The Missing Page 0,56
mints or gum or something. I’m getting a buzz off your breath, hear what I’m saying?’
Darby shifted in her seat. On the laptop screen were two pairs of steady lines which reminded her of an EKG.
She was itching for something to happen, needed to get busy. She kept crossing her legs.
Coop leaned in close to her. ‘Is there something wrong with your ass?’
‘Those devices should have turned on by now.’
‘Be patient.’
Half an hour passed.
‘I talked to my sister last night,’ Coop said. ‘Trish is going into the hospital tomorrow. They’re going to induce labor.’
‘How long is she overdue?’ Darby’s attention was still on the laptop.
‘Almost two weeks,’ Coop said. ‘They finally picked out a name for my nephew. Fabrice.’
‘She’s naming the baby after an air freshener?’
‘No, that’s Febreze. I said Fa brice. It’s French, like her husband.’
‘That kid better grow up with a thick skin.’
‘Tell me about it,’ Coop said. ‘Brandy thought the name sounded cool and hip.’
‘Brandy?’
‘New girl I’m seeing. She’s studying to be a cosmetologist. When she graduates, she wants to move to New York and name lipsticks.’
‘What does that mean? Name lipsticks?’
‘Lipstick companies, they can’t say colors like pink or blue. They’ve got to come up with cool marketing names like Pink Sugar and Loud and Lovely Lavender. Those are her names, by the way.’
‘Hands down, she’s certainly the brightest woman you’ve dated.’
The lines on the laptop’s screen started vibrating.
‘The listening devices are transmitting,’ the FBI tech said.
Darby grabbed the edge of her seat as the van sped up.
Chapter 42
The hospital bathroom reeked of Pine-Sol. Boyle was alone. He stood inside the last stall on the far left. He had already taken off his hat and FedEx jacket. The empty backpack, which had been strapped across his back, was now on the floor.
Boyle had worn green surgeon’s scrubs underneath his clothes. He took off his boots and slipped on a pair of sneakers. After he tied a bandana around his head, he stuffed the boots and FedEx clothes into the backpack and opened the stall door.
He checked himself in the mirror. Good. A pair of stylish black-framed glasses was tucked inside his breast pocket. He put them on.
Boyle stuffed his backpack inside the garbage can. He took out his BlackBerry and typed: ‘Ready. In position.’
Boyle opened the door and stepped out into the bright, busy corridor on the eighth floor. He walked down three corridors and stopped near the large bay windows overlooking the entrance for Mass General.
The only vehicles allowed near the main entrance were taxis and ambulances. He saw six ambulances parked out front. Two more ambulances were coming. Police were busy directing traffic. More police had been called in to handle the swelling crowd of reporters. They were huddled near the old brick building used for hospital deliveries.
Richard’s message came through five minutes later: ‘Go.’
Boyle reached inside his pocket. The detonator felt cold in his hand.
He walked away from the windows toward ICU. When he reached the waiting room, he hit the button.
A distant rumble, followed by glass shattering. Then the screaming started.
Stan Petarsky was trying hard not to think about the dead body inside the box next to his feet. He tried to think about something pleasant – like Jim Beam over ice – when the elevator door opened.
Erin Walsh, the pretty blonde he saw sometimes in the cafeteria, was standing in front of a door, talking on her cell phone and waving to him to come this way, to the stairwell. Stan picked up the box and carried it into Serology Lab.
Erin started taking pictures. Stan didn’t want to stick around to see a severed body. He headed for the door, thinking about how to get his hands on some Jim Beam, when the package exploded.
Chapter 43
Darby had a new view: a monitor showing what was happening outside the surveillance van.
They were driving at a good clip down Pickney Street, three blocks away from the Cranmore house. The houses were a little better over here, but not by much. Darby spotted more than one car parked up on cinder blocks.
Karl Hartwig, one of the SWAT members, was kneeling in the center of the van, his face covered by the periscope. Everyone else was watching the laptop.
On the monitor and coming up close was a battered black van parked on the left-hand side of the road, near a grouping of trees making up a small patch of hillywoods.
Spikes danced on the laptop screen and leveled off.
‘He’s in the black van,’ the FBI tech