The Outsider

by Anthony Franze

  May all your dreams come true.

  CHAPTER 47

  It didn’t feel like Christmas morning. No snow, no Salvation Army bell-ringer outside D.C.’s Union Station, just weary-looking travelers. Three giant wreaths, lit up in white sparkling lights, hung under the station’s three triumphal arches, but they seemed out of place in the sixty-degree weather. It was a December for the record books, with multiple humid, foggy days, and temperatures reaching the seventies.

  Ben Freeman was excited to see Jay. Since Jay had left for NYU, life was too quiet. The house lonely. Truth be told, he missed waking up his cranky kid for high school, which started way too early to be healthy for any teenager. He missed the fights about curfew, Jay’s obsession with his smartphone. There were some tough years after Sharon died: the acting out, the constant fighting, the distance between them. But his Jay had come back to him.

  Ben was parked at the pick-up line, and watched as a group of travelers exited the station and lined up for a cab. Hopefully passengers from Jay’s train. Then he saw his son. He looked good with his bald head, light sweater over broad shoulders. With him, a pretty blonde with a cheerful smile, leggings tucked in her boots. Jay had said her father was an investment banker, hopefully not like the assholes Ben knew from work. Tough-talking alphas who wouldn’t last a week at Quantico. Jay’s girlfriend laughed at something he said. Ben took note that no one gave the interracial couple a second look. Times had changed since he and Sharon had gotten married.

  Ben rolled down the window and called out to them. But a car with an Uber sticker in the window pulled up to the curb, obstructing his view. When the car pulled away, Jay and his girlfriend were gone. Did he forget Ben was picking them up? He tried to suppress the annoyance. It was so Jay to forget.

  Ben was boxed in now and couldn’t catch up to the Uber. He fished out his phone and dialed his son’s mobile. After a few rings Jay picked up.

  “Hey, Dad! Merry Christmas! We just arrived. Should be there in about thirty minutes.”

  “Hey, buddy, Merry Christmas to you too.” He didn’t let the annoyance sneak into his tone, not wanting to spoil his son’s good cheer. “Are you forgetting something?”

  “Ah, I don’t think so, what?”

  “That your old man said he’d pick you up at the station?” He chuckled to let Jay know he wasn’t mad. “I’m sitting outside Union Station. I just saw you get in the Uber.”

  Jay said, “But your assistant e-mailed me, said you were sending an Uber?”

  “I didn’t ask her to—” A wave of terror ripped through him. “Jay, you need to get out of the car.”

  But his son didn’t respond. Jay was talking to the driver. “Why are you pulling over? What are you—” There was the sound of a struggle, Jay howling in agony followed by a woman’s scream.

  “Jay … Jay!” Ben yelled into the phone desperately.

  Then an unfamiliar voice on the line: “Mr. Freeman?”

  “Who is this?” Ben screamed into the phone.

  “If you want to see your son alive ever again, you need to do exactly as I tell you.”

  CHAPTER 48

  On the last day of the year, Gray and his co-clerks were back at the Supreme Court, putting the final touches on the January decisions. He felt rejuvenated from the trip to the Vineyard. Gray’s mind drifted briefly to that spot in the blowing reeds, and he was looking forward to seeing Lauren tonight for New Year’s Eve. One of Justice Anderson’s clerks was having a party, so the plan was to finish up around seven, get cleaned up, then head over. Hopefully they could spend some time alone after the ball dropped. But then the phone rang and they were summoned to the chief’s chambers.

  “I can’t tell you how sorry I am about this.” The chief justice wore a tuxedo, apparently on his way to a party. He’d stopped by the office to break the news to them in person: he needed them to work late. “Justice Cutler insisted that I get her the revised draft of Filstein by tomorrow morning.”

  “On New Year’s Day?” Mike asked, dumbfounded.

  The chief nodded sympathetically. Cutler was on a power trip, toying with the chief. He’d swayed her back to his side on Filstein, but Cutler could always flip. She was the crucial swing vote the chief needed. Gray and his co-clerks stood there, trying not to look annoyed about the last-minute request.

