The Escape

by David Baldacci

  I’m glad Ian is okay. But now that he’s healthy you have to consider what you’ve done and the damage that it’s caused. Because you opened the door for them. You and Susan. We need to meet.

  Robinson stared down at the little screen and then, after looking around to make sure no one was watching him, thumbed in a brief response.

  How? They’re everywhere.

  As Robinson read the reply his opinion of Robert Puller was once more validated. He was a very smart man.

  Union Station was busy at this time of day. Robinson parked in the upper deck and rode the escalator down to the station. He walked inside and over to a bank of phones set against one wall. In a world of cell phones, there was no one using these antiquated tools of communication.

  Across from him some scaffolding enclosed with a tall curtain had been set up around repair work being done on the ceiling.

  Robinson parked himself at the phone farthest from the door he’d come in and waited. A few seconds later it rang.

  He picked it up and said hello.

  “You’re looking good, Niles. Trim as ever.”

  Robinson didn’t bother to look around. He doubted he could have spotted the man.

  “How did you get out of DB, Bobby?”

  “Nothing planned. Just taking advantage of an opportunity.”

  “Your brother came by to see me.”

  “I’m sure.”

  “I don’t think he believed me.”

  “It’s pretty much impossible to lie to him.”

  “I know you went to see Susan. She said you tried to kill her. That she finally got away and got to her gun and that you ran.”

  “I’m sure she did. Not exactly how it went down, but that’s Susan for you.”

  “Meaning she’s a lying sack of shit.”

  “That’s sort of what I meant, but I like the way you said it better.”

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t want to do it, Bobby. But they had me cornered. No way out. Ian was going to—” Here, Robinson faltered.

  “I’m not here to judge you, Niles. Given the circumstances, I might’ve done the same thing. But now we have to make this right.”

  “How?”

  “For beginners, you need to tell me who paid you off to do what you did.”

  “I never met anyone. It was all emails and they never deposited any money in my account. They just paid for the medical care in Germany directly. That way no one would be the wiser. We explained away the treatment in Germany as a charity case because the company running the clinical trials needed bodies to try it on.”

  “Okay, but what exactly did they want you to do? Backdoor them into STRATCOM and from there everywhere else?”

  “That might have been their plan. But that’s not what they told me to do. I just had to finger you meeting with the Iranian. They provided the doctored photos.”

  “Okay, Niles, but there had to be some endgame on this.”

  “You ever wonder why they specifically targeted you out of everybody at STRATCOM?”

  “Of course I did.”

  “And did you ever find an answer?”

  “Not a good one, no.”

  “Well, I asked myself that question many times.”

  “And did an answer ever hit you?” asked Puller.

  “About a year ago, when I was at work.”

  “And what was it?”

  “You were being groomed to go all the way to the top, Bobby. General Able was pretty clear on that.”

  “So what?” asked Puller.

  “There were some who might not have liked that.”

  “Who exactly are you talking about?”

  “I tried to make it right, Bobby. I really did. This has been eating me from the inside out for over two damn years.”

  “Give me a name, Niles,” urged Puller.

  The shot hit Niles Robinson right in the base of his neck and severed his medulla. With that core destroyed, so was he. He stood there for an instant, a look of intense surprise on his now bloody face where the round had exited and struck the wall. Then he fell face first into the phone bank and slid to the floor, the wall smeared with his blood, his hand still clutched around the receiver.

  The shooter, dressed as a police officer, was behind the enclosed repair site. He had aimed and fired his suppressed pistol through a slit in the curtain. He holstered his weapon, exited out the other side of the work site, and started yelling at people not to panic but to move away from the site of the shooting. Most people obeyed since he was in uniform.

  Still, hundreds of people were screaming and fleeing in all directions, abandoning their luggage and trying to get away from the murdered man. Police, guns out, rushed toward him. Union Station was instantly transformed into a nightmare scenario.

  Only two people walked calmly out of the station that day.

  One was Robert Puller.

  The other was the person who had just killed Niles Robinson.

