Disclaimer and beta thanks in Chapter 1.

Thanks for sticking with me so far…we're getting to the exciting part soon…

oooooooooooooooo

Chapter 10
Monday, November 21, 2005
10:45 A.M.
FBI field office

"Mr. Basso." Don dropped a file folder on the tabletop and lowered himself into a chair. "My name is Don Eppes, and I'll be asking you a few questions." The Bassos had been led to separate rooms when they arrived at the field office, provided with coffee as requested, and then left to wait. Ellen had sat quietly, but Tim had been pacing back and forth like a caged animal.

Now the tall, blond man was standing in one corner of the room, arms folded across his chest. "Eppes, huh? You related to Alan? Does that have something to do with why I'm here?"

Don sighed. "Yes, he's my father, and no, it's nothing but a coincidence. Now please, have a seat."

"What am I being charged with?" he asked belligerently, though he did drop into a chair.

"Nothing. Like I said, I just need to ask you some questions with regards to an ongoing investigation."

He snorted. "You can't just drag me off and start interrogating me without charging me with a crime. I know my rights."

"Mr. Basso, this isn't an interrogation." Okay, so it was in one of the interrogation rooms, and they were being watched on the monitor, but since the man wasn't technically in custody... "Tell me about your organization, the River Protectors."

"Oh, is that what this is about. Trying to hunt yourselves some eco-terrorists, are you?"

"Is that what you are?" Don asked mildly.

The other man stared at him incredulously. "Do you have any idea what you sound like? Hauling me and my wife in here while we're doing important work for the good of the planet, or at least our small corner of it. Is it because of our organization's name that you're automatically suspicious? Look, we have done nothing against the law with our activities, no matter what the LAPD says."

Don filed that one away for future reference and tried a different tack. "How do you know Tomas Ataud?"

His expression was blank. "Who?"

"Tomas Ataud. How long have you been in contact with him?"

"Whoa, now this is starting to get strange." He unfolded his arms and rested his hands on top of the table. "This isn't about demonstrating without a permit, is it?"

"No, it's not. Do you know a Tomas Ataud?"

Basso's demeanor had changed. His defiant posture had deflated, replaced with a quieter air. Don watched him just as closely, though. "No, I don't," he replied. "May I ask what this is about?"

Just because his quarry had softened up didn't mean Don was going to. "You received a phone call from him ten days ago. What did you talk about?"

He slowly shook his head. "I don't know. Who is he, and why did he tell you that he called me?"

Don was aggravated that their main suspect still hadn't said a word, so he snapped out his reply. "The conversation lasted seven minutes, made to your home phone. That's way too long to be a wrong number. What did you talk about?"

Either the man was a very good actor, or he really was totally bewildered. "The name doesn't ring a bell. What day of the week was that?"

Don checked the file. "It was Wednesday the 16th, about 10 A.M."

He watched as Tim Basso stared off into space for a moment. Finally, he said, "That Wednesday I had a meeting with a lawyer about a suit we're considering bringing against Boeing. There's some perchlorate contamination in the Santa Susana Mountains, even worse than what's coming from JPL. I wasn't at home to answer the phone."

"Was your wife with you?"

He shook his head. "She stayed at home."

"Do you get many business calls at your home number?"

"Our home number is the main number for the River Protectors, so we get lots of calls. Ellen never mentioned this man to me, so I guess he must not have been very important."

Don held back the scoffing sound he wanted to make. "Do you have the name and phone number of that lawyer?"

"You need an alibi for me not answering my phone?" When Don said nothing, only regarded him with a steady look, he threw up his hands. "All right, let me check my PDA." He pulled it out of his pocket and scrolled through a few screens. "Yeah, here it is." He flipped the device around so Don could read off the screen.

"All right, thank you," Don said as he got to his feet. "I'll check this out and get back to you."

Basso rose to his feet as well, but Don signaled for him to stay put. Before the man could protest, he slipped out the door and closed it firmly behind him. After handing off the slip of paper with the lawyer's phone number on it to a junior agent with instructions to call, he went into the monitoring room, where Megan was again watching both screens. "What do you think?" he asked.

"I think the more interesting show is going on over there," she said, nodding towards the display that showed Colby talking to Mrs. Basso. "I think we've got a case of the wife doing something the husband knows nothing about."

"Yeah? What's she said?"

"Well, she totally doesn't corroborate your guy's story. Says she was out shopping all morning last Wednesday. But someone picked up their phone when Ataud called, and it's easier to verify his story than hers."

"Right. We've got someone checking that out."

Just then, a short blond woman poked her head in the doorway and said, "Agent Eppes? I think you should take a look at this." She held out a cell phone. "This rang this morning, and the caller ID matches Mrs. Basso's cell phone number."

Five minutes later, Don had brought Tim into the room where his wife was, ignoring Colby's questioning look. "All right, Ellen," he said as he sat down across from them, laying the sheet of paper on the table in front of him. "Why did you call Tomas Ataud this morning?"

"Who?" she asked. Her eyes crinkled a little too much at the corners, as if she were trying hard to recall the person's name.

"Yeah, who is this guy, anyway?" Tim asked.

Don held up the cell phone that had been brought to him, the one that belonged to one of their reticent suspects. "Why did you call this number?" he asked a little more loudly. "How do you know him?"

"I—I don't understand," she replied, leaning back in her chair as if his voice was assaulting her. "What are you talking about?"

