A/N: Thanks again for all of your reviews. I hope you still have a couple of fingernails in reserve. ;)
Disclaimer and acknowledgments are in the Prologue.
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Chapter 14: End of the Road
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
8:25 P.M.
3930 Glenalbyn Drive,
Los Angeles, CA
Don had wondered for months what would happen when he encountered the person responsible for Liz's murder, his own arrest and conviction, and the months of pursuit that he had endured since. Now, standing in Javier's dining room of all places, staring at the man behind it all, only the gun in Tuttle's hand kept him from lunging across the table and wrapping his hands around the man's neck. He swallowed, forming his bound hands into fists, wishing that looks indeed could kill.
"Speechless?" Tuttle asked calmly. "No threats to make, no promises of retribution at a later date? That's not like you, Mr. Eppes."
Cold anger ran through him, but he forced himself to stay calm. Despite what he had been thinking earlier, even someone as powerful as Tuttle wouldn't have put such an elaborate plan into motion based solely on the taunt that Don had delivered to his face. "I don't want to waste any breath on you," he said in an icy voice.
"Probably wise, since you don't have that many breaths left," the older man replied evenly.
Don's eyes flickered down to the gun in his hand, noticing that like Brock, he was wearing thin latex gloves to avoid leaving fingerprints. For the first time, he noted the other objects on the table: a cell phone, a Glock, a pair of handcuffs, and a manila folder, all of which probably belonged to Javier. He wondered if she had taken them off and placed them on the table when she entered the house, following the regular routine upon arriving home, or if Brock had surprised her and removed them once she was unconscious.
He turned his head slightly as he saw Brock pushing Javier into the chair at the end of the table, bringing his gun to rest at the back of her neck. She was sitting perfectly still, her eyes darting between him and Tuttle, her face wearing the careful, practiced lack of expression that he instantly recognized as an agent trying not to reveal her emotions. He was trying his hardest to keep the same blankness on his own features, although between his growing anger and the pain from his sore legs and ribs, it was becoming more and more of a struggle to do so.
His gaze settled back on the man seated at the table, and he jerked his head towards Javier. "I can figure out why you're ticked at me, but why is she here?"
Tuttle raised an eyebrow. "Don't tell me you're actually concerned for her welfare. I would have thought you'd enjoy the opportunity to watch her demise after all that she's put you through."
"After all that you've put me through," he growled, ignoring the more ominous part of Tuttle's sentence. "When did you decide to kill Liz? Was it after we shut you down, or were you already planning it while we were investigating?" Inspiration struck, and he added, "Or was it after I found another way to put you out of business?"
"So that was you," Tuttle mused, leaning back in the chair. "I didn't think your brother was the type to go around publishing semi-classified information for the sake of a grudge."
Don held back a sigh of relief. He'd been right. That was why Tuttle had gone after him: he thought Don had put Charlie up to publishing that article and exposing the election fraud scheme to the world. If Tuttle thought for a second that Charlie had done it on his own, there was no way he would be safe. "So when was it?" he demanded, his voice hard.
"Come now, this isn't the act of the drama where the villain explains his motivations. Besides, from my point of view, the two of you are the villains." Tuttle slowly rose from his chair. "Six years of work I put into that project. Six years that you took apart in as many weeks. Do you have any idea what that feels like?"
Nothing like destroying my entire life in a matter of days, he wanted to hurl back, but he wouldn't give the other man the satisfaction. Instead he kept his face blank and said in an insolent tone, "Sucks to be you, I guess."
He saw the corner of Javier's mouth briefly turn up, but then Tuttle turned toward her and her face darkened. "And you," he said in the tone of a supervisor talking to an incompetent employee. "How hard can it be to track down one escaped fugitive in this day and age of ubiquitous government surveillance and high security?" He shook his head. "Director Boudreaux was quite disappointed with his recommendation of you, that's for certain."
Don stiffened. Boudreaux had recommended that Javier be the one to hunt him down? He stared at her, his mind racing, going back over all of his interactions with her, trying to ferret out if she had been acting at someone else's bidding or on her own. Her eyes were narrowed, and she was glaring at Tuttle. The mention of Boudreaux obviously wasn't news to her, and Don's stomach dropped further. Could he have misjudged her so badly?
