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“But let me know right away if you see them again.”

Up the street I saw homeowners mowing late-season grass or raking early leaves. The day was warm, the air crisp. I scanned the entire area twice. I'm often described as paranoid. And I probably am. But the opponent here was Henry Loving, an expert at being invisible . . . until the last minute,
of course, at which time he becomes all too present. Thinking of Rhode Island again, two years ago, when he'd just materialized, armed, from a car that he simply couldn't have been inside.

Except that he was.

Hefting my shoulder bag higher, I returned to the Nissan and noted my reflection in the window. I'd decided that since Ryan Kessler was a police detective, what it took to win his confidence was looking more like an undercover cop than the humorless federal agent that I pretty much am. With my casual clothes, my trim, thinning brownish hair and a clean-shaven face, I probably resembled one of the dozens of fortyish businessmen dads shouting encouragement to their sons or daughters at the soccer game up the street at that moment.

I made a call on my cold phone.

“That you?” Freddy asked.

“I'm here, at Kessler's.”

“You see my guys?”

“Yes. They're good and obvious.”

“What're they going to do, hide behind the lawn gnomes? It's the suburbs, son.”

“It's not a criticism. If Loving's got a spotter on site, I want him to know we're on to him.”

“You think somebody's there already?”

“Possibly. But nobody'll make a move until Loving's here. Anything more on his position or ETA?”

“No.”

Where was Loving now? I wondered, picturing the highway from West Virginia. We had a safe house, a good one, out in Luray. I wondered if he was driving near it at the moment.

Freddy said, “Hold on, just getting something
 . . . Funny you asked, Corte. Got some details from the team at the motel. Okay, he's in a light-colored sedan. No year, no make, no model that anybody saw.”

Henry Loving stimulates the amnesia gene. But it's also true most people are simply extremely unobservant.

Freddy continued, “I say at least three hours before he's even in the area. And he's going to spend some time staging before he gets to the Kessler place.”

I said, “Are you owed any favors—the Virginia State troopers?”

“No, but I'm such a lovable guy, they'll do what I ask.”

I have trouble with Freddy's flippancy. But whatever gets you through the day in this difficult business.

“Can you get his picture to the state police? Have it sent to all the cars between here and West Virginia on an orange notice.” The officers on patrol would get a flash on their computers and they'd be on the lookout for light-colored cars and a driver who fit Loving's description. The orange code meant he was dangerous.

“I'll do it but I know you're a math wizard, Corte.”

“And?”

“Divide a million cars by forty troopers. Whatta you get?”

“Thanks, Freddy.”

We disconnected and I called Ryan Kessler.

“Hello?”

I told him who I was and that I'd arrived. I'd be
at his door in a moment or two. I wanted him to call Freddy and check on my appearance. This was a good security measure but I also did it to increase his paranoia. I knew Kessler, as a cop—and a decorated street cop at that—would be a reluctant principal and I wanted him to sense the reality of the danger.

Silence.

“Are you there, Detective Kessler?”

“Well, sir, I told Agent Fredericks and those men outside . . . I see you out there too, Agent Corte. I told them this isn't necessary.”

“I'd still like to talk to you, please. If you don't mind.”

He made no attempt to mask his irritation. “It's really a waste of time.”

“I'd appreciate it,” I said pleasantly. I tend to be overly polite—stiff, many people say. But a calm, structured attitude gets people's cooperation better than bluster, which I'm not very good at anyway.

“All right, fine. I'll call Agent Fredericks.”

I also asked him if he was armed.

“Yes. That a problem?” Testy.

“No,” I said. “Not at all.”

I would rather he wasn't, but as a police officer he was entitled, and asking a cop to give up his weapon was a battle rarely worth fighting.

I gave him some time to call Freddy, while I considered the house.

Nearly all single-family residences are indefensible.

