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  Paul nodded to Lightstone. "Dwight Stoner. Ex-offensive tackle for the Raiders." He glanced at the sprawled figure of Brendon Kleinfelter. "Also, fortunately for us, a special agent of the United States Fish and Wildlife Service."

  Chapter Two

  Sunday, September 26th

  At eleven o'clock on the same morning, seven hours after the Alaska White suspects had been booked into the Anchorage Police Department jail, Mike Takahara opened the door of the penthouse suite in the downtown Anchorage Hilton.

  "We were about ready to give up on you two," the muscular agent said cheerfully as he motioned the two men inside, then firmly pushed the door shut. "Hey, guys, we've got company."

  The three men seated at the dining-room table looked up as U.S. Attorney Jameson Wheeler and Henry Lightstone entered the room.

  "Hey, Jameson!? Que pasa, hombre? And Lightstone, mah man." Larry Paxton grinned widely.

  "Yep, it's that crazy fellow all right." Dwight Stoner, the huge bouncer-agent nodded, then went back to work on his dinner-plate-sized omelet.

  "Ah, don't know, man, maybe he ain't so crazy after all," Paxton observed. "Dude brought a gawdamned lawyer with him this time."

  "Yeah, but he didn't bring a very good one," Carl Scoby said, giving Wheeler a broad wink.

  "I keep telling them that I'm either going to start being more selective about my clients or up my already outrageous fees, but they just won't listen," U.S. Attorney Jameson Wheeler said to Lightstone as he shook his head sadly. Then he yelled out toward the kitchen, "Hey, McNulty, how's a guy supposed to get anything to eat around here?"

  "About time you guys showed up," Paul McNulty said as he poked his head through the kitchen door. He came out wiping his hands on his grease-stained apron. "Thought you might have decided to have brunch down at the jail instead. What'll it be? The McNulty Special?"

  "I'll have whatever Stoner's having, only make it normal human size," Wheeler answered.

  "You got it," McNulty said agreeably. Then he turned toward Henry Lightstone, who was still standing in the entryway of the spacious four-room suite.

  "So, what do you think, Henry?" MeNulty asked, a thoughtful expression on his relaxed face.

  "I'd say this place looks more like a drug dealer's hideaway than the command headquarters for a federal undercover operation. It's also a lot nicer than where I spent the evening," he finally said.

  "Yeah, I understand the PD's a little stingy on its accommodations," MeNulty smiled.

  "Did it ever occur to you guys," Lightstone went on, "that you could have told them I was a cop before you had me booked?"

  "Shit. Knew there was something we forgot to do," Larry Paxton said to Dwight Stoner.

  "Told me you were gonna do that," Stoner said, mumbling the words through a large mouthful of omelet.

  "Me? Ah thought you-"

  Lightstone turned to Wheeler. "Of course they did remember to tell the cops that I'd been pinched for buying illegal walrus ivory, so they'd be sure to announce it to the world when they put me in the tank with about a half-dozen shit-face-drunk Eskimos."

  "Oh, yeah, we definitely remembered to do that," Stoner nodded with a cheerful smile.

  "So how'd the brothers react when they saw you get bailed out a few hours later by some sleazy lawyer?" Larry Paxton asked as he winked at Jameson Wheeler.

  "I'd say it probably confused the hell out of them," Lightstone said. "It confused the hell out of me, too. The way I understood it, I was supposed to dig at them a little deeper while Kleinfelter and Popper were still in the hospital."

  Paul MeNulty came up alongside the tall police officer, patted him on the shoulder and motioned him over to a chair next to Wheeler at the head of the large kitchen table. "Believe it or not, Henry, there really was a purpose to all of this. Why don't you sit down, have a cup of Martha's coffee, and let Scoby here fill you in? I'll whip up a couple more omelets for you and Jameson."

  An hour later, Henry Lightstone finished his boysenberry pie, set the plate aside, and looked over at Paul MeNulty, who was scraping out the bowl of a large briar pipe with his pocket knife.

  "So when did you guys know?"

  "About you?" MeNulty asked.

  Lightstone nodded.

  "Oh, I'd say it was about four weeks ago," McNulty told him.

