by Stephen Frey
“Nothing you say will change my mind,” Franz assured her. “I will not support you on Jury Town,” he said as he brushed a piece of lint from his dark gray suit coat. “You thought you could do this project without me. You thought wrong. I intend to start an investigation into this charade,” he promised, glancing at Dez. “Is he on the payroll, too?”
“Dez Braxton is my head of security.”
Franz sneered as he rolled his eyes. “Security. What do you need security for?” He shook his head. “Oh yes, I’m starting an investigation this very afternoon.” He waved behind himself at the door leading to the General Assembly chamber. “And I have tremendous support for that course of action out on the floor. How does that sound to you, Ms. Lewis?”
“It sounds fine,” she replied calmly, moving to the anteroom door opposite the one leading to the chamber.
“Are you taunting me?” Franz demanded. “Are you daring me to do it?”
“I’m telling you to go ahead,” she said defiantly. “But I think it’s important for you to understand what my response will be before you initiate your investigation.” She tapped the knob three times, then opened the door Franz was facing, and nodded to the figure standing there. “Barney, I believe you know Rex Conrad. He’s a guard at Jury Town.”
Franz’s mouth dropped slowly open at the sight of Conrad.
“Dez,” she said, nodding at the door to the chamber, “could you give us a moment.”
“Certainly.”
When he was gone, she turned to Conrad. “Thanks, Rex.” And she closed that door. Now it was just Franz and she inside the anteroom. “So now you know what I have on you personally. Right?”
Franz nodded, his face ashen.
“Here’s the more important point. You’re right. Jury Town is costing the state quite a bit of money at this point. In the long run, it will more than pay for itself; I’m convinced and confident of that. But I can’t deny those fiscal accusations you’re hurling at me out in the chamber.” She hesitated. “I’m taking you into my confidence, Barney. This must remain absolutely confidential between us.”
“All right,” Franz agreed quietly.
“There is another reason I’m certain Jury Town will not cost the taxpayers of Virginia anything.”
“What?”
“The federal government is prepared to write us a check every year to pay for Jury Town. And that comes straight from Michael Delgado, the United States attorney general. No matter what the deficit is, they’ll make it up to us. It will probably come from the Energy Department labeled as something else, but it will come.”
“Why is Delgado willing to do that?”
“Now do you understand?” she asked when she’d finished her explanation of the nationwide jury tampering.
“My God,” he whispered, nodding. “No wonder.”
“Remember, you can’t tell the hounds out there what’s really going on. You must figure out another way to explain it to them.” She pointed at him. “Be a good politician. Don’t make me use what I have on you personally.”
CHAPTER 43
RICHMOND, VIRGINIA
“What happened back there?” Dez turned to look back at Victoria from the front passenger seat of the third Escalade in the convoy, which was rolling through downtown Richmond. “Why was Barney Franz so scared when he saw who was standing behind the door of the anteroom?”
Victoria glanced to her left at the woman sitting beside her, then back at Dez with a raised eyebrow.
“She’s okay,” Dez assured Victoria, nodding at the woman. “I mean, look at her. How can you not have faith in her, given how she’s dressed?”
Victoria trusted Dez completely at this point. If he claimed the member of the security team sitting to her left was okay, then she was okay.
And then there was his other point on top of all that.
“I do like your outfit,” Victoria joked as she gave the woman an apologetic smile. “It makes you look even more like me.”
“Thanks.”
“I’m just being careful, as your boss has taught me,” Victoria said, gesturing at Dez. “No offense meant.”
“None taken.”
“What about Rex?” Dez asked.
“Rex was a state trooper before he came on board at Jury Town. In his off-hours from the state force, he ran security for a few high-ranking members of the General Assembly when they needed it. One of those individuals was Barney Franz.” Victoria leaned forward as the Escalade pulled to a stop in front of the Virginia Supreme Court Building. “Mr. Franz has a wife and three children. But, apparently, he’s having an affair, or at least he was. And it was with a young man. Quite by accident, Rex Conrad discovered that affair one night.”
