Noah laughed.
“I’m betting there was enough money, and we found someone who liked it.”
She rolled her eyes.
“What’s up, chuckles? What did you and Noah find?”
“Well, speaking of people who want the president’s dick in them…”
Yeah, that grossed her out.
Then again, she was sleeping with three men, two of which were sexy Native brothers.
Who was she to talk about fetishes?
Still, she went there.
“Well, that can’t be a long list. His wife didn’t want him near her. They were living separate lives,” she said, explaining what she’d learned.
No one was shocked.
“What did you find?”
“Well, the president was diddling his limo agent. She was proud of it too.”
They told her about Melina Bowling and how Damian was footing the bill.
“Jesus. Millennials. I blame their parents.”
Callen laughed.
“I think it’s more about being opportunistic than a millennial. She clearly wanted to ride her way to the top.”
“I’ll puke. Stop. I pictured it.”
Chris patted her leg.
“Poor thing.”
She snorted.
“Well, she was all about his dick, and she was proud of it. I doubt she killed him. She is shit out of luck now,” Alex stated. “She did give us two more suspects—or interviews.”
“Who?”
He told her about the fight between Alfie and Tiegan.
“I cannot speak to those two again. If I do, I’m going to rip their hair out as I drag them to the nearest cliff to toss them off. Someone else will have to tag in for them. I would rather kiss the hookers than deal with them.”
“I would pay good money to see that,” Alex teased.
Callen cleared his throat.
“Or not.”
Noah laughed. It was, once again, time to save the man from himself.
“We can do it. If you can get us cleared at the White House, we can handle them.”
“Thank you.”
She sent Ethan a text.
Immediately, one came back that he’d handle it for them.
“The deputy director is all over it.”
She pointed at Max and Harmony.
“What did your interview say about the hookers?”
“The basic. He liked getting laid, so they would sneak them in the back door.”
She dropped her heel onto her knee as she thought this out.
“I interviewed the wife, and she knew something was up,” Elizabeth stated. “A wife knows when the person they love is cheating on them. We feel it in our gut.”
“I had a boyfriend who cheated on me,” Harmony stated. “I kicked his ass when I got my proof. I’m not quite as malleable as the First lady.”
“Is she banging the VP like a drum?” she asked. “Do you recall them being close?”
Harmony thought about it.
“Well, they were friendly. I left shortly after the president rolled into the office.”
She told them what Ivan had found out.
“It’s handy having a Marine on duty. Today, I won’t bitch about carrying the weight of the toadstool around,” she stated, meaning Ivan.
He was against the wall, watching everyone. Someone was taking the protection thing a little too seriously.
Who was going to get her in there?
Chris?
Max?
Harmony?
“Back at you, Mrs. Bitchypants. Like you’re not dead weight for me either.”
She laughed.
Ivan always had amused her.
“See? I do like sarcasm at the right moments. He’s walking sarcasm.”
No one doubted that.
“So, the wife caught him raping someone,” Max said, carefully watching Harmony. He was thinking about what had happened to her. “And no one helped the senator?” he asked, wishing someone had helped her all those years ago.
“Nope. No one and that’s a bone of contention for me. If she was screaming, and none of the Secret Service checked on her…”
“They were likely told not to bother him,” Harmony said. She could feel herself getting hot all over again, and she willed herself to stay calm.
Max gently touched her on her back, trying to help reassure her that he was with her.
While he wouldn’t bring it up, he really thought Elizabeth should know.
This was a bad spot for them to be in, and he was aware of it. That made him just as guilty of not saying something.
“Yeah, well, that makes them just as guilty. We’re following up with Senator Forbes. Come to think of it, she’s young, brash, and she is an up and comer in Washington. He’d want to control that—especially if she challenged him.”
“Well, speaking of that,” Harmony stated.
“The bad news.”
“Okay, kick me in the balls. I’m ready.”
“Said no sane person ever,” Callen stated. “That’s proof you don’t carry them. I got the willies when you said it.”
She opened her mouth.
“Don’t. We all know you own mine. There’s no need for you to tell us.”
She snorted and gave him a kiss.
“Continue,” she stated.
“Well, we know who he wanted upstairs at the hotel,” Harmony stated.
“Who?”
They both pointed at her.
“He was prepping his love nest for a grand peacock,” she stated. “A sarcasm loving, bitchy one, who he desperately wanted.”
She laughed.
“I wouldn’t have slept with him. As you all can see, my life is packed full of sexiness. He was a short, fat, bald troll. I wouldn’t go there if my life depended on it.”
Max didn’t think she understood.
“He wasn’t going to take no for an answer.”
Callen sighed and got up from his place beside her on the lounge couch.
“Where are you going?” she asked, confused by it.
“I’m going out to the morgue table to abuse his corpse. He was planning to rape my wife. I can’t let that one go.”
She laughed.
