Power Play (An FBI Thriller)

by Catherine Coulter

  He had to step back into the bushes when he saw two cars arriving, one pulling in Savich’s driveway, the other against the curb. He watched as three people went inside. He had no idea who they were, not that it mattered. Whoever they were, they were messing up his plans.

  After some time, he made his way to the living room window and peered in. No one was in there, but he heard faint voices and laughter coming from another room. He moved along the house until he was looking into the dining room. He saw Savich, smiling and nodding, full of himself, chatting to a woman and the two men at the table. He couldn’t make out what they were saying, but he saw spaghetti, corn on the cob, garlic bread, and a big salad bowl on the table. He could swear he smelled the garlic. His stomach growled. He hadn’t realized how hungry he was.

  Both of the men looked young and hard, like Savich, all sharp-eyed and confident, ready to take on the world. Probably FBI agents. One of them wore a black turtleneck sweater beneath a really sharp black jacket, the other a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. The young woman with them seemed buff enough to be an agent, too, he couldn’t tell. Weren’t they all having fun?

  Agent Sherlock presided at the far end of the table, her thick red hair shining at him under the chandelier. She looked pleased and relaxed, a forkful of spaghetti in her hand, nodding at something one of the men said. She looked magnificent, he thought. She would look that way until he closed his hands around her skinny little neck and squeezed the life out of her.

  Blessed straightened. It looked to him like those people would be here for a long time. Should he take the risk and stay until they left, hoping no one would see him?

  His stomach growled again. He had to eat, then he’d decide whether or not to come back.

  Natalie Black’s house

  Friday night

  Natalie usually liked it black as pitch when she went to sleep, but not tonight. She felt too antsy, too on edge. There was something she had to figure out, something unpleasant and real just beyond her reach, but for the life of her, she couldn’t grasp it. Everything that had happened, both in England and here at home, was flying about in her head like scattered bits of paper in a high wind.

  She had to focus. Why was the president still defending her? She grinned—Thorn, the president—she clearly remembered him at twenty years old, smooth and cocky even then, always ready to break a rule, but so very smart. He’d always been there, Brundage’s best friend from freshman year, then hers, too, and there had been more, on his part, but it had never been spoken of until Arliss had come out and asked her about it. The four of them had mixed together so well, settled into friendships that became deep and abiding, that had lasted.

  But now Brundage was dead. Thornton was the freaking president of the United States, with the ultimate authority over her future. How much longer could he resist his advisers, all the party bigwigs, all the pressure from the public who wished her gone? And then what? Disgrace, yes, but would it end with that? If someone wanted more than to disgrace her, if they wanted her dead, what could stop them? Perhaps she could stay alive for a while, but how long could she keep bodyguards around her? Forever?

  Every politician, every public figure in the world, no matter how well protected, could be killed. There is always a way. Always. She could see herself ending up paranoid, suspicious of all her acquaintances, all her friends.

  And now they’d put Perry in the mix. Why? How did that make any sense?

  She had met so many and diverse people in the foreign service, made so many important decisions that had affected her and Perry, at least before Perry had gone to college and become independent. Would one of the decisions she’d made result in her murder? And Perry, there was always Perry, and the fear for her daughter ground deep.

  Had it all begun with George McCallum? In any case, that’s when it had come out in the open. Dear George, a fine man, honorable, innocent of any wrongdoing. She hadn’t loved him like Brundage, not to the depths of her. She was sure there would be only one such love in her lifetime. But she had cared deeply for him. He’d given her pleasure and companionship and respect, and they both knew they would rub along very nicely together. And then he’d been, what? Sacrificed? Or was he the target? But then why blame her, why all the malicious rumors? Why come after her here, at home? Bits of paper—swirling about, never coming together.

  She turned onto her side, staring in the darkness toward her window. She was making herself crazy. She had to sleep, had to have a clear head, because soon now, tomorrow, she would have to make a decision that would change the course of her life.

