by Stephen Frey
CHAPTER 31
BLACKSBURG, VIRGINIA
“If you elect me to the United States Senate in November, I promise to give you everything I have every day of my term!” Angela shouted above the applause that was hurtling up into the rafters of Cassell Coliseum, Virginia Tech’s cavernous basketball arena, and then echoing back down, creating a continuous, deafening roar. “I will never, never stop working for you!” she yelled into the microphone affixed to the dais in the middle of the huge stage. “I promise you I won’t!”
Kanye West was appearing tonight on this stage, and Trent had arranged the rally through Kanye’s people and the Virginia Tech athletic department’s senior staff, all of whom Trent knew from his days as an NBA star. Somehow he’d also filled the coliseum with more than ten thousand screaming fans who seemed obsessed with a changing of the guard in Washington, DC.
She’d assumed when she walked onstage forty minutes ago that she’d be met by a polite, low-key crowd half filling the arena, which would dutifully listen to her explain her major initiatives. She’d assumed wrong. Trent had filled the place to capacity, arranged for network coverage, all prior to raising significant money for the campaign from influential people in the Blacksburg area at an intimate downtown breakfast this morning. He seemed to know everyone everywhere. He seemed able to achieve anything for her campaign—including quickly shaving points from Chuck Lehman’s lead.
“When we announced our candidacy, no one gave us a chance,” she said, signaling for quiet. “The reporters, the political pundits, even most people on the street shook their heads and said I had no chance to defeat Chuck Lehman.” Cassell Coliseum had gone pin-drop silent in an instant. “They said he was an institution in Washington, destined for greater glory when he finished his third term as senator. That I was crazy, even arrogant, to believe I could beat him. After all, he is the senate majority leader. Well, let me tell you all something,” she said defiantly, pushing her chin out, “as far as I’m concerned, there is no greater glory than serving the people of the Commonwealth of Virginia as a United States senator. That’s all I want. That’s all I’ll ever want. I don’t need anything more than that. I want to serve you. I have no other agenda.”
Trent exhorted the crowd from stage left—to which they responded immediately.
“We started out so far back, I couldn’t even see Chuck Lehman ahead of me,” she said, raising her voice along with the crowd noise. “He laughed at our campaign when we announced it. He called it ‘cute.’”
The roar intensified.
“Senator Lehman isn’t calling it cute anymore.”
When Trent waved to the crowd with both arms, the applause quickly turned wild, the loudest yet.
“Lehman needed binoculars when he snuck that first peek over his shoulder in our direction. Oh, yeah, I saw him do it.”
The crowd rose to their feet, and the building shook as people began to jump up and down.
“Well he doesn’t need those binoculars anymore. He doesn’t even need to look over his shoulder. All he has to do is look over. I’m right there with him now, and it won’t be long before we’ll need binoculars to see him in our rearview mirror!”
As Angela’s last few words evaporated into the thunder, Trent trotted to where she stood in the middle of the stage and raised her hand in his.
She smiled up at him, in awe. The polls didn’t show her drawing even with Chuck Lehman. She’d exaggerated that for effect, taken a little political liberty with the numbers to help her corner. But she wasn’t that far behind, either. Only yesterday, one of Lehman’s aides had admitted to a Washington reporter that the Gaynor campaign was far more potent than anyone had foreseen.
Her smile widened as she gazed out over the cheering crowd. All of this was thanks to Trent Tucker. As they leaned against each other, she broke her hand from his and slipped her arm around him. She wanted him … desperately.
DARIEN, CONNECTICUT
“Jesus,” Rockwell muttered to himself as he watched the raucous video clip of Angela Gaynor’s rally, which had just concluded. “Chuck Lehman better be worried.”
The message attached to the clip read: some polls have her down by just six points.
Rockwell shook his head as he moved away from the clip and began roaming the Internet again. His instincts had been exactly right. He’d found one of the Grays on the Department of Homeland Security website. Again, the man was a senior staffer, just like the man at NSA who Rockwell had found by doing this same thing.
