The Devil's Teardrop

30

The agent was young enough to still be thrilled at the idea of being an FBI employee. So he didn't mind one bit that he'd been assigned the midnight-to-8 shift New Year's Eve in the Bureau's Security Center on the third floor of headquarters.

There was also the fact that Louise, the agent he was working with, wore a tight blue blouse and short black skirt and was flirting with him.

Definitely flirting, he decided.

Well, okay, she was talking about her cat. But the body language told him it was flirting. And her bra was black and visible through the blouse. Which was a message too.

The agent continued to gaze at the ten TV monitors that were his responsibility. Louise, on his left, had another ten. They were linked to more than sixty security cameras located in and around headquarters. The scenes on the monitors changed every five seconds as the cameras sequenced.

Louise of the black bra was nodding absently as he talked about his parents' place on the Chesapeake Bay. The intercom brayed.

It couldn't have been Sam or Ralph-the two agents he and Louise had replaced a half hour ago; they had total-clearance entry cards and would've just walked inside.

The agent hit the intercom button. "Yes?"

"It's Detective Hardy. District P.D."

"Who's Hardy?" the agent asked Louise.

She shrugged and went back to her monitors.

"Yes?"

The voice crackled, "I'm working with Margaret Lukas."

"Oh, on the Metro shooter case?"

"Right."

The legendary Margaret Lukas. The security agent hadn't been with the Bureau very long but even he knew that Lukas would someday be the first woman director of the FBI. The tech pushed the ENTER button, spun around to face the door.

"Can I help you?"

"I'm afraid I'm lost," Hardy said.

"Happens around here." He smiled. "Where you headed?"

"I'm trying to find the document lab. I got lost on the way to get some coffee."

"Documents? That's the seventh floor. Turn left. Can't miss it."

"Thanks."

"What's this?" Louise said suddenly. "Hey, what is this?"

The agent glanced at her as she hit a button to stop the video camera scan and pointed to one of the monitors. It showed a man lying on his back not far from where they were now, on this floor. The monitors were black and white but a large pool of what was obviously blood ran from his head.

"Oh, Christ," she muttered and reached for the phone. "It looks like Ralph."

From behind them came a soft thunk. Louise gave a sudden jerk and grunted as the front of her blouse disappeared in a mist of blood.

"Oh," she gasped. "What-?"

Another pop. The bullet struck the back of her head and she pitched forward.

The young agent turned toward the doorway, lifting his hands, crying, "No, no."

In a calm voice Hardy said, "Relax."

"Please!"

"Relax," he repeated. "I just have a few questions."

"Don't kill me. Please-"

"Now," Hardy asked matter-of-factly, "your computers're running SecureChek software?"

"I-"

"I'll let you live if you tell me everything I ask."

"Yes." He started crying. "SecureChek."

"What version?"

"Six oh."

"And if you don't log in at regular intervals a Code Forty-two goes out over the Inter-Gov System?"

"That's right… Oh, look, mister." He glanced at the body of the woman beside him, which twitched twice. Blood flowed into the control panel. "Oh, God…"

Speaking slowly, Hardy asked, "You started your shift at midnight?"

"Please, I… "

"Midnight?" he repeated, a schoolteacher coaching a child.

The agent nodded.

"What was your first log-in time?"

He was crying hard now. "Twelve twenty-one."

"When's the next time you have to log in?"

"One-oh-seven."

Hardy glanced at the clock on the wall. He nodded.

Panic in his voice, the young agent continued. "On holidays we use a pattern of increasing intervals, so after the second log-in we-"

"That's all right," Hardy reassured the agent then shot him twice in the head and pushed the button to release the door.

The man who was not Detective Len Hardy, a fictional name, but was in reality Edward Fielding made his way to the elevator.

He had until 1:07 before the automated alarm would go off.

Plenty of time.

The building was virtually deserted but still he walked the way he knew he should walk. With an aura not of urgency but of preoccupation. So if he were to run into one of the few remaining agents here they'd merely glance at his pass and, judging Fielding's demeanor, decide to let him continue on to wherever he was headed on his important business.

He inhaled deeply, took in the smells of the laboratory, the offices, the morgue. Feeling a wrenching thrill to be here-in the center of the law enforcement universe. The corridors of FBI headquarters. He remembered, a year ago, the Digger muttering insistently about going to an art museum in Hartford. Fielding had agreed and the crazed man had stood for an hour in front of a Doré illustration from the Divine Comedy: Dante and Virgil about to descend into hell. This is just what Fielding felt now-as if he were on a tour of the underworld.

As he walked through the hallways he spoke silently to his teammates. No, Agent Lukas and Parker Kincaid and Dr. John Evans… No, my motive isn't revenge for faded politics or terrorism. It's not exposing social injustice. Nor is it greed. Twenty million? Christ, I could've asked for ten times that.

No, my motive is simply perfection.

The idea of the perfect crime was a cliché, true. But Fielding had learned something interesting when he'd been studying linguistics, looking for just the right words and phrases to use in the extortion note. In an article in the American Journal of Linguistics a philologist-a language expert-had written that although serious writers are told to avoid them, clichés have value because they describe fundamental truths in universally comprehensible terms.

The perfect crime.

Fielding's holy chalice.

Perfection… It was intoxicating to him. Perfection was everything-the way he ironed his shirts and polished his shoes and trimmed his ear hairs, the way he set up his crimes, the way they were executed.

If Fielding had had an aptitude for the law he'd have been a lawyer and devoted his life to creating the perfect defenses for impossibly guilty clients. If he'd had a lust for the outdoors he'd have taught himself everything there was to learn about mountain climbing and made the perfect solo ascent to the summit of Everest.

But those activities didn't excite him.

Crime did.

This was just a fluke, he supposed, to be born utterly amoral. The way some men are bald and some cats have six toes. It was purely nature, he'd decided, not nurture. His parents were loving and dependable; dullness was their only sin. Fielding's father had been an insurance executive in Hartford, his mother a homemaker. He experienced no deprivation, no abuse. From an early age, though, he simply believed that the law didn't apply to him. It made no sense. Why, he spent hours wondering, should man put restraints on himself? Why shouldn't we go wherever our desires and minds take us?

Though it was some years before he learned it, Fielding had been born with a pure criminal personality, a textbook sociopath.

So while he studied algebra and calculus and biology at St. Mary's High School the young man also worked at his true calling.

And, as in all disciplines, that education had ups and downs.

Fielding, in juvenile detention for setting fire to the boyfriend of a girl he had a crush on (should've parked my car three or four blocks away).

Fielding, beaten nearly to death by two police officers whom he was blackmailing with photos of transvestites giving them blow jobs in their squad car (should have had a strong-arm accomplice with him).

Fielding, successfully extorting a major canned-food manufacturer by feeding their cattle an enzyme that mimicked a positive test for botulism (though he never picked up the money at the drop because he couldn't figure out how to get away with the cash undetected).

Live and learn…

College didn't interest him much. The students at Bennington had money but they left their dorm rooms open and there was no challenge in robbing them. He enjoyed occasional felonious assaults on coeds-it was challenging to rape someone in such a way that she doesn't realized she's being molested. But Fielding's lust was for the game itself, not sex, and by his junior year he was focusing on what he called "clean crimes," like robbery. Not "messy crimes," like rape. He buckled down to get his psych degree and dreamt about escaping from Ben & Jerry land and into the real world, where he could practice his craft.

Over the next ten years Fielding, back in his native Connecticut, did just that: honed and practiced. Robbery mostly. He avoided business crimes like check kiting and securities fraud because of the paper trails. He avoided drugs and hijacking because you couldn't work alone and Fielding never met anyone he trusted.

He was twenty-seven when he killed for the first time.

An opportunistic-an impulse-crime, very unlike him. He was having a cappuccino at a coffee shop in a strip mall outside of Hartford. He saw a woman come out of a jewelry store with a package. There was something about the way she walked-slightly paranoid-that suggested the package contained something very expensive.

He got into his car and followed her. On a deserted stretch of road he accelerated and pulled her over. Terrified, she thrust the bag at him and begged him to let her go.

As he stood there, beside her Chevy, Fielding realized that he hadn't worn a mask or switched plates on his car. He believed that he'd subconsciously failed to do these things because he wanted to see how he'd feel about killing. Fielding reached into the glove compartment, took out a gun and before she even had time to scream shot her twice.

He climbed back into his car, drove back to Juice 'n' Java and had another cappuccino. Ironically, he'd mused, many criminals don't kill. They're afraid to because they think they'll be more likely to be caught. In fact, if they do kill they'll be more likely to get away.

Still, police can be good and he was arrested several times. He was released in all those cases except one. In Florida he was collared for armed robbery and the evidence against him was strong. But he had a good lawyer, who got him a reduced sentence on condition that Fielding seek treatment at a mental hospital.

He was dreading the time he had to serve but it turned out to be an astonishing two years. In the Dade City Mental Health Facility, Fielding could taste crime. He could smell it. Many, if not most, of the convicts were there because their lawyers were quick with the insanity defense. Dumb crooks are in prison, smart ones are in hospitals.

After two years and an exemplary appearance before the Medical Review Panel, Fielding returned to Connecticut.

And the first thing he did was get a job as an aide at a hospital for the criminally insane in Hartford.

There he'd met a man named David Hughes, a fascinating creature. Fielding decided he'd probably been a pretty decent fellow until he stabbed his wife to death in a jealous rage on Christmas Day. The stabbing was a dime-a-dozen matter but what was so interesting, though, was what happened after hubby gave Pamela several deep puncture wounds in the lungs. She ran to the closet and found a pistol and, before she died, shot Hughes in the head.

Fielding didn't know what exactly had happened inside Hughes's cranium, neurologically speaking, but-perhaps because the aide was the first person Hughes saw when he awoke after surgery-some kind of odd bonding occurred between the two. Hughes would do whatever Fielding asked. Getting coffee, cleaning up for him, ironing shirts, cooking. It turned out that Hughes would do more than domestic chores, though-as Fielding found out one evening just after night-duty nurse Ruth Miller removed Fielding's hand from between her legs and said, "I'm reporting you, asshole."

A worried Fielding had muttered to Hughes, "That Ruth Miller. Somebody ought to kill that bitch."

And Hughes had said, "Hmmm, okay."

"What?" Fielding had asked.

"Hmmm, okay."

"You'd kill her for me?"

"Uhm. I… sure."

Fielding took him for a walk on the grounds of the hospital. They had a long talk.

A day later Hughes showed up in Fielding's cubicle, covered with blood, carrying a piece of jagged glass and asking if he could have some soup.

Fielding cleaned him up, thinking he'd been a little careless about the when and where of the murder and about getting away afterward. He decided that Hughes was too good to waste on little things like this and so he told the man how to escape from the hospital and how to make his way to a nearby cottage that Fielding rented for afternoon trysts with some of the retarded patients.

It was that night that he decided how he could best put the man to use.

Hartford, then Boston, then White Plains, then Philly. Perfect crimes.

And now he was in Washington.

