Up-to-date blueprints of Hampton Manor were easily obtained from the Old Brooking Planning Commission since, several years back, blueprints were filed for the major reconstruction to the West Wing of the mansion to house Adam Hampton II. The Assassin spent over three hours poring over the prints, looking for the weak spots. The first was a narrow shaft between two bedrooms on the second floor that dropped down to a space behind the control room in the West Wing. It could be accessed from a panel in the wall of a closet in one of the bedrooms. The interior of the shaft was one foot wide and two feet long with an eight inch diameter pipe in the center. More than enough space remained to lower a Nitrex package into the wing. The oxygen and nitrogen tanks, known to be stored nearby, would assure that the wing would be an inferno within minutes.
The search for a second bomb site took longer and required some ingenuity on the Assassin’s part. It would have to be a Pyro/Nitrex bomb that would create enough heat to ignite wood, plastic and some metals on contact. To work best it needed to be placed near the East Wing somewhere between the front and back doors so the conflagration would spread quickly through the main living space and the East Wing, simultaneously. No obvious location was evident on the prints. Out of frustration he tossed the highlighter he was using down onto his desk, knocking over a half filled Styrofoam cup and sending a stream of black coffee down onto the blueprints of the first floor. He grabbed a napkin and began sopping up the coffee. As he did he noticed that the spill ended at the bottom of the broad staircase leading up to the second floor. It was as if providence was pointing at the answer to his dilemma. Of course, that’s it. There has to be a space under the staircase. That would make a perfect location, but why isn’t a door or panel shown anywhere on the prints? I’ll have to check on that.
Two days later, in the guise of a reporter from an Architectural magazine, the Assassin was given permission to roam about Hampton Manor to take photographs. He located the panel on the second floor and the entrance to the space under staircase. He had was sufficient time to plant the Nitrex devices he had stored in his backpack. A late night visit to the Old Brooking Water District’s pumping station and the abandoned warehouse completed the preliminaries of his plan.
He needed the Hamptons to be together, preferably, after dark. There was always more confusion at nighttime fires. This required an inside contact to alert him when the father and son were together in the West Wing. Ten thousand dollars bought him that contact in the person of Neil Gilbert a young Registered Nurse employed by Adam Hampton. All that was left to do was to wait for the right opportunity. Hopefully that won’t be too long.
He took a room in a rundown motel at the edge of town. It was a perfect location for what he had in mind. From there it would take only minutes to be within the range of the remote detonator that would destroy the pumping station and set off the warehouse fire. Ten minutes later he could be driving past Hampton Manor where a press of the last button would finish the job for which he would be paid a cool one million dollars.
Chapter 29
Lauren sat on a box in the storage area of her house. Packing was not going well. She started two days ago but has made little progress. There were too many memories attached to the items she picked up. At this rate it’ll take me a week to pack. I’ve got to stop reminiscing about everything I touch. Hell, half of this crap should go in the trash can. I think I’m going to have to go by the rule that if I haven’t used it in the past three months, or plan to use it in the next three, it goes to the poor or out in the trash. That should help move things along.
With her new resolve she emptied the storage room within two hours and returned to the kitchen for a glass of wine. Daniel walked into the kitchen just as Lauren was ready to uncork the bottle.
“When did you get back?”
“Just a few minutes ago. I was at my lawyer’s office signing the last of the contracts. Everything is on schedule. We’re free to go. That is if I can get you to finish up here. Hell I had all my stuff packed two days ago. You’re still days away.”
“I’m sorry it’s taking so long, Daniel, but I am making progress. I just finished going through the storage room.”
“That’s great. How can I help?”
“Actually, I think you can help. I made a decision that will help me weed through everything faster. I’m going to build a big pile of things I’m not going to take. You could go through it and separate what is good enough for Goodwill and what has to be trashed. That will help me a lot.”
“At your service, ma’am. I’ll get a box of large trash bags and build some cartons. I’ll be ready to go in about five minutes.”
Lauren uncorked the bottle and poured him a glass. “Sit and have a glass of wine with me, first.”
“Don’t mind if I do,” he said as he pulled up a chair. “You know, if you wanted to, I could get someone in to pack everything up and you can go through the boxes at your leisure up in Westfield. They’d mark what is in each box so if you really needed something, you’d be able to locate it quickly. It would relieve a lot of pressure on you. We have lots of space up there to store the boxes until you can get around to unpacking them.”
“That’s a very tempting offer, Daniel, but I wouldn’t want to have a stack of boxes piled up reminding me that I had to go through them. I only want to take the things that can be used when we get there. We’ll probably have to move only twenty or thirty percent of this stuff. I just have to concentrate on the job at hand.”
“Okay, but the offer is open in case you change your mind. It would allow us to move sooner and that ain’t all bad.”
Lauren sat back in her chair and gazed up at the ceiling. A pensive expression appeared on her face as her mind abandoned the mundane chores at hand and traveled to a deeper place.
“You look like you have something on your mind besides moving. Am I right?”
“Yes, but it’s nothing I can talk about.” There’s no way I can tell him what I‘m planning. I can‘t believe that I’ve stooped so low as to play by Adam Hampton’s rules, but I don’t feel that I have any alternative. She answered, “You know how sometimes you have to do something even though it goes against everything in your nature. It’s like that.”
Daniel thought for a moment about what she said. Man, if she knew what I did, she’d be very disappointed in me. This is one secret that I best take to the grave. I led her to believe that I was taking everything in stride, but I couldn’t sit idly by while that man undermines my livelihood. “I think I understand what you’re talking about. I’ve had to do some things in my life that I’m not very proud of, but, as you said, sometimes there is no way out. The decision is often taken out of our hands.”
“I’m glad you understand. I don’t ever want to have this discussion with you again. I just want us to get on with our lives.”
He raised his glass in a solemn toast, “Here’s to secrets, best left untold.”
Chapter 30
Bert Wilson was slow in responding to Kane’s question. “I don’t know how to advise you. I know it’s been a week since we got word about the SEC investigation, but the wheels of government move slowly. They either have a case and are being careful to dot all the ‘i’s’ and cross all the ‘t’s’ or they can’t find anything and are trying to find a way to justify having spent tens of thousands of dollars of the taxpayer’s money on a wild goose chase. Either way, my contacts tell me that a statement is due out tomorrow morning. We’ll just have to wait until then.”