Free The Hammer of Eden by Ken Follett Page A

should tell her. I’ll see if I can get a number for her.”
    “Whatever.” Kincaid was impatient to get off the personal stuff and talk about work. “Here in the office, there are some changes, inevitably. I’ve been made acting SAC in Milt’s absence.”
    Judy’s heart sank. “Congratulations,” she said, trying for a neutral tone.
    “I’m moving you to the Domestic Terrorism desk.”
    At first Judy was just puzzled. “What for?”
    “I think you’ll do well there.” He picked up the phone and spoke toLinda. “Ask Matt Peters to come in and see me right away.” Peters was supervisor of the DT squad.
    “But I just won my case,” Judy said indignantly. “I put the Foong brothers in jail today!”
    “Well done. That doesn’t change my decision.”
    “Wait a minute. You know I’ve applied for the job of supervisor in the Asian Organized Crime squad. If I get moved off the squad now, it’s going to look like I had some kind of problem.”
    “I think you need to broaden your experience.”
    “And
I
think
you
want Marvin to get the Asian desk.”
    “You’re right. I believe Marvin is the best person for that job.”
    What a jerk, Judy thought furiously. He gets made boss and the first thing he does is use his new power to promote a buddy. “You can’t do this,” she said. “We have Equal Employment Opportunity rules.”
    “Go ahead, make a complaint,” Kincaid said. “Marvin is better qualified than you.”
    “I’ve put a hell of a lot more bad guys in jail.”
    Kincaid gave her a complacent smile and played his trump card. “But he’s spent two years at headquarters in Washington.”
    He was right, Judy thought despairingly. She had never worked at FBI headquarters. And although it was not an absolute requirement, headquarters experience was thought desirable in a supervisor. So there was no point in her making an Equal Employment Opportunity complaint. Everyone knew she was the better agent, but Marvin looked better on paper.
    Judy fought back tears. She had worked her socks off for two years and scored a major victory against organized crime, and now she was being cheated of her reward by this creep.
    Matt Peters came in. He was a stocky guy of about forty-five, bald, wearing a short-sleeved shirt and a tie. Like Marvin Hayes, he was close to Kincaid. Judy began to feel surrounded.
    “Congratulations on winning your case,” Peters said to Judy. “I’ll be glad to have you on my squad.”
    “Thank you.” Judy could not think what else to say.
    Kincaid said: “Matt has a new assignment for you.”
    Peters had a file under his arm, and now he handed it to Judy. “The governor has received a terrorist threat from a group calling itself the Hammer of Eden.”
    Judy opened the file, but she could hardly make out the words. She was shaking with anger and an overwhelming sense of futility. To cover her emotions she tried to talk about the case. “What are they demanding?”
    “A freeze on the building of new power plants in California.”
    “Nuclear plants?”
    “Any kind. They gave us four weeks to comply. They say they’re the radical offshoot of the Green California Campaign.”
    Judy tried to concentrate. Green California was a legitimate environmental pressure group based in San Francisco. It was hard to believe they would do something like this. But all such organizations were capable of attracting nutcases. “And what’s the threat?”
    “An earthquake.”
    She looked up from the file. “You’re putting me on.”
    Matt shook his bald head.
    Because she was angry and upset, she did not bother to sweeten her words. “This is stupid,” she said bluntly. “No one can
cause
an earthquake. They might as well threaten us with three feet of snow.”
    He shrugged. “Check it out.”
    Judy knew that high-profile politicians received threats every day. Messages from crazies were not investigated by the FBI unless there was something special about them. “How was this threat