D.C. Dead

14

The team of six men let their vehicles roll silently down the hill, nearly to the house, then they got out and trotted the last thirty yards. Todd Bacon gave them the hand signal that told them to take the positions worked out during their planning session at the motel, none of them on Teddy’s property, which Todd knew would have motion sensors.

When enough time had passed, Todd walked up the front walk at a normal pace, crouched before the front door, and used a professional lockpick to open it, then he unslung his light machine gun and spoke one word into his handheld radio: “GO!”

They came into the house from all sides, kicking doors open. One minute later, Todd spoke again on the radio. “They’re gone,” he said. He was disappointed but not terribly surprised.

“All right,” he said into the radio, “let’s take this place apart. Bag anything that might be remotely of use.”

The team went to work. Two hours later, they had three garbage bags full of what Todd knew was nearly all garbage. Still, there might be that one thing.

“All right,” he said. “I want you to pull out all stops, yank in as many bodies and phones as you can get your hands on. I want a survey of every general aviation airport-nothing is too small-that has had land today a stranger in a Cessna 182 RG with a fresh paint job, and do callbacks from a month ago to now.” Todd clapped his hands together. “Let’s get to work, people.” He got into his vehicle and drove back to the very nice motel that had been home for the past twelve days.

Todd dumped his bag in his suite, dug out his satphone, and walked out to the pool. It was too early for swimmers, but he’d have a clear view of the satellite. He punched in the number, and it rang.

“This is Holly Barker,” she said.

“It’s Todd Bacon.”

“How did it go in San Diego?” she asked.

“It went extremely well,” he replied.

“Does that mean you actually bagged Teddy?”

“No, that would have been super well. We missed him by, well, maybe as little as thirty minutes-four hours, max.”

“Poor timing, then.”

“We’ve been working flat-out. We couldn’t take him yesterday afternoon, when you got the call from the doc in San Diego. It would have caused an uproar in the neighborhood, would have been all over drive-time news. We do not want to be the talk of the town on this ~ey>e c job.”

“Certainly not,” Holly replied. “You were right to wait until the middle of the night. You must have spooked him somehow.”

“Impossible,” Todd said. “He had no idea.”

“So he’s in his airplane now, free as a bird.”

“I’m afraid so.”

“Listen, next time concentrate on finding the airplane first, then stake it out so if he runs, you’ll get him at the airport.”

“That’s a very sensible suggestion,” Todd said.

“It’s not a suggestion,” Holly said emphatically. “You should have thought of it earlier, instead of waiting for me to tell you.”

“All right, all right. I have a good team, though, and we are going to get Teddy. We’ve already started a survey of every GA airfield on the West Coast, all the way to the Canadian border.”

“Why the West Coast? I mean, apart from why not?”

“His choices were south to Mexico, north up the West Coast, or east to God-knows-where. I think he likes the West Coast, it’s a very appealing place. I can’t see Teddy disappearing into Kansas, you know? He has certain needs of a hometown-some arts, good restaurants, shopping. We mustn’t forget that he has the girl. She’s not going to rely on Walmart for her shopping.”

“I know her,” Holly said, “and your assumption is correct. She needs opportunities for style around her.”

“Well, that sounds like San Francisco or Seattle to me-how about you?”

“Either would fit the bill, or any suburb of the two places.”

“The airport is the key,” Todd said. “He has to have that to make his escape when we rumble him, and we will rumble him. How much time have I got?”

“I want a definitive, provable, but very quiet end to this well before our man’s term is up.”

“That’s eighteen months. Have we got that long?”

“Make it a year.”

“I can do it in that time,” Todd said.

“I think you can, too,” she replied, “and if you cant, there’s always that big pot of oil we keep on simmer down in the basement, waiting for your tender carcass.” She hung up.

Todd hung up, too, and then he gulped. It wouldn’t be boiling oil, he knew; it would probably be something worse.