"What do you think?"

She shook her head. "I don't know for sure. But just for the sake of argument, let's say these Danish terrorists didn't exist until six months ago. Why would they bother to plant information that said they were a lot older? What would be the point? I mean, so they're only six months old, what difference would that make to anybody? Are they looking for prestige? Some kind of validation? They want to be the Elks or the Masons of terrorists?"

Michaels nodded. "Good point. Why would would they bother?" they bother?"

"Maybe they didn't," she said. "Maybe it was somebody else."

Came the dawn into his head, a few bright streaks painting the dark sky of his mind. "Oh, man. Yeah, I can see that. Maybe there isn't any such group as Frihedsakse Frihedsakse. Maybe it's somebody who wants us looking for a terrorist group that doesn't exist. They leave just enough clues for us to think we're finding something, to stay interested, when in fact we're spinning our wheels and not getting anywhere. Maybe it's not terrorists at all."

"It's just a theory," she said.

He shook his head, suddenly angry at himself. "But we should have checked this out before. We didn't look for another target because we had this big fat turkey plopped right down in front of us. It was too easy."

Toni said, "The thing is, if it's not terrorists, who is it? And what do they want? Somehow, I have a lot of trouble believing some lowbrow high-school-dropout jock from a little town in Georgia has the wherewithal to pull all this off."

Michaels said, "Let's put Frihedsakse Frihedsakse on the back burner. Check on what systems were hit, and who might benefit from them being damaged or down." on the back burner. Check on what systems were hit, and who might benefit from them being damaged or down."

She stood. "I'll go talk to Jay and Joanna."

"Good."

She started to leave. He couldn't let her get to the door without saying something else. "Toni?"

She turned. "Yes?"

"About that... thing in the Miata..."

"Do you want to forget it ever happened, Alex? Because I can't forget it, but I can pretend nothing happened, if that's what you want-"

"No," he said. "I don't want to forget it. If we survive this, I think we should lie down-I mean, we should sit sit down-and discuss it." down-and discuss it."

Jeezus, man! That was lame, Michaels. Lame, lamer, lamest. I cannot That was lame, Michaels. Lame, lamer, lamest. I cannot believe believe you said that. You are a moron you said that. You are a moron!

Toni's smile, however, told him she had not only caught the Freudian slip, but wasn't in the least offended by it.

Bad idea, Michaels, a really bad idea. You don't c.r.a.p in your nest. You never sleep with the enlisted women, his father had told him. It's always a mistake.

But looking at Toni, it didn't seem like such a mistake. She was bright, beautiful, and physically adept enough so she could kick his a.s.s if she felt like it. For some reason, those things taken together had a powerful appeal. And she had kissed him first, hadn't she?

Yeah, right, she seduced you, and if you don't sleep with her, she'll stomp your b.u.t.t? Uh-huh. Who are we trying to fool here, pal Uh-huh. Who are we trying to fool here, pal? n.o.body is buying that one n.o.body is buying that one.

Michaels watched Toni disappear from view. He shook himself and blew out a big sigh. Worry about that later. Right now, he had bigger problems on his plate.

His com beeped. "Yeah?"

"Your ex-wife is on three," his secretary said.

Michaels laughed. Of course she was.

"Take a message," he said.

Chapter Thirty-Three.

Sat.u.r.day, January 15th, 11:45 p.m. Kansas City, Kansas "There they are," Winthrop said.

"Rats," Jay said. "You had to pick rats?"

"You'd rather cute little puppies or kittens? Something about you I ought to know, Gridley?"

Jay shook his head and raised the twelve-gauge pump shotgun to his shoulder. The gun was a Mossberg with an extended magazine tube that held ten rounds. There was a flashlight and a laser mounted on the barrel. An elastic band on the gun's stock held another ten sh.e.l.ls.

Next to him in the poorly lit alley, Winthrop raised her own weapon, a South African Streetsweeper, also a twelve-gauge, but with a big circular drum underneath that held a whole box of sh.e.l.ls. She also had a flashlight and a laser sight mounted on the weapon.

