I’m going to vomit.
“I looked into him. Halliday, too. You know, online. Did some…digging.”
Hacking. Not like it matters, really. Not when you compare it to his other sins.
“What I found…I knew…I knew what he’d done to you. His campaign…He was doing research. On us. Dylan, too. He was using a private investigator.”
In my mind I can see that search term on Zachary’s laptop. DC private investigators. The pieces are falling into place. “You hacked in to see what he was doing.” My voice sounds chillingly calm.
“The guy was following you, Mom. Following us. And I saw Halliday’s emails. He thought you were a liability. They were making plans to discredit you. To ruin you.”
Why didn’t he tell me? Why couldn’t we have dealt with that, together? “Zachary—”
“I had to do something. So I started meeting with him. And I—”
Oh God. “The gun—it really was yours?”
He shakes his head, adamantly. “I met with a dealer, but I didn’t buy.”
“You were going to shoot him?”
“No!” He sounds astounded that I would suggest it. “It was for protection. To protect us.”
Relief staggers me, but is swiftly extinguished. This wasn’t protection. This was murder.
“Last week, someone contacted me. Dealer’s friend. Said he’d gotten some…drugs.”
I never should have said anything to him. Never should have let him know what was happening. “So you bought the poison. With your grandmother’s money. And Dylan?”
“When I saw his name on the encrypted forum—DTaylor—I knew. That Halliday was setting us up. Trying to destroy my life, and Dylan’s, and yours, too. I couldn’t let him get away with it, Mom. Especially not with everything he’d already done to you.”
There’s a pleading look on his face. He wants me to understand, needs me to understand, but how can I understand this?
“So I got in touch with Dylan. And he was really scared. The FBI had been to his house, Mom. He wanted to help. Knew Halliday was going to be at that charity dinner…” He shrugs, miserable. “I brought him the drugs, at the hotel….And somehow things just went wrong.”
Someone made this happen. Someone coordinated it. Someone played him—and played us.
But Zachary was part of it. Zachary tried to kill Halliday. One count of first-degree murder, two counts of—
“I made a mistake, Mom.”
“This is more than a mistake, Zachary.”
“I’m going to jail, aren’t I?” I flinch at the terror in his voice.
Are we safe, Mommy? The question reverberates in my brain so loudly that I’m dizzy.
I squeeze my eyes shut and breathe deeply, and I’m back in that car, watching him in the mirror, listening to my own whispered promise.
I’ll always keep you safe.
I meant it. I always believed I’d do anything to keep him safe. But this?
If I turn my back on the truth now, it’s all been for nothing. All those years of trying to do the right thing, at all costs. To be the champion of those who were wronged. To speak for those who dared not speak.
But how could I turn my back on my son?
I look at the phone, the one Jackson gave me.
Then I look at this frightened young man across from me. This criminal. My son.
And I know what I need to do.
Epilogue
Jackson’s at home, asleep in bed, when the encrypted phone rings.
“It’s over,” an unfamiliar voice says. “Rendezvous point. Immediately!”
He springs out of bed, suddenly wide awake. Slides his feet into athletic shoes, throws a coat over his sweats, tucks the phone in his pocket. Heads straight for the door, swings it open, sprints down the hall and flights of stairs, exits the building through the rear.
Once outside, he bows his head against the cold drizzle and walks quickly. His hands are in his pockets, his shoulders hunched against the rain.
Streetlights cast ghostlike pools of light; the light catches the mist, illuminates it until it’s a haze. Each time he passes through one, he’s visible, then he steps back into the darkness, and he disappears from sight.
A car approaches, the first one he’s seen. Its headlights cast a beam of light over the street; its engine cuts through the quiet of the night. Jackson tenses, but the car passes, and then all is still and dark once again.
There’s a dumpster up ahead, a big blue one. It’s set just off the road, in a service alley, and its lid is open. Without slowing his pace, Jackson takes the encrypted phone and in one swift movement throws it into the dumpster. It clangs against the side, and clatters to the bottom.
He knows he’s not alone even before he sees anyone. Some sixth sense, all those years of training. And his pace slows, then grinds to a halt, just as he hears the sound that confirms his suspicion. Someone racking a gun.
His own gun’s at home. He closes his hands into fists at his sides, and he waits.
A man steps from the shadows into one of the pools of light. Jackson’s eyes settle on the pistol in his hand, at his side. And then on the tattoo on his forearm. Two knives, crossed in an X.
His mind flashes back to that restaurant. The man with the tattoo, approaching the table. Wes giving him the smallest nod, barely perceptible.
And in that instant, everything becomes clear.
He was set up. Betrayed. Sacrificed for the greater good.
The man raises the gun, and Jackson closes his eyes. He takes a deep breath, focuses on the sweet scent of the rain, the way the cold lands on his skin like ocean spray.
And then everything goes black.
* * *
—
The gunman stands over the body. He watches blood trail into rivulets of water, an almost inky blackness. Watches the rain pelt Jackson’s skin, his lifeless eyes. Then he holsters the gun.
He extends his forearm. Grabs one edge of the crossed knives. Slowly, carefully, peels the image from his skin, until his arm is bare. Crumples the design into a ball, holds it tight in his fist.
Then he rolls the sleeve down to cover his arm, turns, and strides away.
* * *
—
Across the river, in the penthouse apartment, Wes stands in front of the picture windows, looking out over the city. There’s a steady drumbeat of rain, the occasional flash of lightning in the distance. His gaze settles on the part of town where he knows Jackson has an apartment.