  "That's about the time I first met Kleinfelter at the bar," Lightstone said, embarrassed by the sudden realization that he'd been made from day one.

  "That's when," Dwight Stoner mumbled through a huge mouthful of pie.

  "Don't feel too bad about that, Henry." Larry Paxton smiled sympathetically. "Once Stoner worked his way into the High Horse as a bouncer and then got us our jobs, we started running makes on anybody who ever said more than three words to Kleinfelter. We got curious about you when Mike over here hit a brick wall trying to track back on that Mastercard you used to rent the Honda."

  "Yeah, had to spend the better part of a weekend peeling back all the protection layers on that computer of yours," Takahara complained good-naturedly.

  "What computer? I don't-" Lightstone started to say, then it hit him. "You guys broke into the San Diego Police Department's computer? Christ, that thing's supposed to be protected!"

  "No big deal." Mike Takahara shrugged, "I cheat."

  "I see," Lightstone said, nodding slowly as if he understood the situation, which he didn't.

  "Having a guy like Mike along on an operation makes it real difficult for the bad guys to hide," Larry Paxton commented. "Otherwise we wouldn't put up with the little runt. Him and his goddamned egg-rice, seaweed shit. Enough to make a grown man puke."

  Lightstone looked over at the Oriental agent and judged that at about six-one and no less than two hundred and ten pounds, Mike Takahara was maybe an inch shorter and twenty pounds heavier than Paxton. The covert team's idea of a runt.

  "Power of the computer age," Takahara grinned. "You just watch. Microchips and robotics are gonna make you field guys obsolete yet."

  "Already made me obsolete," Lightstone commented sourly. "Doesn't make much sense to spend a couple of months setting up a deep cover if assholes like Kleinfelter can tap into a goddamned police computer any time they want."

  "Kleinfelter tap into a computer?" Takahara laughed out loud. "Come on, give me a break. It'd take those idiots a week just to find the on-off switch."

  "Then how was he able to figure out I was a cop so fast?" Lightstone demanded.

  "Probably because Stoner told him," Mike Takahara said matter-of-factly.

  "Stoner did what?" Lightstone exclaimed, blinking his eyes in shock and then turning his head slowly to stare at the huge ex-bouncer.

  Dwight Stoner looked up over the remnants of his pie and nodded his massive head in confirmation.

  Lightstone sat in silence for a long moment and then turned back to McNulty. "Any particular reason why you guys decided to set me up so I could get my ass blown off?" he asked quietly.

  "Actually, there was," McNulty said in a perfectly calm and reasonable voice. "We had Brendon pretty well lined up for the big sale, and we were all set to take him down; but then he started getting suspicious. Didn't want to show us his stock, and he kept sending that little asshole Popper and his buddies around to give us a bad time, see how we'd react. Then all of a sudden you show up, hot on the trail, all by yourself, nice cover, determined to work your way in."

  "The perfect distraction," Carl Scoby nodded. "Stoner supposedly checks us out, gives us a clean bill, and then lets Brendon know that he's got a cop on his ass. All of a sudden we look real good."

  "And then Larry steps in with the Alaska White scam, which Brendon thinks is a really funny idea," Takahara added. "Stoner follows up by telling Brendon that he wants to be the one who knocks you off 'cause he's never got to kill a cop before, which pretty well lines it up for you to be there at the buy."

  "And gives me a real nice opportunity to save your butt," Dwight Stoner finished.

  "Which you put into jeop
ardy in the first place," Lightstone reminded.

  "Yeah, exactly. Kinda poetic, huh?" the huge ex-Raider bouncer smiled.

  "Think I'm going to make friends with a couple of pro linebackers," Lightstone said after a moment. "Maybe Lawrence Taylor and Carl Banks, for a start. See if I can get those guys to work you down to my size.

  "LT and Carl? Couple of pussies. No problem," Stoner grinned happily.

  "So," Lightstone went on, "Mike the Hacker here tracked me back to the PD through the computer, and that's how you found out about Bobby and figured I was running a Lone Ranger operation, right?"

  "No, actually we called up your captain and asked if he knew where you were," McNulty said. "Naturally he had no idea, since you hadn't bothered to check in for about six weeks. We got the impression that if we'd found your body facedown in a ditch, he wouldn't have been all that upset."

