"Are we sure thats where he is, and that he has Mom and the children with him?" I asked.

"All four of them were seen on the sixth floor, walking toward the stairway that leads to the observatory," he said. My heart sank when he added, "Its likely Gabriel made up some con, like being a student a.s.signed to take them to see Dr. Mayer, to get the children and your mother to go with him. At that point, they didnt appear frightened. In fact, they walked past a professor who said they all appeared happy. Maggie was laughing."

My thoughts flashed back to Maggie and Mom at the dinner table, so excited, talking about their trip to the university. Maggie bubbled with enthusiasm. And Strings, that dear sweet child, with his rebellious streak. Why hadnt I gone with them?

Just then, a diminutive man, bald with a well-trimmed salt-and-pepper goatee, wearing round gla.s.ses and a spotless white lab coat, exited an elevator and bustled toward us. "Im Dr. Norton Mayer," he said, pumping my hand and appearing highly agitated. "I told the police. I know nothing about this man who has your family. Ive never seen him. I didnt invite your daughter here to the university. Why, I-"

"Its all right, Dr. Mayer," I said. "I know this has nothing to do with you. This man just used your name to lure them here."

"Thats what I told that FBI agent," he said, incredulously. "How could anyone believe I was involved, after all-"

"What FBI agent?" I interrupted.

"I believe his name is Scroggins," said the doctor. "Horrible man. Why he as much as suggested that I was somehow involved in all this. Ive never in my life..."

I felt sickened when I realized that Scroggins had arrived and already insinuated himself into the situation.

"Please, Professor, dont let it bother you," said David, whod been standing behind me. "Im sure Agent Scroggins was simply ruling out that possibility. We have no reason to believe youre involved in any way."

"Well then, as I was telling that disagreeable man, I am eager to help," he said. "I know the observatory better than anyone. Ive held cla.s.ses there for nearly thirty years and helped design the facility."

"Then come with us," said the captain, who held open an elevator door.

Nearly all the players in the drama of the past two weeks had already gathered when we arrived at the fourth-floor physics department offices-two floors below the observatory-hastily commandeered to be used as a temporary command center. The reception area resembled most academic offices, piled high with papers and books. The walls were covered in framed posters of milestones in the history of physics and tacked-up notices of changes in room a.s.signments. Scroggins sat half-on half-off the corner of a cheap brown metal-and-Formica desk, as c.o.c.ky as ever, and accompanied by two men and a woman I pegged as members of an FBI SWAT team. Detective Nelson had tagged along, probably to gloat, I a.s.sumed. But then I noticed hed lost his swagger. Even more red-faced than usual, he looked perplexed when I walked into the room, as if he couldnt decide whether to hate or pity me.

Then I noticed Captain Jim Perkins, head of Houston P.D.s SWAT and hostage negotiation teams, my first good news. Jim had been one of Bills best friends for more than a decade, and our families were so close that Id stood up as his daughters G.o.dmother at her baptism five years earlier.

"Thanks for coming, Jim," I said.

He slipped his arms around me. His badge pinched my cheek, but I didnt pull back. "When I heard, they couldnt keep me away," he whispered. "Dont worry. Well get them out."

Embarra.s.sed, I brushed away a tear.

With every ounce of the little self-control I retained, I squared my shoulders and surveyed the officers gathered before me. "If Gabriel lives up to our agreement, weve got half an hour to get my family out alive," I said. "How do we make this happen?"

"Its our opinion, at the Bureau, that this man wont kill your family," said Scroggins, walking around the room, tapping a pointer hed lifted from one of the desks. Id been listening to his p.r.o.nouncements and staring at my watch for nearly ninety seconds with no hint of what he intended. Now it appeared he planned to tell me. "Lieutenant, its you he really wants, and h.e.l.l wait for you. Our tactic is to keep promising you but not produce you," he explained. "We want to wear him down, wait until hes tired, hungry, and then negotiate to gain release of the hostages."

I couldnt believe what I was hearing.

"He will kill them," I said, bridling in crushing frustration. "The man youre talking about is a psychopath who has killed at least six people. He loves nothing better than torturing and murdering. And now, hes suicidal. He knows his run is over, that h.e.l.l never leave this building alive and a free man. What hes done here, Agent Scroggins, is to orchestrate his own suicide, a dramatic finale. He intends to go out in a blaze of glory, but not alone. If we do nothing but talk, in precisely twenty-eight minutes, my mother, my daughter, and an innocent young boy will all die truly horrible deaths."

"Thats not true, Lieutenant," Scroggins insisted. "Youre too close to this and not looking at it rationally."

Was he right? Could I be wrong?

"What do you think, David?" I asked.

Glaring at Scroggins from across the room, David said, "I agree with Sarah. We cannot a.s.sume Gabriel will not kill his hostages. This is a highly motivated killer who has expressed what could reasonably be taken for suicidal intentions. We need to act as quickly as possible."

