The Chemist Part 50

Still listening through her earbuds, Alex leaned her forehead against her arms. Carston was typing again.

She pictured him at his desk, poker face in place as he sent out directions or questions. Would he be flushed with anxiety? Would tension sweat drip off his pale, bald head? No, she was sure he would be cool and precise, no more worked up than if he were typing out a request for paper supplies.

He'd know the right things to ask, even if Deavers didn't. He could manage the whole operation from his ergonomically correct desk chair. He'd see Kevin tortured to death, then run out for his dinner reservations without a second thought.

The sudden anger that flared up almost choked her.

What was happening now had nothing to do with national security or saving lives. Carston was running a private vendetta for a man who was quite possibly the kind of person who actually belonged on an interrogation table. Carston had crossed the line from arguably necessary black ops to purely criminal acts a long time ago, and it didn't seem to have affected him at all. Maybe it had always been this way. Maybe everything she'd done for him, every inhuman action she'd performed in the name of public safety, had been a scam.

Did he think he was so untouchable? That these hidden choices would never touch his public life? Did he think he was exempt? Did he not realize that he had liabilities, too?

There were worse things than being poisoned.

Alex's breath caught. Unexpectedly, a new avenue, something she'd never considered before, opened up inside her mind. It was a reach, and she knew it. There were a thousand things that would probably go wrong, a million ways to screw it up. It would be almost impossible, even with a year to plan every detail.

She felt Daniel's hand on her back. Through her earbuds, she heard him ask, "Alex?" in a worried tone.

She looked up slowly. She stared at Daniel, a.s.sessing. She examined Val the same way.

"Give me ten more minutes," she said, then she put her head down on her arms and concentrated once more.

CHAPTER 28.

Alex spoke quickly as she laid out her plan, emphasizing the details she was sure of a little more than necessary. She tried to make it sound well thought out, like she was confident about it. Daniel seemed to be buying her version, listening intently, nodding at certain intervals, but Alex couldn't read Val at all. Her eyes were focused toward Alex, but almost like she was looking through Alex's face to the back of her head. Her expression was politely distant.

Alex talked through the conclusion, which wasn't nearly as fail-safe as she would have liked it to be, and she could tell she wasn't selling the outcome as well as she had the preliminaries. She looked down at Einstein's face resting on her leg instead of at the human faces, petting him more frequently as her discomfort grew. Trying to wrap it up on a positive note, she went on a little longer than she should have. She was still midsentence when Val interrupted.

"No," Val said.

"No?" Alex repeated. She said the word like a question, but she was already resigned.

"No. I won't do that. You're going to get killed. It's nice that you want to go back for Kevin, but be realistic, Alex. This isn't going to work."

"It might. They won't be expecting this. They won't be ready."

"It doesn't matter if they're ready or not. There will be more than enough of them to make up for it. So you get off a lucky shot and take one down. The guy next to him will get you."

"We don't even know how many people will be there."

"Exactly," Val said in a flat voice.

"Val, they won't pay attention to you. You'd just be an anonymous aide. These people see hundreds of a.s.sistants every day. You'll be invisible to them."

"I have never been invisible in my life."

"You know what I mean."

Val looked at her with a perfectly smooth face. "No."

Alex took a deep breath. She knew it wasn't fair to involve Val. She would have to make do.

"Okay," she said, wis.h.i.+ng her voice sounded stronger. "I'll do it by myself, then."

"Alex, you can't," Daniel insisted.

She smiled weakly at him. "I can. I don't know how well I'll do, but I have to try, right?"

Daniel looked at her, torn. She could see that he wanted to argue. He wanted to say no, she didn't have to try, but that would mean walking away, leaving Kevin to die in agony. His was an untenable position. Now that there was any hope at all, how could he turn his back on it?

"Together, we'll be able to get the first part done," she told him. "It won't take more than the two of us."

"But the second you're separated from Carston, he'll double-cross you."

Alex shrugged. "I'll just have to sell my threat. If he thinks betraying me means the hostage dies, maybe he'll play it clean."