“Sit. I know he’d try to force me, only, I’m not some newbie-senator. I’m vicious.”
“Like a viper,” Chris stated. “Thank freaking God for that too.”
He was sick over the idea. The idea that he’d try to hurt her like that…it horrified Chris.
“You were the one he wanted,” Max stated. “Had you not left early…?”
Yeah, she got it.
He would have tried to rape her, and she would have killed him herself.
“Well, then we would know who killed him with a lamp, now wouldn’t we. The joke is on us. I could have saved all of us this investigation.”
No one found it funny.
“Ivan, you are to be all over her all of the time,” Callen stated. “I know he’s dead, but now I’m feeling a tad bit freaked-out that the Secret Service wouldn’t have intervened when a woman was being raped.”
Harmony felt dizzy.
All she needed to do was survive this.
“So, he raped a senator, and he wanted to rape me. Well, it looks like we have a pretty good idea of what power had done to him.”
Yeah, it corrupted him big time.
Here was the proof.
Her phone chimed.
‘I can’t get them in to see them until tomorrow. The White House is on lockdown, and you made a lasting impression browbeating a widow. They can find them at home and interview them tomorrow. I love when you’re all feisty.’
She read them the text, minus the last part. Everyone there was well aware Ethan loved her, and that she was, indeed, feisty. In fact, it could be her middle name.
“Okay, so what do you want us to do?” Alex asked over the phone.
“Head in. I’m going to be doing the hooker interviews once we get th
eir real names and addresses. You know how I love an adventure, but I know you. That’s a little too much fun for you. Noah will be exhausted babysitting you.”
“Amen,” the man stated.
“HEY!” Alex objected.
They all laughed.
There was a lot of truth in what she was saying, and everyone there knew it.
“After my meeting with Ethan, we’ll regroup and figure out our next plan. Grab an early lunch. In fact, pick up pizza. I’m buying.”
“Thanks, boss. See you soon.”
They disconnected the call.
“How’s it going, Callen?” she asked, regarding the research on the hookers.
“It’s running. As soon as I have something, you, my love, will have something too.”
Well, that worked for her.
“Okay. So, back to what we were discussing. We know he’s more than willing to violate a woman. That would explain the anger. Someone was pissed.”
When she got quiet, they knew she was thinking—processing what she’d learned.
“Problem,”’ Chris stated. “I can see the wheels turning from here,” he stated
“Yes.”
“What?” Max asked.
“Whoever killed the president had to be strong. A pissed off woman…I don’t know if they could do that kind of damage.”
They thought about it.
“You’re pretty strong,” Max stated.
Yeah, that was the truth.
“Could I?” she asked. “I took down some Secret Service agents, but to bash a man’s face clear off of his head…?”
Chris thought about it.
“You’re in excellent shape. You could do it. The person who was wielding that lamp had leverage.”
Harmony chimed in.
“Well, Secret Service agents are strong. Is Alfie still in shape?” she asked. “I don’t know this Tiegan personally.”
“Yeah, they both looked fit to me,” Callen stated.
“Checking out the ladies?” she teased.
“Yeah, so I can figure out if my wife is in danger when she pisses them off. You tend to rub people the wrong way. Case in point—our new ME.”
She laughed.
“It’s a gift. It’s taken years to perfect this. I wasn’t this good at it when I started out.”
Chris laughed.
“Uh, yeah, you really were.”
Elizabeth smiled.
“I’m a prodigy. What can I say?”
Callen found that amusing.
“Uh huh.”
Elizabeth knew they had to keep running with this. He was the profiler. It was time to get some things out of him. It would help.
“Okay, we’ll go talk to Ethan, he’s clearly done if he’s playing secretary for me. Then we’ll come back, have some lunch, and then regroup for the rest of today. I want to make sure that we have everything covered.”
They got it.
“Uh, can I talk to you?” Harmony asked.
“Yeah, you can. Clear out.”
She stopped them.
“They can stay,” she stated, meaning Chris, Ivan, and Callen. “They can hear what I have to say.”
She stayed seated.
“What’s on your mind?”
“The president was an asshole. You’re going to have a rough time with this case.”
“Doubting me? Why?”
“I want to go on the record with something,” she stated. “I need to go on the record.”
Max watched her.
Her face was blank, but her eyes…they told the tale. She was really struggling. Since he was sitting beside her, he gently touched her hand. She flipped it over and held onto his.
Elizabeth watched her.
“What aren’t you telling me, Harmony? Where is this coming from?”
Elizabeth didn’t know what had happened to make the woman want to bail.
“If something has gone down, you can tell me. We’ll do what we can to help you,” Elizabeth promised.
How could she not?
Harmony was her friend.
She took a deep breath and knew that she had to tell the woman. It was only right.
“He deserved to die. I might not be the best person to work on this case,” she stated.
That surprised Elizabeth.
