Although under torture he might have admitted that he wanted to eyeball Dr. Birdsall's entire figure as she stepped out of the elevator into the office, Guerrero's eyes were immediately drawn to the firearm buckled under her left breast. He knew that everyone else's attention was riveted in the same place, except for Ilsa's maybe. Mrs. Pucci was probably analyzing the cut of her skirt and the quality of her shoes.
"Whoa," Ames murmured. "Is she always strapped, or is she only putting on the ritz for us?"
Guerrero ignored her, as usual. Chance merely raised his eyebrows.
Winston was bending almost in half to kiss and embrace the petite doctor. It had been over a year since Guerrero had last seen her. He remembered that she had looked good wearing a labcoat; now she looked even better in a tightly-wrapped shirt dress under a loose jacket that tried to hide her shoulder holster. Ilsa, whose laissez-faire approach was becoming distinctively less laissez and more faire, waited eagerly to greet their new client, practically bouncing in her excitement over this new adventure. Guerrero wondered exactly how she was describing her relationship to the team. He saw Ilsa put out her hand to show Dr. Birdsall into the conference room, and then Winston was following the two women around the glass partition. From his seat near the doorway, Guerrero thought he could smell a fragrance something like suntan lotion mixed with baby powder. It was a warm and welcoming fragrance.
What's this happy horseshit? Imagining smells now, are we? Probably a frickin' brain tumor.
"Mr. Chance," the doctor was saying, "it's a pleasure to see you in such fine fettle. A full recovery since our last meeting, I assume?"
"Not even a scar, doc," Chance responded gallantly, rising to shake her hand.
The ghost of a smile curved her lips.
"You remember Guerrero."
Her dark eyes roved slowly toward him, but Guerrero made no move to rise from his chair. He even left his ankles crossed on the table. He saluted her in a manner which he hoped mingled elements of the roguish and the nonchalant. Chance could not restrain a sigh, shoving his hands into his pocket. "And this is a new member of our team: Ames."
The young brunette kept her seat, as had her ersatz mentor, while the doctor surveyed her with a slightly surprised expression that clearly read, "I didn't realize you were running a kindergarten." Guerrero swiped a hand over his mustache to hide a smile.
"Won't you sit down, doctor?" Ilsa offered, with the grace that came as easily to her as breathing.
Dr. Birdsall was talking before her backside hit the expensive black leather. "I'll get right to the point, if I may. I have a...high-profile...patient coming in next week, and I want protection for both her and my staff. It seems that the various leagues are already well-mobilized, and I anticipate that a sizable group of demonstrators will be present when my patient tries to enter the clinic."
"You think it will be more than the average circus?" Winston asked, easing himself into the chair at the head of the table.
"I've received a number of death threats regarding this matter. I believe them to be credible."
"How tough can a bunch of Jesus-freaks be?" Guerrero scoffed, despite himself. Winston adopted the look of disdain which he reserved for the smaller man. Guerrero pulled his feet off the table and leaned forward. "Look, I know they mean business, dude. But this is a limited target area, and the threat has a clock on it. We put the mother in a vest, scan the area for snipers, put me up top with a rifle, you guys on the ground...fifteen minutes, tops."
Winston leaned back in his chair and tapped the table, exchanging a glance with Dr. Birdsall. "There's also the issue of crowd control."
oooOOOooo
"Oh, man, look at 'em all," Ames whispered, staring out the windshield of the El Dorado. Hundreds of eyes stared back at her. The two hundred yards between the car and the clinic was a writhing sea of humanity. A veritable forest of signs swayed above the demonstrators' heads.
Ames shrank down in her seat, adjusting her wig, and clasped her padded belly in an unconsciously protective manner. Impressed by the picketers' numbers despite himself, Guerrero shifted the ElDo into first. "I'm going in, dude."
"Roger that," Winston replied over the comm. He put the Escalade in gear to follow Guerrero as closely as possible.
oooOOOooo
"I've been following this case in the papers, Dr. Birdsall," Ilsa offered cautiously. "I understand that the family courts just emancipated the young lady in question."
The doctor hesitated, and Guerrero watched as she uncrossed and re-crossed her slim runner's legs, composing herself against Ilsa's guardedness. "Yes. Hayley is free to pursue termination now. Unfortunately, due to her parents' objections and the subsequent legal actions, the procedure will be late-term. Naturally, this is far more controversial than a first or second trimester termination. Pro-life activists from all over the West Coast have been alerted. I estimate a turn-out of at least three hundred picketers, any one of whom could pose a threat to Hayley or a member of my team."
"A threat to Hayley?" Chance repeated in confusion. "I don't get it. If they hurt her, they hurt the baby, right? Doesn't that defeat the purpose?"
