‘Sorry, buddy. Have to be super careful with these calls. I’ve got a real ball buster commanding the marine platoon that came to back us up. Doesn’t want me talking to anyone. Gotta keep everything on the down low.’
‘Understood.’
‘What do you have for me?’
‘Found your scientist in Boston.’
‘She as cute as her picture?’ Jason asked.
Having overheard the comment, Brooke looked expectantly at Flaherty with raised eyebrows.
‘Eh,’ Flaherty said in a minimalist tone.
She hit him in the arm and he smiled to let her know he was teasing.
‘Actually, she’s in the car with me,’ he explained.
‘Oh,’ Jason said in a confused tone. ‘Okay …’
‘So let me put you on speaker. That work for you?’
‘Sure.’
Once the introductions were over with, Flaherty said, ‘Like I said in my text message, Brooke was there in 2003. Part of an excavation team that studied that cave you uncovered. She deciphered an ancient language … some writings found on a wall.’
‘There were also picture engravings,’ Brooke added.
‘I’ve seen the writing,’ Jason confirmed. ‘The pictures, too … carved into the left wall of the entry tunnel.’
‘That’s them,’ she said. ‘Beautiful, aren’t they?’
‘Um. What does it all mean?’
‘It’s a bit complicated. But it’s the earliest recorded specimen of ancient Mesopotamian mythology … a story about a woman who came from another land.’ At this point, having almost been murdered, she was comfortable with throwing her confidentiality agreement to the wind.
‘The woman who was decapitated?’ Jason asked.
‘That’s the one.’
‘Why did they kill her?’ Jason asked.
‘The story implies that many people died shortly after her arrival. Similar to a colonial witch hunt, I suppose,’ Brooke guessed. ‘She was different, came from a faraway place. They didn’t understand her.’
‘And they blamed her for the deaths,’ Jason said.
‘Absolutely.’
There was another pause, and Brooke knew that Jason was trying to understand the military’s interest in this archaeological discovery. He was incredibly intuitive in sifting for the devil in the details.
‘What was her name?’
‘Actually, it wasn’t specified in the writings I studied.’ Evil didn’t really need a name, she thought.
Flaherty jumped in, anxious to get to the juicy facts. ‘Hey, Jason, you’re not going to believe who brought Brooke and the other scientists over there, all expenses paid …’
Brooke gave him a thumbs-up.
Flaherty recapped Brooke’s story. He explained her role in the excavation sponsored by none other than the US military - the tight security protocols; the mysterious facilitator known only as ‘Frank’. Jason had plenty of probing questions, most of which Flaherty fielded, with Brooke occasionally chiming in for clarification. Jason focused mostly on Brooke’s recollection of the cave’s layout.
‘Brooke, you only saw the first leg of the tunnel?’ Jason clarified.
‘That’s right.’
Flaherty felt a tug on his sleeve. When he looked over, Brooke held up the BlackBerry and tapped on the USAMRIID logo. Then she pointed to the phone and mouthed, ‘Tell him.’
‘I’m afraid it gets even stranger,’ Flaherty warned. ‘It wasn’t just the military that watched over the excavation. Seems the guys at USAMRIID were involved too.’
‘What? You mean the biochem guys?’
‘Yeah.’
A pause.
‘Any idea what the connection might be?’ Jason finally asked.
‘No,’ Brooke said. ‘Sorry.’
‘Brooke didn’t see anyone suited up in Hazmat gear,’ Flaherty added. ‘So I don’t think there is any hazardous material in there.’
‘All right,’ Jason said. ‘We’re prepping a recon bot to send into the cave. I’ve got enough surprises to worry about.’
Flaherty wanted to ask Jason if the quarry was still trapped in the cave, but ruled against it. Jason sending a bot into the cave did, after all, provide indirect confirmation that the hunt was still under way. ‘I’m afraid there’s something else. Something you should definitely be concerned about.’
‘Great,’ he said. ‘Hit me.’
‘Right after I spoke to Brooke, some guy with a gun came after her. Tried to kill her.’
