Two agents parked themselves against a wall until Jane said, "Please wait outside." One burly agent gave Sean a piercing look as he and his partner edged to the door. "We'll be right outside, ma'am." He closed the door behind him. Sean turned to face the sister and brother.
"Thank you for coming," Jane said.
"You made it sound like it was important. I hope it is."
His brusque manner seemed to catch the woman off-guard. Before she could respond, Sean turned his attention to Tuck. "You look like you're feeling better. The mother of all concussions healing nicely?"
"It still hurts like hell," said Tuck defensively.
Sean pulled up a chair and sat down across from the pair.
"I just got smacked out of left field by a TV reporter on a witch hunt." He glanced at Jane. "Know anything about that?"
"Of course not, how could I?"
"I don't know." He settled his gaze back on Tuck. "Okay, Tuck, time is of the essence so why beat around the bush? Cassandra Mallory?"
"What about her?"
"Who is she to you?"
"She's an employee of my company."
"That's all?"
"Of course it is."
"That's not what your partner thinks."
"Then he's wrong."
Sean rose and peered out the window. Down below was the motorcade waiting for the First Lady to finish her visit. Life in the bubble. Sean knew it well. Every move treated to the closest scrutiny, sucking the breath right out of you. And yet some spent hundreds of millions of bucks and devoted years of their life to getting to that bubble. Was that insanity, narcissism, or elements of both hidden under the excuse of public service?
He turned back to them, thinking rapidly. If he admitted he knew that the password to Tuck's computer was Cassandra, he'd be confessing his own guilt in hacking into the guy's database. Instead he said, "You willing to take a polygraph on that?"
Tuck started to say something, but Sean saw the First Lady's fingers tighten on his shoulder and no words came out.
"Sean," she began, "why are you doing this?"
"You asked me to investigate this case. That's what I'm doing. I can't help where it might lead, even to places you don't want it to go. You told me to go for it while sitting in the White House. I'm sure you remember. It wasn't that long ago. I believe the exact phrase was, 'Let the chips fall.' "
"I also recall that I asked you to find Willa."
"Well, I can't very well do that if I don't find out who took her and why. And killed Pam in the process." He glared at Tuck when he said this last part.
"I had nothing to do with this," Tuck snapped.
"Then you won't mind taking a polygraph."
"You can't make me take one," he shot back.
"No, but if I go to the FBI and tell them what I've found out, they'll start looking in places you don't want them to look. If you pass the polygraph, I won't do that. That's the deal."
Jane said calmly, "So you talked to his partner, David Hilal?"
"I didn't think you were that familiar with your brother's work."
She continued imperturbably. "Did Hilal also tell you that he's been desperate to buy Tuck out? That he wants the company for his own?"
Sean looked at Tuck. "Is that true?"
"Absolutely true. I won't lie. I've had some financial reversals. David knew I needed money. He wants to buy me out, but at a price that does not reflect the value of the contract with DHS we're working on. It would mean millions of extra dollars."
"So you see, it's in Hilal's interests to implicate Tuck in this. If Tuck goes to jail, Hilal will get everything for pennies."
"Not necessarily," said Sean.
"But I'd be forced to sell at that point, just to pay the lawyer's bills," Tuck pointed out. "He would get it for next to nothing. And I built that company."
Jane added, "Sean, you may want to redirect your attention away from Tuck and onto a more plausible suspect."
Sean took a moment to process this. "You think Hilal orchestrated a kidnapping and murder just so he could blame it on Tuck and get the company? That's a bit of a stretch, don't you think? And why kidnap Willa?"
Jane came around and perched on the edge of the hospital bed. "I'm not going to try and reconstruct the mindset of what may be a psychopath. Yet it's no more of a stretch than thinking my brother would have his wife murdered, his beloved daughter kidnapped, and suffer a blow to his head that could have easily killed him, simply because he was allegedly having an affair."