Dr. Birdsall fixed him with her dark, long-lashed eyes. "A movement has arisen lately that damns the mother as complicit in the so-called murder of her fetus. The more violent element has explored ways in which the mother can be...injured outside the gates of a clinic, such that the rescue squad must be called and the fetus extracted at a hospital via cesarean section. A fetus of that age would, at least theoretically, be viable."
"So the baby would live," Ilsa translated.
Winston cleared his throat.
Chance glanced at the widow, than back at Dr. Birdsall. "Has it been confirmed that the, uh, fetus is the product of incest?"
"A paternity test can't be conducted when the fetus is in utero. I can submit tissue for testing once the procedure is complete."
"'Tissue'?" Ames murmured, grimacing. "Gross."
Dr. Birdsall's eyes flicked toward the pretty brunette. Guerrero read something like pain in her expression.
"The D.A. is waiting to move forward on the accusations of rape and incest until the testing occurs. But I've spoken extensively with Gina Willis, who was serving as Hayley's guardian ad litem. Gina believes without question that Burt Simms is responsible for his daughter's pregnancy."
Chance winced with distaste.
"Doctor," Ilsa interjected, "what are the risks to Hayley of the procedure?"
"As you can imagine, Mrs. Pucci, I would have preferred that Hayley terminate much earlier in the pregnancy. Her own extreme youth and the fetus' development make the procedure much riskier. But I hope to conduct the termination without incident and with no future adverse effects to Hayley."
Ames frowned and leaned over to Guerrero. "'Extreme youth'? How old is Hayley?"
Guerrero sighed, something that had become habitual whenever Ames addressed him. "Don't you read the papers? Do you even know how to read?"
Ames crossed her arms over her chest and made a moue. He looked at her reprovingly over the frames of his glasses.
"She's eleven, dude."
oooOOOooo
After endless minutes of honking and creeping forward ,Guerrero and Ames were only 300 feet from the gate of the clinic when a cluster of picketers took a stand deliberately in the El Dorado's path. Grimacing, Guerrero slowed the car to a crawl. When the picketers did not scatter, he braked suddenly, within inches of a heavy-set man wearing a 'Niners ball cap. The man's picket sign bore a full-color picture of a dismembered fetus. "Abortion is murder!" the picketer roared at them. Guerrero put the car in park and tromped on the gas, revving the engine threateningly. Something thumped against his window. He looked up to see a press of hands and faces thronging the ElDo.
"Oh, shit!" Ames gasped, shrinking away from the picketers mobbing her side of the car.
"Don't kill your baby!"
"Come with us, Hayley. We'll help you!"
"Jesus loves you and your baby!"
The ElDo rocked slightly, and a muffled bump came from under the front bumper.
"Guerreroooo," Ames moaned nervously.
"Can you guys see what they're doing?" he barked into the comm.
"No visibility back here," Winston responded. "Too many people."
"Chance?"
"It looks like they're..." Chance's voice trailed off. "Damn, I didn't think she was serious."
oooOOOooo
"They may lie down in front of the car."
"I beg your pardon, doctor?" Ilsa's eyes were laughably wide. She glanced nervously at Chance, as if waiting for him to dismiss this ridiculous notion.
Dr. Birdsall clasped the pendant that hung around her neck and ran it back and forth along its white-gold chain. Guerrero watched her closely; he wondered if this would be the good doctor's tell in a game of poker. "It's an extension of a non-violent protest technique. They lie down on the asphalt in front of the car. Sometime they even clasp the front wheels, like this." She circled her arms in a completely unnecessary demonstration. "Usually it's adults, but I've seen children as young as eight do it."
Winston ran a hand over his face, then exchanged a look with Chance.
"Ladies, would you excuse us while we, uh, walk through some scenarios?" The blond flashed his most charming smile.
Ilsa looked nonplussed, but she rose from her seat. Guerrero figured that she had danced this dance many times while her husband was still alive.
Dr. Birdsall eyed Winston pointedly. "Would you care for brandy and cigars?" she murmured.
The big man smiled ruefully. "You came to us, Zahra. Let us do what we do." He raised an open palm to indicate that she should follow Ilsa. The doctor dropped her pendant, letting it fall against her clavicle. She rose and allowed Ilsa to guide her into the other room. "Coffee, doctor? Tea?" the widow asked as they stepped out, their heels clacking in double-time on the hardwood.
Almost alone now, all three men looked at Ames, who turned an expression of rank disbelief on Guerrero. "What, me too? You've got to be kidding!"
Guerrero waited patiently through her display, then indicated the door. "Scoot."
She flared her eyes at him rebelliously. He stared her down. Grinding her teeth and glaring at each of the men in turn, Ames scat.