"You won't know how he's playing it. You won't be prepared."

"Val doesn't want to risk her life. Can you argue with her?"

Val watched Daniel with half-lidded eyes as he hesitated.

"No," he said. "But I can do her part. We'll trade. Val, you could do mine, right?"

Alex squeezed her eyes shut and then slowly opened them again. "Daniel, you know that won't work. Even if you weren't Kevin's twin brother, these are the people who put your face on the news."

"Val can fix me up, can't you, Val? Make me look different enough?"

Val's expression s.h.i.+fted abruptly, became more engaged. She examined his face closely.

"Actually... I think I could." She turned to Alex. "It's not like anyone is going to be looking for him there. Trust me, a lot more people would look at me-even as a nameless a.s.sistant. I think I can make him different enough for them not to give him a second glance."

"I'm not doubting your abilities, Val... but they're twins."

"Let me try?" she asked, an unfamiliar pleading tone coming into her voice. "I do want to help Kevin." When she said his name, Einstein looked up. "I just won't die to do it. Let me do something."

Einstein put his head on Alex's leg again.

"I guess I could let you try. But it's a waste of time and we don't have enough of that as is."

"It won't take me that long."

"And you'd be willing to do Daniel's part of the plan?"

"Sure, that's easy. No one will be shooting at me."

Alex winced.

What was she contemplating here? People would be shooting at Alex for certain, she'd already come to terms with that. But if Val could disguise Daniel enough, which Alex couldn't even imagine, then they might be shooting at Daniel, too. She reminded herself of all the reasons they had to go after Kevin. He had too much vital information. If he told the bad guys everything he knew about Alex and Daniel, the cars they were in, the places they had to go to ground, the way Alex operated, it wouldn't be that hard for the Agency to track them down. Val, too. Most likely, they'd all die anyway.

Die like cowards, running.

But the reasons were moot. If there was a way to save Kevin from what was happening to him, she had to do it. There was a bond there now that she hadn't even realized was forming. He was her friend. Her second liability. They were hurting him, even as she sat here considering. She had to stop it.

"Get to work, Val. This first part will take me two hours, if I'm lucky. When I get done, we'll reevaluate."

THOUGH SHE'D LIVED in DC for almost a decade, Alex had never visited the National Zoo. She'd always thought of it as something for children, but there seemed to be plenty of adults attending today unenc.u.mbered by offspring.

There were still many, many children-it seemed like thousands of them yapping in high-pitched voices and flailing around their parents' feet. All appeared to be under the age of five, so she guessed school wasn't done for the year yet, though it must be close.

She tried to think how long it had been since she'd first met with Carston, but she couldn't tally up the days in a way that made sense. Daniel had had around three weeks left of school then. More time had pa.s.sed than that... hadn't it? Maybe Daniel's school finished earlier than average.

Alex's first stop was the rental line at Guest Services. It wasn't long. Most of the visitors would have arrived earlier, in the cool of the morning. Lunchtime was approaching, with the sun beating down almost directly overhead. Some people would leave then, avoid the high prices of the food inside the park. Head home for naptime.

She had quite a bit of information about Erin and Olivia, all gleaned from Erin's Facebook page. It was the same place that, months ago, she'd found the picture of Olivia that hung around her neck now.

Alex knew Olivia was three and a half. Still small enough that she would fit in a stroller. Alex knew what Erin looked like from nearly every angle and had a good idea of the kinds of clothes she wore. She knew Erin was a late riser and probably wouldn't have gotten to the zoo right as it opened. She knew Olivia was most excited about seeing the pandas.

Alex paid nine dollars cash for a single stroller, then put her backpack in it and headed into the park. She craned her neck around, searching. It made sense that she would be looking for someone-maybe her sister and nephews, or her husband and their child. There were lots of other patrons looking for their parties. She didn't stand out.

Erin and Livvy would be past the pandas by now, probably thinking about lunch. She a.n.a.lyzed the map she'd gotten with the stroller. She'd try across from the apes first, then near the reptiles.

She walked fast, ignoring the turnoffs and viewing areas.

