David Dun - The Black Silent

Now he moved back to the right and circled behind the house, remaining inside a small patch of trees. On the back patio stood two barbecues and flower boxes with a multitude of plants in full color, maintained by hired help. It would be impossible to completely verify that no one was watching.

They would have to take a chance.

Sam motioned to stay low and led Haley as quickly as his leg would allow over the last open ground between them and the house.

Frick had the safecracker back at work on the wall safe in Ben's office. He had regained his composure and now felt calm and confident. When they had the safe open, it would become simple. With Ben's research in hand, he'd be free to find and kill Ben Anderson

— still difficult, but doable-and that would end the matter.

The safe expert had electronic listening devices splayed across the metal surface.

Numbers had been flashing across a laptop on the desk for at least ten minutes. As Frick watched, the man slowly turned the dial through the sequence for the twentieth time.

Suddenly the numbers on the computer stopped at eighty-seven.

"Uh-huh." The safecracker turned the handle and the safe opened.

Inside stood a handmade sign: Fools rush in where angels dare to tread.

As the technician leaned in, an explosion sent sticky black soot everywhere. The technician took the main force of the blast, covered by a harmless but nasty substance.

Frick was largely unscathed, but that was little comfort. They had bet everything on the escrow; if Ben had fudged that, the research would be in the wall safe.

The safe held nothing else, and the clock was ticking on Frick's life.

This time Rossitter contacted him by phone. Sanker wondered if he had the new shoes on yet.

"We haven't located Ben. Neither has Frick."

"What does Judas say?" Sanker felt as if he'd already had a bellyful of uncertainty.

"He says he doesn't know."

"Has he got his hands on the formula?" Sanker asked.

"Not yet. He says there's only one place and he has to get there. He's not even sure about that."

"Where does he think it is?"

"Like before, he said that's not part of our deal," Rossitter said.

"It's our deal for him to deliver it as a backup."

"He says as long as we have Frick trying, we don't need the backup. He says he'll tell us, though, the minute he has it."

"I have a question," Sanker said, pondering even as he spoke.

"What's that?"

"Are we sure that Judas is a he and not a she?"

There was a long pause. Obviously this hadn't occurred to Rossitter.

"It's a male voice, disguised, but still male. You're thinking Judas could be more than one person?"

"There are a number of possibilities. How do we know for sure that Judas is even a Judas?"

"He told us what Anderson was planning," Rossitter said, while still not sounding certain.

"Judas could be a man, woman, or a group," the old man began. "He could be working both sides, like a double agent, ours and American Bayou's. And Ben Anderson could have been afraid we'd find out he was leaving, anyway, so he devised some kind of test and he's playing us. Keep in mind, the information may not always be true. Remember Judas learns things from us just as we learn from him. Judas could be working with Frick, American Bayou, or some other third party. Who is feeding who, here?"

"I still think it's as it appears. Judas wants money, and we're the biggest source."

"You're right, I suppose, if it's all true. You tell him next time he calls that we demand to know Ben Anderson's whereabouts. Even the manner of his response may tell us something."

"I'll do that. For now, I recommend that we stick with the plan."

"Do we have a choice?" Sanker sounded as irritated as he felt. He wanted to be proactive, not reactive, and he couldn't find a way to get complete control and drive events. It was an unaccustomed subservience to history in the making.

Sanker clicked the receiver in Rossitter's ear without saying good-bye in order to signal his dissatisfaction.

Rossitter was typically good under pressure. Maybe he would come up with something.

Twenty minutes later, Frick sat in a small grove of Douglas fir and watched the undersheriff, Roy Knauff, through the branches. In preparing for the weekend, Frick had made a special point of learning the undersheriff's likely whereabouts. The undersheriff, Frick discovered, was tight with his cousin, an electrical contractor on the island. Sure enough, Frick's hired man had followed the undersheriff to his cousin's house and he was here kicking back just as his man had promised.

Meanwhile, Frick had the department working on a new front. They were close to obtaining a search warrant for a safe-deposit box that Ben Anderson rented. Anderson's secretary, Sarah James, had told Frick about the box when she called looking for Anderson. He doubted the search would be fruitful. She had given up the story a little too easily.

There was no cell signal at the undersheriff's cousin's place, here on Wescott Bay. The pager would work, but the undersheriff's was broken. Frick had seen to that. The dispatcher had left a message on the undersheriff's cell and sent someone around to the undersheriff's place. Frick knew it was only a question of time before the undersheriff called in or the dispatcher found him, so he had to work fast. He had known all along that if the papers weren't where they were supposed to be, things would unravel and he would need to handle the undersheriff. When the time was right, Frick wanted to be the one to tell him about Crew's murder.

Through the window of the house, a pretty redhead was laughing and the undersheriff was giving her his undivided attention. Had to be the cousin's wife. In Frick's world no man ever paid that much attention to his own wife. While he watched them, he used an encoded police radio to call Khan, who'd arrived shortly before Frick left. Khan had set up base in the Sanker conference room.

"Khan."

"What have our eggheads found?" Frick asked.

"I'm no scientist. Your guy McStott calls it a lot of basic genetic research. Probably not what you're after. Then again, it stands to reason, though, that a man can't completely cover his tracks. We have mounds of paper and printouts from his office and lab, and McStott says he's piecing it together. But nothing exactly on point."

"We have this weekend," Frick said. "That's it. By Monday this place will be raining state cops and feds. Chase is not going to sit still. He must know people."

"We're trying to pull it together."

Frick clicked off. Khan and McStott didn't seem to get it. Mounds of irrelevant paperwork was Ben Anderson covering his tracks to perfection.

Frick would need to improvise. He called the Strope man he had at Ben Anderson's place.

"Seen anything?"

"I was about to call you. Someone just got here. I saw a faint light go on inside the house. Earlier I saw movement outside."

"Who is it?"

"They must've come on foot-sneaking. It's got to be them."

"If they try to leave, stop 'em any way you can. I don't care if you shoot Robert Chase, but don't kill Haley Walther."

"I'm not looking to kill anybody."

"Do your damn job. They're dangerous fugitives, for God's sake."

Frick dialed the undersheriff's cousin, on a satellite phone watching through the window as the redhead started at the sound of the house phone.

"May I speak with the undersheriff, please."

He could see the man take the phone.

"Hello?"

"We have a situation," Frick began. He told him his version of the whole story.

"The guy who used to be in the wheelchair shot Crew?"

"Yeah. But you know he's not in a wheelchair now. The wheelchair was a fraud all along. I don't think he was ever hurt at all."