Sean looked out the window again, his hands stuffed in his pockets. What she was saying did make some sense. He might have jumped to conclusions about what Hilal had said without corroborating it. And yet the computer password? Something jolted him. What if someone had changed the password and made it "Cassandra1"? What if Hilal had done it, thinking that Sean would try to break into the hard drive, guess the password, and conclude beyond doubt that the lady and Tuck were having an affair?
That, he concluded, was about as likely as his insurance company paying for his terrorist damage.
He whipped around. "Tuck, what's the password on your computer at work?" Sean snapped his fingers to push the man's answer along. "Come on, what is it?"
Tuck hesitated just enough. "Carmichael."
Jane said quickly, "That's Pam's maiden name, isn't it?"
Tuck nodded, as he lifted a hand and wiped a tear from his right eye.
You are both lying to me. They know somehow that I hacked the computer. They sent the reporter chick after me. To scare me off.
Tuck's prevarication was not surprising. The First Lady going along with it struck Sean as very odd. He obviously had a lot more digging to do.
"Okay, I'll check out Hilal."
"Good." Jane rose, gave Tuck a peck on the cheek and a hug.
As she walked toward Sean, she said, "I appreciate your continued cooperation on this."
"Right." He ignored her outstretched hand and walked out of the room.
CHAPTER 24
SAM QUARRY WIPED the streaks of sweat from his brow, angled his aching back just so and received a gratifying pop as pressure was released from his overworked spine. He was surveying his farmland from the highest point at Atlee, an anomalous rock mound that jutted about fifty feet in the air with access gained to the top by a series of stone steps worn smooth by the boots of his ancestors. It had been known, at least for as long as Quarry could remember, as Angel Rock. As though it were the stepping-off place to heaven and ostensibly a better life than the one granted to the Quarry family on plain earth. He wasn't a gambling man, but Quarry would've bet a few bucks that almost none of his male ancestors had successfully made the journey.
Atlee, for all its historical significance was, at bottom, a working farm. The only things that had changed over the last two hundred years were what was grown and how it was grown. Diesel engines had replaced mules and plows and a variety of crops had taken the place of cotton and tobacco. Quarry was not wedded to any particular crop and would try something different so long as it could be profitable with small farms like Atlee had become. Like most efficient farmers he obsessed over every detail, from the soil composition, to rainfall, to harvest times down to the minute, to predicted frost levels to yield per acre in relation to expected market prices, to the precise number of hands to do the picking, tractors to do the hauling, and bankers to extend the credit.
He was too far north in Alabama to grow kiwifruit but he had taken a stab at raising canola because a milling plant had finally opened not too far away that could turn the collard-like plant into "value-added" canola oil. It was a good winter crop and produced more income per acre than the staple winter wheat. He also grew traditional produce like cabbage, pole and snap beans, corn, okra, squash, pumpkins, tomatoes, turnip greens, and watermelons.
Some of it fed the people who lived at Atlee with him, but most was sold to local companies and stores for income that was desperately needed. He also carried twenty hogs and t
wo dozen head of forage-fed cattle and had found willing markets in Atlanta and Chicago that used the beef in churrasco cooking. They also kept some for their own consumption.
Farming was a risky proposition under even the best of circumstances. Folks who toiled in the dirt could do everything right and a drought or an early freeze could come and wipe them out. Mother Nature never apologized for her divine and sometimes disastrous intervention. He'd had his share of good and bad years. While it was clear that Quarry would never become rich doing any of this, money just as clearly wasn't the point. He paid his bills, he held his head up, and he was fairly certain a man shouldn't expect more than that out of life unless he was corrupt, overly ambitious, or both.
He spent the next several hours toiling with rented help in the fields. He did this for at least two reasons. First, he liked to work the land. He'd been doing it since he was a boy and saw no reason to stop simply because he was fast becoming an old man. Second, his workers always seemed to put a little more back into their labor when el jefe was around.
