CHAPTER 32 Sampson
Sampson
I’M BACK IN THE basement of DC Metro headquarters. Dennis Chan is at his usual station, slumped in his chair, exhausted. After leaving the bombing site, Anna Rizzo and I parted ways. I took Chan, and Rizzo went back to her lab to see what she could dig up with her forensics team.
I lean over Chan’s shoulder. “What’ve you got on this one?”
“Not as much,” he says, sitting up straighter. “I know that’s not what you want to hear.”
Chan taps a few keys and his monitors light up. We’re looking at surveillance footage from early this morning on Henry Bacon Drive. Not much traffic, just a few pedestrians and joggers.
“What time?” I ask.
“Six thirty-one a.m. Coming right up. See, here we go.”
We’re looking at a black Ford pickup with a blue tarpaulin over the truck bed. The truck pulls over to the side, near a bunch of shuttered vendor booths and souvenir stands. The truck’s hazard lights start flashing.
Like an apparition, the driver steps out.
White painter overalls.
Gloves.
Face mask.
White baseball cap pulled down low.
He walks around the front of the truck heading toward the wall—and disappears.
Chan freezes the image and turns to me. “You ready?”
“Let it roll.”
Even though I know what’s coming, it still feels like a punch to the gut.
As soon as Chan restarts the video, a bright white-orange flash fills the screen. When it recedes, billowing smoke obscures everything.
When the smoke dissipates, the pickup truck is gone. Completely destroyed. Two cars parked nearby are shattered.
I stare at the screen, where there’s chaos: injured people stumbling around, a few people helping the victims using handkerchiefs or neckties as temporary bandages.
One man is moving. Dressed in jogging gear.
Leg gone below the knee.
He falls and thrashes on the ground as blood gushes out.
Chan turns in his chair. “John, whatever we’ve got here, it’s not some hermit like Ted Kaczynski. He’s bold and he’s not afraid to be out there in public, and he delivers the bomb right where he wants it. But why?”
“The purpose of terror is terror.”
“But we still have no one claiming responsibility and no leads.”
“Right. And no clue about what he plans to blow up next.”
My phone vibrates with a text alert.
It’s from Rizzo.
See me soonest.