Erin had the fair skin of a redhead, like her father. She'd posted pictures of herself sunburned and moaned about freckles. Erin would be in a hat and probably light long sleeves. Her hair was bright and hung halfway down her back. It would catch the eye.

Alex scanned the crowds as she moved quickly through them, looking for a woman with a child, ruling out those with friends and spouses and multiple children. For a while, she followed a woman with her hair rolled up under a wide-brimmed straw hat pus.h.i.+ng a single stroller, but then the child climbed out to walk with her-it was a boy.

A quick loop around the big cats, and then down toward the petting zoo. All the while, she was conscious of how she looked-map in hand, vigilantly searching for her companions. She wore a straw hat of her own over the dark blond wig and wide-framed sungla.s.ses. She had on a plain T-s.h.i.+rt, boyfriend jeans, and the sport-shoe/ballet-flat hybrids that would let her run if she had to. Nothing about her would be particularly memorable.

Several shades of red hair had grabbed her attention throughout the course of her search, but many of them had been clearly unnatural. Others had been on women too old to be Erin, or too young, or holding extra children. Now she spotted one headed along the trail toward the Amazon exhibit-a long braid of golden-red hair swinging from beneath a white bucket hat. The woman was pus.h.i.+ng a single stroller; it looked exactly like Alex's, tan molded plastic with a dark green shade. She wore a sleeveless tank, and her arms were thick with freckles. Alex walked quickly after her.

The woman wasn't moving fast; it didn't take long for Alex to pa.s.s her. Alex kept her head down and glanced into the stroller as she walked alongside it.

The little girl looked right. Her face was turned away, but the fluffy blond hair seemed the same. Her size fit the profile.

Alex kept walking and beat the mother and daughter to the exhibit. She parked her stroller in the designated s.p.a.ce beside the bathrooms, inconspicuously wiping the handle with the hem of her s.h.i.+rt before she removed her backpack and shrugged into it. Now that she was fairly certain the woman was Erin and that Erin had her own stroller, she didn't need this one.

She located the woman and child dawdling along the trail. A larger group had caught up to them and flowed around them from both sides. Alex could see the woman's face clearly now-it was definitely Carston's daughter. Erin had paused to offer Olivia a sippy cup.

The path was getting more crowded. It was hot, and the wig was making her head itch and sweat. The straw hat wasn't helping.

Alex focused on an empty bench about ten feet ahead of the duo. There was another large crowd behind the first. If she timed it right, she could intercept Erin at the bench while the second crowd was pa.s.sing.

Alex moved purposefully back the way she'd just come, watching through her dark gla.s.ses to see if anyone was paying attention to her. The first group-a loud extended family, it looked like, with several toddlers, multiple parents, and one older woman in a wheelchair-enveloped her for a moment. She dodged through them and then slowed a bit.

The second crowd was all adults-foreign tourists on a day trip, she guessed, many of them wearing f.a.n.n.y packs-and they reached Erin as she was almost to the bench. Alex moved against the flow until she was just ahead of her quarry. As Erin pa.s.sed a foot away from the bench, Alex turned, twisting around an older man, and pretended to stumble. She reached out and grabbed Erin's hand on the stroller handle. Her palm mashed the pouch of clear fluid and forced it empty with one strong squeeze.

"Hey!" Erin said, turning.

Alex ducked back, twisting partially behind the closest guest. Erin came face to face with the bald septuagenarian.

"Excuse me," he said hesitantly to both of them, not sure how he'd become entangled. He pulled free of Alex and stepped around Erin and the stroller.

Alex watched as Erin blinked once, then again. Her eyelids seemed to get stuck on the second blink. Alex jumped forward and grabbed Erin around the waist as she started to crumple, then jerked her toward the bench so that they fell heavily onto it together. Alex jammed her elbow against the wooden back; it would leave a bruise, but one she could easily cover. Erin was taller and weighed more than Alex, so Alex wasn't able to keep them from slumping awkwardly. Alex loosed a slightly manic laugh-hopefully anyone watching would think they were playing around.

