Point of Control (9 page)

C
HAPTER
17

Friday, March 20, 6:15 a.m., Palisades Mine, Washington

Dana Thorpe woke early, as always, even though no sunlight entered the small, sparse room. She sat up on the narrow bed, and her lower back cramped in pain. The lumpy mattress was too thin to cushion her body against the plywood underneath. A shiver ran up her spine, and she reached for her sweater. Might as well get moving to get warm.

She figured she was underground somewhere, god knew where. The chloroform they’d used had knocked her out, and she’d regained consciousness in the backseat of an SUV, hands and wrists bound. She had no idea how long she’d been out, and the blindfold had kept her from seeing where they drove, but she’d still tried to keep track of the time and listen for familiar sounds. Other than tires on a highway, she’d heard almost nothing along the way. The two men in the front had been mostly quiet too, with occasional whispered exchanges.

Dana stood and stretched, moving slowly to ward off muscle spasms. The cold and the lack of exercise made her vulnerable to cramping. How long would she be here? A month? A year? When it was over—and she’d either accomplished the breakthrough they wanted or completely failed and given up—they would probably kill her. Despair washed over her, and she collapsed back on the hard bed. How was she supposed to do her best work under these conditions?

The thought of her research gave her strength. If she could stabilize the new material and make it work the way she envisioned, syndyspso, as she called it, would revolutionize digital-product manufacturing, as well as provide an alternative to dysprosium in the manufacture of dozens of other types of high-tech equipment. She wanted the synthetic metal—the product of years of research—to be successful, even if someone else got the credit. When it came onto the market, would her university peers know it was her discovery? Either way, she would leave a legacy. If she was going to die in this bleak research lab, she should at least accomplish something first. And she had an idea she was eager to try.

Dana dressed and used the small bathroom to brush her teeth. She was grateful to not have a mirror. She didn’t need or wear makeup or care that much about her looks, but she was afraid to see the expression in her eyes. Fear and despair were not normal for her. Poor Garrett had to be feeling the same. The thought of her son almost derailed her. She missed him dearly. The thought of his grief when she didn’t come home nearly crushed her. But she’d raised him to be strong, and he would be fine eventually.

How would they even begin to search for her? Her ex was an FBI agent, so he was probably involved in her case, but what could they do? She had no idea who’d taken her or where she was, so why would they? Her only hope was to somehow escape, but that seemed unlikely.

When she was ready, she knocked loudly on the door, as instructed. It took the keeper nearly ten minutes to respond, but finally, a key turned in the lock. For a moment, Dana had a fantasy of assaulting him and running for her life. She’d had the same idea a few times, but always rejected it. At five-three and a slight hundred and ten pounds, she was no match for anyone. Especially without a weapon. No, she would have to be crafty and watch for an opportunity when she was in the lab.

The man opened the door and shuffled back, keeping his distance. A black bandanna obscured much of his face, and a hoodie covered his hair, but she had memorized what she could—dull brown eyes and tiny pockmarks on his forehead. Five-ten and two hundred pounds, with most of the weight in his chest. His legs were skinny, he had a stiff walk, and he was at least her age. She told herself these details mattered. One day, he would be on trial for keeping her prisoner. It was all she had to keep herself going.

Dana stepped into the concrete hallway and moved to her left, eager to be in the lab. The keeper, as she thought of him, couldn’t be the person responsible for her abduction. His eyes were too dull to understand the complexity of her research. A hired hand, she suspected, and one without morals. The fact that he hid his identity gave her some hope she might eventually be released. But that was probably the point, to keep her spirits up so she would keep working.

At the end of the short hallway, the keeper opened another locked door. Dana walked into the lab and clicked on the lights. Constructed of concrete and covered in blond wood paneling, the room was ugly and windowless. But it held all the equipment she needed. More than she had at the university, actually—a small, cheerful fact that gave her an emotional boost. Someone had spent a fortune on this lab, so they expected to make an even bigger fortune.

“I’ll bring food in a bit.” Her keeper, still in the hall, locked the metal door behind her.

Dana moved to her workbench, ready to test her idea. The key was in the electrons. She just hadn’t found the exact combination that produced a stable, magnetic-resistant material that didn’t overheat. But she was close.

A tapping sound on the other side of the wall caught her attention. Her neighbor was up and working early. He usually came in a few hours after her and didn’t seem to stay long. She’d never seen him but assumed he was a man, because most metallurgists were. When she’d asked about him, her keeper had told her to be quiet and mind her own business.

What was he working on over there? A material compound similar to hers, or something else entirely? Was that why they were keeping them separate? Collaboration might produce what they wanted faster. She’d tried communicating with him once by tapping on the wall, but he’d ignored her. Maybe he’d been instructed to ignore her. Too bad. Together, they might be able to force their way out.