  What would you say, Brundage? Would you tell me to resign? Would that help protect Perry? Natalie felt a shift in the cool, still air in her bedroom, a puff of a fresher and colder air. From the window. She stared toward the curtained windows though it was so dark she could barely make them out. Were they moving? She started to reach for the cell phone on top of her night table. The autodial was set to ring in Connie’s and Hooley’s rooms, her new-age panic button. No, not yet. If she pressed the button, both of them could come running in, and if there was someone outside her window about to come in, he’d very likely escape. Besides, she was far from helpless. She picked up her pistol and waited, breathing lightly as if she were asleep.

  Perry Black’s condo

  Friday night

  It was nearly midnight. Perry sat on the sofa, leaning over her laptop on the coffee table, a bottle of water at her right elbow. Davis sat opposite her in a wing chair directly in front of the fireplace, wishing a bit of heat would come his way. He got up, added more firewood, and sat down again. He looked over at Perry, who was drumming her fingers as she read over what she’d written on her blog. Every once in a while, she looked over at him, then down again, quickly. How much longer could she pretend she wasn’t finished? She couldn’t ignore him for the rest of the night, could she?

  Davis watched her. She’d changed into a blue Patriots sweatshirt, a dangerous move in Washington, D.C. He wondered if she ever dared wear it to FedExField on Sundays.

  Her jeans were on the baggy side and looked a decade old. She was wearing only thick white socks, her boots beside her on the floor. He realized he liked watching her, liked seeing that same hank of hair fall out of the braid and onto her cheek. Energy seemed to thrum all around her, even now, near midnight, even when he knew she’d finished the blog. A live wire, his mom would call her. Come to think of it, that was what his mom called him. Her iPod was playing “Waiting Room” by Fugazi, turned way down, and that was just plain wrong. “Waiting Room” should be on full blast while, say, a guy was painting a wall, or shooting hoops, or washing his Jeep. It was versatile music, not only for messing around but also when he was working his butt off. Play it nice and loud and it always kept his brain jiggering.

  Yep, he loved punk rock, appreciated women who loved it, too. He was smart enough to know the woman bending over her laptop, shoving that hank of hair behind her ear again with an unconscious hand, could become important to him, and not only because she liked his music. He found her immensely satisfying. She’d close her eyes for a moment every now and then, frown, speak to herself as if testing out a phrase, then type quickly again. Perry Black, football maven. Who’d have thought? He remembered her straddling her Harley, pulling her black visor down, roaring off as he stood in his driveway, watching her. That had been only three days ago. Amazing.

  Davis sighed, sat back and closed his eyes. Good dinner at Savich’s house, nothing accomplished, really, but everyone got a little well-deserved R&R, and he’d told his story about getting smacked in the head with Mrs. Shaw’s spade in Hogan’s Alley. He’d found out that the Brit, Nicholas Drummond, would be assigned to the New York Field Office when he graduated from the Academy. He wondered if they would ever work together. Maybe, maybe not. Davis liked the man. In fact, he had to admit he recognized bits and pieces of himself. But he also sensed a darker history beneath Drummond’s very smooth surface, something c
omplicated, unspoken, held close.

  He wondered what it was, then gave it up. He was here in Perry Black’s living room, watching her go over her work, ignoring him. He could outwait her, easy. He let his brain slow and mellow as he listened to “Waiting Room.”

  “I’ll give you blankets and a pillow and you can sack out. I can finish off the blog in the bedroom.”

  Her voice sounded only a bit on the snarky side. He didn’t open his eyes, merely said, “You’ve already finished. What did you write about?”

  She gave him a brooding look, then shrugged. “I wrote about the quarterbacks who run whenever they see a lane or even the whisper of a lane, like RG3 and Michael Vick, and how sad it is they’re always only one hit away from ending their careers. Running is part of who they are, and you can practically feel their sheer joy when they can take off, like a greyhound out of the chute. They’re exciting to watch and they’re immensely talented, but they’re always getting pounded and smashed into the ground. Nobody can take that kind of punishment for long. Sooner or later they go down.