He laid the phone down on the table and dropped his voice. "Why did you place a call this morning to Tomas Ataud, and why did you talk to him ten days ago?"

"Look, we don't know who this Ataud guy is!" Tim had leaned forward and placed an arm across his wife's shoulders.

For an answer, Don flipped open the phone and paged through the screens. When he came to the one showing calls received, he turned the device around and showed it to the two of them. "This is Ataud's phone, and this is your phone number. Now can you explain what it's doing here?"

"Why would you have this man's phone..." Tim trailed off, and Don could almost see the wheels turning in his head. "Ellen, I thought you called that guy from Marina del Ray this morning. The one who was talking to us about the Bellona Wetlands. You said you were going to have some information for him later today."

She hesitated, and Don knew that Megan's analysis was right. The wife knew something the husband didn't. The only question was, what was it?

She lifted her gaze to meet Don's, and he saw apprehension written all over her face. "Can you tell me," she asked quietly, "who this man is?"

He let out a breath. Usually it wouldn't be in his interest to release information about one suspect to another, especially when he didn't know how they were connected. But if he was reading Mrs. Basso correctly, she was more worried about how he was going to answer her question than about whatever it was she might have done.

"Can you tell me how and why you've had contact with him, and with anyone else who might be connected with him?" he asked more quietly.

Tim was looking at his wife in confusion as she said, "I never met him. We spoke on the phone a few times. He had offered me help with a project that I've been considering taking up."

"What kind of project?" Tim's voice was wary, and he removed his arm from around her shoulders.

She took a deep breath and stared down at her hands, folded on the tabletop. "We founded the River Protectors two years ago to do something more meaningful, to take more direct action. And we haven't. We've held meetings, we've written letters to the editor, we've had a few dozen people stand outside City Hall and wave signs." Her voice tightened. "And all the while, who knows what has been leaking into our water from JPL and a hundred other sites, and no one does anything about it."

Don repeated Tim's question. "What kind of project, Mrs. Basso?"

She lifted her eyes to his again. "Tim knew nothing about this. I need you to understand that. I was only pursuing the idea myself, and if it looked like it was something that we could do, I was going to tell him." When Don nodded, she went on, "It was only an idea. I got it from a TV show, if you can believe that. There was this environmentalist who wanted to show how vulnerable the water supply was, and he put some kind of chemical in a stream that would react with the water purification chemicals and turn people's water green in their taps. Just to make a point, you know, not to actually hurt anyone."

"You were going to contaminate the water supply?" Tim had leaned away from his wife and was staring at her incredulously. "And get me to do it, too?"

"Don't you see?" she said, turning towards him. "How else are people going to understand if they don't see it for themselves? All the reports that people produce, all the evidence that is out there, and the public just ignores it. If they saw for themselves how much our water supply is in need of protection, then maybe they'd do something about it."

Don watched as Tim flung threw himself out of his chair and paced to the far corner of the small room, muttering something to himself. He caught Colby's eye and nodded at him. Colby said, "Mr. Basso, I'd like to ask you a few questions in the other room."

"No," he replied in a low voice. "I want to hear what she has to say for herself."

Don regarded him for a moment, and then nodded. Ellen had resumed staring at her clasped hands, and he directed his question at the top of her head. "Mrs. Basso, what does Tomas Ataud have to do with this?"

"I don't know who that is. The man whose cell phone I called is named John Parkinson, and he's a British man who was going to help me determine the feasibility of this project." She spoke in a low, rapid voice, and Don had to lean forward to catch all of her words. "I had looked around on the Internet to see if anything like this had been done before. I came across a listserv for people interested in this sort of... environmental direct action, and I posted an inquiry. Mr. Parkinson contacted me a few days later, and said he knew of someone who had planned something like what I was proposing in London, but hadn't been able to pull it off because of increased security after 9/11."

"What's the name of this listserv?"

She shook her head. "I don't remember. I can get it for you, though." She went on, "We exchanged a few e-mails, and he eventually told me that he was the person who had been thinking of this type of project. He sounded really excited that someone else had thought of the same thing, and he suggested coming out here to help carry it out."

Don was unable to keep the sarcasm out of his voice. "And it didn't strike you as odd in any way? That this man was anything other than what he claimed to be?"

She looked him in the eye and said quietly but firmly, "As far as I know, he's not anything other than what he claimed to be. You still haven't told me any differently."

He exchanged a quick look with Colby. Then he said quietly, "His name is Tomas Ataud. We've had him in custody for over a week now. He was on the no-fly list of the Department of Homeland Security, but he and a companion managed to make their way into the country a week ago. We haven't yet determined what they are doing here, but..." He trailed off, sure that she could connect the dots for herself.

She had lifted a hand to her mouth, and her face had gone white. "Terrorists?"

"What did you expect, Ellen?" Tim snapped from where he'd been leaning against the wall, his arms folded tightly across his chest. "You find someone on the Internet who wants to help you put a chemical into the water supply, and you don't think to question his motives?"

She turned to him and started to say something, but he was looking at Colby. "I can answer those questions for you now, if you'd like."

Colby nodded and gestured for him to precede him out of the room. When they had gone, Don turned back to Mrs. Basso, whose hands were clenched so tightly that her knuckles had turned white. "I'm going to need to see all of the e-mails he sent you, and I need to know everything he ever said to you on the phone, and what you told him as well. There might be more people that are part of this, and we need to find them as soon as possible."

She nodded, and quietly started to talk.