The Lion's Game (76 page)

That wasn’t exactly what I had in mind, but it was good for Fleming and Rhee to hear that one of us was sane.

Ms. Mayfield continued her mission statement and said, “If Mr. Wiggins shows up first, then we’ll interview him and ask that he turn over the premises to us, then someone here can escort him to another location. In either case, we intend to remain in this house waiting for the suspect, who we believe is headed this way.”

Ms. Rhee replied, “We have determined that six is the optimum number of agents we want in the house for safety and logistical reasons. So if the suspect shows up at this location, we’ll ask you to take a position in a back room, which we’ll show you.”

I said, “Look, Ms. Rhee, Mr. Fleming, we could all be here a long time, sharing the bathroom and bedrooms, so why don’t we cut the shit and try to get along? Okay?”

No response.

Kate, to her credit, changed her tone and said, “We’ve worked this case since Asad Khalil landed in New York. We’ve seen over three hundred dead people aboard the aircraft he arrived in, we’ve had a member of our team murdered, our secretary murdered, and the duty officer murdered.”

And so on. She put it to them, too nicely, I thought, but they got the message and actually nodded when Kate was finished.

Meanwhile, I looked around the living room, which was sparse, yet tasteless. Also, untidy, which I’d like to blame on the Feds, but which I thought was probably a reflection of Mr. Wiggins’ attitude toward life.

Ms. Rhee offered to introduce us to her colleagues, and we followed her into the kitchen, while Mr. Fleming took up his position at the front picture window, peering through the Venetian blinds. High-tech. But, of course, someone on stakeout would tip us if anyone approached the house.

The kitchen was dimly lit by a soft fluorescent bulb under a cabinet, but I could see that the kitchen was circa 1955, and in it were another man and woman, also wearing the urban commando outfit of dark trousers, dark blue shirts, and nylon windbreakers. Their blue baseball caps sat on the counter. The man was seated at the small kitchen table, reading a stack of case reports with a flashlight. The woman was positioned at the back door, peering through the small door window.

Ms. Rhee introduced us to the gentleman, whose name, like my own, was Juan, though his last name was a mouthful of Spanish that I didn’t catch. The lady was black, and her name was Edie. She gave us a wave as she continued to scope out the backyard.

We next went back through the L-shaped area and through a door into a small foyer, off of which were three doors, the smaller leading to a bathroom. In the larger of the rooms, a bedroom, a man dressed in a suit sat at a computer station and monitored his radio and two cell phones, while he played with Mr. Wiggins’ PC. The only light in the room came from the monitor screen, and all the blinds were shut.

Ms. Rhee made the introductions, and the guy, whose name was Tom Stockwell, and whose ethnicity was pale, said to us, “I’m out of the L.A. office, and I’m the case agent for this detail.”

I guess that left me out. I decided to be nice and said to Tom, “Ms. Mayfield and I are here to help, without being intrusive.” How’s that?

He replied, “How long you staying?”

“As long as it takes.”

Kate briefed Tom by saying, “The suspect, as you should know, could be wearing body armor, and he has in his possession at least two weapons, forty caliber Glocks, which, like the body armor, he apparently took from the two agents on board the aircraft.” She gave Tom a verbal report, and he listened attentively. She concluded with, “This man is extremely dangerous, and we don’t expect taking him without a fight. But, of course, we need to take him alive.”

Tom replied, “We have various non-lethal weapons and devices, such as the goo-gun and the projectile net, plus, of course, gas and—”

“Excuse me?” I said. “What’s a goo-gun?”

“It’s a big handheld device that squirts this goo that hardens immediately and immobilizes a person.”

“Is this a California thing?”

“No, Mr. Corey. It’s available nationwide.” Tom added, “And we also have a net which we can fire and which ensnares the individual.”

“Really? Do you have real guns, too?”

Tom ignored me and continued his briefing.

I interrupted and asked, “Have you evacuated the neighborhood?”

He replied, “We went through a lot of debate about that, but Washington agrees that to try to evacuate the neighborhood could be a problem.”

“For whom?”

He explained, “First of all, there’s the obvious problem of agents being seen making the notifications. Some people aren’t home, and may come home later, so this could take all night. And the residents would be inconvenienced if they had to leave their homes for an indefinite period.” He added, “We did, however, evacuate the houses on both sides and the back of this one, and there are agents in place at those houses.”

