"Atlanta. You'll be disembarked at CDC headquarters and taken to Govind's lab." She stretched her index finger toward the body bags. "In those."
Carl looked at Doctor Saleh. "What then?"
"Then you're no longer my problem, and Govind owes me a very large favor."
Chapter 31
February 9th, 8:22 AM EST; Homeland Security Nebraska Avenue Complex, WMD Division; Washington, D.C.
Emile Frank's direct line rang. The caller ID read "White House." The FBI had been hounding him for days for his source on the nuclear-weapons tip, and he was tired of hiding behind "need to know." Suppressing a sigh, he picked up the phone and put it to his ear. "Doctor Frank."
"Hi, Emile," said the pleasant male voice on the other end. "This is Trubb. Or is it Palenti? I don't remember which one I am."
Emile went cold. He kept his voice neutral. "You're on a secure line?"
"Duh," Paul Renner replied.
"What can I do for you, Mister Renner?"
"What you can do is give me every piece of information you have involving your research on heroin addiction."
"And why would I do that, Mister Renner?"
"Because if you don't, I'm going to kill you. And call me Paul."
Emile paused. "You might find that more difficult than you think, Mister Renner."
"Oh, please," Renner said. "I know where you live, where you work, what you drive, and I have your travel itinerary for the next two months. Do you honestly believe that the extra security you have lurking around your house is going to stop me?"
Emile closed his eyes. "So my choice is life in prison or you kill me? I think I'll take my chances."
"I have no interest in ruining you," Renner said. "I don't care what happens to you one way or another."
"Then why would you want the research?"
"It doesn't matter." Renner's voice was tense.
"Yes," Emile said, "it does. It matters a lot. So either you're going to tell me, or this conversation is over."
Silence. Emile began to sweat.
"Mister Renner?"
Paul Renner's voice was flat. "My father was one of your patients."
Oh, shit. "I see," Emile said.
"I don't think you do," Renner said. "But I'm going to have to insist. Your research. All of it."
"And you'll leave me alone? You'll leave my family alone?" Emile hated the desperation in his voice.
"You give me everything you have, everything, and you can go on living your life as if nothing ever happened. After you do whatever you're going to do to Palomini's team."
"Where do I drop it?"
"Get out of your eight-thirty meeting and get your car. After you've retrieved the information from wherever you have it, go home. There's a scrubbed cell phone in the drawer of your nightstand, under the old newspapers where you kept that unlicensed pistol. I'll give you instructions from there."
I'm going to fire every one of those meat-headed sons of bitches. "All right," Emile said. "I'll have the files in fifteen minutes, but they're going to be heavily encrypted. I'll deliver them to you and will send you the password as soon as I'm safely away. Then you and I are done. Finished. Permanently."
"You'll call me with the password within twenty minutes of the exchange." The line went dead.
Emile disengaged the magnetic failsafe on his bottom drawer, opened it, and pulled out an external hard drive. This should have made me rich. He locked the drawer and headed out, an excuse on his lips.
Doug watched Dr. Frank though his binoculars. "He's heading to his car, alone," he said into the mini-COM that Sam had set up. "A blue Volvo, Virginia tags. Seven-Echo-Three-Zulu-Charlie-One."
"Roger," Gene replied.
Doug pulled down the binoculars and put his car in drive. "He's heading south. Stay behind me and out of sight." In his rear-view mirror, Gene's car pulled out from two-hundred yards behind him.
"Roger again. Just don't lose him, Doug. This might be our last chance at Renner."
Tell me something I don't know.
* * *
February 9th, 9:37 AM EST; Anacostia Park; Washington, D.C.
Paul watched from a park bench as Frank's cobalt-blue Volvo XC90 pulled into the restaurant parking lot. The air was bright and clean, and the sounds of morning traffic had faded from an insane cacophony into dull background noise. "Okay, I'm here," the doctor's voice said through his phone.
"I know. Get out of the car and walk into the park, toward the swings." A little girl shrieked with glee behind him as another child chased her across the grass. "Okay, now turn right down the jogging path."