Julie hesitated, sensitive to every deviation from the norm.
Agent Ford looked puzzled, his shoulders hunched over in the downpour. “What?” he asked.
“The trunk is jammed?” Julie asked, gripping the handle of her suitcase tighter than necessary.
Agent Ford opened his palms. “Mrs. Bracco, is there a reason you’re acting this way?” He showed her an embarrassed smile. “I could give you the phone number of my kindergarten teacher, she’d vouch for me.”
Julie realized she was overdoing it. Too many years married to a cynical FBI agent. She managed a tight grin. “I’m sorry, Agent Ford. I’m a little tense, that’s all.”
She tossed her suitcase in the backseat and slid in beside it. Agent Ford shut the door and hurried into the driver’s seat. Pulling his hands over his scalp, he squeezed the moisture from his hair. Looking over his shoulder he said, “Ready?”
Julie nodded. She looked back at her home, getting smaller as the car drove away, and wondered what kind of world she occupied. Her own residence was no longer considered safe.
It was almost ten o’clock and Nick was working his last group of mobsters. They stood with their arms folded, taking in the information with nods and smiles. A hit man’s dream come true, Nick thought. The government was not only sanctioning their occupation, but they were actually getting targets to choose from.
The fax machine rang to life and Walt pulled out the first page. Everyone stopped to see his reaction. Walt scanned the sheet and looked up. “Ohio,” he said, leaving out the emotion. “They left a garbage can full of Semtex in front of an apartment building in Cleveland. No one noticed it. It killed twelve, including three kids.” He crumpled the paper into a tight ball and tossed it into the trash.
The room remained silent for a few dreary moments. Grown men looking at each other with sorrowful eyes. Suddenly, the unethical cloud that hung over the assortment of criminals and policemen seemed to lift. Opposite sides of the law began to merge like in-laws for a family crisis. Nick made eye contact with Don Silkari and the both of them shook their heads at each other in disbelief of what was happening to them. To their country. Their homes.
Finally, Sal broke the silence. He cemented the accord with a sentiment that connected every man in the room. “Kids,” he said, with a mouthful of disdain. “The bastards are killing our kids.”
Dutton’s cell phone chirped. He answered, spoke a couple of brief words and hung up. “We’ve got a lead,” he said. He looked at Sal with something approaching a grin and said, “Let’s go do something with it.”
Julie looked at her watch. It was ten thirty and the rain was slapping the windshield so hard visibility was a chore. She’d made little conversation with Agent Ford. This seemed to suit the man since he made no attempt at small talk. Julie spent her time gazing out of her window as residential streets turned into tree-lined corridors. She’d lived in Maryland all of her life, but wasn’t familiar with the roads she’d seen tonight.
“Just out of curiosity,” she said, “where exactly are we going?”
Agent Ford kept his attention on the obscure dashes in the middle of the road. “Someplace where you will be safe.”
“How far away is it?”
Agent Ford sighed. “Not much longer.”
He was evasive, which was typical for an FBI agent, but he seemed to get edgier with every question she asked. The deeper into the wilderness they got, the less cordial he became.
There was a faint knock from under her seat. It sounded like a tire had flung a rock into the undercarriage of the car. She listened intently for a few minutes, but there was nothing more.
There were very few cars on the road and it disquieted her, although she wasn’t sure why. The car slowed as Agent Ford appeared to be searching for a marker of some sort, peering back and forth as if he’d become lost.
“Can I help you find something?” she asked.
Agent Ford ignored her, maintaining a hyperactive inspection of his surroundings.
Then, the knock again. This time it seemed to come from behind her.
“Did you hear that noise?” she asked.
Agent Ford sounded annoyed. “No, I don’t hear anything.”
Again a thump sounded, only louder this time. “That noise,” she said. “You can’t hear it?”
Agent Ford made eye contact with her through the rearview mirror. It was a look that forced her into a quick breath.
Another loud thump sent her nerves into overdrive. It wasn’t the thump that unnerved her as much as the reaction from the FBI Agent driving the car. He seemed annoyed, as if Julie was causing the noise.
“Certainly you heard that,” she insisted.
“Yes,” he said with a perfunctory nod.
“What do you think it is?”
“I know what it is,” he said. But he stopped there.
Why was he being so coy?
It dawned on her that she was locked in the backseat of an FBI vehicle. Which meant she was locked inside the car without any means of escape. The man was leering at her now through the mirror. This was not the way an agent treated another agent’s wife. Something was very wrong.
There was one way to find out if her worst fears were being realized. “Listen,” she said, “I… uh, what was your first name again?”
A hesitation, then, “Wesley.”
“Wesley,” she continued casually, as if she hadn’t caught the misnomer, “is there something wrong with the car?”
He mumbled something about a wheel bearing, but she didn’t hear a word. Instead, she heard her husband’s voice telling her the Agent’s real first name. William. Her world seemed to stop. She thought about Nick, about how they would never get to have a child together. How she’d never be a mother and watch her husband push their kids on the swing in the backyard, as promised. Nick was going to leave the Bureau and they would be safe, and everything was going to be all right. But not anymore and she knew it.
When her eyes met the stranger’s again in the rearview mirror, she thought she saw uncertainty. He wasn’t sure whether she had made him or not. She remembered something that Nick had told her years ago, when they were still dating. He was worried about her teaching in a public school in a rough section of the city. If she was ever in a situation where she was about to become a victim, strike the first blow. An attacker is never prepared for a woman to be aggressive. It sets them back. She thought it was peculiar advice from a law enforcer. She’d always read the best method of survival was to acquiesce.
But Nick was used to dealing with a different type of criminal, and she had a feeling it was exactly the sort of assailant she was dealing with now.
She stealthily removed her belt and re-looped it in front of her, low and out of sight. She slid her cell phone from her purse and glimpsed down at it just long enough to see where the redial button was, then quickly returned her attention to her driver. She knew Nick was the last person she had called and she was sufficiently frightened enough to call him back.
When her thumb pressed down on the redial button, the tiniest of beeps sounded. The man swiveled his head, saw the device in her hand, and snatched it from her with adroit swiftness. He rolled down the window, tossed it out, and shut the window.
“You’re not supposed to be using that thing. It could be traced,” the man said, searching her face for a reaction.
The banging became louder. Before she could think about what she was saying, she asked, “What in the world is that noise, really?”
He heaved a reluctant sigh. She thought she saw relief on his face. “It’s Agent Ford. He’s locked in the trunk.” The man shrugged, “I guess he’s no longer unconscious.”