The Last Family (41 page)

Eve boarded nearly last. Larry and Stephanie got on ahead of her and began to get nervous as the plane started filling up and she still hadn’t come on board. Just as they were about to decide that she had other plans,
she walked in and took her seat beside a man in a red sweater. The last people on board were, according to their uniforms, a pair of airline personnel.

The airplane taxied out and took off. As soon as the plane was off the ground, Eve pushed her scarf back until it was off her head and gathered on her neck. She busied herself with a flight magazine.

Two rows behind her, Stephanie smiled because she knew Eve couldn’t be reading without her prescription glasses. Larry had a Scotch and water and fell asleep for the duration of the flight.

Stephanie was glad Eve was almost blind—or she might have recognized the two cable-repair agents who were sitting a few rows in front of her, trying to look inconspicuous. Joe McLean, boarding last in a pilot’s uniform, walked back to the bathroom, passing her without so much as a sidelong glance.

42

P
AUL PICKED UP THE PHONE ON THE SEAT AND DIALED THE LOCAL
DEA chief’s number. The call was forwarded to the man’s home. Paul ignored the background noise—television newscast, kids yelling.

“Thad, Paul Masterson. I’m in New Orleans for a quick visit.”

“Yeah, Paul. What can I do for you?”

“I just cracked the house, where I walked straight through two police patrols and one of the two best men you said you had. He’s licking his wounds about now.”

“What do you want me to do about it?”

“What? Well, Thad, if a crippled, one-eyed man and a red-headed Watusi can get in, what do you
think
you should do about it now?”

“Paul, I’m sorry about that, but Greer’s in charge. I gave him my two best agents, but he’s deploying them.”

“Listen, Thad. If you want to cover your ass on this, I
mean if you want a career after this weekend, I’ll tell you what you should do.”

“Listen, Paul—”

“You listen, Thad. Turn off the fucking television or go into a quiet room and get on the horn to the chief of police and the Coast Guard. Here’s what I want.”

“But—”

“Butt’s an ass, Thad. I’ve told you what’s wrong. You don’t want to see what’ll happen to your career if anything happens on your watch. Anything happens to Laura and the kids, I’ll bury you so deep you’ll have to dig a hole to China to see stars.”

“Okay, Paul, tell me what you want.”

By the time Paul and Rainey Lee stepped from the car and started walking on the dock near the
Shadowfax
, cars filled with policemen and serious men in suits were converging on the yacht basin.

Within thirty minutes half of the New Orleans SWAT team was at three locations in the city. Sharpshooters were being briefed on the grass beside the yacht club. Others were near Laura’s house and setting up in a grassy field across from Tulane University.

The Coast Guard had furnished their best diver, who was searching the piers around the
Shadowfax
for bombs. The bomb squad had dogs checking the dock lockers, the vessel’s deck and interior. A Hatteras was pressed into service and moored within sight of the boat where snipers would be positioned. The dockmaster’s people were towing away the other vessels on the nearby piers to rob any opposing force of cover. Paul spent an hour giving orders and making certain the security was as close to impenetrable as possible. He was beginning to feel a lot better about the situation.

Thorne was completely amazed. All he had to do, it turned out, was join a work in progress. Anyone coming in from outside had to pass through several police roadblocks. There were uniformed patrolmen, deputies, and highway patrolmen in evidence.

By eight-thirty it had started- to drizzle a little, as if
the way was being prepared for the impending storm that was moving over the Louisiana coastline. The tropical storm had already weakened as it neared landfall south of New Orleans. Although there was little chance of serious wind damage to secured vessels, the Coast Guard had posted high-wind warning flags at the mouth of the harbor. There was a steady stream of boat owners who were checking lines and securing their vessels in preparation for the weather.

A forty-foot Coast Guard cabin cruiser sat like a mother hen, one hundred feet away from the
Shadowfax
, in effect guarding the channel. A group of seamen stood on her stern. One sailor had an M-16 on his shoulder and a pair of binoculars in his hands. The others were watching the diver preparing to drop into the water from the pier.

Paul and Rainey watched as the diver slipped the mask into place and slid into the dark-brown water. The flashlight came to life, and its white glow began moving down the length of the boat’s hull.

