Chapter 5 Wedding Tackle

Lee went over again how Beaman would need to blow the miniscule charges attached to the dye packets inside his shirt.

"Are you two listening to me? This is crucial."

"Lee, we know how to detonate the dye packs. We know the timing is crucial. Have you got teams inside looking for a shooter?"

"Yeah, I have had them in there all night long. There is nothing in there."

"You checked the podium, the stage?"

Lee sighed. "Yes, I checked the podium and the stage."

Efraim knew Francine was nervous, this was how they both approached a big operation, going over and over the details. He handed Lee the thermal goggles. "Might as well use these. Maybe you'll see someone working up a steam to try and kill me."

Lee stopped what he was doing, and held the goggles up to his eyes. "You think you could see a fluctuation that small?"

Efraim shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe. Comparatively. I mean, if the guy is sweating rivers while everyone else is relatively calm and cool, I guess you would be able to see it."

Lee nodded and hooked the goggles on a ring attached to the belt of his black jumpsuit. "Remember, try and hit the floor behind the podium, it'll afford you some cover, and stay down."

Efraim nodded as he checked his own gun to make sure he could get to it easily. Lee had brought it over with him on the military transport, side stepping customs and the questions that usually arise over transporting a weapon into a foreign country. The SIG fit snugly in his belt holster, and easy for him to reach. He hoped he wouldn't need it, but he wasn't about to take any chances.

"Francine? I'm gonna check the podium one last time, okay?"

"Okay Efraim, then get back in here."

He shot her a grimace and nodded. Francine was all business right now, checking the miniature listening transmitters and receivers they were all wearing. She went through a series of sound checks, testing everyone's equipment.

Efraim listened to her voice going through counts. The further he walked out on the stage, the more static he encountered. Giving his head a shake, he tried to clear the static in the earpiece. No luck. He walked to the podium just as security opened the doors and allowed the press to enter the auditorium. Surprised, Efraim watched as they poured in with the finesse of a tidal wave.

"Dr. Beaman! Dr. Beaman! Will you answer questions?"

"Is it true you're not a physicist? What kind of doctor are you, Dr. Beaman?"

"Can we get some tape of you?"

"Do you have any comment on the disappearance of Dr. Quigley?"

Efraim saw Lee walk out onto the balcony behind the crowd of reporters. He watched as he tapped his earpiece and even though Efraim couldn't hear what Lee said, he knew what the word was from the movement of his mouth. Lee wasn't happy.

Francine came out of the side stage, calling his name. He looked at her and started towards her. She wasn't paying attention to what was going on, he could see she was intent on finding out what the problem was with their equipment.

The photographers started taking pictures, flashes were clicking away. Francine looked, up startled at the noise and light.

"Francine! Don't look at the lights!" She raised her eyes to Efraim, then focused behind him. He saw surprise register on her face as she tossed the receiver in her hands and dove for him.

Efraim reached for his gun and was able to pull it free as Francine hit him. He managed to turn them both as they fell, finally seeing the threat she had picked up. A man with a camera was on the stage, but where his tape was supposed to be inserted into the camera, there was a handgun and the man was pulling it out.

Efraim could see that the man was shaking. The man fired and his first shot went high. Francine went limp in his arms, the charge releasing the dye packs as they both hit the floor with a thud.

The shooter aimed again, pointing the gun at Efraim as he tried to protect Francine. Screams echoed throughout the auditorium as the strobe lights of the cameras flashed. The man fired the gun again, blinking as the cameras continued to flash.

Lee hit the man just after he fired the gun. They both went sliding towards Francine and Efraim who were lying on the floor. What looked like blood poured out of Efraim's suit jacket and Francine was covered in it. Lee turned his attention back to the gunman.

Dave hit the stage at full run, took a look at what had happened and started to herd the photographers out of the auditorium.

Lee injected the gunman with a tranquilizer as planned. He pulled him up by the collar, the man's arms flailed about, hitting Lee squarely in the chest. When the drug finally took effect, Lee let the man go and he crashed to the stage.

He ran over to Beaman and Francine. Kneeling down, he shielded their heads as he checked for pulses.

"Lee, I should tell you, I'm ticklish and if you touch Francine, I'll break your arm."

"This stuff is getting cold Lee, can you get us out of here? Does it stain? I have it in my hair; I'm going to have blood red hair!"

"Baby, I could get used to you as a redhead!" Francine dug a fingernail into him, he grimaced and gave her a look that promised he would get even with her.