Now he was looking for the third man—and it didn’t take long to find him. The third Gray was CIA—at the very top of the pyramid there—exactly as Rockwell had anticipated. Rockwell was doing this just from memory, but the face on the screen was too familiar to mistake. It was the same man whose hand Rockwell had shaken immediately after the blindfold had come off in the Maine cabin.
He reached for his small, black, leather-bound datebook, which was lying beside the computer, and wrote down the man’s name beneath the name of the man from DHS, whose name was immediately below the name of the man from the NSA.
Now he needed to find that fourth man.
As he began to search, his phone rang. “Yes?”
“We believe we have success,” the voice spoke up quietly. “The message you wished to convey should be conveyed later this afternoon. All has been arranged.”
“Excellent,” Rockwell whispered, “excellent.”
“What about the money?”
“I’ll have all hundred thousand to you by COB today. And by the way,” Rockwell spoke up as he thought about how ecstatic the other Grays, one in particular, would be when he related the news, “there will be more, much more.”
“Better be.”
WASHINGTON, DC (GEORGETOWN)
“Can she beat you?”
Chuck Lehman glanced over at Martha. He’d been gazing into the full-length mirror of their bedroom in the four-story Georgetown town house in which they stayed while the Senate was in session. They were attending a reception this afternoon at the French Embassy. Then it was on to a formal White House dinner for the president of France later tonight.
He’d been admiring himself in his tuxedo. Now he was admiring Martha. She looked delicious in her lacy, short slip and high heels.
Lehman had wandered into the adultery swamp a few times in the early days. He and Martha had been married when they were both twenty-two, only a few months after they’d both graduated from the University of Virginia, but before he’d finished sowing his oats.
But he hadn’t strayed since those early days, and not once in Washington despite the almost daily invitations from younger women who were drawn to his undeniably dashing good looks and immense power. He was almost as proud of his record of being faithful as he was of being senate majority leader.
Martha had delivered two perfect sons to him. Both were handsome, spitting images of him. Paul would graduate from Princeton in May and go to Wall Street, while Peter was a sophomore at Harvard. She worked tirelessly at several charities, in Washington and Richmond. She only ever had one drink at any function and spoke four languages, so foreign dignitaries were routinely enthralled with her. Through the years she could have had her own affairs with powerful people from around the world. But, according to the CIA and the FBI, she never had. She had classic beauty, the gentleness of an angel, the poise of a president, and the heart of a lioness.
She was the perfect political wife.
“What did you say?” he finally asked in a distracted tone so she understood how much he was still attracted to her.
“Can Angela Gaynor beat you?”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
“I saw a poll today that claimed she’d cut your lead to single digits.”
“She’s getting a bang out of something new. We’ve seen it before. We’ll see it again. It won’t last.”
“The basketball player seems to be helping her quite a bit.”
Lehman glanced back into the
mirror. Looking in the mirror pleased him. Hearing about Angela Gaynor and Trent Tucker did not. “This country’s obsessed with sports,” he muttered. “It’ll end up being our downfall.”
“Maybe you should counter Trent Tucker with a sports celebrity of your own.”
Lehman straightened his black bow tie, then moved to where she stood and slipped his arms around her slender frame. “Then I’d look like I was imitating her. I’d give her credibility by doing that. As the senate majority leader, I shouldn’t be derivative of anyone.”
“I don’t like this woman gaining on you,” Martha admitted. “It makes me nervous. You’ve worked hard to get where you are. I don’t want to see a fickle and mostly uninformed public make a big mistake.”
He kissed her gently on the forehead. “I love you.”
“I love you, too, Chuck.”
“Don’t worry. I’ve got this all taken care of.”
“Do you? Do you really?”
He grinned as he stared into her flashing eyes. “I’ve never seen you like this before.”