Once Paul was certain the boat would be as safe as an open location could be, that it would take a platoon of fully armed Martin Fletchers to pose a serious threat to those aboard, he prepared to leave for the airport. He was certain the security could be no better were the President on board.

43

T
HE STREETS AROUND
L
AURA’S HOUSE WERE ALIVE WITH BLUELIGHTED
cruisers and armed patrolmen on foot. There were roadblocks on the corners. Two K-9 units were beside each other, the dogs standing in the rear seats, anxious and showing their tongues. There was a darkly dressed, black-faced figure standing on the porch roof with an automatic weapon held across his chest. A police Hughes 500 made a low pass over the side street and turned its powerful beam down into Laura’s backyard, turning everything white as snow. The wind was picking up, and it was beginning to drizzle.

Thorne, dressed in a rubberized parka, stood in the yard talking to the police captain in charge of the forces that had descended on the neighborhood. He heard a loud beating of rotors and looked up to see a giant orange-and-white Coast Guard Sikorsky passing overhead. It was the signal to move.

Inside, Wolf was excited and barked every few seconds as another figure passed by the window. Reb entered the room in his slicker with the bird in the small traveling cage.

“Why don’t you leave Biscuit here?” Reid said.

“No,” Reb said.

Reid took a breath and exhaled. “This’ll be quite an adventure.”

“We aren’t shoving off, are we?” Reb said nervously. “Going out on the lake?”

“No, we’re staying docked,” Reid said.

“Good,” Reb said. He didn’t mind sitting at the dock, but being out on the water was scary for him. When he was going for a sail, he wore a life jacket from the time he got to the pier until he got back on dry land.

Erin said, “He’s terrified of drowning. You know he won’t take lessons because he’s afraid he’ll drown learning.” She rolled her eyes toward the ceiling. “Wears a life preserver in the pool.”

“Well,” Reb said. “People that drown always seem to be good swimmers. Sometimes they say how these great swimmers drowned. People who don’t get in the water don’t get drowned.”

“He’s friggin’ impossible,” she said, exasperated.

“He may have a point,” Reid said.

“Nothing is impossible,” Reb said. “So I won’t learn to swim or take my vest off, and I’ll be twice safer than you, Erin.”

She stuck her tongue out. “And that stupid bird.”

Laura came in with Wolf’s lead, and the dog started jumping and spinning. “Okay, Wolf. Just a minute. Erin, got your slicker?”

“In my bag.”

“Well, put it on.”

“We’re just waiting for the word,” Woody said. He had a radio in his hand, which was alive with confusing, coded, and unintelligible official chattering. Woody had an earpiece, which he hooked up to silence the radio, calming the room.

Laura was amazed that he could understand anything
coming over the air. It sounded like a grand and official stew of voices to her. She was grateful this pandemonium hadn’t been a constant since the protection had started. To Laura this pitch of confusion was mind deadening. Her anxiety level over missing work, and being in limbo until Martin was dealt with, made it hard for her to stay cool on the outside, even for the children’s sake.

“Maybe we should leave Wolf at home,” Reid said. “And Biscuit.”

“I’ll stay with them, then,” Reb said, poking out his bottom lip.

“But Wolf’ll need to be walked,” Reid added.

“I’ll walk him if he needs to,” Reb said.

“Someone will,” Woody said. “Let’s not worry over the zoo.”

“I’d feel better if I had a gun,” Reid said.

Laura almost said that she did but remembered what Paul had said.
Tell no one
.

“You know how to use a gun?” Woody asked.

“I fired a few guns in my youth. I know what you guys are taught in your handgun training,” Reid said.

“You do?” Woody said.

“Sure, they go over it and over it until you get it right. They tell you that the bullet comes out the little front hole, so you should stand behind it when you pull the trigger.”

Woody stared at Reid with bored eyes.

Reb and Erin laughed. Woody didn’t.

“If you hear shooting, just do one thing we always tell civilians over and over,” he said.

“Stand behind us?”

“No, kiss the dirt and we’ll help you clean out your pants when it’s all over.”

The kids and Woody laughed. Reid didn’t.

Agent Alton Vance stepped inside from the porch. He was carrying a shotgun with a flashlight bracketed under the barrel. “Okay, people, we’re ready.” Thorne was standing behind him with his pistol in hand.

