by Dale Wiley
“I won’t tell no one nothin,’ baby. You give me your number so I can call you?”
“Give me your phone.” He took her phone and dialed in his semi-private number. He hit send. It would be good to keep tabs on her, but he wasn’t giving out his real number—only serious niggas got that shit.
“I ain’t got this number on today on account of all this. Don’t be callin’ me right away.”
Becky clearly thought her stock should have risen more than this, but she didn’t say anything.
They practically crawled back downtown with all the traffic and met up with Raylon west of where the concert was on the residential side of Hollywood Boulevard. She started to get out before Raylon could get in, but Pal Joey stopped her.
“Don’t talk about this until we can get it figured out.”
“Okay, I told you so.”
“You could get people in serious trouble.”
“Look, I know. I just want to get home. I’m already hella late.”
Joey frowned. He had serious reservations about letting her go. But it would be better than having her witness a murder if it came to that.
Thirty-Three
Grant put the car in gear and headed back to Highway 40. He knew Mandy would be nearly panicked by now. Doing what he did seemed stupid, one more boneheaded move that seemed ingrained in him. Naseem acted differently, as he would expect, but he couldn’t worry about that now. He had played a hunch and a power profile, and he hoped he was right.
Mandy LaPierre, Grant’s boss, answered on the first ring.
“Where have you been?”
“Talking to our source and getting more unsolicited information.”
“Sources just come out of the woodwork for you, don’t they?” The way she said this reminded Grant of all the pushback he had faced over the last two years. Almost all of the agents thought he should have been fired, and every day he dealt with passive-aggressive comments. He had no time for this.
“Do you want to hear it or not?”
“Oh, do enlighten me.”
“I have received info from a second source indicating once again that Las Vegas has been the training ground.”
God, please don’t let her ask who. Please don’t let her ask who.
“And who is this source?”
Why did he even ask? Of course she would ask that. He spit it out. “Caitlin. You remember her.”
Mandy waited a minute before responding. “Grant, you fucking kill me. You can’t be serious. How is your fucking ex involved in this?”
Grant’s phone buzzed—call waiting. He looked down and couldn’t believe his eyes. It was a day of reunions.
“Mandy, I’ve gotta go!”
“Bullshit you’ve gotta …”
“Mandy, it’s the president.”
Not even Mandy had a response to that.
Thirty-Four
Grant Miller was a very young FBI agent that Tuesday morning, September 11, 2001. He was late for work—a detail that would get left out of all press clippings, because they never figured it out—and was on his way from New Jersey, where he had found a place to stay in Fort Lee without being able to afford it, up to Midtown.
The story later was one of an instinct for the action; he stepped off the subway in the financial district, having heard the bombing of the first World Trade Center, but it turned out he actually needed a hat. His little cousin’s birthday was the following Saturday, and he wanted to send him a Trade Center hat. He got off, knowing he was already late and probably going to get his ass chewed once again, and made it into the underground mall below the towers. As he stood in line for the checkout, he heard the blast, and, to be fair, he did some pretty great work.
Grant came above ground and carefully organized hundreds of people in the mall, helping them quietly and quickly escape. He was in the plaza when he saw the second plane hit the towers and knew then what was going on. He organized, energized, and did whatever was needed, shooing hundreds of people away, flashing his badge, and making the sage call to keep from sending three rescue crews inside, where they would have certainly been killed if they were left to their own sacrificial instincts.
When the towers were disintegrating and the whole world seemed to collapse, Grant went against his own good judgment and ran back in one more time to grab a small Mexican woman who made it down most of the stairs but had no energy left. He saw she was confused; she didn’t realize she made it, and she started to lay down on the stairs, away from all the people pushing past her. He put her in his arms, leapfrogged a falling construction worker in front of her, and ran like hell away from the hell that befell them. They made it to safety, and someone captured the image on video. And so, because of being late and ill-prepared for his little cousin’s birthday, he began his new life as Grant Miller, hero.
The FBI, taking a pounding over security and their inability to talk with other agencies, was proud to have someone look good. They let him do Letterman and Leno, knowing they would have to pull him off any serious duty for a long while. That mattered little, because his bosses mainly considered him a lightweight anyway. He took a photo with President Bush that was used often by the White House in political ads; they were two mavericks with the same glint in their eye. Miller’s goodwill and all-American charm could even help a president.
After his victory tour, he returned to the field office, and, being a name worth knowing, would occasionally get good tips. He uncovered a plot to kill a low-ranking justice department official, and, in 2006, he was given classified intel by a CIA operative that led to the arrest of three FBI agents who were giving serious information to organized criminals in Russia and the US, leading to the death of several CIA officials. Because of the way the information had come to Miller and his cavalier attitude throughout the whole endeavor, the attorney general could not bring criminal cases, but the rats were found and were swept out of the basement. Miller looked like a hero again.
With the FBI’s permission, he wrote a lower-rung New York Times best seller. During the following several-year stretch, he became a well-known, slightly rich, insufferable asshole. He acted like a colossal dick.
