by Jason Winn
A sickening knot built up in her stomach as she dialed the notice number once more.
“Hello, please state the document number you are calling about, followed by the requesting party or parties. If you have reached this number in error, please hang up now.”
“Document Number 223871-G. Shelby Painter.”
The receiver fell out of her hands and clamored on the desk, before Ms. Hepler snatched it up and slammed it down on the cradle. She resolved herself to forget about all the bad things that were surely to follow for Ms. Painter. Surely, she was a bad person for asking about such sensitive information. She must be up to no good. That was it. Ms. Hepler had done a good thing by reporting the request. Secrets needed to remain secret, for the good of the country.
With that mollifying thought in her head, she stacked the files back onto her pushcart and sent the notice to Ms. Painter that the search for Moonmilk and Rose Widow had yielded no results.
***
Two days later, three armed Marines accompanied Ronald Golden, special counsel to the president, who carried a message in a sealed, tamper-proof bag. The quartet raced down Vermont’s Highway 7 in a blacked-out Ford Explorer. They had strict orders to hand the message to former Senator Albert Connolly. They would be at his home, outside of Middlebury, Vermont in fifteen minutes.
Now in his nineties, Senator Connolly reveled in his escape from Washington almost a decade ago. The party faithful had begged him to run for an unprecedented ninth term, but he fought them off.
“I’ve got soil to till and fish to fry,” he said over scotch and through cigar smoke. “Let me go,” he’d said to the party boss, as a crowd of suit-wearing hopefuls sat staring, wishful looks in their eyes, along a big oak table.
“You’re sure you can’t win one more for us? That Sally woman is going to ruin us,” said the boss, with his best “the world’s comin’ to an end, if you can’t pull this off for us.”
Connolly cut him off. “You’ll live. The party will live. The sun will rise, the sun will set and I’ll forget all about you bastards,” said soon-to-be former Senator Connolly.
With that he mashed out his cigar, downed his scotch and walked out of politics for the rest of his life. That is, until the black SUV pulled up so close to his hedgerow, it almost plowed over his cubic cypress bushes.
Senator Connolly knelt in his flower bed, covered in topsoil and the dead leaves from the azaleas he was trying to plant. He didn’t bother to look up as the four men clomped up the brick walkway.
“Not too subtle, are you?” he called out.
The men stopped a few feet away from him.
“Senator Connolly,” said Ron Golden. He was a short, bald man with the shoulders of a linebacker, and wore bifocals with thick black frames.
“What now? You come to shoot me? Get on with it.” He pushed a small azalea into the hole he’d dug, smoothing the dirt back around the exposed roots.
“Sir, we’re here because someone has tried to access information on Project Ajax.”
Senator Connolly’s head sunk. “God damn it,” he muttered.
With a grunt, he rose to his feet, not bothering to brush away the black dirt from his knees. He was a short, wiry man with a wide nose and big ears. Despite his age his keen eyes had the flicker of a teenager. They narrowed as he measured the president’s man.
“Say that again, boy? And who the hell are you?”
“Sir, I am Ronald Goldman, special counsel to the...”
Senator Connolly held up a hand. “That idiot in the White House. Good gravy you kids get younger and younger, don’t you? Now what was the first part again?” At Connolly’s age, everyone was a young man, even the sixty-five-year-old Golden.
“Sir, as I said, someone has requested information on Project Ajax.”
There was a silent pause, save for the Ford’s motor still running and the lawn sprinkler twitching in the backyard.
“Couldn’t have waited until I was dead, could they?” Connolly said, staring down at his half-planted flower bed. He wanted to plant the rest and sit in his chair and watch Jeopardy. But, he was sworn to do something. Protocol demanded it. He was bound to protect Project Ajax for the rest of his life, provided he was of sound mind. He’d never expected they’d come for him, but after General Franks died five years ago, he was the last member of the response team. And as long as he was alive, there was no need to pass that responsibility down to another generation. No one was going to see the briefing films or read the files, or visit the installations that were closed up and locked tight.
