The Bomb 11

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Lee sat numbly looking at the video, his mind in torment. Amanda was lying on a small bunk, apparently unconscious while a masked man, dressed all in black, sat beside her, his hand insolently turning her face to the camera. She had a black eye that hadn't been there before, and her left arm looked swollen. The wall behind her was of cinderblock and painted a stark white with a line of letters across the middle.

"She's not dead, Scarecrow." The arrogant voice taunted. "But she can be, if I don't get what I want. You have information on the Jurganson case. I want it and I want you."

The man removed his hand from Amanda's face and moved it slowly down to rest on her slender throat. "If I don't get what I want, she will die." The man chuckled for a moment before, sobering. "Meet me at the Chesapeake pipe factory at midnight. Don't think of trying anything, Scarecrow. Unless, that is, that you would like to see this beauty end up like Alton Weight."

It was all Lee could do, to keep from pulling the tape out and smashing it to pieces. But that tape was the only thing they had that could lead them to Amanda, little as it was. It had been delivered to the Georgetown foyer by a courier who'd picked it from the front desk of a sleazy motel.

The front desk clerk, at the motel, remembered a man with a wide brimmed hat pulled low over his face and a long coat coming in and placing the package on the desk and informing him that a courier would soon arrive to collect it. According to the clerk, the man lingered in the lobby until the courier pulled up and then disappeared from a side door. He didn't know who the man was and was too creeped out by him to ask.

Lee watched the tape through and then rewound it again and hit play. He had watched it now, countless times and had gleaned little from it, other than the fact that Amanda, though obviously hurt, was alive and that whoever was holding her wasn't alone.

Billy, who'd watched the tape just as many times as Lee, looked over at the younger man in sympathy. Lee had never proclaimed to have any feelings for Amanda other than friendship and the occasional irritation, but Billy was an astute observer of human nature and he had an idea about how Lee really felt about her.

He also knew that this was tearing him up inside, knowing Amanda was hurt and needing his help and unable to do a thing other than follow the instructions of a terrorist.

When the tape ended again, Lee automatically rewound it and started to play it again, but Billy placed a hand on his, causing Lee to pause the tape at the point where the man reached his hand towards Amanda's face. "Lee, we can't get any more from this tape. We at least know Amanda's alive and what he wants. That's more than we knew a couple of hours ago. But we've gotten all we can."

"Actually, I think there is something more we can get from that tape." Francine spoke up. She had been busy making a pot of coffee, when she turned to see the screen paused and noticed something they hadn't really seen before.

Lee and Billy both turned to her with curious looks. "What?" Billy asked.

Francine walked over to the screen and pointed to the villain's hand. There, shining nicely, was a ring. But not just any ring. It was a championship ring given to the players of season winning football teams. Teams like the Washington Redskins, who'd just won the super bowl in 1982.

"That's it!" Lee exclaimed as he jumped and grabbed Francine giving her a resounding kiss on the lips and leaving her slightly breathless. "That's the link, Billy. I don't know why I didn't see it before."

Billy, who knew why Lee hadn't seen anything but Amanda in that tape, still was stymied as to just what link Lee was referring to. "Link? Lee you don't think any one of those football players had anything to do with…"

"No!" Lee hastily assured him. "Not the players, not even the management."

Francine and Billy exchanged glances of concern with each other, certain that Lee made have gone over the deep end but willing to give him time to explain himself.

Quickly stepping over to the filing cabinets lining one wall, Lee jerked open the second drawer and started pulling out one file after another until he finally found what he needed. "Here it is!" He practically yelled.

"Lee, what in the world are you talking about?" Francine asked, even more sure that he'd finally lost it.

"Ajax Manufacturing." Lee proclaimed as though that cleared things up perfectly. Seeing that it didn't, he shook his head. "Okay, sorry, I guess I'm getting a little ahead."

"A little?" Francine quirked an eyebrow.

"Alright, a lot." Lee amended. "Look, earlier I pulled up some information on Ajax Manufacturing to see if they could have had any connection to this. At first, what I found, didn't seem to have any link, but I think maybe it does."

"What kind of link?" Billy asked again, trying to keep himself from getting his hopes up just in case, Lee was just grasping at straws.

"Ajax Manufacturing is a multi-layered company. They have their fingers in as many pies as they can get them. One of those pies is in the making of those championship rings. I remember Max making some kind of comment once about getting one of those through his uncle's company somehow."

"So, that could be Regal." Billy looked back over at the masked man on the screen. "But what does that have to do with the Jurganson case?"

A peculiar light lit up Lee's face making him look almost demented as he answered. "Adolph Jurganson, as you know, is a dealer. He'll sell anything to anyone if the price is right no matter how illegal or how bad the buyer. I've been trying to get something to nail him with for some time, since before Max was scooched even. But most of what I got was worthless. But I did find some references to his trying to make a deal to sell some plane parts to the Libyans. Plane parts that Ajax Manufacturing just happens to have a hand in making."

Lee watched Billy and Francine's faces as the made the same connection that he'd just made. "You mean, Max wants to know how to get a hold of Jurganson so that he can strike a deal for those parts and maybe make some money with his uncle's parts?"

Lee nodded. "Either that or he's already made a deal and wants the info I have in order to make sure no one else can tie him to it."

"But why the bombing?" Billy asked. "And why not just try killing you again when he realized the first attempt failed?"

Lee shrugged. "I figure he tried killing me first, thinking with me out of the way, no one else would be interested in an obscure dealer that can't be tied to anything. When he realized that wasn't going to work, he tried to set up some sort of trap with that tan Buick at the gas station. And when that failed too, he probably decided to use Amanda to get me and the files to come to him and he'll kill me when I show up."

"Interesting plan." Billy conceded. "Only you're not going to show up, at least not alone. I'll get a detail on this and…"

"No, Billy." Lee stopped him. "If he so much as suspects a trap, he'll kill Amanda without even blinking. Besides, I think I know where Amanda is. And if you'll help me, I can get her out of there before that deadline."

Billy considered his words for a minute, before nodding. "Deal. Tell us what to do."

TBC