“What? What happened?” she asked. She’d known Harmony a few years, and the woman NEVER backed down.
Ever.
This was so damn hard for Harmony.
It physically made her ache. The pain from it never went away, and she was struggling with it.
Every day, there was still that horror. She’d been young, and she’d run. She’d taken the job, and she’d bailed on her self-respect.
This had to be done.
For her.
For his other victims.
She hadn’t spoken out then, but she would speak out now. Harmony was tired of feeling like it was her fault.
She was exhausted from feeling she wasn’t strong enough.
The last six years, she believed his threats.
That was then.
This was now.
She was ten times stronger, and she’d remade her life into this so she could fight that demon.
“I was one of his victims. I was raped by the President of the United States, and I didn’t report it because I was scared.”
It hung there.
Elizabeth had been caught off guard.
Everyone had.
What was she supposed to say to that?
Yeah, they were screwed.
BIG TIME.
Chapter Eight
T o say she was surprised by what her friend was telling her about her past would be an understatement. Harmony Wells wasn’t exactly a stranger. She was a woman Elizabeth had worked with on a few cases, bringing in the bad guys. To hear that she’d been sexually assaulted by the man made her sick.
It made her angry.
No.
It made her furious.
“Harmony,” Elizabeth began, trying to find a way to convey how sorry she was, and how painful working this case had to be for her. Elizabeth wasn’t sure she could do it had the roles been reversed.
Harmony had been violated by the man, and here she was, being a professional as she tried to work his homicide.
That took balls.
“I’m okay,” she stated, her voice wavering as she fought to be strong in front of all of them. These were her peers, and she’d hold on for as long as she could.
While she said it, no one bought it. There was no way anyone would be ‘okay’ after that.
Elizabeth had to make a decision.
“Everyone out but Harmony. We need to have a little talk about this.”
Everyone left, and no one tried to fight to stay. That said how uncomfortable the whole thing was for the men in the room. They were placed in a position of knowing that someone they liked had been hurt, and they couldn’t rectify it.
When the door closed, Harmony began pacing the room like a caged tiger. Elizabeth watched her from her seat on the couch as she waited for the woman to tell her what the hell had happened.
“I was young and stupid. The president had just been elected, and he had just started his tenure in the Oval Office.”
Elizabeth calmly listened.
“He called me into his office, and I went. I was bright-eyed, hopeful, and naive. I never saw it coming.”
Elizabeth knew sometimes, you had to just listen while someone was hurting, and Harmony was definitely in a shitload of pain.
“Go on.”
Harmony needed to vent, and she needed to vent to a woman who would understand.
“He flattered me. He offered me a long-term position on his team because my smile made his day. He was charming, and I hadn’t been around him long enough to know that he was a very nasty snake.”
Oh, he had lots of people fooled. He’d been full of charisma and charm on the election trail too.
“We were
sitting on the couch in the Oval Office, and all of a sudden, he was on me. I couldn’t get to my gun, I couldn’t get my arms free. I was paralyzed with this fear. All I knew was the President of the United States was raping me. I fought, but I was so shocked…”
“It’s not your fault,” she said, knowing where this was going. Elizabeth had dealt with victims of sexual abuse before, and there was that guilt that you could have done more.
You couldn’t, simply because it wasn’t anyone’s fault but the person perpetrating the crime against them.
She stared at Elizabeth, tears in her eyes.
“I know. I know that now, but then, I didn’t know. After he finished,” she said, tears slipping past her lashes, “he told me I was the best he’d had. That he couldn’t wait for our time together.”
She listened.
“I freaked-out. I lost it. I think I surprised him. He told me to shut up, or he’d break me. He told me that I hadn’t stopped him. I wanted it. I let him cum in me, and I was nothing.”
Elizabeth wished she’d been around because she would have kicked his ass then.
“He was an asshole.”
“I didn’t even think to threaten him with calling the police. I didn’t even go there. I think I knew it wouldn’t happen. He was the president. I was some young agent…”
She took a deep breath.
“I went home. I did the walk of shame, and all of the agents knew. They had to have heard me screaming. They had to have heard me in the Oval Office. He had to have told them not to come in no matter what.”
That pissed her off.
Yeah, there were going to be ramifications for the president’s actions, and the Secret Service’s inaction.
Mark her words.
“I went home, and I showered. I sat at the bottom of that tub, and I scrubbed my skin raw.”
Getting up, she headed right for the still pacing Harmony. She stopped her, and then Elizabeth hugged her.
“I’m sorry this happened to you. I am so sorry that he got away with it.”
She let herself be held.
Then she continued, “The next day, I got a call. I was offered a position with the US Marshals. I jumped at it. I took it without a second’s hesitation. I think a part of me knew that he’d set it up to get me out of there. A part of me knew he’d offered me hush money in the form of a job.”
All the King's Henchmen Page 31