Committing what was turning out to be the most perfect crime, he decided (though reflecting that a linguist like Parker Kincaid would be troubled by the unnecessary modifier).

For the last six months he'd spent nearly eighteen hours a day planning the theft. Slowly breaching FBI security-masquerading as young Detective Hardy from the police department's Research and Statistics Department. (He'd selected his particular pseudonym because studies into the psychological impressions of names reported that "Leonard" was unthreatening and "Hardy" conjured an image of a loyal comrade.) He first infiltrated the Bureaus District of Columbia field office because that office had jurisdiction over major crimes in the District. He got to know Ron Cohen, the special agent in charge, and his assistants. He learned when SAC Cohen would be on vacation and which of his underlings would be-as the currently in-vogue term went-"primary" on a case of this magnitude. That would be, of course, Margaret Lukas, whose life he invaded as inexorably as he worked his way into the Bureau itself.

He'd camp out in conference rooms, copying voluminous crime statistics for his fictional reports, then would make trips to the vending machines and restrooms, glancing at internal FBI memos and phone books and ID documentation and procedure manuals. Meanwhile at his home and at his safe house in Gravesend he was spending time cruising the Internet and learning about government facilities, police procedures and security systems (and, yes, Parker, about foreign dialects).

Fielding made hundreds of calls to interior designers who'd worked at FBI headquarters, to the GSA, to former clerks, outside contractors, security specialists, asking innocent questions, talking about phony employee reunions, arguing about imaginary invoices. He usually managed to extract one vital fact-say, about the layout of the headquarters building, the staffing on holidays, the exits and entrances. He learned the brand and general location of security cameras in headquarters. The number and stations of the guards. The communications systems.

He'd spent a month finding the perfect front man-Gilbert Havel, a bum with no criminal record and virtually no recorded past. A man naive enough to think that someone as brilliant as Fielding needed a partner. A man easy to kill.

It was arduous work. But perfection requires patience.

And then, this morning, the Digger shot the hell out of the Metro and Fielding showed up at the Bureau doorstep, eager to help but suitably indignant about being the third wheel on the investigation. Other agents would have double- or triple-checked his credentials, called police headquarters. But not Margaret Lukas, the poor childless widow. Because here was Len Hardy, soon to be a childless widower, racked with the same sorrow she'd struggled through five years ago.

Of course she accepted him into the fold without a thought.

And they'd never guessed a thing about him.

Just as he'd figured.

Because Edward Fielding knew that combating crime today is the province of the scientist. Even the psychologists who profiled the criminal mind use formulae to categorize their prey. Yet the perpetrator himself-the human being-is so often overlooked. Oh, he knew that the agents, believing the unsub to be dead, would be concentrating so hard on the extortion note, the linguistics, the handwriting, the trace evidence, and their computer programs and fancy equipment that they'd never see the real mastermind standing-literally-three feet behind them.

He now came to the elevator. The car arrived and he got inside. Fielding didn't, however, push the seventh-floor button to go to the document lab. He pushed 1B.

The car began to descend.

The FBI's evidence room is the largest forensic storage facility in the country.

It's operated around the clock and usually there's a staff of two to help the agents log in evidence and sometimes to help them carry the heavier items into the locker area or drive confiscated cars and trucks and even trailered boats into the warehouse connected to the facility.

Tonight, though, there were three agents on duty, a decision made jointly by the deputy director and Margaret Lukas. This was because of the value of a particular item of evidence sitting in the vault at the moment.

But since it was a holiday the two men and the woman were pretty casual. They were lounging around the log-in window, drinking coffee and talking about basketball. The two men had their backs to the window.

"I like Rodman," said one of the male clerks.

"Oh, puh-lease," responded the other.

"Hi," said Edward Fielding, walking up to the window.

"Hey, you hear what happened with that guy on the Mall?" the woman asked him.

"No," Fielding said and shot her in the head.

The other two died reaching for their weapons. Only one managed to get his Sig-Sauer out of the holster.

Fielding reached through the window, buzzed himself in.

He counted eight video security cameras trained on the window, shelves and vault. But they sent their images to the third-floor Security room, where there was no one left alive to see the perfect crime unfolding.

Fielding lifted the keys from the dead woman's belt and opened the vault. It was a large room, about twenty by thirty, and was where agents stored drugs and cash taken from heists. In his months of research for the robbery Fielding had learned that prosecutors are obligated to present to the jury the actual cash seized during, say, a drug bust or kidnapping. This was one reason the agents would have brought the ransom money here. The other was something else he'd anticipated-that Mayor Kennedy, whom Fielding had psychologically profiled, would want to keep the cash available in case the Digger contacted him and demanded the ransom after all.

And here it was, the money.

Perfect…

Two huge, green canvas satchels. A red tag dangled from each strap. FEDERAL EVIDENCE. DO NOT REMOVE.

He looked at his watch. He estimated that he'd have twenty minutes before Cage and Kincaid and the other agents returned from the Mall after their shoot-out with the Digger.

Plenty of time. As long as he moved quickly.

Fielding unzipped one bag-it wasn't locked-and dumped the cash on the floor. The satchel was wired with several homing devices, as he'd known it would be. The money wrappers too, he'd learned from Tobe Geller-a trick he hadn't anticipated. He wondered if individual bills themselves had been rigged somehow. He doubted it; Geller had never said anything. Still, to make sure, Fielding reached into his pocket and took out a small silver instrument-a Trans-detect, a scanner that could sense the faintest transmission signal of any wavelength, from visual light to infrared to radio waves. He ran this over the pile of cash, just in case the Bureau techs had managed to insert a transmitter into a bill itself. But there were no signals.

Fielding tossed aside the sensor-he had no need for it any longer-and pulled a silk backpack from under his shirt. It was made of parachute material and he'd sewn it himself. He began to pack the money into the bag.

He'd asked for $20,000,000 because that was a credible amount for a scheme like this and also to give some credence to the motive of revenge for a significant event like the Vietnamese War. Fielding, however, would only be able to carry $4,000,000-which would weigh seventy-two pounds. Generally unathletic, he'd worked out at a health club in Bethesda, Maryland, for six weeks after he'd come to the area so that he'd be strong enough to carry the cash.

The hundred-dollar bills were all traceable of course (tracing money was easy now thanks to scanners and computers). But Fielding had considered that. In Brazil, where he would be in several days, the $4,000,000 in traceable cash would become $3,200,000 in gold. Which would in turn become $3,200,000 in untraceable U.S. dollars and eurodollars.

And over the next few years it would easily grow to $4,000,000 once again and then beyond, the mutual fund industry and interest rates willing.

Fielding had no regrets about leaving the rest of the money. Crime can't be about greed; it must be about craft.

He packed the cash into the bag and slung it over his shoulder.

Stepping into the corridor, staggering under the weight, working his way to the elevator.

Thinking: He'd have to kill the guard at the front door, as well as anyone in the team who was still here. Tobe Geller, he thought, had gone home. But Lukas was still in the building. She definitely would have to die. Under other circumstances killing her wouldn't matter-he'd been very careful about hiding his identity and where he really lived. But the agents were much better than he'd anticipated. My God, they'd actually found the safe house in Gravesend… That had shaken Fielding badly. He never thought they'd manage that. Fortunately Gilbert Havel had been to the safe house a number of times so neighbors would see Havel's picture when the police were doing their canvassing and assume he was the man who'd rented the place-reinforcing the agents' belief that he was the mastermind of the crime.

And nearly finding that the Ritzy Lady was the site of the second attack… He'd sat in the document lab in horror as the computer had assembled the fragments from the note at the safe house. He'd waited for just the right moment and blurted out, "Ritz! Maybe the Ritz-Carlton?" And as soon as they'd heard that, the solution was set in stone. It would be almost impossible for them to think of any other possibilities.

That's how puzzle solving works, right, Parker?

And what about him?

Oh, he was far too smart, far too much of a risk to remain alive.

As he walked slowly down the deserted corridors he reflected that, while Fielding was the perfect criminal, Kincaid was the perfect detective.

What happens when perfect opposites meet?

But this was a rhetorical question, not a puzzle, and he didn't waste time trying to answer it. He came to the elevator and pushed the UP button.

31

Margaret Lukas swung open the door to the document lab.

She looked inside. "Hello? Dr. Evans?"

He didn't answer.

Where was he? she wondered.

She paused at the examination table, looked down at the extortion note.

The end is night…

Thinking: Maybe Parker Kincaid wasn't quite correct when he'd said that no one would make this kind of mistake.

In a way the end is night. Darkness and sleep and peace.

Night, take me. Darkness, take me…

That's what she'd thought when she'd gotten the call from her mother-in-law about the crash that killed Tom and Joey. Lying in bed that windy November night, or two nights later or three-it was all a jumble now-lying by herself, unable to breathe, unable to cry.

Thinking: Night, take me. Night, take me, please. Night, take me…

Lukas now stood hunched over the document examining table, gazing down, her short blond strands falling forward past her eyes, like a horses blinders. Staring at the words of the extortion note, the swirls of the sloppy letters. Lukas remembered watching Kincaid as he'd studied the note, his lips moving faintly, as if he were interviewing a living suspect.

The end is night…

Shaking her head at her own morbidly philosophical mood, she turned and left the lab.

She walked to the elevator. Maybe Evans was waiting at the guard station. She looked absently at the indicator lights as the elevator ascended.

The hallways were deserted and she was aware of the small noises of empty buildings at night. The field office, where she worked, was located near City Hall, some blocks away, and she didn't get here very often. She didn't like headquarters very much. It was too big. And tonight, she reflected, the place was dark and spooky. And it took a lot to make Margaret Lukas spooked. She remembered Kincaid projecting the extortion note onto a screen in the lab and she'd thought: It looks like a ghost.

Lukas sensed more ghosts now. Here in these corridors. Ghosts of agents killed in the line of duty. Ghosts of victims of the crimes that were investigated here.

And her own personal ghosts? she thought. Oh, but they were with her all the time. Her husband and son. They never left. Nor did she want them to. The changeling needed something to remind her of Jackie Lukas.

She glanced down at the floor in front of the elevator. There was a dark stain on the floor. What was it? She smelled sour coffee.

The elevator light flashed and a chime sounded. The door opened. Someone stepped out.

"Oh, hi," Lukas said. "Got some news for you."

"Hey, Margaret," said Susan Nance, juggling a dozen files. "What's up?"

"They just tagged him. Got him on the Mall."

"The Metro killer?"

"Yep."

The woman gave a thumbs-up. "Excellent. Oh, Happy New Year."

"Same to you."

Lukas got on the elevator and descended to the main floor.

At the employee entrance guard station Artie looked up at her and nodded a pleasant greeting.

"Did that Dr. Evans sign out?" she asked him.

"Nope. Haven't seen him."

She'd wait for him here. Lukas sat in one of the comfortable lobby chairs. Sank down into it. She felt exhausted. She wanted to get home. She knew people said behind her back how sad it must be-a woman living alone. But it wasn't sad at all. Returning to the womb of the house was a hell of a lot better than sitting at a bar with girlfriends or going out on a date with the endless fodder of eligible-and dull-men in Washington.

