“Sam,” David said. “I want you to be prepared. You’re going to hear about it soon, and you should hear it from me.”
Sam shifted in his seat.
“Everything is taken care of,” David said.
“With . . .”
David raised his hand. He didn’t want Malcolm Widener’s name spoken out loud.
Sam put the back of his hand to his mouth. He looked away, out the window at the cranes towering near the old Union Station railyards.
“So he’s . . .”
David nodded.
“Christ,” Sam said. He shut his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. Killing. He mouthed the word, his lips barely moving as he shook his head.
After a moment, he brought his hand down and turned back. “That isn’t me, David.”
David looked at him squarely. “Isn’t it?”
Sam leaned closer, his face hard with anger. Was that a threat? he seemed to be asking. But it wasn’t. It was just a stark reminder of the stakes they were playing for, the facts they needed to deal with.
“When we talked about this,” Sam said, “this isn’t what I wanted.”
“Come on, Sam. You wanted me to handle it. It’s handled. There was no other choice. You don’t have to pretend with me. You knew what you were asking for. That’s why you’re only having a ministroke right now.”
MacDonough let out a long breath.
“I know you, Sam. I’m the one person who really knows you. I can protect you from all this. I have for twenty-five years, and we only need a few more days.”
Sam ran his hands along his thighs, saying nothing. David wondered if he might break. It would be understandable.
But when Sam turned back, he just nodded his head twice and looked as if the conversation had never happened. He was a politician. The mask was back on.
“The only way out of this is through, all right?” David said. The safest place for Sam MacDonough was in the Oval Office.
David had left behind almost every mark of where he came from as he assumed the ways of Washington. Within a few weeks of arriving at St. Albans as a teen, he had dropped the faint North Jersey accent he didn’t know he had and started saying “water” instead of “wood-ur.” But one trait never left him: he looked out for his friends, no matter what. It was a rare thing here, and it had served him well.
Sam reached for the door handle.
“Are we all right, Sam?” David asked.
Sam’s eyes opened a little wider as he thought about it.
“Of course.” He patted David twice on the leg. “Thank you. For everything.”
19
Nick and Delia worked through most of the night. She caught a couple hours of rest, but there was no chance of Nick sleeping in the middle of all this. A little after five a.m., they drove back to her apartment. She was going to start tracking down anything she could find on those shell companies and the other leads.
Delia had set up the smartphone for Nick so that he could call and message her securely. Calls to his regular number would forward to the smartphone as well.
He told her to keep her head down. She would work this from behind the computer, and he would handle anything on the street.
“What if the police call or come by?” she asked.
“Don’t lie to them,” he said. He didn’t want this coming down on her. “But you don’t have to talk to them either.”
“So don’t answer the door?”
“For anyone,” he said.
He put his hand on the doorknob, preparing to go, but he noticed Delia looking down. Something was sitting wrong with her.
“Why did they choose you to set up, Nick?”
“Because I could get to him.”
“I don’t know. All this work. The way they targeted you. Those messages. It all seems so personal.”
He nodded. He’d been thinking the same thing all night. Nick couldn’t shake that question—Why did they choose you?—as he left her apartment and walked through the predawn gray toward Shaw.
Their work truck was parked in an alley, a rented space a block down from the carriage house. They used it on bigger jobs when they had to carry a lot of gear. He made sure no one was watching it, then got in and headed for home.
The sky was turning red as he wound down a tree-lined street and parked in front of his house. A few lights flicked on in his neighbors’ homes. A minivan cruised by. The Post lay in its plastic wrapper on the driveway.
For an instant, Nick could pretend everything was normal. He could imagine himself inside, a cup of coffee warm in his hand as he split the paper with Karen.
The night had been hunting and being hunted, a thousand questions, the desperation of escape. But now he stepped back.
They had planned to kill him at Widener’s house. He was certain. What could be worth that risk? Worth murdering the former director of Central Intelligence?
He thought of those messages they had planted to make it look like he was threatening Widener. They were dated from a month ago, and he had no idea if they had really been sent then or had just been somehow placed in that account and backdated.
Leave her alone, the message had said.
They made it seem like Nick was a stalker, that he had some grudge against Widener because of a woman. Why would they choose that motive to connect him to Widener? Nick was crazy about his wife. He never strayed.
He looked at his home, perfect as a photo on a real estate agent’s flyer, and Karen’s garden. His eyes lingered on the driveway, the front door, the picture window with a clear view into his living room.
There was only one reason that he could think of. It had happened a month ago, here at this house. A woman he had once known well had come to him with a secret and then disappeared.
Her name was Emma Blair.
20
Emma showed up at Nick’s home unannounced on a cold and cloudless Saturday.
He had just parked his truck in the driveway and was walking to the front door. Karen was out with a friend. He heard footsteps behind him and turned to see Emma Blair coming toward him on his front walk.
