Terminal Rage (25 page)

Blackwell pointed to the broken glass. “You guys found it like this?”

“Uh-huh. There is a surveillance camera in the corridor here, but it was disabled during the break-in. Whoever did this used some sort of digital silencer to make sure we were blind.”

“Anything else?”

“Yeah. The door to the master office inside was also forced open.”

He thanked her and went inside to join Vlasic and the rest of the team.

The reception was bare, with only a medium-sized desk still bearing the name plaque of the woman who had probably once managed the office many years ago. Suzy Greiss.

The master office was in a private room whose locked oak door had also been forced open, just like the forensic agent outside had told him. It too was sparsely furnished and nondescript. There was a huge ornate desk with nothing on its glass surface, and a new Steelcase Leap chair still in its plastic cover. A photo of a much-younger version of the deposed president Mubarak hung on the wall. And a few leather armchairs were sprinkled around the room with no design strategy to speak of.

The cute forensic agent from outside showed them a teak shelf that had been pulled down, its leather-bound books scattered on the floor. Behind it, a room-sized safe had also been broken into with a shrewd combination of burglary and science. The safe was stacked with locked metal boxes, many of which had been opened with their contents spread on the floor. But two specific chests had been completely plundered. Whoever broke in had found exactly what they were after inside of them, and then stopped looking.

Blackwell blurted out the first and only thing that came to his mind.

“We may never find out who did this.”

TWENTY-ONE

Saturday, April 7, 2012—11:03 a.m.
Easton, Maryland

A
FedEx van turned off Fort Stokes Lane into his tree-lined driveway and triggered his security camera. He was sitting in the kitchen reading when the monitor on the central island blinked and caught his attention. The speed of the van and the length of his driveway gave him enough time to finish the last lines of the op-ed in the
Washington Post
.

It had been many years since he
’
d received a package here, and wondered if it would be the same FedEx driver delivering it. After all, this was Easton, Maryland, and time moved at its own leisure. People worked in the same place for thirty or forty good years.

He
’
d only been living here for the last five months. This used to be his parents
’
house. But when they both died in a car crash in Guatemala, he and his younger sister Alice inherited it equally, and for a while kept up the family tradition of meeting there every Thanksgiving with their spouses and children. But that hadn
’
t happened in more than five years.

Sunlight was flooding in from every possible direction. He had opened up the large French windows that extended the kitchen into the backyard. The house was a mansion nestled in acres of land with apple trees and a heart-shaped swimming pool in the backyard
that overlooked the Tred Avon River. A bed of roses exploded with vibrant colors at the end of the driveway and always seemed to delight whoever came by.

The remnant whiffs of creamy scrambled eggs and toast exposed his kids
’
failure to keep their end of the bargain and clear up after the breakfast he cooked. Dirty dishes and glasses littered the table, next to a milk carton and a bottle of orange juice desperate to get back in the fridge if they were to stay fresh.
Where are the kids
?
I don
’
t think I
’
ve seen them since breakfast.

Across the cavernous ground floor of the house, he could see the silhouette of the FedEx driver behind the cast-iron and glass door, holding a package in one hand and the scanning device in the other. He rang the bell once. The door was ajar but the driver knew better than to push it open or try to come in. Out here in Talbot County, people took their private property seriously, and trespassers were fair game. Easton guns were big and always loaded.

His twelve-year-old son and nine-year-old daughter had been in the living area near the main door all along, sitting mute on the white leather sofa. Three-D glasses covered their faces and they were sucked in by
Kung Fu Panda 2
. His yellow Labrador retriever, Jacky, was napping peacefully at their feet.

He was about to get up to open the door for the FedEx driver but changed his mind, hoping the kids would do it. It was part of his ongoing campaign to get them to engage more with real people rather than bury their heads in tiny screens all day. The dog however needed no such training. Its social skills were on steroids, and fortunately for the driver, she continued her lazy siesta.

The kids happily ignored the bell so the driver rang it again. Finally his daughter half got up, but then changed her mind and slouched back in the couch as if she was connected to it through some invisible intravenous port.