  “No problem, chief,” Keir said. “I’ve looked at Justice Cutler’s memo, and I think I can handle this by myself. There’s no need for everyone else to stay.”

  Gray was surprised that Keir was taking the bullet, but then he realized that it wasn’t about saving his co-clerks’ night. Keir simply didn’t want to share the glory of working on Filstein.

  “That’s very thoughtful of you, Keir,” the chief justice said. “But this is a lot of work, and I think we’ll benefit from the team’s help. I think Cutler’s wavering again, so I’m concerned.”

  Keir gave a reluctant nod.

  “You understand all of her points?” the chief asked.

  “We’ve got it covered,” Keir said without looking at the others. “She just wants to make sure the decision can’t be used to interfere with any other executive orders, that it covers only the drone policy.”

  The chief nodded, yanking at the sleeves of his tux. “That, and she wants to gum up the opinion with citations to her own prior decisions. I swear, the ego on that woman.”

  Cutler was abusing the process. After the justices voted on a case, the chief got to assign who wrote the majority opinion. He assigned Filstein to himself. As was customary, he sent around a proposed opinion to the justices. Cutler had sent back her “join memo,” the way a justice indicates she plans to formally sign-on to another justice’s draft opinion. Often the justice simply joins unconditionally. Cutler’s join memo, however, had several strings attached. Cutler wanted the chief to include a new section in the opinion, and provided a list of several of her prior decisions that she “suggested” the chief work into the majority decision.

  “She’s demanded the draft first thing in the morning,” the chief said, “so I’ll try to review it when I get home tonight, which could be late. If you haven’t already e-mailed it to me, I’ll let you know when I’m home and online.”

  Gray and the others gave defeated nods. So much for New Year’s Eve. They wouldn’t dare send the draft opinion to the chief until he was home. He’d expect them to continue to polish the draft until the last possible minute.

  “Thank you again,” he said.

  The five turned to leave his chambers, but the chief called out to them. “I almost forgot.” He walked from behind his desk and handed Gray a business-sized envelope. “Please deliver this to Wall’s chambers. Slip it under his door if he’s already gone.”

  Gray felt Keir’s glare, annoyed that Gray was given responsibility for the famous “envelope” and its mysterious contents. Gray normally would have marched immediately over to Wall’s chambers and made the delivery, but Keir called a meeting. Keir was still the lead on Filstein, so tonight Gray and the others were his minions.

  In the reception area of chambers Keir said, “All right. I’m going to work on trying to limit the decision without totally gutting the thing. Praveen and Mike, can you draft the insert Cutler wants about executive power?”

  “No problem,” Praveen said. Mike was tapping on his phone, likely canceling on whatever girl he’d lined up for the evening.

  Keir turned to Gray and Lauren. “Why don’t you two figure out how we’re going to work in Justice Cutler’s opinions. I’ve never even heard of half of these stupid cases she wants thrown in. The chief never cites Cutler’s decisions—I think he’d rather cite Korematsu than one of Cutler’s cases—but he said to accommodate her.” In Korematsu v. United States, the court upheld the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. It was widely considered one of the worst Supreme Court cases in history.

  “Gray and I can split them up,” Lauren said.

  Keir handed Lauren a list of citat
ions. Although Keir and Gray had reached a truce, Keir still preferred to deal with Gray through intermediaries. Gray and Lauren went to his office to pull the cases from Westlaw. As they waited for the printer to spit them out, Gray sat back in his chair and stared at the envelope. It was rumored to contain all the votes from the term, including the one in the Anton Troy case. He thought back to his talk with Justice Marcus’s clerk, Helen, just before Thanksgiving.

  After what the chief did in the Anton Troy case, it’s not like Justice Marcus is in the mood to do him any favors.

  Did the chief really vote against saving Troy? The envelope could hold the answer. He plucked absently at the privacy sticker sealing the envelope. Gray then held up the envelope to the light.

  “What are you doing?” Lauren whispered.