The subtext here was that it was more important to capture Asad Khalil than it was to worry about taxpayers getting caught in a crossfire. I couldn’t honestly say I disagreed with this.

Ms. Rhee added, “The stakeout people are instructed not to try to apprehend the suspect on the street, unless he senses danger and attempts to flee. Most likely, the apprehension will take place in or near this house. The suspect is most probably alone, and most probably armed with only two handguns. So, we don’t expect there to be a large exchange of gunfire—or
any
gunfire—if we play it right.” She looked at Kate and me and said, “The block will be sealed off to traffic if we determine that the suspect is approaching.”

I personally thought the neighbors wouldn’t even notice if there was a wild shoot-out on the front lawn if they had their TVs and stereos turned up loud enough. I said, “I agree, for what it’s worth.” But I had this mental image of a kid riding by on a bicycle at the worst possible moment. It happens. Boy, does it happen.

Kate said, “I assume the stakeout people have night vision devices.”

“Of course.”

So, we chatted awhile, and Kate made sure to tell Tom and Kim that she was once a California girl herself, and everyone agreed that we all had our acts together, except perhaps me, who felt a bit like the odd man out here.

Tom mentioned that Wiggins’ former house in Burbank was also occupied and staked out by the FBI, and he informed us that the local police here and in Burbank were alerted but not asked for direct assistance.

At some point, I got tired of hearing how everything was covered nine ways from Sunday, and I asked, “Where’s your sixth person?”

“In the garage. The garage is very cluttered, so Wiggins can’t pull his car in there, but the door has an automatic opener, so Wiggins may enter that way on foot and come into the kitchen through the connecting door. That’s probably what he’ll do, since it’s closest to where he’ll pull his car into the driveway.”

I yawned. I was a little jet-lagged, I guess, and I hadn’t had much sleep in the last few days. What time was it in New York? Later? Earlier?

Tom also assured us that every effort was being made to locate Elwood Wiggins before he headed back to this house. He said, “For all we know, Khalil could try to take him while he’s driving home. Wiggins drives a purple Jeep Grand Cherokee, which is not here, so we’re alert for that vehicle.”

I asked, “What does the girlfriend drive?”

Tom replied, “A white Ford Windstar, which is still at the girlfriend’s house in Oxnard, which is also under surveillance.”

Oxnard?
Anyway, what could I say? These people had their act together, professionally speaking. Personally, I still thought they were dweebs.

I said, “I’m sure you’ve been briefed about Khalil’s prior visits to Wiggins’ now-deceased squadron mates. This indicates to me that Khalil may have more information about Chip Wiggins than we do. He’s been looking for Wiggins a lot longer than we have.” I added, for the record, “There’s a strong possibility that Mr. Wiggins and Mr. Khalil have already met.”

No one commented on that for a few seconds, then Tom said, “That doesn’t change our job here. We wait and see if anyone shows up.” He added, “There’s an area-wide alert for Khalil and for Wiggins, of course, so we may get a happy call from the police telling us that one or the other or both have been found. Wiggins alive, and Khalil in cuffs.”

I didn’t want to be the bearer of further bad karma, but I couldn’t picture Asad Khalil in cuffs.

Tom sat back at Wiggins’ PC and said, “I’m trying to get a clue as to where Wiggins might be, from his computer. I’ve checked his e-mail to see if he corresponded with a state or national park, or reserved a camping space, something like that. We think he’s camping ...” he said, I guess to me, “... that’s where you go out into the woods with a tent or a camper.”

I concluded that Ms. Lopez and Tom had spoken.

I asked Tom, “Have you checked out Wiggins’ underwear?”

He looked at me from his computer. “Excuse me?”

“If he wears medium boxers, I’d like to borrow a pair.”

Tom thought about this a moment, then replied, “We’ve all brought changes of clothing, Mr. Corey. Perhaps someone—one of the men, I mean—can loan you a pair of shorts.” He added, “You can’t use Mr. Wiggins’ underwear.”

“Well, I’ll ask him directly if he shows up.”

“Good idea.”

Kate, to her credit, wasn’t trying to pretend she didn’t know me. She said to Kim Rhee, “We’d like to see the garage and the rest of the house.”