She was speaking in a cold, deliberate tone. "Director Boudreaux got what he deserved, as far as I'm concerned. The two of you and Metzke tried to use me to frame an innocent man, and that's utterly despicable." She glanced over at him and must have seen his sudden wariness, because her expression took on a hint of exasperation. "Come on, Eppes. Chicago?" Remember? her tone said.
The first thing that sprang to mind was the fact that she had been the one to identify Lee Boudreaux as the FBI mole, which made her look even more suspicious. Then he realized what she was trying to say. She had saved him from a killer sent by Boudreaux—no, sent by Tuttle—and if she was in cahoots with them, he would have gotten a bullet to the head in that dark alleyway with no one to ever know the difference. He gave her the smallest of nods, his mouth tightening.
Tuttle had been watching the exchange between the two of them with interest. "Yes, it seems Boudreaux would have been quite disappointed in his choice. And you started out so promisingly, Agent Javier."
Her eyes gleamed. "You screwed it up for yourself. That's what happens once you solve a problem by making someone disappear; you think it's the solution every time. If you hadn't been so eager to get rid of Eppes, I might never have known."
A slight frown wrinkled his forehead. "Thank you for the advice. I'll have to remember that next time."
Don scoffed. "You're finished, Tuttle. There's not going to be a next time."
"Those are strong words from a fugitive in the predicament that you currently find yourself in." His mouth twisted pitilessly. "After all, you are just one man."
The memory of the words echoed in Don's head, and he raised his chin. "No, I'm not," he said quietly. He knew there was a team behind him at the FBI office, family and friends who were doing their best to unravel Tuttle's conspiracy and prove him innocent. All he had to do was hold on until they could pull it off.
Tuttle's eyes narrowed, and Don felt a small bit of triumph at having finally provoked a reaction in him. "Oh, but you will be soon enough." The triumph was replaced by a chill at the quiet malice in the other man's voice. Tuttle shifted so that his pistol was pointed at Javier and gave Brock a nod. "Alex."
Don tensed, and he saw Javier doing the same thing, although there was nowhere for either of them to go. Brock reached around Javier and took her gun off the table, taking the one he had been holding and holstering it in his waistband. Then he raised it and took two steps forward, stopping when the end of the gun was resting against Don's left temple.
With considerable effort, he kept his breathing even, not wanting to let either man see his fear. Javier's eyes widened slightly, and she cast a quick glance at Tuttle, but his aim at her remained steady.
Tuttle reached forward and took the cell phone from the table, flipping it open. "There's one thing left for you to do, Mr. Eppes."
"I'm not doing anything for you," he ground out, trying to ignore the cold, hard circle of the gun barrel against the side of his head.
The older man continued as if he hadn't spoken. "You're going to call your former Assistant Director Wright. You're going to tell him that you're holding Agent Javier hostage, and that you want safe passage out of the country and a million dollars for all the pain and suffering the FBI has caused you."
Don looked at Tuttle with as cold a gaze as he could manage. "No way."
He gave a slow nod. "Alex."
Beside him, he barely heard the soft click as Brock started to squeeze the trigger, releasing the first internal safety of the Glock. His heart pounded at the thought of how little pressure it would take on the trigger to end his life, but he kept staring at Tuttle. If they were going to kill him anyway, there was no reason to make things worse by giving into their demands. "I won't do it," he said through gritted teeth.
The older man didn't respond right away, but regarded Don for a moment. Then he put down the phone and reached for the file folder still sitting on the table, flipping it open and holding it up. Don looked at the photograph in the folder and felt the blood drain from his face. It was an image of a large lecture hall with a chalkboard covered in mathematical symbols, a familiar figure with dark curly hair writing on the board, and yesterday's date in the upper left-hand corner of the chalkboard. He raised his eyes to meet Tuttle's, his heart thumping. The other man merely smiled and let the photo slide to the table top. Behind it was another photo, obviously taken through a window, of Alan Eppes reading a newspaper. The next picture was a close-up, showing today's date on the paper.
Tuttle didn't say a word. He didn't have to.