Visibility, permeable construction, susceptibility to fire. They're naked to thermal sensors and have limited escape routes. Tactical cover is a joke. A single
bullet can take out the power. A proudly advertised five-minute response time by central station security companies simply means the lifter knows he has a guaranteed window for a leisurely kidnapping. Not to mention that the paper trail of home ownership, automobiles and financial documents will lead the perp directly to even the most reclusive citizen's front door in no time at all.

Principals, of course, always want the security blanket of their homes but I remove them from their beloved residence as fast as possible.

Seeing Ryan Kessler's house I was determined to spirit him and his family away from the insubstantial two-story colonial as soon as I could.

I walked to the front door, checking windows. Ryan opened it. I knew what he looked like from personnel files and my other research. I glanced past him at the empty downstairs and moved my hand away from the small of my back.

He moved his from the holster on his hip.

I introduced myself. Shook his hand. I showed him my ID, which has my picture, name and a federal government logo on it, eagle included like the Justice Department's but our own brand of bird. There's nothing specific about our organization. I'm described simply as a “United States officer.”

He took a fast look and didn't ask the questions I would have.

“Did you call Agent Fredericks to check on me?”

“No.” Maybe he felt his cop's intuition could verify my credibility. Maybe it didn't seem very macho.

Ryan Kessler was a solid man, broad shoulders and black hair, looking older than his years. When
he tilted his head down, which he had to do because I was shorter and a step below, a double chin rolled outward. A round belly above tapering thighs and hips. His eyes were inky and focused. It was as hard to imagine a smile on his face as on mine. He'd be good at interrogation, I surmised.

“Well, Agent Corte—”

“Just Corte's fine.”

“One name? Like a rock star.”

My ID has two initials but I never use them or anything more than Corte. Like some people, Ryan seemed to consider this pretentious. I didn't explain to him that it was simply a wise strategy; when it came to my business, the rule was to give people—good people, bad or neutral—as little information about myself as possible. The more people who know about you, the more compromised you are and the less efficiently you can do your job protecting your principals.

“Agent Fredericks is on his way over,” I told him.

A sigh. “This is all a big mixup. Mistaken identity. There's nobody who'd want to threaten me. It's not like I'm going after the J-Eights.”

One of the most dangerous Latino gangs in Fairfax.

“Still, I'd like to come in if I could.”

“So you're, what, like protection detail?”

“Exactly.”

He looked me over. I'm a little under six feet and weigh about 170, a range of five pounds plus or minus depending on the nature of the assignment and my deli-sandwich preference of the month. I've never been in the army; I've never taken the FBI course at Quantico. I know some basic self-defense
but no fancy martial arts. I have no tattoos. I get outside a fair amount, jogging and hiking, but no marathons or Iron Man stuff for me. I do some push-ups and sit-ups, inspired by the probably erroneous idea that exercise improves circulation and also lets me order cheese on my deli sandwich without guilt. I happen to be a very good shot and was presently carrying a Glock 23—the .40—in a Galco Royal Guard inside-the-pants holster and a Monadnock retractable baton. He wouldn't know that, though, and to Ryan Kessler, the protection package would be looking a little meager.

“Even them.” His eyes swung toward the FBI car across the street. “All they're doing is upsetting my wife and daughter. The fact is, they're a little obvious, don't you think?”

I was amused that we'd had the same observation. “They are. But they're more a deterrent than anything.”

“Well, again, I'm sorry for the waste of time. I've talked it over with my boss.”

“Chief of Detectives Lewis. I spoke to him too on the way over here.”

Ronald Lewis, with the District of Columbia's Metropolitan Police Department. Squat, with a broad face, dark brown skin. Outspoken. I'd never met him in person but heard he'd done a good job turning around some of the more dangerous neighborhoods in the city, which was one of the more dangerous cities in the country. He'd risen high in the MPD from street patrol in South East and was a bit of a hero too, like Ryan Kessler.

Ryan paused, registering that I'd been doing my homework. “Then he told you he doesn't know any
reason I'd be a target. I really will have to ask you to leave now. Sorry you wasted your time.”