Wolf was wild-eyed and had to be pulled along as
Reb led him toward the big orange-and-white Sikorsky helicopter where Thorne and Sean waited by the open door. There was a ring of heavily armed, flak-vested cops around the place, their backs to the helicopter. The craft was sitting in the park across from Tulane University, its rotors moving slowly enough so the individual blades were in evidence. The family climbed in through the large door and were buckled into the seats by crew members dressed in orange jumpsuits who were wearing handguns in nylon chest holsters.

Reb looked back out at the police cars with their blue lights echoing in the mirrors of wet pavement on St. Charles. “The rain won’t hurt it?” Reb yelled at the man with the white helmet who fastened him in. The bird inside the cage seemed to be trying to fly in several directions at once. The guardsman placed a jacket over the cage. “This chopper’d fly underwater, Hoss, but we plan to stay in the air,” he said.

“I hope so,” Erin said.

The blades picked up speed, and the volume of the engines grew to a roar.

“Where’s the parachutes?” Reb yelled. The man secured Wolf’s leash to a ring set in the wall beside Reb’s seat, and the dog skittered into a nervous half crouch, his head bowed. Thorne and Sean climbed in last, and the Sikorsky lifted off the ground, tilted, and rolled out to the north with its precious cargo. Reb looked down at the lines of stopped cars on St. Charles Avenue.

“Let’s see Mr. Fletcher follow us now,” Reid said, smiling.

Thorne nodded nervously as he dialed a number on his cell phone. “Okay, Paul, we’re in the air. Good hunting.”

As the Sikorsky traveled toward the lake, Paul’s jet was taking to the air through the rain. The sky closed in on the craft, enveloping it in cloud as it climbed.

44

I
N
D
ALLAS
, E
VE HELD THE WICKER PURSE AGAINST HER CHEST AND
seemed to be short of breath as she walked down the concourse. Joe McLean had changed out of the airline pilot’s outfit and into a zippered jacket and baseball cap. The airport was thick with people arriving and departing. Eve was a mother goose with her five agent goslings, scattered but trailing along behind her, trying to look inconspicuous. They were all hooked into hidden radios so they could talk to each other. Larry and Walter wore Walkman look-alike transceivers. Joe, Stephanie, and Sierra wore small receivers that looked like hearing aids, with separate microphones in their lapels. Stephanie’s microphone was clipped to her bra, between the cups.

Eve moved well behind the speed set by the flow of fellow travelers, and it was all that the agents could do to keep from running into her. She slowed and entered the ladies’ bathroom. Joe waved Stephanie inside, and she
almost tripped over Eve when she went in but veered toward the row of sinks and started fumbling in her handbag, watching Eve in the mirror. Then Eve was staggering toward the line of sinks.

“Are you all right?” a woman dressed in a flight attendant’s uniform asked.

Eve whirled and looked at her. There was spittle on her lips, the lipstick smeared. Her eyes were dull where they looked over the dark lenses. “I’ll be fine. I need to splash my face and freshen up before I get on the plane.”

“Let me help you,” the woman said, ushering Eve to the sink. Eve pulled the scarf free with one hand while maintaining the grip on the purse. Stephanie stood at another sink and played at checking her makeup. “Seems our girl is having a hot flash,” Stephanie whispered. She watched out of her peripheral vision as Eve flooded her face, wetting the front of her dress as she did. “Let me get a sky cart to drive you to your flight,” the stewardess offered.

“That would be nice. I feel kind of peaked all of a sudden. I’m not used to flying. The excitement.”

Eve smiled a crooked smile, and the stewardess smiled back. Warning buzzers were sounding in Stephanie’s head. Eve might have something up her sleeve. She could be trying to lose her tail or make them show.

Stephanie went out through the doorway behind the stewardess and waved at Sierra. She showed the stewardess her badge. “Police business, ma’am. I’d appreciate it if you’d call that sky cart and go on with your business.”

The stewardess didn’t ask any questions. She satisfied herself that the badge was real as far as she could tell and nodded her head. Then she walked toward a gate and spoke to the man taking tickets, who in turn nodded, eyed Stephanie, and spoke into the telephone.