Ronald started to say something, but the senator stopped him with a shake of the head.
“What’s in the bag?” asked Connolly. His tone had gone from feisty old man to tired old man as he started sorting out what to do next.
“Sir, it is for your eyes only,” said Ronald.
“Well hand it over. I hope you brought the key.”
Ronald nodded to the Marine carrying the tamper-proof bag, who in turn produced a key, unlocked the lock on the zipper and opened the bag. Ronald then pulled out a single envelope and handed it over.
“I’ll read this in private,” said Connolly. His shoulders had shrunk and suddenly he felt tired and weak.
“Sir,” Ronald started, “I have to take that back to...”
“Go on, boy, and buy these devil dogs a steak dinner.” He nodded to the Marines behind Ronald, who stood at parade rest. One of them cracked a smile. “You go tell your idiot boss, I’ve got this in hand.”
With that, former Senator Albert Connolly turned toward his house and trudged inside, thinking about the only person left he could contact: Colonel Nathan Trask.
Chapter 26
Madison and Sarah sat in the poolroom, watching the night sky. The lights were off, and the glow of the DC skyline could be seen on the other side of the river.
A secure text lit up Madison’s phone—it was from the Outfit. The charges of disturbing the peace and interfering with an officer in the course of their duty had been dropped. As an added bonus, the officer who had roughed her up, Crate, had been suspended and would probably be fired.
“Damn. Remind me never to piss you guys off,” Madison mumbled to herself.
“What?” asked Sarah.
“Nothing, just the Outfit telling me the police shit from the other night is handled.”
Her thoughts returned to the dinner party Sarah had turned into a gun show. Next to her was a half-empty bottle of Ciroc. Sarah puffed absently on a joint, twirling a lock of blonde hair in her fingers.
“You probably shouldn’t have shot him in front of everyone like that,” said Madison.
“No,” said Sarah as she exhaled smoke. “I should have cut his throat—would have been more blood to send the message.”
Maybe Sarah was right. Hank was a pile of ash, melting into the dirt behind the greenhouse. Madison felt nothing seeing the Winter Rose convert his bloody flesh and bone into something resembling an expertly built sand sculpture. He’d been an arrogant pain in the ass to deal with, always condescending to her, never offering up a compliment or so much as a thank-you for putting money in his pocket. And he loved reminding her how much she needed him.
“I don’t want to kill any more of them. You get me?” said Madison.
“You can’t be a half-assed gangster, Maddy.” Sarah took another drag off her joint, before sitting up and looking Madison in the face. “If you show them any weakness, they’ll turn on you.”
“I doubt that.” But Madison didn’t feel as confident in that statement as she wanted. “We’ve got the recipe and the storm brewer. What do they have?”
“They know where you live. How long will it take for them to figure out the storm brewer is hidden in the basement? One of them gets pissed, thinks you’re weak or playing favorites, and maybe they decide they can run things better than you. They bust in here, torture you, me or Margaret to death. Eventually you talk.” She took another puff and exhaled. “Everyone crac
ks, eventually. Everyone. All it takes is a pair of pliers, maybe a hammer to the knee. You’ll tell them. I’d tell them.”
Sarah’s calm in describing torture was unsettling. Madison felt her heart flutter and took a huge gulp of vodka, before refilling her glass. She didn’t want to think about any of that.
“So Maddy, people need to know you’re aren’t going to put up with that shit. Warlords and mob bosses have to intimidate to keep their people in line. I watched a man bash in the skull of his brother once, because the brother was stealing from him.”
Madison went sober for a moment. “Jesus, where was that?”
Sarah took a deep drag. “Nigeria.” Her eyes went distant. “It was so fucked up. Daddy was waiting for this man, named Sam, to bring him the money for this truckload of Chinese land mines. Sam was huge and scary looking. I can still see him standing there, in his dusty military uniform, sweat rolling down his skin. It’s really hot in Nigeria.
