Chapter 17
In the secret location of Mammoth, forty feet underneath Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles, Dan Heath used his mouse to click the play button on his computer. The recording of the phone call was received seven days earlier and recently flagged to be related to case 052.
Her voice was sweet, vulnerable, like the song of an angel. It reminded him of his wife, Gabriella.
Dan had fallen in love with Gabriella in his senior year of high school in history class as they studied together and commiserated over the horribly jumbled and boring lectures the teacher would give.
His appetite for her love was unending. If fact, he was perturbed at working so late on a Saturday night rather than spending it with her, their ritual of giving each other massages after a candlelight dinner disrupted. But that was the deal he had made with his superior in exchange for a week off last month. He had so much enjoyed the trip to Hawaii for his sixteenth wedding anniversary.
His office obviously had no windows, but that didn’t bother him. Two pictures of Gabriella were view enough. The one in the middle of his desk was the wedding picture of them cutting the cake. The one on the left corner of his desk was taken last month at Punalu’u black sand beach in Hawaii. Sunbathing, Gabriella’s radiate white skin contrasted beautifully.
On the recording, the woman’s voice broke up while speaking to an overnight FBI agent. Her cell phone evidently didn’t have good reception from wherever she had called from. “Please help … U.S. citizens … Southern Mexico lab … Malik—” and hate suddenly stained her angelic voice, “—is leader of Project X, taking innocent lives … trapping … project … 1120 Pine Street, apartment twenty-three, in Santa Ana … Malik changed … no longer cancer ... lies … high technology—”
—and the signal was lost. He wondered how much longer she had continued talking, believing the FBI agent heard her.
With his mouse, he clicked the replay button. He wanted to make sure he didn’t miss any of her words. He took out a pen and paper to take notes.
Dan was the commanding agent of the covert Mammoth team, which investigated potential national security breaches. The offices had been built when Griffith Observatory had been closed to the public for renovations. However, few people knew just how much renovation had been made.
On this hilltop, certain surveillance equipment and communications worked better than underneath a building in downtown Los Angeles or in the neighboring cities. Another structure in the San Bernardino Mountain chain could be easily spotted with satellite photos and questioned. But Griffith Observatory had been around since before its opening to the public on May 14, 1935. Satellite photos of this area would confirm nothing new to outside sources.
Griffith Observatory was such a popular tourist spot that Mammoth agents in casual dress appeared inconspicuous to observers. The crowds were a type of natural camouflage available. Even if recognized, the few agents coming here could be mistaken as taking a relaxing day off from work.
Dan’s computer wasn’t repeating the recorded phone message. He clicked the replay button again.
He wanted to make sense of this.
He hated women in trouble. His wife had been in a domestic violent relationship with a boy from high school before meeting Dan. His father had always treated his mother with the utmost respect, and taught Dan to do the same. It just didn’t make sense to him how horribly some men could treat women who they supposedly “loved.”
Besides, according to intelligence at Los Angeles headquarters, this woman’s call could be linked via the disclosed address to case 052, which he had been working on for the last month. This priority case involved a dangerous leak of top-secret information.
During the second playing of the message, he noticed the woman’s tone almost imperceptibly acquiring the desperate hollowness of loneliness as the message neared its end.
She needed help. She was alone.
He ran his hand over the smooth skin of his bald head.
Technology had failed her. She probably assumed that her entire call was heard.
Dan had planned on making a trip to the Pine Street address before even hearing this recording. Case 052 was linked to this apartment from phone calls made to it from several foreign political officials and suspected terrorists from North Korea to Iran to Afghanistan.
Without delay, he made a call to prepare his unit to visit Pine Street tonight.