Darrell McCaskey never thought he would be grateful for rush hour.

The highway was clogged in both directions as he picked his way through the slow-moving traffic. Herbert kept him posted on Lucy's progress. The two cars were converging, albeit slowly. As a precaution, McCaskey called Detective Howell to have someone go to Lucy's apartment. He wanted to make certain she was not there, that the person in the car was not a decoy. Howell dispatched a squad car without comment. His emotional neutrality was not surprising. It would not have served his cause to challenge the request or to attach it to demands or guarantees. The detective was still a professional.

As McCaskey got onto 95 heading east, he was informed that Lucy's apartment was empty. She was almost certainly in the car. A minute later, Herbert came back on the line.

"You're about two klicks shy of her position," he said. "If I can make a suggestion, she has no more exits between where she is and your current position. You can get out of the car and cross the guardrail north of Springfield-"

"I know the place," McCaskey said. "I can see it ahead."

The car was moving a little less than twenty-five miles an hour. He looked into the oncoming traffic as he hooked the phone on his belt. He left the line open.

"Maria, I'm going to intercept Ms. O'Connor and get her to pull over," McCaskey said. "We'll wait for you on the shoulder. I need you to get off at the next exit and swing around."

"You are a.s.suming she'll stop," Maria said.

"She will," her husband said. "If she doesn't brake willingly, I'll stop the car in front of her."

"What if she's armed?" Maria asked.

"I'll keep my mouth shut tight," he replied.

Maria frowned disapprovingly. "With a gun, not a hypodermic."

"I'll watch myself," McCaskey a.s.sured her. "Crossing the highway will be the tough part."

McCaskey did not usually crack wise in situations like this. Something about Maria's gravity had touched and amused him. This was not like Madrid, where they had been former lovers as well as grumpy and reluctant allies. This was not even like the stakeout for Ed March on Monday morning. This was the first case they had worked together since getting married. Maria was showing concern. He had wanted to try to minimize that.

He kissed her cheek as he put the car in park and opened the door. Maria maneuvered herself over the armrests and took the wheel. McCaskey ran in front of the car and waved an arm as he scooted across two lanes of traffic. Cars braked and horns whined. He swore as he reached the guardrail. The Mustang was about five hundred yards ahead, in the pa.s.sing lane. He saw the pa.s.senger's side. She was traveling about twenty miles an hour, then suddenly stopped. McCaskey hoped that Lucy had not heard the commotion and saw someone coming toward her. He did not want her trying to get away on foot. She would have a considerable head start.

"Darrell, can you hear me?"

McCaskey s.n.a.t.c.hed the phone. "Yeah, Bob!"

"We're getting a thermal spike from the DSP," he said.

"Meaning?" McCaskey asked just as he heard horns in the oncoming lane. Cars around the Mustang were stopping. "Never mind," he said. "I can see it. She torched the d.a.m.n thing!"

"What?"

"There's smoke coming from the closed windows!" McCaskey said. "She must have snuck out when the car stopped. Can you get a visual on her?"

"No," Herbert said. "We've got cloud cover on the natural-light camera."

"All right. Call 911. I've got to find her."

McCaskey started running. People who could not maneuver away from the Mustang were leaving their cars and hurrying away on foot. A man in a Ram 1500 had pulled off on the shoulder, five car lengths back. He was rushing over with a fire extinguisher. Just then, McCaskey saw red lights flash behind him. He turned and saw Maria standing on the roof of their car. She was tossing road flares, trying to get his attention. His wife must have noticed the smoke and stopped. She was gesturing toward the Ram. Through the smoke McCaskey could just make out someone climbing into the cab. That had to be Lucy. The Ram had a 5.7-liter HEMI Magnum engine. It was a truck with cojones cojones. The vehicle would take the driver through cars and off road with no trouble.

