Reynolds found herself nodding in agreement. “Maybe.The Outer Banks has thousands of beach houses where one could hide.”
Connie suddenly looked less hopeful. “Thousands of beach houses,” he muttered.
“Well, the first thing you can do is call the Bureau’s airline liaison and find out what flights run out of Norfolk for the Outer Banks. And we have some times to work with. Their flight was scheduled to get into Norfolk at noon. I don’t see them cooling their heels any longer than necessary at a public place, so the flight out had to be relatively close to noon or so. Maybe one of the commuters has regular service. We already checked with the major airlines. They didn’t reserve with any of them out of Norfolk.”
Connie picked up the car phone and placed the call. It didn’t take long before they got an answer.
Connie’s features looked hopeful again. “You’re not going to believe this, but there’s only one commuter service to the Outer Banks from Norfolk International.”
Reynolds smiled broadly and shook her head. “Finally, some luck in this damn case. Talk to me.”
“Tarheel Airways. They fly out of Norfolk to five places in Carolina: Kill Devil Hills, Manteo, Ocracoke, Hatteras and a place called Pine Island, near Duck. There’re no regular departures. You call ahead and the plane is waiting for you.”
Reynolds spread open the map and scanned it. “Okay, there are Hatteras and Ocracoke. They’re the farthest south.” She put a finger on the map. “Kill Devil Hills is here. Manteo south of that. And Duck is here, to the north.”
Connie looked at where she was pointing. “I’ve been down there on vacation. You cross the bridge over the sound and head north for Duck. South for Kill Devil. They’re fairly equidistant from each other at that point.”
“So what do you think? North or south?”
“Well, if they were going to North Carolina, it was probably at Lockhart’s prompting.” Reynolds looked at him curiously. “Because Adams took the map,” Connie explained. “If he knew the area, he wouldn’t have done that.”
“Nice, Sherlock, what else?”
“Well, Lockhart has some serious money. One look at her house in McLean will tell you that. If I were her, I’d have a safe house under my phony name in case the roof caved in.”
“But we’re still at square one: north or south?”
They sat there stewing over this until Reynolds suddenly slapped her forehead. “God, how stupid. Connie, if you have to call Tarheel to arrange for a flight, our answer’s right there.”
Connie’s eyes grew wide. “Damn, talk about blind.” He picked up the phone, got the number for Tarheel and placed the call, relaying the date and approximate time and the name Suzanne Blake.
He hung up and looked at her. “A reservation for two people with Tarheel was made by our Ms. Blake two days ago to fly out of Norfolk around two P.M. They were pissed because she never showed. They normally take a credit card, but she’d flown with them before, and so they just took her on her word.”
“And their destination?”
“Pine Island.”
Reynolds couldn’t help but smile. “God, Connie, we might actually pull this off.”
Connie put the car in gear. “Only bad thing is, I don’t rate one of the Bureau’s planes. We’re stuck with the old Crown Vic here. I figure six hours or so, not counting stops.” He checked his watch. “With stops, that’ll put us there about one in the morning.”
“I’m not supposed to leave the area.”
“Bureau Rule Number One: You can go anywhere so long as you have your guardian angel along.”
Reynolds looked troubled. “What do you think about calling in reinforcements?”
He eyed her quizzically. “Well, I guess we could call Massey and Fisher and let them take all the credit.”
Reynolds suddenly smiled. “Give me a minute to call home and then let’s roll.”
It had taken Lee many agonizing hours, but he had finally tracked down Renee. Her mother had flatly refused to give him her phone number at college, but in a series of calls to the admissions office, among others, Lee had lied, begged and threatened until the number had been given up. It figured. He hadn’t called his daughter for a long time, and when he did, it had to be for something like this. Boy, she was really going to cherish her old man now.
Renee’s roommate at UVA swore on her grave that Renee had left for class accompanied by two members of the football team, one of whom she was dating. After telling the young woman who he was and leaving a number for Renee to call, Lee had hung up the phone and then gotten the telephone number for the Albermarle County Sheriff’s office. He talked his way to a deputy sheriff and told the woman that someone had made threats against Renee Adams, a student at UVA. Would they please send someone to check on her? The woman asked questions that Lee could not answer, including wanting to know who the hell he was.
