James PATTERSON - Cross Fire

So when Brent Forster, one of the college interns, interrupted her train of thought for the umpteenth time that day, it was everything Colleen could do not to bite his head off and eat it whole.

“Hey, Coll? You want to take a look at this? It’s real interesting. Coll?”

“Unless something’s on fire, just deal with it,” she snapped at College Boy.

“Then let’s say something’s on fire,” he said.

She had to swivel only halfway around to take a look over his shoulder – one of the very few advantages of working in a teeny-tiny office.

An e-mail was up on his screen. The sender was a jayson.wexler@georgetown.edu, and the subject line was “Foxes in the Henhouse.”

“I don’t have time for spam, Brent. Not now, not ever. What is this?”

The young intern rolled his chair out of her way. “Just read it, Coll.”

to the people of dc – theres foxes in the henhouse. they come at night when no ones looking and take what dont belong to them. then they get fat on what they took while too many others go hungry and get sick and sometimes even die. theres only one way to deal with foxes. you dont negoshiate and you dont try to understand them. you wait until they come around where your hiding and then you put a bullet in their brain. studies show that dead foxes are 100 percent less likely to rip you off, ha-ha. vinton pilkey dlouhy downey are all just a start. theres plenty more foxes where they came from. they are in our government, our media, our schools, churches, armed services, on wall street, you name it. and their ruining this country. can anyone really say their not? to all the foxes out there, hear this. we are coming for you. we will hunt you down and kill you before you can do any more damage than you already done. change your ways now or pay the price. god bless the united states of america! signed, a patriot

Colleen pushed back fast from the computer. “‘A patriot’? Is this for real?”

“Funny you should ask,” College Boy said, and pulled up a second e-mail. “Well, not funny, really, but – check it out.”

p.s. to the true press – you can tell the dc police this is no joke. we have left a fingerprint on the lion statue in the law enforsement memorial, near d street. it will match what they found before.

Colleen swiveled back around to her own desk.

“Do you want me to call the police?” College Boy asked.

“No, I’ll do it. You call the printers. Tell them we’re going to be a day or two late, and I’m going to want to run twenty thousand copies this time, plus another thousand of last week’s issue to tide us over.”

“Twenty thousand?”

“That’s right. And if any of the vendors ask, tell them it’ll be worth the wait,” she said. For the first time that day, Colleen was smiling. “They’re all going to be eating a little better this week.”

AS SOON AS we got word on the True Press e-mails, I called in an old contact at the Bureau’s Cyber Unit, Anjali Patel. She and I had worked together before on the DCAK case, and I knew she could hold her own under pressure.

A short while later, Anjali and I showed up at the paper’s office, a single donated room at a church on E Street.

“You can’t stop us from printing this!”

That was the first thing Colleen Brophy said when we introduced ourselves. Ms. Brophy, the paper’s editor, just kept hammering away on her keyboard while we stood there, with three other staff members jammed into the tiny space between us.

“Who was the first person to open those e-mails?” I asked the room.

“That’d be me.” A scruffy college-aged kid raised his hand. His T-shirt said PEACE, JUSTICE, AND BEER. “I’m Brent Forster,” he added.

“Brent, meet Agent Patel. She’s your new best friend,” I said. “She’s going to take a look at your computer. Right now.” I’d worked with Patel enough to know she could hold down this end on her own.

“And, Ms. Brophy?” I said, holding the door open to the hall. “Could we talk outside, please?”

She got up then, begrudgingly enough, and took a pack of smokes off her desk. I followed her down to the end of the hall, where she opened a window and lit up.

“If we can make this quick, I’ve really got a full plate today,” she said.

“No doubt,” I told her. “But now that you have your scoop, I’m going to need some cooperation on this. This is a murder case.”

“Of course,” she said, as if she hadn’t made us feel about as welcome as an outbreak of herpes so far. A lot of homeless people – and by extension their advocates – tend to see the police as more obstacle than ally. I got that but thought, Tough.

“There’s not much to tell,” she offered. “We got the e-mails a few hours ago. Assuming they’re not from this Wexler kid, I have no idea who sent them.”

“Understood,” I said, “but whoever it was, they just did your paper a huge favor, wouldn’t you say? I wonder if there might be some connection you can help us with?”

“They’ve also got a pretty good point to make, wouldn’t you say?”

She reminded me of my FBI friend Ned Mahoney, with the rapid-fire speech and hyperactive hands. I’d never seen anyone smoke so fast either. Not Ned – Brophy.

“I hope you’re not going to turn these guys into some kind of heroes,” I told her.

“Give me a little credit,” she said. “I’ve got a master’s from Columbia Journalism. Besides, they don’t need us to turn them into anything. They’re already famous, and they’re already heroes – with anyone who has the guts to admit it.”

My pulse took a step up. “I’m surprised to hear you talk this way. Four people are dead. These punks aren’t any heroes.”

“Do you know how many people die of exposure on the streets every year?” she said. “Or because they can’t afford prescription meds, much less a trip to the doctor? These victims of yours could have made a lot of other people’s lives better instead of worse, Detective, but they didn’t. They looked out for themselves, period. I’m no fan of vigilante justice, but I do like poetry – and this is just a little bit poetic, don’t you think?”

She may have been defensive, but she definitely wasn’t stupid. This case could easily turn into a PR nightmare, for exactly the reasons she was describing. Still, I wasn’t here to debate. I had my own agenda.

“I’m going to need a list of all your vendors, advertisers, donors, and staff,” I told her.

“That’s not going to happen,” she said right away.

“I’m afraid so. We can wait for the U.S. attorney to process the affidavit, and then for the judge to sign off on a subpoena, and the officer to get it over here. Or I can be out of your hair in about five minutes. Didn’t you say something about having a full plate?”

She gave me a glare as she twisted the last of her cigarette ash out the window and pocketed the butt. “It’s not like most of these people have regular addresses,” she said. “You’re never going to find them all.”

I shrugged. “All the more reason I have to get started right away.”

I STEPPED OUTSIDE of the churchyard about fifteen minutes later and saw a whole throng of press parked up and down the block.

Then I saw Max Siegel. His back anyway.

He was talking to a dozen or more reporters, blocking the sidewalk and running his mouth.

“Our Cyber Unit’s tracking every possible channel,” he was saying as I came up closer, “but we’re inclined to believe what this appears to be, which is a case of a stolen laptop.”

“Excuse me, Agent Siegel?” He and everyone else turned, until I had a face full of microphones and cameras. “Could I have a word, please?”