The Big Bad Wolf

"DO YOU KNOW what they say about you, Dr. Cross? That you're close to psychic. Very imaginative. Maybe even gifted. You can think like a killer." Those were Monnie Donnelley's words to me that very morning. If that was true, why had I been taken off the case? I went to my classes in the afternoon, but I was distracted, maybe angry. I suffered a little angst: What was I doing in the FBI? What was I becoming? I didn't want to fight the system in Quantico, but I'd been put in an impossible position. The next morning I had to be ready for my classes again: "Law," "White-Collar Crime," "Civil Rights Violations," "Firearms Practice." I was sure that I'd find "Civil Rights Violations" interesting, but a couple of missing women named Elizabeth Connolly and Audrey Meek were out there somewhere. Maybe one or both of them were still alive. Maybe I could help find them - if I was so goddamn gifted. I was finishing breakfast with Nana and Rosie the cat at the kitchen table when I heard the morning paper plop on the front porch. "Sit. You eat. I'll get it," I told Nana as I pushed my chair away from the table. "No argument from this corner," Nana said, and sipped her tea with great little-old-lady aplomb. "I have to conserve myself, you know." "Right." Nana was still cleaning every square inch of the house, inside and out, and cooking most of the meals. A couple of weeks ago I'd caught her hanging on to an extension ladder, cleaning out the gutters on the roof. "It's not a problem," she hollered down to me. "My balance is excellent and I'm light as a parachute." Come again? The Washington Post hadn't actually reached the porch. It lay open halfway up the sidewalk. I didn't even have to stoop to read the front page. "Awhh, hell," I said. "Damn it." This wasn't good. It was awful, actually. I almost couldn't believe what I was seeing. The headline was a shocker: ABDUCTIONS OF TWO WOMEN MAY BE CONNECTED. Worst of all, the rest of the story contained very specific details that only a few people in the FBI knew. Unfortunately, I was one of them. Key was the story told about a couple - a man and a woman - who had been seen at the most recent kidnapping in Pennsylvania. I felt sick in the pit of my stomach. The eye- witness account given by Audrey Meek's children was information that we hadn't wanted released to the press. Somebody had leaked the story to the Post; somebody had also connected the dots for them. Other than maybe Bob Woodward, nobody at the newspaper could have done it by themselves. They weren't that smart. Who had leaked information to the Post? Why? It didn't make sense. Was somebody trying to sabotage the investigation? Who?