Ms. Rhee led us into the foyer and opened the door of a room that faced the backyard. The room, formerly a bedroom probably, was now an entertainment center that held a huge television, audio equipment, and enough speakers to start another earthquake. On the floor, I noticed six overnight bags. Ms. Rhee said, “You can use this room later. The couch pulls out into a bed.” She added, “We’ll all take turns getting some sleep if this goes through the night.”

I used to think that my worst nightmare was Thanksgiving dinner with my family, but being trapped in a small house with FBI agents just took first place.

Ms. Rhee also showed us the small bathroom, leading me to wonder if she’d once been a Realtor. One thing I noticed that was missing from this house was any military memorabilia, which indicated to me that Elwood Wiggins did not want to be reminded of his service. Or maybe he just lost everything, which would be consistent with the profile we’d developed on him.
Or
, maybe we had the wrong house. It wouldn’t be the first time the Feds got the address wrong. I thought about mentioning this last possibility to Ms. Rhee, but this is a touchy subject with them.

Anyway, we went back to the kitchen, and Ms. Rhee opened a door that revealed a cluttered garage. Sitting in a lawn chair behind some stacked cardboard boxes was a suntanned, blond-haired young man, obviously the junior agent, reading a newspaper by the light of the overhead fluorescent bulb. He stood and Ms. Rhee motioned him back in his seat, so that he was out of sight if the garage door suddenly opened electronically. She said to Kate and me, “This is Scott, who volunteered for garage duty.” She actually smiled.

Scott, who looked like he’d just stepped off a surfboard, flashed his capped teeth and waved.

I said, “Like, yeah, dude, hang in there—you know?” Of course I didn’t say that, but I really wanted to. Scott was my size, but he didn’t look like the boxer shorts–type.

Ms. Rhee closed the door, and we stood in the kitchen with Edie and Juan. Ms. Rhee said, “We’ve stocked some frozen and canned food here so that no one has to come or go, if this lasts awhile.” She added, pointedly, “We have six days of food for six people.”

I had a sudden image of FBI agents turning cannibal when the food ran out, but I didn’t share this thought. I was already on thin ice, or the California equivalent.

Juan said, “Now that we have two more mouths to feed, let’s order pizza. I need my pizza.”

Juan was okay, I decided. Unfortunately, he was a lot heftier than me, and also not the boxer shorts–type.

Edie said to me, “I cook a mean microwaved macaroni and cheese.”

We all chuckled. This sucked. But so far, it was turning out a hell of a lot better than I could have expected twenty-four hours ago. Asad Khalil was within our grasp. Right? What could go wrong? Don’t ask.

But at least if Wiggins was still alive, he had a good chance of staying alive.

Kate said she was going to call Jack Koenig and invited me to join her in the back room. I declined the opportunity, and she went off. I stayed in the kitchen, chatting with Edie and Juan.

Kate returned about fifteen minutes later and informed me, “Jack says hello and congratulations on a good piece of detective work. He wishes us luck.”

“That’s nice. Did you ask him how Frankfurt was?”

“We did not discuss Frankfurt.”

“Where’s Ted Nash?”

“Who cares?”

“I do.”

Kate glanced at our colleagues and said softly, “Don’t obsess on things of no importance.”

“I just want to punch him in the nose. No big deal.”

She ignored this and said, “Jack wants us to call him if something develops, of course. We’re authorized to escort Khalil, dead or alive, to New York, rather than Washington. That’s a major coup.”

“I think Jack is counting his chickens before they’re caught and cooked.”

Again, she ignored me and said, “He’s working with various local police forces to put together a clear picture of Asad Khalil’s movements, his murders, and who his accomplices are or might have been.”

“Good. That will keep him busy and off my back.”

“That’s exactly what I told him.”

I think Ms. Mayfield was joshing me. Anyway, we didn’t want to amuse our colleagues any further, so we ended the conversation.

Edie offered us coffee, and Kate, Kim, and I sat at the kitchen table with Edie, while Juan watched the back door. They were all very interested in everything that had happened since Saturday, asking us questions about things that hadn’t appeared in the news or in their reports. They were curious about what the mood was at 26 Federal Plaza and what the bosses in Washington were saying, and all that. Law enforcement people, I decided, were the same all over, and despite the initial politely masked hostility upon our arrival, we were all getting along well—bonding and all that good stuff. I thought about leading everyone in a chorus of “Ventura Highway,” or maybe “California, Here I Come.” But I didn’t want to overdo this West Coast moment.