Home…

Thinking about the report she'd have to write about METSHOOT

Thinking about Parker Kincaid.

Focus, she told herself.

Then she remembered that she didn't have to focus anymore.

What about him? Well, he wanted to ask her out. She knew he did.

But she'd already decided to say no. He was a handsome, energetic man, filled with the love of children and domestic life. How appealing that seemed. But, no, she couldn't inflict on him the sorrow that she believed she radiated like toxic fumes.

Maybe Jackie Lukas might have had a chance with a man like Kincaid. But a changeling like Margaret never would.

Artie looked up from his paper. "Oh, forgot to say-Happy New Year, Agent Lukas."

"Happy New Year, Artie."

As the Digger smouldered with a foul reek and the fire department spurted foam onto the scorched cherry trees as the crowds circled the burnt-out bus, Parker and Cage stood together.

The Digger's gone. So long.

Verses from Dr. Seuss trooped through his mind like some of the author's bizarre creatures.

Parker blamed his mania on a cocktail of exhaustion and adrenaline.

He called the Whos and promised them he'd be home in a half hour. Robby told his father about the air horn someone had blasted at midnight, waking up the Bradleys down the street and causing a neighborhood stir. Stephie described the sparklers in the yard with breathless, sloppy adjectives.

"Love you, Who," he said. "Be home soon."

"Love you too, Daddy," the girl said. "How's your friend?"

"He's going to be fine."

Cage was talking to an evidence tech from PERT and Parker was jockeying to get downwind of the smoke from the bus. There was an unpleasant scent-worse than the burnt rubber of the tires. Parker knew what it was and the thought of inhaling any of the Digger's ashy corpse nauseated him.

A dead psycho smouldering before him, and Parker, at the tail end of an evening like none other he'd ever had… Yet it's the mundane things in life that poke up like crocuses. He now thought: Hell, I don't have enough cash to pay Mrs. Cavanaugh. He patted his pockets and dug out a small wad of bills. Twenty-two bucks. Not enough. He'd have to stop at an ATM on the way home.

He glanced at a piece of paper mixed in with the money. It was the transcription of the unsub's notes on the burnt yellow pad. The references to the last two sites of the attacks that he'd found on the pad of paper Tobe Geller had saved from the burning safe house.

… two miles south. The R…

… place I showed you. The black…

"What's that?" Cage asked, kneading his wounded rib.

"A souvenir," Parker said, looking down at the words. "Just a souvenir."

Edward Fielding paused at the end of the corridor, gasping under the weight of the money on his back.

He looked toward the reception area thirty feet away and saw the short blond hair of Margaret Lukas. Beyond her was the guard, reading the newspaper. The lights were out in the corridor and even if they'd turned toward him it would have been difficult to see him clearly.

Adjusting the money more comfortably, he clutched the pistol in his right hand and started down the hallway. His leather soles tapping faintly on the tile. He noted that Lukas was facing away from him. He'd put one bullet in her head. Then as the guard looked up, he'd kill him.

Then home free.

Tap tap tap.

He closed the distance to his targets.

Perfect.

32

Margaret Lukas, gazing at the Christmas tree in the lobby, stretched like a cat.

She listened absently to footsteps coming up the hall behind her.

Two weeks ago the entryway here had been filled with presents that the agents and staffers had donated for homeless families. She'd volunteered to give away some of the toys but at the last minute she canceled and, instead, worked twelve hours on Christmas day, investigating the killing of a black man by two whites.

Tap, tap, tap…

Now she wished she hadn't canceled on Christmas. At the time she'd reasoned that giving out toys was frivolous when she could be doing "serious" work. But now she admitted that the thought of seeing small children on the holiday was more harrowing to her than kicking in the door of a redneck gun nut in Manassas Park.

Coward, she told herself.

Tap, tap, tap…

She looked out the glass windows. Crowds, people returning from the Mall. She thought about the Digger. Wondered about the shoot-out, about who'd fired the shots that killed him. She'd been in two firefights in her career and remembered mostly confusion. It was so different from in the movies. Never any sense of slow motion-a gunfight in real life was five blurry seconds of utterly terrifying chaos and then it was over with.

The vivid images came afterward: caring for the wounded and removing the dead.

Tap… tap…

A buzzing phone startled her.

In front of her Artie answered and she absently watched his grizzled face.

"Front desk… Oh, hello, Agent Cage."

Suddenly the guard was frowning. He glanced at Lukas then focused past her. His eyes went wide. "Well," the guard said uneasily. "Detective Hardy?… He's who? What do you mean?… But he's right here, he's-Oh, Jesus."

Artie was dropping the phone, fumbling for his weapon.

Tap tap taptaptaptap…

Instinctively Lukas knew that the footsteps, now running toward them, were an attackers. She fell forward just as the rounds from the silenced pistol snapped into the back of the couch where she'd been sitting, ripping Naugahyde and bits of stuffing from the upholstery.

She looked behind her, twisting around, scrabbling for cover behind a potted plant.

It was… Wait, it couldn't be! It was Hardy.

Firing wildly, Artie shouted, "It's him! He's the killer. He… Oh, my. Oh, no…" The guard looked down at his chest. He'd been hit. He slumped to his knees, fell behind the desk.

Another bullet snapped through the back of the couch, near Lukas's head. She curled for cover behind the anemic palm tree so many agents had ridiculed. She cringed as a bullet was loudly deflected by the chrome pot.

Lukas was on automatic. She didn't even try to figure out what had happened or who this man really was. She looked up quickly, searching for a target. But she had to duck fast as another bullet chopped though the thick green blades of leaf inches from her face. She rolled to her left, against the wall, rose and drew a target. In a portion of a second she checked the backdrop behind Hardy and fired three fast shots.

The heavy 10-millimeter slugs just missed him and dug huge chunks out of the wall. Hardy fired twice more at her then vanished back down the corridor.

She ran to the wall beside the hallway, pressed her back against it.

The tapping footsteps receded.

Another voice from the far end of the corridor called, "What's going on? What's going on!"

Somewhere along the hallway a door slammed.

Lukas looked around the corner quickly then went back to cover. She'd seen a man down at the end of the hall, in silhouette. She dropped to her belly, drew a target, shouted, "I'm a federal agent! Identify yourself or I'll fire!"

"Ted Yan," the man called. "In Software Analysis."

Lukas knew him. He was a friend of Gellers, an agent. But she thought: Great, I've got a computer nerd for backup.

"You alone?" she shouted.

"I'm-"

Silence.

"Ted?"

"No. There're two of us… Susan Nance is here with me."

Nance's voice cracked as she called, "Oh, Margaret, he got Louise in Security! She's dead. And Tony Phelps too."

Jesus. What was going on?

Ted said, "We're by the-"

"Okay, quiet," Lukas barked. "Don't give away your position. Did anybody go past you?"

"No," Ted called. "He couldn't've gotten by me. I heard a door slam in the hallway here. He's somewhere between us."

"Cover me," Lukas called.

Watching her back, Lukas ran to the guard station. Artie was unconscious but wasn't bleeding badly. She picked up the phone but Cage was no longer on the line. She hit 911, identified herself as a Justice Department agent and called in a Code 42 at FBI headquarters.

To her knowledge nobody'd ever done this, not in the entire history of the Bureau. It meant an assault on headquarters. It had become a joke over the years-when somebody 42'd, it meant they'd totally screwed up.

"You armed?" Lukas called.

"Service," Ted called. "Both of us."

Meaning their Glocks or Sig-Sauer service pistols. Lukas thought about her MP-5 machine gun, sitting in her truck at the moment. She would have given anything for the weapon but didn't have time to get it now.

She studied the corridor, which was still empty.

Eight doors in the hallway. Five on the right, three on the left.

He's behind one of them.

Here's a puzzle for you, Parker. Which door leads to our Judas?

Three hawks have been killing a farmer's chickens…

Holding the gun out in front of her, she eased forward, saw the silhouettes of the other agents at the far end of the corridor. Using hand signals, she motioned them aside, back around the corner. If Hardy burst from a doorway she'd have trouble acquiring a target with Ted and Nance in the background. They'd have the same trouble too and might hesitate to light up Hardy for fear of hitting her. Alone, she'd lose the cross-fire advantage but could shoot freely if he tried to make a run for it.

Lukas moved down the corridor.

Which door? she wondered.

Think… Come on! Think!

If Hardy had any sense of orientation he'd know that the five offices on her right were exterior ones; he wouldn't've picked any on the left because he'd risk getting trapped inside the building.

Okay, we'll narrow it down to those on the right.

Of these five, two were labeled RECEPTION-the euphemism for the interrogation rooms like the one in which they'd met with Czisman. Hardy might logically doubt that the FBI would have reception rooms and he might figure that they had something to do with security and would have no access to outside-which in fact they didn't; they were windowless.

The door in the middle was labeled MAINTENANCE. Lukas didn't know exactly where that one led but she supposed it was a janitor's closet with no other exit and concluded that Hardy would have made the same deduction.

That left two doors. Both unmarked and both, she happened to know, leading to small offices for temporary word-processor operators. Both rooms had windows facing the street. One was the office closest to the reception area. The other was closest to Ted and Nance.

But what's the hurry? she asked herself. Just wait for backup.

Yet Hardy could be trying to break out one of the windows right now, close to escaping. Lukas wouldn't risk that this man might get away.

Which door, which one?

She made her choice: The door nearest the lobby. It made sense. Hardy wouldn't have run thirty or forty feet down the corridor with an armed agent behind him before taking cover.

Once she made her decision she forgot all other options.

Puzzles are always easy when you know the answer. Just like life, right?

She tried the knob. But the door was locked.

Were they always locked? she wondered. Or had he locked it from the inside?

No, he'd locked it. He had to be in there. Where else could he have gone? She ran to the guard station, got the keys from Artie's belt, returned. She slipped the key in the hole as quietly as she could.

Turned the latch.

It clicked with an alarming sound.

Hell. May as well just shout out, Here I come!

One, two…

Breathe deep.

She thought about her husband, about her son.

I love you mommy!

And pushed through the door fast.

Crouching, weapon up, pressure on the sharp trigger of the Glock…

Nothing…

He wasn't here.

Wait… the desk… It was the only piece of furniture he could be hiding behind.

She stepped around it, swinging her weapon in front of her.

Nothing.

Hell, she'd gotten it wrong. He'd gone through the other door, the far one.

Then, from the corner of her eye, faint motion.

The door directly across the hallway from this one-another door marked MAINTENANCE-had opened slightly. The muzzle of a silenced gun was lowering toward her.

"Margaret!" Susan Nances voice came from the end of the corridor. Then the woman shouted, "Freeze, you!"

Lukas flung herself to the floor as Hardy's gun fired twice.

But he wasn't aiming at her. The bullets were meant for the plate-glass window. The glass shattered into a thousand pieces.