Gabriel joined him in the afternoon after walking a mile from the bus stop. The young boy was strong and focused and wielded a tool and drove the machinery with a steady, practiced hand. Later, over dinner, Quarry let Gabriel say the blessing while his mother, Ruth Ann, and Daryl looked on. Then they ate the simple meal, almost all of which had been canned or made from previous harvests. Quarry also listened to Gabriel expound on what he'd learned in school that day.
He looked admiringly at the boy's mother. "He's smart, Ruth Ann. Like a sponge."
Ruth Ann smiled appreciatively. She was rail thin and always would be due to an intestinal disorder that she didn't have the money to treat properly and in about ten years would probably kill her. "Don't get that from me," she said. "Cooking and cleaning, that's all what's in my head."
"You do that real good." This came from Daryl, who sat opposite Gabriel and had been busily shoving cornbread into his mouth before taking a huge gulp of lukewarm well water to wash it down.
"Where's Carlos?" asked Gabriel. "He didn't go off too, like Kurt, did he?"
Daryl shot his father an anxious look, but Quarry calmly finished sopping up some tomato gravy with his cornbread before answering. "He's just doing some things for me out of town. Be back soon."
After dinner, Quarry ventured to the attic where he sat amid the cobwebbed detritus of his family's history, mostly in the form of furniture, clothing, books, and papers. He was not up here for nostalgic purposes, however. He spread the plans out over an old side table that had belonged to his maternal great-grandmother, who'd ended up killing her husband via shotgun blast over-at least the family legend held-a lady with a pretty face, nice manners, and very dark skin.
Quarry studied the road, the building, access points, and potential problem areas detailed on the plans. Then his attention turned to a set of drawings he'd prepared of a more mechanical nature. He had earned a scholarship to college in mechanical engineering, but the war in Vietnam sent those plans awry when his father demanded he enlist to help fight the communist plague. When he'd gotten back home years later his father was dead, Atlee was his, and attending college just wasn't in the cards.
Yet Quarry could fix anything that had either a motor or moving parts. The guts of any machine, no matter how complicated, easily revealed themselves to his mind in startling simplicity. It had paid dividends at Atlee, for while other farmers had to send out for costly help when equipment broke down, Quarry just fixed it himself, mostly lying on his back, a big wrench in his muscled grip.
Thus he pored over the plans and drawings with an expert's eye, seeing where improvements could be made and disaster avoided. Afterward he ventured downstairs and found Daryl cleaning rifles in the small gunroom off the kitchen.
"Ain't no smell better than gun grease," Daryl said, looking up at his father as he walked in the room.
"So you say."
Daryl's sudden smile faded, perhaps because of the memory of a Patriot pistol being leveled against the base of his skull by the man now standing a few feet from him in a room filled with weapons of singular destruction.
Quarry closed and locked the door and then sat down next to his son and unrolled the set of plans on the floor.
"I've already gone over this with Carlos, but I want you to understand it too, just in case."
"I know," his son said, as he wiped down the barrel of his favorite deer rifle.
Quarry rattled the papers at him. "Now this is important, Daryl, no room for screwing up. Pay attention."
After thirty minutes of back-and-forth, a satisfied Quarry rose and folded up the plans. As he patted them back into a long tube he kept them in he said, "Almost crashed the damn plane I was so broke up about Kurt."
"I know," Daryl replied, a tinge of fear in his voice, for he knew his father was an unpredictable man.
"Would've probably cried if it'd been you. Just wanted you to know that."
"You a good man, Daddy."
"No, I don't think I am," said Quarry as he left the room.
He went up to Gabriel's room and called through the door, "You want to go along with me to see Tippi? I got to stop on the way to visit Fred."
"Yes sir, I will." Gabriel put down his book, slipped on his tennis shoes, and spun his baseball cap backward on his head.
A bit later Quarry and Gabriel edged up in front of the Airstream in Quarry's old Dodge. On the seat between them was a box with a few bottles of Jim Beam and three cartons of unfiltered Camels. After setting the box on the wooden steps going up to the Airstream, Quarry and Gabriel lifted from the bed of the truck two crates containing some kitchen-preserved vegetables, ten ears of plump corn, and twenty apples.