Just check the latest most-wanted list,
he wanted to tell her. Sick with worry, he tried his best to impress upon her the sincerity of what he was saying. Then he hung up and stared down at the digital missive once more: “Renee for Faith,” he slowly said to himself.
“What?”
He jerked around and stared at Faith, there on the stairs, her eyes wide, her mouth open.
“Lee, what is it?”
Lee was out of ideas at the moment. He simply held up the phone for Faith, his face an anguished mess.
She looked at the message and then stared at him. “We have to call the police.”
“She’s okay, I just talked to her roommate. And I called the police. Somebody’s blowing smoke at us. Trying to spook us.”
“You don’t know that.”
“You’re right, I don’t,” he said miserably.
“Are you going to call the number back?”
“That’s probably what they want me to do.”
“You mean so they can trace the call? Can you trace a cellular call?”
“It’s possible, if you have the right equipment. Phone carriers have to be able to trace a cell call to determine the location of a 911 caller. It uses a time difference of arrival method by measuring signal distances between cell towers and kicks out a string of possible locations. . . . Shit, my daughter’s head might be in the guillotine and I sound like a damn walking science magazine.”
“But not an exact location.”
“No, at least I don’t think so. It’s not as precise as satellite positioning, that’s for certain. But who the hell really knows? Some geeky asshole invents some new piece of shit every second that rips away a little bit more of your privacy. I know, my ex-wife married one.”
“You should call, Lee.”
“And what the hell am I supposed to say? They want to trade you for her.”
She put one hand on his shoulder, rubbed his neck and then leaned against him. “Call them. And then we’ll see what we can do. Nothing is going to happen to your daughter.”
He looked at her. “You can’t guarantee that.”
“I
can
guarantee that I will do everything I can to make sure she’s not harmed.”
“Including walking into their hands?”
“If it comes to that, yes. I’m not going to let an innocent person get hurt because of me.”
Lee slumped back against the couch. “I’m supposed to be so good under pressure too and I can’t even think straight.”
“Call them,” Faith said very firmly.
Lee took a long breath and punched in the numbers. With Faith sitting beside him and listening in, they waited as the phone rang once and then was answered.
“Mr. Adams?” Lee didn’t recognize the voice. It had a mechanical quality to it, making him think it was being altered somehow. It sounded inhuman enough to make his skin tingle with absolute dread.
“This is Lee Adams.”
“Nice of you to leave your cell phone number at your apartment. It made contacting you much more convenient.”
“I just checked on my daughter. She’s fine. And the cops are on the scene. So your little kidnapping plan—”
“I have no need to kidnap your daughter, Mr. Adams.”
“Then I’m not sure why I’m talking to you.”
“You needn’t abduct someone to kill her. Your daughter can be eliminated today, tomorrow, next month, next year. While going to class, lacrosse practice, driving on holiday, even while she’s sleeping. Her bed is right next to a window, first floor. She often stays late at the library. It couldn’t be easier, really.”
“You sick bastard! You sonofabitch!” Lee looked like he wanted to break the phone in two.
Faith gripped his shoulders, trying to calm him down.
The voice continued with irritating calm. “Histrionics won’t help your daughter. Where is Faith Lockhart, Mr. Adams? That’s all we want. Give her up and all your problems go away.”
“And I’m supposed to just accept that as gospel?”
“You really don’t have a choice.”
“How do you know I’ve even got the woman?”
“Do you want your daughter to die?”
“But Lockhart got away.”
“Fine, next week you can bury Renee.”
Faith jerked at Lee’s arm and pointed at the phone.
“Wait, wait!” Lee said. “Okay, okay, if I have Faith, what do you propose?”
“A meeting.”
“She’s not going to come voluntarily.”
“I don’t really care how you get her there. That’s your responsibility. We’ll be waiting.”
“And you’ll just let me walk away?”
“Drop her off and drive away. We’ll take care of the rest. You don’t interest us.”