“I’ve never felt like this before. If she beats you, well, that would be unthinkable. It would ruin your chances for the White House, and I want you to be president, Chuck. More importantly, you deserve to be president. Even more importantly, the country deserves it.”
“Thank you, sweetheart.”
This time she kissed him. “I like being a guest at White House parties.” She smiled. “But at some point in the near future I want to host them.”
Oh, yes, she was the perfect political wife.
BLACKSBURG, VIRGINIA
Angela tumbled down onto the mattress from atop Trent and eased back onto the pillows. Her heart was still going a million miles an hour. She’d never felt anything like that in her life.
“That was incredible.” She could barely breathe. “Where am I?”
He chuckled as he pulled her onto his broad chest, then pulled the covers up over both of them.
“I’m assuming from your reaction you’ve heard that before.”
“Once or twice,” he admitted, caressing her shoulder.
“I’ve been waiting twenty-five years for that,” she admitted in a dreamy tone.
“I know.”
“Well, you don’t have to be so smug about—”
“So have I.”
“Really? You’re not just saying that, Trent?”
“I don’t think I really knew it until that day we met on the beach. But I realized it then for sure. And I really did want to wait until the campaign was over. But after I saw you onstage today whipping ten thousand people into a frenzy, well I couldn’t resist anymore. I had to have you.” He glanced down at her as he caressed her shoulder. “You had every person in that arena in the palm of your hand, including me.”
“I’ve never experienced anything like it,” she admitted, then laughed when she realized what she’d just said. “Not until two minutes ago, anyway.” She shook her head as she ran her fingernails across his chest. “I had the two most incredible experiences of my life in the same afternoon. That shouldn’t happen to a girl. It’s all downhill from here.”
“No way. The day you’re elected a United States senator and you take down Chuck Lehman will be even better. I guarantee it.”
JURY TOWN
The cleaning woman glanced over her shoulder to make certain she was alone in Felicity West’s room. All of Wing Three was closed off to jurors while they changed beds, vacuumed floors, and dusted—but at least ten other members of the cleaning staff were on the wing, and she couldn’t chance being surprised by one of them. That could mean being fired, facing criminal charges, and, worst of all, losing out on ten thousand tax-free dollars.
Her fingers shook as she reached into her pocket, lifted the pillow of the freshly changed bed, and slipped the note between the mattress and the pillow.
Then she headed out, glad that they were keeping no official register of who had cleaned which room.
As she emerged from the room, she nearly ran into the guard who had been in charge of watching this cleaning shift. He seemed to take an extra-long, suspicious look at her.
Hopefully, she was just imagining things. Her heart was pounding so hard she could barely breathe.
CHAPTER 32
RICHMOND, VIRGINIA
Victoria sprinted down the long hospital corridor—past gurneys, wheelchairs, doctors, and nurses, with Dez on her heels.
She’d gotten the jarring call fifteen minutes ago out of the blue and bolted from her office in downtown Richmond immediately, without even grabbing her pocketbook, shrieking for Dez to get her to the hospital. Cameron’s vital signs were quickly deteriorating.
Dez had driven the lead Escalade himself, with two subordinates inside and two more bulletproof black SUVs trailing.
Victoria raced into the hospital room, dodging a young nurse who tried to restrain her, and rushed to Cameron’s side, sinking into the chair beside the bed and slipping her hand into his as he lay there on his back.
She was too late. His fingers were already cold. The bullet through his lung had ultimately killed him. The surgeons had been wrong.
“I’m sorry, Cam,” she whispered as the first heavy sob wracked her body. “I owe you everything.” Tears spilled down her cheeks in rivers. “I’ll call your mom. I’ll tell her … what a good son … what a great man you are … were.”
Dez grimaced as he glanced away, then ushered the young nurse out and closed the door when sobs overwhelmed Victoria, and her forehead fell slowly to Cameron’s pale hand.
After a few moments she rose up and hurried straight for him. “Hold me, Dez,” she begged, overwhelmed by how alone in the world—and scared—she was.
