"What's the next step for me? When do we go?" were her only two questions after he had detailed the basics, though not the actual target.

"Tomorrow at one you'll to be at Manassas Regional Airport in Virginia. An MD-530 helicopter will set down there at five past the hour. We'll have an HK PSG-1 on board for you."

Williams frowned and shook her head. "Unh-uh. If you don't mind, I'll bring my own. I prefer the Winchester M70, with 300 Win Magnum hollow-point boattails. I've field-tested them, know they're best for this kind of job. You said that glass has to be penetrated, right?"

"Yes, that's right, Captain. You have to shoot into an office building."

Shafer didn't object to the change in weapons. He had worked with plenty of snipers and knew they were always idiosyncratic, had their own peculiar way of doing things. He'd expected modifications from her and was surprised there weren't more, actually.

"So who's going to die tomorrow?" Nikki Williams finally asked. "I need to know that, of course."

Shafer told Captain Williams the target, and to her credit, she never raised an eyebrow. Her only reaction was "My price just went up. It just doubled."

Shafer nodded slowly. "Agreed. That will be just fine, Captain."

Then Nikki Williams smiled. "Did I settle too low?"

Shafer nodded again. "Yes, you did. But I'm going to give you one-fifty anyway. Just don't miss him."

We might have gotten a decent break in the case-finally, something, and it had started with a tip from me. The wheelchair! We had a lead.

At ten in the morning, I raced across Washington to the Farragut apartment building on Cathedral Avenue. Three years before, a partner of mine named Patsy Hampton had been murdered in the underground garage of the Farragut. Geoffrey Shafer had killed her. The Farragut was where his old therapist lived.

We'd had Dr. Elizabeth Cassady under surveillance for the past thirty-six hours, and it seemed to have paid off. The Weasel had shown up. He parked in the underground garage near where Patsy had been brutally killed. Then he went upstairs to the penthouse apartment, 10D, where Dr. Cassady still lived.

He'd come in a wheelchair.

I boarded an elevator with four other agents. We had our guns drawn and ready. "He's extremely dangerous. Please take what I'm saying seriously," I reminded them as we stepped from the elevator on the therapist's floor.

It had been painted since the last time I was there. So much of this was familiar, hauntingly so. I was getting angry all over again about Patsy Hampton's death, about the Weasel.

I pressed the bell at 10D.

Then I called out, "FBI, open the door. FBI, Dr. Cassady."

The door opened, and I was staring at a tall, attractive blond woman whom I recognized.

Elizabeth Cassady recognized me, too. "Dr. Cross," she said. "What a surprise. Well, no, it isn't really."

As she spoke I heard a wheelchair rolling up behind her. I raised my gun, pushing Dr. Cassady out of the way.

I aimed my weapon.

"Stop right there! Stop!" I shouted.

The wheelchair, and the man seated in it, came into full view. I shook my head and slowly lowered the gun. I held back a curse. I smelled a rat, or should I say a Weasel.

The man in the wheelchair spoke. "I'm obviously not Colonel Geoffrey Shafer. Nor have I met him. I'm a stage actor named Francis Nicolo, and I am physically impaired, so no rough treatment, please.

"I was told to come here and I am being paid handsomely to do so. I was instructed to tell you that the colonel says hello and that you should have listened to the explicit instructions you were given. Since you are here, you didn't listen."

The man in the wheelchair then bowed from the waist. "That's my part, my piece. It's all I know. How was my performance? Acceptable? You may applaud if you wish."

"You're under arrest," I told him.

Then I turned to Elizabeth Cassady. "So are you. Where is he? Where's Shafer?"

She shook her head and looked incredibly sad. "I haven't seen Geoffrey in years. I'm being used, and so are you. Of course, for me it's harder-I loved him. I strongly suggest that you get used to it. This is how his mind works, and I should know."

So should I, I was thinking. So should I.

This is impressive, thought Captain Nikki Williams. And not the airfield meeting itself. The whole plan was dazzling. Audacious.

Manassas Regional was a small, nondescript airport spread over eight hundred acres, with two parallel runways. There was a main terminal building and an FAA control tower, but it was a very good spot for the mission.

Somebody is really thinking things through. This is going to work.

A couple of minutes after Captain Williams arrived at the airfield, she saw her helicopter setting down. She had two instant notions: where the hell had these people gotten an MD-530? And it was just right for the job she'd been given.

This was definitely going to work. It might not even be that hairy.

Nikki Williams hurried to the helicopter, carrying the Winchester in a cloth sling bag. The pilot had the other critical puzzle pieces for her. He was apparently the man with the final plan.

"I'm all fueled. We're headed northeast, over Route 28. I'm gonna set down for half a minute or so in Rock Creek Park," he told her.

" Rock Creek Park? I don't follow," Captain Williams said. "Why would you put down again once we're airborne?"

"The park stop is just to get you up on the skid. That's your position for the hit. All right with you?"

"Perfect," Williams said. "I get it now."

The scheme was daring, but it made sense to her. Everything about it did. They had even picked an overcast day with very slight winds. The MD-530 was fast and highly maneuverable. It was also stable enough to shoot from. In her army days, she'd fired thousands of rounds from them in all kinds of weather, and practice made perfect.

"You ready?" the pilot called back once she was on board. "We're going to be in and out of D.C. in less than nine minutes."

Williams gave it a thumbs-up, and the MD-530 corkscrewed up fast, flew northeast, and was soon crossing the Potomac. It never got higher than thirty or forty feet off the ground and was traveling at about eighty knots.

The helicopter set down for less than forty seconds in Rock Creek Park.

Captain Williams took a position on the right skid, behind and just below the pilot. Then she signaled for him to lift off. "Let's go. Let's do it."

Not only is this smart, it is cool as hell, she couldn't help thinking as the helicopter took off again and closed on her target. In and out of harm's way in less than nine minutes. He'll never know what hit him.

I was back at my desk before noon, feeling edgy and ragged, tapping into the National Crime Information Center computer database, drinking about a gallon of black coffee-which was the worst thing to do. The goddamn Weasel: he knew we had found out about the wheelchair. But how? They have somebody inside, don't they? Somebody warned Shafer.

At about one, I was still at my desk when a shrill, ear-splitting alarm sounded in the building.

At the same time my pager signaled a terrorist alert.

I heard loud voices up and down the hall. "Look out your window! Go to your window, quick!"

"Oh, good God! What the hell are they doing down there?" somebody else yelled.

I took a look outside and was stunned to see two men in fatigues running across the pink granite cobblestone of the inner courtyard. They were just passing the bronze sculpture "Fidelity, Bravery, Integrity."

My first wild thought was that the men might be human bombs. How else could just two of them hope to damage the building or anybody inside?