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He clicked off and Letty smiled at Hawkins: “He can’t help himself. He’s a cop.”
“He’s teasing me now, is what he’s doing.”
“What did you think of Barb?”
“Just that.”
“What?”
“She’s a barb. You know, like a sharp, steel, well-curved harpoon.” He paused, then said, “However, not totally unattractive.”
“Yeah, tell me about it. She’s sleeping with the best-looking computer genius in Los Angeles.”
“That sounds like a story.”
“It is, but we’re not allowed to tell it.”
—
As Letty andHawkins drifted off to sleep, Scott, Catton, and Callister were working through the same analyses that the cops had gone through.
“I don’t know exactly how they got Randy’s ID and photo, but I’d bet that cell phones were involved somehow,” Scott said. “Damn it all, I didn’t see this happening. We should have gone to Dallas or Los Angeles to do the vaccines. We didn’t need the isolation up at the ski valley. We could have done an Airbnb in a major city and if trouble showed up, we could have gone right out to the airport…or driven to another major airport. No way to seal off Los Angeles or Dallas.”
“Water under the bridge,” Catton said.
“What do we do now?” Callister asked.
“You got out of the store, so they apparently don’t know your face yet. But they will, and soon,” Scott said. “I can see them doing facial recognition runs on the supermarket surveillance video, and phone analyses of calls that we all made to you and comparing the faces that come up with the cell phone numbers. That must be how they identified Rose and Randy.”
“Danielle should run,” Catton said, looking at Scott. “The Santa Fe airport only goes to about three places, but they’re all major airports—Phoenix, Dallas, Denver. If she can crack a vial in the airport, the virus could make it to three hubs. If she can get down to the Albuquerque airport, she’s got that ticket for Dallas early tomorrow.”
Scott: “I agree.”
Callister: “What if they don’t know my face, but they know my car from the ski place?”
Scott: “Then…You’ll know at the checkpoint. They’ll be all over you. Put one of the vials between your feet on the floor of the car. If they jump you, crush it with your foot. Then surrender. Put your hands in the air. You’ll be okay, but you’ll infect everyone who handles you.”
Callister dropped her face, looking between her legs, said, “Oh, God.”
Catton said to Scott, “The cars might be a problem, but this house is for sure. Randy and Danielle were seen, what, six blocks from here? When they talked to the couple on the street?”
Scott: “Yes, but, where’d we go?”
“To Marilyn’s,” Catton said. Marilyn Wong was the Realtor who offered to rent them the house. “We know she lives alone. She’s single and her own boss…maybe nobody will expect to see her tomorrow. She lives at the other end of town, and she’ll have a car…”
Scott looked at her: “We’d have to kill her.”
Catton said, “Listen to yourself. Why are we even here?”
Scott licked his lip, then nodded. He turned to Callister: “Danielle. You think…you could do this? Make the run to Santa Fe and Albuquerque in your car? If they don’t know your face, they probably don’t know the car.”
“You mean…right this minute? I’m pretty fucked up right now.”
Scott: “I don’t know if it’s true, but I’ve always read that the body’s lowest time in the day, the time when it’s least alert, is between three and five o’clock in the morning. That’s when we send you out.”
Callister nodded and said, “All right. Go at three o’clock. I’ll go with you to Marilyn’s.”
—