Don closed his eyes, clenching his jaw even tighter. All this time, all that Tuttle had put him through in the past year, and it all came down to this. The message was clear: if he didn't do what he was told, Charlie and Alan would suffer, and he knew the man standing in front of him would have no scruples about carrying out his threat. If he could get close enough to take these photos, despite the protection the FBI had arranged, he could get close enough to do a lot worse. If Don played along, there might be a way out of this—at least for his family, if not for him.
"All right," he said in an undertone, looking away. "Give me the phone."
"Eppes!" came Javier's accusing voice as she sprang to her feet, Brock instantly pulling the gun away from his head and pointing it at her. She froze in place, shooting daggers at him with her eyes.
He mouthed one word:Charlie.
She drew in a sharp breath. Some of the fire left her eyes, although she still looked furious.
Tuttle dropped the file folder on the dining room table and picked up the cell phone before tucking his gun into a holster underneath his suit jacket. "You will tell him exactly what I tell you to say. No deviations, no secret messages, or Alex is going to take a trip to Pasadena and bring back some more guests."
Don gave a short nod, hatred burning in his eyes. Tuttle took a pen from his pocket and wrote a few sentences on the inside of the file folder. He put the page in front of Don and opened the phone. "Speakerphone only. You," and he looked up at Javier, "will not say a word." He entered a number and handed the phone to Don, who took it as best he could with his hands tied together. "Now."
Don pressed the button to dial, holding the phone out in front of him, and they all waited a few seconds while the number rang. "Hello," came the voice at the other end.
"A.D. Wright?" Of course it was. This late at night, there would be no use in dialing the main office, and he shouldn't be surprised that Tuttle's spiderweb of connections included the personal number of an Assistant Director of the FBI.
"Who is this?" Wright's voice had turned suspicious.
He stared at the phone. All of the instincts he had cultivated over the past seven months were about to go out the window when he spoke the next few words. "This is Don Eppes."
There was silence for a second. Then the other man said carefully, "This is a surprise."
Tuttle tapped the paper, and he drew a deep breath. "I'm here with Agent Javier," he said, staring down at the words on the page and feeling three pairs of eyes boring into him. "And I can't take this anymore."
There was a sharp intake of breath on the other end. "What does that mean?"
He looked up at Tuttle, but the other man was watching to see how he responded, a slight smile curling his lips. He was actually enjoying this. Bastard. "What do you think it means?" he rejoindered, looking away.
"Let me talk to her," Wright demanded.
Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Tuttle shaking his head while scribbling something else on the manila folder. "I can't do that," he replied, thinking for a moment of the convenience store back in Texas and the robber who'd forced him to pretend he was an accomplice. That had been hard enough, but this was so, so much worse. He could only twist his words so far before Tuttle punished him for it—or, more likely, punished his family for it. And the stakes here were even higher.
"If you lay a hand on one of my agents…" came the threatening voice on the other end.
Don swallowed hard, almost feeling physical pain from the words he was being forced to say. "She'll be fine as long as you do what I say," he said roughly, not believing it for a second.
A movement caught his eye, and he looked up to see Javier staring intently at him. He'd seen those light brown eyes of hers wide with fear, sparking with anger, and calm and in control. He'd never seen them expressing the compassion that they were currently showing, despite the fact that he was essentially making a threat against her life. He took a deep breath as he looked back at her, a small part of him noting the irony of drawing strength from this woman who had been his persecutor for so long, but was now his only ally in a situation that was growing more and more impossible by the minute.
Wright exhaled, the sound hissing through the tiny speaker of the cell phone. "What do you want, Don?" he asked in the calm negotiator's voice that Don had used so many times himself, but never been on the other end of.
Tuttle's finger moved down the page, and he tore his eyes away from Javier's, his stomach churning as he read the words. "I want…a safe way out of the country for both of us, with no one following. I want a million dollars as compensation for…for what the FBI has done to me. Once I have both of those things, she'll be let go." He bit his lip and closed his eyes. "That's all."
"It'll take some time to put that together, as you well know."