Quarry rapped on the door of the old, dented trailer while the cat-quick Gabriel chased a lizard through the dust until it disappeared underneath the Airstream. The old, wrinkled man opened the door and helped Quarry and Gabriel carry in the provisions.
"Thank you," said the man in his native tongue as he eyed the crates.
"Got more than we need, Fred."
When the Indian had come here, he'd never told Quarry his name, he'd just shown up. After a couple of awkward months Quarry had started calling him Fred and the fellow had never objected. He didn't know what his Indian friends called him, but that was their business, Quarry felt.
The two other Indians were inside. One was asleep on a raggedy couch that had no legs and no springs, allowing the man to sink nearly to the floor. His loud snores indicated this did not bother him in the least. The other man was watching a comedy show on an old fifteen-inch television Quarry had given Fred a few years ago.
They cracked open the Beam, smoked, and talked while Gabriel played with an old mutt that had adopted Fred and his Airstream and sipped on a bottle of Coke Fred had given him.
When Quarry occasionally stumbled over a Koasati word, Gabriel would look up and supply it. Every time he did so, Fred would laugh and offer a sip of Beam to Gabriel in reward.
And each time Quarry would hold up his hand. "When he's a man he can drink, but I wouldn't advise it. Does more bad in the long run than good."
"But you drink, Mr. Sam," Gabriel pointed out. "A lot."
"Don't model yourself after me, son. Aim higher."
Later, they drove on to see Tippi. Quarry let Gabriel read from Pride and Prejudice.
"Kind of boring," the boy pronounced when he'd finished the long passage.
Quarry took the book from him and slipped it in his back pocket. "She don't think so."
Gabriel looked over at Tippi. "You never did tell me what happened to her, Mr. Sam."
"No, I never did."
CHAPTER 25
SEAN HAD TALKED to David Hilal again, catching him out in the parking lot as the man was heading home. Tuck's partner had not had much to add to what he'd already said. Yet he calmly answered each and every query as he leaned against his car and simultaneously read and typed messages on his BlackBerry.
&nbs
p; When Sean brought up the issue of the buyout, however, his tone changed. He thrust the BlackBerry in his pocket, folded his arms across his chest, and scowled at Sean.
"What exactly was I supposed to buy him out with? I put all my money into this firm. I'm hocked to the limit. I couldn't even get a loan to buy a car right now."
"He said you made a lowball offer."
"We talked about something like that, but the key is, it was the other way around."
"Him buying you out?"
"That's right. For the lowball offer."
Okay, which one's telling the truth?
"Why would you think of bailing out before the big contract award? Tuck says that would add millions to the value of the firm."
"It absolutely would. If we win it. But it's not a lock. We have proprietary technology that I think is the best out there. That's the reason our prime contractor teamed with us. But we're up against some big players with their own products that are very close in performance and reliability to ours. And the world of government contracting is not done on a level playing field. The big guys skirt the rules, throw the cash around. And because they usually have an inside track they also buy up the most sought-after talent and the little guys get stuck with the scraps. And I don't want to bail out, but I'm running out of money. And if we don't win the contract, the firm will be worth a lot less than the offer he made me. We might have the inside track right now, but like I told you before, the president of the United States' brother-in-law having an affair with Cassandra isn't helping matters. That gets out, we've got problems."
"He said there was nothing between him and Cassandra."
"Really? Then ask him where he stayed when he was down there. I'm sure he'll have some handy excuse."
"You said before you didn't think Tuck would kill his wife, but you don't sound like you love your partner all that much."
"I don't."
"You didn't mention that before."
"Didn't I?"
"I'm a great note-taker. So, no, you didn't."
"Fine. I'm not in the habit of trashing my partner to people I don't even know. But it's hard not to, to tell you the truth."
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