Bob Morris_Zack Chasteen 02 (3 page)

“Why, yes, I do. It’s a first edition. It’s signed by Naipaul. It’s very dear to me, a gift from my mother, and I fully intend to . . .”

I turned her toward the door.

“Just go,” I said. “We’ll worry about the book later.”

I watched as she left the skybox and disappeared down the hallway, followed by Bill Barnett, the two campus cops and the skybox attendant.

The young man and woman said their good-byes to Whitehall, but as they moved to the door, the young woman turned on the young man and shouted: “It’s all your fault! If you hadn’t decided to . . .”

“Ali!” Darcy Whitehall silenced her. “That’s enough. This has nothing to do with your brother.”

The woman held his look for a moment, then stepped into the hall. The young man stood in the doorway, anguish in his eyes.

“Dad,” he said. “If this is about me, I’m sorry. I’ll quit. I’ll drop out. I’ll . . .”

Whitehall put up a hand to quiet him.

“You’ll do no such thing,” Whitehall said. “It’s not your fault. I’ll be alright. Now go.”

The young man stepped away. That left just me, Monk, and Darcy Whitehall in the skybox. With a bomb.

Some fun party this was turning out to be.

Outside, the band stopped playing and I heard the stadium announcer telling the crowd the game had been postponed “upon advisement of the National Weather Service.” There were boos and catcalls, but they quieted down as several dozen state troopers moved through the stadium, and everyone began heading toward the exits.

As Monk stepped over to the window and gazed out on the stadium, Darcy Whitehall looked me up and down.

“So, you’re the one Monk’s been telling me about, are you?”

“Zack Chasteen,” I said, sticking out my hand. Whitehall gave it a shake.

“Forgive me for not getting up,” he said.

“Gee, what’s the world coming to? Put a lousy little bomb under a guy’s chair and good manners go out the window.”

Whitehall smiled.

“Reminds me of that movie,” he said. “
Lethal Weapon
something-or-other. The second one, I think.”

“The one where Danny Glover sits down on the toilet and there’s a bomb rigged to the seat?”

Whitehall nodded.

“Mel Gibson walks in, checks it out, and Danny Glover looks
at him and says, ‘Tell me I’m not fucked.’ And Mel Gibson says, ‘Don’t worry, guys like you don’t die sitting on toilets.’”

“Compared to Danny Glover you got it good,” I said. “Your pants aren’t down around your knees. And you don’t have to listen to Mel Gibson make wisecracks.”

Whitehall laughed.

“Nor do I intend to die at a bloody football game.”

“Makes two of us,” I said.

Monk turned from the window and stepped next to the chair.

“You want to take a look at that thing down there, Zack?”

As if I knew a bomb from a Bundt cake. But I kneeled and looked under the chair and tried not to think about what could happen if Whitehall was overcome by a sudden butt twitch. Might ruin my schoolboy complexion.

There wasn’t much to see. Just a rectangular box, a shoebox it looked like, fastened to the bottom of the chair with duct tape. No wires. No ticking clock. Nothing that shouted: Bomb! Which made it all the scarier.

I stood up.

“Beats heck out of me,” I said, “but I’m guessing it’s not a new pair of Nikes in there.”

Monk looked at Darcy Whitehall.

“We’re going to get this worked out,” he said. “Just sit tight.”

“I intend to,” Whitehall said. He looked at me. “So, Mr. Chasteen, assuming we put this bomb business behind us, Monk tells me you’ll be coming down to Jamaica.”

I looked at Monk. He winced, then shrugged an apology.

“Sorry,” Monk said. “But that’s what I wanted to talk to you about, Zack. I need some help.”

“Doing what?”

“Backing me up, lending a hand, doing whatever needs doing security-wise.”

The whole thing was coming at me from so far out in left field that I couldn’t think of anything to say. I just stood there.

“I think it’s rather obvious that I require some looking after,” said Whitehall. “And you strike me as a man who would be a good hand in a tight spot. We could use you.”

Monk said, “It will only be for a couple of weeks, Zack, just until I can find someone who . . .”

“Who what? Knows what they’re doing? Hell, Monk, I don’t have any experience in the security business. And I damn sure don’t know anything about bombs.”

“Doesn’t matter,” he said. “I just need someone I can trust. That’s why I’m asking you, Zack. How about it?”

Before I could answer, there was a commotion in the hall and I turned to see the Alachua County Sheriff’s Department bomb squad coming through the door.