Nance fired a group of three as Hardy, who ran awkwardly because of a large knapsack on his back, stumbled through the corridor and into the office where Lukas crouched. The agent's shots missed. He fired blindly in Lukas's direction, forcing her under cover. She rolled to the floor. The slugs clanged into the desk and Hardy leapt through the empty window frame onto the deck overlooking Ninth Street. He jumped over the fence to street level. Lukas returned fire but she missed too.

She climbed to her feet and ran to the window.

Lukas understood what had happened: Hardy had tried the door on the window side of the building and found it locked. He'd waited in a janitor's closet across the hall, outguessing her-figuring she'd probably pick the door she did and get the key to open it. He'd used her.

She'd been dead wrong.

He aims at the hawk on the left and shoots and kills it…

Standing on the crisp broken glass on the deck, she looked up and down the street but could see no sign of Hardy.

The bullet doesn't ricochet…

All she saw was a huge crowd of people returning from the fireworks, staring in surprise at the shattered window that framed the attractive blonde with a gun in her hand.

How many hawks are left on the roof?…

33

Parker and Cage were in the document lab once more. Joined this time by the dep director.

"Six dead," the director muttered. "Lord almighty. Inside headquarters."

Dr. John Evans, shot twice in the face, had been found in a seventh-floor closet. Artie the guard was badly wounded but would live.

"Who the hell is he?" the director demanded.

The man pretending to be Hardy had left some good fingerprints and they were being run through the Automated Fingerprint Identification System files right now. If his prints were on file anywhere in the country they'd know his identity soon.

Lukas pushed through the door. Parker was alarmed to see a peppering of blood on her cheek.

"You all right?" he asked.

"Artie's," she said in a low murmur, noticing his eyes on the blood. "Not mine." She looked at Parker then Cage for a moment. The stones in her eyes were gone but he couldn't tell what had replaced them. "How did you know?"

Cage glanced toward Parker. "It was him figured it out."

"Tremble," Parker answered. He held out the sheet of paper that he'd found in his pocket when he'd been looking for baby-sitter money. "I noticed there was tremble in his handwriting. That's what happens when somebody tries to disguise their writing. I remembered it was Hardy who'd written down what I dictated but why would he try to fake his writing? There was only one reason-because he'd written the extortion note. I checked the lowercase i in 'two miles' and the dot was a devil's teardrop. That confirmed it."

"What happened?" the deputy director asked. "The director wants to know. Immediately."

"It was all a setup," Parker said, pacing. Somewhere in his mind the entire plot was quickly falling into place in minute detail. He asked Lukas, "How did Hardy get involved in the case?"

"I knew him," she said. "He's been coming by the field office for the past few months. Just flashed a badge and said he needed some stats on felonies in the District for a congressional report. District P.D.'s Research and Statistics does it a couple times a year. It's all public information-not ongoing investigations-so nobody bothered to check. Today he showed up and said he's been assigned as liaison for the case."

"And it's one of those obscure departments," Parker pointed out. "So that if the mayor or the police chief really did send somebody from Major Crimes or Investigation over here for liaison he probably wouldn't have known there was no Len Hardy."

Lukas said, "So he's been planning this for two months." Sighing in disgust.

"Probably six," Parker muttered. "Planned every detail. He was a goddamn perfectionist. His shoes, his nails, his clothes… Flawless."

Cage asked, "But the guy in the morgue, the one we thought was the unsub. Who's he?"

Parker said, "A runner. Somebody Hardy-or whatever his name is-hired to deliver the letter."

"But," Cage said, "he was killed in an accident."

"No, it wasn't an accident," Lukas said, stealing the words from Parker's throat.

Nodding, he said, "Hardy murdered him, ran him down in a stolen truck to make it look accidental."

Lukas continued, "So we'd think the perp was dead and bring the money back to the evidence room. He knew we'd have tracking devices in the bags. Or that we'd try to collar him at the drop."

Cage, wincing again from the cracked rib, said, "He left the transmit bags downstairs. Repacked the money. And ripped off the tracking labels too."

"But he came up with the info about the Digger, didn't he?" the deputy director asked. "Because of him we stopped the shooter before he could do any real damage on the Mall."

"Well, of course," Parker responded, surprised they didn't get it.

"What do you mean?" the dep director asked.

"That's why he picked the Vietnam Memorial. It's not far from here. He knew we'd be shorthanded and that we'd virtually empty the building to get everybody out, looking for the Digger."

"So he could just waltz into Evidence and pick up the money," Lukas said bitterly. "It's just what Evans said. That he had everything planned out. I told him that we'd rigged the bags with tracers but Evans said he had some plan to counter that."

Cage asked Parker, "The prints on the note?"

"Hardy never touched it without gloves but he made sure the runner did-so we could verify the body was the unsub's."

"And he picked somebody with no record and no military service," Lukas added, "so we couldn't trace the runner… Jesus, he thought of everything."

A computer beeped. Cage leaned forward and read. "It's an AFIS report and VICAP and Connecticut State Police files. Here we go…" He scrolled through the information. A picture came up on the screen. It was Hardy. "His real name is Edward Fielding, last known address, Blakesly, Connecticut, outside of Hartford. Oh, our friend is not a very nice man. Four arrests, one conviction. Juvie time too but those records're sealed. Treated repeatedly for antisocial behavior. Was an aide and orderly at Hartford State Hospital for the Criminally Insane. He left after a nurse he was accused of sexually harassing was found stabbed to death.

"The hospital administration," Cage continued, reading from the screen, "thinks Fielding talked a patient, David Hughes, into killing her. Hughes was admitted two years ago. Christmas Day. He had severe brain damage following a gunshot wound and was highly suggestible. Fielding probably helped Hughes escape. The Hospital Board and the police were going to investigate Fielding but he disappeared after that. That was in October of last year."

"Hughes is the Digger," Parker announced softly.

"You think?"

"Positive." He continued, "And the Hartford newspaper shooting-what got Czisman started on Fielding's trail-that was in November." Recalling the clipping in Czisman's book. "That was their first crime."

A Chronicle of Sorrow…

"But why so much death?" the dep director asked. "It can't just be for the money. He must've had some terrorist leanings."

"Nope," Parker said definitively. "Not terrorism at all. But you're absolutely right. It has nothing to do with the money. Oh, I recognize him."

"You know Fielding?"

"No, I mean I recognize the type. He's like a document forger."

"Forger?" asked Lukas.

"Serious forgers see themselves as artists, not thieves. They don't really care about the money. The point is to create a forgery that fools everyone. That's their only goal: a perfect forgery."

Lukas nodded. "So the other crimes-in Hartford and Boston and Philly-they were just exercises. Stealing one watch, a few thousand dollars. It was just to perfect his technique."

"Exactly. And this was the culmination. This time he got a big chunk of money and's going to retire."

"Why do you think that?" Cage asked.

But Lukas knew the answer to that one too. "Because he sacrificed his errand boy so he could escape. He told us where the Digger was."

Recalling how Hardy had fired at the bus, Parker added, "He may actually have been the one who shot the Digger on the Mall. If they took him alive he might have talked."

"Hardy was laughing at us," Cage said, slamming his fist down on the table. "The whole fucking time he was sitting right next to us and laughing."

"But where is he?" the dep director asked.

Parker said, "Oh, he'll have his escape all planned out. He's outthought us every step of the way. He won't stumble now."

"We can get his picture off the video camera down in the lobby," Cage said. "Get it to all the TV stations."

"At two in the morning?" Parker said. "Who's going to be watching? And we've already missed the newspaper deadlines. Anyway, he'll be out of the country by sunup and on a plastic surgeon's operating table in two days."

"The airports're closed," the dep director pointed out. "He can't get any flights till morning."

"He'll be driving to Louisville or Atlanta or New York," Lukas said. "But well put out a bulletin to the field offices. Get agents to all the airports, Amtrak stations and bus terminals. Rental-car companies too. Check DMV and deeds offices for an address. And call Connecticut State Police." She paused, looking at Parker. He could see that she was thinking exactly what he was.

"He's thought of all that," Parker said. "I'm not saying we don't have to do it. But he's anticipated it."

"I know," she said and seemed all the more angry because of her helplessness.

The dep director said, "I'll authorize ten-most-wanted status."

But Parker wasn't listening. He was staring at the extortion note.

"Perfect forgery," he whispered to himself.

"What?" Lukas asked.

He looked at his watch. "I'm going to go see somebody."

"I'm going with you," Lukas said.

Parker hesitated. "Better if you didn't."

"No, I'm going."

"I don't need any help."

"I'm going with you," she said firmly.

And Parker looked into her blue eyes-stone or no stone?

He couldn't tell.

He said, "Okay."

They drove through the streets of the District, mostly deserted now. Parker was at the wheel.

A car paused at an intersection, to their right. In the glare Parker caught Lukas's profile, her thin mouth, her rounded nose, her sweep of throat.

He turned back to the street and drove deeper into Alexandria, Virginia.

Maybe she envies you.

How much he wanted to take her hand, sit with her in a bar or on his couch at home. Or lie in bed with her.

And talk. Talk about anything.

Perhaps about the secret of Margaret Lukas, whatever that might be.

Or just do what he and the Whos did sometimes-talk about nothing. Talk silly, they called it. About cartoons or neighbors or the Home Depot sale or recipes or vacations past and vacations planned.

Or maybe he and Lukas would share the war stories that cops-federal or state or crossing guards-loved to relive.

The secret could wait.

She'd have years to tell him, he thought.

Years…

Suddenly he realized that he was considering a connection with her that might last more than a single night or a week or month. What did he have to base this fantasy on? Nothing really. It was a ridiculous thought.

Whatever connection there might be between them-she the soldier, he the hausfrau-was pure illusion.

Or was it? He remembered the Whos in the Dr. Seuss book, the race of creatures living on a dust mote, so small no one could see them. But they were there nonetheless, with all their crazy grins and contraptions and bizarre architecture. Why couldn't love be found in something that seemed invisible too?

He looked at her once again and she at him. He found his hand reaching out tentatively and touching her knee. Her hand closed on his, nothing tentative about it.

Then they were at the address he sought. He removed his hand. He parked the car. Not a word said. Not a look between them.

Lukas climbed out. Parker too. He walked around to her side of the car and they stood facing each other. How badly he wanted to hold her. Put his arms around her, slip his hands into the small of her back, pull her close. She glanced at him and slowly unbuttoned her blazer. He caught a glimpse of the white silk blouse. He stepped forward to kiss her.

She glanced down, unholstered her weapon and buttoned her blazer once more. Squinted as she looked past him, checking out the neighborhood.

Oh. Parker stepped back.

"Where to?" she asked matter-of-factly.

Parker hesitated, looked at her cool eyes. Then nodded at a winding path that led into an alley. "This way."

The man was about five feet tall.

He had a wiry beard and bushy hair. He wore a ratty bathrobe and Parker had obviously wakened him when he banged fiercely on the rickety door.

He stared at Parker and Lukas for a moment then, without a word, retreated quickly back into the apartment, as if he'd been tugged back by a bungee cord.

