by Stephen Frey
“I can’t go any farther.”
Jesse saw the blood covering his shirt and fingers. He wasn’t going to make it much further. She looked around quickly. Down the grove she spotted a particularly full tree. Its branches were so thick the tree’s trunk was completely obscured. “Come on. We don’t have to go far. Just a few feet.”
He moaned as she helped him to his feet once more and led him through the tall weeds to the tree. She looked up and down the grove quickly, saw no one, and pulled several of the low hanging branches aside. “Get in there,” she ordered.
Todd stumbled through the branches and fell onto the bare ground beneath the tree. Jesse darted in behind him, and from inside the canopy pulled the thick branches together again to hide any sign of their presence. Then she helped him crawl to the trunk, where they sat, backs against the tree, listening for any sound, trying not to breathe heavily and give away their presence.
For several minutes there was only silence, except for the gentle rustle of leaves as an early-afternoon breeze drifted through the huge orchard. Then someone sprinted past the tree, footsteps pounding heavily on soft earth. Jesse followed the sounds as they passed, trying desperately to see who it was, but she could discern nothing except the flash of a shirt through the leaves. And the sound of the footsteps faded until she and Todd were left with nothing but the rustling of leaves again.
She turned toward Todd. He sat with his head back against the trunk, perspiration pouring down his face. Every few seconds his face would contort as the pain from the wound tore through his body.
“We’ve got to get you to a hospital,” she whispered.
He let his chin fall to his chest. “I don’t know if I can even get up, much less make it back to the car.”
“You can’t stay here.”
“The people at the store must have seen what happened. They will have called the police. That guy can’t—”
Suddenly she thrust a hand over his mouth and put a finger to her lips. He nodded slowly and she pulled her hand away.
For a moment Jesse saw nothing, and then, through the leaves, she caught quick glimpses of someone moving slowly around the perimeter of the branches. A piece of a white shirt through one tiny aperture, a boot through another opening in the leaves close to the ground. Jesse held her breath as the figure moved. It was death and she knew it. And then she lost sight of the figure. There was no longer any movement or sound. But still she held her breath, unable to believe they had escaped a second brush with the assassin.
Thirty seconds passed before she finally let out a long breath. Instantly the branches parted and Gordon Roth’s face, arms, then chest appeared between the leaves. Instinctively Jesse backed up against the trunk. She tried to look away but couldn’t. Her eyes were drawn to his hideous smile and for what seemed like forever they stared at each other. Then slowly he raised the gun, aimed and pulled the trigger. As he fired she turned away, closed her eyes and threw her hands before her face, expecting to feel excruciating pain.
Jesse heard the gun explode but felt nothing. The bullet had missed her, slamming into the tree trunk directly above her head, shattering the wood and showering her with splinters. Jesse opened her eyes. Amazingly, Roth was no longer before her, no longer peering at her through the branches. He was gone. Then she heard a frantic physical struggle going on just beyond the branches, and then several gunshots in rapid succession. The bullets zipped angrily through the leaves around them, and she flattened herself against the bare earth.
But this was stupid. They couldn’t stay here. Jesse grabbed Todd, helped him to his feet, and pulled him through the thick branches on the opposite side of the tree from where Roth had appeared. She and Todd crashed through the foliage together, headfirst, and fell heavily to the ground, but they were up again instantly, running wildly after two more pops of the gun. They ran past tree after tree, uncertain which way they had come or which way they were going, trying only to put distance between themselves and the assassin.
Suddenly they were at the stone fence again, hurtling it, and then they were sprinting across the gravel toward the rental car. Jesse threw herself into the driver’s seat, jammed the key into the ignition and revved the motor as Todd fell onto the passenger seat. But he could not close the door, so weak was his right side, and she had to reach across the seat and slam the door shut for him.
At that moment Gordon Roth leaped the stone fence and ran for the rental car.
“Jesus, there he is!” Todd pointed with his left hand, barely able to gasp the warning. “I don’t see a gun, though.”
Jesse punched the accelerator, and the rental car skidded across the gravel toward the main road. As tires met blacktop, Roth closed the distance to the car and lunged for Jesse’s open window. He grabbed the door with one hand and a fistful of her hair with the other. His weight pulling at her hair slammed her cheek down against the doorframe and pain shot through her face, but she managed to keep her foot on the accelerator. The rental swerved out of control back toward the parking lot, scraping several large stones placed next to the road as barriers. Finally Roth fell away as the rocks tore gaping holes in his clothes and flesh.
“Dammit!” Todd yelled.
“What?” she screamed, jerking the steering wheel to the right to avoid a car bearing down on them. Todd had turned around and was looking into the backseat. “What is it?”
Todd turned back so he was facing forward. He shook his head, then suddenly grabbed his chest and doubled over. “Nothing, Jess. Just get me to a hospital,” he groaned. “I think I’m gonna—”
But he didn’t finish. The loss of blood and the intense pain finally overwhelmed him, and he slipped into unconsciousness and slumped against the door.
Chapter 34
Jesse sat next to the bed, head forward, holding Todd’s limp hand against her cheek, caressing his fingers. The assassin’s bullet had grazed the right lung, causing significant internal bleeding, and the emergency room doctors had decided to operate immediately.
