Riptide

by Catherine Coulter

  “I’d like that,” she said. Then she smiled over at Adam, but she didn’t say anything.

  21

  Detective Letitia Gordon and Detective Hector Morales of the NYPD looked over at the woman who lay in that skinny hospital bed, looking pale and wrung-out, IV lines running obscenely into her arms, her eyes shiny with tears.

  Detective Gordon cleared her throat and said to the room at large, “Excuse me,” and flashed her badge, as did Hector Morales, “but we need to speak to Ms. Matlock. The doctor said it was all right. Everyone out.”

  Thomas straightened and looked at them, assessing them, quickly, easily, and smiled even as he walked forward, blocking their view of his daughter. “I’m her father, Thomas Matlock, detectives. Now, what can I do for you?”

  “We need to speak to her now, Mr. Matlock,” Letitia Gordon said, “before the Feds get here and try to big-foot us.”

  “I am the Feds, Detective Gordon,” Thomas said.

  “Damn. Er, a pleasure to meet you, sir.” Detective Gordon cleared her throat. “It’s important, sir. There was a murder committed here in New York, on our turf. It’s our case, not yours, and your daughter is involved.” Why had she said all that? Because he was a big federal cheese, and that’s why she’d tried to excuse herself, tried to justify herself. What was he going to do?

  Detective Morales smiled and shook Thomas’s outstretched hand. “Hector Morales, Mr. Matlock. And this is Detective Gordon. We didn’t realize she had any relatives other than her mother.”

  “Yes, she does, detectives,” Thomas said. “There’s still some drug in her system, so she’s not really completely back yet, but if you would like to speak to her for a couple of minutes, that probably wouldn’t hurt. But you need to keep it low-key. I don’t want her upset.”

  “Look, sir,” Detective Gordon said, pumping herself up, knowing that she should be the one giving the orders here, not this man, this stranger who was with the government. “Ms. Matlock ran away. Everyone was looking for her. She is wanted as a material witness in the shooting of Governor Bledsoe of New York.”

  Thomas Matlock merely arched a very patrician brow at her and looked intimidatingly forbearing. “Fancy that,” he said mildly. “I can’t imagine why she would ever want to leave New York what with all the protection you offered her.”

  “Now see here, sir,” Detective Gordon said, and tried to shake off Hector Morales’s hand on her arm, but he didn’t let go, and she looked yet again into that man’s face, and she shut up. There were words bubbling inside her, but she wasn’t about to say them. He was a Big Feeb, and she saw the power in his eyes, something that flashed red warning lights to her brain, an ineffable something that shouted power, more power than she could imagine, and so she kept her mouth shut.

  “There is a lot we do not understand, Mr. Matlock,” Detective Morales said, his voice stiff, with a slight accent. “May we please speak to your daughter? Ask her a few questions? She does look very ill. We won’t take long.”

  The thing of it was, Letitia Gordon thought as she walked to the bed where the young woman lay staring at her with dread, her dyed hair tangled and dirty about her face, she wanted to stand very straight in front of that man, perhaps salute and then do exactly what he told her to do. And here was Hector, acting so deferential, like this guy was the president or, more important, the police commissioner. Whatever he was, this man wore power like a second skin.

  “Ms. Matlock, in case you don’t remember, I’m Detective Gordon and this is Detective Morales.”

  “I remember both of you very clearly,” Becca said, and concentrated on clearing the sheen of tears out of her eyes. These people couldn’t hurt her now, Adam and her father wouldn’t let them. And she wouldn’t, either. She’d been through enough now that a couple of hard-assed cops couldn’t intimidate her.

  “Good,” Detective Gordon said, then she caught herself looking over at Mr. Matlock, as if for approval of her approach. She cleared her throat. “Your father said we could ask you a couple of questions.”

  “All right.”

  “Why did you run, Ms. Matlock?”

  “After my mother died and I’d buried her, there was no reason for me to stay. He found me at the hotel where I was hiding, and I knew he would get me. None of you believed me, and so I didn’t think I had a choice. I ran.”

  “Look, Ms. Matlock,” Detective Gordon said, coming closer, “we still aren’t certain there was a man after you, calling you, threatening you.”