The brown rats, the size of c.o.c.ker spaniels and with mouths full of long, yellow teeth, milled around in the dead-end alley for a few seconds before they realized they couldn't get out that way. The big rodents looked around for a means of escape, and the only path out was blocked by Winthrop and Gridley.

No real problem in guessing which way they would go.

"Here they come!" Jay shouted.

The rats, at least twenty of them, came toward them like a furry tide.

Winthrop fired first, getting off two shots before Jay pulled the trigger on his weapon.

Big rats turned into b.l.o.o.d.y red clumps of twisting fur as the #4 buckshot tore into them. Five, eight, twelve of the charging animals fell. The rest kept coming.

"To your left!" Winthrop shouted. She swung her gun over and cooked off a couple more rounds. She blasted one of the rats, hitting it so hard she rolled it like a soccer ball.

Jay tracked the two rats trying to flank him on the left, fired, hit one, pumped the gun, fired, missed- Winthrop caught the one he'd missed, then fired twice more-whump! whump whump!-and rolled two more.

Jay lined up on the last one he saw moving, put the little red dot from the laser square on the thing's head, shot it- He blew out a sigh. Blasting plague-carrying rats was certainly more exciting than chasing down viral code strings in RW voxax or fingertap mode. In reality, the rats were circular sub routines with escape and evasion codings, eating up storage s.p.a.ce in the Federal Reserve's KC Division. The city had been evacuated-the computer had been taken off-line-so that exterminators could come in and clear out the infestation. Mostly that didn't go over too well, but that was how it had to be.

And this wasn't that bad. A couple of the banking systems had been hit so hard they'd had to be shut down completely. n.o.body n.o.body had liked that. had liked that.

Winthrop reloaded her shotgun from a pouch full of ammo she carried around her waist. And Jay had to admit, his earlier disapproval of the lieutenant notwithstanding, she looked pretty exciting standing there, shoving rounds into that big honking shotgun, smelling of gunpowder and all. There was something s.e.xy about an attractive woman with an automatic weapon in her hands.

Probably a month's work for a shrink trying to sort out that that symbolism, Jay figured. It was a good thing he wasn't into shrinks. He'd be broke all the time. symbolism, Jay figured. It was a good thing he wasn't into shrinks. He'd be broke all the time.

Winthrop touched her headset. "We've cleared the alley behind the bank," she said. "We're moving into the one next to the Thai restaurant on the south side."

Jay grinned. "You throw that in in my honor?"

"You look like you ought to know your way around a Thai restaurant."

"Of course. You like peanut sauce? Maybe I'll make us some nice rat satay satay."

"You probably would. Come on."

"As you command, mistress," Jay said. "You should have worn leather, you know. To go with the gun."

As they walked across the street toward the Thai place, she said, "Oh, by the way, nice job on running down that Platt guy-"

"Shucks, ma'am, 'twarn't nothin'."

"Wrong persona, Gridley."

"Ah, I stand corrected. This is present-day, so how about, 'Nopraw, fem.' "

"Better."

"I'd never have found him if you hadn't snagged his spook. Kinda hard to believe he slipped up like that."

"Even the smartest guys get stupid sometimes," she said. "I'll take lucky over good if it gets me there."

"Amen. I hope the feebs can catch the sucker."

"Rat city, just ahead."

"Lock and load, ma'am. You want right side or left this time?"

"Left. That gun of yours throws the empties in my face on the right."

"It's always something, ain't it? But it's FS, Winthrop, FS."

She smiled.

FS stood for "Frankenstein Scenario," shorthand for the concept "If you create it, then you take care of it." Any problems in your scenario were your responsibility.

"Fine, you can build the next one," she said.

"I will. You like snakes?' "

"I used to collect them when I was a little girl," she said. "Catch them with a long forked stick, put them into denim bags, and sell them to pet stores. Great things, snakes."

