P Deutermann - The Cat Dancers

“But Kenny said-”

“That’s what you said Sergeant Cox said, Lieutenant. And even that was ambiguous and spoken in a dying delirium. You said so yourself.”

He sat back in his chair. The room suddenly seemed uncommonly warm.

“So you sent Annie the E-mail?”

“From inside your office, yes. From your computer, actually.”

“And you planted that bomb?”

“No. The man with me planted the bomb; while I was inside with your judge, gaining access to her home computer, and from that, the judicial network.”

“Fuck that- you killed Annie Bellamy.”

“She killed herself, Lieutenant. And didn’t I overhear you tell her to come over once everyone left? Maybe you killed her, Lieutenant.”

He felt a wave of cold rage sweep through him. He could take her. Scream at her like that big cat and leap across the room, bat that pea-shooter out of her hands and then take her lying little head right off. If he attacked her the shepherds would join in. One of them would get her. She read the sudden murderous blaze in his eyes and raised the cell phone.

“If I press send, she dies,” she said calmly. He sank down in his chair. “Back to your part of the deal, Lieutenant. Here it is in a nutshell: You must not testify. That’s the long and the short of it. When we’re convinced that you are honoring your agreement, we will release your pretty little park ranger.”

“How long will that take?”

She didn’t answer him. He recalled what Computer Crimes had said about the video images. “I think you’re lying,” he said. “I think she’s already dead.”

“Shall I hit the ‘send’ button, then?” she asked. “Although it’s not as if there will be a big boom heard halfway across town.”

He hesitated. She lowered the phone. “For our part, the executions will stop. We will even leave the feral cats alone. You simply refuse to testify.”

“McLain won’t buy that,” he said. “The Bureau will pursue this forever.”

“We’ll take our chances with McLain,” she said. “We might know him and what he will do with this better than you do, if their E-mail is any indication. They’ve been arguing with the ATF ever since the bombing as to the true nature of what’s been going on, but even they can’t ignore the fact that everything continues to point back to you. But if you go silent, and we go silent, they have every incentive to quit looking, don’t they, not to mention that’s what Washington wants, too.”

Cam thought she was wrong about that, but this wasn’t the time to argue. “So the real deal is, I take a dive, Mary Ellen goes free, and you guys get away with it?”

“What we did was mete out justice, Lieutenant-justice as propagated by the old gods, not the politically correct ones. And besides, it won’t be that obvious, this ‘dive’ of yours. Remember, you are the evidence. If you don’t talk, everyone’s case goes dim.”

“What about what I’ve already told them?”

“If necessary, you recant. You’re no longer sure. Those were stressful situations-you may have been mistaken.”

He wasn’t sure of what to say. He’d sat right here in this house and debriefed Bobby Lee and the DA, so in a sense, he’d already testified. But she might not know that. Or did she? Had they gone back to their offices and put it all into a computer report? Which she could have read? On the other hand, what was to stop the sheriff from reopening the whole thing once they got Mary Ellen back? They had some candidates. He decided that he needed to play along right now.

“Even if they didn’t come after me,” he said, “I’ll still have to get out. Retire.”

“Yes, you probably will, but that’s better than being shot with a hunting rifle through your kitchen window one night, isn’t it? You were a military sniper scout? You know how easy that would be to do, yes?”

He remembered the case of the abortion clinic doctor and tried to blank out that unpleasant image.

“Think of it this way, Lieutenant: For now, you will have succeeded-You will have put us all out of business.” She looked at her watch. “I have a plane to catch.” She put the cell phone on the coffee table. “This phone has a speed-dial feature. Selection zero one activates the chair. Zero two disables the chair. Don’t get them confused.”

She looked at her watch again. “In two hours, not before, and using this phone, select zero three. You will then get voice mail. Say yes and hang up. Wait five minutes; then select zero two.”

“Why not speed-dial zero two right now?”

“Because you hold half the key, Lieutenant. Until the other half is called in, all keys turn the chair on. So, do it our way, please.”

Still in shock at what she’d laid out for him, he nodded slowly. She went through it one more time.

“When do we get her back?”

She again ignored his question. “I’m going to leave now,” she said. “What I have done to you can be undone. Or made even more interesting, should we feel the need for it. I can do it to the sheriff, too. I can build an incriminating coil of ones and zeros around anyone who has a connection to the computer world, which in America, of course, is anyone of consequence. We are inside the law-enforcement system, Lieutenant, and in case you missed it, that’s a system that is getting stronger by the day. Never forget that.”

He stared straight ahead while she walked out of the room. The dogs watched her go and then looked over at Cam.

“I think I’m fucked, guys,” he said.

An hour and a half later, he was back downtown in the sheriff’s executive office. The precious cell phone lay on the sheriff’s desk. Cam’s watch lay next to it, its timer counting down the minutes.

The only outsider there when Cam got in was Mike Pierce of the SBI. Cam had described his little tryst with Jay-Kay. The sheriff wanted to get a line on her immediately, but Cam talked him out of it. “Let’s do the drill, get the ranger back, and then we can chase the bad guys,” he said. Mike Pierce had the scan report Jay-Kay had given them. He highlighted the numbers for the pay phones and went to get some help to access Cam’s phone records to see if it was true that Jay-Kay had implicated him.

Cam stared down at the cell phone after Mike left. “I have one big problem with all this cell phone shit,” he said.

“What’s that?”

“She said all three speed buttons would turn the chair on until I make that other call.” He looked over at the sheriff. “What if that’s still true after I make that call? Or when I make the ‘yes’ call? What if this is all bullshit and I end up sending the signal that kills Mary Ellen?”

The sheriff frowned, and Cam realized that he looked older and grayer than when this mess had begun. “I’ll do it, if you’d like,” the sheriff said. “You’ll have to say the words, but I’ll punch the buttons. I’ve got the SWAT team standing by, and the ops center is ready to trace the numbers that come up in the window.”

Cam sighed and slumped in his chair. “She’s got me boxed, Sheriff,” he said. “With your support, I can probably avoid a federal prosecution, but if I don’t testify, I’m finished in law enforcement.”

The sheriff didn’t say anything. He did check the watch, which was ticking away on his desk.

“Where’s McLain and his tactical team?” Cam asked.

“Don’t know,” the sheriff said.

Mike Pierce came back into the room, clutching the report. He closed the door and sat down. “Please confirm your home phone number, Lieutenant,” he said. Cam gave it to him. Mike scanned the report and nodded.

“You guys didn’t go through all the data, right? You read her executive summary and conclusions?”