  Adam said mildly, knowing until he and Thomas had discussed it, Krimakov’s probable identity would remain under wraps to the NYPD, “Then who do you think kicked her out of a moving car at One Police Plaza? A damned ghost?”

  “Maybe it was her accomplice,” Detective Gordon said, whirling on Adam, “you know, the guy who shot Governor Bledsoe.”

  Becca didn’t say anything. Thomas saw she was pulling away, even though she hadn’t moved a finger, trying to draw into herself. She looked unutterably tired.

  “Also,” Detective Gordon added, not looking at Mr. Matlock, “our psychiatrist reported that he believed you have big problems, Ms. Matlock, lots of unresolved issues.”

  Adam raised an eyebrow. “Unresolved issues? I love shrink talk, Detective. Do tell us what that means.”

  “He believes that she was obsessed with Governor Bledsoe, that she had to have his attention, and that was why she made up these stories about this guy calling her and stalking her, threatening to kill the governor if she didn’t stop sleeping with him.”

  Adam laughed. He actually laughed. “Jesus,” he said. “That’s amazing.”

  “I’m sure that old woman who was blown up in front of the Metropolitan Museum didn’t think it was funny,” Detective Gordon said, her jaw out, not ready to give an inch.

  “Let me get this straight,” Adam said mildly. “You now think she blew up that old woman to get the governor’s attention?”

  “I told you the truth,” Becca said, cutting in before Letitia Gordon could blast Adam. “I told you that he phoned me and told me to look out my window, which happens to face the park and the museum. He killed that poor old woman, and you didn’t do anything about it.”

  “Of course we did,” Detective Morales said, his voice soothing and low. “It’s just that there were a lot of conflicting stories coming in.”

  “Yes,” Becca said. “Like the ones Dick McCallum told the cops in Albany that made all of you disbelieve me. This guy probably paid off Dick McCallum to lie about me, and then he murdered him, too. I don’t understand why it isn’t clear to you now.”

  Detective Gordon said, “Because you ran, Ms. Matlock. You wouldn’t come in and speak to us, you just called Detective Morales from wherever you were hiding. You’re at the center of all this. You, only you. Tell us what’s going on, Ms. Matlock.”

  “I believe that’s enough for the time being,” Thomas said, and calmly moved to stand between the two New York detectives and his daughter. “I am very disappointed in both of you. Neither of you is listening. You are not using your brains. Now, let’s get this perfectly clear: Since you’re having difficulties logically integrating all the facts, I want you to focus on catching the man who kidnapped my daughter and shoved her out of his car right in front of cop headquarters. I trust you people have been trying to find witnesses? Questioning them? Trying to get some sort of composite on this guy?”

  “Yes, sir, of course,” Detective Morales said. As for Detective Gordon, she wanted to tell him to go hire his damned daughter a fancy lawyer, that Dick McCallum had been murdered, that she could have had something to do with that, too, maybe revenge, since McCallum had blown the whistle on her. She opened her mouth, all worked up, but Thomas Matlock said quietly, “Actually, detectives, I am a director with the CIA. I am now terminating this conversation. You may leave.”

  Both detectives were out of there in under five seconds, Detective Gordon leading the way, Morales on her heels, looking both apologetic and
scared.

  Becca just shook her head, back and forth, back and forth. “They didn’t even want to know anything about him. Don’t they have to believe me now that Dick McCallum was murdered, too?”

  “One would think,” Adam said, his eyes narrowed, still looking at the now-empty doorway. “New York’s finest aren’t shining in this particular instance. Now, not to worry, Becca.”

  “I think Detective Gordon needs to be pulled off this case,” Thomas said. “For whatever reason, she made up her mind about you early on and is now refusing to be objective. I’ll make a call.”

  “I want to leave this place, Adam. I want to go far away, forever.”

  “I’m sorry, Becca, but there’s not going to be any forever yet,” Thomas said. “Krimakov got what he wanted. I’m out in the open now. The problem is that you still are, too. Now I’m going to make that call.” Thomas walked out of the hospital room, his head down, deep in thought, as he pulled out his cell phone.

  The Feds arrived forty-five minutes later.