Lukas preceded Parker inside. She looked around then holstered her weapon. The rooms were cluttered, filled to overflowing with books and furniture and papers. On the walls hung a hundred signed letters and scraps of historical documents. A dozen bookshelves were chockablock with more books and portfolios. An artists drawing table was covered with bottles of ink and dozens of pens. It dominated the tiny living room.

"How you doing, Jeremy?"

The man rubbed his eyes. Glanced at an old-fashioned windup alarm clock. He said, "My, Parker. It's late. Say, look at what I've got here. Do you like it?"

Parker took the acetate folder Jeremy was holding up.

The man's fingertips were yellow from the cigarettes he loved. Parker recalled that he smoked only outside, however. He didn't want to risk contaminating his work. As with all true geniuses Jeremy's vices bent to his gift.

Parker took the folder and held it up to a light. Picked up a hand glass and examined the document inside. After a moment he said, "The width of the strokes… it's very good."

"Better than good, Parker."

"Okay, I'll grant you that. The starts and lifts are excellent. Also looks like the margins are right and the folio size matches. The papers from the era?"

"Of course."

"But you'd have to fake the aging of the ink with hydrogen peroxide. That's detectable."

"Maybe. Maybe not." Jeremy smiled. "Maybe I've got something new up my sleeve. Are you here to arrest me, Parker?"

"I'm not a cop anymore, Jeremy."

"No, but she is, isn't she?"

"Yes, she is."

Jeremy took the sheet back. "I haven't sold it. I haven't even offered it for sale." To Lukas he said, "It's just a hobby. A man can have a hobby, can't he?"

"What is it?" Lukas asked.

Parker said, "It's a letter from Robert E. Lee to one of his generals." He added, "I should say, purporting to be from Robert E. Lee."

"He forged it?" Lukas asked, glancing at Jeremy.

"That's right."

"I never admitted anything. I'm taking the Fifth."

Parker continued. "It's worth maybe fifteen thousand."

"Seventeen… If somebody were going to sell it. Which I never would. Parker arrested me once," Jeremy said to Lukas, tweaking his beard with his middle finger and thumb. "He was the only one in the world who caught me. You know how he did it?"

"How?" she asked. Parker's attention was not on the excellent forgery but on Margaret Lukas, who seemed both amused and fascinated by the man. Her anger had gone away for the moment and Parker was very pleased to see that.

"The watermark on the letterhead," Jeremy said, scoffing. "I got done in by a watermark."

"A few years ago," Parker said, "Jeremy… let's say, came into possession of a packet of letters from John Kennedy."

"To Marilyn Monroe?" Lukas asked.

Jeremy's face twisted up. "Those? Oh, those were ridiculous. Amateurish. And who cares about them? No, these were between Kennedy and Khrushchev. According to the letters, Kennedy was willing to compromise on Cuba. What an interesting historical twist that would have been. He and Khrushchev were going to divvy up the island. The Russians would have one half, the U.S. the other."

"Was that true?" Lukas asked.

Jeremy was silent and stared at the Robert E. Lee letter with a faint smile on his face.

Parker said, "Jeremy makes up things." Which happened to be the delicate way he described lying when he was speaking with the Whos. "He forged the letters. Was going to sell them for five thousand dollars."

"Four thousand eight hundred," Jeremy corrected.

"That's all?" Lukas was surprised.

"Jeremy isn't in this business for the money," Parker said.

"And you caught him?"

"My technique was flawless, Parker, you have to admit that."

"Oh, it was," Parker confirmed. "The craftsmanship was perfect. Ink, handwriting attack, starts and lifts, phraseology, margins… Unfortunately, the Government Printing Office changed the presidential letterhead in August of 1963. Jeremy got his hands on several of those new sheets and used them for his forgeries. Too bad the letters were dated May of '63."

"I had bad intelligence," Jeremy muttered. "So, Parker, is it cuffs and chains? What've I done now?"

"Oh, I think you know what you've done, Jeremy. I think you know."

Parker pulled up a chair for Lukas and one for himself. They both sat.

"Oh, dear," Jeremy said.

"Oh, dear," echoed Parker.

34

Finally, it was snowing.

Large squares of flakes parachuting to the ground. Two inches already, muting the night.

Edward Fielding, lugging the burdensome silk bag of money on his back and carrying a silenced pistol in his right hand, waded through a belt of trees and brush in Bethesda, Maryland. From FBI headquarters he'd driven here via two "switch wheels"-getaway cars that professional thieves hide along escape routes to trick pursuers. He'd stayed on major highways the whole way, keeping exactly to the speed limit. He parked on the other side of this grove of trees and walked the rest of the way. The money slowed him down but he certainly wasn't going to leave the cash in the car, despite the relative safety in this placid, upscale Washington suburb.

He eased through the side yard and paused by a fence separating his rented house from the one next door.

On the street, every car was familiar.

Inside his house, no movement or shadows he didn't recognize.

Across the street, the lights in all the houses facing his were dark except for the Harkins' place. This was normal. Fielding had observed that the Harkins rarely went to bed before 2 or 3 A.M.

He set the knapsack holding the money beside a tree on the property next door to his house. And stood upright, letting his muscles enjoy the freedom from the heavy load. He moved along the fence, checking out the ground in the front, back and side yards around his house. No footprints in the snow there or on the sidewalk in front of the houses.

Fielding picked up the money once again and continued along the walk to his house. There were several security devices he'd rigged to let him know if there'd been any unwanted visitors-homemade tricks, rudimentary but effective: thread across the gate, the front door latch lined up with a tiny fleck of dried paint on the storm door, the corner of the rattan mat curled and resting against the door.

He'd learned these from a right-wing Web site on the Internet about protecting yourself from blacks, Jews and the federal government. Despite the snow, which would have revealed any intruders, he checked them carefully. Because that was what you did when you committed the perfect crime.

He unlocked the door, thinking of his next steps. He'd only be here for five or ten minutes-long enough to pack the money into boxes that had contained children's toys, collect his other suitcases then drive, via three safe cars already planted along the route, to Ocean City, Maryland. There he'd get on the chartered boat and be in Miami in two days. Then a chartered plane would take him to Costa Rica and that night he'd fly on to Brazil.

Then he'd-

He wasn't sure where she'd been hiding. Maybe behind the door. Maybe in the closet. Before Fielding even had time to feel the shock of adrenaline flooding through his body the pistol had been ripped from his hand and Margaret Lukas was screaming, "Freeze, freeze, federal agents!"

Fielding found himself not freezing at all but tumbling forward and lying flat on his belly, under her strong grip. Gun in his ear. The cash was pulled off him and his hands were cuffed by two large male agents. Fingers probed through his pockets.

They pulled him to his feet and pushed him into an armchair.

Cage and several other men and women walked through the front door, while yet another agent inventoried the money.

He had a completely mystified expression on his face. She said, "Oh, those trip wires and things? You do realize we bookmark the same Web site as everybody else-that Aryan militia crap."

"But the snow?" he asked. Shivering now from the shock. "There were no footprints. How'd you get in?"

"Oh, we borrowed a hook and ladder from the Bethesda Fire Department. The SWAT team and I climbed in through your upstairs window."

Just then Parker Kincaid walked through the front door. Lukas nodded toward him and explained to Fielding, "The fire truck was his idea."

Fielding didn't doubt that it was.

Parker sat down in a chair opposite Fielding and crossed his arms. The detective-Parker couldn't help but think of him that way still-looked older now and diminished. Parker remembered wishing earlier that the unsub were still alive so that he could see how the man's mind worked. One puzzle master to another. It seemed he'd gotten his wish. But now he felt no professional curiosity at all, only revulsion.

Puzzles are always easy when you know the answer.

They become boring too.

Lukas asked him, "How's it feel to know you're going to be in an eight-by-eight cell for the next ten years-until they give you that needle?"

Cage explained, "You wouldn't last very long in general population. Hope you like your own company."

"I prefer it to most people's," Fielding said.

Cage continued, as if Fielding hadn't spoken. "They're also going to want you in Boston and White Plains and Philadelphia too. I guess Hartford as well."

Fielding lifted a surprised eyebrow.

Parker asked, "The Digger was the patient in your hospital, right? The hospital for the criminally insane? David Hughes?"

Fielding didn't want to seem impressed but he was. "That's right. Funny guy, wasn't he?" He smiled at Parker. "Sort of the boogeyman incarnate."

Then Parker suddenly understood something else and his heart froze.

Boogeyman…

"In the command post… I was talking about my son. And not long after that… Jesus, not long after that Robby saw somebody in the garage. That was the Digger!… You called him, you sent him to my house! To scare my son!"

Fielding shrugged. "You were too good, Kincaid. I had to get you off the case for a while. When you went off to raid my safe house-finding that was very good, by the way-I stepped outside to make a call and left a message that my friend should go visit your little fella. I thought about killing them-well, and you too, of course-but I needed you to be at headquarters around midnight. To make my deductions about the site of the last shooting more credible."

Parker lunged forward and drew back his fist. Lukas caught his arm just before it crashed into Fielding's cringing face.

She whispered, "I understand. But it won't do anybody any good."

Trembling with rage, Parker lowered his hand, stepped to the window, watching the snow. Forced himself to calm. He believed if he'd been alone with Fielding now he could kill the man. Not because of the host of deaths tonight but because he could still hear the hollow fear in Robby's voice. Daddy… Daddy…

Lukas touched his arm. He looked at her. She was holding a notebook. She said to Parker, "For what it's worth, he did the same thing to me." She flipped through the pages, tapped several entries. "My house was broken into a few months ago. He's the one who did it. He took notes about my life."

Fielding said nothing.

Lukas continued, speaking directly to the killer. "You found out all about me. You found out about Tom… "

Tom? Parker wondered.

"You cut your hair the same way as his. You said you were from outside Chicago, just like him. You read his letters to me…" She closed her eyes and shook her head. "'Right as rain.' You stole his expression! And then you told me about having a wife in a coma. Why? So I'd keep you on the team-when everybody else-me included-didn't want you interfering with the case."

"I needed to get inside your defenses, Margaret. I knew what kind of adversary you'd be."

"You stole my past, Fielding."

"What's the past for but to use?" he asked evenly.

"But how could you kill so many people?" Lukas asked in a whisper.

"Appalled?" Fielding asked. He seemed exasperated. "But why not? I mean, Jesus Christ, why not? Why is one death less horrifying than a million? Either you kill or you don't. If you do, then death is just a matter of degree and if it makes sense, if it's efficient, then you kill whom you have to kill. Anyone who doesn't accept that is a naive fool."

"Who's the guy in the morgue?" Cage asked.

"His name is Gil Havel."

"Ah, the mysterious Gilbert Jones," Parker said. "He rented the helicopter, right?"

"I had to make you believe that I was really going to try to get away with the money from the drop on Gallows Road."

"Where did you find him?"

"In a bar in Baltimore."

"Who was he? Havel."

"He's just some loser. A bum, more or less. I promised him a hundred thousand dollars to deliver a note to City Hall and help me with the helicopter and rent the safe house. I made him think he was my partner."

