by Jeff Abbott
Belias walked along the trail. The air was rich with the smell of ponderosa pine and snow hung in the air like little escaped fragments of light. He felt savagely glad to be alive after the horror of the penthouse, and as he waited he thought of making a snowball. Silly, insane. He remembered making them one day outside Moscow, at Borodin’s dacha, a snowball fight between him and Roger and Svetlana. Pure silliness. Their laughter had floated in the air like the snow. Her beautiful, lying laughter. Throwing snowballs with him, encouraging him, while she was bedding his father. Now they were all dead, but he was alive; all was going to work out all right; and Sam Capra and this Felix person would soon no longer be a problem.
And Holly. He would have Holly now. She’d seemed a bit surprised by his overture in the Las Vegas airport, but soon she’d want the protection of his arms. Maybe he could join her. Be a father to her kids; he’d do a better job than Glenn ever did. Have a family. The network just needed to run itself out for the next few years, until Henderson’s political career was done with honor, and he’d have enough money to retire wherever he pleased. With no one the wiser of what he’d done.
He saw Frederick Henderson—the senator’s husband—hurrying up the trail. Alone. Good. Out of impulse he hoisted up the cool, pliable snow in his hands and lobbed the snowball at him. It dusted the side of Henderson’s jacket arm on the left side and Henderson scowled at him.
“Is this a joke? Do you know how difficult it was for me to get away? And you want to have a snowball fight?”
“Goodness, you’re tense. Best practice your smiles for the camera. Your wife is going to be the next vice president of the United States. It will be very hard for you and I to meet face-to-face ever again.”
Henderson said, “Yes. And I appreciate how you’ve always been there for us, John. Helping me help her.”
“When is the big announcement?”
“Two days. The vice president’s widow will be joining us for the press conference. In Washington.”
“So unfortunate about Vice President Camden. A stroke, yes?”
“Yes.”
“And lucky that Madame Senator was an obvious choice.”
“Right place at the right time. As you always say, Belias, we make our own luck.” His voice sounded strained. “We thought we’d have to wait for the next election to get the VP spot. But this is better. To steal another quote, fortune favors the prepared.”
“Your own luck. I make your luck. The three people that could conclusively testify in a court of law that they broke laws to benefit Marjorie Henderson are being eliminated. Barbara Scott and Lucky Lazard are already dead. The third will be dead soon enough.”
Henderson paled. “No. Stop it. There’s no point.”
“I won’t have anyone threatening Marjorie’s position,” Belias said. “It’s been a long-term chess game and we’re close to the end. No way I stop now.” He knelt to gather up another snowball.
“You have to stop. Someone might figure out the connections. You have to stop now.”
Belias stood, the snow in his hands, watching Frederick Henderson’s frown. “Like I said, Steady Freddy, practice that smile. I wanted to tell you how we’ll communicate in the future.”
“There is no more. We’re done.”
Belias smiled at him. “What, you think you get too successful, our deal is null and void? Just the opposite.”
“John. Be reasonable. Marjorie has done so much to help you and the others…who have made the pact with you.”
“She doesn’t get to walk away, Freddy.”
“There is no way you can ask Marjorie for anything anymore. She’s under too much scrutiny. You’re like a lobbyist on steroids. She has a chance in three years to run for president.”
“This is what is going to happen…” Belias began.
“No, John, it’s not.” Frederick Henderson’s nasal tone turned to a growl. “You step back. After Marjorie has been president, when she’s no longer in office, maybe she can help you then. She’d still be hugely influential. But we’ve moved beyond you. It would be far too big a danger not only to her, but to you. Be reasonable. You’d get caught trying to stay in touch with us and it won’t ever work.”