Winston sat forward and put his head in his hands. "Now: how the hell are we going to do this?"
OooOOOooo
"Looks like you're on," Guerrero told Ames. She winced as he clicked the car doors unlocked and pulled a face at him. He jerked his head at the passenger-side door. She pulled the handle, and at first there was too much pressure inward, but then the picketers began to fall back, and she was able to squeeze out into the crowd.
"Please help me!" she squealed to the demonstrators. "Please! My baby!" A middle-aged white woman and a young black man grasped Ames around the shoulders and hustled her away from the ElDo with near-military efficiency. The crowd's shouting turned into a low rumble of confusion. Guerrero heard only fragments of Ames' theatrical wails ("Jesus...sorry...baby!"), which were perfect for an audience this large. Guerrero could see the very top of the head of the young man who had Ames under his arm. He and Edith Bunker were moving the girl quickly and steadily down the block, away from the clinic. The other picketers milled uncertainly, looking from Ames to the stationary vehicles.
"Come on," Guerrero muttered. "Take the bait."
With the sudden shift characteristic of large crowds and several cries of "Hallelujah!", the picketers heaved after the "rescued" girl. Guerrero took several slow, deep breaths, waiting for his path to clear.
"That's it, Guerrero, you're a go," Chance reported from the roof of the clinic.
Guerrero put the ElDo into gear and watched the Escalade creeping up on his back bumper. In his rearview, he could see past Winston to the wide-eyed woman and her charge huddled together in the back seat. He shook his head and muttered, "Twelve-year-olds, dude."
"All right, Guerrero. I'm as close as I can get without spoiling your precious paint job."
"Copy that, Winston. We are Oscar Mike."
Chance snorted at the military acronym, but Guerrero ignored him and began to roll forward, maintaining a low speed. Winston kept pace in the Escalade. Ames' exclamations, though somewhat distant, were becoming even more high-pitched and hysterical. She had seen them moving.
How long before everyone else does too?
The mini-caravan of Cadillacs rolled cautiously toward the gate.
"Uh, let's pick up the pace a little there, grandma," Chance warned.
"Are they onto us?" Guerrero asked, obliging his colleague anyway by lowering his foot slightly on the gas. He could now see the blond leaning over the edge of the clinic's roof. The guard began to back away from his position at the gate into the guardhouse. It was the same Vietnamese man who had admitted them the last time they had entered the facility.
"Can we get that damned gate open, please?" Winston muttered impatiently. Guerrero saw Chance give a sign to the guard.
It was the sound of the gate opening that finally alerted the crowd to the subterfuge being perpetrated on them. Guerrero heard the cries of dismay and fought the urge to look out the passenger-side window. "Pickin' up speed, dude," he called, hoping that Winston could maintain the close distance. He crushed the accelerator and heard the ElDo's V8 roar to life. The Cadillacs tore over the asphalt. Wails and angry shouts trailed them as Guerrero slid into the turn, tires squealing and bumping on the edge of the sidewalk cut-out. The Escalade was right behind him. Picketers rushed after them, clamoring at the closing gate. A few enraged souls charged right through into the compound. The guard emerged from the gatehouse and drew his Walther. "Please maintain your distance," he ordered the crowd, over and over again. The invaders backed away and returned to the far side of the gate just before it clicked shut.
"That's criminal trespass!" Guererro heard Gina Willis' outrage over the comm from the Escalade. "Where's SFPD? Those people should be arrested." He missed Winston's response jockeying for comm bandwidth with Chance's answer, because he suddenly spotted Dr. Birdsall trotting around the side of the building, Kevlar layered under her labcoat, eyes searching for the Escalade. A fresh round of imprecations erupted from the other side of the gate when the picketers caught sight of her.
"What the fuck, doc?" he roared ineffectually at his windshield. He saw Chance lean over the edge of the roof and wave Dr. Birdsall frantically toward the rear of the building. The petite woman fell back grudgingly. Guerrero swore under his breath as he parked the ElDo. Two anxious nurses were holding the back door to the clinic open; they shouted at Dr. Birdsall, who paid them no heed. Winston pulled up behind Guerrero, angling the Escalade with the driver's side toward the gate. Hayley Simms, pregnant belly enormous on her slim frame, exploded out of the backseat on the passenger side, followed by Gina Willis, the statuesque black woman who had served as Hayley's guardian ad litem. The girl was weeping hysterically. To Guerrero's amazement, Dr. Birdsall looked close to tears too. Smiling nevertheless, she reached out for Hayley's face, clasping one hand on each of the girl's cheeks.
"Hayley," she told the child, "I'm Dr. Zahra Birdsall, and we're so glad you made it safely."