She was Nick’s ex and, like Malcolm Widener, a child of the Washington establishment. She and Nick had dated for a year, had been practically living together for part of it, but that had been a decade ago.
He was surprised to see her. They didn’t talk anymore, though he had run into her once or twice in Georgetown. Those encounters had been cordial enough, not much more than a few pleasantries and a goodbye. Everything between them had ended well. It was all in the past.
As she came closer to him on the path, he noticed her tentative steps and the way her eyes never stopped moving, scanning. She was afraid of something.
It wasn’t unusual for people to seek out Nick when they thought they might be in danger. His friends knew the kind of work he did.
Emma started out talking too fast, apologizing for just showing up, saying something about not trusting the phones or email.
“It’s all right, Emma,” he said, speaking calmly, holding his hands out. “Just tell me what’s going on.”
She looked up and down the quiet street, and then at him.
“I need you to protect me,” she said.
“Come inside.”
Nick led her to the living room and Emma sat on the couch, perched on the edge, all restless energy.
“Is someone threatening you?” he asked, standing by the coffee table.
“Yes. I mean, no one has said anything to me, but I’ve seen them at night outside my house, and black trucks behind me on the road, following me.”
“Do you have any idea why anyone might be after you?”
“It’s something that happened a long time ago. It was really bad, Nick. I never talked about it, did anything about it until now. I started trying to make it right, and it got all fucked up.” Panic edged into her voice. “And now the people who did it—”
She took a deep breath in and ran her fingers
under her eyes, then went on, calmer now.
“Please, Nick. I’m scared. I just need you to look out for me for a little while.”
It hurt him to see her, or anyone, this upset. He wanted to sit, to comfort her, but that didn’t feel right with just the two of them in the house.
“Everything’s going to be okay, Emma,” he said, his voice soft. “Don’t worry. Who are we talking about?”
“It’s serious, Nick. It’s DC, it’s this whole town, the people I grew up with. I should have left years ago.”
“Can you give me a little more than that? Anything you tell me stays in this room. Did someone hurt you back then?”
“I don’t want to get into the specifics. I don’t want you to feel like you have to do something, to take it all on. I know how you are, how you don’t let things go. I just need you to watch out for me while I figure out what to do next. It won’t be long.”
Nick checked her eyes. They were clear. Emma had her issues. She drank. When they were together, she had tried to play it off like some high-class bohemian jazz-age charm, all classic cocktails, but he saw it for what it was. That was a big part of why he’d left her. She wasn’t ready to stop, or accept help, though he’d heard that in the years since she’d been in and out of recovery places in New England and out west.
“I can find someone to look out for you, Emma.” He couldn’t guard her himself. He didn’t do that work anymore and it was too intimate a job to do for someone he’d been involved with.
“No. People said you were the best, and I need someone I trust. You were always so good to me, Nick. You’re not part of the world I came from. That’s what I need.”
Her father had been a cabinet secretary, and she’d grown up with too much money and too little attention, attended private school with the sons and daughters of the big names. Those kids ran the town now. They’d inherited it from their parents.
Emma looked up. Her attention fixed on a photo on the wall, a portrait of Karen with her mother and father. She stood and walked toward it.
Karen had also been raised among the elect and had gone to National Cathedral School with Emma. It was the sister school to St. Albans, their campuses side by side surrounding the cathedral and gardens on one of the highest points in the city, Mount Saint Alban.
Emma took a step and peered into the den. A few photos there showed Karen with clients of her PR firm—a governor, the CEO of a tech giant.
She turned back and examined one of the framed shots in the living room. It showed Nick and Karen on their wedding day, walking down the aisle in a field surrounded by friends and family. They had just beaten the rain.
“She’s still close with everyone from school?” Emma asked, her hand inching toward her collar.
“Karen?” Nick said. “A lot of them, sure.”
“Are you?”
A car pulled into the driveway. Nick looked up to see Karen stepping out of the passenger side of her friend’s Mercedes SUV. Karen looked through the window, a smile dawning on her face as she saw Nick, and disappearing just as quickly as Emma came into view.
“Did you ever think you had it backward when you were in the Service, Nick?” Emma asked, watching him carefully. “Guarding all those politicians? Did you ever think you should be protecting us from them?” She took in this perfect Craftsman house and the furniture Karen had inherited from her family. “Or are you part of it now, too?” Emma looked down. “I’m sorry,” she said, her face reddening. “This . . . I should go.”
“We’ll get you some help, Emma. I know a lot of good people. You don’t have to be afraid.”
She broke away, shaking her head. Nick followed her as she marched toward the door and passed Karen without a word. He stopped beside his wife, her face full of puzzlement and hurt. She didn’t need to say anything. Her look said it all. What the hell is this, Nick?
Emma got in her car and drove off.
He should have followed her. He should have found a way to protect her. Now he knew that.
