Heartland by David Hagberg Page B

grabbed her arm, and pulled her back.
    â€œWho the hell was on the phone?” he shouted.
    â€œYour wife,” she said, hanging her head, the tears coming to her eyes.
    â€œJesus,” Rossiter swore, half under his breath. “Oh, Jesus Christ!” He let go of Laura, grabbed the telephone, and dialed, speaking to Laura over his shoulder. “Get dressed. You’re going to have to drive me down there.”
    She padded across the bedroom and went into the bathroom, softly closing the door.
    â€œCargill,” said the phone at Peter’s ear.
    â€œStan? This is Pete.”

    â€œAm I glad to hear from you,” the night manager said. “You’d better get down here right away.”
    â€œI’ll be there in twenty minutes. What the hell is going on?”
    â€œI tried to get you at home, but Liz said you were in Minneapolis. I called up there. and they told me you hadn’t arrived, but to get ahold of you somehow and keep the cops out of it.”
    â€œOut of what?”
    â€œWe’ve got a guy here with a bomb. Carl found him down in L tunnel getting ready to set it.”
    â€œA bomb!” Rossiter shouted. “He hadn’t set it yet?”
    â€œNo. Carl said he was just taping it up to one of the overhead conveyors.”
    â€œWas that the only one?”
    The night manager sucked his breath, the sound clear over the phone. “Christ, Pete, we never even thought of that. We just assumed …”
    Rossiter cut him off. “Get the night crew down there immediately. I want every tunnel searched, inch by inch.”
    â€œYes, sir.”
    â€œAnd call the New Orleans P.D. bomb squad.”
    â€œBut Minneapolis said no cops.”
    â€œI don’t give a shit what they said! It’s my elevator. Now get on it, Carl. I’ll be down there within fifteen minutes.”
    As Rossiter hung up, Laura came out of the bathroom. She was wearing blue jeans and a T-shirt, and the tears were streaming down her cheeks.
    He jumped up, grabbed his clothes, and started to get dressed. “Get your car out and bring it around to the
front. I’ll be taking it.”
    â€œI’m going with you,” she said.
    â€œNo way. Some nut has planted at least one bomb down at the center. There may be more.”
    â€œI’m coming with you,” Laura said defiantly, and before he could object again, she grabbed her purse and left the apartment.
    Within a couple of minutes, Rossiter was at the front door of the building, where Laura waited for him in her Chevy Camaro, the engine running, the headlights on. The dense fog of the night had gotten worse, if anything, and as he jumped in the car he realized with a sinking feeling that it would take a hell of a lot longer than fifteen or twenty minutes to get across town.
    â€œLet’s go,” he said, “but for God’s sake, be careful in this shit. I don’t want to be in an accident.”
    She pulled out of the driveway and headed at a crawl toward the freeway, the low beams barely illuminating the road one car length ahead of them. They didn’t speak, both of them staring intently out the windshield, the wipers slapping back and forth, until they had made it to the freeway, and she was able to speed up to twenty miles per hour.
    â€œWhat did my wife say to you?” Rossiter asked gently.
    Laura glanced at him, her eyes red rimmed. “She knew you were there.”
    â€œWhat’d you tell her?”
    Laura shook her head. “Nothing. I was frightened.”
    â€œThen she doesn’t know for sure.”
    â€œShe knows, Peter! Goddamn it, she called Minneapolis and they told her you weren’t up there. If she didn’t know about us, then why would she have
called my number?”
    One more piece of shit in an already overloaded pot. “Laura …”
    â€œDon’t say it,” she said. “You’ve got your hands full now, so don’t lie to