  “I told you what Helen said about the Anton Troy vote,” Gray said.

  Lauren shook her head. “She was just trying to justify Justice Marcus not changing his vote on Filstein. There’s no way the chief voted to execute Troy.” She walked over to him. “I heard a clerk once peeked inside and was fired on the spot.”

  She was right. Gray tossed the envelope on the desk.

  “Smart move. I was worried I was going to have to tackle you to the floor to stop you.”

  “Really? Maybe I should tear into it then,” he grabbed for the envelope, laughing, but knocked over his mug. Coffee spilled all over the desk.

  Lauren raced to save the envelope, but it was too late. She picked it up by its corner and let the brown liquid drip on the desktop. Gray pulled out some napkins he kept in a drawer from the many lunches at his desk and blotted the envelope, soaking up the coffee. They found a fan in a storage closet to air it out.

  “You don’t think Wall is waiting on it, do you?” Gray asked.

  Lauren grimaced.

  Amid the loud hum of the box fan, they read Justice Cutler’s cases, trying to identify harmless places they could stick them in the draft Filstein opinion. It was hard to concentrate with the noise, and the distraction of worrying about Wall calling for the envelope that was propped against the fan.

  Near midnight, the envelope was finally dry to the touch. “I’m going to run this over now, so we can watch the ball drop,” Gray said. Lauren had already pulled up the revelry of Times Square on her iPad.

  Gray rushed to Wall’s chambers. The envelope had a large brown stain on it now, but maybe the contents had been spared. Or maybe Justice Wall would assume the chief had spilled the coffee.

  The reception area was dark but for a cut of light coming from the small opening of Wall’s office door. Gray could hear Wall speaking with someone. He was surprised he was in the office this late on New Year’s Eve. Gray was going to knock when he heard a woman’s voice.

  “Who do they belong to?” She was upset, angry.

  “I don’t know, I suppose my wife could’ve left them.”

  “Your wife left her underwear in your office couch? You think I’m a fucking idiot?”

  Gray backed away from the door.

  “Calm down,” Wall said.

  “I’m risking everything seeing you, my career.”

  “And I’m not?” Wall said.

  “You have life tenure,” the woman said. “Maybe I should ask your wife if the panties are hers.”

  “So now you’re threatening me?”

  “Maybe it’s not a threat.”

  A shadow cast over the light from the crack in the door. Gray stood motionless, holding his breath. Justice Wall peered through the opening, but Gray wasn’t sure if the justice had seen him. Wall’s door slammed shut.

  Gray stood in the dark. He’d definitely deliver the envelope later. He made his way back to his office. The countdown for the new year was bellowing from Lauren’s iPad.

  Ten … nine … eight … seven …

  Lauren walked up to him and took his hands in hers. “I’m glad I met you, Grayson Hernandez.”

  … six … five … four …

  “I’m glad I met you too.”

  … three … two …

  One!

  On the iPad, the crowd erupted, couples kissed, and confetti floated in the sky. Lauren softly kissed Gray, then whispered in his ear, which sent a tingle down his spine.

  “Happy New Year, my love.”

  CHAPTER 49

  Milstein woke on New Year’s Day with a splitting headache. She wished it had been the result of a wild night out. But she’d celebrated the end of a shitty year with a shitty night watching TV and waiting three hours for her delivery pizza to arrive. During those three hours, she’d downed a full bottle of Kendall Jackson and some stale crackers.

  The new year meant that the task force officially took over the case. Even before the new year, though, Aaron Dowell had directed the investigation. As expected, Milstein and Cartwright had been relegated to secondary tasks. And everyone was focused singularly on finding former agent Kevin Dugan. To be fair, he fit the profile of the perp: white, male, educated, a motive for revenge. And he’d shown a propensity to violence when he’d beaten the storekeeper all those years ago. There didn’t appear to be a sexual component to the crimes, so that meant there was likely an ideological or personal motive. Dugan wasn’t some jihadist, but he had an extremely personal reason for the killings: to punish those who had taken everything from him. Why was he so hard to find? That itself elevated suspicion.

