The Burning Wire (Lincoln Rhyme 9)

"They're classics now--wristwatches that link to your computer. Telling the time is only one of a hundred things they can do. Astronauts have worn them to the moon."

Another look at the computer screen. No one was approaching the town house.

"And all this change, this modernity doesn't bother you?" Rhyme asked.

"No, it simply proves how integrated in our lives is the subject of time. We forget that the watchmakers were the Silicon Valley innovators of their day. Why, look at this project. What an impressive weapon--electricity. I shut down the entire city for a few days, thanks just to electricity. It's part of our nature now, part of our being. We couldn't live without it. . . . Times change. We have to change too. Whatever the risks. Whatever we have to leave behind."

Rhyme said, "I have a favor."

"I've adjusted the circuit breakers in your service panel. They'll carry three times the load. It'll be fast. You won't feel anything."

"I never feel very much in any event," Rhyme said.

"I . . ." Logan felt as if he had committed a shameful faux pas. "I apologize. I wasn't thinking."

A demurring nod. "What I'm asking has to do with Amelia."

"Sachs?"

"There's no reason to go after her."

Logan had considered this and he now told Rhyme his conclusion. "No, I have no intention to. She'll have the drive to find me. The tenacity. But she's no match for me. She'll be safe."

And now Rhyme's smile was faint. "Thank you . . . I was going to say, Richard. You are Richard Logan, right? Or is that fake?"

"That's my real name." Logan glanced at the screen again. The sidewalk outside was empty. No police. None of Rhyme's associates returning. He and the criminalist were completely alone. It was time. "You're remarkably calm."

Rhyme replied, "Why shouldn't I be? I've been living on borrowed time for years. Every day it's a bit of surprise when I wake up."

Logan dug into his gear bag and tossed another coil of wire, containing Randall Jessen's fingerprints, onto the floor. He then opened a baggie and upended it, letting some of Randall's hairs flutter to the ground nearby. He used one of the brother's shoes to leave an impression in the spilled water. Then he planted more of Andi Jessen's blond hairs, along with some fibers from one of her suits, which he'd gotten from her closet at work.

He looked up and checked the electrical connections again. Why was he hesitating? Perhaps it was that Rhyme's death represented for him the end of an era. Killing the criminalist would be a vast relief. But it would also be a loss he'd feel forever. He supposed what he was experiencing now was what one felt making the decision to take a loved one off life support.

Close to you . . .

He slipped the remote control from his pocket, stood back from the wheelchair.

Lincoln Rhyme was studying him calmly. He sighed and said, "I guess that's about it, then."

Logan hesitated and his eyes narrowed, staring at Rhyme. There was something very different about the criminalist's tone as he'd spoken those words. His facial expression too. And the eyes . . . the eyes were suddenly a predator's.

Richard Logan actually shivered as he suddenly understood that that incongruous sentence, delivered so incongruously, was not directed toward him at all.

It was a message. To somebody else.

"What've you done?" Logan whispered, heart pounding. He stared at the small computer monitor. There was no sign that anybody was returning to the town house.

But . . . but what if they'd never left in the first place?

Oh, no. . . .

Logan stared at Rhyme and then jammed his finger onto the two buttons of the remote control switch.

Nothing happened.

Rhyme said matter-of-factly, "As soon as you came upstairs one of our officers disconnected it."

"No," Logan gasped.