London Bridges

maybe half a dozen helicopters. As our copter began to settle down I spotted techies in chemical protective overgarments.
    Jesus, what happened here?
    Chemical warfare?
    War?
    Is that a possibility? In this day and age? Of course it is.

Chapter 10
    IT WAS PROBABLY the scariest thing I’d ever seen in my years as a police officer—total desolation, without apparent rhyme or reason.
    As soon as we touched down and I climbed out of the helicopter, I was outfitted in chemical protective overgarments, CPOGs, including a gas mask and other gear. The rubber mask was state-of-the-art, with dual eyepieces and an internal drinking tube for replenishing fluids. I felt like a character in a scary Philip K. Dick story. But it didn’t last too long. I took the unwieldy mask off as soon as I saw a couple of army officers roaming around without theirs.
    We got a possible break soon after I arrived. A couple of rock climbers had spotted a man using a video camera to film the explosion. He looked suspicious, and one of the climbers had photographed the man with his digital camera. The climbers also had shots of the town’s evacuation.
    Two of our agents were interviewing the climbers, and I also wanted to talk to them as soon as the agents had finished. Unfortunately, the local police had gotten to the camera first and were holding it until their chief arrived at the scene. He was late, because he’d been away on a hunting trip.
    When the chief finally got there, in an old black Dodge Polaris, I was all over him. I started talking before he had even climbed out of his car.
    “Chief, your men are holding important evidence. We need to see it,” I said, not raising my voice at the sixtyish, potbellied man but making sure he got the point. “This is a federal investigation now. I’m here representing both the FBI and Homeland Security. We’ve lost valuable time because of your men.”
    To his credit, the police chief himself was exasperated. He began yelling at his officers. “Bring the evidence over here, you morons. What the hell are you two trying to pull? What were you thinking?
Do
you think? Bring the evidence.”
    His men came running, and the taller of the two, who I later learned was the chief’s son-in-law, handed over the camera. It was a Canon PowerShot and I knew how to get at the pictures.
    So what do we have here?
The first shots were well-composed nature photos. No people in any of them. Close-ups and wide-angle shots.
    Then came pictures of the actual evacuation. Unbelievable.
    Then I finally got my first look at the man who had filmed the explosion.
    His back was to the camera. At first he was standing, but in the next few shots he was down on one knee. Probably to get a better angle.
    I don’t know what had prompted the rock climber to take the initial few shots, but his instincts were pretty good. The mystery man was videotaping the deserted town—then suddenly it went up in flames that rose several hundred feet high. It seemed pretty clear that he had known about the attack
before
it happened.
    The next photograph showed the man turning in the direction of the climbers. He actually began to walk toward them, or so it appeared on film. I wondered if he’d spotted one of them taking his picture. He seemed to be looking their way.
    That was when I saw his face, and I couldn’t believe what I was looking at.
I recognized him.
And why not? I’d been chasing him for years. He was wanted for more than a dozen murders here and in Europe. He was a vicious psychopath, one of the worst of his kind still on the loose anywhere in the world.
    His name was Geoffrey Shafer, but I knew him better as the Weasel.
    What was he doing here?

Chapter 11
    THERE WERE A COUPLE more crystal-clear shots as the hateful Weasel got closer to the photographer.
    Just the sight of him sent my brain reeling, and I felt a little sick. My mouth was dry, and I kept licking my lips.
What is Shafer doing here? What connection does he have to the bomb that leveled this small town?
It was crazy, felt like a dream, completely unreal.
    I’d first come across Colonel Geoffrey Shafer in Washington three years ago. He’d murdered more than a dozen people there, though we could never prove it. He would pose as a cabdriver, usually in Southeast, where I lived. The prey was easy to grab, and he knew D.C. police investigations weren’t as thorough when the victims were poor and black. Shafer also had a day job—he was an army colonel working