His strong arms comforted her, and she was reminded of how her father had held her in the parking lot the day he’d been released from Archer Prison.
“I’m getting your shirt wet,” she murmured, pulling away. Dez’s shirt smelled so good, unlike her father’s. “I’m sorry.”
“Stop it,” he said sympathetically, easing her face gently back against his chest.
“I need to go somewhere,” she whispered.
“Where?”
“Anywhere but here. Take me … please.”
WASHINGTON, DC
“Rockwell’s running all over the Internet to find us.”
“Do you have track-and-trace on him?”
“I’m watching him as we speak. He’s found three of us. His virtual fingerprints are everywhere.”
“He cannot be allowed to find Walter Morgan.”
“That would be very difficult for him to do … but, unfortunately … not impossible.”
“I’m disappointed in Mr. Rockwell. I was hoping he’d be more satisfied to stay in his place and not go digging for things we cannot have him find. I was hoping the money would be enough and that we’d found a permanent solution in him.”
“As we all were hoping. That’s the reason I’ve gone straight to JD Mr. Rockwell cannot be trusted. He’s trying to insulate himself, trying to find ways to protect himself. I’m glad we decided to keep watching him.”
“Yes, you were right. Time left?”
“A minute. I’ll let you know as we close in. What do you have?”
“The information has been passed to Felicity West. It details what we know about her and, in no uncertain terms, what we’ll do unless she votes to acquit Commonwealth Electric Power.”
“How did it happen?”
“I’ll give Rockwell this. He did a nice job of recruiting George Garrison, the head of the guards at Jury Town. Garrison had one of his thugs get to a cleaning woman. Of course, now that Garrison’s taken a bribe, he’s ours for good. We’ll feed him a little along the way, for insurance, but he’s in our pocket.”
“Everyone has a price.”
“Felicity West is still in the jury room; court’s still in session. But she’s in for a nasty surprise when she gets to her room.”
“Angela G
aynor has a nasty surprise of her own approaching.”
“If we can’t manipulate juries, we’ll manipulate the evidence.”
“Exactly. Although, thanks to Garrison, it looks like we’re back in business in Virginia.”
“It didn’t take long, and it’s so much more dependable in the long run.”
“Money talks, bullshit walks. That’s the mantra.”
“That’s always the mantra.”
They shared a harsh laugh.
“And Victoria Lewis?”
“She remains a top priority.”
“Fifteen seconds.”
“That’s all I have. Good timing.”
“Fight on.”
“Yes, fight on, my brother.”
JURY TOWN
“Hi, David.”
Someone tapped Racine gently on the shoulder, and he glanced up from a delicious dinner of roasted chicken and dumplings—straight into Sofia Acosta’s dazzling green eyes.
“May I sit with you?”
“Of course,” he answered—a little too loudly, he chastised himself—and stood up to hold her chair out.
He’d arrived this afternoon and hadn’t finished arranging his room on Wing Four when dinner was served. Tantalizing aromas had seeped into his room, and he was famished, so he’d left the rest of settling in for later. It felt surreal—and lonely—being locked inside these walls. It was only the first day, the first few hours, but he wasn’t certain he’d ever become accustomed to it. Two years was going to seem like ten.
He’d been agonizing over whether Claire had made it to Los Angeles all right—she had a connecting flight. He’d dropped her off at the Richmond airport and then reported directly to Jury Town—and not knowing if she was okay was killing him. He wouldn’t know if she’d arrived all right for two years. He was definitely hungry; however, he’d also been hoping dinner would distract him from her trip. But it hadn’t.
Seeing Sofia did.
“It’s nice to see a familiar face.”
“You’re telling me,” she agreed. “I’ve been walking around like a zombie, not knowing anyone.” She gestured toward the middle of the room as she put her tray down and sat in the chair he was holding. “Thank you.” A hundred people or so were eating. “They all came to Jury Town together. It’s been hard breaking in.”