“Jesse!”
Jesse swung around in the chair. David Mitchell stood in the doorway. Instantly she was on her feet. “I swear to God, David, I’ll scream. There’ll be fifty doctors and nurses in here in two seconds.”
“I’m not going to hurt you.” He raised his arms above his head in a non-threatening posture and remained at the door. “I promise.”
“How did you find me?”
“Simple. Greater Baltimore Medical Center is the closest hospital to the Worthington Valley. I knew you’d bring Todd here. I’m from Baltimore, remember? I checked the emergency room register when I got here, and, sure enough, Todd Colton’s name was on it.” David glanced at Todd. “I saw him get shot. How is he?”
“He’s going into surgery in a few minutes.” Her eyes narrowed. “David, you played me for such a fool. And it’s my own fault. I let you. I believed somehow that you couldn’t do all this to me. That down deep you cared. That you weren’t responsible. I let my emotions get in the way, and because of that, I walked right into that trap out in the Worthington Valley.” She shook her head. “Is this another trap, David? Is that trigger-happy friend of yours standing outside? Is he going to appear behind you in the doorway in a second, take aim and finish Todd and me once and for all?”
“No,” David said quietly. “Jesse, I’ve got a lot to tell you and not much time to do it in.”
“What do you mean by that?” She touched her cheek and winced. It was swollen and sore from when Roth had grabbed her hair and pulled her face down against the car door.
“It won’t be long before that guy who shot Todd gets here.”
“Oh, right, you’ll be giving him a call, I suppose. You two probably split up to check all the hospitals in the area more efficiently. Let me help you. There are pay phones just down the hall.” She sat back down in the chair.
“Jesse, listen to me!” David took a step toward her, then stopped as he saw her recoil. He gritted his teeth in frustration
. “All gunshot wounds received by emergency rooms have to be reported immediately to the police.” His voice was low and even. “They’ll be here soon.” This was it. She had to listen to him now or it would be all over. “Jesse, I had my initiation.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’m officially a member of the club now. The other night, Webb, Mohler and another man named Jack Finnerty confirmed everything for me. About how Webb feeds information to Sagamore. About how Coleman is the heir apparent to Webb in the Senate and how they’ve been influencing that election. They told me everything.” David paused. “And they gave me two million dollars.” He shook his head. The after-tax amount was already in his account.
“I knew you could be bought.” She continued caressing Todd’s fingers. “That’s why you’ve helped them track me down, and why you haven’t gone to the authorities yet. Because they made you rich. And that’s the most important thing in the world to you.”
“You’re wrong, Jesse. Look, I could go to jail for stealing a significant amount of money from Doub Steel. I didn’t do it. It was a setup. But I’d have a hard time proving that.”
“Sure you didn’t do it.”
“I’m not kidding!” David yelled.
“Why are you telling me all this?”
“Because I need you to understand how difficult a position I’m in. Because I need your help.”
Jesse gently placed Todd’s limp hand down on the bed and turned in her chair toward David. “You’re incredible, David Mitchell.” She could barely speak. “To save yourself, you gave them information about me that is terribly personal. Something I’ve kept inside of me since I was seventeen. Something that is going to tear my mother and me apart when she hears about it. And now you want my help.” Jesse clenched her hands together to keep them from shaking.
“I have all the information about the abortion, Jesse.”
Her eyes flashed to his.
“Everything. I have the file from Rebecca Saunders’s office and the information from Edgewood General. It’s in my car. It’s safe. That’s why I called you this morning. To tell you I had it all. Mohler left it in his desk. That’s why I wanted you to meet me out at the store. To give it to you. No one is ever going to find out about the attack or the abortion.”
Jesse’s mouth fell slowly open. “But the assassin.”
David shook his head. “I don’t know how they found you. I didn’t—”
“They found me because you told them where I was.” She cut him off abruptly.
“You’re wrong, Jesse. I wasn’t working with them. I never have been. I’ve made them believe that to help you. I’ve never put you in danger. I’ve put myself in danger to save you. Why do you think the guy missed when you and Todd were under that tree? Christ, I almost got myself killed trying to take that gun away from him.”
“That was you?” She stood up again.
“Who the hell did you think it was?”
“But what happened?”
“I saw him lean into that tree and I knew he was going after you. So I slammed into him and we struggled. We both had our hands on the gun, but I had mine on the trigger. I kept pulling it to unload the clip. When it was empty, I got away from him and started running.”
“That’s why he didn’t have his gun when I was in the car getting Todd out of there.”
David nodded.
“But you led them to Becky Saunders and to Edgewood General.” Her voice was suddenly harsh again.
“No. I got the information from Becky’s office. But that was to protect you. I’ll admit, I wanted to know why you were seeking professional help. But I didn’t get it to use against you.”
“Then why did you get the information from the hospital?”
“That wasn’t me, Jesse.”
“It was me,” Todd gasped.
Jesse turned back toward Todd, horrified.
“I’m so sorry, Jess.” It was difficult for Todd to speak.
“Todd? No!”