  The first man into the room came to a fast stop and stared. He cleared his throat. He straightened his dark blue tie. He looked as if he wished his wing tips were shinier. “Mr. Matlock, sir, we didn’t know you were involved, we had no idea, didn’t know she was related to you—”

  “No, of course you didn’t, Mr. Hawley. Do come in, gentlemen, and meet my daughter.”

  He leaned over her and lightly touched his fingertips to her cheek. “Becca, here are two guys who want to talk to you, not batter you like the NYPD detectives, just talk a bit. You tell them when you’re tired and don’t want to talk anymore, okay?”

  “Yes,” she said, her voice so thin Adam swore she was fading away right before his eyes. If he hadn’t been worried sick, Adam would have enjoyed watching Thomas turn his power onto the FBI guys, but he didn’t. Now Adam wondered how Thomas knew Tellie Hawley, a longtime FBI guy who had a reputation for eating crooks for breakfast. He never cut anyone any slack. He was sometimes very scary, sometimes a rogue, admired by his contemporaries and occasionally distressing to his superiors.

  “Hey, Adam,” Hawley said. “I guess I’ll find out soon enough why you’re here. Where’s Savich?”

  “He and Sherlock will be in a bit later.” Adam nodded then to Scratch Cobb, a tough-looking little man who wore elevator shoes that brought him up to Adam’s chin. He got his nickname years before, when it was said that he scratched and scratched until he found the answers in a high-profile case. “Scratch, good to see you again. How’s tricks?”

  “Tricks is good, Adam. How’s it going, my boy?”

  “I’m surviving.” Adam took Becca’s hand and lightly squeezed it. He leaned close and whispered in her ear, “The guy standing to the left has hemorrhoids. The big one with the mean eyes, Hawley, will want to cross the line, but he doesn’t dare try it, not with your dad here. Actually, he has five dogs and they rule his house. Now, go get ’em, tiger.”

  If she were a tiger, she thought, she was a very pathetic one, not worthy of the name, but still—She smiled, she actually smiled. “Hello, gentlemen,” she said, and her voice wasn’t as paper-thin now. “You wanted to speak to me?”

  “Yes,” Hawley said, stepping forward. Adam didn’t move, just smiled a feral smile at him that could make a person’s teeth fall out.

  “Adam, I’m not going to bite her. I’m a good guy. I work for the U-nited States government. You don’t have to stand guard.”

  “I’m supposed to be protecting the lady, Tellie. The thing is, I screwed up, and the bad guy got her, drugged her, and dumped her right in front of One Police Plaza.”

  Hawley nodded, then said, “Okay, so you’re not going to budge.” Hawley continued smoothly, coming one step closer, watching Adam from the corner of his eye. “This guy who kidnapped you and drugged you and put you out of his car, who is he?”

  “I don’t know, Mr. Hawley. If I did, I would have announced it to the world via CNN. You know that I reported his stalking me, calling me, threatening to kill the governor. It started in Albany and he followed me to New York. Then he killed that old woman in front of the Metropolitan Museum.”

  “Yes,” Tellie Hawley said, and he shifted from his left foot to his right. “But what we want to know is who this guy is, why he tried to kill the governor. We need to know why and how you’re involved in all this—”

  Adam said very quietly, “The governor was shot, just like the guy threatened to do, and then the aide to Governor Bledsoe turned out to be the one who told the cops that Becca was an obsessed liar. He was murdered. Did you know that, Tellie? Did you know that the guy who killed him ran him down in a car he’d stolen in Ithaca, after he’d murdered the owner? Did you know that the cops have impounded that car with its dark-tinted windows so no one would be able to identify him when he ran down Dick McCallum? Hey, do you and your fed techs realize that you can go crawl all over it right now?”

  “Yeah, okay, we know all that.”

  “Then why are you pretending it didn’t happen?”

  “We’re not pretending it didn’t happen,” Hawley said, his hands fisted, anger creeping up over his shirt collar to redden his neck. “But there’s no damned reason for him to have picked Ms. Matlock out of the blue, that he targeted someone as unlikely as she is. It only makes sense that she must know something, that she must be aware of his identity, have some idea who he is and why he’s doing this. This is big, bad stuff, Adam, and she’s slap-dab in the middle of it. I hear there’s all sorts of doings in the CIA, but I can’t find out what’s going on. I’ve heard that it involves this case, but no one will tell me anything, even my bosses. Let me tell you that it burns my ass to be kept on the outside. Now back off, Adam, or I’ll burn your ass before they get mine.”

