Rogue Justice (13 page)

The man continued. "You came along rather late in the game, excelled at everything you did. Life was good in the Idaho hills, a nice little slice of Norman Rockwell. Then one day, Zach left and never came back, tore the family apart, broke your heart. You were eight at the time, as I recall. He moved to some hick town in Missouri, not the end of the world but close, found himself another woman."

Zora was vibrating now, her face red with fury. She remembered hearing the news, remembered that day like it was yesterday. And every birthday, every holiday after that, she would run down to the mail box, hoping her father had sent a card, maybe even a gift. He never did. She kept reaching out to him anyway, hoping things would change. When she was eleven, she saved up all her allowance and bought him an expensive cardigan sweater for Christmas, wrapped it up nice and neat. She found his address in Mother's appointment book, rode into town, and sent it first-class mail. It came back ten days later, unopened. A year later, he shot himself in the chest.

The man took a deep breath and spread his hands, palms up. "Curious how most of this got left out of the
Vanity Fair
story, isn't it? Same goes for the unfortunate accident with your young friend, must have been terrible watching her and her horse disappear into that ravine."

"Give it a fucking rest, already," Zora snapped. "And leave my father out of this. He's burning in some dark corner of hell, which is exactly where he belongs." She tugged on the hood of her yellow poncho, took a deep breath. Just then, two bald eagles swooped down, soared above a broken-down old building, and disappeared over the harbor. Looking up she wished she could sprout wings and fly, too, get as far away as possible from this man and this nightmare.

A contrite look came over his face. He nodded and said, "You know what? I hear you. My old man's not exactly a candidate for sainthood either. He, uh, well he—"

Zora shot him a give-me-a-break look. "Remind me to bring my violin next time."

"Listen," the man said. "I've got no ax to grind here. I really don't. Personally, I hope your mother lives to be a hundred and nine. But there's something you need to understand, captain. The people in this game do not play by the rules. They
are
the rules. Think of the nastiest thing imaginable, the most despicable thing one human being can do to another, and they are capable of it. As cold and as cruel as all this must sound, I'm just trying to be honest with you."

Zora felt sick to her stomach, trapped in a dark tunnel with no way out. She stared at him in fury, then after a long pause, said, "Okay, so why me? I don't know a damn thing about killer whales. I catch fish for a living."

"Asked and answered. Other options were considered and ruled out, as I said before. I have no doubt you'll get the job done. Can't be any worse than playing Russian roulette with a man-eating shark, right?"

Zora ignored the reference. "Okay, let's say I
do
manage to pull this off somehow. What proof do I have that you'll leave my mother and me alone?"

"You don't. You'll have to take it on faith, captain. It's the best you're gonna do."

Zora threw him a cold stare. She was in complete free-fall now. "Fuck you and the horse you rode in on."

They stood toe-to-toe for several long moments, staring one another down.

Then the man slowly backed away. Glancing at his watch, he remaining maddeningly composed. "I'm sorry you feel that way." He pulled a card from his coat pocket and handed it to Zora. There was a number on it, nothing else. "This is a private number, untraceable. You have until midnight to call me with an answer. That's less than six hours from now. If I don't hear from you, or you decide not to accept our generous offer, then you'll just have to live with the consequences. Oh, and don't even think about calling the cops. We'll know before you hang up the phone. Good-bye, captain, and good luck."

Seconds later, the man vanished into the night mist.

Zora watched after him, her heart cold and heavy. She walked on another block to a wooden landing that looked out over the gloomy, wind-swept harbor. In the amber light of a streetlamp, a lone gull swooped in looking for scraps, found none, and flew off. She sat down on a stone bench, boiling mad, her mind racing. Not even tough Zora, the one she relied on, the one her crew relied on, could hold it together now. She felt achingly alone, a loneliness that settled on her like a second skin. She leaned forward, cradling her head in her hands, searching for answers.

None came.

But the tears did, pouring out so hard, her whole body shook.

What should I do, Mom, what the hell should I do?

Chapter 14

30 March, 10:30 AM PDT

Kingdom of the Sea Oceanarium,

Seattle, Washington

Colby freeman paced back and forth in his office like a caged animal, all dark circles and nervous energy. A smoldering headache pressed hard on his temples. He'd already popped four ibuprofens to dull the pain, but so far the pills hadn't kicked in. Nearly two hours had now passed since he'd learned of Samson's death. The news was hardly unexpected, yet still it hit with dizzying force.

Freeman thought about the steps he'd taken in the past twenty-four hours to contain the inevitable, satisfied that his actions had been quick and decisive. After moving Samson to a heavily-guarded sea-pen sealed off from the rest of the property, he'd then temporarily reassigned the entire orca team, except for Leanne and Big Boy. This was no small task. It took nearly three dozen pros alone, most working behind the scenes, to keep the whales healthy and the popular exhibit humming. And every one of them knew Samson was the glue that held the entire operation together, the gift that kept on giving.

Finally, he'd issued a carefully crafted press release, touting more safety measures in the wake of the Osaka incident. Employees around the world were fed essentially the same message, a message entirely consistent with CGE's unwritten policy. Known simply as "The Chandler Way," it said without saying that the company's position on employees discussing business matters with outsiders was one of zero tolerance. Those who disregarded the mandate quickly found themselves in the unemployment line, a place nobody wanted to be, especially in these tough times. The global outreach was no small task either. The KOS empire employed thousands of people divided into dozens of departments filled with specialists, from traffic flow engineers to designers to animal behaviorists to guest relations.