“I owed some bad people a lot of money,” he whispered. “Money I couldn’t come up with. They took care of the situation for me. They were willing to protect me from the people I owed the money to. But if I didn’t cooperate they were going to turn me over to them.” Todd attempted to sit up but couldn’t. “They told me they just wanted information in return for their protection. Information they could use against you. And all the stuff you’d compiled. So I gave them what they wanted. I was desperate. And no one was supposed to get hurt.” He closed his eyes tightly. “Then that guy started shooting out at the store. Shooting at me. They lied to me.” He shook his head.
“I can’t believe it. How did you get everything?”
“I bribed a nurse at the hospital.” His voice became almost inaudible. “I took all the stuff from the bag in the closet at your mother’s house too. I knew it was there because I followed you to your mother’s after we broke into LFA. After I left you in the parking lot at your apartment.”
“So you have all the information that was in the closet.” Jesse was incredulous.
“I did,” Todd admitted. “It was in the bag in the back of your rental when we got to the country store. But someone took it as we were getting out of there. I guess the guy who shot at us at the store got it somehow.”
“You attacked my mother?” Jesse’s voice began to shake.
“I didn’t attack her, I—”
“You could have frightened her to death, literally. And you did all this to me? After all we’ve been through? As long as we’ve known each other?” She was so angry she could barely get the words out. “And I risked my life for you.” She reached toward Todd.
But David was on her instantly, wrestling her away from the bed.
“Let me go,” she screamed.
“No! Forget him. You’ve got to get out of here. I’m telling you. You’ve got to call the police. You need their protection.”
“Why? It doesn’t matter. I don’t have anything left that will prove what they’ve done. The cops will laugh at me.”
David pulled Jesse to the door. “Look down.”
She glanced at him, puzzled, then followed his finger, which was pointing down at the floor. At her feet lay the bag she had seen Todd throw into the back of the rental at the Towson Motor Inn—the bag she now realized contained the information she had hidden at her mother’s house. “But how?”
“I snagged it from your car when you and Todd ran for the woods. Elizabeth told me Todd had informed them he was going to get it last night. I didn’t figure Todd would let it out of his sight, but I took a quick look in the back of the car anyway as you all were running for the woods. Sure enough, it was there.”
Jesse threw her arms around David’s shoulders and hugged him tightly. “I was so wrong about you, David. Can you forgive me?”
“With the right kind of convincing,” he said slyly, wrapping his arms around her.
“Excuse me.” A doctor stood in the hallway. “We need to get Mr. Colton to surgery right now.”
“Sorry, doctor.” Jesse pulled David out of the doorway so the medical team could pass. “What do we do now?”
“Go to the authorities.”
Jesse shook her head. “What are we going to say? That Carter Webb, one of the most respected and influential men in this country, is at the center of a multi-million-dollar insider trading and fraud scandal? The police and the FBI would just laugh at us.”
David pointed at the bag on the floor. “But we have the information you put together.”
“It will take time for the authorities to confirm all of that. Days, maybe even weeks. In the meantime, we could be killed.”
“They’ll give us protection.”
Jesse rolled her eyes. “You think Webb couldn’t still get to us? Would you really feel safe?”
David’s expression became grim. “I guess not. We really can’t trust anyone, can we?”
Suddenly Jesse snapped her fingers. “I know who to go to!
”
“Who?”
“Come on!” she yelled as she headed down the long corridor.
David picked up the bag full of information and ran after her. He caught up with Jesse at the door to the outside. “Where are we going?”
“Washington.”
“Let’s take my car,” he yelled, as they jogged into the parking lot.
“Fine.”
“It’s over there.” He pointed at the black BMW.
As they reached the car, David slowed down. “Damnit.”
“What’s wrong?”
“The trunk’s been popped.” He walked to the back of the BMW and pulled the trunk up. “The information from Becky’s office and Edgewood General is gone,” he said dejectedly, looking inside.
“What!” Jesse was instantly suspicious again. “Don’t do this to me, David,” she pleaded, glancing around the lot for signs of trouble.
“Stop it, Jesse.” He knew what she was thinking. “Didn’t you hear what Todd said back there?” David jerked his thumb over his shoulder at the hospital. “He took the information from Edgewood and stole the information on Webb and the rest of them from your mother’s house. You’ve got to trust me once and for all.” David ran his finger over a stain on the car. “Blood,” he murmured to himself.
“What?” She was nervous as hell.
“You said something about the assassin not having his gun when you were getting away from the farm store. What did you mean?”
“When I was driving away, the guy ran out of the orchard and tried to stop me. He actually reached inside the car and grabbed my hair. I gunned the car and he fell away. Fortunately, he didn’t have his gun.”
David nodded. “He must have gotten hurt. That’s what this blood is.” David pointed at the trunk. “I guess he went through my car after you got away.”
“Then why didn’t he get the other information?” she asked warily. “What’s in the bag you’re carrying on your shouler?”
“Because when I took it out of the back of your rental car I didn’t have time to get to my car and keep track of you. Things were happening pretty fast if you’ll remember.” He was irritated. She was still questioning him. “So I threw it over the fence into the field and came back for it when I was certain Roth was gone.”