Dana focused on her work, hoping the keeper would bring coffee soon.

Two minutes into her experiment, a blue aura of light appeared in her peripheral vision.
Oh no.
She was having a seizure. She’d known it could happen. Her medication was sitting at home in her bathroom. Would it be a minor one, or would it knock her on her ass? Her eyes blinked uncontrollably and the room started to spin. Dana dropped to the floor just before she blacked out.

Someone was calling her name and slapping her face. Dana opened her eyes and saw her keeper kneeling on the floor next to her. How long had she been out? Her temples ached, but that was typical after a seizure. Or it had been. This was her first in years.

“What happened? Are you all right?” His eyes looked worried.

“I had a seizure.” Dana sat up. “It could happen again if I don’t get my prescription.”

“What is it?”

“Aptiom.” She’d been taking it for only a few months. Before that had been Topamax. She’d been switching meds every six to nine months since the epilepsy had developed a few years earlier. None of her peers knew about her condition. In fact, no one but Garrett knew, and she’d sworn him to secrecy. She hadn’t even told the professor she’d been dating for a few months. Nor had she told her son about the new man in her life.

“I need the medication right away. If I had one seizure, I could have many more.” Dana crawled to her knees, thinking the worst. “If I fall and hit my head on this concrete floor, I could become useless to you.”

“Do you need anything right now?” He spoke slowly, as if challenged. “A cold compress or something?”

Did she hear real empathy in his voice or just job-security concern? “For now, I need coffee. And eggs, please.” As long as she had caffeine and protein, she could work and be healthy. But the seizures were unpredictable.

When she’d first been diagnosed, she’d been angry and bitter. She thought she’d never get any significant work done again. But the medication was mostly effective, and she’d kept right on working. At least it wasn’t dementia. As long as her brain could think clearly, she wouldn’t give up her research. She’d always visualized herself at ninety, skinny, wrinkled, and a little hunched over, but still in her lab, curious to see what she could develop or experiment on next. Retirement was for people who hated their jobs, and she loved hers. Even here, in this dungeon prison, her work still excited her. At least for brief moments.

The keeper struggled to his feet and left the room. Dana hauled herself off the floor, rotated her neck to work out a kink, and went back to her experiment.

C
HAPTER
18

Friday, March 20, 9:00 a.m., Seattle, Washington

Bailey called the state’s business licensing office and asked to speak to the highest-ranking person available. After a few false starts with midlevel managers, Nolan Fredrick came on the line and asked how he could help.

She repeated her identification one more time, pacing the hotel room as she talked. “I’m working a case that involves kidnappings and a homicide. We believe the abducted scientist is being held somewhere here in Washington and being forced to do very specialized work at a new business. What I need is a list of business-related real estate that’s been sold in the last year.”

“Can you narrow that down?” He gave a soft laugh. “You don’t want car washes or fast-food restaurants, do you?”

“I do not.” She’d meant to offer more specifics, but he’d cut in too soon. “I’m looking for unoccupied buildings, rural acreages, and anything related to technology or mining.”

“That’s a more manageable list, but it may still take a day or two.”

“I don’t have that kind of time. Not only is a woman’s life at stake, but national security could be as well.” An exaggeration. Or not, depending on what the megalomaniac kidnapper had in mind. “This request comes from the director of the FBI.”

“I’ll do what I can.”

“I also need the name of the person or business who bought each property.”

“Of course.”

She made certain he had her contact information and started to hang up, then remembered it was important to say thank you. People were more likely to help if they were treated well, and she needed the information quickly. A lifelong question popped into her brain. What was the difference between pretending to be polite and actually being polite? She’d been faking and imitating her way through social situations for so long that she’d mostly become the person she pretended to be. The difference was, as a non-empath, she had another side that allowed her to use every tool at her disposal—as long as the benefit outweighed the risk.

Her next call went to Gunter Havi, a coworker at the bureau’s DC headquarters. Havi was her go-to tech-and-data guy, one of best analysts in the CIRG. She liked Havi because he didn’t care that much about rules either. Getting the job done was more important, and he was skilled at covering their tracks. His name and looks—a broad, square German face with dark coloring and soft brown eyes—suggested he was the product of a mixed marriage. But she’d never asked about his personal life, and most of their contact was by phone or email. “Havi, it’s Bailey. I need your help.”

“What’s the case? I knew you were gone, but no one is talking about your assignment.”

She summarized the crimes and her working theory. “I need to know about mining operations along the West Coast. Specifically, facilities with rare earth potential.”

“I see your thinking.” His computer keys clicked in the background. “The earth-metals market is crazy right now,” Havi said. “China’s export embargo has even Ayn Rand disciples talking about nationalizing our resources.”