Flames curled from the tops of the windows of the Mustang. The Ram driver hit it with a blast from the fire extinguisher. As he did, the windshield cracked from the heat, the spiderweb pattern shooting out from the center. A fire started with a cigarette lighter and whatever was lying around should not have gotten so hot so fast. She must have used an accelerant- She was going to the airport, McCaskey realized. She had sprayed the contents of an aerosol can, hairspray or deodorant, in carry-on luggage. McCaskey realized. She had sprayed the contents of an aerosol can, hairspray or deodorant, in carry-on luggage.

McCaskey jumped the rail and grabbed the man about the waist and pushed him down just as the can itself exploded. It blew out the fragmented windshield and sent a small fireball rolling across the hood. Pieces of singed black Tumi luggage floated on the smoke like black snow. Former junkies might not be slick, but they knew household chemicals. They also knew how to distract the law.

McCaskey rose from the asphalt. "You all right?" he asked the other man.

"Yeah. Thanks."

McCaskey was bruised but intact. He jumped around the front of the burning automobile. The Ram was coming toward them, along the shoulder. He tried to get in the back of the pickup as it pa.s.sed, but he missed it.

Maria did not.

His wife had gotten back into the car and jabbed her way through traffic. When she was just a few yards from the oncoming Ram, she drove the car hard into the guardrail. The metal did not break, but it bulged just enough to clip the fender of the Ram, tearing it free on the pa.s.senger's side. The chrome dug into the spinning front tire. At the same time, Maria accelerated against the guardrail, bending it more and locking the fender into the tire.

The Ram's 345-horsepower engine screamed as the driver tried to push through the impa.s.se. Before she could succeed, McCaskey was at the driver's side door. He yanked it open and looked up at the face of desperation. He saw a woman who was crying so hard there was as much sweat along her scalp as there were tears on her cheeks. She was a woman so far over her pay grade that she was trembling all over, everywhere but her hands. Her fingers were bone white and locked around the steering wheel. She looked down at McCaskey.

"It wasn't going to be like this," she said, her voice an unsteady whisper. She looked back out the front window.

McCaskey climbed onto the step. He reached past her and turned off the ignition. With fire engines screaming behind him, it was difficult to hear. He leaned close. "What was not going to be like this?" he asked.

"They told me I would get exclusives," Lucy said. "That's all I wanted."

"Who said that?"

She did not appear to hear. "They said I was putting him to sleep. They said that was what they wanted. They wanted me to mess up his room, make it look as if he had partied hard. They said he would be discredited."

"Wilson, you mean," McCaskey said.

Lucy did not answer. McCaskey turned her face gently toward him. "You gave William Wilson the injection."

"Yes."

"So you would have exclusive access to stories?"

She looked into his eyes. "They told me he wouldn't be hurt. Not like Meyers."

"Who is Meyers?" McCaskey asked.

"Richard Meyers. He was my boyfriend. We were on the beach three years ago in Corpus Christi. I gave him a speedball. He died."

"They knew about this?" McCaskey asked.

"I ran."

"They found out?" McCaskey asked.

"Yes."

"So there was blackmail," McCaskey asked.

Lucy nodded once.

The young woman, a junkie, had been in Texas. Someone must have found out and kept that information for future use. For blackmail. These guys must have been building their plan, their operation, for some time. "What about Mr. Lawless?"

"I did that, too," Lucy replied. "I had to. They said they would turn me in if I didn't. And then I had to put the dress in Kat's apartment." Lucy started to cry. "I didn't want to hurt Kat. I like her."

"Who told you to do all that?" McCaskey asked.

"She told me I would have to write only good things about them or I would go to prison for murder," Lucy said. "I got stuck. I didn't know how to get out."

"Lucy, who did you speak with? Admiral Link? Senator Orr? Someone who works for one of them?"

"A woman."

"Do you know which which woman?" woman?"

"No," Lucy said.

"What number did she call?"

"My cell phone," Lucy said.

"Okay," McCaskey said. "Now I want you to stay here. Someone will come for you. You have to believe I'm going to try to help you, all right?"

"All right," she said blankly.