“Jesus,” Dez whispered. “People.”
“That’s why Mr. Franz was so shocked when he saw Rex. He knew what was up immediately.”
“And you knew he would.”
“I don’t believe Mr. Franz will be stirring up any more problems for Jury Town in the General Assembly.”
“Nice.”
She shook her head and grinned wryly. Jury Town had been organized to defend against exactly the sort of blackmail Franz had just been a victim of—and he’d been trying to destroy it. The irony was almost too perfect for her to accept.
“Arriving at the Supreme Court,” Dez muttered into his microphone. “Everyone ready.”
“Thank goodness,” Victoria said quietly to herself, glancing at her watch as the car pulled to a stop at the curb. “Judge Eldridge despises being kept waiting.” She reached for the handle of the door.
JD had not been left with a great deal of time to make arrangements. Still, he was quite satisfied with his impromptu sniper nest.
Two hours ago, he’d trailed an elderly woman back to her apartment in downtown Richmond, forced his way inside when she’d answered his knock, strangled her, and then hidden her body on the floor of her bedroom closet.
The old woman’s ninth-floor apartment had a small balcony with a beautiful view of the Virginia Supreme Court Building.
As the convoy of four black SUVs came into view, he began to breathe deliberately, consciously controlling his heartbeat. God, he loved these moments just before a kill.
He quickly checked right and left, at the balconies on either side of him, then raised his M40A5, rested the rifle’s black barrel on the patio’s banister, pressed his eye to the near end of the scope, and grinned slightly as those old familiar crosshairs came into view.
As soon as the blond woman wearing the red suit appeared from the back of the convoy’s third SUV, JD acquired her, held his breath, and squeezed his gloved finger. Through the scope, he saw the woman fall.
“What the hell are you doing out here?”
JD rose up quickly and pivoted right. A man had appeared on the balcony next door. Well, this would be an even simpler shot.
He hit the man squarely in the forehead, sending him over the banister and down nine stories.
JD set the rifle down. He hated to leave it, but he couldn’t be seen carrying it. Besides, he had nine more exactly like it at home.
Now he had to meet Salvatore Celino—and then get to Maine.
JURY TOWN
Racine and Sofia stood side by side in her room, watching a replay of the prosecutor interrogating Jack Hoffman on the screen on the desk. Court proceedings had concluded for the day an hour ago, and he’d arranged, as the foreman, to have the replay sent to Sofia’s screen so they could watch it together.
“Here it comes, here it comes,” Sofia murmured excitedly, clenching his arm.
“Quite a grip you’ve got there,” he said, laughing as the wonderful tropical scent of her body lotion reached him.
“Watch, watch!”
As he gazed at the prosecutor’s face, Racine realized that Sofia was right. The man did seem shocked by Hoffman’s answer to his question. And why would he? Hoffman was his witness.
“You see?” she asked, leaning toward him so her face was close
to his.
Her expression was almost childlike, and it melted him. “I do,” he admitted. He wasn’t just saying it, either. She was right.
“Angela Gaynor is innocent.”
Racine gazed into those glittering green eyes for several moments. “I’ve got an idea.”
“Is it to help her?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, bueno!” she shouted, thrusting her arms around him and hugging him tightly. “What is the idea?” she asked, leaning back.
“I’ll tell you later.” He reached up and gently brushed tears from her face. “What’s wrong, Sofia?”
“Nothing,” she murmured, turning away.
“Tell me.”
“I miss my children so much.”
“I’m sorry. I know it’s so hard for you to—”
Racine stopped short when he caught a look at Victoria Lewis’ inspirational quote of the day, visible at the bottom of the screen now that the video they’d been watching had ended.
And a chill crawled slowly up his spine.
“Are you all right, David?”
He glanced over at her. “Yeah, I’m fine. I’m thinking maybe I can help you with how much you miss your children … maybe for a little while, anyway.”
