1st Case - James Patterson Page 0,42

the ICU.

Keats was the only one allowed in, so I waited with another agent, Carl Baillette, in the nearest chairs. There was still plenty I could get done with my laptop.

And plenty to think about, too. This latest move wasn’t about spreading us thin. The FBI had more than enough resources to cover as many crime scenes as these slippery sons of bitches could throw at us.

No. It was about flexing their muscles and showing off.

I’m no criminologist, but I know hackers. They’re driven by three things: ego, money, and notoriety, which is really just more ego. This was all about toying with us and controlling our moves. And so far, they were succeeding.

Emphasis on they. If there had been any lingering doubts about this as some kind of solo operation, those were gone. We now knew that the Nicholson family had been attacked in Boston within the same hour that Reese Sapporo was dropped off at the airport garage in Portland. And nobody was calling it a coincidence. This had been a carefully orchestrated sequence of events.

At a minimum, there were two perpetrators involved here, if not more. And they were clearly upping their game. Fast.

As for where it might be headed next, I could only guess.

A few minutes after Keats had gone in to do his interview with the one surviving member of the Nicholson family, he was back again. I looked up from where I was sitting and saw him motioning me over through the glass doors of the ICU.

“I need your help,” he said, handing me some kind of visitor’s pass to clip on. “The kid’s name is Justin Nicholson. He’s cogent, but he can’t speak. You’re going to help him do that. I just need you to sit and hold his hand. Okay?”

“Absolutely,” I said. My head was swimming, but there was no question. Of course I could do this. I’d have to. And I was glad Billy had come to trust me this much—not just because I wanted to be involved, but because I wanted to give him as much support as I possibly could.

I followed Keats through the ICU doors, into the antiseptic smell of the unit, and down to the last bed on the hall. That’s where I saw Justin Nicholson for the first time. He seemed to be asleep, but when we came in, his eyes fluttered open.

He was a huge guy, linebacker big, and took up most of the bed. There was a tracheostomy tube in his throat, and I could see a yellow-and-rust-colored stain on the gauze around the entry point. From there, a ribbed white hose ran to a respirator, which was helping him breathe.

“Justin, this is Angela,” Keats said. “She’s going to assist with these questions.”

Right away, Justin seemed agitated. He looked at me wide-eyed and opened his mouth, but nothing came out. I went to the side of the bed and put my hand on his.

“Don’t try to talk,” I said. Two tears ran down the sides of his face and I wiped them away with a tissue. It was heartbreaking to see him so devastated, and to think about everything he’d just lost. For all I knew, I reminded him of his sister, who hadn’t been much younger than me. Instead of asking any of the million questions coursing through my mind, I tried to keep it professional and let Keats take the lead.

Keats put himself at the foot of the bed where Justin could easily see him. I stayed where I was, focused on Justin, ready to do whatever I could for him.

“I’m just going to ask a few yes or no items,” Keats told him. “You can squeeze Angela’s hand once for yes, and do nothing if it’s a no. Okay?”

I felt a tentative squeeze on my hand and nodded at Keats to keep going. This had to be quick. Justin was in no shape for a long interview.

“Justin, did you see the person who attacked you last night?” Keats asked.

I got another squeeze and gave Keats a fast nod.

“Did you see more than one person?” Keats asked.

There was no response. I shook my head for no.

“And the person you did see—was it a man?”

Yes.

“Anyone you recognized?”

No.

I could feel a kind of quickening in the air. This was progress—the closest thing we had to an eyewitness—even if it was too little, too late. Justin kept shifting his gaze from Keats to me and back again. I could tell he wanted to say something.