Yeah, I know. He'd stalled ransom demands too many times himself not to know that most of that time went to trying to find out the location of the perpetrators rather than actually making any kind of arrangements. But Tuttle had one more thing for him to say, so he cleared his throat. "You have one hour."
There was a short sigh. "Don, it's getting well into the evening, and it's going to be hard to get into touch with everyone I have to in order to make this happen. You have to give me more time than that."
He glanced at Tuttle and was rewarded with an implacable shake of his head. "I can't."
Wright asked carefully, "What happens if it's not enough time, Don? What are you going to do?"
He could feel the anguish on his face as he looked at Javier and tried to think of how to answer the question. She was gazing solidly back, calm and reassuring, her eyes telling him to do whatever he had to in order to get through this. He suddenly realized that she really did trust him, not so much in terms of whether he was a flight risk, but in terms of his abilities and his instincts as an FBI agent. He felt the tiniest spark of hope that he thought had been extinguished when Tuttle opened the file folder a few minutes ago. He didn't know how, but they might manage to make it through this.
He took another deep breath, more steady than before, and answered in a level tone, "Just make it happen, Assistant Director."
Then he flipped the phone shut and dropped it on the table as though it were burning his fingers, still looking at Javier. She gave him the slightest of nods before shifting her attention to Tuttle.
The older man was looking back and forth between the two of them with an evaluative gaze. But all he said was, "Well done."
"You know Wright won't believe that for a second," Javier snapped. "He knows everything that's going on with the investigation, including who the truly guilty parties are. It'll take more than a phone call to change his mind."
"Oh, there'll be more than a phone call." Tuttle raised a hand, and Don stepped back. But Brock moved too quickly, grabbing his arm and pulling him in front of him, the gun in his hand now pressing against the right side of Don's head. He struggled, but the grip on his arm was too firm, not to mention that in his exhausted and injured state, a twelve-year-old could probably have taken him.
"There'll be two dead bodies and plenty of forensic evidence to draw a logical conclusion," Tuttle went on. "I think we can agree that someone who's had to go through what you have the last few months, Mr. Eppes, would be more than a little resentful towards the FBI agent who's been chasing you around the country. More than resentful; maybe even homicidal? Certainly suicidal, after realizing there's no way out for you. I'm sure A.D. Wright and the investigative team will agree."
If it were possible, the gun against the side of his head suddenly seemed even more menacing. He exchanged a quick look with Javier, then flicked his eyes to the cell phone on the table. The FBI would be running a trace on the GPS chip inside, and if they could stall long enough, the cavalry would arrive. He didn't see how he'd be able to get away, but keeping himself and Javier alive was all that mattered right now. There was grim agreement in her eyes, tinged with the bleak realization that they probably didn't have enough time to wait for the cavalry. They were going to have to do something in the next few minutes to save themselves.
And he had no idea what that might be.
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"Charlie, how are you coming in here?"
"Nothing yet," he replied, not looking up at the sound of Megan's voice but continuing to tap away on the touchpad of his laptop.
She perched on the table next to him. "Are we pulling you in too many directions at once here?"
He shook his head. There was no such thing as too many directions when it came to trying to help Don. "No, I'm just experiencing concept drift."
A tiny frown furrowed her forehead. "What?"
"Concept drift. See, sometimes when you're trying to model a variable, its statistical properties change over time in ways you can't predict at the start. So you have to keep readjusting the model to take those changes into account."
"And what you're trying to model is…"
David's voice broke in from the other side of the room. "Whoever else at this office might be 'employed' on the side by Tuttle."
"Right," Charlie said, continuing to type away. "Only the problem is, as soon as you guys find someone like that lab tech who was killed in the hit and run, that changes a lot of the variables, and it takes time for me to adjust them."
"Do you have any possibilities?" Megan asked, a note of plaintiveness entering her voice.
He shook his head in frustration, trying not to sound exasperated as he said, "No, but I'll let you know as soon as I do, okay?"
She patted him on the shoulder and slid off the desk. "No problem."
Tuning out the low-voiced conversation she and David were having, he continued to adjust and readjust the parameters of his model. According to his preliminary results, there was no one else in the L.A. field office who was likely to have been influenced by Tuttle. That should have been reassuring, but instead it was making him doubt his work. There couldn't have been just the one lab tech and Metzke, could there?