  “Of course, every player is one hit away, but you take quarterbacks like Russell Wilson and Colin Kaepernick. They’re as fast as cornerbacks, too, but since they pick their spots more carefully, slide when they can, they’re likely to last longer.

  “Peyton and Eli Manning and Drew Brees—they’re the ultimate passing quarterbacks. They wouldn’t move out of the pocket unless threatened with dynamite or three hundred and fifty pounds of mean.”

  “All good points. Now I’d like to talk about something else.”

  “No,” she said, and kept her eyes glued to her computer screen. “If you want to talk about what happened today, about Uncle Milton in particular, I’m liable to belt you. Be quiet, I’m still working.”

  He smiled, still didn’t open his eyes. “We FBI special agents know when to keep things close to the vest. Advice? I’ll say it again about your uncle—get over it, Black.”

  “Shut up.”

  “At least now you know what Uncle Senator Milton is all about. I know your mom doesn’t think he’s behind this, and I don’t, either, not really, but I’ll know for sure tomorrow.”

  That got her attention. She looked at him. “Oh? And how may I ask will you know tomorrow? You’re going to hold a séance?”

  Davis pulled a recorder out of his pocket. “I’m going to play our conversation today with Uncle Milt for Carlos Acosta, see if he can identify him as the man who called him.”

  Something else he hadn’t told her. She’d forgotten about Carlos, forgotten he might recognize the voice. Well, that’s why she wrote about football and he was a cop. “Is he still at Quantico?”

  “Yeah, in the Jefferson Dormitory. I’ll be visiting him tomorrow. Savich is keeping him there, along with Isabel’s cell phone. If he gets another call on that cell, we may get a chance to trace it in real time. Isabel is still off visiting her aunt in Florida for a week.”

  Perry sighed. “I was hoping for more than that by now. This not knowing who—it’s hard.”

  “It’s only been three days since the big guns have come in on it.”

  She snorted and continued to type. “Big gun—is that really how you see yourself?”

  He still didn’t open his eyes. “I mean the Bureau. What would you call me?”

  “Me? I’m still not speaking to you.”

  Natalie Black’s house

  Friday night

  Natalie’s heart started to pound. Would the man outside her window hear it? It didn’t matter. She held the gun pointed at the window, her eyes focused on the curtains. It wasn’t fear that surged through her, it was rage. Come on in, you bastard, come to Mama.

  The alarm blasted out, piercing, sharp, the pitch of police sirens in Europe, loud enough to shake her nearest neighbors out of a dead sleep.

  Natalie jumped out of bed and ran toward the window, threw back the curtains. She saw him climbing down through the branches in the huge oak tree outside her window. She yelled for him to stop and fired once, twice, three times, chipping off bark, but she didn’t hit him.

  Hooley and Connie burst into her room. Connie jerked her away from the window and pressed her down onto the floor, covering her. Hooley threw the curtains wide. “He’s down below!” he shouted, and climbed out after him.

  Natalie shoved Connie off. “Come on, Connie, we’ve got to help. There’s no danger now, let me up!”

  The two women were at the window, watching Hooley as he climbed down from branch to branch and finally hit the ground. He sprinted after a man running full-out toward the distant front of the property, straight to the high stone fence. Hooley was wearing nothing but running shoes and pajama bottoms, his gun in his hand.

  “You stay right here, Natalie.” Connie climbed down from branch to branch as Hooley had done, in her dainty pink pajamas with little flowers, her Beretta in her hand.

  Natalie had no intention of staying put. She jerked on a pair of sneakers and was in the tree only a few seconds after Connie, carefully navigating the branches until she dropped to the ground. She saw Connie racing after Hooley.

  Hooley saw the man some twenty yards ahead grab a rope that hung down over the stone fence. No way, buddy. He fired into the wall and yelled, “Stop right there, bozo! You’re not going anywhere.”

