Chapter 47

Mac waited until the media crowd had dispersed before walking over to where the Cutlers and Henry Takayama were standing in front of the stage.

"Got a few minutes for a quick chat before you leave?" Mac asked Oliver. "Think of it as information sharing."

"No problem," Cutler said. "Is in here okay?"

"How about outside?" Mac said. "I'll probably need only five minutes, tops."

"You got it," Cutler said. He turned to Takayama, whom Mac had acknowledged with only a nod. "Henry, why don't you and Leah head back to the villa. She and I will be working from there tonight. You can tell our driver that I'll be along straightaway."

Leah Cutler and Takayama walked down the center aisle and out the double doors, neither one of them looking back, the overhead lights in the auditorium reflecting quite nicely, Mac thought, off Leah's silver jumpsuit.

Outside, Mac looked around to make sure it was just the two of them in the darkened area near the back parking lot. Then he grabbed Cutler by the front of his jumpsuit, nearly lifted him off the ground, and shoved him so hard against the stadium wall that Cutler's head snapped back.

"Are you out of your goddamn mind?" Mac said.

"Am I out of my mind?" Cutler sputtered. "Get your hands off me, you bastard."

"I know what you're thinking, Ollie," Mac said. "Where are all your media friends when you could really use them?" He gave Cutler another shove, then released him. Dr. John MacGregor couldn't remember the last time he'd been in a physical fight, or anything close to one. Maybe not since junior high school. But he was spoiling for one right now.

His face was still close to Cutler's, which had turned crimson. But Mac could see in Oliver Cutler's eyes that he wasn't about to say or do anything to escalate the situation.

"Just what exactly did you think you were accomplishing in there?" Mac asked. "Other than maybe getting you and your wife fired, which is frankly kind of a dream of mine. I don't know why you and Leah are here. Maybe Rivers thinks that somehow the two of you can humanize this whole situation. Or maybe by the time Takayama invited you to the party, it was too late for the general to do anything about it. I don't give a shit either way. What I do give a shit about is you causing me problems."

"I was telling the truth," Cutler said.

Mac snorted. "The truth?" he said. "Maybe those suckers in the media bought your garbage about ‘examining the subvolcanic structure.'" Mac raised his hands to put air quotes around the words, which made Cutler flinch. "But we both know better, don't we? You and Leah are no seismologists, and I know you don't employ any, because you're just lava chasers. I happen to know every place you've been since you arrived on this island. And Mauna Loa wasn't one of them. Neither was the HVO data room."

"You're having me followed, MacGregor?" Cutler asked.

"We try to keep an eye on loose cannons," Mac said. "Even ones dressed like space-age cheerleaders."

Cutler let that go. "People have a right to know what's going on inside that mountain," he said. "And by the way, I don't take orders from you. I report to General Rivers, same as you."

He slid along the wall to create some space between himself and Mac. It was still just the two of them behind the auditorium.

"You act like I volunteered for this," Cutler said. "I didn't. I was asked to come."

"Yeah," Mac said, "by that clerk Takayama, like I said. He decided you could be useful, except that all you did in there was act like a useful idiot."

"You better figure out a way to work with me," Cutler said, "because my wife and I aren't going anywhere."

Mac took a step toward him, but Cutler managed to stand his ground.

"No, Ollie, you've got it wrong," Mac said. "You're the one who needs to find a way to work with me. Or I will bury you."

He let the words hang there in the night air, then got into his car, slammed the door shut, and drove off. He was so focused on getting far away from Cutler that he didn't notice the pretty, dark-haired woman running across the lot from the other side of the building, frantically waving at him to stop.