My pulse started to race. “Where was this?”
“Within the flight path radius. Town of Pine Ridge, New Hampshire. Forty miles away, like I said.”
89.
“We’re in the wrong place,” I said.
“What makes you so sure?”
“His phone’s probably in there. But he’s not. This is a diversion, maybe even a setup.”
“How so?”
“He knows Navrozov is trying to shut him down. Maybe he wants to lure Navrozov’s guys to the wrong site to conceal his true whereabouts.” I took the handset from the dash-mounted radio, pressed the communicator button, and said, “Break-Zulu One, this is Victor Eight.”
“Nick, what are you doing?” Diana said.
“We need to stand down,” I said to her. “And head north.”
The SWAT team leader’s voice came over the speaker, crisp and loud: “Go ahead, Victor Eight.”
“Zulu One, I have some new intel I need to pass to you. What’s your location for a meet?”
Diana stared, aghast.
A pause. “Say again, Victor Eight?”
“Zulu One, I have urgent intel I need to pass on. Request a meet ASAP. How copy?”
“That’s a negative, Victor Eight,” the voice came back.
But I wasn’t going to give up. “Zulu One, urgently request meeting.”
The team leader’s voice came back immediately: “Received, Victor Eight, and that’s a negative. Get off the radio. Out.”
I shrugged, replaced the handset on the hook.
“Wow, Nick,” Diana said. “Just… wow.”
“What?”
“We’re about to launch an assault.”
“Which means that the FBI’s best people are tied up forty miles away while our guy finishes the job. Come on, let’s go.”
“I can’t just leave the scene, you know that. You don’t leave your position without permission.”
“They don’t need you here. You’re a spectator. This is a waste of your time and your talents.”
She looked agonized, wracked with indecision.
“Come on,” I said, opening the Suburban’s door.
“Heller!”
“Sorry,” I said, getting out.
“Nick, wait.”
I turned back.
“Don’t do it, Nick. Not by yourself.”
For a moment I looked at her: those amazing green eyes, the crazy hair. I felt something inside me tighten. “I’ve got to go,” I said.
“Don’t, Nick.”
I gently pushed the door closed.
90.
The walk back to the parking lot where I’d left my car, a mile away, was arduous and slow, along narrow country roads and then a heavily trafficked highway. The rain had become a downpour of biblical proportions. By the time I reached the Defender, my clothes were soaked through, even despite the rain slicker.
Then I cranked the heat all the way up and headed north toward Pine Ridge. Dusk rapidly turned into night, and still the rain didn’t let up.
Three hundred and twenty days a year the Land Rover was an overpowered beast, a curiosity, an M1 Abrams tank in the city streets. That night, the driving treacherous, it was king of the road. I passed countless beached cars, washed up along the side of the road, their drivers waiting out the storm.
About fifteen minutes after I’d set out, Diana called.
“They found a body.”
“Any ID?” I asked.
“Yes. The name is Kirill Chuzhoi. In the U.S. on a green card, residing in East Rutherford, New Jersey. Born in Moscow. He’s on the payroll of Roman Navrozov’s holding company, RosInvest.”
“And in his pocket you found a knockoff Nokia cell phone,” I said.
“Right. Probably Zhukov’s.”
“No, more likely his own phone, with Zhukov’s SIM card inside.”
“Huh?”
“He knew if he put his SIM card in the other guy’s phone, his phone number would pop up in your search and you’d think you finally found him. And he was right.”
“I don’t get it. Why not just swap phones?”
“Look, the guy’s smart. He didn’t want to take the chance that Chuzhoi’s phone had some sort of tracking software encoded in it. Now, can you send me a photo of the body?”
“Hold on,” she said. A minute or so later she got back on. “You should have it now.”
I put the call on hold, looked at my e-mail, and found the picture.
The bogus legal attaché from the Brazilian consulate. The one who’d killed the drug dealer at the FBI office in Boston. Roman Navrozov had probably sent him to make sure Mauricio Perreira didn’t give up any information that might tie him to Alexa’s abduction.
When I got back on the call, I told Diana, “Send this picture to Gordon Snyder, okay?”
“Why?”
“Because it ties Navrozov to the murder at FBI headquarters.”
“Got it. Will do.”
“Where are you now?” I said.
“Headed back to the staging area. You?”
“Twenty-two miles away. But the driving is really slow. Can you get the team redeployed up here?”
“Where?”
I read off the GPS coordinates.
“Is that the exact location where you think he is?”
“No. That’s the center of the town of Pine Ridge. Which covers thirty-five square miles.”
“What makes you so sure you have the right place?”
“I’m not sure. Dorothy’s cross-checking property records against Google Earth satellite views.”
“Looking for what?”
“Land that’s big enough and private enough. Multiple points of egress. Unoccupied, abandoned, foreclosed, whatever. Absentee owner goes to the top of the list.”
“What about utility bills?”
“We don’t have your resources. We’re sort of running blind here. So try to get SWAT up here as soon as possible.”
“I’ll do my best,” she said. “See you up there.”
“I hope so.”
A minute or so after I hung up, I had an idea. I reached Dorothy on her cell. “Can you get me the home number of the chief of police in Pine Ridge?” I said.
91.
“Oh, believe me,” the police chief’s wife said, “you’re not interrupting dinner. Walter’s out there sandbagging, and I don’t know when to expect him home. They’re all out there, the part-timers and every volunteer they can rustle up. It’s a mess. The river’s swollen and there’s mudslides just all over the place. Can I help you with anything?”
“Think he can use one more volunteer?” I said.
“Head out there.”
“What’s his cell phone?”
Chief Walter Nowitzki answered on the first ring.
“Chief,” I said, “I’m sorry to bother you during such a difficult time, but I’m calling about one of your officers-”
“That’s gonna have to wait,” he said. “I’m up to my neck in alligators here.”
“It’s about Jason Kent. He was on your force, reported as a homicide?”
“Who’s this?” he said sharply.
“FBI,” I said. “CJIS.”
He knew the jargon. Any cop would. CJIS was the FBI’s Criminal Justice Information Services Division, which maintained the central NCIC database of all reported crimes.
“How can I help you?”
“You reported this as a 908, a premeditated homicide on a police officer, and I was following up on that.”
“All right, I-you know, this is probably not the best time to talk, we’ve got some real bad flooding up here in New Hampshire and we’ve got people stuck in their cars and the river’s swelling its banks, and-”
“Understood,” I replied. “But this is a matter of some urgency. We’ve got a homicide in Massachusetts that seems to fit some of the basic parameters of the one you reported, so if you could answer just a couple of real quick questions…”
“Let me get into my vehicle so’s I can hear you. Can’t even hear myself think out here.”