“The way that happens is that they will surround the place. Then somebody will get on a bullhorn and tell him—hell, you’ve seen the movies—‘This is the FBI. We have you surrounded. Come out with your hands on your head, and no harm will come to you.’ ”
“And what if he starts shooting his machine gun? The both of them start to shoot their machine guns?”
“They’ll look out the window and they won’t see anything to shoot at. The FBI’s not going to stand there in the open where they can get shot. They’re not stupid.”
“And if Bryan doesn’t come out with his hands on his head?”
“Probably nothing. They don’t want to start shooting unless they have to. With or without knowing there’s a baby inside. After a long time—a long, long time—they might shoot some tear gas into the place. But that’s it. Once they have the place surrounded, that’s it. They can wait; time is on their side.”
She didn’t reply.
“And with that thought in mind, probably the smartest thing we could do right now would be to call Jack Matthews, have him meet us, you show him where Chenowith is, and let the FBI do their thing.”
“If I show you where the house is, you’ll have to promise you won’t tell the FBI until after we meet with Jennie.”
“Jesus!”
“Promise!”
“Okay, okay.”
Several minutes later, moving down a narrow, winding road, Matt said:
“You know what worries me the most? That your friend Jennie, once I put the arm on her, is not going to listen to one goddamn word you say to her about keeping her mouth shut until she sees a lawyer. You’re not going to be the friend trying to save her ass, trying to keep her baby from getting hurt, but the traitorous bitch who turned her in to the cops.”
“And?”
“She starts screaming that you were in on this whole thing from the beginning. If she and Chenowith are going down, I think it’s entirely likely they’ll want to take you down with them.”
“I was, more or less,” Susan said. “I’ll just have to take that risk.”
“Another option, of course, is for me to stop the car and start slapping you around until you tell me where the bastard is.”
“Oh, stop it!”
“That’s the best idea I’ve had all day,” he said. “I really have no idea at all why I’m going along with this bullshit idea just to try to save your friend, who, I am growing more and more convinced, is just as dangerous as her boyfriend.”
“You could slap me around all day, and I’d never tell you where the house is,” Susan said.
She believes that. She’s probably never been slapped in her life.
Could I slap her?
Yes, I could.
And get her to tell me where this goddamn house is?
Yes, I could.
And the FBI takes the house, and the asshole shoots off his homemade terrorist machine gun, and the FBI blows him, his girlfriend, and the baby away.
And whose fault would that be?
For the rest of her life, for the rest of our life, I would be the son of a bitch responsible for poor Jennie and/or her precious child getting blown away.
Not Jennie herself. Not even Chenowith. He’s crazy, so it’s not even his fault, no matter what the son of a bitch does.
Me. I would be the son of a bitch.