  CHAPTER

  42

  AT SEVEN A.M. the next morning Knox and Puller sat at breakfast in the hotel restaurant. Rays of cheery sunlight were coming through the window facing the street. People walked in and out of the restaurant, and cars motored on their way. It seemed improbable that someone had tried to murder them a few hours ago and only a short distance from here, but improbable or not, it had happened.

  She said, “I have to tell you I had trouble going to sleep, at least for the three hours of sack time I had.”

  “Why?”

  “I shot a man, Puller. Maybe that’s routine for you. Not so much for me.”

  “Shooting someone is never routine. At least I hope it never becomes routine.”

  “We’re on the same page there. But we must be making some people nervous. That’s progress.”

  Puller paused with his cup of tea halfway to his lips. “We’ve covered a lot of ground but we have no answers, Knox. That is not progress. Not in my book.”

  “I disagree. We’ve discovered that two people were lying their asses off and got your brother sent to prison wrongly. We figured out–well, you did–that some Croatian snuck a bogey into Fort Leavenworth who was sent there to kill your brother. We’ve accomplished a lot. We really have.”

  “But we really don’t have answers yet. Not for the important questions. Namely, who and why?”

  She fiddled with her spoon. “Obviously your brother is out there right now trying to figure it all out.”

  “You sound like you’ve been giving that some thought.”

  “I’ve been giving it a lot of thought, actually.”

  “And what do you think?”

  “That he’s maybe ahead of us on some things.”

  “Why?”

  “He’s super smart. He was set up. He was in the intelligence field. And he’s trying to prove his innocence. Lots of motivation there.”

  “I’ve started to think that he was the one who saved my butt when those goons snatched me. It’s really the only thing that makes sense.”

  Knox looked at him in surprise. “I hadn’t even considered that. But I guess that would make sense. So you might have been a few feet from him that night?”

  “I might have been, yeah. As it turned out, it might as well have been a few miles. He’s gone, and I’m no closer to finding him.”

  “You were really tight with your brother, weren’t you?”

  “For a long time we were all each other had. Our mother was gone and our dad might as well have been.” He nudged a roasted potato on his plate. “That may be one reason I never took the plunge.”

  “What? Marriage?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Why? Afraid you’d be a crappy father?”

  “Crappy husband too.”

  “I don’t see that, Puller, I really don’t. You’d make a great catch. And a great dad. Teaching your kids right and wrong, how to color in the lines, throw a ball, execute a room breach, fire a sniper rifle, take out four bad guys with a piece of rope and a stick of chewing
gum. All good life lessons.”

  “You ever think of getting hitched?”

  “Actually, I did.”

  Puller hiked his eyebrows. “You mean you thought about it?”

  “No, Puller, I mean I walked down the aisle, exchanged rings, and got married in front of a licensed preacher.”

  “When?”

  “Long time ago. We were both eighteen. High school sweethearts. It lasted all of fourteen days. Big friggin’ shock there, right? I mean, we both knew exactly who we were and what we wanted in life at eighteen, right? Well, turns out we were clueless. So we did a bookend. And got it annulled. So there’s no record of it even happening.”

  “Did a bookend? What does that mean?”

  “That means we were married in Vegas and divorced there, all within the span of two weeks. We returned our rings and signed the necessary papers and went our separate ways. I never even told my parents. They thought I was at a college prep retreat.”

  “Why do I not picture that at all? I mean, you marrying at eighteen in a wedding chapel in Sin City?”

  “I told you I liked to live my life fast. But the fact is I was a straight-as-an-arrow, straight-A student, three varsity letters, did everything right back then. Never walked off the line my parents laid down for me. I won all the awards, got into all the best schools. Then something snapped and I went psycho right after high school graduation. Like I said, it lasted for two weeks. After that I got back on track. I got a top-notch education at Amherst while also servicing my athletic side, earned a master’s, decided to serve my country on the intelligence side, and the rest, as they say, is history.” She gazed over at him. “You ever do anything like that?”

  “No.”

  She looked disappointed. “Always by the book, then?”

  “I was an Army brat with an officer for a father. The book was all we ever knew. The Army way or nothing.” He said this last part with particular sternness.

