In the Shadow of Mordor

Chapter 39

Krystal Murphy and Special Agent Ferguson grabbed a table by the window at a Starbucks on Courthouse Plaza, not far from her office. This followed an uncomfortable impromptu press conference at the crime scene. Without his parka and watch cap, the FBI agent was solidly built with a shock of unruly jet-black hair that matched the dark shadow of a beard on his jaw.

She didn’t get on well with the press, but Chief Fogerty introduced her to the gaggle of reporters as his primary investigator and the go-to person for questions. She’d had no choice but to politely say to the microphones that it was too early to speculate on what might have caused the explosion and that the Arlington police were working hand in hand with the FBI and Homeland Security.

After the scene inside the Metro Station, neither she nor Ferguson harbored any doubt about what they faced. This was no gas main explosion, no electrical malfunction; this was a terrorist suicide bombing, and it scared the hell out of her.

Random acts of terrorism by self-motivated extremists were at the top of the law enforcement’s threat list. Without forewarning about a specific individual who might be contemplating such violence, it was impossible to predict where and when an incident might take place. Heretofore, terrorism on American soil had been perpetrated almost exclusively by men. But now this unknown, apparently lone woman had blown herself and dozens of others to bits and increased the suspect pool by a hundred percent.

Ferguson stared glumly into his coffee, his thoughts as dark as the brew. “We need a starting point,” he said.

“Agree. There won’t be much, if anything, to go on until we have the forensics results, unless we get a break. What does your gut tell you?”

“My gut tells me there’s going to be hell to pay. We might not be able to confirm to the press what we suspect, or even what we may find, but the speculation is already out there, and before you know it we, the FBI, Homeland, even you cops, will be blamed for ‘missing the clues.’ Then the politicians on one side will demand scalps, and the ones on the other side will say it was only the action of a single deranged person and has nothing to do with religion. Meanwhile, people are dead and maimed, and we could be in store for more.”

“Maybe someone will claim responsibility for the bombing,” she said.

“Yeah, and maybe there’ll be fifty claims from nutcases all over the place, and we’ll have to track down every one. Like you said, Murphy, if we don’t get a break, a big juicy break, a lead we can’t see right now, we might never solve this case. Or if today’s bomber has friends, they could all blow themselves up before we find them.”

“Jeez, Ferguson, you’re just a bundle of optimism, aren’t you?”

He gave her a rueful grin. “Sorry. What we just saw isn’t exactly a confidence builder.”

“No need for apologies. But you feebies have the lead on this.”

He sighed. “Yeah, I know. We’ll start by checking the alerts and potential bad guys we have on file. Maybe something will pop from the travel lists. Leads aren’t quite so easy to come by since they clipped the NSA’s wings. Assholes!”

“The NSA?”

“No, the politicians and the gullible idiots who believe the hype, the absolute falsehoods they’ve been fed about metadata.”

“Copy that. The way I see it, you guys and the intel types are damned if you do and damned if you don’t. That’s why I like being a simple cop.”

Ferguson regarded her with what might have been envy. He gulped the dregs of his coffee and said, “I’d best get downtown. It’s going to be a long night. Can I drop you anywhere?”

She didn’t want to go to the office where she would face a barrage of questions to which she as yet had no answers. So she hid out at home in the hope that more information would be available tomorrow. She hadn’t been in the apartment long enough even to unpack before Fogerty’s phone call. Frankly, she just wanted to close her eyes and wish it would all go away.