The little girl was singing to herself inside the stroller. She hadn't seemed to notice that she'd stopped moving. Alex extricated herself from the mother and pulled the stroller closer, angling it so that Olivia was facing away from Erin.

Erin lolled on the bench, her head falling onto her right shoulder and her mouth hanging open.

A third conglomeration of visitors moved past them. No one stopped. Alex was operating quickly, so she couldn't keep close tabs on any reaction, but no one had raised an alarm yet.

She pulled the bucket hat lower over Erin's face, shading her lifeless expression. Out of the side pocket of her backpack, Alex drew the little perfume bottle. She reached around the edge of the stroller's shade and pressed the nozzle down for two seconds. The singing ceased, and then Alex felt the light thud through the plastic frame of the stroller as the child fell back against the seat.

Moving as casually as she could, Alex patted Erin's shoulder, then stood up and stretched.

"I'll get her some lunch, you go ahead and rest," Alex said, smoothing the wig under her hat in case her tumble had disarranged it. She glanced around, eyes hidden behind her gla.s.ses. No one seemed to be focused on the little tableau she'd created. She grasped the stroller's handle and started moving back toward the parking lot. At first she kept the pace easy. She looked toward the animal cages like the others were doing. As she got farther from the bench, she began moving faster. A mother with an afternoon appointment.

Outside the bathroom at the visitors' center, she parked the stroller and pulled Olivia into her arms. The child had to weigh over thirty pounds and felt heavier because her body was slack. Alex tried to arrange the unconscious child into the same position she'd seen other parents use-straddling one hip, legs on either side, head cradled on the shoulder. It didn't feel like she'd gotten it right, but she had to move anyway. She gritted her teeth and walked as quickly as she could through the gate. She wished she'd been able to park closer, but eventually, with sweat soaking her T-s.h.i.+rt, she reached the car.

Alex hadn't had time to get a car seat. She glanced around surrept.i.tiously to see if anyone was watching, but the area of the parking lot she was in was mostly full, and the people arriving now were far away. The early quitters had already left; she was alone.

She laid the child on the backseat and wrapped a seat belt around her waist. Then she covered Olivia with a blanket to conceal her.

Alex straightened up and checked for witnesses again. No one was nearby; no one was watching her. She pulled a syringe from the inside pocket of her pack and leaned in to administer the drug to the sleeping child. She'd calculated the dose for someone weighting thirty to forty pounds. It should keep Olivia under for about two hours.

Alex turned the car on and cranked up the air-conditioning. She started breathing again for what felt like the first time since she'd entered the zoo.

Phase one was successful. Erin would wake up in forty-five minutes, more or less. Alex was sure that paramedics would be attending to her by then. When she woke, she'd sound the alarm about her missing daughter. The zoo would be searched first, then the police would be brought in. Alex had to be in position when Erin realized her daughter had been taken, that she'd not merely wandered off while her mother was having some sort of seizure. Alex was 85 percent sure which call Erin would make first.

She really hoped that Val would be done working her magic by the time she arrived at the new hiding place so Alex would know exactly which plan was moving forward-not because she'd made up her mind as to which outcome she wanted most. Going in alone... that was suicide. But taking Daniel... was that murder-suicide?

Maybe Val's confidence in herself was misplaced. Maybe Daniel would just look like himself in a wig.

Alex could do it alone. She'd just make it very clear what would happen to Olivia if she, Alex, didn't live through the night. That would keep Carston in line, wouldn't it?

She didn't want to think about the things Carston could set in motion. The traps he could lay so that once he had Olivia back, Alex would be his.

Alex called Val as she approached the new building, and when she pulled into the underground garage, Val was waiting by a set of elevators with a wheeled cart-it looked like something a hotel visitor would receive room service on. The garage was otherwise empty of other people. Alex couldn't spot any cameras, but she kept her body between the open back car door and the best view inside. Neither Val nor Alex spoke. Alex s.h.i.+fted the sleeping child to the bottom shelf of the cart, then rearranged the blanket around her so her shape was obscured.