"I dont agree," said Scroggins. "Im telling you-"

Ignoring him, I turned to Jim Perkins.

"Jim, what are our options," I said. "How will your team proceed?"

"As I explained to Agent Scroggins before you arrived," he replied, "if our SWAT team runs this scene, we do it with no interference from his men. Ive already stationed officers around the building perimeter, outside the observatory door, and snipers on the rooftops of every adjacent building. I have a helicopter with a decoy on its way, so we can have it land on the grounds outside as a diversion, to stage your arrival. A specialist is ready to infiltrate the observatory with a pinhole tandem microphone and camera device to establish surveillance, as soon as he gets the order."

"What are you waiting for?" I asked.

"a.s.surance that were in charge, Sarah," he said, motioning at Scroggins. "Currently, weve been ordered to stand down."

"I told you, Perkins, you dont need cameras and microphones. Its never getting to that point." Scroggins bristled. "As for whos in charge, the FBI is in control of this scene. That means, as the senior agent, that Im in charge, and theres no way in h.e.l.l Im letting you burst in and get innocent people killed. Well negotiate those hostages out of there. Were not forcing entry."

"Who put you in command?" I questioned, my anger rising to the surface.

"When the FBI is on a scene, we run the show," Scroggins said, a thin coat of sweat glistening on his forehead, and his voice thick with resentment. "If Captain Perkins wants to hang around to see how its done, well, thats up to him. But Im calling the shots."

I couldnt take it any longer.

"Your services are no longer needed here," I snapped at Scroggins. "Get out."

"Sarah, we might need their help," David objected. Except to answer my direct question, hed hung back, listening. I didnt know what he was thinking. Maybe he thought this was my fault, that Id put my family in danger. Maybe he was right. "Lets scope this situation out first, before we start sending people away."

"No," I said, inwardly wondering if I was making the right decision. Yet my gut screamed one thing: something had to be done and it had to be done fast. "I want Scroggins and his men out of here, now."

"Thats not your decision, Lieutenant," Scroggins shot back, anger spilling out with every word. "Your position in this room is that of a concerned relative of the hostages. Nothing more. On this case, you have no stature as a law officer."

"Captain," I said, turning to my boss, who leaned against the wall near the door. "They cant do that. Can they?"

"Well, Sarah..."

"Im telling you, this is the way it is," said Scroggins, so haughtily his entourage, milling about the room, looked uneasy.

"Ted, we need to listen to the lieutenant. Its her-" Nelson ventured.

"Listen, you d.a.m.n redneck, sit down and shut up," Scroggins barked. He then turned to his men. "Now, I want a phone line directly hooked up to-"

"Captain," I said again, a lump of bile swelling in my chest. "Isnt it true that the FBI is on this scene at our departments invitation?"

"Technically..."

"Well then, fire them."

"You sure, Sarah?"

"Yeah," I said, swallowing hard. "Im sure."

Eyes narrowed, Captain Williams said, "Agent Scroggins, your services and those of your men are no longer required. Please leave the scene."

"You cant..." Scroggins bl.u.s.tered. "Washington will hear..."

"Go ahead, call D.C.," the captain said, frowning. "But in the meantime, get the h.e.l.l out."

Scroggins glared at me but didnt argue.

"Thanks, Captain," I said. I was about to turn toward Jim Perkins, when I thought better of it. I wanted one more shot at Scroggins, who was angrily stalking toward the door.

"By the way, did you leak the information on this case to the press to set me up to take the fall when your case against Priscilla Lucas fell through? Is that why you did it?" I shouted.

Scroggins turned back to face me, his face contorted with anger. He said nothing, but I knew without question, Id been right. David must have reached the same conclusion because he said, fuming, "Ted, leave. Get out of here before I throw you out."

Dr. Mayer, whod been silent yet looking rather pleased throughout the entire exchange, smirked at Scroggins and observed, "Looks like youre just in the way here, Agent Scroggins."

After shooting the professor a smoldering gaze, Scroggins turned on his heels and stormed from the room, followed by his minions. Nelson hung back.

"Id like to help," he said. "In any way I can."

"Id appreciate that," I said. Then I turned to Jim. "Okay, how long before you have surveillance, and how do we get inside?"

"Sarah, just a minute," he said, motioning to one of his men. "Anderson."

"Yes, Captain Perkins."

"Get that camera positioned and functioning; youve got three minutes."

"Yes, sir."

"Sarah, this is what Ive got in mind..."

Thirty-six.

The situation was a difficult one. The building we were in, SRI, was the tallest on this section of the campus, ruling out any possibility that snipers would have a shot at taking Gabriel out. The gunmen were stationed merely as a backup, to prevent his escape if he attempted to run from the building.