Lee shook his head. "I can't believe the two of you were just shot at and here you are teasing one another!"

Efraim shrugged. "What's with the shooter?"

"I hit him with the tranquilizer. He's out. The press should be able to verify that he was taken down during the attack on you."

Efraim sighed, letting his SIG drop on the stage, the sound echoing through the now empty auditorium. "That was too close. Who let the press in anyway? It was too early for them."

Lee shook his head. "I don't know, I don't have that answer, but I agree it was too close and I was too far away."

"Dave was with me, we were getting interference on the equipment." Francine said, wiggling around in Efraim's arms. "Can we get up? This stuff is cold."

"Soon, hon. I was on stage and Lee was in the balcony when the doors were opened."

"Maybe Quigley wanted to be here for the kill," Francine suggested.

"I hope we gave him a good show,"

Both Lee and Francine nodded their agreement to that.

Dave vaulted himself up on the stage. "I think I saw our man in the crowd. Was holding a boom microphone. Beard is gone, changed glasses, but I'm pretty sure it was Quigley."

Lee nodded. They could hear the wail of sirens coming in. The plan had been to get a call to Amanda and get their vehicles here to 'remove' Beaman, Francine and Dave. They'd have to modify the plan to make it work now that Quigley had been in the auditorium.

Williams and Kent from the embassy came through the auditorium doors each pushing a stretcher. The third person with them was his wife. Lee frowned. "I should have known you wouldn't stay at the embassy. You just had to see for yourself."

Amanda smiled at her husband and patted him on the shoulder. Lee shook his head at her.

Lee handed Beaman's SIG to Amanda, Kent and Williams lifted Beaman and dropped him on the gurney, none to gently he saw. They were better with Francine, but she was glaring at them both. They pulled sheets over both of their heads, red staining through against the stark white.

Lee helped with the gunman, they secured him with cuffs to the gurney, and pulled the sheet up and over his head as well.

Lee and Dave followed them out. The photographers and news crews were waiting at the doors. Pulling his hat down low over his eye as far as it would go, Lee climbed into the ambulance with Amanda. Dave answered questions as Beaman, Francine were loaded into an ambulance and the gunman in another.

They pulled away and headed towards the embassy.

"That went down fast," Amanda said, fear still evident in her words. "I didn't expect the call that soon. I was worried."

Lee gave Amanda's hand a squeeze to reassure her. "Yeah, it was too fast. Dave said Quigley was in the crowd. He must have somehow managed to let the press inside early. Beaman was alone on the stage. I was checking the balcony out, we lost signal. Francine headed out onto the stage and lunged at Beaman. He jumped, grabbed her and rolled all while managing to get his gun out. I don't know how he did it, but it was a great move.

"Thanks!"

"Shut up Beaman, you're dead, remember?"

"Not yet I'm not!"

Francine laughed and Lee and Amanda shook their heads in unison.

They pulled into the embassy. The Marine's had formed an honor guard, and they were standing smartly as the ambulance pulled in. The garage doors were open and Amanda pulled in. A Marine closed the doors behind them.

The Ambassador was waiting inside with Ballard and Miller, the other Agency assets in Bucharest. Miller opened the back doors of the ambulance, while Lee pulled off the sheets covering Beaman and Francine.

Miller waved a hand at the two caskets on rollers standing open. "Your accommodations are ready, sir, madam. Welcome to Romania!"

Francine managed to shampoo most of the dye out of her hair after washing it quite a few times. The overall effect was that she now was a very pale, strawberry blonde. She complained loud and long, but the other agents knew she was dealing with the aftershock of the attack in the auditorium. Beaman however, was nearly silent. He was very protective of Francine, not allowing anyone near her without him being present. He refused to allow a television to be turned on, he said he wasn't ready to see Francine's death yet.

Lee found him lying across the bed in Francine's room in the embassy. Francine was still complaining behind the closed bathroom door. Lee sighed as he watched a silent and unmoving Efraim. "Wanna talk?"

Beaman turned a weary eye on Lee, shaking his head no.

"Well, I wanna talk. And since I'm in charge, we're gonna talk."

"Lee, sometimes you're an ass."

"You too, buddy. A little too close for comfort there today, huh?"

Efraim sighed, knowing Lee would hound him until he talked to him, so he pushed himself up on the bed.

"Yeah; I saw Francine run for me and all I could think was she was going to get hit."