I said, “Mr. Kessler, just do me a favor? Please. Let me come in and lay out a few things. Ten minutes.” I was pleasant, not a hint of irritation. I said nothing more, offered no reasons—arguments held in doorways are hard to win; your opponent can just step back and close the door. I now simply looked up at him expectantly. My eyes never left his.

He sighed again. Loudly. “I guess. Come on. Five minutes.” He turned and, limping, led me through the neat suburban house, which smelled of lemon furniture polish and coffee. I couldn't draw many conclusions about him or his family from my observations but one thing that stood out was the framed yellowing front page of
The Washington Post
hanging in the den:
H
ERO
C
OP
S
AVES
T
WO
D
URING
R
OBBERY
.

A picture of a younger Ryan Kessler accompanied the story.

On the drive here Claire duBois, as efficient as a fine watch, had given me a backgrounder on Ryan. This included details of the officer's rescue. Some punk had robbed a deli downtown in the District, panicked and started shooting. Ryan was en route to meet an informant and happened to be in the alley behind the deli. He'd heard the shots, drawn his weapon and sped in through the back door, too late to save the husband and wife who owned the place, but he had rescued the customers inside, taking a bullet in the leg before the robber fled.

The story ended with a curious twist: The woman customer had stayed in touch with him. They'd started going out. She was now his wife, Joanne.
Ryan had a daughter by his first wife, who'd died of ovarian cancer when the girl was six.

After delivering the bios, duBois had told me in the car, “That's pretty romantic, saving her life. Knight in shining armor.”

I don't read much fiction but I enjoy history, medieval included. I could have told her that knight's armor was the worst defensive system ever created; it looked spiffy but made the warrior far more vulnerable than a simple shield, helmet and chain mail or nothing at all.

I also reflected that getting shot in the leg seemed like a rather
unromantic
way to get a spouse.

As we moved through the cluttered family room, Ryan said, “Here it is, a nice Saturday. Wouldn't you rather be hanging out with your wife and kids?”

“Actually, I'm single. And I don't have children.”

Ryan was silent for a moment, a familiar response. It usually came from suburbanites of a certain age, upon learning they're talking to an unmarried, family-less forty-year-old. “Let's go in here.” We entered the kitchen and new smells mingled with the others: a big weekend breakfast, not a meal I'm generally fond of. The place was cluttered, dirty dishes stacked neatly in the sink. Jackets and sweats were draped on the white colonial dining chairs around a blond table. Against the wall the number of empty paper Safeway bags outnumbered the Whole Foods four to one. Schoolbooks and running shoes and DVD and CD cases. Junk mail and magazines.

“Coffee?” Ryan asked because he wanted some and preferred not to appear rude, only discouraging.

“No, thanks.”

He poured a cup while I stepped to the window and looked out over a backyard like ten thousand backyards nearby. I observed windows and doors.

Noting my reconnaissance, Ryan sipped, enjoying the coffee. “Really, Agent Corte, I don't need anybody to stand guard duty.”

“Actually I want to get you and your family into a safe house until we find the people behind this.”

He scoffed, “Move out?”

“Should just be a matter of days, at the most.”

I heard sounds from upstairs but saw no one else on the ground floor. Claire duBois had given me information on Ryan's family too. Joanne Kessler, thirty-nine, had worked as a statistician for about eight or nine years, then, after meeting and marrying widower Ryan, she had quit to become a fulltime mother to her stepdaughter, who was ten at the time.

The daughter, Amanda, was a junior at a public high school. “She makes good grades and is in three advanced placement programs. History, English and French. She's on the yearbook. She volunteers a lot.” I'd wondered if some of the organizations were hospitals or devoted to health care because of her mother's death. DuBois had continued, “And she plays basketball. That was my sport. You wouldn't think it. But you don't have to be that tall. Really. The thing is you have to be willing to bump. Hard.”