But Freeman had not pulled any punches with the two colleagues standing a few feet from him now, talking in hushed tones. Samson's death had changed everything and he told them so. Savannah Sokolov had flown in earlier that morning aboard a CGE corporate jet, and she too seemed taken aback by the news. On Savannah's right stood Darnell Atwater, managing partner at Black Stallion. He'd taken a commercial flight the night before from his headquarters in Denver. A former Army Ranger, Atwater was gym-rat fit with hard-boiled eyes, a poker face, and a nose that had been broken one too many times. His birth certificate put him at fifty-nine. He looked at least ten years younger.

They were staring at a photo.

Savannah turned to Freeman. "Okay, so you're telling us that, as of late yesterday afternoon, Dr. Kincaid here gave us forty-eight hours to notify the Feds, right?"

Freeman nodded.

Atwater said, "By Feds, you mean the National Marine Fisheries Service?"

Freeman nodded again.

NMFS was a division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the government agency responsible for carrying out more than three dozen federal statutes designed to protect fish stocks from depletion and marine mammals from extinction.

"She'll want a necropsy done too," Freeman added. "To understand how
and why Samson contracted this fatal disease. And a proper burial, of course."

Savannah set the photo down on Freeman's desk, her displeasure with the entire affair written all over her face. "Yeah, well, given this plan Mitchell's cooked up, we need to persuade her otherwise, don't we?" She glanced at her watch. "And there's no time to waste. We've got less than thirty hours left, not nearly enough to get done what needs to get done."

Freeman stared at his feet. "I'm just saying ..."

Atwater spoke up. "So, who else knows about the whale's death, Colby?"

"Our senior vet and Samson's head trainer, Leanne. That's it."

"And they're not talking, right?"

"Not a chance," Freeman said. "The vet's actually an ex-marine buddy of Mitchell's. Long story short, let's just say I
inherited
old Big Boy and leave it at that. He's as loyal as a sheepdog though, so no worries there. Now Leanne, she—"

"She's a friend of Dr. Kincaid's," Savannah interrupted, her voice icy cold. "Which means they talked. It's what girls do. They love to talk. Unlike you men who sit around shooting the shit... and saying nothing."

Freeman jumped in, ignoring the dig. "Actually, I've already spoken with Leanne. She gave me her word she wouldn't tell a soul, including the doc."

"And you believe her?"

"Yes. Her daughter's ill and the treatments cost a fortune. No way she can possibly afford them without good health coverage."

"I can appreciate that," Savannah replied. "Even so, we're running out of time."

"Then let's pay the good doctor a visit," Atwater said, tongue-in-cheek. "Suggest to her, in a nice way of course, that she needs to back away from all this, give us some breathing room. And I know just the man for the job."

Savannah threw him a look. "Let me guess, the same guy you sent to San Diego last summer to keep that cocky journalist quiet. What's his name?"

"Iago," Atwater replied.

Freeman was hardly a Shakespearean scholar, but he knew Iago was one of the Bard's more sinister knaves, a soldier and close confidant of Othello. "What am I missing here?" he asked.

Atwater explained. He said he'd grown up in Ashland, Oregon, the only child of two company actors with the town's famed Shakespeare Festival. In deference to his parents, he'd code-named all Black Stallion operatives after prominent characters from Shakespeare's plays, adding, "Iago's got the fiercest eyes I've ever seen and I swear he's got ice water running through his veins. Navy man, recruited back in the first Gulf War to be part of a secretive counterterrorist unit known as Seal Team Six. It's a quick-strike team with a single-minded mission—kill terrorists and rescue hostages. Same bunch that took down Bin Laden, they're that good. After leaving the Navy, he was recruited by a clandestine CIA unit and trained as an assassin. He's been with us for over three years now."

Freeman felt a small knot form in the pit of his stomach. He'd been raised in a white-collar suburb north of Chicago, the only son of a soft-spoken jeweler and an elementary school principal. He knew nothing of the dark world of mercenaries, men who trained in the shadows and jumped out of airplanes in the middle of some godforsaken jungle. His mind was now catapulting from one looming disaster to another. "C'mon, how much muscle do we need? I mean the woman's a marine biologist, not some bomb throwing maniac from al Qaeda."

"Relax, Colby," Atwater said with a perfect poker face. "Nobody's going to get hurt. The guy's a real pro. He'll be in and out and make his point before the woman has time to think."

The knot grew larger. Freeman glanced at the picture of his wife and daughters sitting on his desk. His future flashed before his eyes: arrest... trial... conviction... firing squad! What would his family think? Who would take care of them after he was gone? He took a deep breath, trying to keep the panic out of his voice. "Look, I still don't—"

"He's right," Savannah said tersely. "Now let's make sure we're all on the same page here. This woman is
not
to be harmed in any way. Understood?"

Atwater grimaced. "Look, I get paid to deliver results. And that's exactly what I intend to do. But yes, message received loud and clear."

"Okay, good," Savannah said, turning back to Freeman. "What about Samson? What's going on with him right now?"

"He's in the sea-pen under lock and key," he said. "The water's cold enough to slow decomposition so we should be okay there for now. It's guarded 24/7 and nobody can get within two hundred yards of the place without my permission." Freeman wiped away tiny beads of perspiration that had formed on his brow. The old cliché, "caught between a rock and a hard place," came to mind, but he managed to dismiss the thought. "I'll tell you this, though," he added. "If Dr. Kincaid
does
find out Samson's dead, the Feds will storm in here like it's D-Day."