Bailey hadn’t had time to pay attention to politics since she’d taken the assignment, so this was news to her. “I have to go into the local field office and check on a witness. Call me if you find any mines in Washington, Oregon, or California that have a new owner within the last year or so.”

“I’m already on it.”

“Great. If you need me to do a little hacking to get the intel, I’m game.” She wasn’t an expert, but with the right code and a little guidance, she could access non-secure data. Most of the information companies kept was non-secure. Only financial institutions and tech companies understood how grave the threat was.

“Let’s see what I can find out first.”

“Thanks, Havi.”

The mining idea was a long shot, and some operations were on federal lands. But Thurgood was an extraction expert, so she had to explore that avenue. Another possibility was that the two scientists were being held in different locations. And for all she knew, Thurgood’s participation could be voluntary. That was why she’d also asked the state business office to look at real-estate deals for abandoned buildings and rural properties. The megalomaniac may have purchased a variety of businesses to pull off his scheme. Whatever it was. Dominate the device market? Or did he or she simply want to make a fortune selling the metals other manufacturers needed? She needed to look at property transactions in other states too. The only rare earth mine she knew of was in California, not far from where the second scientist had been abducted. And Oregon was filled with remote areas where fringe groups could hide out.

Bailey pulled on a dark sweater—she refused to dress in a jacket like a man—and grabbed her satchel. Before she made it out of the motel room door, her phone rang again. Her boss. She stepped back inside and closed the door. “Bailey here.”

“It’s Lennard. Give me a quick update.”

She’d filed a report that morning, but her boss apparently hadn’t had time to read it. “The two men who kidnapped Dana Thorpe tried to kidnap or kill me last night in front of her house. They escaped by abandoning their vehicle in the lake and taking off on foot. We have a decent description of one unsub, and a local sketch artist is working on an image of him. I was just heading to the field office now.”

“Good. We need a teleconference with the special agent in charge out there. I have directives from the White House, and you both need to hear them.”

Oh hell.
When politicians got involved in law enforcement, it was always trouble. They worried too much about public image and political correctness. “I’ll be in the field office in twenty minutes or so. Text me with the meeting time when it’s set.” Bailey hung up, not worrying about etiquette. Her boss hated unnecessary chitchat too. She headed out again, wondering what the hell was going on that involved the president.

She found the Seattle field office with little trouble and put up with the screening process without complaint. On the other side of the metal detector, she asked, “Is Garrett Thorpe here? He’s supposed to be looking at mug shots.”

“In the second-floor conference room.” The desk agent gave a we’re-done-here nod.

Bailey hurried upstairs, eager to see Garrett again. She’d wanted to hook up with him the night before—after the exhilarating chase—but there had been too many cops and agents at the house. She not only accepted but embraced her attraction to him. Even though she wasn’t a highly sexual person, she never felt any guilt or shame about her encounters.

At the door, she knocked once and stepped in. Garrett jumped up from his chair at the end of the long table and smiled. “Agent Bailey. I was just going to call you.”

“You found the guy?” She walked toward him, feeling suddenly warm, and had to pull off her sweater.

“Maybe.” Garrett gestured at the laptop on the desk. “He’s younger and thinner in this photo, but I think it might be him.”

“Excellent news.” The new lead, combined with her unexpected sexual desire, filled her with an impulsive pleasure. Bailey touched the sides of Garrett’s face and pressed her mouth against his, a deep, probing kiss that asked for much more. After a split second of shock, he responded, and their passion made her knees shake. Bailey drew back, suddenly aware the room might have video recording. She didn’t want to be reprimanded for something so trivial. He wasn’t the target of her investigation, so intimacy with him wasn’t specifically against the rules. She only followed explicit rules, and only fought for self-control when it served her best interest. What was best for her in this situation was Garrett.

She smiled seductively. “Show me the photo.”

Blinking with happy eyes, he sat down. Garrett scrolled back through three pages of images—all men between twenty-five and forty—then stopped and pointed in the upper left corner. “Him.”

Jerry Rockwell.
An ugly man with a broad face, a wide nose, and brownish skin coloring. She guessed Hawaiian or Alaskan Indian. In the mug shot, he looked twenty-five, but his birth date indicated he was fifty-two. The timing was about right, though. He’d been convicted of trespassing and vandalism of a federal building in Fairbanks in 1988. He’d done six months in prison, but hadn’t been in trouble since. Unusual that he would be involved in kidnapping and murder now—unless he’d been a criminal all along and learned to be smart and careful.

“Are you sure?” she asked.

Garrett bit his lip. “Not a hundred percent. I mean, this photo is twenty-seven years old.” He looked at the photo again. “But see this dark spot on his cheek? That’s what caught my attention. I think I saw it on the kidnapper. But I was freaking out at the time, so I didn’t really process it then.”

