Page 92 of Fatal Mistake
“Good. I’d like your man to control the bot, but I’ll be the one suiting up to work on the device if it comes to that.”
Another nod.
“Show me the lay of the land.”
Udall bent over the hood and tapped a home five houses in from the intersection where they stood. “Subject’s house. We don’t have a blueprint yet, but it’s a two-story, and she’s on the first floor in the dining room. It faces east and the front door faces south. Back door, north, but the backyard falls off into a gully, and you’d have to climb two flights of stairs to get to the door.”
Cal looked down the road. “So the bot goes in through the front.”
He nodded. “Unless you want the dogs to take a look-see first.”
“You have dogs?”
“Best bomb sniffers in the country. We can strap a camera on ’em and send ’em in.”
“Let’s use the robot for now.” Cal didn’t want to risk a dog’s life when a robot could perform the task they needed to complete.
“We’re ready, Sarge,” the tech called out from the back of his truck.
Cal spun, and tuning out the commotion outside of the perimeter, he joined the tech inside the truck. The young man who looked barely out of college sat behind his control module.
“Let’s get the bot moving,” Cal directed.
The tech nodded and started the robot whirring forward. Bots didn’t move fast, so the drive from the perimeter to the front of the house seemed to take forever.
Cal’s phone chimed, and he glanced at it to see a text from Kaci saying she located Nabijah Meer’s address in D.C. Kaci had dispatched a team to Meer’s house to bring her in for questioning. Kaci had also attached Meer’s photo. Cal studied the woman’s face and wondered why she would team up with Keeler.
“Nearing the house,” the bomb tech said.
Cal’s attention needed to be on the bomb, and he could think about Meer after he’d neutralized the bomb. He stowed his phone and turned his attention to the tech. “What’s your name?”
“Frankie.”
“And the robot. Does he have a name, too?” Cal asked, knowing many teams named their bots.
“She, actually.” Frankie looked up and grinned. “Anne Droid.”
“From Dr. Who,” Cal said, recognizing the name.
Frankie nodded.
“How long have you been doing this, Frankie?”
“This job, three years. The marines another eight.”
So he wasn’t as young as he looked. And if he was a bomb disposal tech on a county squad, he’d be certified and have graduated from the FBI Hazardous Devices School in Huntsville, Alabama, as Cal had done when he’d come out of the navy. That meant he and Frankie spoke the same language when it came to rendering a bomb safe. The knot in Cal’s gut loosened a fraction.
Anne Droid approached the house, and Cal quit talking to focus on the monitor. It didn’t take a great deal of skill to move a robot down a street, even if Frankie faced a flat screen in a three-dimensional world. But to enter a house and approach the woman took far greater concentration.
Frankie took the bot right up the stairs, and with great dexterity, used Anne Droid’s pinching arm to turn the knob and open the door. Inside the house, she veered to the right.
“Turn on the speakers so I can communicate with the victim,” Cal directed, and Frankie complied.
“Ms. Tabet,” Cal said into the microphone. “I’m Special Agent Cal Riggins with the FBI. We’ve just sent a robot into the room. If you speak up we can communicate through the bot.”
“Hello.” Her tone was tentative and, even in a single word, her fear evident.
“We’re here to safely get you out of this device, but I’m going to need your help.”