Being on the cover of Time means people remember you. If you’re with the FBI, you’re not going to get into a lot of fights, like other famous people who don’t have bodyguards often do. So during his platinum days, Grant was able to bring it with the ladies. With your lady if she was so inclined. He was young. He was good-looking. He was in FBI shape. Although he wasn’t always “single,” he was never married. He was an eligible and knowledgeable jackass of a bachelor. He taped enough sex to have started a porn site and was just smart enough to destroy the tapes before anything became public. He got comped at the Playboy Mansion—the FBI really wanted the press—and he swam at the private pools at the Bellagio. He lived it up.
Somewhere in his soul, he began to smell his own stink—not totally, but he got enough of a whiff to realize he had changed fairly dramatically and not for the better. And then he met Caitlin.
Caitlin liked Grant in spite of who he was. She managed the fame; she didn’t dwell in it. She had been a party girl of monumental proportions before meeting him, an Army brat who had lived all over the world. She was not intimidated by Grant.
They met in Chicago, although she was from Kansas City. She worked for a brokerage, not really engaged in her job, and she had no idea who he was when they met. This perturbed him. Most of the time he spent dealing with—and liking—”Aren’t you …?” He was so angry he couldn’t help telling her.
She still didn’t know, and she thought his head would explode. When he finished with his soliloquy about his status, she turned up the corner of her mouth and said, “Well I like you anyway.”
She played hard to get for months, and, finally, after she had sent a large dose of humility his way, she fell for him. For a while, their lives were like a movie montage. They held hands in romantic spots and made love passionately in the nicest places. He became ki
nder and less full of himself. He saw the difference in her, and everyone saw the difference in him. He realized how egotistical he had become when his assistant Mandy, now his boss, told him she was just days away from quitting before he had started to change. “I was willing to go work at a McDonald’s if I didn’t have to work for you,” she said. It stuck with him.
He went on a presidential detail to the G8 Summit in Sea Island, Georgia. He had her come down right at the end, when the president had already gone. He commandeered a spot on Jekyll Island, found in the same quaint part of the world. It was early August, and all of the delegates had left the smaller island. It felt as if all of the islanders left them alone to run the place. She cooked dinner in their condo, and they took the top down on their convertible rental and drove around the entire length of the island listening to Broken Bells and taking in a sherbet-colored sunset that seemed to last hours. They listened to the sounds of the beach and marveled at the beauty of the ancient Spanish moss. Dragonflies swarmed them as they walked alone to the pier at the north end of the island. Caitlin mentioned that there was a wives’ tale this was a great omen. He told her he believed that.
He half-expected a crowd to be enjoying a perfect evening like this, still summer weather, but they were nearly by themselves. They walked all the way out on the pier above the water. It swayed and danced beneath them as the sun finished sliding into the marsh. He pulled a ring from his pocket and dropped to his knee. He looked into her eyes and didn’t say anything for a minute. She gasped and looked at the ring. Then he asked her to marry him. She said yes. She cried and fanned herself as the sun went all the way down, the timing perfect.
After an hour at the condo and Caitlin calling everyone she ever knew while Grant glowed watching her show such love and happiness, they walked out on the beach and found they were all alone again. They took off their clothes and swam, even though the tide was coming in. When they came out of the surf, they made love in a tide pool, holding each other tight and feeling the breeze whisper on their naked bodies. She joked about getting crabs, and he marveled at how lovely she was in the silver light. He told her to wait there.
He slipped on his sandy underwear and tiptoed back to the condo. It didn’t matter; no one was around. He grabbed towels, blankets, and a bottle of red wine and went back to the beach. They found a spot near one of the gazebos, hidden not only from other people but from too much wind as well. They fell asleep so close to each other that it hurt his arm, but he wasn’t going to move. He lay there for what seemed like hours, thinking about what mattered and what joy he found. He finally joined her in the night’s final dream. The dawn woke them. She looked at her ring. He looked at her. Perfection.
It lasted all of three weeks.
Thirty-Five
Britt sat in the back of the limo, listening to something sad and dreamy by Zero 7. He was on his second pass through Vegas. He was sure the chauffeur knew something was up. He could tell. Was he on their side?
Then he stopped himself. God, he was thinking so crazy. He felt several times that day like his faculties were leaving him. He had to make it through this and just hold on. He was drowning. He no longer felt like he was in control.
As he watched the familiar Vegas scenery pass again, he thought about where he had been for five years. He had wrapped his life around this plan, from his first illegal angle to being the biggest mass murderer in US history. He was thirty-two, the same age as Alexander the Great.
Alexander the Great was the pupil of none other than Aristotle, who was taught by Plato, who was taught by Socrates. It was hard to imagine a more impressive legacy. But Alexander, son of the great leader Philip of Macedon, took it much further. His domain was not academic. It was the entire fucking world. He fought Jews, Greeks, Turks, and even managed to subdue the greatest empire the world had ever known: Egypt. He conquered most of the known world. Alexander wept when he discovered there were no more worlds to conquer and then died. Was this Britt’s fate?
