“I know,” the first lady comforted. “I know. But it’s going to be all right. Everything’s going to be all right.”
It would indeed, in a way only a handful of people in the entire country understood, because they alone were willing to do whatever it took to save the United States of America. To set it on the right track once and for all, with her husband steering the ship he no longer grasped he was riding. She had to hold it together just a bit longer, hold him together just a bit longer.
That’s all it would take. Just a few days left to go now.
And the countdown was on.
CHAPTER
25
BETHESDA, MARYLAND
How can I help you, Agent?” the Secret Service liaison asked Kendra Rendine, after closing the door to her office in the south wing of Building 1, along the same hall as the office of Walter Reed’s inspector general.
“The vice president’s death requires some routine follow-up, given the proximity of her passing to the procedure recently performed here.”
The woman, a hospital administrator named Sheila Wigg, nodded, her expression genuinely mournful. “Such a tragic loss for the country, for this hospital, for everyone. She was a wonderful woman.”
Rendine could only nod. Prior to coming to the Walter Reed offices, she’d made a quick stop at the hospital to pick up the autopsy records on Vice President Stephanie Davenport. She cursorily checked the report’s contents—sad, dry, and virtually all boilerplate—before briefly studying photographs of the three stents that had been removed during the procedure. They’d been thoroughly cleaned and Rendine had no real idea of what she looking at.
“As you may recall, we met the day of her procedure. She didn’t know my name, of course. But she promised to remember it the next time she came by to visit the troops.”
“And she would have,” Rendine said, because it was the truth, something else that she had admired in the woman she had no doubt had been murdered.
Located in Bethesda, Maryland, the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center was a military medical facility serving the region’s army, navy, and air force personnel. It was also commonly referred to as the Bethesda Naval Hospital and had previously been called the National Naval Medical Center. Walter Reed provided care for service members and their families as well as the president, vice president, members of Congress, justices of the Supreme Court, and, on occasion, foreign military and embassy personnel. The massive facility was staffed by more than 8,500 personnel from all three services and was situated on 243 acres, which included the National Intrepid Center of Excellence, built to support the care and rehabilitation of the wounded warriors whom Stephanie Davenport had visited every single week she’d been in office.
“How can I help with this follow-up?” Sheila Wigg asked.
“I need to interview the medical personnel and staff members who participated in the procedure. Just routine, but I need to go over the details and talk with them in order to rule out any connection with her death.”
Given Rendine’s suggestion, Administrator Wigg could have gotten defensive, but she showed no signs of being anything but cooperative. “I understand. You’ve reviewed all the camera footage, I assume.”
Rendine nodded. “Multiple times. Nothing struck me, nor the outside medical personnel the Secret Service consults with on such matters, as anything but routine and professional. In fact, they were extremely complimentary.”
Wigg looked pleased by that. “I’ll pass the news along. Do you have the names in question?” she asked, positioning herself closer to her computer. “I could look it up, but if you have them handy, it would save some time.”
Rendine produced the list and handed it across the desk to Wigg, who regarded it, after donning her reading glasses. “Seven personnel on the roster, when the norm for this procedure is four.”
“As you’ll recall, we had a surgeon present just in case something went wrong. His chosen OR nurse as well, along with anesthesiologist, in addition to the tech.”
Wigg laid the list of names down in easy view. “Let’s go alphabetically, if you don’t mind.”
“Whatever’s easiest for you. And I’ll need all the contact information you have on file for them.”
“Of course,” Wigg said, working the first name on the list—one of the techs, Rendine recalled. “Hmm…”
“What?”
“That’s odd. I don’t seem to be able to find that name. Are you certain it’s spelled right?”
“I pulled it from the detailed background check we did on all the names your office furnished us.”
Wigg frowned, not seeming to like the prospects of that at all. “Let me try again.”
As she did, Rendine was able to tell from her expression that this search, too, had come up blank.
“It could be a glitch in the system,” Wigg offered, as an explanation.
“Try another name.”
“The operating room nurse is next alphabetically.”
“That’s fine.”
“Oh,” Wigg uttered, when the results came up on her screen.
Rendine waited for her to continue.
“She was transferred to the Center for the Intrepid on the grounds of Brooke Army Medical Center, outside San Antonio.”
“When?”
Wigg squinted slightly, even though she was wearing reading glasses. “Five days after the vice president’s procedure. I don’t have a forwarding address, but I do have a phone number,” Wigg said, jotting it down.
“Is that unusual?” Rendine asked her.
“The transfer? Not necessarily. Normally, such things are requested, though it’s possible the transfer was mandated by a staffing shortage at that facility. I can look into it further, if you like.”
“I would, but not now. Let’s continue down the list.”
“Next name, then,” Wigg said, going back to the keyboard.
She looked up moments later, staring at Rendine across the desk, her expression speaking even before she did.
