“Forty-seven,” she said.
“Impressive,” Rodgers said.
“Not compared to what you have done,” Lucy said.
Rodgers rolled a shoulder. “I was in the wrong places at the right time.”
“A true hero, taciturn and modest,” Lucy remarked. “But since you’ve very happily fallen in my lap, General Rodgers, tell me, in as few words as you like. Is Op-Center busy redefining its mission?”
“If having your budget whacked is redefining, I suppose the answer is yes,” Rodgers replied.
“I heard about the cuts, but that isn’t what I meant. I’m talking about the Wilson investigation.”
“Wow, that’s really the talk of the town, isn’t it?” Rodgers asked.
“Everything is the talk of this town,” Lucy said.
“The Wilson investigation is a fluke,” he said.
Rodgers leaned past the reporter and ordered a Samuel Adams. He hated being pushed, and he hated being pushed by journalists even more. They attacked the front door, the back door, the windows, and when that did not work, they crawled under the front stoop and waited like snakes.
“Is that what you two are here to discuss?” Lucy asked.
“Good guess, but no,” Kat told her.
Lucy frowned. “You’re not going to tell me it’s purely social.”
“Actually, it is,” Rodgers said as the bartender handed him his beer. “I was at the senator’s party last night. Ms. Lockley wanted to meet me and called. Here I am.”
“Why were you at the party?”
“Free food,” Rodgers said.
Lucy smiled. “All right, General. I won’t press. But Kat? I want a half-hour window if there’s any news. That will give me time to put it on my web site.”
“And give you bragging rights for being the first,” Rodgers said.
“That’s what gives a reporter heft,” Lucy replied. “You remember those days, don’t you, Kat?”
Kat said she did and agreed to give Lucy a scoop if there was one to be had. The reporter left the bar to scout for leads elsewhere. Kat picked up a shopping bag that was beside the stool, and Rodgers escorted his date and his beer to the restaurant atrium for dinner.
“Sorry about all that,” Kat sat as they were seated. “She got there right before you did, so there was no time to disengage. I hope it wasn’t too painful.”
“Define ‘too.’ ”
“Enough to make you not want to work with us,” Kat said. “We have to be much more accessible than the key people at Op-Center.”
“It will take getting used to, but I’ll survive,” Rodgers said. “All I need to do is keep up that Gary Cooper facade.”
“That may be even more appealing,” Kat pointed out.
“Maybe, but at least there are only two words to the script,” Rodgers said. “ ‘Yup’ and ‘nope.’ I can handle that. But how about we do what we told Ms. O’Connor. Keep this social.”
“Good idea,” she said, just ahead of a smile that was the first one he could recall seeing.
“Anything interesting in the bag?” Rodgers asked.
“A present and my Nikes,” Kat said. “Heels get tiring.”
“I can imagine,” he said. “You want to change? I won’t say anything.”
“Not appropriate in here. When I leave.”
“So tell me. How did you come to work with the senator?” Rodgers asked.
“Well, as you probably gathered from Lucy, I used to be one of them,” she said. “I graduated from Columbia and was hired by the Wall Street Journal as a reporter for the Washington Bureau.”
“Were your folks reporters or politicians?”
“They were New York City cops. Both of them. So was my older brother. The Lockley family defined the word tough.”
“Was there any pressure for you to go into law enforcement?”
“Not directly.” She laughed. “Unless you consider taking martial arts and gun safety classes instead of ballet and playing with dolls to be pressure. I didn’t mind, though. We did it as a family.”
“Sounds pretty well-adjusted,” Rodgers said.
“It was.”
“Then where did journalism come from?”
“Our other family activity was watching the news on TV,” Kat said. “The local news always had a lot of police stories, and I loved watching the reporters. They got to hang with police officers and firefighters and soldiers, so I started doing my own newscasts with our video camera and interviewing my folks and their friends. I loved it, and it stuck.”
The waiter came over, and they took a moment to look at the menu. They decided to order several appetizers and share.
“So,” Rodgers went on. “Did you go directly from the Journal to becoming the senator’s press secretary?”
“Pretty much,” she said. “I made some stabs at getting into TV, but you need connections, fangs, or both. All I had was an interest in reporting news. Dad and the senator were old buds. When I was assigned to cover Don Orr’s last campaign, he offered me a job. He said it wasn’t nepotism. He told me I had ‘the goods.’ ”
“You do,” Rodgers said.
“Maybe.” She shrugged. “I figured if nothing else, I’d pick up TV connections for the future.”
“Smart. Looks like you anticipated everything.”
“Not quite,” she said. “In a high-profile position like this one, you have to watch everything you say and everything your boss says.” She gestured toward the bar. “As you saw back there, self-censorship is a constant process, and you suffer a complete loss of privacy. I did not appreciate the degree to which that would happen.”
“Maybe you need to come up with an alter ego,” Rodgers suggested. “Get a wig, a pair of sunglasses, black lipstick.”
“I have all of those.” She laughed. “It’s my Goth side.”
“Pardon?”
“Goth. Gothic. You know—vampires, black lace and leather, sharpening your teeth with a file and dying your skin white.”
