Along Came a Spider

actually. Good prospects? On a roll, maybe? Clearly on a roll, yes.
    And nothing at all like Chips. Nothing like our Mr. Soneji
!
    Away came the thick mustache that Gary Soneji had worn since the day he’d arrived to interview at the Washington Day School. Then the contact lenses were removed. His eyes changed from green back to chestnut brown.
    Gary Soneji held the dwindling candle up to the dingy, cracked bathroom mirror. He rubbed one corner of the glass clean with the sleeve of his jacket.
    “There. Just look at you. Look at you now. Genius is in the details, right?”
    That insipid nerd from the private school was almost completely eradicated. The wimp and the do-gooder. Mr. Chips was dead and gone forever.
    What a wondrous farce it had been. What a daring plan of action, and how well executed. A shame no one would ever know what had really happened. But whom could he tell?
    Gary Soneji left the farmhouse around 11:30 P.M., right on his schedule. He walked to a detached garage that was north of the house.
    In a special place in the garage, very special, he hid five thousand dollars from his savings, his secret cache, money he’d stolen over the years. That was part of the plan, too. Long-range thinking.
    Then he headed down to the barn, and his car. Once he was inside the barn, he checked on the kids again. So far, so great.

    No complaints from the kiddies.
    The Saab started right up. He drove out to the main road, using only the dimmers.
    When he finally reached the highway, he flicked on the headlights. He still had work to do tonight. Masterpiece Theatre continued.
    Cool beans
.

CHAPTER 11

    FBI SPECIAL AGENT ROGER GRAHAM lived in Manassas Park, midway between Washington and the FBI Academy in Quantico. Graham was tall and physically impressive, with short, sandy brown hair. He’d worked on several major kidnappings, but nothing quite as disturbing as this current nightmare.
    At a little past one that morning, Graham finally got home. Home was a sprawling Colonial, on an average street in Manassas Park. Six bedrooms, three baths, a big yard that covered nearly two acres.
    Unfortunately, this had not been a normal day. Graham was drained and beaten up and bone-tired. He often wondered why he didn’t just settle down and write another book. Take early retirement from the Bureau. Get to know his three children before they fled from the house.
    The street in Manassas Park was deserted. Porch lights glowed down the line of the road, and they were a comforting, friendly sight. Lights appeared in the rearview mirror of Graham’s Ford Bronco.
    A second car had stopped on the street in front of his house, its headlamps gleaming. A man got out, and waved a notepad that was clutched in his hand.
    “Agent Graham? Martin Bayer,
New York Times
,” the man called out as he walked up the driveway. He flashed a press credential.
    Jesus Christ. Son-of-a-bitching
New York Times
, Graham thought to himself. The reporter wore a dark suit, pin-striped shirt, rep tie. He was your basic up-and-coming New York yuppie on assignment. All these assholes from the
Times
and the
Post
looked the same to Graham. Not a real reporter among them anymore.
    “You’ve come a long way at this hour for a ’no comment,’ Mr. Bayer. I’m sorry,” Roger Graham said. “I can’t give you anything on the kidnapping. Frankly, there isn’t anything to give.”
    He wasn’t sorry, but who needed enemies at the
New York Times
. Those bastards could stick their poison pens in one of your ears and out the other.
    “One question, and one question only. I understand that you don’t have to answer, but it’s that important to me — for me. For me to be here at one in the morning.”
    “Okay. Let’s have it. What’s your question?” Graham shut the door of his Bronco. He locked up for the night, flipped the car keys, and caught them.
    “Are
all
of you this incredibly insipid and stupid?” Gary Soneji asked him. “That’s my question, Grahamcracker.”
    A long, sharp knife flashed forward once. Then flashed again. The blade sliced back and forth across Roger Graham’s throat.
    The first slashing motion pinned him back against his Ford Bronco. The second slashed his carotid artery. Graham dropped dead in his driveway. There had been no time to duck, run, or even say a prayer.
    “You’re supposed to be a freaking
star
, Roger. You wanted to be the star, right? I see no evidence of that. None, zero,” Soneji said. “You’re supposed