Shoot, Jay thought. Too bad Too bad. Well. There must be some icky thing she didn't like. Given how much of the federal banking system was infected, they were going to be mopping things up for a while. Surely he could figure out what made her squirm before they were done...

Sunday, January 16lh, 1:15 a.m. Atlanta, Georgia Platt knew that Hughes wouldn't like being woken up early, and it must be six or seven in spookland over there, but he wanted to be sure to catch him when he wasn't busy. Platt wasn't supposed to be calling Hughes at all unless it was an emergency, and given as how he had gotten away clean, maybe it wasn't an emergency anymore, at least not technically, but to h.e.l.l with it, he was gonna call anyhow.

He hated losing the house Momma had left him, but that was done. He wasn't going home again.

He used one of the one-time scramblers and a pay phone in the lobby of the Stonewall Jackson Memorial Motel on the outskirts of College Park, just off 1-285. Hughes had his virgil rigged up to rascal his call with the military-grade scrambler built into it, so n.o.body would trace nothin'. He needed to get this done and move out-Atlanta was a big town, but way too close to Marietta. He wanted to be a thousand miles away from both come sunrise, and he'd have to hurry to pull that off. He had a chartered plane waiting at the airport, and once he was in the air, he'd feel a lot better.

"What?" Hughes said.

Yep, he'd woke him up, all right.

"Howdy, Boss. We got a little situation here you need to know about."

"Hold on a second."

Hughes put him on hold, and Platt grinned. Six in the morning, Hughes would be in bed, and if he was puttin' Platt on hold, then he wasn't in the bed alone. Somebody was being sent to the John, Platt would bet.

"All right. What?"

"Sorry if I interrupted anything," Platt said, not the least bit sorry.

"Don't worry about that. What's the problem?"

"The feds ain't as stupid as they look. They backwalked a signal to my momma's house."

"What? How could that happen?"

"d.a.m.n if I know. Maybe they got some new techno-toy I haven't heard about. Don't matter as much how as they did it. I had to hightail it out pretty quick."

"But you got away without any real trouble?"

"Well, yes and no. They didn't see me, I was long gone time they showed up, I expect, but that place was under my own name. I'm gonna have to do a little ID switching."

"Is that a problem?"

"Not so you would notice. I got a half-dozen new me's lined up if I need 'em."

"How about the other thing?"

"Oh, the other other thing. That went smooth as oil on a baby's b.u.t.t. Our bank boy from the place in-where was it? Minnesota? I-oway? whatever-should be able to do the deed like he's supposed to. I expect to hear from him by about noon tomorrow. Well, today now." thing. That went smooth as oil on a baby's b.u.t.t. Our bank boy from the place in-where was it? Minnesota? I-oway? whatever-should be able to do the deed like he's supposed to. I expect to hear from him by about noon tomorrow. Well, today now."

"Good, good. You need anything?"

"I'm gonna have to hit one of the caches," Platt said. "I'm a little short on cash."

"Fine, whatever you need. Listen, if there are any problems with your IDs, let me know, I'll work something out so you can get out of the country."

Platt grinned. "Why, thank you, Boss, I surely do appreciate that. Nice to know there's somebody you can count on in today's dog-eat-dog world. I'll call you back soon as bank boy does his thing."

"Right. Later then."

Platt pushed the disconnect b.u.t.ton down, pulled the scrambler from the mouthpiece, and dropped it into his pocket. He'd toss it into a lake somewhere later. Hmm. Hughes hadn't seemed as upset as he'd expected by the feds sniffing Platt out. He was a cool one, all right. Maybe too cool. Truth was, Platt trusted him about as far as he could pitch the man one-handed, and while he was strong, that wasn't all that far.

Once bank boy had done his thing, Hughes was going to be eyeball-deep in money, at least for a little while, and maybe he wouldn't need an attack dog as much as he had before. Or maybe he thought he might get rid of the old one and buy himself a new dog.