"Let me see your shoes," Marty said.

Sandy shucked them off and handed them over.

Marty inspected the soles, the insoles and the laces. He handed them back, then ran his fingers through Sandy's hair and checked his wristwatch. After several minutes of this, he waved him back to his chair.

Marty picked up the cell phone, removed the back and the battery, then took a small screwdriver from his desk drawer and partially disassembled the phone. Satisfied, he reassembled it and handed it to Sandy.

"Sorry about that," Marty said. "I can't be too careful."

"It's perfectly okay," Sandy said. "Believe me, I understand. Can I speak freely now?"

"Go ahead; what do you need?"

"I've got a client who's in the middle of a big divorce. He wants me to bug his own house-he's moved out. He wants a mike in every room-just audio, no cameras. My problem is, his wife rarely goes out for more than a few minutes. The most time I'm going to get inside without being disturbed is, maybe, thirty minutes. You think you could put something together that would work for me?"

"Sure, but it ain't going to be cheap."

"How long would it take you to get it together?"

"How about ten minutes?" Marty said.

Sandy grinned. "Ten minutes would be good."

Marty went to a large safe in the corner, worked the combination with his body between Sandy and the safe, and opened it. He removed a plastic box, and as he turned to close the door of the safe Sandy was able to get a glimpse of the inside. It was filled with electronic components, what appeared to be a considerable amount of cash and two handguns on the top shelf. Marty locked the safe and returned to his desk.

"You recognize this?" he asked, opening the plastic box and handing Sandy a black, plastic object.

"Looks like a standard domestic circuit breaker," Sandy replied, turning it over in his hand.

"How about this?" Marty asked, handing him a plastic object about two inches long and half an inch wide. It was hinged lengthwise, and short spikes protruded from the back.

"You got me," Sandy said. "Never seen anything like it." In fact, he had seen something exactly like it. Marty was copying things that the Technical Services Department at the Agency had been making for years.

"Well," Marty said, sounding very pleased with himself, "here's what you do with your client's house. You go to the main breaker box and replace one of the breakers with mine. Then you go into each room of the house you want to bug, unscrew a power receptacle and crimp the other little thing so that the spikes penetrate both the positive and negative wires. Then you go outside and find an outdoor power receptacle and plug this into it." He handed Sandy a small, black box with a short antenna attached. "What you've done is turned the whole house's wiring grid into a receiver system that's picked up and retransmitted by the box with the antenna. I'll sell you a receiver with a dedicated, off-the-books frequency, and you'll be able to hear and, if you want to, record everything that's said in the house. You can even make it voice activated."

"Wow," Sandy said, pretending to be impressed. "How much?"

"The circuit breaker is eight grand, the crimpers are two hundred each and the retransmitter is two grand. Your receiver is a grand."

"Well, it's not like I'm the one paying for it," Sandy said. "The client will pick up the tab."

"How many crimpers you want?"

Sandy counted on his fingers. "Eighteen."

Marty turned to a calculator on his desk and began tapping in numbers. "That comes to fourteen thousand six hundred bucks," he said. "Call it fourteen thousand even, and with cash, no tax."

"Done," Sandy said. "I'll need to make a run to get the cash; that's more than I walk around with."

"Sure; I'll have everything packed up and ready for you in half an hour; you can pick it up anytime today."

Sandy stood up to go. "You must have a great workshop here," he said.

"I do. You want a gander?"

"God, yes, please!"

Marty walked him through another door and into a large, beautifully equipped workshop where four men were hunched over work-tables, wiring and soldering. "There you go. I can build you just about anything you want in here."

"This is really something," Sandy said. "I mean, I'm working out of my basement, you know?"

"Listen, I used to work out of my basement," Marty said.

"You've got a lot of building here," Sandy said. "What do you do with the rest of it?"

Marty walked him through another door into a storeroom filled with components and wiring, then into a large garage. Sandy counted four unmarked vans and half a dozen cars. "I keep larger equipment and my vans in here, and my employees park here, too. That's about as big a draw as health insurance. You got any idea what it costs to park in this city these days?"

"Tell me about it," Sandy said. He turned and saw a staircase going up to a windowed office in the high-ceilinged garage. "More work space?" He noted that blinds were pulled down over the windows.

"Nah, just storage," Marty said, steering him back toward the retail shop.

"I'll be back in a little later with your fourteen grand," Sandy said.

"You do that," Marty said, turning back toward his office. "Bye-bye. Nice doing business with you."

Sandy picked up his wire in the shop, then walked back to his car. He got out his cell phone and called Lance.

"Yes?"

"It's Sandy. Martin Block gave me the ten-cent tour. He's got four vans that the lady could be moved in, and there's a room I didn't get to see, up a flight of stairs in the garage. If Block has her, that's where she'll be. By the way, there are two cops in a Crown Vic sitting near the building, drinking coffee and eating doughnuts."

"Good work, Sandy."

"Oh, one more thing, Lance."

"What?"

"I'm going to need fourteen thousand dollars."

"What?"

47

STONE'S CELL PHONE RANG, and he picked it up. "Yes?"

"It's Lance. My man is back; he's cased the building, and there's one room where Arrington is probably being held. Part of the building is a garage, and the room is up a flight of stairs. It's the only logical place they would keep her."

"Then let's get in there."

"No, I don't think so. Billy Bob is supposed to call you midafternoon, right?"

"Right."

"Billy Bob will give you some complicated routing to meet him at some place or other. They'll track your movement, then, at some stage, either exchange you for Arrington or keep you both."

"That had occurred to me."

"They'll move her in one of Block's vans-he's got four. We'll raid the place as they're leaving-they won't be ready for us then."

"And what if Arrington isn't there?"

"Then we'll sequester everybody on the premises, so they can't call Billy Bob, and you'll have to go through with the meet. If Arrington isn't at Block's business now, it seems likely that they'll take you or both of you back there, and we'll be ready for them."

"And if Billy Bob doesn't have Arrington there now, and if he doesn't take her back there, what?"

"We'll be on your tail. We'll plant a transmitter on you, and we'll have a chopper on the job. When he gets wherever he's going, we'll be right on top of him."

"It sounds good, except for one thing."

"What's that?"

"Suppose he just shoots us both and dumps our bodies."

"Well," Lance drawled, "there is that. We can't cover every contingency, can we? The upside is, we'll at least take Billy Bob, and we'll roll up Block's operation."

"I'm sure that will be very comforting to me when I'm dead. How is Peter?"

"He's a sensible lad; he's curious about your and his mother's whereabouts, but Corey is handling him well, and he seems happy enough."