“Where?”
Lee was given an address outside of Washington, D.C., on the Maryland side. He knew it well: very isolated.
“I have to drive it. And the cops are everywhere. I need a few days.”
“Tomorrow night. Twelve sharp.”
“Dammit, that’s not a lot of time.”
“Then I suggest you start right now.”
“Listen, if you lay a hand on my daughter, I’ll find you, somehow I will. I swear it. First I’ll break every bone in your body, and then I’ll really hurt you.”
“Mr. Adams, consider yourself the luckiest human being on the face of the earth that we don’t see you as a threat. And do yourself a favor: When you walk away don’t ever, ever look back. You won’t turn to salt, but it still won’t be pretty.” The line went dead.
Lee put the phone down. For a few minutes he and Faith just sat there without speaking. “Now what do we do?” Lee finally managed to say.
“Danny said he’d be here as soon as he could.”
“Great. I’ve got a deadline: tomorrow, midnight.”
“If Danny’s not here in time we’ll drive to the place they gave you. But first we’ll call in some reinforcements.”
“Like who, the FBI?” Faith nodded. “Faith, I’m not sure we could explain all this to the Feds in one year, much less one day.”
“It’s all we have, Lee. If Danny gets here in time and has a better plan, so be it. Otherwise I’ll call Agent Reynolds. She’ll help us. I’ll make it work.” She squeezed his arm. “Nothing is going to happen to your daughter. I promise.”
Lee gripped her hand, hoping with all his heart that the woman was right.
Buchanan had a number of meetings on Capitol Hill scheduled for the early evening, pitching to an audience that didn’t want to receive his message. It was like throwing a ball at a wave. It would either be kicked back in your face or lost at sea. Well, today was the end. No more.
His car dropped him off near the Capitol. He went up the front steps and over to the Senate side of the building, where he climbed the broad staircase to the second floor, which was mostly restricted space, and continued to the third floor, where people could freely wander.
Buchanan knew he was being followed by more people now. While there were lots of dark suits around, he had trekked these halls long enough to sense who should be here as opposed to those who looked out of place. He assumed they were the FBI and Thornhill’s men. After the encounter in the car, the Frog would have deployed more resources. Good. Buchanan smiled. He would, from now on, refer to the CIA man as the Frog. Spies liked code names. And he couldn’t think of a more appropriate one for Thornhill. Buchanan just hoped that his stinger was potent enough, and that the Frog’s shiny, inviting back wouldn’t prove too slippery.
The door was the first one a person would come to upon reaching the third floor and turning left. A middle-aged man in a suit stood next to it. There was no brass plate to identify whose office this was. Right next door was the office of Franklin Graham, the Senate sergeant-at-arms. The sergeant-at-arms was the Senate’s principal law enforcement, administrative support and protocol officer. Graham was a good friend of Buchanan’s.
“Good to see you, Danny,” the man in the suit said.
“Hello, Phil, how’s that back of yours?”
“Doc says I should have the surgery.”
“Listen to me, don’t let them cut you. When you’re feeling the pain, have a nice, pleasing shot of Scotch, sing a song at the top of your lungs and then make love to your wife.”
“Drinking, dancing and loving—sounds like good advice to me,” Phil said.
“What’d you expect from an Irishman?”
Phil laughed. “You’re a good man, Danny Buchanan.”
“You know why I’m here?”
Phil nodded. “Mr. Graham told me. You can go right in.”
He unlocked the door and Buchanan passed through, and then Phil closed the door and stood guard. He didn’t notice the two pairs of people who had idly watched this exchange.
The agents reasonably figured they could wait for Buchanan to come out and then take up their surveillance once more. They were on the third floor, after all. It wasn’t like the man could fly away.
Inside the room, Buchanan grabbed a raincoat off the hook on the wall. Lucky for him it was drizzly outside. There was also a yellow hard hat on another wall hook. He slipped this on as well. Then he pulled Coke-bottle glasses and work gloves from his briefcase. At least from a distance, with his briefcase under the raincoat, he would change from lobbyist to laborer.