Actually, the bright yellow letters on the back of the black T-shirts said “Anti-Terrorism Unit.” But unlike a S.W.A.T. team with its macho bravado, they moved in slowly, quietly, their group demeanor geared toward instilling a sense of calm.

I counted six of them, seven if I included the dog, a German shepherd. Once inside the skybox it rested on its haunches, looking up at its handler. The dog’s long pink tongue lolled from its mouth, drool dripping on the skybox floor.

The other members of the unit rolled in handcarts and dollies filled with all sorts of high-tech gear. Some of it wasn’t so high-tech. I saw bolt cutters and sledgehammers, too.

A trim man in a crew cut approached Monk and I. He eased us away from Whitehall’s chair and introduced himself as Captain Kilgore.

“We’re going to take care of a couple of quick things, then I’ll need to ask you some questions,” he said. “After that, I want you out of here.”

Kilgore signaled the shepherd’s handler, who unleashed the dog. It went straight for Whitehall’s chair, sniffing and pawing the floor, and otherwise signaling that there was something down there that might blow up and go boom.

“Heel, Sweeney,” said the handler, and the dog returned to his side.

Sweeney? The dog didn’t look like a Sweeney. It looked like a Duke. All German shepherds do. Duke, or Rex, or King maybe. Sweeney was what you called a bloodhound. I’d have to take it up with the bomb squad’s nomenclature department.

Kilgore turned to the only woman in the unit, a blonde with her hair tied back in a ponytail.

“OK, Syzmeski, you’re primary. Suit up,” said Kilgore.

She looked like a Syzmeski. Thick-faced and squarely built, the sleeves of her T-shirt rolled up just like the guys. Her biceps bulged just like theirs, too.

Two men held the jacket and pants of a military-green Kevlar suit. They helped Syzmeski into the heavy outfit. Then she lumbered toward one of the carts and removed a stubby black wand, sort of like the kind they use at airport-security stations. She flipped a switch on the side of the thing.

One of the men opened a laptop computer. He studied the screen.

“It’s showtime,” he told Syzmeski, and she moved toward Whitehall’s chair.

Another of the men knelt on the floor in front of Whitehall, cradling in his arms a Kevlar blanket.

“Sir, if you don’t mind, I’m going to drape this around you,” the man said. He unfolded the blanket until it covered Whitehall from his shins to his shoulders.

“Is it to protect me or you?” said Whitehall.

“Both,” said the man. He smiled and looked Whitehall in the eyes, holding his gaze. “You doing OK?”

Whitehall nodded. He glanced down at the woman as she stuck the black wand under the chair.

“What in the devil is that thing?”

“An RTR4,” said the man kneeling on the floor. “Real-time X-ray. Whatever it sees is gonna pop up on the computer over there.”

Whitehall thought about it. Then he said: “Excuse me, miss.”

Syzmeski looked up at him.

“Yes?”

“As long as you’re down there, would you mind giving my prostate a quick look-see?”

Syzmeski bit back a smile. She got back to work.

Kilgore zeroed in on Monk and me.

“OK, one of you fill me in on what I need to know,” he said.

I let Monk do the talking. He stood there, casual as could be, hands in his pockets, giving Kilgore the lowdown. He might have been talking about the game. Just seeing him like that made me relax a little. Things might actually turn out OK.

The guy studying the computer screen called out: “No signs of fragmentary.”

“That’s a good thing,” the guy kneeling by the chair told Whitehall. “That’s a real good thing.”

“So what next?” said Whitehall.

“Well, after Syzmeski finishes playing tourist down there, we’ll figure a way to get you out of that chair. It’s mostly a matter of keeping steady pressure on the seat while you step away.”

“You make it sound like a walk in the park.”

“Well, sir, it’s a scenario we’ve worked on in the past.”

“A scenario. Meaning you’ve never actually encountered the real thing.”

“No, sir. Not actually.”

I backed up to the counter. No one was paying any attention to me, so I sampled one of the shrimp. It was sweet and briny, and the remoulade sauce had a nice tang to it. Maybe a little light on the horseradish, but far be it from me to complain. I didn’t want the shrimp to feel lonesome, so I tried a piece of tenderloin and followed it with a couple of spicy tuna rolls and generous dabs of wasabi.

I checked out the bar. Mostly top-drawer labels. Johnny Walker Blue. Some small-batch bourbons. Grey Goose and Beefeater. But they’d cheaped out on the rum. Bacardi Gold. Monkey piss, meant for umbrella drinks.