Looking up for a moment, he sighed, watching Megan walk out of the room. There was no one else on this floor of the office this late at night besides the six of them, and so while Charlie was ensconced in his corner of the war room, the five agents had spread out over practically the entire floor. They moved from the glass-walled room to their respective cubicles as if it were all one giant workspace, calling to each other across the space in between, no other sound but the faint whirring of the central air conditioner.
So when Megan's cell phone trilled out across the floor, Charlie could make out of most of what she said. Especially once she raised her voice.
"You did?"
He lifted his head in time to see her shoot to her feet. "What?" she exclaimed, getting everyone's attention.
That was followed by, "Sir, I don't think—"
He exchanged a questioning glance with David. Then her voice dropped about twenty degrees. "There is no way—"
David was rising to his feet, and Charlie placed his laptop up on the table and stood as well, in time to hear Megan say, "Of course, but Agent—Don would never—"
At that, Charlie strode forward out of the conference room, David half a step behind him. They reached the edge of the cubicle, Colby and Matt meeting them just as Megan lowered her voice. "Of course, sir, you're right. We'll get going ASAP."
She hung up the phone and turned, not showing any surprise at seeing all of them there. "Get your gear," she said to the agents gathered around her. "Vests and weapons, in thirty seconds or less."
"What's going on?" Chad Danvers asked as he rose from his seat.
"I'll explain on the way," she said with a sideways glance at Charlie.
He folded his arms across his chest. "Megan, what is it?"
She brushed past him. "I can't tell you, Charlie. We've got to go."
"Megan!" He'd never heard Don's commanding tone of voice coming out of his own mouth before, and it startled him almost as much as the rest of the team. Colby's head whipped around at the sound, and Megan turned so sharply that she almost bumped into the cubicle wall. He tried to channel authority rather than pleading as he went on, "Please, tell me what's going on."
She bit her lip, then leaned towards him and put a hand on his upper arm. "You can't tell anyone. Especially not your father."
It was a struggle to keep his expression calm at those words, but he thought he managed, even though his stomach was doing flips. "All right."
She sighed and lowered her voice. "A.D. Wright just got a call from someone whom he said sounded like Don, claiming to be holding Dina hostage."
"What?" he exploded.
David had been digging through his desk for equipment, but he turned around at her words. "Let me guess," he said grimly. "Wright doesn't think it was a 'claim'."
Megan shook her head, lips pressed together.
"But that—that's ridiculous!" Charlie exclaimed.
Colby's voice added from behind him, "Don wouldn't say anything like that unless he was forced to."
Charlie whirled to face him, the words making a connection in his brain that made his heart sink. "You're right," he breathed, fear for his brother suddenly choking his throat.
"The call came in on Dina's cell phone," Megan said, and he turned back to face her. "The techs are tracing the GPS chip, and by the time we get to the vehicles downstairs, they should have a location for us." She was pulling on her Kevlar vest over her dark brown blouse and pulling her ponytail away from the back. "We'll call you as soon as we know anything. Remember," she said, pointing a finger at him as she backed out of the cubicle. "Not a word."
He nodded and watched the rest of the team follow her towards the elevators, checking their arms and armor, and he swallowed. One way or the other—and it had to be the other—Don was in serious trouble. He was here, right here in L.A., and he was in big trouble. And all Charlie could do was watch the agents disappear into the elevator on their way to rescue him.
No, there was something else he could do. He dashed back to the conference room and dove back into his work. Don was going to be fine, he knew it. His team was on their way. And once his brother was retrieved safe and sound, he was going to need Charlie to deliver the proof that he'd been innocent all along. His fingers flew over the keyboard as he turned his focus away from thoughts of Don holding someone at gunpoint, Don being held at gunpoint —no, don't go there—Megan and the team breaking down a door and carting off the bad guys in handcuffs. There, that's a much better image to keep in mind.
He fought to hold on to the image as he typed and clicked, hoping desperately that his work would, in fact, be needed.
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A/N: (clop clop, clop clop) Will the cavalry make it in time? They'll ride faster the more times that review button gets clicked…