“Hi! Got a package for your dad.” Even more indifference from the kids. The FedEx driver rang the bell a third time.

His daughter cupped her hands around her mouth to transform it into a megaphone and bellowed, “Dad! It
’
s for you.”

This wasn
’
t going to work. He jumped out of the comfort of his rocking chair and yelled out to the FedEx driver, “Coming!”

“Right here.” He handed him the stylus to sign. As he had expected, even hoped, he was the same FedEx driver from the days his parents used to live in this house for six months of the year.

“Sorry about the wait.” He scribbled something resembling his name. Alexander Blackwell.

The driver smiled at him. “Don
’
t worry about it. My kids were the same at that age. Heard about your folks. I
’
m so sorry.”

Blackwell bit his lips and nodded.

“Welcome back to Easton.”

“Thanks.” Blackwell closed the door and held the package in his hands, hoping its weight would give him some indication of its contents. It was addressed to him from Frankfurt, Germany, by a person called Dietrich Meier, a name he didn
’
t recognize.

He didn
’
t expect to receive a package at Easton, let alone from overseas. Other than Melanie and the kids, only his sister Alice knew he had moved back to Maryland right before Christmas. Alice was traveling with her own family for the next few months in Thailand and Malaysia, so it was unlikely this was from her.

Blackwell had moved back to be near his kids again. They were just an hour
’
s drive across the Chesapeake Bay in Bethesda, where Melanie had relocated after the divorce. The kids had suffered the most in the past five years while he and Melanie had razed the marriage to the ground. The short encounters in the dead of the night that Melanie had reluctantly approved in the last two years were not enough for him anymore. Not after what had happened in Manhattan anyway, when he had come unbearably close to a rerun of Hermosa Beach.

It took him a few months to negotiate this arrangement with Melanie. His winning pitch was based on Milo and Calista
’
s deep yearning for a nurturing environment. On his part, Blackwell was desperate to prove to her he no longer obsessed about his inner demons. And to demonstrate in the most practical terms that the kids were his only priority now. A lot of time had been wasted, missing out on seeing them grow up.

Part of the agreement with Melanie was for him to go to Bethesda at least twice a week to give her a hand with the relentless logistics of parenting. Melanie had borne the brunt of the responsibility with the kids while he was on his four-year “emotional safari” in Anguilla, and it was time for him to carry some of the weight.

She had started to date other men and had told him bluntly, but he
’
d managed to be grown up about it, hoping that this would earn back her respect and trust. This arrangement with her had only really started to work a few months ago. He and Melanie were finally forging a functional relationship. They needed to operate in partnership, in the interest of these two kids.

This was the first Spring Break with Milo and Calista in Easton since his meltdown and escape to the Caribbean. To his delight, and disbelief, Melanie had accepted his invitation to join them for the second part of the week-long holiday. Although he was certain she must have agonized over this decision and probably only did it for the kids. They were starved for a taste of normal, desperate to be with both their parents under a peaceful sky without the torrential rains of domestic fighting. All the shouting, the hurtfulness, and the crying that had become the norm during the last few months of their marriage before it all came crashing down.

Blackwell touched the FedEx envelope and a familiar electric current traveled through this body. It was a light package, but the fact it was addressed to him at Easton, and from an unknown sender, raised questions that would only be answered if he looked inside. He picked at the tip of the seal with his fingers to rip it open but then remembered the kids. Milo and Calista had removed their three-D glasses and were staring at him with huge “What’s next?” eyes, as the credits rolled on the screen. He gazed at the envelope then back at the kids and made up his mind.

“Assuming you kids clear up the kitchen as you promised, who wants to go crabbing after that?” He already knew the answer to that question. Milo and Calista jumped up and down on the couch in pure joy. Jacky the Labrador woke up and circled around her tail in solidarity with the kids. Poor pooch—oblivious of her unwarranted excitement. She wasn
’
t invited to the boat excursion. Blackwell stashed the envelope inside a bookshelf near the television and asked another redundant question.

“Trotline or crab pot?”