McCaskey gave her a rea.s.suring pat on the back of her tense hand. Then he stepped back onto the highway. The police were making their way through traffic. Maria was standing there. Behind her, the airbag of the car had inflated.

"Nice move," he said. "Are you hurt?"

"No. You?"

"No."

McCaskey kissed his wife on the forehead and reached for his cell phone. It was gone. Poor Bob was probably mad with concern and madder with confusion. McCaskey hurried ahead. He needed to get a phone so he could call the intelligence chief. He showed one of the police officers his Op-Center ID. The man loaned him his phone. McCaskey said he would return it later.

McCaskey did not call Bob Herbert's phone because the line was probably still open. Instead, he called the Tank. Bugs Benet answered. He asked Hood's a.s.sistant to have Herbert find out who called Lucy O'Connor's cell phone within a half hour of the murder of William Wilson.

"Will do," Bugs said. "How can we reach you?"

"Don't worry about me," he said. "Keep an ear to the ground for Mike." McCaskey wasn't being heroic, just practical. He had a feeling that whether he was about to resign or not, Mike Rodgers was the one who would have to carry this ball in for the touchdown.

FIFTY.

San Diego, California Wednesday, 3:45 P.M.

Inevitably, out of chaos comes order. The only two questions are when and at what cost?

Chaos evolved quickly in the hotel lobby, as it always does. One convention-goer carried it to three who carried it to nine. When chaos spreads, Mike Rodgers knew that the most important thing was not to try to contain it. Security had called the police, and reinforcements were on the way. Their presence would emphasize what was already an extraordinary situation and remove whatever remained of normalcy. That would merely put the same amount of tumult in a more confined s.p.a.ce. And chaos tended to leap whatever firebreaks were placed around it. The task at hand was to eliminate the cause, not to contain the result.

The cause was shock about the apparent abduction of Admiral Kenneth Link and uncertainty about who did it or why. Mike Rodgers wanted to get on the problem right away. And not just to help eliminate the panic. Apparently, this was related to whatever the h.e.l.l had started in Washington just four days ago.

Rodgers walked over to a relatively quiet corner near the magazine stand. He called the office of General Jack Breen at Pendleton. Breen said it was good to hear from his old friend.

"Where are you?" the marine general asked.

"San Diego," Rodgers replied.

"San Diego? I hear there's noise in that area. Yours?"

"Indirectly," Rodgers said. "Jack, I need air recon ASAP. Something with eyes and and teeth. We believe Admiral Kenneth Link has been kidnapped from the hotel here." teeth. We believe Admiral Kenneth Link has been kidnapped from the hotel here."

"Details?"

"He was in a limo, that's all I know. I don't know what kind. I wouldn't trust anyone to give me the right information anyway," Rodgers said.

"I'm requisitioning an Apache on the e-command link as we speak," Breen said. "Do you think there will be a ransom request or is this a GAT?"

GAT was grab and terminate. It was a military adaptation of the Mafia acronym SAW, s.n.a.t.c.h and whack.

"I don't know, which is why we need to try to find the limo," Rodgers said. "Can they pick me up somewhere around here?"

"Roof of the convention center, ten minutes," Breen said. "What kind of manpower do you need?"

"Full suit?"

That was thirteen men. Breen said he would provide that.

"Perfect," Rodgers said. "I'll be there."

"We'll plan to cover the routes east," Breen said. "The police will have plenty of resources deployed north along 405 headed up to Los Angeles and south to Mexico," Breen said. "I doubt kidnappers would want to get into the traffic or border check along that corridor anyway."

"Agreed," Rodgers said as his phone beeped. That meant there was an incoming call. "General, I'll see your boys in ten." Rodgers jogged from the lobby as he switched to the other call. "Yes?"

"Mike, it's Darrell."

"Have you got something?" Rodgers asked.

"Yes. It sounds like you're running."

"I am," Rodgers told him. "I'm organizing recon. It seems Admiral Link was just kidnapped."

"He was? That's surprising."

"Why?"