“We’d been there a few times before, to sell stuff to Sam. Didn’t think anything would go wrong.” Sarah smiled. “Daddy told me we’d go to Paris after the deal, spend a month at Disney Land there.” Her face went cold again. “Sam’s brother was supposed to bring the money, but he acted like he didn’t have it. Maybe the brother was hoping my dad would get mad and shoot Sam. It wasn’t a very good plan. One of Sam’s goons found the money stashed behind the seat of a car in like two seconds. So Sam knocks his own brother down, picks up a big rock and bashes in his head, right there. You could tell the rest of the people there were never going to fuck with Sam again.”
“Jesus Christ. How old were you?”
“Thirteen, maybe fourteen.”
“Why did he take you all over the place like that?”
“At first, it was for cover. We pretended to be missionaries when he took me to Eastern Europe. That was when I was around nine or ten. He told mom he was taking me to visit his mother in Boca Raton.”
“What were you doing there?”
“Running guns to the Ukrainian resistance.”
“Why were you disguised as missionaries?”
“Want to know a secret?”
“Sure.”
“There’s a whole denomination of Catholic churches in that part of the world that are tied to organized crime. Governments use them as an intel network and waypoint system to move guns and equipment around. Nobody suspects the churches.” She smiled at Madison and winked.
“That still doesn’t explain why your father took you.”
“A guy and his little girl don’t attract very much attention. Daddy wore a fake beard and I had to wear a black wig. We loaded up a big truck full of crates and drove to the other side of the country and sold them. Then he took me to Switzerland and we skied for a week. It was great. The next trip, I got to be a lookout. I saw a guy try to pull a knife on Daddy, screamed just like he taught me, and he beat the shit out of that guy. After that trip we got to go to Kenya and do a safari. That shit was amazing. Got to see a bunch of cheetahs and giraffes.”
Sarah had a way of normalizing her fucked-up childhood. There was something preternatural about her ability to suppress the horrors she’d witnessed as a child. Maybe it was all the weed she smoked. If that was the case, Madison was all too happy to let her smoke up.
“Where the fuck was your mother in all of this?” Madison asked.
“At home. Choosing to think that I was on some educational trip. She knew what Daddy did. She was probably cheating on him while he was gone all the time. She never once stopped him from taking me, either. I don’t know. Other than the fact that she seemed a lot more mellow when we came back as compared to when we left. She would try to hide her feelings, but you can just sense things with people sometimes. You know?”
“I don’t feel anything. Maybe that’s what’s wrong with me.”
“Careful the levy don’t break.”
“What do you mean?”
“All those feelings might be hiding out in you somewhere. Never know when they might all want to come out at one time.”
That would be one hell of a flood.
Sarah shook her head, as if to clear it. “How did Nancy keep people afraid?”
“Langston mentioned they used to talk about the White Union—they were the sorcerer assassins, all from this one school named Shenandoah Pines.”
“Well I don’t know any spells.”
Sarah was right—they were exposed and looked like a couple of lotto winners who didn’t know how to treat real money, the kind who were eventually found dead in a room full of hookers and a pile of blow.
“Shit,” said Madison. “You’re right. We need an army.”
She needed an army of Sarahs. But where to go for that? Protection companies were out—Madison and Sarah had discussed those in the past. All the shady ones Sarah knew through her father were overseas making a fortune guarding black ops bases and secret prisons.
“Who’s going to handle Hank’s clients now?” asked Madison.
“It doesn’t matter,” said Sarah placidly. “Our Moonmilk is the best, by far. They’ll find you.”
“Maddy,” called Margaret. “I think everyone is gone.” She came shuffling into the poolroom, wearing a faded and somewhat tattered bathrobe over flannel pajamas. In her hands, she carried a blue notebook embossed with the outline of a blue rose, the logo for Blue Petal Foods.
“Yeah,” said Madison, “everyone cleared out a while ago. What are you still doing up?”
“Some loud banging woke me up, sounded like party poppers.”