CHAPTER 44
NORTHERN VIRGINIA (FAIRFAX)
Dez grabbed his phone off the interrogation room table inside the Fairfax County Jail and scanned the message. “Good news.”
“Melanie?”
“Yes, and she’s fine. She’s out of the hospital. They kept her overnight for observation, but they released her a few minutes ago.”
Victoria’s shoulders sagged with relief. “Thank God.”
Melanie Otto had acted as Victoria’s double yesterday on the trip into Richmond. She and Victoria were roughly the same height and petite build; Melanie had worn a blond wig as well as a red suit, matching the one Victoria had appeared at the General Assembly wearing, to complete the illusion.
Beneath the suit, she’d worn the latest high-tech body armor—ultrathin but ultrastrong. The assassin’s bullet had been straight and true, directly on target to pass through the heart from behind. If not for the armor, Melanie would have been killed after stepping from the SUV onto the sidewalk in front of the Supreme Court Building.
“She’s got a hell of a bruise on her back,” Dez said, finishing the message, “but she’s okay.”
“What if the shot had been to her head?” Victoria asked.
“No chance,” Dez answered confidently. “A sniper always goes for the chest. It gives him or her much better odds because it’s a much bigger target.” He placed the phone back down on the table. “It’s time to take this to the FBI, Victoria. We can’t hold back on this any longer. We need to find out who’s after you, and we need to find out as soon as possible.”
“I agree,” she said quietly. “Hopefully, what you and Mitch are up to later will lead to something.”
“Hopefully,” Dez agreed as two jail guards escorted George Garrison into the interrogation room.
When Garrison was seated across from her and the guards were gone, Victoria leaned over the table toward him. “Are you tired of sitting in here?” she asked. “Are you ready to talk?”
“It depends,” Garrison answered.
“No,” she snapped, “no conditions.”
“But, I—”
“We’re closing in on your benefactors independently,” she interrupted, gesturing at Dez. “By this time tomorrow, we may not need you, George.”
“Will you put me in the Witness Protection Program?”
“If you give me a name, and that name turns out to be relevant.”
Garrison exhaled heavily. “Okay.”
“Who was it?” Victoria asked. “Who approached you about manipulating the Commonwealth Electric verdict?”
“A man named Philip Rockwell.”
GREENWICH, CONNECTICUT
The two women behind the reception desk glanced up in shock as seven FBI agents hurried through the main entrance of Rockwell & Company, the lead agent with his badge open and displayed.
“Special Agent Holmes of the FBI,” he announced to the two open-mouthed women behind the desk. Other agents had already reported in that Philip Rockwell was not at his home in Connecticut. And still others were posted at the two back exits to these offices in case Rockwell tried to escape. “I’m looking for Philip Rockwell.”
“He’s not here,” one of the women answered in a quivering voice.
“Where is he?”
“Traveling, but we don’t know where. Sometimes he doesn’t tell us where he goes.”
RICHMOND, VIRGINIA
Through powerful binoculars and the gathering dusk, Mitch watched Salvatore amble through the strip mall parking lot and deliver the package to a slim young man with short blond hair and buckteeth. Unbeknownst to the young man, an ex–Special Forces man was, at this moment, affixing a GPS beacon to the underside of the kid’s silver Charger. Meanwhile the young man accepted what he believed was a complete list of Jury Town occupants from Salvatore, which were, in fact, bogus names.
This was the young man Salvatore had been passing Jury Town information to for the last six months—in return for a great deal more money than Salvatore was paying Mitch. Salvatore had all but admitted to this as he was being interrogated in Mitch’s Denali—after being taken into “custody” on the dirt road beside the James.
The attack had been executed to perfection. Dez and nine of his people had parachuted down and subdued the mobsters in seconds, cuffing Mitch as well, so Salvatore had no idea that Mitch was involved.