‘Christ,’ he groaned in frustration.
‘Yeah, we barely got out of there alive,’ Flaherty said. He painted a quick picture of the incident that took place outside the museum.
‘That’s too much of a coincidence for my taste,’ Jason said.
‘Not sure who the gunman was … or who might have sent him,’ Flaherty said. ‘But Brooke offered a good suggestion. Seems USAMRIID sent out some samples for processing. If our guys can dig through USAMRIID’s records, we might find out what they were studying … and who ordered the tests.’
‘Smart thinking. Look, Tommy, you two need to keep safe until we figure out what’s going on here.’
‘I know. I’m taking Brooke to the office now,’ Flaherty said. ‘You watch over your shoulder too.’
‘Will do,’ Jason said. ‘You’re in good hands, Brooke. Nice talking with you.’
‘Thanks,’ she said.
‘Gotta go,’ Jason said. ‘I’ll be in touch shortly.’
The line went dead.
Flaherty pocketed the phone.
‘Sounds like a clever fellow,’ Brooke said.
‘If only you knew,’ Flaherty said. In the rearview mirror, the angular headlights swooped in from behind - the vehicle a mere shadow through the rear window’s crackled glass. Checking the side mirror, he saw a Hyundai sedan was putt-putting along in the fast lane, about three car lengths back. Then the vehicle tailing him made another abrupt manoeuvre and eclipsed the Hyundai. The silver Ford Explorer had returned, and for the first time, Flaherty glimpsed the driver’s silhouette. When he finally discerned the driver’s narrow face and big ears, his heart jumped into his throat.
‘Red light!’ Brooke yelled, throwing both hands on to the dashboard. Instead of slowing, Agent Flaherty stomped on the accelerator and blew through the intersection. He nearly clipped a green and white taxi that was cutting along Belvidere Street. The taxi slid to a stop in the busy crosswalk outside Prudential Center’s south exit.
‘Just hold tight,’ he said. In the mirror, he saw the Ford Explorer weave erratically around the taxi and shoot forward in pursuit.
‘Are you crazy! What are you—!’
‘That’s him in the Explorer … behind us.’
She turned to get a look. ‘Oh my God…’ she gasped. ‘Does this thing have airbags?’ she nervously asked, staying low in the seat.
He didn’t reply, and focused on the traffic up ahead. A meandering canary-yellow duck boat chugged along the centre lane, splitting between a bus in the slow lane and a car easing to queue for a left turn where signboards pointed to Prudential Center’s underground parking lot.
Flaherty’s anxiety spiked. ‘Come on …
come on!
‘ he yelled at the half boat, half truck.
‘You can’t stop!’
‘I know …’
He considered an evasive U-turn along the wide avenue, but the traffic coming in the opposite direction was too thick and allowed no adequate opening.
Any hope of making a right on to Garrison was instantly dashed as the bus eased to a stop with its right blinker on, waiting for pedestrians to cross the side street. The Chrysler Concorde’s front bumper practically kissed the duck boat’s rear as Flaherty angled around the bus. The rowdy tourists on board the modified WWII amphibious troop carrier began quacking loudly, just like they’d been told by the driver at the tour’s inception. Having been cheated of a full tour, thanks to the frozen Charles River, their pent-up energy was now fully directed at Flaherty’s Concorde. Under better circumstances, Flaherty might have thought the scene comical.
An aggressively driven taxi slipped in behind him, one step ahead of the Explorer. Flaherty expected the Explorer to move in behind the taxi, but it didn’t. His eyes darted back to the road. The next opportunity to make a turn would come on Harcourt Street, just ahead on the right. However, he could see that that walkway was also clogged with pedestrians.
‘Shit,’ he growled. Staying the course towards the bottleneck at Copley Square was a losing proposition.
‘Look out!’ Brooke yelled, pointing out his side window.
Flaherty turned just as the Explorer swerved into the centre lane and forced the duck boat to fall back with a dissenting blow of its air horn. The Explorer’s passenger window was already down and Flaherty glimpsed the assassin steadying the gun for a clear shot.