Parker said, "And you had him walk back to the Metro or bus stop along a particular route. Where you were waiting with the van to run him down."

"You had to believe that the mastermind was dead. So you'd bring the money back to the evidence room…"

"What about Kennedy? You sent him to the Ritz."

"The mayor?" Fielding asked. "That was a surprise-when he called me. And a risk. But it worked out well." He nodded analytically. "For one thing, I had to keep you focused on the Ritz-Carlton, not the Ritzy Lady. And then my penance for the betrayal was bringing you the bone about the Digger's name… You know, you really are something, Kincaid. How'd you figure it out?"

Parker continued, "How did I find out you were the unsub? Because of your handwriting. I had a sample-when I dictated to you from the yellow sheets Tobe saved."

"I was worried about that," Fielding said. "But I couldn't very well balk when you asked me to take notes, could I? But I tried to improvise-I tried to disguise my writing."

"The dot on your lowercase i gave you away."

Fielding nodded. "Oh, that's right. The devils teardrop. I didn't think about that… What did you say? That it's always the little things."

"Not always. But usually."

Lukas asked, "The information about the Digger-you had that all along, didn't you? You didn't go to the library."

"Nope. Hell, that's why I named Hughes the Digger. So you'd think he had some ridiculous revenge scheme against the government. But…" He looked around the room, "How'd you get here?"

"To this house?" Parker couldn't resist. "Perfection," he said and watched the arrogant smile slide off the killer's face. He continued. "To escape after the perfect crime you'd want the perfect passports. You'd find the best forger in the business. He happens to be a friend of mine. Well, let's just say we're close; I put him in prison once."

For a moment Fielding was flustered. "But he didn't know my real name or address."

"No, but you called him," Parker countered.

"Not from here," Fielding said, argumentative, whiny.

Lukas too wanted part of deconstructing the man. "From the phone booth up the street." She nodded toward the corner. "We ran the pen register numbers through Bell Atlantic security." Then she held up a computer picture of Fielding. "We lifted it from the tape in the FBI headquarters security camera. Just showed it to a half-dozen people in the neighborhood tonight and got a beeline to your front door."

"Shit." He closed his eyes.

The little things…

Parker said, "There's this saying among forgers that the expression 'You can't think of everything' doesn't count. You have to think of everything."

Fielding said, "I knew you were the strong link, Parker. The biggest risk. I should've had the Digger take care of you right up front."

Cage asked, "You didn't have any problem sacrificing your friend?"

"The Digger? Wouldn't exactly call him a friend." Fielding added, "He was a dangerous person to keep alive. Anyway, you may've guessed, this was going to be my last job. I didn't need him anymore."

An agent walked into the doorway. "Okay, Fielding. Your ride's here."

They started to lead him off. He paused at the doorway. Turned back.

"Admit it, Parker, I'm good," he said churlishly. "After all, I nearly did it."

Parker shook his head. "Either an answer to a puzzle's right or it's wrong. There's no 'nearly' about it."

But when he was led out of the door Fielding was smiling.

35

The workmen were lashing the burnt bus to a flatbed.

The medical examiner had carted off the Diggers body, in whose hands was fused, horribly, a scorched black machine gun.

Edward Fielding sat in federal detention, legs shackled and wrists cuffed.

As Parker said goodnight to Cage, looking around for Margaret Lukas, he noticed Mayor Gerald Kennedy start toward them. He'd been here, with a skeleton crew of journalists, surveying the damage and talking to police and rescue workers.

He walked up to them.

"Your honor," Cage said.

"I have you to thank for that little news story, Agent Cage? Implicating me in the screwup at the boat?"

A shrug. "Investigation had priority, sir. Shouldn't've showed up at the Ritz. Probably would've been better to keep politics out of it."

Kennedy shook his head. "So I understand you've caught the man behind this."

"We did, sir."

Kennedy turned his jowly face to Parker. "And you're Agent-"

"Jefferson, your honor. First name's Tom."

"Oh, you're the one I've been hearing about. The document examiner?"

"That's right," Parker said. "I saw you do some pretty nifty shooting there."

"Not nifty enough." The Mayor nodded ruefully toward the smoking bus. The mayor asked, "Say, you related to Thomas Jefferson?"

"Me?" Parker laughed. "No, no. It's a common name."

"My aide's name is Jefferies," he said as if making cocktail party conversation.

Then Lukas arrived. She nodded to the mayor and Parker could see the tension in her face, as if she were expecting a confrontation.

But all Kennedy said was, "I'm sorry about your friend, Agent Ardell."

Lukas said nothing. She stared at the scorched bus.

A reporter called, "Mayor, there's a rumor that you chose not to call out the National Guard tonight because you thought it would interfere with tourist traffic. Could you comment on that?"

"No, I couldn't." He too gazed at the bus.

Lukas said, "Tonight didn't turn out very well for anybody, did it?"

"No, Agent Lukas," Kennedy said slowly. "I suspect things like this never do."

He took his wife's hand and walked to their limousine.

Margaret Lukas handed Cage some documents-maybe evidence reports or arrest records. Then, eyes still on the bus, she walked to her Explorer. Parker wondered, Was she leaving without saying goodbye?

She opened the door, started the engine and put the heater on-the temperature had dropped and the sky was overcast with thick clouds, which were still shedding fat grains of snow. She left the truck's door open, leaned back into the seat.

Cage shook Parker's hand then muttered, "What can I say?" To Parker's surprise the agent threw his arms around him, hugged him once hard, wincing at the pain, then started off down the street. "Night, Lukas," Cage shouted. "Night, Parker. Man, my side hurts. Happy New Year, everybody. Happy goddamn New Year."

Parker zipped up his jacket and walked toward Lukas's truck, noticing that she was looking at something in her hand. Parker wasn't sure what it was. It seemed to be an old postcard that had been folded up. She stared at it. She glanced at Parker then seemed to hesitate. Just before he got to the truck she put the card away in her purse.

She pulled a bottle of beer out of her pocket, a Sam Adams, cracked it open with a church key that rested on the dash.

"They sell those in vending machines at headquarters now?"

"Present from my witness, Gary Moss." She offered it to him. He took a long sip, handed it back. Lukas remained in the Ford but turned sideways, facing Parker. "What a night, hm?"

"What a night," he repeated. He reached forward and offered his hand.

She gripped his solidly They'd both removed their gloves and though their hands were red from the cold, their flesh was the identical temperature; Parker felt no cold or heat coming from her skin.

Neither of them let go. He enclosed her hand with his left.

"How're the kids?" she asked. "What do you call them again?"

"The Whos."

"Whos. Right. Have you talked to them?"

"They're fine." Reluctantly he released his grip. Was she reluctant too? He couldn't tell. Then he asked, "You'll need a report, I assume?" He remembered all the paperwork U.S. attorneys required to get ready for federal criminal trials. Mountains of it. But Parker didn't mind; after all, documents were his business.

"We will," Lukas responded. "But there's no hurry."

"I'll do one on Monday. I'm finishing a project this weekend."

"Document? Or home improvement?"

"You mean home improvement as in tools?" He laughed. "Oh, I don't do that. Kitchens I know. Workbenches, uh-uh. No, it's a possible forgery. A letter supposedly written by Thomas Jefferson. A dealer in New York wants it analyzed."

"Is it real?"

"My gut feeling is yes. I have some more tests to run. Oh, here." He handed her the pistol.

Lukas, in the skirt now, was no longer dressed for hiding backup weapons on her ankle. She slipped the gun into her glove compartment. Parker's eyes strayed to her profile again.

Why on earth would you envy me? he wondered silently.

Sometimes puzzles answer themselves, in their own time.

And sometimes you just never do find the answer. And that's because, Parker Kincaid had come to believe, you weren't meant to.

"Hey, you doing anything tomorrow night?" he asked suddenly. "Want to have a ridiculously suburban dinner?"

She hesitated. Not moving a muscle. Not even breathing, it seemed. He didn't move either, just kept a faint smile on his lips, the way he waited for the Whos to confess about missing cookies or a broken lamp.

Finally she too smiled but he saw that it was fake-a smile of stone, one that matched her eyes. And he knew what her answer would be.

"I'm sorry," she said formally. "I have plans. Maybe some other time."

Meaning: never. Parker Kincaid's Handbook for the Single Parent had a whole chapter on euphemisms.

"Sure," he said, trying to step on the disappointment. "Some other time."

"Where's your car?" Lukas asked. "I'll give you a ride."

"No, that's okay It's right over there."

He gripped her hand again and resisted the urge to pull her close.

"'Night," she said.

He nodded.

As he walked to his car he looked at her and saw she was waving. It was an odd gesture since her face was emotionless and she wasn't smiling.

But then Parker noticed that she wasn't waving at all. She was wiping off the condensation on the windows, not even looking at him. When she'd cleaned the glass Margaret Lukas put the truck in gear and sped into the middle of the street.

On the way home, driving through the quiet, snow-filled streets, Parker stopped at a 7-Eleven for black coffee, a ham-and-egg on a croissant and cash from the ATM. When he walked in the front door of his house he found Mrs. Cavanaugh asleep on the couch.

He woke her and paid her twice what she asked for. Then escorted her to the door and stood on the front steps, watching her walk over the snow carefully until she disappeared into her own house across the street.

The children had fallen asleep in his bed-his room sported a TV and VCR. The screen was bright blue, circumstantial evidence that they'd watched a movie. He was afraid to see which video had lulled them to sleep-he had a collection of R-rated thriller and sci-fi films-but what popped out when he hit eject was only The Lion King. Troubling enough-Robby would forever detest hyenas-but at least it had a noble ending and the violence was largely unseen.

Parker was exhausted-beyond exhaustion. But sleep, he felt, was still an hour or so away.

Despite his urging her not to, Mrs. Cavanaugh had done dishes and cleaned the kitchen-so he couldn't work off energy that way. Instead, he bundled up the trash from around the house and carted it out into the backyard, lugging the green bags over his shoulder like Santa. Thinking: What a crazy life-to have been pointing a gun at someone an hour ago, to have been shot at himself, and now to be back in the middle of suburbia, lost in these domestic chores.

As he eased up the lid of the trash bin Parker glanced into the backyard. He stopped, frowned. There were footprints in the snow.

Recent footprints.

Only a few minutes old, he judged-the edges were still sharp, unsoftened by the falling snow and the wind. The intruder had walked up to the guest room window, then disappeared toward the front of the house.

Parker's heart began thudding.

He carefully set the garbage bag down and walked quietly back into the house.

He closed and locked the kitchen door behind him. Checked on the front door. It was locked. Because of his document business-the value of the specimens and the risk of pollution and dust in the air-the windows in the house were sealed and couldn't be opened; he didn't need to check them.

But whose footprints?

Just kids, maybe.

Or Mr. Johnson looking for his dog.

That's all it was. Sure…

But ten seconds later he was on the phone to the federal detention facility in Washington, D.C.

He identified himself as FBI Special Agent Parker Kincaid, a statement only a few years untrue. "I was working on that case tonight with Margaret Lukas."

"Sure. The METSHOOT."