“Sorry about that,” said Sarah. “Things got a little out of control.”
Margaret flopped down in a chair next to the girls and stared out into the night sky, beyond the poolroom glass.
“What’cha got there?” asked Madison.
“Oh, almost forgot,” said Margaret, “I found this the other day in your grandmother’s closet. I thought you might like to have a look.”
Madison sat up and took the outstretched book from Margaret. She was a little tipsy, and figured now was as good a time as any to ask Margaret a question that had been nagging away at her for months.
“Margaret, how did she do it all?”
“Nancy?”
“Yeah, I mean she built Blue Petal from nothing and ran a Moonmilk empire. I can barely hold the latter together, never mind thinking about the former.”
Margaret though for a moment and then smiled. “She always surrounded herself with good people, honest, reliable people.”
That wasn’t much help. “I get that. I mean did you ever see her lose her cool, crack under the pressure?”
“No. She was made of iron, that one.” Margaret paused and her eyes drifted away from Madison’s. “Until your grandfather died. Then she seemed to darken. I think she killed a lot of people after that, right before she left.”
“What do you mean?”
“Oh, you don’t know, do you?”
“Know what?”
Sarah seemed to be paying particularly close attention now.
“Well, she’s not around to scold me for telling you, and your mother isn’t here to stop me.”
“Stop you from what?” asked Sarah.
Margaret shifted around in the chair, getting comfortable for a long story. “Your grandfather didn’t die in a hiking accident. He was murdered.”
Chapter 27
Fans hooted and carried on as they exited the stands of Nationals Park. Dana elbowed her way through the crowd and down First Street, trying to get to her Uber driver. Her souvenir bags hung heavy from her arms as she fiddled with her phone.
The air was hot and damp and the smell of victory fireworks clung to the humid air. The Nats had won and the night was young. The few sad Cubs fans milling about couldn’t be all that sad, having broken the curse a while back.
Where to now? Dana had a mind to troll for an evening hookup. The bars would be full of cute guys, looking for someone to take home.
Her mood dar
kened seeing the limousines that lined the street, black, clean, and glowing under the stadium lights. All flanked by smart-looking drivers.
Waiting for their richie owners, she thought.
She should be in one of those, instead of waiting for some Arab who didn’t speak English. He would offer a few grunts, while talking on his phone the entire ride. Maybe that’s what money bought you—a driver that stayed off his fucking phone and spoke English. Was that the line between rich and poor? Dana decided that it was.
Her suspicion was confirmed when a fat white man, clad in a cream-colored linen suit and red sink shirt, led four bimbos into the back of one. The driver asked him, in a British accent no less, if he enjoyed the game.
Of course he did. His girls were taking turns on his cock while Harper was knocking down three home runs. Brice Harper wasn’t the only one scoring in the park tonight.
A group of quiet men with tan muscles and thick beards strolled past her. There were six of them and they didn’t look like the rest of the fans. Their clothes blended in, but their eyes shot in all directions, like Secret Service agents. A few of them were cute, Dana thought. But guys like them always had girlfriends or wives. They were always attached. Unlike her.
She considered for a moment that for the last few months, that’s all she’d been: alone. Why was that? Madison had all the friends. But that was because she was smart and pretty and outgoing. Somehow Dana got the quiet genes, from her dad no doubt.
It was better to be alone, though, because in the end people did shitty things to you. They lied and backstabbed. Some even hit you, especially when they found out you were basically an heiress, with potentially millions of dollars coming to you from a trust fund, so long as you were willing to get married and have kids. One of her old boyfriends tried to beat the money out of her.
Feeling the weight of her bags and the five beers, she found a bench and sat down, telling herself that she was waiting for the crowds to clear up.
The abusive relationships were way back in the rear-view mirror. There was no sense in dwelling on those now. She wasn’t going to put herself in that situation again. She needed to be strong like Madison. But Madison didn’t want to share. She wanted to keep everything for herself. That was so typical.