  The man stopped. He stayed pressed against the stone fence, breathing hard, holding tight to the thick rope. Hooley came to a stop ten feet away from him and aimed his Beretta center mass.

  “Let go of that rope and drop. Now.”

  The man let go of the rope and dropped. He landed soft, knees bent. He was wearing a black ski mask over his head, all of his face covered except his eyes. He was dressed in black, supple and stretchy, so he could move and climb easily.

  “Now drop your weapon, slowly. Believe me, I will shoot you dead. This close, I won’t miss you, even in the dark.”

  The man said, voice low, scratchy, “I don’t have a gun.”

  “You’re a lousy liar. Drop the gun.”

  Hooley heard Connie running toward them, still some distance behind. He yelled, “Connie, go around and flank him to the right. The clown is lying to me.” In the same instant the man’s hand whipped up and he fired, missed, and Hooley fired back. The bullet slammed into the man’s side, throwing him back against the wall. In a move so fast Hooley would swear he never saw it, the man sent a stiletto blurring through the air that struck him in his chest. Hooley dropped to his knees.

  The man grabbed the hanging rope and was nearly to the top of the wall when Connie emptied her magazine at him, but she wasn’t close enough, and she missed as he went over the other side. She heard Natalie panting behind her, and yelled, “See to Hooley. I’m going after him!”

  Connie jumped up to grab the rope, but the man was already jerking it up and over the wall. She ran to the gate, punched in the code. Finally, she was able to squeeze through the opening, her gun up and ready, but she didn’t see the man, only the black ground under a black sky, and the taillights of a car speeding away. The rope with its three-pronged anchor lay in the grass beside the wall.

  Washington Memorial Hospital

  Davis and Perry ran into the emergency room together, saw her mother standing in her blood-covered pajamas with a pair of sneakers on her feet, speaking to a nurse. Perry walked up to stand beside her and put her hand on her mother’s shoulder.

  Natalie turned to her daughter, tried to smile and failed. “Hooley is being prepped for surgery. This is an experienced trauma center and one of their best surgeons happened to be finishing up surgery on a car accident victim. He’s scrubbing in right now. It was bad, Perry, the knife was in his chest, right over his heart. I knew better than to pull it out.” She swallowed, more words beyond her.

  Perry held her close. “They got him here real fast, Mom. Hooley’s strong, he’s got a good chance, right? Come on, we’ll wait together.”

  Davis said, “I called Savich, told him what happened. He decide
d there’s nothing to see tonight at the house, so he and Sherlock are coming straight here. He’ll go out with the FBI techs tomorrow morning, see if the guy left anything to help us.” He looked over to where a nurse was writing at the admissions desk, saw her glance up at Natalie and frown.

  He patted Natalie’s shoulder and walked to the nurse. “What is it you’re not telling Mrs. Black? Is it about Hooley?”

  Nurse Chambers looked at the tall young man standing in front of her, thought about sex, wished she was ten years younger, and realized she was so tired she was going bonkers. She cleared her throat. “No, there are no secrets here. It’s serious, I know, but Mr. Hooley is in Dr. Proctor’s very capable hands. It will be my job to check in with the OR and give you updates whenever I can. Are you Mrs. Black’s son?”

  Davis pulled his creds out of his pocket. “Special Agent Sullivan. Then why were you frowning at Mrs. Black?”

  “Well, I recognized her. Her photo’s been in the papers—about how her fiancé killed himself in England because of her, and she was called back to the United States—”

  He cut her off. “Whatever you’ve read, Nurse Chambers, you should put away the frown, because that’s not what happened at all. She had nothing to do with her fiancé’s death. It is Mrs. Black who is under threat.”

  Nurse Chambers blinked. “But it’s all over the Internet—”

  “And you believe everything you read on the Internet?”

  “Well, I suppose not. You’re really an FBI agent and she’s really in danger?”