He didn’t know. His thinking was premature. He was not even out of the country yet. At this point, he no longer felt like Alexander. Now, after one short chain of events, he felt more like Nixon—at his most powerful and most paranoid—the man who had more second chances than any American politician. He needed to be back in charge. Earlier that day, he might have worried about how he would do without the adrenaline and the power, or what little remained of his adventure should he survive, or how would he survive success. Now, he hoped this latest setback would remind him he was far from done.
It was a tad surreal to see television screens lit up with his vision, his novel, his cinematic death score—majestic and electric and incredibly provocative. He wished Caitlin was here for more than one reason. Yes, for once he could use a woman, use an outlet for all of this power and desire he felt building in his body. And oh, she was talented at that. She also could appreciate his greatness, even if she couldn’t fully understand it. That’s what he hoped he had found in Caitlin. He knew she was Grant’s woman and that was why he had initially desired her, but he also recognized just how rare she was. Now that he couldn’t have her, he wanted her. Perhaps, she was the country remaining to be conquered.
It seemed strange that this entire endeavor might have been begun because of his sexual frustration. After all, it certainly wasn’t started because of money. Ever since Grant took his real power from the FBI, he somehow seemed to strip Britt of his sexual power as well. Britt created elaborate stories to tell anyone about his embarrassing little problem, but he knew what the reason was: he was a eunuch now. Grant Miller made him a eunuch. He needed to get his power back. It was within his grasp today but slipping back. It reminded him of those elusive feelings for Caitlin, the ones that most closely seemed to border on normalcy.
The reason he could sleep with Caitlin was easy for any armchair psychologist to understand: she belonged to Grant Miller. Britt caused their breakup, engineered the incident that drove them apart forever, and made Grant look like a fool. Grant wanted Caitlin, loved her dearly, and Britt took her away. He could be a sexual stallion with Caitlin. Now, he felt sure that the power he wielded today, over Miller, over the president, over the nation, would be enough to bring him back. He was going to prove it tonight—one way or the other. He could almost believe it.
Tomorrow, he would know about the index and which endgame he would play. He would devise a new exit. Right now, with his extra time, he would see about life after Caitlin. He’d see what he could do with some new playmates. Given all of his power and all of the drama today, surely his dry spell was over.
He called his contact at the MGM Grand and placed his order. He finally had a place to tell his driver to drive to.
Thirty-Six
Grant picked up the phone and heard the familiar “Mr. Miller? Please hold for the president.”
He had gotten several calls like this, most in the good old days when for whatever reason he became almost a confidant of President Bush, and still had the White House switchboard number in his phone. President Morgan, very politically different from President Bush, had still been a friend, and the two of them definitely made his continued career with the FBI a reality.
Of course, the calls stopped. Grant was political Chernobyl. They were no more able to carry on a friendship with him as with Osama Bin Laden. He was to be forgotten—until today.
“Miller? What the hell is going on?”
Thank God for the spared pleasantries. Morgan liked to cut to the chase.
“Mr. President, I don’t know much more than you do. I’m just following the one lead that fell in my lap.”
“And just how did that happen?”
“He’s here with me if you want to ask him.”
“Fuck you, Miller. I’m not talking to him.”
“Okay then. I don’t know. I am finding that at least some of this seems to deal with me as one of many targets.”
“You know what some people think,” Morgan said, trying to get at Mi
ller, see if he could get him to respond differently than the president expected.
“I’m sure. There are a lot of people reconsidering their decision to let me stay on. You may be one of them.”
“Did you have any involvement in this, Grant?”
Miller spoke emphatically. He knew this man, and he believed he could appeal to him. “Sir, I had no direct or indirect involvement in this. My only desire is to help my country and my agency in any way possible.”
There was silence on the line. Miller knew he said what he needed to. He knew that the next person who spoke would be capitulating.
“I’m gonna direct that you get whatever support you need. God help me if I’m wrong.”
“Sir, I have always appreciated your friendship and help. I won’t let you down.”
Miller looked down and saw his knuckle bleeding from his involvement with Naseem. He’d do a whole lot more than that if he had to.
Thirty-Seven
Caitlin called in her one solid. Six months earlier, she had come upon a girl weeping miserably out in front of the Wynn and instead of passing her by—her default mode since breaking up with Grant—she sat down next to the girl. She had no idea why she did this. She asked what the matter was, and, upon hearing the girl’s tale of being turned out as a trick by a boyfriend who deserted her, Caitlin let down her hard-as-nails guise and helped the girl. Tonya was of reasonable intelligence and very even-keeled, despite how Caitlin first met her. She soon found a job working in housekeeping at Harrah’s, and she texted Caitlin just a few weeks ago to tell her she moved to floor supervisor. Caitlin came by and congratulated her. Now she returned, no texts and no calls. She left the phone given to her wedged into the seat of the cab and headed for the service entrance. She hoped the cabby’s next ride took him to the other side of the strip. She was sure Britt would have some way of tracking it.