“People do that?” Rodgers asked.
Kat nodded. “It’s a large and growing subculture.”
“I had no idea.”
The age difference of some twenty years suddenly became very apparent to Rodgers. He still thought the rock group KISS was over the top. At the same time, Rodgers’s respect for Senator Orr grew. The Texan was even older, yet he had dared to hire a twenty-something who brought different ideas to the staff. Though it was alarming to think of vampires as a potential voting bloc.
“It’s funny,” Kat said as the food arrived. “I’m the journalist, yet you’re the one asking the questions.”
“I don’t have access to a dossier of your entire life,” Rodgers pointed out.
“Touché,” she said, smiling again.
The two talked a little about Rodgers and then about the problems of mounting a national campaign. It was an open, intelligent talk. Rodgers did not know if it had been part of Orr’s plan, but by the time they were finished, the general had decided to accept the employment offer.
While they were having coffee, Lucy O’Connor returned. She was making notes in a PalmPilot as she weaved through the crowded restaurant and made her way directly to the table. Upon arriving, she fixed her eager eyes on Kat.
“There’s been another killing,” she said breathlessly.
“Who?” Kat asked. She seemed unusually alarmed. Or maybe she was tired of talking to reporters.
“A big shot Southern realtor named Robert Lawless,” Lucy said, reading from the PalmPilot. “A woman went to his hotel room—at the Monarch, this time—and left a few minutes later. Sometime between, she apparently poked him under the tongue with a hypodermic. The only difference between the Wilson and Lawless incidents is that this killer went up with him.”
“Did the security cameras get anything?” Rodgers asked.
“Same as yesterday,” Lucy replied. “A woman whose features were hidden, this time by a scarf and sunglasses.”
�
�How did you hear about it?” Kat asked.
“Someone in hotel security saw the woman in the elevator, thought she looked suspicious, and decided to check on Mr. Lawless. I was in the bar, networking, heard the fuss.”
“But they didn’t hold the woman,” Kat said.
“They were a few steps too late,” Lucy said. “She got off on the mezzanine, not in the lobby, and walked out a side door. The good news, I guess, is that it seems to take your soiree out of the spotlight. Lawless wasn’t on the invite list.”
Kat looked at her watch, then excused herself. She said she was going outside to call the senator. This was something he should know before he taped the show. “I owe you,” she said to Lucy as she left.
“I’ll want a comment from the senator,” Lucy said.
Kat nodded as she walked away. The reporter smiled and took the seat across from General Rodgers. The thirty-something woman had short blond hair, pale skin, thin red lips, and a hungry look.
There were all kinds of vampires in Washington.
“Lucky you were there,” Rodgers said.
“My middle name is Kay,” the reporter said. “My folks gave it to me so I could add it to Lucy whenever I wanted.”
“Cute,” Rodgers said.
“So, General,” Lucy said. “What about these rumors that Op-Center is being phased out?”
“Intelligence fund reapportionments are cyclical,” Rodgers said. “Op-Center got a boost five years ago, now they’re being cut back. They’re still beefier than they were when they started.”
That was longer than “nope.” Mike Rodgers was proud of himself—but only for a moment.
“They?” Lucy said.
That was a slip. Rodgers should have been more careful.
“General, are you going to work for Senator Orr and the USF?” Lucy asked. “Is that why you were at the party last night?”
“Nope,” he said.
“Nope?” Lucy said, her mouth twisting.
“Nope.” Words were a reporter’s oxygen supply. Cut it off, and they died.
“Sir, I am on your side, their side. I can help. The more leads I get, the more credibility I have, the more favorable press the senator gets. Are you sure there’s nothing you want to tell me?”
“Yep,” he said.
She frowned. She reached into the PalmPilot carrying case and handed him a business card. “When you feel like talking, call me first.”
He tucked the card in his shirt pocket. He said nothing, though he did smile politely.
Kat returned then and said that the news had reached the senator right after he left.
“How did he hear about it?” Rodgers asked.
“From Nightline,” she replied. “They wanted him to know that they were going to go easy on the questions about Wilson because of this.”
Lucy got up to give Kat the seat. “Well, I’m going to get online and coin a name for our serial killer before someone else does. It will make an incredible book title one day.”
The reporter left while Rodgers and Kat finished their coffee.
“Well, that was a strange end to a very unusual day.”
“Strange in what way?”
“It started with me denying that Op-Center would ever fake evidence to get publicity and ended with me sitting here wondering if a reporter would kill people to get a book deal.”
The woman laughed. “Lucy is aggressive. But I don’t think she’s a killer.”
“Was she at the party last night?”
“Yes,” Kat said. “That was why she came over to me at the bar. To guarantee continued terrific coverage of the USF for continued A-list status.”
“Will you give it to her?”
“I said I’d talk to the senator,” Kat said. “But I’ll probably give it to her. Otherwise, she might become homicidal.”
Kat insisted on picking up the tab, after which Rodgers walked her to her car. There was no sexual tension, which was fine with him. It had been a long day. He was looking forward to catching Nightline and going to bed.