  Thomas stepped up. “I wanted to avoid this but now I don’t see a choice. I believe it’s time for official talks. You people haven’t been let in on what’s going on here, and it’s time.”

  Thomas raised his hand when all of the men would speak at once. “No more hotdogging, Adam. Mr. Hawley, if you like, you and Mr. Cobb here can come to Washington. We’re going to be meeting with the director of the FBI and the director of the CIA, that is, if I can manage to get the two of them in the same room without bloodshed. I’ll have to pick a meeting place where neither of them will get his nose out of joint.”

  Hawley gaped at him. “Both the CIA and the FBI? But why? I don’t understand, Mr. Matlock.”

  “You will,” Thomas said. “Now, go make arrangements to come to Washington, if your bosses want you to stay involved.”

  “We’re New York FBI, Mr. Matlock,” said Tellie Hawley. “Of course we’ll stay involved. We’re the primary players. I’ve heard that there’s some really, really deep shit going down and Cobb and I want to be part of it.”

  “Just call the director’s office in a while and find out when and where.”

  After the FBI guys had left, champing at the bit to find out what was going down, Thomas closed the hospital door and turned to Becca. “No way will they be allowed to come to Washington, but at least we got rid of them for a while. Now it’s time to play with both the big boys, not just Gaylan Woodhouse. I’m hoping he’ll see reason and get Bushman at the FBI to work on it. Everyone needs to know what’s going on now.”

  “First thing,” Adam said, “is for Savich to find that apartment Krimakov rented. Then we send our own people over to Crete and take the place apart.”

  “Agreed,” Thomas said. “Let’s do it. Now, Becca, Tommy the Pipe, Chuck, and Dave will all be here to protect you until we get back.”

  “No,” Becca said, coming up on her elbows. “I’m coming with you.”

  “You can barely walk,” Adam said. “Lie back and calm down. No way our people will let him get near you again.”

  “No more orders, Adam. Now, sir, there’s no way you’re going to face this alone.” Becca calmly pulled the IV lines from her arms. She pushed back the hospital sheets and swung her
legs over the side of the bed. “Give me another drink of water, ask Sherlock to buy me some clothes, and we’re out of here. An hour. That’s all I need.”

  “I think,” Thomas said slowly, stroking his long fingers over his chin, “that there is perhaps a bit too much of me in you.”

  Becca grinned at him. “That’s what Mom told me, many times.”

  “Then I’d best clear your leaving town with our local cops,” Thomas said, and wanted to pat her cheek, but didn’t because she wasn’t a little girl anymore and she barely knew him. The thought of that made him clear his throat.

  Washington, D.C.

  The Eagle Has Landed

  There weren’t any leaks. None of them could believe it. Their short flight to Washington, then the drive to Georgetown to a small restaurant called The Eagle Has Landed didn’t raise any curious eyebrows. There wasn’t a single TV van in front of the restaurant, not a single reporter from the Washington Post.

  “I don’t believe it,” Thomas said as he ushered Becca into the foyer of the small British pub. “No flashbulbs.”

  “Glory be,” said Adam.

  Andrew Bushman, appointed director of the FBI six months previously after the unexpected retirement of the former director, stood tall even with his rounded shoulders, his gray hair tonsured like a medieval monk’s, and beautifully suited, when Thomas walked to the small circular table at the back of the restaurant. Bushman raised an eyebrow. “Mr. Matlock, I presume? You have pulled me away from some very important matters. I came because Gaylan Woodhouse asked me to, told me it had to do with the attempted assassination of the governor of New York. My people are directly involved in this. I will be interested to hear how the CIA could possibly be involved, what they could possibly know that’s pertinent.”

  Gaylan Woodhouse eased around the back of a shoji screen. He was a slight man of sixty-three who had come up through the ranks of the CIA and had been known in the old days as the best spy in the world because no one—absolutely no one—ever noticed him, and still he was paranoid, staying in the shadows until there was no choice but to come out. He had been the director of the CIA for four years now. Thank God, Thomas thought, Gaylan had a long memory and a flexible mind.