I was going in for another shrimp when I heard Syzmeski holler: “Goddamn . . . !”

I looked up to see the box with the bomb in it dangling
from a piece of duct tape under the console chair. It hung there, vibrating.

“It’s engaged!” Syzmeski shouted.

She flung herself backward. So did the guy kneeling by the chair. The rest of the squad scattered, too, bailing out through the skybox door. Captain Kilgore rolled behind a row of chairs and pulled Monk down with him.

Darcy Whitehall sat rigid, eyes wide open, looking right at me as I dived behind the counter, toppling trays of food and bottles of liquor.

I crash-landed on the tile floor.

And waited.

It would be wrong to call the bomb a dud, because it succeeded in scaring hell out of us. Still, it wasn’t much of an explosion. Just a muffled pop, like a firecracker going off beneath a pillow. Then came a flash and a hiss and a lot of smoke. It stunk up the place and stung my eyes, but that was as bad as it got.

I stood up behind the counter, wiping bits of shrimp and sushi off my clothes. The greenish splatter of remoulade sauce complemented all the other stains on my T-shirt. I smelled like bad rum. Wasn’t the first time.

Darcy Whitehall sat in the chair. He looked shaken but hadn’t stirred.

“You OK?” I said.

He nodded.

The bottom was blown out of the chair. Pieces of cardboard lay scattered around the skybox, along with fragments of plastic and bits of wire.

I stepped around the counter and started to pull the Kevlar blanket off Whitehall.

“Hold it!” shouted Kilgore. He sprung up from the floor, Monk at his side. “There might be a secondary. Just hang tight. Don’t let him move.”

Whitehall blew out air, exasperated.

“Well, if I must continue sitting in this bloody thing . . .” He looked at me. “Did you destroy all the liquor in your mad leap for cover?”

“Think there might be a few bottles left back there.”

“Then would you mind fetching me a tumbler of scotch?”

Kilgore turned on him.

“I don’t think drinking is a good idea. Not at a time like this.”

“On the contrary,” said Whitehall, “it’s a splendid time. It appears that I am still breathing air. Less than a minute ago, I had my doubts.”

Kilgore let it slide, but he didn’t like it.

I went behind the counter and poured Whitehall three fingers of Johnny Walker. I delivered it to him and watched as he finished two fingers of it on the first pull. Monk stood beside us, edgy, ready to get out of there.

Kilgore was with Syzmeski, who sat hunched up in her Kevlar suit behind a row of chairs. The guy who had been kneeling beside Whitehall was with her. The others in the unit were moving back inside the skybox.

Syzmeski looked mad enough to spit nails.

“Just a box of fucking squibs,” she said. “Some asshole . . .”

“You OK to eyeball it?” Kilgore said.

“Yeah, I’m good,” Syzmeski said.

She got down on her back and slid under Whitehall’s chair.

“Nothing here,” she said. “Looks clean.”

“OK then people, let’s shit and git,” said Kilgore. He slung the blanket off Whitehall and helped him to his feet.

The other bomb-squad guys fell aside as Kilgore led Whitehall out the skybox door. Monk and I followed them into the hallway.

A cop was standing by the elevator, holding the door open and waving us to get on.

“We got another couple hours of work up here, picking up the pieces, trying to figure out what the hell this is all about,” said Kilgore. “We’re going to have lots of questions for you.”

“I daresay I won’t have many answers, but I will cooperate
in whatever way I can,” said Whitehall. “Meantime, I can’t thank you enough for your service.”

He raised the tumbler of scotch and gave Kilgore a crooked smile.

“Cheers, Captain,” he said.

Kilgore tilted his head.

“Back at ya,” he said.

The three of us stepped onto the elevator. The door closed behind us. We all exhaled at once. Then came one of those long, awkward elevator moments when no one says anything. The elevator started heading down.

Darcy Whitehall drained his scotch. He smacked his lips.

He said, “I knew the bastards were bluffing.”

“And what bastards would those be?” said Barbara.

“I don’t know. The elevator doors opened and it was a madhouse with the cops and everything. I had about two minutes with Monk before we found you, and then they were gone.”

It was long after dark. Barbara and I were on the road and heading back to my place. It’s a two-hour drive from Gainesville to LaDonna, a big chunk of it on a dismal stretch through the Ocala National Forest, where the most common forms of wildlife are rednecks in pickups foraging for beer.