‘Down!’ Flaherty yelled. He ducked low and jammed on the accelerator just as the assassin fired a triple shot. The rounds blew Flaherty’s window into a thousand pieces. Luckily, Brooke had already squirmed down on to the floor, because the slugs that would have cut through her neck instead pounded through the door handle on the passenger-side door.
Flaherty popped up again.
The assassin nearly slammed into a bus that stopped abruptly in the centre lane, but made a hard turn that put the Explorer directly behind the Concorde, in the same spot the alarmed taxi driver had abandoned a split second earlier.
As Flaherty was about to pass under the enclosed pedestrian bridge that connected Prudential Center to the Copley Place shopping mall he saw nothing but taillights flashing red all the way to the split for Stuart Street. Worse yet, the bus had boxed him in on the left. Even steering up on to the crowded sidewalk and mowing a path through pedestrians would only get him so far.
If the assassin did manage to push him into the gridlock, things would get very ugly very fast. That left only one possibility - to outrun the Explorer; the worst possible scenario.
‘Here we go,’ he grimly warned Brooke.
Crouched low, Brooke saw the narrow pedestrian bridge sweep overhead, just before Flaherty cut a hard right that threw her up against his legs hard enough to make her see stars.
The Concorde careened through a line of garbage-can-sized orange construction barricades, giving the Explorer the split second needed to close the gap. The assassin drove full speed into the Concorde’s rear, shattering plastic and snarling metal. The trajectory of the impact nearly sent the Explorer into a spin, but did little to stymie the Concorde’s forward advance. The assassin righted the wheel and got the Explorer back on track.
The roadway fed into a wide tunnel with tiled walls and began a sharp descent beneath Copley Place. The Concorde’s tyres squealed as Flaherty steered into the bend.
Brooke was disoriented by what little she could see: ceiling tiles and lights. ‘You turned into a garage? What—?’
‘Not a garage. I’m taking a shortcut to the Mass Pike.’
‘Shortcut?’ That’s when she realized what he meant. ‘You’re going down into the tunnel?’
He nodded.
She’d driven this ramp many times - a main exit for Interstate 90, which the ambitious Big Dig had diverted through massive tunnels snaked deep below the city centre. Problem being that she knew the traffic flow only went
up
. ‘This tunnel is a one-way exit! You’re going the wrong—’
‘I know! I know …’ He checked the mirror and could see the Explorer’s headlights skimming the curved wall behind him. ‘The ramp’s closed for construction. It’s okay.’
But up ahead, where the ramp merged at a Y, he spotted a contradiction to what he’d just told her - a hulking utility truck mounted with bright lights and workers in hardhats repairing tiles in the tunnel ceiling.
Not okay, he thought
.
The truck was at a standstill in the centre of the roadway with barely any room to spare to its right. But there was no stopping now, thought Flaherty.
He punched the accelerator and leaned on the horn.
Seeing the headlights racing towards them, the befuddled workmen barely had time to react. They hit the deck and grabbed hold of the safety rail that looped around the truck’s platform, fully anticipating a violent collision. One brave worker vaulted the rail and dropped clumsily to the roadway before scurrying out of view.
Flaherty gripped the wheel at ten to two, pulled slightly to the right to aim for the narrow opening. He winced on the approach and clenched his teeth.
The wide-bodied Concorde slipped cleanly through the gap with inches to spare on either side. But not fifteen metres ahead, a second truck blocked his lane. Flaherty corrected the wheel hard to the left and slalomed around the truck, so close that the passenger-side rearview mirror sheared off with a loud clack.
His heart was in overdrive and adrenaline had all his senses buzzing. And knowing that the most dangerous leg of this obstacle course still lay ahead only added to his anxiety.
In his remaining side mirror he saw the Explorer bob and weave to avoid the second truck. But the assassin’s slight miscalculation ground the Explorer’s metal side panels along the tunnel wall with a showering plume of orange sparks. It cost the assassin precious seconds, but he quickly resumed the chase.