"It's still hard for me when Amanda is in the field, even after all these years. And she's a great agent, one of the best I've ever worked with. But, she is also my wife, the mother of our children and it's hard for me to see her walk into a situation that could very well end with one of us dead."

Efraim had his head down, making a great study of his hands. Finally, he quietly asked. "How do you handle it?"

Lee laughed; a short, harsh sound. "Not well. I get angry, withdraw, yell a little, then I look at the operation and I take all the names out and review it as dispassionately as I can. Usually, if I'm honest with myself, I can see that I did everything I could have done, everything I should have done. And in most cases, I see where my concern for Amanda enabled me to make those extra precautions that kept us both alive."

"How do you get the image of what could have been out of your mind?"

"I focus on what we have instead. I focus on our family, the kids, us. It took me a long while to get to that point. I'm hoping to pass it on to you, so your adjustment to married life goes easier than mine did. Let me tell you, I did not like sleeping on the couch when I let my temper get the best of me."

Efraim gave Lee a sympathetic look; he wouldn't like sleeping on the couch either.

"Look, Amanda had these delivered for Francine. Why don't you give them to her? You know how she likes chocolate after these big operations."

Efraim took the silver wrapped box of chocolate truffles and set them on the bed. He stood up and gave Lee his hand. "Thanks."

Lee nodded and told him that he needed to check in with Billy. "Beaman, is she this noisy all the time?" Lee inclined his head towards the bathroom door where Francine was questioning the parentage of shampoo makers in five different languages.

Efraim laughed. "I kinda like it."

"You'd have to buddy. It would drive me nuts!" Lee laughed, then sobered. "Think about what I said, okay? Just be honest with yourself. I think you'll see what happened the way the rest of us do."

Efraim picked up the phone as Lee left the room and made a secure call to Billy. The connection to D.C. came through clear. Efraim was trying to do the time difference, he figured it was 3:00 PM local time and D.C. was seven hours earlier, so Billy should be in the office by the time he connected.

"Beaman, you made the news here. They haven't released your names though," Billy told him, relief evident in his voice on hearing his agent on the telephone.

"Great."

"Look, I've talked with your father. He was pretty concerned. He agreed to keep it quiet, The President has been informed, and is not even telling the DOD. If Quigley is as connected as we think, we don't want this to leak."

"Well that's gonna help my naval career. It was too close as it was this morning to have to go through it all again." There was silence on Billy's end of the phone. Efraim steeled himself for the interrogation.

"How are you handling this?"

"Did Lee talk to you?"

"I'm asking you," Billy's tone brooked no argument.

"I'm tense. It hit a little close to home for comfort in my opinion. This may always be hard for me, but Lee said to look at it objectively. We had done everything we could to minimize the risk. And essentially, the plan worked. I would have preferred for it to be more to script but, nothing's perfect. None of us were hurt. Geiger spotted Quigley in the crowd and we were able to get the gunman."

"I'm glad you talked to Lee. You're too good an agent not to learn how to work these things through. We all had to learn how to do it. I'm just sorry that yours had to come right on top of the Los Angles case."

"I agree."

"I hear Francine's a redhead now."

"God help us!"

"I always thought that woman should come with a warning. This should do it." They both laughed. "She doing okay?" Billy asked.

"Let me get her for you, you'll feel better after she lays into you about her hair," Efraim dragged the phone to the bathroom and knocked on the door.

Francine opened the door, wrapped in a towel, her hair flying about her and she didn't look happy. Efraim took her chin in his hand and kissed her until she was clinging to his shoulders. He smiled at her, winked and handed her the phone.

"It's Billy; he wants to make sure you're alright."

Francine took the telephone and walked to the bed. She sat back against the pillows, well aware that the towel opened on her hip, showing more of her than it covered. She smiled at Efraim, and turned her attention to Billy. "The red dye did a number on my hair, Billy. I'm getting married in three weeks and I'm not getting married as a red head."

"Glad to hear you're doing okay, Francine. I'm sure we can take care of your hair in time for the wedding, although maybe you should keep it, new look for a new start in life!"

"Humph. I don't think so. How is my mother taking all of this?"

"I went out there myself to talk with her. She decided to shut herself up in the house. She let me know that if anything happened to ruin the wedding, I was going to pay for it with my hide. So, be careful over there, okay?"

"Gotcha. Thanks for talking to her, I'm all she has."

