Дэвид Балдаччи - Walk the Wire

“Daddy’s perfect little girl,” said Decker.

“What?”

“I told Caroline before that that’s what I think her dad saw in her. She said there was no such thing.”

“Well,” said Southern. “I think she’s right about that.”

“So Dawson killed his rival and then shot himself. At least that part of the case is closed.”

After Jamison said this she glanced at her partner. She was driving them back to the hotel.

“Decker, did you hear me?”

Decker didn’t comment.

“And once again this has nothing to do with the ticking time bomb,” she added. “We’re still at square zero there.”

“Not quite.”

“What do you mean?” she shot back. “Are you holding out on me? I hate when you do that. I am your partner. I bet Robie doesn’t hold out on Jessica Reel.”

“I’m not holding out on you. I’m just thinking.”

“Of what?”

Decker closed his eyes and downloaded a memory. “Speaking of the ticking time bomb, remember what she told us Cramer said? ‘To maybe not grow our own food’?”

“Wait a minute, who said that?”

“Judith White. Cramer advised her not to grow food on her land. That’s what she told us when we interviewed her.”

“That’s right, she did,” Jamison said. “Wait a minute, their farm is right next to the Air Force facility. Are you thinking...?”

Decker didn’t answer right away because another memory came to him. It was something Daniels had said. And it was perhaps even more ominous than Cramer’s comment.

“Let’s drive out to the Brothers’ place again.”

“Why?”

“Just humor me, Alex.”

“Okay, but you don’t make it easy,” she snapped.

“Since when have I ever been easy?”

“Well, you could make an effort every once in a while.”

Jamison cut a sharp U-turn and headed off in the opposite direction.

Forty minutes later they pulled to a stop in front of the metal farm gate that was the main entrance to the Brothers’ Colony. The gate was now closed.

Jamison put the SUV in park and said, “Okay, now what?”

Decker got out and started to look around. Jamison followed him.

“What are we looking for?”

He stared across the acres of farmland. “They’ve been here a while, right? The Brothers, I mean.”

“You know they have.”

“I mean at this location.”

Jamison looked uncertain. “Well, from the looks of things they’ve been here a few years. It would take at least that long to build all this up to what we’re seeing today.”

Decker continued to watch as twin John Deere tractors moved slowly across a field far in the distance. Beyond that was the Air Force station.

“I think you’re right about that.”

“But why is the amount of time they’ve been here important?”

“It’s just a theory,” he said absently.

“Can you explain your theory,” she said curtly.

He didn’t answer. Decker headed back to the SUV, and she followed, not looking happy.

“This can’t be right,” he said, stopping at the vehicle’s passenger door.

“What can’t be?”

“If it were on the Air Force property,” he began, but now Jamison saw what he was getting at and leapt ahead of him.

“The biochemical weapons. No one could get to them if they were on the Air Force property. Meaning they must be on the land they auctioned off.”

“Right. But I don’t see how they could be on the Brothers’ land. I mean how could anyone hoping to get to the WMDs go there without them knowing?” He paused and his confused look deepened. “But why else would Cramer have mentioned to Judith White not to eat the crops they were growing there.”

“Meaning she thought if the weapons were buried they might have leached out and contaminated the soil?”

“Exactly.”

Realization grew across Jamison’s features. “But, Decker, part of the auctioned land was leased. The Brothers don’t control it.”

He shot her a look. “The frackers. Come on!”

They ran to the SUV and jumped in.

After they had driven for a bit, Jamison pulled off next to the land occupied by the All-American Energy Company drilling site.

“Got your binoculars?” Decker asked.

She pulled the optics from the console and handed them across.

Decker focused the binoculars and surveyed the site. Then he looked in the distance at the adjacent Air Force station, and the ground in between.

After about a minute she said, “See anything interesting?”

“It’s more what I’m not seeing.”

“What?” she said.

“There’s nobody working the site. It’s empty. I wonder if they’ve finished fracking it?”

“Let me see.”

She slowly surveyed the property and then lowered the binoculars. “But if they’ve finished fracking, why isn’t there a gas flare on the vent pipe sticking up over there? Remember, I noticed that before and you called it a miracle. And I don’t see any rig pumping the oil up like the other sites have, either.”

“We need to ask an expert. And I know just the person.”

They skidded to a stop at the oil rig that Stan Baker was staging and jumped out of the SUV.

They hustled up to the trailer. Decker didn’t bother knocking, he just burst in with Jamison right behind.

Baker was seated in front of the computer terminals. He whirled around to stare at them. “Hey, what are you two doing here?”

“The All-American Energy Company?” said Decker.

“What about them?”

“There’s nobody working the site.”

“What do you mean?”

“There’s nobody there. No trucks, no people, no activity.”

“Decker thought they might have finished fracking the site, but we couldn’t be sure,” said Jamison. “So we came to see you, since you’re the expert.”

Baker shook his head. “They couldn’t have finished fracking that well. They haven’t been there long enough. They haven’t even been drilling that long, so they couldn’t have gotten down all that far.”

“Stan, how come McClellan didn’t get the rights to that parcel of land? He’s got most all the other ones around here.”

“I heard scuttlebutt that All-American kept bidding the price up to where it got crazy. Like two or three times what it was worth. I guess McClellan just thought those boys didn’t know what the hell they were doing.”

“I think they knew exactly what they were doing,” said Decker ominously.

Jamison said, “And they have one of those vent pipes like we’ve seen around, but there’s no lit flare coming off it.”

“A vent pipe!” Baker looked puzzled. “No way they could be having gas coming up at this stage.”

Decker suddenly flinched. “How far could they have gone down by now?”

“If I had to guess, I’d say no more than a couple hundred feet.”

“That’s what I was afraid you might say.”

“Afraid? Why?”

Decker looked at Jamison. “I think we just found our ticking time bomb.”

When they reached the fenced-in area at the All-American Energy Company, Decker jumped out of the SUV and tried to open the gate. It was locked.

He climbed back into the vehicle.

“Ram it, Alex,” he ordered.

“Are you—”

“Just do it. We’re out of time.”

Baker, who was in the back seat, curled his fingers around his armrest and looked nervously at his brother-in-law.

Jamison gunned the motor, put it in drive, and slammed her foot down on the gas pedal. The big SUV leapt forward and smashed through the gates.

They leapt out, with Decker leading the way to the trailer. The door was locked.