Because he had never seen Emma again. As far as he could tell, no one had ever seen her again. Nick had called to check on her that night, and a few days later. He knew what real fear looked like. He’d seen it in her face.
She didn’t answer the phone. He found out later she didn’t show up to work that Monday. One of her coworkers eventually called the police to report her missing, and they went into her house. She was gone, with no sign of foul play. By the night of Widener’s death, Emma had been missing for a month.
It wasn’t totally out of character for Emma to drop off the map. She would go off on retreats—Costa Rica, Peru—always looking for answers, for an escape. But she had left no trace of any plans for a trip.
After the way she came to him, Nick couldn’t let it go. He felt an obligation, a duty, guilt. She had asked for his protection.
He went looking for her, trying to find anyone who might know who was after her or why she was so afraid. He talked to her friends and coworkers, and some people from her AA meetings. Emma had always been troubled, but she had seemed so clear that day she came to him. She was eight months sober, starting step nine. She was making amends.
As he had searched for her, he’d noticed them every so often in his rearview mirror: black SUVs keeping their distance. He would ask himself if they were following him, if they were pros. Or if maybe Emma was just paranoid and had run off somewhere, and the paranoia was starting to infect him, too.
Nick didn’t find her. He didn’t find the answers. But now he feared the worst: Emma carried a secret worth killing for.
He’d been targeted. Maybe someone thought Emma had shared what she knew with Nick, or thought he was getting too close to the truth. Someone powerful. The kind of person who would have the resources to pull this off and would need to take out a CIA director.
21
Nick stepped through the front door to his house, drew his pistol, and started going through one room after another, clearing them. He’d learned it at Camp Pendleton and mastered it at war. He’d never thought he’d be doing it in his own home.
Karen was due back sometime today. They both traveled constantly. She was a communications consultant and had her own firm. There had been times recently when it felt like they were just regulars at the same hotel.
Part of him hoped that the people hunting him would come here, that they would be waiting. The simplest way out of this would be to haul whoever had really killed Malcolm Widener in to the police.
But the house was empty. He went to the master bedroom and his closet, where he kept a small safe beside his shoe rack. He dialed it open and put a stack of cash into his wallet and his passport in his pocket. Then he took out the Glock 19 and its accessories. He placed them into his pack, along with some clothes.
He still had his knife, with blood dried on the blade and handle, wrapped in a plastic bag he’d taken from the ice bucket at the hotel. He laid it carefully on top of the other items and zipped shut the backpack.
A car engine purred up the street, coming closer.
He went to the window. It was Karen, pulling into the driveway in her Lexus. He shouldered his bag, went downstairs, and met her outside as she stepped out of the car.
“God, it’s good to see you,” he said, spreading his arms and wrapping them around her, holding her close.
After a moment, she stepped back and looked at the bruise growing on his temple. Her eyes widened with concern. “What happened?”
“Work.” He waved his hand. “Just a bump.” He reached into the back of the car, grabbed her suitcase, and led her inside, putting her bag and his backpack down as they walked into the kitchen.
“How was the red-eye?” he asked, and started the coffee.
“Magical as always.”
He looked over her face, framed by dark curls laced with gray she felt no need to cover. Every year she seemed more beautiful, confident, at ease. She laughed and gave him an odd look. He realized he was staring at her, smil
ing like a kid on a first date.
“What’s going on with you?” she asked.
He felt high, flooded with relief. He was home. She was safe.
He wanted to ask her whether she knew if there was a connection between Widener and Emma Blair—they might have known each other from attending neighboring prep schools—but for now he was happy to wait and draw out this moment as if last night had never happened.
“Tell me about your trip. Chicago, right?”
“Oh, the usual,” she said. “Surrounded by saboteurs. But everyone pulled together and we got it done.”
Nick put a cup of coffee with cream beside her on the counter. She took a sip and rolled her shoulders.
“No fun at all?” Nick cocked his head.
She shook hers, the corner of her mouth ticking up. “Are you trying to charm your way out of the doghouse?” she asked. Things had been rocky between them this past month, ever since Emma had shown up at the house and Nick had started looking for her. Karen’s late first husband, a law partner and political fund-raiser, had been unfaithful. She had a hard time with trust.
“Just glad to see you.”
“We went to karaoke,” she said, relenting a little. She took out a plate, then pulled an orange from the bowl on the counter and started to peel it.
“What did you sing?”
“Nick. I appreciate all this, but I’m really tired.”
“‘Sweet Caroline’?”
She nodded. It was her go-to.
“I bet that crushed,” he said.
“You bet right,” she said, the peel one long unbroken strip in her hand. She put it on the plate, pulled the fruit into two halves, and handed one to him.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” she asked.
He wanted to tell her everything, but he checked himself. This was all too dangerous to bring her into. “Yeah,” he said, and touched her arm. “Thanks.”
Hour of the Assassin Page 5