“You did fine. It’s a possible lead. I’ll get my analyst to see if he can locate this guy.”

Garrett stood and met her eyes. “That kiss. What does it mean?”

Bailey’s cell phone beeped in her pocket. Relieved not to have to explain herself, she slid it out. A text from her boss:
Conference in ten minutes.

She looked up at Garrett. “I have a meeting here in a few minutes. Did you get all the way through the mug shots?”

“I did.”

“Then it’s best if you leave now.”

“Will I see you again?” Such longing in his expression.

His attraction intensified hers. “If I can. But this investigation could go anywhere.”

“Give me your phone and I’ll key my number in.” He reached for it. “At least keep me updated about my mother. If we don’t find her soon, she could—” He stopped and pressed his lips together.

“Could what? I need to know everything.”

“My mother has epilepsy and without her medication she could have seizures.”

A critical piece of information.
“Why am I just hearing about this now?”

“She’s very secretive about it. I’m the only one who knows, and she made me promise to keep it quiet. So I couldn’t tell my father. That would’ve pissed Mom off.” Garrett grabbed her hand. “Please don’t put that in your report. If word gets out, the epilepsy could ruin her career.”

Bailey loved that he was so loyal—and optimistic that his mother would survive this. “I’ll do my best to protect her secret.”

“Please call me.” He stepped backward toward the door, not breaking eye contact until he had to.

When he was gone, Bailey felt relief. And a strange loneliness. But the emotion was distracting, so she tried to turn away from it. Compartmentalizing was usually easy for her, but not this time.
Well, hell.
Would hooking up with him cost her more than she would gain?

She moved to the other end of the room, where a large monitor hung on the wall, slid into a chair, and pulled out a notepad to prepare for the meeting. She had a few minutes, so she checked her email. The medical examiner in San Jose had finally sent lab reports. He’d attached the full printout, but he’d also summarized the findings in his email:

Nick Bowman had alcohol in his blood (.12) but nothing else worth noting. The brown stains on his palms were caused by handling gallium, which melts when it touches the skin.

Gallium was a rare earth metal used in devices, but she’d never seen it in person and didn’t know much about its properties.

The doorknob clicked and she looked up, hoping Garrett had come back. Special Agent Thorpe stepped in. He was technically her superior, and she stood, more out of habit than respect.

He strode toward her. “Do you know what this is about?”

“No, but we’ll soon find out.”

Thorpe sat opposite her and clicked on the monitor, which stayed dark.

Bailey remembered she had a question for the field office. “Hey, what did the technicians find on the SUV that was pulled out of the water?”

“No trace evidence from the shooters.” Like most law enforcement, Thorpe had a flat delivery. “The vehicle had been stolen earlier from Bremerton. We canvassed the area but didn’t find any witnesses or abandoned cars.”

The thugs were craftier than she’d expected.

A phone in the middle of the table rang, and Thorpe clicked the remote. Agent Lennard’s face appeared on the screen. “Good. You’re ready. Have you seen the news this morning?”

“Not since six o’clock. Why?” Bailey sensed something big had happened, but she hadn’t been at headquarters with her unit to hear about it.

“A gang broke into a Walmart warehouse in Compton, California, looking for cell phones and tablets, and a group of bystanders joined them. When the news hit Twitter, a crowd started looting electronics from Best Buy in Florida City. The shortage has hit a choke point, and the White House wants to get it under control.”

“What steps is the president taking?” Thorpe asked.

“For one, the National Guard is preparing its troops to protect warehouses and retail stores in the big cities.” Her boss paused, as if in disbelief. “Plus Congress is drafting legislation that would nationalize rare earth mines. Possibly even the device industry.”

As Havi had predicted. “How does this affect my investigation?” Bailey asked.

Lennard’s mouth tightened. “We’re calling you off. The Critical Incident group needs you back here.”

No! How stupid.
Was this Lennard’s decision? Bailey studied her boss’ face and noticed the pinched lines around her mouth. The decision had likely come from higher up, and Lennard had to support it.

Bailey still had to argue. “But we’ve identified one of the kidnappers. I just need a few more days.”

“Who’s the suspect?”

“Jerry Rockwell. He has an old conviction, but nothing since.”

“Do you know where to find him?”

“Not yet.”

“Then nothing’s changed. The bureau has bigger issues to deal with—such as the wholesale theft of cell phone shipments. A truck was hijacked yesterday, and the driver was killed.”

Criminals stole truckloads of things every day, including maple syrup. Cell phones were more personal and universal, but still, her boss was keeping something back, and it infuriated Bailey. “What is this about? Tell me the truth.”

“Once the government nationalizes the industry, or its components, our unsub loses his profit and motivation. The problem goes away.”