"I know that, Francine. She's alright now and will be happier when you come home. See that you do."

"Yes sir!"

The call ended, Francine hung up the phone. Efraim walked over to the bed, lay down and opened his arms. Francine snuggled up against him and sighed.

"Let's get some sleep, hon. We have a mad scientist to catch starting tomorrow."

She laughed at his choice of words. "Efraim?"

"Hmmmm?"

"You okay?" She heard him sigh. But she wasn't going to back down. "Please don't pull away from me. I don't think I could handle it again."

"I'm not pulling away from you. I'm having a hard time seeing you on the floor with that red dye pouring out of you. That stuff looks real. And the look on your face as you dove at me, that's gonna stay with me awhile too."

"I knew you hadn't seen the cameraman climb up on the stage."

"Thanks."

Francine raised herself up on her elbow to look at Efraim. His eyes were closed; tiredness was etched in the lines around his eyes, and in the tenseness of his mouth. She touched her fingertips to his face, easing them across the shadows she saw there. He opened his eyes at her touch, watching as she gently trailed her fingers on his face. Her face was a mixture of tenderness and love and he sighed, feeling some of the tension and worry ease from his body.

"Thanks for what, B?"

"For being there."

She leaned down and kissed him, hard and passionate, letting him feel the love she had for him. "If you think dying was going to get you out of marrying me, think again, Beaman!"

He laughed at her, and pulled her back into his arms, resting his head against hers. "Take a nap, Desmond, I'm tired."

Francine snuggled against him again, closed her eyes and let sleep claim her, only after she heard Efraim's breathing deepen and slow as he fell asleep.

The agents were busy at the embassy the remainder of the night. Williams was busy with the local authorities regarding the shooting. The ambassador made several statements to news crews who were looking for background on Dr. Beaman and his assistant. Geiger had not been identified by name and the press referred to him as an unidentified U.S. Federal employee, as was Lee.

The plan was for Lee and Geiger to accompany the caskets on the military transport plane to Germany, but change places with ground crew members and slip back out. They would meet up with Francine and Beaman, who would be taken out of the city by Kent. Amanda would coordinate communications from the embassy.

Amanda reported that a message had been delivered to Efraim's father in D.C. expressing condolences at Beaman's death. It had simply been signed Quigley. Francine took Efraim's hand when she saw his reaction; a tick was working overtime in his jaw when Amanda relayed that information. But he shook his head and continued working on the plans.

Geiger ran down some tape of the morning's shooting and was able to enhance a frame of the man who he had thought looked like Quigley.

Efraim's face went blank, his eyes hardened as he watched the tape. "Yeah, that's him. Good eye, Dave."

"Nah, it was easy, Beaman. He was the only one smiling."

Efraim grunted on hearing that. Francine put her hand on Efraim's arm; he turned to look at her, smiled and took her hand in his.

Efraim laid out the territory around the power plant and the steps leading to the castle above. They thought they might have a good view of the power plant and river below. Efraim, Lee, and Francine would approach the power plant. Geiger and Kent would take the high ground at the castle. Amanda would keep them updated from the embassy regarding the approach of Air Force One.

Lee stated again that timing would be crucial in this operation. "Why can't they cancel this visit, or at least use an alternative route? Who's in charge of the President's security that they would allow this transit with a known danger on the ground?"

"Lee, we don't know that the Secret Service hasn't changed plans let alone his approach. They aren't about to let it become public knowledge if the President's agenda has changed." Amanda explained.

Lee sighed, "Yeah, you're right, Amanda. It's just frustrating. I know we have to apprehend Quigley, but with the President's arrival hanging over our heads, I don't know. Sorry."

Efraim agreed. "It means that there's no room for mistakes. We won't get any second chances from Quigley as it is."

The entire group nodded their understanding.

"That's it then, until tomorrow." Lee pushed his chair away from the table and stood up. "We work under the assumption that the President's plans have not changed. We better be on top of our game. Quigley threw a curve at us this morning with the press corp, we can't let that happen again." Lee pulled out Amanda's chair and offered her his hand. "Goodnight. I suggest everyone get some sleep."

The agents left the table, heading to their rooms for the evening. Efraim and Francine folded the maps and made sure everyone's coordinates were the same.

When all the materials were put away, Francine walked over to Efraim and hugged him. "My place or yours, sailor?"

He smiled at her, running the back of his hand over her cheek. "Yours. Everything I need is there."