“Marjorie is going to make a new best friend. Her name is Holly Marchbanks. They’ll meet at some fund-raiser and Marjorie will find Holly just charming. Holly will quickly become like a sister to her. Holly will be the conduit for information from me to Marjorie. There will be no files, no phone conversations, no electronic or paper trail. They’ll have a private lunch every few weeks and Holly will tell Marjorie what I need done. She can ask her detail to wait outside so Marjorie and Holly can have private talks, the way dearest friends do. No one will suspect.”
Frederick Henderson shook his head. “This won’t work. I told you, we’re done. For the time she’s in office. Then we’ll see.”
“I wonder what the rest of our friends would think, to know someone who could help them is in such high office but won’t. Do you think your beloved wife is the only politician in my network? Do you think I put all my eggs in one basket?”
“Are you threatening Marjorie?”
“I always say I make promises, not threats, Freddy.” He dropped the snowball, dusted his hands free. “I’ll tell the others that she is a direct threat to expose us. Do you really want her targeted by some of the most powerful people in the world?”
“They won’t be able to touch her.”
“They can bring her down. It won’t be hard. The higher the pedestal the more it can totter. I can think of about five or six scandals we could manufacture that would force her resignation. Or even block her appointment before Congress votes on it. There are no more trials these days, Freddy, just unfortunate media coverage.”
“You do that and I’ll expose you.”
“And therefore expose your wife. Who will go down as the first vice president to go to prison.” Belias cracked a smile. “Barbara Scott destroyed her first political rival and Lucky Lazard poisoned the finances of her next big rival and Wade Rawlings derailed another politician who could have brought her down. You are here, Freddy, because we are here. We put you here. And we can remove you.”
“The others…they won’t risk it.”
“Won’t risk what? There is no risk to them. You’ll never tie it to them. What names can you name? None. That’s the beauty of my system. And if I ever thought you were close, then I’d worry about some sort of terrorist attack on you and Marjorie. An assassination attempt. It could be financed. Suicidal fools are easily bought.”
Freddy’s voice shook. “We’ll have Secret Service after the announcement and the confirmation; you’ll never get close to us.”
“What if I own someone inside the Secret Service, Freddy?” And he almost smiled as Freddy Henderson’s face began to pale. “Do you think I haven’t thought this out? You don’t decide to make someone president and not consider all the angles. I thought you loved me for my brain.”
“It won’t work…”
“Marjorie is the throne, Freddy, but I am the power behind the throne, and if you ever forget it, I will kill you and Marjorie and I’ll elevate someone else in her place, even if it takes me another eight years.”
Frederick Henderson didn’t seem to move. As though the words didn’t register.
“Or option two is I get rid of you and let someone else woo Marjorie. A lot of them are very successful men, Frederick, frankly more impressive and better looking than you are. I’m sure many of them would love the chance to be the Second and then the First Gentleman, if you don’t want the honor.”
Frederick Henderson stared.
“Think about all the time you’ve invested in this, Freddy, and what a tragedy it would be to throw all your hard work away. Now. You go on back to Albuquerque. Enjoy your last night not squarely in the limelight. I’ll be in touch soon.”
Without another word Freddy Henderson turned in the snow and walked away. Belias watched him. He dropp
ed the snowball, almost reluctantly, and walked back to his car. Maybe when all this was settled, he’d be able to take Holly and her kids to Canada on a nice vacation. Peter and Emma would probably like a snowball fight, he thought.
He blinked up at the night. This Felix man and Sam Capra were out there somewhere, trying to ruin things. The women had to get to Rawlings first. And then wait for Felix and Capra to show up, and make sure they could never create trouble again.
The lie that Sam had killed Glenn was a good investment, he thought. It made Holly motivated. And Holly as a murderer would bind her tighter to him. It was all going to be okay. It always was.
Part Six
Monday,
November 8
74
Monday, November 8, morning
WE COULD JUST KNOCK on the door,” Holly said.
“If Wade Rawlings is connected to Lazard and Scott and he knows they’re dead, then he’ll be skittish,” Janice said.
“But Belias will have told him to wait here for us.”