  "That's probably right," Lightstone muttered glumly.

  "Typical brass," Dwight Stoner nodded as he gratefully accepted another piece of boysenberry pie from Martha McNulty. "We got the same problem."

  "Which reminds me," McNulty said, ignoring the slight on his supervisory status, "Bobby is doing fine. Came out of the coma a couple of weeks ago, wanting to know where the hell you were."

  "You're kidding?" Henry Lightstone exclaimed, his eyes widening in a mixture of delight and relief.

  "Nope, honest-to-God truth," McNulty said. "Doctors seem to think he'll be fine. Just needs to rest up, stay off his feet for a couple months. His wife and kids said to say hi. They seem to think a lot of you."

  "You talked to Mary and the kids?"

  "We wanted to get an idea of who we were dealing with," McNulty explained as he sipped his hot coffee. "You have an interesting reputation among your fellow officers."

  "'Interesting.' That's a pretty good description," Mike Takahara grinned.

  "Exactly," Larry Paxton confirmed. "See, the thing is, we figure we've got one hell of a group here, as far as federal undercover teams go. In fact, to paraphrase one of our infamous ex-Secretaries of Interior, what we've got is one genuine black, namely, me; one more or less genuine Asian," he nodded over at Mike Takahara; "a gimp," another nod toward Stoner, "and a guy who, as you mentioned, looks an awful lot like a cop." A final nod over at Carl Scoby.

  "But what we really lack, what we really need to round out the team… " Mike Takahara continued.

  "… is a truly crazy fellow," Dwight Stoner finished with a satisfied smile.

  Martha McNulty reached over and filled Lightstone's cup with more of the steaming hot coffee. "I think," she said quietly, "they're trying to ask if you'd like to go outside and play with them." She patted him on the shoulder.

  "You mean this is some sort of interview?"

  "More or less," Paul McNulty acknowledged.

  "We've found that police officers don't usually make good wildlife investigators," Carl Scoby explained. "The cop types always want to control a situation, put everybody on the ground, take away their guns, that sort of thing, instead of going along with the flow… like you did with those fellows in the drunk tank."

  "You guys monitored the cell?" Lightstone asked.

  "We usually let Jameson do all that sneaky-peeky stuff," Scoby shrugged. "Helps him maintain that sleazy image."

  Lightstone looked over at the U.S. Attorney, who smiled back, nodding his head.

  "And then, too, you don't run across all that many cops who are willing to take on thirty-six outlaw bikers single- handed," Larry Paxton added. "Sort of a Don Quixote with a death wish. We like that in a guy."

  "Yeah, especially since we've got plans to take on some fairly serious characters in the next few months," Mike Takahara said.

  "Serious characters, as opposed to wimps like Kleinfelter?" Lightstone said, trying hard not to smile.

  "Serious enough," Larry Paxton said. "Senators, congressmen, high-level bureaucrats, federal judges, CEOs, lawyers, cops. The kind of guys who can make an agent's life downright miserable."

  "Guys who don't think the laws apply to them. Guys who don't like to lose," Carl Scoby added.

  "The thing is," Paul McNulty finished, "we don't like to lose either. Which is why we're looking to bring on another man who can be flexible in a tight spot. Balance out the team. Maybe give us an edge in the likely event that we run into somebody with serious connections."

  "Like the boss said, a crazy fellow," Dwight Stoner agreed. "The game is bunnies and guppies. Big playing field, shit pot full of rules and no referee. Last guy still on his feet wins."

  Stoner paused for a moment and glanced around the table. Then he looked back at Lightstone with a serious expression on his meaty face.

  "You wanna play?"

  Chapter Three

  Sunday, December 2nd

  The cat had been aware of their presence for almost a half hour before he finally chose to show himself, silently pushing his massive head through the concealing sheath of yellow-draping flowers and broad mango leaves to verify with his eyes what his far more sensitive ears and nose had confirmed long ago.

  There were five of the upright human creatures now- four in the tree and one on the ground.

  If a Bengal tiger could have smiled, this one would have done so.

  Taken from his mother and his native India in his second season, the huge male cat had endured six long and frustrating years of captivity at the hands of these creatures.

  Six long years of living in narrow, confining cages, with little else to do but pace back and forth and snarl at his hated captors. Waiting for the chain-link barriers to finally give way against his savage bursts of rage. And watching as the fragile humans winced and cowered back in spite of themselves, their eyes widening with instinctive fear as the cage wire bulged outward, yet held once again.

  He had suffered those six years with implacable patience, waiting for that one moment-the moment that had occurred less than an hour ago now-when the massive steel door was suddenly winched up to reveal a long, narrow, open-ended runway that led out to a wide expanse of brush and trees, and a barely remembered freedom that had been the driving force of the Bengal's very existence for all those many years.

  And when that moment arrived, the Bengal had paused for only a brief second before lunging out onto the sawdust- covered ground, his incredibly powerful muscles tensed, his terrible claws extended, and his fearsome teeth bared in a deep-throated and spine-chilling roar as he searched with fierce yellow eyes for the first human creature to make the fatal mistake of trying to drive him back into the hated cage.

  Several of them had been there, watching his release from the security of a high, restraining fence, and he had stared at each one with a savage hopefulness.

  But none of them had been so foolish as to climb over the fence and stand in his way, and so now he was free… to hunt, to kill, to tear apart the fragile, upright creatures, one by hated one.

  "There he is!" Lisa Abercombie whispered, all too aware that her normally calm and authoritative voice was choked and raspy with a nervous excitement that she hadn't felt since her childhood.

  "Where?" Dr. Reston Wolfe and Dr. Morito Asai whispered simultaneously.

  "Two o'clock, in the mangoes," Abercombie responded in a forcibly controlled voice, her hands trembling slightly as she brushed her dark, shoulder-length hair away from her sweating face. She refocused the low-powered binoculars.

  They were perched twenty-two feet off the ground in a tree with a forty-inch main trunk whose secondary branches were at least twelve feet off the ground, and surrounded by enough waist-high oak planking and iron bracing to stop a rogue bull elephant. The cat knew they were there, so there was no real point in trying to keep their voices low anyway.

  But because the observation platform that had seemed so high and secure earlier that morning now seemed unacceptably fragile and much too low to the ground, the urge to be as silent as possible was instinctive.

  What made it worse was the chilling sense that the six-
hundred- pound Bengal hated each one of them personally.

  Each of them had seen the glint of purposeful rage in the cat's furious yellow eyes as he lunged his massive body into the steel mesh again and again, trying to tear through the chain links.

  "I see him," Dr. Reston Wolfe nodded, once again glancing nervously over at Tom Frank's bolt-action. 416 Weatherby Magnum rifle propped up against the far wall of the platform. Wolfe could still feel the strength of the beams that had been so reassuring that morning, but at this moment, more than anything else, he wanted that Weatherby Magnum rifle in his hands. Wolfe understood now, in a way that he hadn't understood before, that twenty-two feet of height and oak wood barriers wouldn't begin to stop the fiercely dangerous creature that remained partially hidden in the mangoes, staring up at them with those cold, deadly, and absolutely merciless yellow eyes.

  As if sensing the human creatures' fear, the big cat opened its jaws wide, exposing its glistening yellow-white incisors, and roared. The thunderous and primeval sound reverberated through the trees and sent cold chills down the spines of the four treetop observers.

  It was probably just as well that Dr. Reston Wolfe didn't know that his career, and his life, were in the ands of a woman who savored the intensity of a risk-filled adventure. Because if he had known, and had truly understood the forces that motivated a woman such as Lisa Abercombie, he would have been forced to recognize himself as the sacrificial goat. And that would have been more than a self-serving bureaucrat like Wolfe could have tolerated.

  Two years earlier, a strikingly beautiful grass-roots campaign worker from Riverdale, in the Bronx, had used her Italian father's considerable political connections to broker her way into an exclusive "power loop" of wealthy and influential Northeastern conservatives. She could finally say what most of the party elders were afraid to even think.

  "Gentlemen," she had begun in her characteristically forceful voice, "you know and I know goddamned well that the United States of America has squandered its birthright."