And for the first time in his life, General Mike Rodgers realized how utterly, sadly accurate the maxim about old soldiers truly was.
NINETEEN
Washington, D.C. Monday, 10:55 P.M.
Darrell McCaskey was sitting in bed, reading and waiting for Maria to finish taking a shower. His wife had spent most of the day with Ed March, helping him investigate the Malaysian connection. March had taken her to dinner to thank her. McCaskey had been checking on Orr party guests and had been unable to join them.
Maria had just entered the bedroom when the phone beeped. It was Dr. Minnie Hennepin.
“The police are bringing in another apparent hotel homicide,” she told him. “They found the same kind of puncture wound as Mr. Wilson.”
“Who was it?” McCaskey asked as he put his book on the night table. He reached for the TV remote control and put on the local news.
“A Southern businessman. That’s all I heard.”
“Do the police have any information about the killer?”
“Apparently they have no more information than they had on the first one,” she said.
“Doctor, I appreciate the call,” McCaskey said.
Maria lay down beside her husband. He kissed his wife, then cradled her while he checked his cell phone for messages. There were no missed calls. He rang his office phone and found no messages there, either. That was going to make his next step an extremely difficult one.
The death of the businessman, Robert Lawless, was the lead story on the news. They listened to an interview with Lawless’s aide and watched a video shot from the security camera of the woman emerging on the mezzanine. She was careful to hide her face from the camera.
“What does your gut tell you about all this?” McCaskey asked his wife.
“She’s a professional.”
“Yeah. This is not some angry escort turning against men.”
“But what individual would have access to hypodermic needles and drugs?” she asked.
“Potassium chloride is readily available from chemical supply firms, and syringes are easy to come by.”
“Did you learn anything from the party guests?” she asked.
“Unless we’re dealing with a cover-up, all of the women had alibis,” McCaskey said.
The phone rang as they were talking. McCaskey muted the TV and checked the Caller ID. It was Paul Hood.
“I assume you’ve heard,” Hood said.
“Yes,” McCaskey replied.
Maria took the remote and punched up the sound. McCaskey put a finger in his ear so he could hear.
“Not to be cold about it, but how does this impact us?” Hood asked.
“I was just thinking about that, and it looks like a lose-lose-lose situation,” McCaskey said. “The Metro Police have not called to ask for our input. If we force it on them, we’re going to come off as aggressive. If we don’t, we’ll appear weak. If we investigate independently, we’ll seem isolated and high-handed.”
“What if we officially bow out?” Hood asked.
“Bailing is our best option,” McCaskey said. “Scotland Yard will squawk, but it’s unlikely anyone will hear. The trick is what spin do we put on it?”
Maria poked his side. “You can’t leave.”
McCaskey frowned.
“You stand a better chance of finding her than the police,” Maria went on.
“Hold on, Paul,” McCaskey said. He turned to his wife. “Why do you think we can find her?”
“She is not a killer. She is an assassin.”
“Why would an assassin go after a successful but relatively unimportant businessman like Lawless?”
“Exactly,” she said.
“I don’t follow.”
“Unlike the death of William Wilson, this murder was an afterthought,” Maria said. “Someone wanted Wilson out of the way, so they hired a very skilled individual who made it look as if he had died of natural causes. They did not want
a murder. Otherwise, they could have hired a sniper to shoot him from Lafayette Park. When you destroyed that scenario, they were forced to target someone else, to make the Wilson death seem like the first high-profile strike of a hypodermic serial killer who was chasing down wealthy businessmen. Lawless happened to be the man she picked.”
“What makes you think that Lawless was an arbitrary choice?” McCaskey asked his wife.
“Look at the dissimilarities in the approach to the death,” the former Interpol agent told him. “William Wilson had bodyguards. The assassin had to approach him as a lover to get past them and make sure they stayed away. And because she was the lover of a high-profile individual, the hotel staff would have made a point of paying her very little attention. She came to the hotel, they did their business, she left—all of it relatively invisible. Tonight was different. Listen to these interviews,” she said, pointing at the TV. “The woman spoke with another man in the courtyard but never looked up at him. The dead man’s assistant noticed her, but she did not let him see her face. She was being very cautious.”
“Right. She did not want to be identified, because she was waiting to kill him,” her husband said.
“No. After the killing, she got off on the mezzanine,” Maria said. “She had already cased out the hotel, knew how to leave with minimum visibility. Why do that and then go back outside and expose herself to all of this scrutiny? If Lawless had been the intended target all along, she could have posed as his wife or daughter and gotten into the room. She could have ambushed a housekeeper and taken a master key. She could have knocked on his door after he had gone in. Who would not admit a young woman? She could have used a syringe to inject hydrochloric acid into the lock to dissolve it. She took none of those safer routes because our assassin did not know Lawless was going to be her victim. Not until she spoke with him, found out he was successful enough to fit the serial killer motif she—or whoever hired her—had invented, and learned that he was staying in the hotel alone.”
McCaskey was silent while he processed everything his wife had said. “You’re saying that making this appear to be a pattern actually underscores the uniqueness of the first hit,” McCaskey said.
Call to Treason (2004) Page 13