Had an apartment.
He glances down at his watch. By now, it should be done. And it had to happen. Protect the king, at all costs.
They knew Steph Maddox suspected Jackson, had for years. Under any other circumstances, they would have just eliminated her. It’s certainly what Jackson wanted, begged for. She was a threat to the operation. But that secret—that secret.
They learned it from Halliday, from hacking into his research, doing their own digging. Watching him, just like they were watching all the likely presidential candidates. The election would turn out in their favor, one way or another—that much was a certainty.
They found out about Steph. Knew Halliday was vulnerable to blackmail. Knew he was theirs.
And that meant keeping Steph around. They might need her later, to intimidate Halliday. They couldn’t kill her, so they had no choice but to co-opt her.
They watched her. Watched her son. Learned about the DNA test. The hacking. An intriguing prospect, really, because it made him valuable, too. They watched the kid meet with a gun dealer. Knew he had a secret of his own. All secrets are leverage.
And that’s when the idea was born. A way to make sure Maddox would work for them. They would threaten her son’s future. Intertwine him so closely with Jackson’s rise to power that she would be unable t
o stop it without betraying the person she loved the most.
They already had a plan in place to eliminate the FBI director, get Jackson into position. They just inserted Zachary into it. And added a second target.
Second because the others—the ones they leaked to the press—were decoys. “Intended targets” who would be insulated from charges of treason, forever, if the truth ever did come to light.
All it took was dangling the drugs in front of Zachary at the right moment, just before that charity dinner, and the rest fell into place. He and Dylan made exactly the moves they anticipated. All they did was ensure that a spiked cocktail made it into the FBI director’s hands. And then Dylan’s.
It all would have worked out perfectly if Steph had kept her mouth shut. But when she wouldn’t let it go, they had to adapt. And once she shared her suspicions with Vivian, they had no choice.
His own tracks are covered—he’s sure of it. The gunman is one of Moscow’s finest, unknown to U.S. authorities. CCTV cameras all over the city have caught him tailing Jackson, and Steph, too, his tattoo always visible. The authorities will zero in on that tattoo.
They’ll reach the conclusion that it was a mob hit, because that’ll be the easy answer, the one with proof. By then the gunman will be long gone, back in Moscow. And if Steph ever does decide to come clean? They’ll make it look like she ordered the hit, used connections she made on the job in Chicago, all those years ago.
It wasn’t his idea, of course. His handler, the man the Americans call Justice Ranger, came up with it. He thought of everything. Wes can just picture how those pale blue eyes will gleam when he hears of the operation’s resounding success.
He walks over to the chessboard. Looks at Zachary’s pawns, Steph’s pawns. So many pawns in this game. Then he moves Zachary’s knight, sets it up to be sacrificed.
All the pieces are in position now. The board is just as it needs to look. Steph can’t tell the truth without her kid going to prison, and she’s not going to do that, is she? They own her. It’s not the same as having the director, sure, but they can continue to move her up the ranks. Just like Vivian. Exposing Jackson as a Russian agent—that’s going to be a huge coup. Enough to make her chief of the Counterintelligence Center, most likely. Unwittingly married to one of their own, someone who can manipulate her when the time is right, can use their kids if he has to. And then there’s the asset, the one who will have the full trust of the Agency, and the Bureau.
He reaches for Steph’s queen, moves it to the far end of the board.
“Checkmate,” he murmurs.
The phone rings, a steady buzz. Wes looks at the screen, and a smile flickers on his lips. He’s been waiting for this call. There wasn’t any question in his mind, or anyone else’s, that it was coming.
He takes a steadying breath, presses the green button. “Wes Shields.”
He listens.
“Yes, Mr. President.” A pause. “Absolutely, Mr. President. I’d be honored.” A long pause this time. Wes’s gaze is still centered on the same point in the city.
“Oh, the Senate will get by just fine without me, sir. They’ll find a new leader.” A chuckle, then Wes grows serious again. “I’ll strive to serve the office of vice president with integrity, sir.”
A moment later, he presses the red button on his phone, sets it down carefully on the end table. Then he looks back out the window, sets his gaze on a speck of illumination in the distance.
The White House.
For B.J.W.
Acknowledgments
A novel is truly a team effort, and I’m fortunate to work with an incredible team. Huge thanks to all the wonderful people at Ballantine, especially Kate Miciak, Michelle Jasmine, Quinne Rogers, Kim Hovey, and Kara Welsh. Thanks, too, to the great crew at the Gernert Company, particularly David Gernert, Anna Worrall, Ellen Coughtrey, Rebecca Gardner, and Will Roberts, and to Sarah Adams at Transworld and all those who’ve worked on editions around the world. I’m so grateful to the core group of editors and early readers—Kate, Sarah, David, Anna, and Ellen—who shaped and strengthened this novel.
I’m also fortunate to be surrounded by great people at home. I’ve written about characters who have complicated relationships with their husbands and mothers and sons, but thankfully, it’s purely fiction. My relationship with my own spouse, and my mom, and my little boys are all wonderfully uncomplicated, and for that I’m extremely lucky. A big thank-you to my whole family, immediate and extended—and especially B, J, and W: Love you!
By Karen Cleveland
Need to Know
Keep You Close
About the Author
Karen Cleveland is a former CIA analyst and the New York Times bestselling author of Need to Know. She has master’s degrees from Trinity College Dublin and Harvard University. Cleveland lives in northern Virginia with her husband and two young sons.
Karen-cleveland.com
Facebook.com/KarenClevelandAuthor
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