Dez, who’d played the part of the detective, had promised Salvatore a “better deal” if he would cooperate. Salvatore had done exactly what Mitch had suspected. And laughed at them at first.
But Dez had persisted. Ultimately, convincing Salvatore that he’d been videoed with night-vision technology bribing a state official—which Salvatore knew would involve significant prison time. Ultimately, the mob boss had agreed to lead them to his contact—if only, Mitch suspected, to avoid spurring a turf war among the other Mafia families if he were arrested.
Mitch shifted the binocular’s aim left to the Charger. The beacon had been attached. Good thing, because the young man was already headed back to the car.
Mitch held up his phone, displaying the blinking dot on the map, and nodded to himself. The beacon was working perfectly. It was time to find out who the young man driving the silver Charger was working for.
CHAPTER 45
JURY TOWN
“I’ve seen enough,” an overweight man in the front row of the jury box spoke up as all four screens on the opposite wall went dark, signaling an end to the week’s testimony. “Angela Gaynor’s guilty as sin.”
Racine grimaced as he glanced down from his seat at the back right of the second row. The guy had quickly proven himself obnoxiously opinionated and unfailingly willing to deliver those opinions throughout the trial. There was always one in every crowd, Racine figured, a know-it-all who couldn’t wait to speak up about anything and everything. It was the same way in business. As CEO of Excel Games, he’d made it a point to quash that obnoxious individual immediately in any meeting he attended. Here in Jury Room Thirteen, he couldn’t be so aggressive.
“She had her executives paying everybody,” the man went on, brushing Reese’s Cup crumbs from the front of his scarlet golf shirt.
Racine had counted the guy making three trips to the snack table—just in this afternoon’s session.
“And she paid the mayor herself on that one sports complex deal,” the guy continued. “This trial’s over as far as I’m concerned.”
This afternoon they’d heard the ex-mayor of Hampton, Virginia, swear that Angela Gaynor had delivered fifty thousand dollars of cash to him personally.
“Over!” he added emphatically.
“Easy, easy,” Racine called out, “let’s not get ahead of ourselves. We’ve got more rebuttal test
imony coming Monday morning concerning the alleged e-mails. Then we can get to the verdict. Let’s all keep an open mind until then.”
“And let’s not forget that Ms. Gaynor had an alibi,” Sofia spoke up. “Trent Tucker swore he was with her the day the CEO says she delivered money to the mayor.”
Racine leaned forward so he could see.
“Big deal,” the fat man snapped back at Sofia, groaning and yawning while he stretched. “Trent Tucker would probably say anything for her.”
“Why?”
The fat man shrugged. “I can just tell.”
“But you’ve got no good reason to say that.”
“Do I really have to?” he asked, shooting another of the white men in the jury a knowing look. “Come on, everyone knows what I’m saying.”
“Don’t even go there,” Sofia warned, her Spanish accent becoming more pronounced the more animated she became.
Racine grinned. Sofia never backed down.
“Why are you convinced Trent Tucker’s telling the truth?” the guy asked.
“I’m not.”
“Then what are you talking about?”
“Everything’s packaged too neatly,” Sofia explained. “The witnesses against Angela Gaynor all sound like they were in study group together.”
“Give me a break.”
“And I think Ms. Gaynor is way too smart to bribe people so clumsily if she were actually going to do it.”
“So you’re saying you wouldn’t put it past her to make a bribe.”
“I wouldn’t put it past most people, if you want to know the truth. Everyone has a price.”
“Not me,” the man said arrogantly.
“You’re in here, aren’t you?”
Racine shook his head and grinned again. Zing.
“Yeah, well, I—”
“I think she’s guilty, too,” a black man sitting in the back row spoke up. “Did you hear how much she’s going to make on that sports complex?” He pointed at Sofia. “Just like you said, follow the money trail and you’ll find the truth.”
“She’s definitely guilty,” a woman in the back row echoed, “and we should always send messages to fat cats when we can.”