"Right. I'm being a little paranoid here," Parker said. "But the suspect-Edward Fielding. He's not out on bail, is he?"

"Bail? No way. He won't be arraigned until Monday."

"He's locked down?"

"Yep. I can see him. On the monitor."

"He asleep?"

"No, just sitting on his bed. Been behaving himself. Talked to his lawyer-that was about an hour ago-then went into his cell and's been there ever since. Why?"

"Just spooked, I guess. Thought I saw the boogeyman."

"Boogeyman. Ha. Hey, Happy New Year."

Parker hung up, relieved.

For about five seconds.

Talking to his lawyer?

Parker didn't know any lawyer in the country who'd be up at this hour on a holiday, talking to a client who wouldn't be arraigned for two days.

Then he thought: Perfection.

"Oh, Jesus," he muttered.

Fielding-the man who had a plan for everything. He must have had a plan for escaping if he was caught.

He lifted the receiver and hit the first digit of 911.

The line went dead.

Motion outside the kitchen door.

He looked up.

Standing on the back porch, gazing at him through the window in the door was a man. He was pale. Wearing a dark coat. Black or blue. There was blood on his left arm but not a lot of blood. Burns on his face but they weren't serious.

The man lifted his silenced machine gun and tapped the trigger, as Parker leapt aside, crashing into the wall and falling to the floor. The doorknob and lock of the back door blew apart under the stream of bullets. Glass splinters exploded into the room.

Leisurely, the Digger pushed the door open and stepped inside, like a friendly neighbor invited over for coffee.

36

The Digger's cold, the Digger wants to get this over with and leave.

He'd rather be outside. He likes the… click… the… the… the snow.

He likes the snow.

Oh, look, a nice Christmas wreath and a nice Christmas tree in Parker Kincaid's comfy house. Tye would like this.

Funny…

No puppies, no ribbons here. But a nice wreath and a nice tree.

He fires again as Kincaid runs through the doorway.

Did he hit him? The Digger can't tell.

But, no, guess not. He sees Kincaid crawling into another room, shutting out lights, rolling on the floor.

Doing things like that.

The Digger believes he's happy. The man who tells him things called again, an hour ago. Not a message from the voice-mail lady who sounds like Ruth but a real call on his cell phone. He told the Digger that the night wasn't over yet even though the Digger had gone to the black wall and done what he was supposed to do.

Not… click… not over yet.

"Listen to me," said the man who tells him things and so the Digger listened. He was supposed to kill three more people. Someone named Cage and someone named Lukas. And Parker Kincaid. "Kill him first. Okay?"

"Hmmm, okay."

The Digger knows Kincaid. He came to his house earlier tonight. Kincaid has a little boy like Tye except the Digger doesn't like Kincaid's little boy because Kincaid wants to make the Digger go back to the lousy hospital in Connecticut. Kincaid wants to take him away from Tye.

"Then at four-thirty A.M.," said the man who tells him things, "I want you to come to the Federal Detention Center on Third Street. I'll be in the clinic. It's on the first floor in the back. I'll be pretending I'm sick. Kill everyone you see and let me out."

"Okay."

Walking into the dining room, the Digger sees Kincaid roll out from beneath the table and run into the hallway. He fires another stream of bullets. Kincaid's face looks like Ruth's face when he was about to put the glass in her neck and like Pamela's when he put the knife in her chest below the gold cross here's your Christmas present I love you love you all the more…

Kincaid disappears into another part of the house.

But he won't leave, the Digger knows. The children are here. A father won't run out on his children.

The Digger knows this because he wouldn't leave Tye. Kincaid won't leave the little blond boy and the dark-haired girl.

If Parker Kincaid lives, the Digger will never get to Cal-i-fornia. Out West.

He steps into the living room, holding the gun in front of him.

Parker rolled away from the Digger, rolled along the floor, elbows scraped, head throbbing from where he hit the edge of the kitchen table, diving away from the bullets.

The Whos! he thought in despair, scrabbling toward the stairs. He wouldn't let the Digger upstairs. He'd die with a death grip on the man's neck if he had to but he would save the children.

But another burst of shots. He turned from the stairs and dove into the living room.

A weapon… What could he use? But there were none. He couldn't get into the kitchen and grab a knife. He couldn't get into the garage for the ax.

Why the hell had he given back Lukas's gun?

Then he saw something-one of Robby's Christmas presents, the baseball bat. He snagged it, gripped the taped handle and crawled back toward the stairs.

Where is he? Where?

Then steps, faint. The crunch of the Digger walking over broken glass and pottery.

But Parker couldn't tell where he was.

The hallway?

The dining room? The first-floor den?

What should he do?

If he shouted for the children to leap out the window they'd just come to see what he wanted. He had to get upstairs himself, grab them and jump. He'd try to cushion the fall as best he could. The snow would help and he could aim for the juniper bushes.

Footsteps very close. Crunch. A pause. Another crunch.

Parker looked up.

No! The Digger was at the foot of the stairs, about to climb them, looking up. No expression on his face.

He's profile-proof…

Parker couldn't run at him; he'd be in full view and would die before he got three steps toward the man. So he flung the bat into the dining room. It crashed into the china cabinet.

The Digger stopped, hearing the noise. He turned stiffly and walked toward it. Like the alien monster in the old horror film The Thing.

When he was nearly to the arched doorway Parker climbed out from behind the couch and charged him.

He was six feet away from his prey when he stepped on one of Robby's toys. It shattered with a loud crunch. The Digger spun around just as Parker rammed into him, knocking him to his knees. He landed a fist on the killers jaw. The blow was hard but the Digger dodged away and Parker, under the momentum of the swing, fell onto his side. He collapsed on the floor, tried for the Diggers gun. But the man was too fast for him and grabbed the weapon, then struggled to his feet. Parker could do nothing but retreat into the narrow space behind the couch.

His face dripping sweat, hands trembling, he huddled here.

Nowhere else to go.

The Digger backed up, orienting himself. Parker saw something sharp on the floor in front of him. Glistening. A long shard of glass. He grabbed it.

The killer squinted, looking around. He located Parker, who gazed up into the man's dim eyes. Parker thought-no, Margaret Lukas's eyes aren't dead at all; there's a million times more life in them than in this creature's. The killer moved closer. Coming around the back of the couch. Parker tensed. Then he looked past the man-at the Christmas tree. He remembered the three of them, he and the Whos, opening presents on Christmas morning.

It's a good thought to die with, he decided.

But if he was going to die he'd make sure the children didn't. He gripped the long splinter of glass, wrapped his shirt cuff around the lower half. He'd slash the man's jugular vein and pray that he'd bleed to death before he got up the stairs, where the children were sleeping. Not daring to think about the sight the Whos would see in the morning. He tucked his legs under him, gripped his impromptu knife.

It would be all right. They'd survive. That was all that mattered.

He got ready to leap.

The Digger walked around the couch and started to lift the gun.

Parker tensed.

Then: the stunning crack of the single, unsilenced gunshot.

The Digger shuddered. The machine gun fell from his hands. His eyes focused past Parker. Then his head dropped and he sank to the floor. He fell forward, a bullet hole in the back of his skull.

Parker grabbed the Uzi and pulled it toward him, looking around.

What? he wondered frantically. What had happened?

Then he saw someone in the doorway.

A boy… How could that be? He was a young boy. Black. He was holding a pistol. He walked forward slowly, staring at the corpse. Like a cop in a movie he kept the large gun pointed at the Digger's back. He needed both hands to hold it and struggled with the guns weight.

"He kill mah daddy," the boy said to Parker, not looking at him. "I seen him do it."

"Give me the gun," Parker whispered.

The boy continued to stare at the Digger. Tears were running down his cheeks. "He kill mah daddy. He brought me here, brought me in a car."

"Let me have the gun. What's your name?"

"I seen him do it. He do it right in fronta me. I been waiting t'cap his ass. Found this piece in his car. Trey-five-seven."

"It's okay," Parker said. "What's your name?"

"He dead. Shit."

Parker eased forward but the boy pointed the gun toward him threateningly. Parker froze and backed off. "Just put that down. Would you do that? Please?"

The boy ignored him. His wary eyes scanned the room. They stopped momentarily on the Christmas tree. Then returned to the Digger. "He kill mah daddy. Why he do that?"

Parker slowly rose once more, hands up, palms out. "Don't worry. I'm not going to hurt you."

He glanced upstairs. But the shot had apparently not wakened the Whos.

"I'm just going over there for a minute." He nodded to the tree.

He skirted the boy-and the bloodstain surrounding the Diggers head-and walked to the Christmas tree. He bent down and picked up something and returned, knelt. Parker held his empty right hand out to the boy, palm up. Then with his left he offered him Robby's Star Wars Millennium Falcon spaceship.

"I'll trade you."

The boy studied the plastic toy. The gun drooped. He was much shorter than Robby and must have weighed only sixty or seventy pounds. But his eyes were twenty years older than Parker's son's.

"Let me have the gun, please."

He studied the toy. "Man," he said reverently. Then he handed Parker the pistol and took the toy.

Parker said, "Wait here. I'll be right back. Do you want something to eat? Are you hungry?"

The boy didn't answer.

Parker picked up the machine gun and carried it and the pistol upstairs. He put the guns on the top shelf of the closet and locked the door.

Motion beside him. Robby was coming down the corridor.

"Daddy?"

"Hey, young man." Parker struggled to keep his voice from trembling.

"I had a dream. I heard a gun. I'm scared."

Parker intercepted him before he got to the stairs, put his arm around him and directed him back to the bedroom. "It was probably just fireworks."

"Can we get firecrackers next year?" the boy asked sleepily.

"We'll see."

He heard footsteps outside, slapping on the street in front of the house. Glanced outside. He saw the boy running across the front lawn, clutching the spaceship. He vanished up the street.

Headed for where? Parker wondered. The District? West Virginia? He couldn't spare a moment's thought for the boy. His own son took all his attention.

Parker put Robby in bed, beside his sister. He needed to find his cell phone and call 911. But the boy wouldn't let go of his father's hand.

"Was it a bad dream?" Parker asked.

"I don't know. I just heard this noise."

Parker lay down next to him. He glanced at the clock. It was 3:30. Joan would be here at 10:00 with her social worker… Jesus, what a nightmare this was. There were a dozen bullet holes in the walls. Furniture was damaged, the breakfront shattered. The back door was destroyed.

And in the middle of the carpet was a bloody corpse.

"Daddy," Stephie said, mumbling in her sleepy voice.

"It's okay, honey."

"I heard a firecracker. Petey Whelan had firecrackers. His mother told him he couldn't have any but he did. I saw them."

"That's not our business. Go back to sleep, honey"

Parker lay back, closed his eyes. Felt her slight weight on his chest.

Thinking about the bullet holes, the bullet casings, the shattered furniture. The body.

He imagined Joan's testimony in court.

What could he do? What excuse could he come up with?

What…?

A moment later Parker Kincaid was breathing deeply. Content in the sleep of a parent whose children were close in his arms, and there is no sleep better than that.