“I don’t know what to make of this, Agent,” was all she could say. “Two of these names aren’t even in our system anymore, a nurse and another of the techs.”
“How can that be?”
“A glitch, temporary or otherwise, would be the most likely explanation. The system may have misidentified them somehow and performed a purge.”
“A nurse and a tech who both just happened to be part of the surgical team involved with Vice President Davenport’s procedure?” Rendine asked, not bothering to disguise the skepticism in her voice.
“I know it sounds odd.” Wigg regarded her screen again, working the keyboard. “But I can print out the contact info for the other four people who were in the room that day—five if you include the technician, who wasn’t actually part of the team.”
“I don’t recall an eighth person in the room.”
“She wouldn’t have been there very long, necessarily, and it was a she, which probably explains why. Her role was to make sure all instruments were properly sterilized and to be entrusted with custody of, in the vice president’s case, the stents that were to be implanted during the procedure.”
“Custody?” Rendine posed.
“She would be responsible for filling the surgeon’s order, confirming all the requisition codes were correct, and to double-check the condition of the stents prior to passing them on to the cardiologist performing the procedure.”
“What about him, the cardiologist?”
Wigg nodded. “Dr. Safron, one of the best anywhere. Let me check.”
Her fingers danced across the keyboard, stopped, and then danced some more.
“Hmm…”
Again, Rendine thought.
“Apparently,” Wigg picked up, “Dr. Safron is on leave.”
“Effective when?”
“The beginning of the week that followed the vice president’s procedure.”
“Any way to tell if the leave was planned prior to that?”
“No, I’m afraid not. I can give you both the doctor’s home and cell numbers, though. After all, you are the Secret Service, and this does pertain to the death of a sitting vice president.”
“Right on both counts. And this operating room tech?”
Wigg clicked back to the previous screen. “Patricia Trahan.”
“Where can I find her?”
“The second floor of Arrowhead Building, that’s building number nine, where the cardiology department is housed.”
“Might she be there now?”
“If she’s on duty. Want me to check?”
“Don’t bother.” Rendine did some math in her head. “So, of the other six people in that operating room, Dr. Safron is on leave, a nurse was transferred to San Antonio, and two technicians have somehow been purged from the system, which leaves the anesthesiologist and cardio surgeon present in case of emergency.”
“I was going to check those.”
Rendine watched Administrator Wigg do just that, and then repeat the process from the beginning. “Hmm,” she uttered again. “Good news and bad news.”
“What’s the bad news?”
“The anesthesiologist, Dr. Invantino, has left the hospital. But the good news is that the surgeon, Dr. Callasanti, is operating today, starting at eleven o’clock.” She checked the time on her cell phone. “If you hurry, Agent, you might be able to catch him.”
CHAPTER
26
BETHESDA, MARYLAND
Rendine went straight to the Arrowhead Building, where the hospital’s cardiology wing was housed. She sped through the security stations, thanks to her Secret Service ID. She was told that Dr. Matthew Callasanti was in the surgical prep room, trading his civilian clothes for scrubs, and she was waiting for him when a man emerged through the door.
“Dr. Callasanti?” she asked the large figure with hands like meat hooks, hardly looking like those of such an eminent surgeon.
“That would be me,” a voice said from the doorway, belonging to a smaller, mustached man who’d just emerged through the same door. “That’s Vincent from Facilities Management.”
Vincent had already taken his leave, disappearing into a nearby supply closet.
Rendine flashed her ID for Callasanti. “Do you have a few minutes, Doctor?”
He regarded her badge with something between annoyance and disdain. “Not really.”
“I’m doing some routine follow-up on the death of Vice President Stephanie Davenport.”
Callasanti scratched at the thick head of hair tucked awkwardly inside his surgical cap. “If it’s routine,” he said briskly, “it can wait.”
“Not really, because one of the things I’m specifically looking into is any potential connection between the vice president’s death and the angioplasty procedure performed on her approximately five weeks prior.”
“Then let me save you the trouble: there isn’t one. No connection.”
“How can you be sure?”
Callasanti walked off briskly, the same way he did everything, Rendine imagined, and she sped up her pace to match his.
“I watched everything from the observation room, Agent Rendine,” he said, even though he’d barely regarded her ID case, “which provides a much better view than floor level to observe something going wrong.”
“And did anything go wrong, Doctor?”
“No, not a thing. It was textbook from beginning to end. I might as well have been out playing golf.”
“Nothing stands out?”
“The procedure was being done on the vice president of the United States, Agent. Everything stood out, but nothing awry.” Callasanti cocked his head back, as if to look at Rendine at a different angle. “I thought you looked familiar. You worked Vice President Davenport’s detail. You were in the operating room, right?”
Rendine nodded, instead of elaborating.
“Stephanie Davenport was a wonderful woman,” the doctor said. “I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone from either party or political persuasion who didn’t like her.”
There must have been someone, Rendine almost told him.