  “Okay,” she said, taken aback by his tone. “I’ll just call you ‘by-the-book Puller’ from now on.”

  “Okay, but what do people call you?” he said, his tone suddenly harsh.

  They stared at each other for a long, uncomfortable moment. “What exactly do you mean by that?” she asked.

  “It’s just a question.”

  “They call me Veronica Knox. Okay, now let me ask you one. What changed from a few hours ago to now? Because three hours ago things seemed pretty good between us. I shot somebody who was trying to do us harm. But you’re being so cold and distant now I feel like I’m in Alaska instead of North Carolina.”

  “You’re just being a little sensitive, I think.”

  “No, I’m just someone who wants the truth, Puller. You up to providing it?”

  “I’ve never lied to you, Knox. And I never will.”

  “I know, you kept pointing out my deficiencies on that score and you were probably right to do so. But I thought by now I had proved to you that I’m on the up-and-up. So, again, what’s changed?”

  “I like how you put things. You should think about writing a novel. Or a blog.”

  “And you should think about stopping the bullshit and telling me what’s going on.”

  Puller started to say something, maybe more than he should. An internal struggle ended with him standing up, checking his watch, and saying, “It’s time for our meeting with Todd Landry.”

  She sat there as he walked out of the restaurant. Knox muttered, “Women are supposed to be complicated, not guys!” Then she grabbed her jacket and followed him.

  CHAPTER

  43

  THEY HAD MADE an eight o’clock appointment to meet with Todd Landry, Robert Puller’s former defense counsel. He was at his downtown office in Charlotte, only a short walk from the Ritz.

  A secretary led them back to a small conference room in the rear of the office space. As they walked along, Puller took in the blond wood and tasteful artwork and felt his feet sink into the thick carpet. He noted the elaborate layout of cubicles where people looked as busy as bees in a honeycomb as they toiled away on whatever legal conundrum they were confronting.

  Landry greeted them at the door of the conference room. He was about five-eight, thin, with a ring of grayish hair encircling the crown of his head. He wore a dark double-breasted suit and a paisley tie fronting a light blue patterned shirt. Puller also noted the gold monogrammed links on the French cuffs.

  A man careful about his appearance.

  Landry had retained his military bearing in the ramrod-straight posture, firm handshake, and take-charge demeanor.

  “Have a seat. I’m sure you want to get down to it. Coffee, water?”

  “No, thanks,” said Puller, and Knox shook her head.

  They all sat as Landry unbuttoned his suit coat and waited.

  “I suppose you know why we’re here,” began Puller.

  “Robert Puller. Can’t believe he got out of DB. I thought he was innocent, you know. Can’t say that about most of my clients. I guess I was wrong about him.”

  “Maybe you weren’t,” said Puller. “We’ve uncovered enough to make us concerned that an innocent man was indeed sent to prison.”

  “Then why escape?”

  “We really can’t get into that, but we can tell you that there are extenuating circumstances.”

  “Okay, I know I’m not in the military anymore and my need-to-know is pretty nonexistent, but you had some questions nonetheless?”

  “We’ve met with Doug Fletcher already,” said Knox.

  Landry nodded. “Good guy, good lawyer. He’s teaching at JAG now in Charlottesville.”

  “Right. And you spoke with Shireen Kirk?” said Puller.

  Landry smiled. “I hated going up against her. She kicked my ass more times than I care to admit. I hope she never moves to Charlotte and goes into private practice.”

  “We appreciated your being so frank with her.”

  Landry nodded in understanding. “Look, it was a strange case all around. None of it made sense. I know the evidence showed online gambling as the motive, and he had the means and opportunity, but I never bought that. That all can be fabricated quite easily. If Robert hadn’t been so egotistical about someone hacking his computer the verdict might have been different. Maybe not, but at least we would have had a fighting chance.”

  “We understand there was a letter from Robert’s father,” said Knox, drawing a quick glance from Puller.

  Landry eyed Puller. “From your father too. I know who you are.”

  “Yes.”

  “Your brother said you were the best investigator the DoD had. Really proud of you.”