When he opened his eyes it was five minutes to ten in the morning.

Parker had been awakened by the sound of a car door slamming and Joan's voice saying, "We're a few minutes early but I'm sure he won't mind. Watch your step-he knew we were coming and he didn't bother to shovel the walk. Typical. Typical."

37

He rolled from the bed.

Nauseous, head throbbing, he looked out the window. Joan was walking toward the house. Richard was with her, bringing up the rear, sullen. He didn't want to be here. And another woman too-the social worker. Short, clattering along on stocky heels, looking at the house appraisingly.

They walked to the front door. The bell rang.

Hopeless…

He stood in the upstairs hallway, toes curling on the carpet. Well, just don't let her in, he told himself. He'd stonewall. Make her get a court order. That would buy a couple of hours.

Parker paused, looked at his sleeping children. He wanted to grab them and escape out the back door, drive away to West Virginia.

But that would never work, he knew.

The bell rang again.

What can I do? How can I stall?

But Joan would still know something was wrong. Stalling would make the paranoid woman even more suspicious. And what would two or three hours buy him?

He took a deep breath and started down the stairs.

What could he possibly say about the bullet holes in the walls? The blood? Maybe he could-

Parker stopped at the landing.

Stunned.

A thin, blond woman in a long, black skirt and white blouse, her back to Parker, was opening the door.

Which was surprising enough. But what truly shocked him was the condition of the house.

Immaculate.

Not a piece of broken porcelain or glass anywhere. Not a bullet hole in any of the walls. They'd been plastered and primed; buckets of paint sat in the corner of the living room on white tarps. The chair that had been peppered with bullets last night had been replaced by a similar one. There was a new breakfront.

And the Diggers corpse-gone. On the spot where he'd died was a new oriental carpet.

With Joan, Richard and the social worker standing in the doorway, the woman in the dark skirt turned. "Oh, Parker," said Margaret Lukas.

"Yes," he answered after a moment.

She smiled in a curious way.

He tried again. "Morning."

"How was your nap?" she asked. Then prompted, "Good?"

"Yes," he said. "It was good."

Lukas turned back and nodded to the visitors. She said to Joan, "You must be Parker's wife."

"Ex-wife," Joan said, stepping inside. The social worker-a pudgy brunette-entered next, followed by handsome and impeccably slow- witted Richard.

Parker continued down the stairs and couldn't resist touching a wall where he knew he'd seen a cluster of bullets strike last night. The plasterboard was smooth as Stephie's cheek.

He had a terrible pain in his shoulder and head from where he'd dived to the floor last night as the Digger came through the kitchen door. But if not for that he'd have thought the entire attack was a dream.

He realized that Joan was staring at him with a put-out smile on her face. "I said, 'Hello, Parker.'"

"Morning, Joan," he said. "Hello, Richard." Parker walked into the middle of the living room and kissed Joan's cheek, shook her husband's hand. Richard carried a shopping bag of stuffed animals.

Joan didn't introduce Parker to the social worker but the woman stepped forward. She shook his hand. She may or may not have given her name. Parker was too dumbfounded to notice.

Joan looked at Lukas, "I don't think we've met. You're…"

"Jackie Lukas. I'm a friend of Parker's."

Jackie? Parker lifted an eyebrow. The agent noticed but said nothing about the name.

Joan glanced at Lukas's trim figure with a neutral look. Then her eyes-the color so reminiscent of Robby's, the cynical expression so different-took in the living room.

"Did you?… What did you do? Redecorate or something? I didn't notice it last night."

"I had some free time. Thought I'd fix things up a little."

His ex studied him. "You look awful, Parker. Didn't you sleep well?"

Lukas laughed. Joan glanced at her.

"Parker invites me over for breakfast," Lukas explained, offering the two women a look of female conspiracy. "Then he goes upstairs to wake up the children and what's he do but fall back asleep."

Joan's grunt repeated what she'd said earlier: Typical.

Where was the blood? There'd been a lot of blood.

Lukas asked the guests, "You want some coffee? A sweet roll? Parker made them himself."

"I'll have some coffee," the social worker said. "And maybe I'll have half a roll."

"They're small," Lukas said. "Have a whole one."

"Maybe I just will."

Lukas disappeared into the kitchen and came back a moment later with a tray. She said, "Parker's quite the cook."

"I know" Joan answered, unimpressed with her ex-husbands talents.

Lukas handed out coffee cups and asked Parker, "What time did you get back from the hospital last night?"

"Uhm."

"The hospital? Were the children sick?" She asked this with melodramatic concern, glancing at the social worker.

"He was visiting a friend," Lukas responded.

"I don't know what time," Parker said. "It was late?" The answer was largely a question; Lukas was the writer of this scene and he felt he should defer to her script.

"What friend?" Joan demanded.

"Harold Cage," Lukas said. "He'll be all right. Just a broken rib. Isn't that what they said?"

"Broken rib."

"Slipped and fell, right?" Lukas continued her award-winning performance.

"Right," Parker recited. "Slipped and fell."

He sipped the coffee that Lukas had put in his hand.

The social worker ate a second sweet roll. "Say, could I get the recipe for these?"

"Sure," Parker said.

Joan kept a benign smile on her face. She walked around the living room, examining. "The place looks all different." As she passed her ex-husband she whispered, "So, Parker, sleeping with skinny little Jackie, are we?"

"No, Joan. We're just friends."

"Ah."

"I'll get some more coffee," Lukas said.

"I'll help you," Parker said.

In the kitchen he swung the door closed and turned to Lukas. He whispered, "How? How on earth…?"

She laughed-undoubtedly at the expression on his face. "You called Detention last night. Said you were spooked. Night watch called me. I tried to call you. Bell Atlantic said your line'd been cut. Fairfax County SWAT got here around three-thirty on a silent roll-in and found a dead body downstairs and you in bed taking a nap. Who was the shooter who got the Digger? Wasn't you, right?"

"Some kid. He said the Digger killed his father. The Digger brought him here with him. Don't ask me why. The boy just took off… Now answer one for me-who was the body on the bus?"

"The bus driver. We figure the Digger kept him alive and then made him run for the exit in the back. Then Digger shot him then the gas tank and when the fire started he climbed out one of the windows. Used the smoke for cover. Got away through the traffic jam. Smarter than he seemed."

But Parker shook his head. "No, it was Fielding. He told the Digger to do that. He wasn't going to sacrifice his boy at all. This wasn't going to be their last job. They probably had years of this ahead of them… But the house." Parker waved his arms. "How-?"

"That was Cage. He made a few calls."

The miracle worker.

"I don't know what to say."

"We got you into this mess. It's the least we could do."

Parker wouldn't argue with that.

"Wait… What did you call yourself? Jackie?"

She hesitated. "Nickname," she said. "It's what my family calls me. I don't use it much."

There were footsteps on the stairs, soft thuds as the children came down to the living room. Parker and Lukas could hear the voices through the kitchen door: "Mommy! Hey!"

"Hello, both of you," Joan said. "Here, here… This is for you."

Rustling of paper.

"Do you like them?" Joan asked. "Do you?"

Stephie's dubious voice said, "Oh, it's Barney."

Robby laughed out loud. Then he groaned. "And Big Bird."

Parker shook his head at his ex-wife's incompetence and gave Lukas a smile. But she didn't notice. Her head was turned toward the living room, drawn hypnotically toward the sound of the children's voices. After a moment she looked out the window and stared at the falling snow. Finally she said, "So that's your wife. You two don't seem much alike."

Parker laughed. What Lukas really meant was: How the hell did you end up with her?

A legitimate question and one he'd be happy to answer. But doing so would require a lot more time than they had right at the moment. And would also have to be part of a complicated ritual involving her sharing at least some of the answers to the puzzle of Margaret-or Jackie-Lukas.

And what a puzzle she was: Parker looked her over-the makeup, the jewelry. The softness of the white silk blouse, the delicate lace of the lingerie beneath it. And she was wearing perfume today, not just fragrant soap. What did it remind him of? He couldn't tell.

She glanced at his perusing eyes.

Caught once again. He didn't care.

Parker said, "You don't look like an FBI agent."

"Undercover," Lukas said, finally laughing. "I used to be really good at it. I played a Mafia hit man's wife once."

"Italian? With that hair?"

"I had Miss Clairol for backup." Neither said anything for a moment. "Ill stay until she leaves. Thought a hint of a domestic life might help you out with the social worker."

"It's above and beyond the call," he said.

She gave a shrug worthy of Cage.

"Look," he said, "I know you said you had plans. But the Whos and I were going to do some yard work."

"In the snow?"

"Right, Cut down some bushes in the backyard. Then we were going sledding? What it is, we don't get much snow here?"

He stopped speaking. Ending declarative sentences with interrogatory inflection? And he actually began a sentence with "What it is." The forensic linguist within him was not pleased. Nervous, are we? He continued. "I don't know if you'd be interested, but…" He stopped once again.

"Is that an invitation?" Lukas asked.

"Uhm. Yes, it is."

"Those plans I had?" she said. "I was going to clean up my house and finish sewing a blouse for a friend's daughter."

"Is that an acceptance?"

A tentative smile. "I guess it is." Silence for a moment. "Say, how's the coffee? I don't make it very often. Usually I just go to Starbucks."

"Good," he answered.

She was facing the window. But her eyes moved once more toward the door; she was listening to the sound of the children. She turned back to Parker. "Oh, I've figured it out."

"What?"

"The puzzle."

"Puzzle?"

"How many hawks were left on the roof. This morning, sitting here, I figured it out."

"Okay. Go ahead."

"It's a trick question. There's more than one answer."

"That's good," Parker said, "but that doesn't mean it's a trick question. It just means you're thinking the right way-you've realized that a legitimate answer is that there are several possible solutions. It's the first thing that puzzle masters learn."

"See," she continued, "you tend to think that all the facts you need are given in the puzzle but there are some that aren't stated."

Absolutely right. He nodded.

"And those facts have to do with the nature of hawks."

"Ah," Parker said, "and what does a hawks nature have to do with the puzzle?"

"Because," she said, pointing a finger at him and revealing a sliver of girlishness he hadn't seen before, "hawks might be scared off by a gunshot. But they might not. Because-remember?-they were far apart on the roof. That was a clue, right?"

"Right. Keep going."

"Okay, the farmer shoots one bird off the roof but we don't know what the other two do. They both might stay. So then the answer'd be there're two left. Or one might fly off and that'd leave one. Or both might fly off, which'd leave none. So. Those're the three answers."

"Well," Parker responded, "you were right to consider implied facts."

She frowned. "What does that mean? Am I right or not?"

"You're wrong."

"But," Lukas protested, "I have to be right."

"No, you don't." He laughed.

"Well, I'm at least partly right, aren't I?"

"There's no such thing as partly right when it comes to puzzles. You want to know the answer?"

A hesitation. "No. That'd be cheating. I'm going to keep working on it."

It was a good moment to kiss her and he did, briefly, then, as Lukas poured more coffee, Parker returned to the living room to hug his children and tell them good morning on the first day of the year.