Chapter 24
Marcus's phone vibrated with a loud rumble against the wood of the nightstand. He rose from the hotel room bed and slid it out of the leather holster, pressing the answer button and lifting it to his ear.
“Yeah,” He said, sleep still in his voice.
“Marcus,” Hilde’s voice said, “we just got a warrant for Farrah’s place.”
“Excellent.” He glanced at Lonnie and gave a nod. “Where are you?”
“FBI office right now, but we’re headed out immediately.”
“I’m at the hotel with Lonnie. I’ll meet you at the house.”
“I’ll let the agents know you’re coming.”
Marcus disconnected the phone call. Lonnie sat up on the edge of the hotel room bed. Her swollen joints felt as though they had rusted overnight. In the twenty-some hours since Brassert’s attack, her bruised muscles and joints had grown increasingly achy, as if she had done a heavy workout after taking a long break. That discomfort was, of course, heaped on top of her stiff back and round belly. And there was no relief in sight, the pain the doctor had said she could not take any kind of pain medication or anti-inflammatory as it would be likely to endanger the child.
“I am so sick of being pregnant,” she declared.
“It’ll all be over soon honey.” Marcus said. “And you’ll be holding the little one on the outside instead of the inside.”
Her face reddened with the strain as she rose from the bed. She let out a puff of breath once she was upright. She scratched at the wound across the front of her throat. The ER doctor had sprayed it with Liquid Stitches, a hypoallergenic adhesive that bound the skin together for healing. With a little makeup it was almost invisible, a lot better than real stitches.
“God, I wish the delivery was today.”
“Well, let’s make sure the loaf is fully cooked before we take it out of the oven.”
“Huh?” She looked at him quizzically. “Are you comparing our baby to bread? What are you, some kind of closet goblin?”
Marcus grinned at her.
“I will admit,” he said, “I like the taste of your flesh.”
Lonnie put her hands on her back and stretched. Then she crossed the room with an exaggerated waddle and called out in a tired-old-woman voice. “Here I am, your sex slave.”
“If we didn’t need to go…”
“Yeah, right,” Lonnie said. “I am afraid the other night was the last time for a while.”
They moved toward the door, and Marcus gave her a serious look.
“Maybe you should stay here instead of coming to Farrah’s house.”
“Why?”
“For your safety,” he said. “I don’t want you getting hurt again.”
“I don’t think anything is going to happen,” she replied. “Besides, Brassert found me here in the first place. I’d feel a lot safer being with you as my backup.”
She used police talk and a strong voice to sound brave, but Lonnie really was afraid of being alone. The incident with Brassert had shaken her. Before her pregnancy, it was different — she ran into danger as part of her daily workload. She was never afraid. But now, with the baby in her belly, her instincts had shifted. Self-preservation became the sole driving factor — not her own preservation, but that of the new life in her womb. Since seeing the images on the ultrasound, the child had become even more real. The baby’s movement. Its limbs and fingers and toes. The shape of its face, the tiny nub of a nose, the thumb stuck in its mouth. The child was alive, truly and completely alive.
“All right then,” Marcus said. “Let’s get going. But don’t try to get involved if anything happens.”
“Don’t worry.”
Thirty minutes later, they pulled up to a large collection Buick Roadmasters and a dozen State Trooper and Anchorage Police Department cruisers. Marcus searched for a place to park the F250. “Looks like a car lot for a police surplus auction.”
A large utility truck marked SERT in big white letters on the side was parked among them. One of the Special Emergency Reaction Team members stood at the rear door of the van. Lonnie quickly recognized the unmistakable body shape of Trooper Corporal Harland, who had recently been transferred from her detachment in Fairbanks to the headquarters detachment in Anchorage.
At five feet, four inches tall, the fifteen-year veteran weighed over two hundred and ten pounds, but was by no means fat. Harland had been a competitive power lifter in college and was built like a battleship. Unlike the modern sleek and fast models who were mostly untested in combat he was more like one of the old-school iron ships, the kind that were built thick and scary and could take a dozen hits and still make it back to port to get resupplied and back out to the fight. Harland also had a troll-like face that could frighten a Rottweiler. In spite of his intimidating appearance, Lonnie knew him as a really nice guy with a wife and twin teenaged daughters.
“Hey, Harland,” Lonnie said. “How's big-city life treating you?”
“Fine, Lieutenant.” He gave her a slight nod and glanced over at Marcus with a similar greeting. His heavy voice sounded like he ate gravel for breakfast every morning. “To be honest, though, I'd rather be back in Fairbanks, ma'am,” he said. “Being around this big city just ain't my cup of tea. Lots more SERT action down here with all the meth labs and pot grows out toward the valley so duty time is okay, but I think I'm becoming more of a homebody as I get older. My daughters didn't take this move so well — sucks to be thirteen and have to move to a new school.”
“I imagine so,” she said.
“You'll be learning that kind of stuff a bit more yourself in a few years now,” he replied, gesturing at her belly. “Unless, of course, you retire when you hit your twenty. Then the kid might be spared a lot of it.”
“I'm not as close as you are, but that's the plan,” Lonnie said as she and Marcus moved toward the house. An APD officer stopped Marcus and Lonnie and checked credentials before allowing them to enter the yard which was cordoned off with police tape and several officers guarding the approaches. As they drew near several of the SERT team came out of the house, faces obscured by black masks, helmets, and goggles. They wore MP-5 sub-machine guns slung over their shoulders in a tactical posture. Marcus thought they looked more like commandos than cops, and wasn't sure if he liked the idea of that role for police officers. Mike crossed the lawn toward them, his face twisted with a pensive look.
“They’re gone,” he said. “Packed up and split.”
“Anything left behind?” Lonnie asked.
“It’s pretty clean so far.”
Hilde poked her head out from the front door of the house and signaled for them to come in. The trio stepped onto the porch, Marcus helping Lonnie as she struggled up the steps. They entered the house and found Caufield and several other agents standing in the large formal dining room looking at a piece of paper on the table. The SAC glanced up as they came in.
“Any of you read Arabic?”
“I do,” Marcus replied. “I was a linguist in the Marines.”
“Take a look at this and tell me what it says.”
Marcus came into the room and glanced down at the paper. Across its surface in neat lines flowed the waves and curls of handwritten script.
“This isn’t Arabic.”
“It’s not?” said Caufield. “What is it, then?”
Hilde’s cell phone rang. She walked away from the group as Marcus explained his statement.
“It's Farsi script.”
“Farsi?”
“The language of the Persians,” Marcus said. “Iran.”
“Huh,” Caufield grunted. “What does it say?”
“I’m not fluent in Farsi itself,” Marcus replied. “But this is actually English.”