Pushing books, papers, a telephone, and everything else aside, Jim unrolled a blueprint of SRI on a desk. He explained that the observatory consisted of a rectangular room capped by a thirteen-foot dome. Perched on the roof at the west end of the building, the facilitys sole entrance was accessed via a special sixth-floor stairway. A fire door positioned at the top of the stairs led directly into the observatory, while a second door, positioned off the same landing, led to the roof.

"How does the observatory door lock?" I asked Dr. Mayer.

"With a key from the outside, but it also has a bolt-lock mechanism on the inside. The students use the telescope to take photographs, and then develop their film inside the observatory," he said. "Bolting the door from the inside prevents it from being opened, admitting light, and ruining their film."

As Jim described it, the observatory had three openings and, therefore, three possible points of entry: the first, the fire door; the second, two sliding panels, or shutters, in the dome itself that, when fully opened, measured forty-eight-inches wide. They formed the observatorys aperture, the opening through which students pointed the telescope to view the moon and stars.

"The only way to control the aperture, the rotation of the dome, and the telescope itself is through a small control panel attached to the telescope," explained Dr. Mayer.

"Our office pulled a satellite photo of the campus and it appears that the shutters are currently open approximately eighteen inches, and the aperture is pointed west," Jim said.

The observatory, not attached to the buildings heating and air-conditioning systems, had no vents in the walls or the floor. The floor itself was a solid concrete slab, but the walls were a less-substantial construction, concrete block. The third and final opening in the structure consisted of an eighteen-by-twenty-four-inch hole housing an air-conditioning unit.

"Thats where Anderson is inserting the camera. Hes snaking it through the units filter until its flush with the lower grate. It should be well camouflaged. Gabriel wont be able to detect its presence," Jim a.s.sured us. "The good news is that the upper dome is fibergla.s.s, easily penetrated. But then theres the bad news: the entire observatory is surrounded by a gravel rooftop, making it likely our guys movements would be audible from inside."

To m.u.f.fle any noise and prevent Gabriel from discovering their presence, Jims men were carefully laying a special insulation material over the gravel. The first area theyd covered, from the door to the air conditioner, was already being used by Officer Anderson to quiet his footsteps as he inched his way around the perimeter of the dome to install the camera.

"Andersons in," someone yelled, and we hurried to the adjoining office, where a laptop computer manned by an operator had already been set up. At first an image flickered, then swam across the screen as the tiny camera made its way through the final layers of the air conditioners filter and stopped just behind the mesh that covered the lower third of the unit. When the camera settled into place, the computer operator keyed in instructions and a clearer black-and-white image filled the screen. The wide-angle lens gave an elongated view of the inside of a dim room. I saw desks and chairs, dusty bookshelves, a framed photo of the moon on the wall, photographic enlargers, and in the very center, on a tall black pedestal, a large white-barreled telescope pointed toward a shaft of light, the domes opening.

"Where are they?" I said, frantically scanning the screen.

"There," said David, pointing at an object protruding from a far wall.

"Hes got them locked in the equipment storage locker," said Dr. Mayer. "But I only see two people. A boy and a woman."

Even through the distortion of the camera, I could see the images of Mom and Strings locked inside what appeared to be a wire-mesh cage. I could hear m.u.f.fled voices.

"Turn up the volume," Jim ordered.

The operator clicked on an icon and voices came through, loud and clear.

"Well, youre eventually just going to have to let us go," Mom could be heard arguing. "You cant keep us here. Why would you do that? We havent done anything. We havent hurt anyone. Theyre just children."

"I told you to shut up, old woman," Gabriel ordered, from somewhere off-camera.

Strings cut in, "You shouldnt talk to Mrs. Potts that way."

"Be quiet," Gabriel shouted.

Theyre alive, I thought. But where is Maggie? Where is she?

"Jim, I dont see Maggie," I said.

Just then, I heard her voice. "You know, my gram is a really good person, and youre not being nice to her," she said, her voice strained by fear. "No matter what you say about being on some stupid mission and not really wanting to kill people, youre just a stupid killer."

"Shut up!" Gabriel shrieked. "Now!"

"There she is," Jim said, pointing to a small figure on a stepladder, near the base of the telescope.

"Oh, G.o.d, David, hes got her tied up," I said, as the camera zoomed in. Gabriel had used what looked to be electrical cord to tie the equipment locker shut and to bind Maggies arms and legs to the ladders frame. "Hes going to kill Maggie."

"Sarah, stop," David ordered. But I saw my own terror reflected in his face.

"I need a schematic of this room," Jim ordered the operator. "Weve got eighteen minutes before the hours up. I need to know everything thats in that room, down to the smallest detail, in three. Now, do it."

As the computer tech and an a.s.sistant turned their attention to Jims order, Dr. Mayer asked the question Id been thinking, "Wheres this bad guy? I dont see him."