style="font-size:15px;"> There was the hiss of an exhalation as Max pivoted and leaned his backside against the fender of his car. “Most likely west coast. That’s all they’ll say at the moment. Likely timed for the Christmas or New Year’s holiday, for maximum impact. We’ve stepped up security on the main ports of entry—Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Los Angeles—checking all container ships from point of departure on, screening for radiation, and so on. We feel we’ve got the big ones covered pretty well.”
“Then…”
“It’s not the big ones we’re worried about.” Max paused. “You saw that segment on 60 Minutes a while back?”
Roy nodded, his lips twisting in a smile without much humor to it. “Yeah, I wish they’d quit giving the terrorists ideas.”
Max snorted. “I doubt there’s anything they could come up with Al-Qaeda hasn’t already thought of. This one, though…” He paused again, and Roy wondered whether it had been his imagination or whether a shiver had just passed through the man’s body. “Think about it—how many small-boat harbors do you suppose there are between San Diego and Santa Barbara? How many private fishing boats…yachts…sailboats? Wouldn’t take a very big one to carry a biological or chemical agent into a marina. With the right wind conditions…” His voice trailed off.
Roy nodded, fighting a wave of nausea. In Los Angeles, unless there was a storm moving down from the Gulf of Alaska, or the Santa Anas were blowing, the prevailing breeze blew from the west, straight in off the Pacific. It wouldn’t take much of one to carry a killing cloud into the basin, where eight million innocent souls lived and worked…and slept. “Jeez,” he said.
After a long, cold silence, he took a breath. “You must have a lead, or you wouldn’t have called me.”
Max straightened up and nodded. “Not sure you’d call it a lead. One name keeps popping up more often than it should. Abdul Abbas al-Fayad—know him?”
Roy frowned. “Sounds sort of familiar. Where’ve I—”
“He’s been on the watch list for a while, but you’d probably know him from the tabloids. Made the news a few years back when he bought a mansion in Bel Air from some old-time famous movie star, then proceeded to annoy the hell out of his neighbors when he turned the place into a cross between the Playboy mansion and something out of the Arabian Nights.”
“Oh, hell yeah, I remember—painted all the naked statues so they were anatomically correct, didn’t he? Something like that?”
Max nodded, his lips twitching in a smile without amusement. “Outraged his royal relatives back home, too—not exactly the accepted role model for an Arab crown prince, I guess. They disowned him—not that it slowed him down any. Abby—as he’s called—is a billionaire in his own right.”
Roy made a derisive sound. “The guy’s hardly a terrorist. He’s a playboy. And a nut.”
“A playboy…” said Max, and paused meaningfully before adding, “…with a boat.”
“Ah.”
“A helluva big boat. One of those megayachts—the Bibi Lilith, which I’m told translates as ‘Lady of the Night’—I swear to God. Do you suppose he knows what that means in English? Anyway, the damn thing looks like the Queen Mary. Over three hundred feet long and luxury all the way. Twenty guest cabins in addition to the main stateroom, and a crew of thirty.”
“Uh-huh,” said Roy, in a neutral tone.
Max gave him a sideways look. “Don’t you skipper a fishing boat? Something like that?”
“Yeah, I do,” Roy said, thinking, with a sudden sharp twist of longing, of his beach house on Florida’s Gulf Coast, and his boat, the Gulf Starr, which was currently in the capable hands of his best friend and business partner, Scott Cavanaugh. Scott had recently and unexpectedly become his brother-in-law, too, thanks to his recent marriage to Roy’s sister, Joy—something he was still having some trouble getting his mind around.
“What’d you do, get me on this boat’s crew?” He was thinking this assignment might have a definite upside, in spite of the grim nature of its purpose.
“Wish we could, believe me. Problem with that is, you’d have to infiltrate the guy’s inner circle, and they’re a close-knit, suspicious bunch—mostly related, and even that doesn’t mean they trust each other. Even if we could manage to pull it off, it would take time—a whole lot more than we’ve got.” Max was gazing at the distant harbor lights again. There was another pause, and then: “Your dad used to own a big rig, right?”
Wary, now, wondering what Max was getting around to asking of him, Roy nodded. “That’s right.”
Max let out a breath. “I hope to God he taught you your way around a diesel engine.”
“I’ve turned a wrench or two in my time,” Roy said. He didn’t mention the fact that his father had died too soon to have taught him much of anything, and that what he knew about diesels he’d mostly learned from his brother, Jimmy Joe. That, and trial and error.
Except, there wasn’t going to be any room for error here. In his current line of work, an error most likely meant people—a lot of people—were going to die.
“So, you’re thinking about…what, sabotaging an engine?”
Max’s teeth flashed bluish white in the artificial light. “Can you think of a better way to get you on board? They call for a mechanic—”
Roy shook his head. “Tough to jimmy up a diesel—at least, bad enough to need a technician to fix it.”
Max gave him a long look. “I know you’ll think of something,” he said as he turned back to the vista.
There was a long silence. Then Roy asked, in a voice so careful it could have been mistaken for indifference, “Any plans to raise the alert level?”
Max’s reply was a puff of air too muted to be called a snort. “Again? Unless we have something specific to tell ’em, who’s gonna pay attention?” He turned abruptly and tapped Roy’s chest with an index finger. “We need surveillance on that boat. We need something specific. If Abby…” His voice trailed off. He shook his head, once more scanning the sea of lights.
“Even if we knew for certain, what good would it do to tell them? Look at ’em down there. Ten million people. What do you think they’d do if they knew a cloud of death was heading their way? Can you imagine it? Jeez…”
For a long moment there was silence, and the balmy Southern California autumn night seemed to grow colder. Then Max said softly, “Whatever it takes, we have to keep a lid on this thing. Let’s find out where this is coming from, but for God’s sake, don’t let it get out we’re even close to looking at this guy. Abby’s a media magnet even under normal circumstances—surrounds himself with the biggest names in showbiz and politics. If even a hint of this were to hit the media…” He caught his breath, then growled, “They can’t know. Understand? Nobody…can know.”
When the shivering started, Celia did the only thing she knew how to do: She wrapped her arms around the injured man’s body and held him, rocking him like a baby and whispering, “It’s okay…it’s okay…I’ve got you…shh…I’ve
