so the idea is probably just to divert attention for a while. Shame, though: Nobody’s really tried to kill me in must be at least six months, and that was just my boss.”