“We can’t know Rawlings’s state of mind. I prefer to leave nothing to chance.”
Of course you don’t, Holly thought. If you hadn’t made that video, my husband would still be alive. That thought had wriggled into her brain ever since Janice confessed to making the video; her sympathy for Janice because of Diana’s death kept weakening, charring.
“He’ll be more worried and freaked if we break into the house and surprise him,” Holly pointed out.
“Fine,” Janice said. “You knock on the door and tell him Belias sent you to help him. And I’ll sneak around the back. That way we still have an advantage.”
Holly frowned but said, “Fine.”
She kicked the snow from her shoes and waited until Janice vanished from sight around the house.
Holly stepped onto the porch and knocked. In her coat jacket was one of the guns, the suppressor removed. Out here in the countryside it didn’t matter much if the gun made noise.
She knocked again. No answer. She thought she could hear the quiet buzz of a television and she walked down to the bay window. It opened up onto a den, and in the room sat a man, his face turned away from her. SportsCenter was on ESPN and next to the table was a bottle of Jack Daniel’s, half-empty, a glass next to it. His head sagged.
Scared and drunk, she thought. Men. She rapped slightly on the glass and the man’s head moved upward but he didn’t open the eye that she could see. He sat in a dark upholstered chair, dark suit jacket.
Holly went back to the front door and twisted. The knob was unlocked.
It made her uneasy because she never left the house unlocked. But maybe it was a country habit, no other house for a mile.
She pulled the gun from her jacket. She thought of the Russian woman, the shock on her face as Holly fired.
She stepped inside. She could hear the soft drone of the TV commentators and she waited and she listened and she didn’t hear another noise.
She went back outside and found Janice.
“He’s inside. Drunk and asleep and has SportsCenter on. The front door’s open.”
“Good,” Janice said. “I’ve had enough drama.”
They went back onto the porch and Janice followed Holly into the den. An odd smell, like a distasteful food, lingered in the air. Wade Rawlings looked like his picture, the side of him they could see, and it was only when they stepped close that Holly saw the heavy black masking tape binding Rawlings to the chair.
He seemed to become aware of them, and he turned toward them, the hidden half of his face seared and burnt horribly.
“Janice…” Holly turned toward the other woman, but she registered Felix standing there, a cloud of pepper spray hitting her face and then her world crisped into agony. She was dimly aware of a heavy weight hitting her hard in the stomach, fingers seizing her hair and dragging her along, Janice screaming, and then steps. Falling down steps.
Water. Cool, merciful water pouring over her eyes from a bottle. The agony began to subside, and she could see Janice, her eyes rimmed in red, pouring water over her face. Janice’s lip and nose were bloodied.
“Holly, it’s okay, you’re okay,” Janice croaked.
“Oh, it hurts, it hurts.”
“I know. He left us water. Here.” She pressed a fresh water bottle into Holly’s hands and Holly upended it over her face. The sensation of needles in the eyes began to subside, and for a moment she just lay on the hard, cold concrete, shuddering in her breath.
Felix. He’d hit them with the spray and then beaten them with something heavy. Her face and her stomach ached. She groped in her jacket; her gun was gone.
Slowly she sat up. There was a twelve-pack of bottled water at the base of the stairs, and Janice was pouring another bottle over her own eyes in a trickle. The fronts of their coats and blouses were soaked and a shiver took Holly. She blinked her vision clear and began to glance around.
A basement. They lay at the bottom of the stairs, where Felix had apparently thrown them, and she saw the junk that accumulates in tucked-away spaces: an old typewriter, stacks of boxes, a table with a tottering tower of picture frames laying on their backs.
Unsteadily Holly got to her feet. She clambered up the stairs and tried the door. Locked. A dead bolt appeared to be freshly installed.