The children responded in a raucous concert. “Crab pot! Crab Pot! Crab Pot!” Jacky seemed to agree on that too. She jumped on the couch in total defiance of his strict rules and barked in high-pitched delirium.

His dad had purchased the Sea Ray Sundancer boat in ’97 and had taken care of her like family. But after he died, the boat had descended from occasional use to total abandonment. The last nail came after Blackwell’s meltdown and his move to the Caribbean. But just like most of their parents’ belongings, he and Alice had refused to sell the boat. They stored it in the shed, its mechanical parts giving way to rust and neglect.

One of Blackwell
’
s first projects when he had returned to Easton in December was to renovate the boat to its past glory. He labored over the boat during the bitter winter months, and did it all on his own. He gutted her from the insides and fitted brand-new motors and wiring. The navigation system was updated with state-of-the-art tech, and the paint on the fiberglass stripped and a fresh coat applied. The interior was upholstered, and he installed a brand new bathroom and a fancy entertainment system. And even though he didn
’
t approve of how attached both his kids were to their phones and iPads, he installed a 4G Wi-Fi hotspot, just in case he ran out of ideas to keep them entertained. Boating and sea life were an integral part of his childhood. It was a passion both he and Alice had inherited from their parents. And at some level, Blackwell hoped the boat would bring his own kids closer to him.

Calista objected as Milo pranced around the boat to the sound of
Sorry for Party Rocking
by LMFAO. “Why do we always get to listen to
his
music?”

Blackwell kissed Calista
’
s head. “Not true, young lady. How else would I now know the words to every single song ever made by Taylor Swift?” Calista took this as an invitation to break out in an adorable, but discordant version of some Taylor Swift track.

“Remember the rules?,” Blackwell reminded his kids.
“We alternate music every trip. Last one was Cal, this one
’
s Milo
’
s.And the next one is mine—thank God.” Blackwell covered his ears in mock disdain intended as a blanket, old fart
’
s critique of “the music kids listen to these days.”

Milo lashed back in defense of his entire generation. “Dad—your music is soooo lame! All you ever listen to is the Grateful Dead or
Bob Marley. Arggh!”

“Mock them now, kiddo. But when you
’
re older you
’
ll understand why your Uncle Jerry and your Uncle Bob will get you through college.”

He tied the boat to a buoy in the middle of the river and started prepping the Maryland crab pot cage with bait.

“Cal, baby—pass me the chicken legs from the icebox, will you?”

Calista handed him the bait with far less disgust in her eyes than the last couple of times he
’
d made her hold the raw, severed limbs of poultry. He wanted to toughen her up a little.

“What
’
s for lunch, Dad?”

“Malaysian chili crab. Your Aunt Alice
tried it and sent me the
recipe. It has just the right amount of chili for wimps like you.”

Milo and Calista looked at him with intrigue as if he was inventing Penicillin live for their entertainment. He inserted the raw chicken legs into the cage, tied it to a rope, and threw it in the water. They loved watching him do it. And the crab pot required far less work than a trotline, which meant they could play or talk while they waited for lunch to make its way into the cage.

“Now we wait.”

“Dad?”

“Milo?”

Even before Blackwell had a chance to ponder the request, let alone deny it, Milo was already in begging mode. “Can we play Monopoly? Please, Dad—please!”

Two hours later, and just like she always did, Calista had wiped the Monopoly board with him and Milo. When she was done gloating, the three of them sat at the edge of the boat, dangling their feet in the cold river as they sipped on icy root beer.

Calista dug her soft hair into his chest and started making circles with her big toe in the water.

“Dad. Can I ask you something? But promise you won
’
t get mad.”

Blackwell chuckled and kissed her hair. “Doesn
’
t that depend on what you
’
re going to ask?”

Calista slapped her hand on his knees hard. “Dad! Don
’
t start your “negotiator” thing.”

“All right, all right. Go on then—I promise I won
’
t get mad.”

“When Mom comes on Thursday, are you two gonna fight again?”

Blackwell held her face in his hand and turned her head to look straight into her eyes to determine where this question was coming from. “What makes you say that?”