* * *
The sprawling Walter Reed campus maintained a Secret Service hub in a converted break room to serve as a de facto command post when foreign or domestic dignitaries were being treated or hospitalized for an extended stay. The post was seldom occupied, and this was the case when Rendine accessed it with her key card and took a seat at one of the desks. There were phones, computers, and security monitors everywhere; even Rendine was unable to explain the redundancy.
This was as good a place as any to work and plan her next moves in the wake of her meeting with Hospital Administrator Wigg, which had proven both confounding and unsettling, adding to her unease.
The anesthesiologist, Dr. Invantino, had moved on from Walter Reed, and the cardiologist, Dr. Safron, who’d performed the actual procedure, had gone an extended leave shortly after performing the vice president’s procedure. From her seat, Rendine tried them both, at home and on their cells, and got no response on either. That left four more hospital personnel who’d been present in the operating room during Stephanie Davenport’s procedure. The operating room nurse had been transferred to the Center for the Intrepid in San Antonio, and the two surgical techs present had somehow been purged from the hospital’s computer system. That left Patricia Trahan, the operating room tech responsible for the surgical instruments and stents themselves, who Rendine had learned wasn’t on duty today.
When calls to the operating room nurse’s cell phone failed to go through for some reason, Rendine phoned the Center for the Intrepid, where the nurse had been transferred, to see if she could be put through directly.
“What did you same the name was again?”
Rendine provided it.
“Could you spell that, please?”
Rendine did.
“I’m sorry, we have no one by that name employed here at present. Is there someone else you’d like me to check for you?”
She absently declined the offer and tried the cell phone numbers of the two surgical techs next, only to find both numbers had been disconnected. Rendine pressed out each of the numbers again for good measure, with the same result. She was starting to see confirmation of what had begun to dawn on her, what she’d started to fear, up in Administrator Wigg’s office. She made a mental note to check the precise dates on which those numbers had been disconnected, wondering whether it might have been on the same day.
That left Patricia Trahan, the operating room technician, who fortunately answered her phone on the first ring.
“I’m looking for Patricia Trahan,” Rendine said.
“Well, you found her. Unless you want to sell me something, in which case I’m not buying unless it’s free.”
“I’m not selling anything, Ms. Trahan, don’t worry. This is Special Agent Kendra Rendine, head of Vice President Stephanie Davenport’s security detail,” she said by way of introduction, wondering if saying former head might have been more appropriate under the circumstances.
“What a terrible thing. Such a wonderful woman.”
“She was a pleasure to work with, Ms. Trahan, and all of us miss her terribly.”
“So what can I do for you?”
“You were a member of the surgical team during the vice president’s procedure at Walter Reed last month, is that correct?”
A pause followed, long enough to make Rendine wonder if the call had been dropped. She was preparing to hit Redial when the woman’s voice returned.
“Is this about the report I filed?” Trahan asked her.
Rendine felt something scratch at her spine. “What report?”
“We’re supposed to take note of such things. I didn’t think much about it really, but when I heard about the vice president’s death…”
The woman’s voice tailed off. Rendine was unsure what she might have been about to say next. “You filed the report after you heard the news?”
“No, in the aftermath of the procedure itself. That would’ve been over a month ago now.”
“What was in this report?”
“Can I call you back?” Trahan asked her, instead of responding. “There’s someone at the door.”
Rendine felt that same scratch up her spine again. “Don’t answer it!”
“What?”
“And don’t answer the phone, either. Is your address still the same? I have one in Gaithersburg.”
“Yes, I’m still there.”
“I’m on my way, Ms. Trahan,” Rendine said, bouncing up out of her chair. “Don’t do anything; don’t talk to anyone else until I get there.”
“They’re ringing the buzzer again. Can’t I—”
“No! I want you to sit down where you can’t be seen from outside and wait for me.”
“You’re scaring me, Agent.”
Rendine was already on her feet and heading for the door.
“I know the feeling, Ms. Trahan. I’m on my way.”
CHAPTER
27
GEORGETOWN
MAC” lit up in Brixton’s caller ID a mere two hours after he’d handed over the garment bag containing the coat he hoped bore the fingerprints of his attacker from the night before.
“That was fast,” he greeted.
“We need to meet, Mr. Brixton.”
Not Mac’s voice.
“Who is this?”
“That doesn’t matter.”
“Where’s Mackensie Smith? What are you doing with his phone?”
“I didn’t take his phone, just borrowed his number to make sure you’d answer.”
Brixton didn’t bother considering the ramifications of that, technical and otherwise. “And now that I have?”
“We need to meet. Do you know Georgetown Waterfront Park?”
“Sure.”
“I’ll be sitting on a bench beneath the pergola directly before the riverfront steps.”
“How will I know you?” Brixton asked.
“You won’t,” the man said, leaving it there.
“Then maybe we need to do this a different way.”
Murder on the Metro Page 12