She went back down the stairs. There had to be a window. She saw two, both small and narrow and bricked over. She ran back to the middle of the basement as Janice got to her feet. There was a laundry chute but it was a clear drop. She tested the chute’s bottom. It was plastic framing and fabric; it wouldn’t hold her weight. Maybe they could climb on boxes.
Janice joined her. “Maybe,” she said, but doubt in her voice.
“Or maybe there’s something to use as a weapon. An old gun, a knife. He’ll have to open the door to feed us.”
“You’re an optimist. Who says he’s still here or we’re getting fed?”
“He wanted us alive. He could have just shot us dead while we were down,” Holly said, and as she realized it, a chill took her. Not for death. For separation from her kids. She had to get out of here for them.
A gentle knock on the door. “Ladies? Have you freshened up?” Felix.
Holly felt a bolt along her spine at the sound of his voice. Felix knows I killed Diana. What if he says something to Janice? She started glancing around for a weapon. Janice was a killer. Fear pricked her tongue with a taste of brass and blood.
“Ladies?” the voice called again.
“Felix?” Janice went up the steps and Holly hung back.
“Hi, Janice. How are you? Have you been taking care of yourself the past few days? Getting your medications?”
“Felix, I thought you were my friend.”
“I am sure you did. I’m not. And I don’t have cancer. I just pretended to so I could get close to you. So I could ask you to come have a drink with me after the support group meetings. Shame, really, because I liked you. When I didn’t think about you being such a dirty rotten cheater.”
“Cheater?” Janice asked.
“Like all of you. Gaming the system so only you can win. Destroying lives of innocent people so you get the promotion or the hot investment or the right woman. Cheaters.” He said it like someone long ago might have said lepers or a cold warrior might have said Communists, Holly thought. “I got cheated once. You’ll all pay the piper for your past crimes.”
“Felix, let us out. You didn’t really hurt us so I know you don’t want to hurt me. We had so many nice talks…”
“You bore me,” Felix said. “It was so boring listening to you talk at the support group and then at the bar. Having to listen to you talk about how worried you were about your spoiled rotten daughter, your business. Your all-consuming business. I know what you do. I saw the DOWNFALL file, Janice. Ruined lives. You must be so proud. But that’s all right. I used you, too.”
“Felix, please. We can reach an agreement…”
Janice started to speak and Hol
ly touched her arm, shook her head.
“I mean, have you ever thought once about the lives your boss ruins so you can do better? Do you ever think about what it’s like for them? To feel like they’ve played fair, they’ve been honest, they’ve been good, and then some freaking hand of fate reaches down—or rather up, from hell, where Belias belongs—and ruins everything?”
Janice and Holly looked at each other, and then Holly looked at the ground.
“You didn’t keep that DOWNFALL file out of guilt for what you’d done, Janice. You left it so Diana would understand what would be required of her. So she could be just like you.” He managed to spit out the last three words.
“And Holly? I heard what you told Sam. That you did this for your kids. So they could have a better life. What a load. You did this for no one but yourself and that jerk husband of yours. So you could have the nice big house and the finer things and never know want or need or hardship. Not through work, but through deception.”
“No,” Holly said. “I did it for my husband. I did it because he made the pact…”
“And you lacked the courage to leave him,” Felix said. “You two are the sorriest excuses for mothers that I’ve ever seen.”
“Shut up! Did you leave us alive just to give us a lecture?” Janice snapped.
“Yes, I mostly just wanted you to know I’d fooled you, Janice, because you always looked down on me just a bit. The exec, deigning to be friends with a bar manager. I know it warmed the cinder of whatever’s left of your heart.”
“Let us out,” Janice said, “and say that to my face, tough man.”
Holly began to shiver.
“It’s more fun if you stay locked up. I want you to listen to me closely, Janice.”
Oh no, Holly thought.
“Janice, Diana is dead.”
“You’re lying,” Janice said after a moment.
“No. And two people killed her. You are one of them.”
Janice made a noise; she hit her fist against the wall, a blow of rage.