  But other “whys” flooded Milstein’s thoughts. Why the Supreme Court quill pens? Why was the killer leaving them at the crime scenes? Why was he toying with them with silly messages—random words at the scenes, cutting one of the victim’s hair—like it was Silence of the Lambs? And why kill the reporter at the Franklin Theater? It appeared he was running a story about the decades-old abduction of the Whitlock kids, but why now? And why kill him for it and steal his research files? The only thing they knew was that someone had used a computer at the Supreme Court to research the reporter’s home address shortly before the Franklin attack. Maybe it was a coincidence. But show Milstein an agent who believed in coincidences, and she’d show you someone who shouldn’t be an agent.

  Milstein thought about showering, but decided she’d spend the day in sweats. She wondered what her ex, Chase, was doing right now. Probably with his family in New York. Or on some exotic trip with his new girlfriend. Milstein eyed the bankers boxes in the shallow light of her living room. The FBI’s assistant general counsel, Milstein thought her name was Evanson, had them sent to the field office. The litigation file from the storekeeper’s civil lawsuit against the Bureau. Milstein had lugged a few of the boxes home. Her glamorous assignment from the task force was to write a report summarizing the entire litigation file. Only one box to go. She might as well finish. She carried the box to the couch and opened the lid. It included transcripts—Kevin Dugan’s civil deposition by the looks of it. Three volumes. They must have questioned him for days. There also were some old VHS tapes. The lawsuit was in the nineties, so they’d videotaped the deposition. Milstein didn’t have a VCR—did they even sell them anymore?—so she’d have to read the transcripts. Or maybe the Bureau had an old machine in storage.

  Her cell phone rang. Cartwright’s beefy mug came up on her screen. No doubt calling to invite her over. But she wasn’t in the mood for football or family today. So much for her New Year’s resolution to be more social. She swiped the call to voice mail. Holidays were the worst. She thought for a moment to when she was a kid, before the divorce, her dad and mom dressed up, their modest Long Island home smelling of cookies.

  Her phone rang again. For fuck’s sake, Cartwright. Give it a rest. She answered the line. She expected his usual upbeat Happy New Year! But instead Cartwright said, “He did it again.”

  Milstein felt her stomach drop.

  “Ben Freeman. And Freeman’s son and a young woman, they think it was the son’s girlfriend.”

  “Murdered?” She thought of the handsome former agent. So sure he could handle himself against any attacker. />
  “Not just murdered, Em.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It’s—” Cartwright seemed to be catching his breath. “Can you come now?”

  “Sure. Where?”

  “I’ll text you the address. Ben Freeman’s house in McLean. And, Em…”

  “Yeah?”

  “If you haven’t eaten breakfast yet, you should wait.”

  CHAPTER 50

  Gray took New Year’s Day off, but was back at his desk on Saturday, January 2. It was quiet around the court, and Gray managed to finish his bench memos for the upcoming arguments and even got ahead on the cert pool memos. He also gave his Jando opinion a final sign-off. The Reporter of Decisions, a persnickety man charged with making sure the opinions had no grammar errors and complied with the court’s style guidelines, had e-mailed Gray proposed revisions.

  Lauren appeared at his door. “You see it yet?”

  “See what?”

  “Pull up the Washington Post site.”

  Gray did so and his eyes locked on the headline: DUPONT UNDERGROUND AND FORMER FBI AGENT’S MURDER CONNECTED TO SUPREME COURT.

  “They think the Dupont Underground murders and a former FBI agent’s murder are related, and somehow connected to the court,” Lauren said.

  Gray clicked on the link. The story was short on details, but according to an unidentified source, evidence connected the Dupont killings to the recent murder of a former agent and his son and another woman at the agent’s home.

  Gray shuddered over the description of the crime. Sources said that the agent’s son and son’s girlfriend had been dismembered. They’d been dead for nearly a week before they were found on New Year’s Day. Gray scrolled down the site. The story included photos from the Dupont Underground murders. The killer had spray-painted something in the tunnels near where the bodies were found: