Falling by T.J. Newman

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

THEO AND THE OTHER AGENTSstood across from the Hoffman home, which was disintegrating into little more than a smoldering pile of rubble. Lone structural beams rose up from the foundation here and there. Embers glowed inside withering timbers. In the haze of the late-fall golden hour, the house took on an odd quality of aliveness. Like a felled beast, her wounded form exhaled its final breaths: black smoke rising and dissolving into the atmosphere.

A heavy crack sounded from somewhere in the rubble. Everyone turned to see the house shift, a charred piece of a wall crumbling into the foundation. Liu never moved.

“What about cars?” she asked the fire captain.

“Garage was empty.”

Liu chewed on the inside of her cheek. “Two-car family. One brought Bill to work. The other…” She cracked her knuckles. “Check the database and put out a citywide alert on their cars, priority on whatever seems like it would be the family car. A minivan or an SUV.”

The agent standing next to Theo nodded and walked away, punching buttons on a device.

“Did you find any cable equipment?” Liu asked, turning back to the fireman. “Or anything that seemed out of place in a family home?”

The fire captain looked at the house and back. “Ma’am, that fire was completely catastrophic. I don’t know what to tell you. That house is a dead end.”

Liu nodded her thanks as he walked off.

“Ma’am?” came a voice through Theo’s earpiece. “We’ve heard back from CalCom. There was no record of a service visit for the Hoffmans today. They also don’t have any male employees with a name that starts with the letter S. And all company service vehicles are accounted for.”

Watching Liu’s jaw clench, Theo wondered if the rest of the agents also felt the impulse to take a step back from her.

“Tell me you got something,” she said to the two agents walking up.

“Nothing,” one of them said. “Two neighbors have video surveillance, but none of the camera angles cover the Hoffmans’ property.”

“So,” she said, “we don’t have a name, location, or description of our suspect.”

No one challenged her.

“If the captain knows this guy blew up his house—and let’s assume he does—he’s got to be getting scared. This guy isn’t a hack. I mean…” She gestured toward the house. Turning back to the team, she said, “I want to know more about the captain. Who is he, and why should we trust him. Our priority is the family. But we got a whole plane full of people to think about as well, not to mention Washington, DC.”

Liu glanced down the street to where the media had assembled. Looking around the group of agents in full SWAT gear, her gaze landed on Theo. With a sinking feeling, he knew where this was headed.

“You,” she said to him with a nod at the reporters. “Deal with them.”

Five media vans lined the street on the other side of the yellow caution tape that surrounded the perimeter. The satellite dishes on top of the vans all angled the same way, the side doors opened to expose similar control panels.

This wasn’t Theo’s first time acting as spokesperson for an investigation—but it was his first time lying about one.

“Gas leak?” one of the reporters said, clearly skeptical. “Then why haven’t you evacuated the rest of the neighborhood?”

“OG&E is assuring us it was an isolated event,” Theo said, trying not to squint. The lights from the camera were a lot to handle with a concussion.

Another reporter didn’t wait to be called on. “But the FBI was already on scene when the explosion happened. Why?”

“We were responding to a report that a cable worker might have cut a gas line. We were here in an abundance of caution.”

“But SWAT? And—” The reporter pointed at Theo’s injured arm, tucked against his body in a sling.

“I’m feeling pretty lucky,” Theo said, glancing over his shoulder at the house.

“Was anyone else hurt? Was anyone home at the time of the explosion?”

Theo immediately flashed to the politician.

“The investigation is ongoing, and I’m not at liberty to comment on that,” he said, trying hard to keep emotion out of his voice. He spoke quickly before anyone could lob another question. “Ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much. I’m sorry we don’t have more information at this time. When I get something new, you’ll know.” Turning, he ducked under the yellow tape.

“Agent Baldwin?”

One of the reporters stood off to the side. The others were heading back to the vans. Theo walked over casually, trying not to attract attention. He recognized her from CNB broadcasts. Vanessa Perez. She’d always struck him as a professional who told the news with integrity, not someone who just wanted her face on TV.

“Gas leak?” she said.

Theo didn’t say a thing and neither did his expression.

“Gas leak,” she repeated, nodding. “Absolutely. But.”

She extended her hand, a business card tucked between the index and middle finger. “Just in case that changes.”

Remaining unreadable, Theo pocketed the card without a word and walked away.

“Liu wants you,” Agent Rousseau said as Theo approached.

“Maybe I’ll get fired twice today,” he said, looking around for his boss. Seeing her alone and on a phone call down the street, he headed that way, checking his phone as he went. Thank god the fire captain had told them the house was empty before Liu called Washington to evacuate and Theo could send a text to Aunt Jo telling her the family was dead. Misinformation like that could have been disastrous. His phone showed nothing new from his aunt and he opened the message thread to make sure all of his texts said “Delivered.” He had no choice but to wait. She was probably busy preparing for the gas attack, he realized with a chill.

The situation he was living through was surreal enough. But at that exact moment, his aunt was facing a trauma of another magnitude. Jo had been flying forever, and from the stories she’d told over the years, he knew all the crazy stuff she’d seen. But this? Never had her stories come anywhere close to this.

When Theo was six, his mother put him and his two little sisters in the car one night and drove away from their father and the only home he’d ever known. He didn’t understand what was going on, but something told him they would never be coming back. He still hadn’t gone back to Texas, to this day. That night his mom drove all the way to California, where her only sister lived—Aunt Jo. She was pregnant with Wade at the time; Devon would be born two years later. By then, Theo and his family were settled into the house four doors down from Aunt Jo’s, his new world consisting of two back doors that were never locked, constantly opening and closing. He was the eldest of the five cousins and since he didn’t have a father figure, he took it upon himself to fill the role. Even Uncle Mike, Aunt Jo’s husband, seemed to regard him as a peer, not a child.

Every night, the kitchen in one house or the other would fill with the sounds of family; a hot sizzle coming from the stove, a soda being cracked open after a mom said it was okay, a tale being told of what had happened that day at school or at work. The best stories were always Jo’s. She was a natural raconteur, always knew how to paint a scene just so. Her tales would begin like they were no big deal and not two minutes later, forks full of spaghetti would hover over plates, forgotten.

Theo couldn’t wait to hear how he and Jo would recount this day to their family. This one would be replayed for the rest of their lives. They would get it to the point where it would become a bit, both of them sharing their viewpoint as the saga unspooled. Legendary.

He nodded to himself, confirming that happy future.

“Theo!”

An agent raced up to him with the news that the LAPD had spotted the Hoffmans’ SUV at a vacant strip mall not far away.

Theo pumped the fist of his good arm. “I’ll grab Liu.”

She had her back to Theo, unaware of his presence. He wasn’t going to wait for her to finish the call to tell her the good news. This was too important—she’d want to be interrupted. Coming closer, Theo could overhear her conversation.

“Yes, sir,” she said, pausing. “I understand and agree. But this is Washington, DC. This is potentially the White House. We’re talking about the safety of the president of the United States. I think we need to start thinking very seriously along the lines of secondary protocol.”

Theo stopped in his tracks.

In a situation like this, there was only one contingency plan, one line of secondary protocol.

If the FBI didn’t save the family, they were going to shoot down the plane.