"Not a thing. He was a Boy Scout-poor kid who pulled his own way up. Married his high school sweetheart, had gained widespread respect as a judge. The only concern we had was that he wasn't conservative enough. But he assured us he'd back the administration's positions. He really wanted the job. I mean, if you're a lawyer, it's a dream job. Almost all you ever do is argue before the Supreme Court. Although, shortly after McKenna was nominated, his kid was diagnosed with a terminal illness, and he wanted to be in D.C. because there were better treatment options. I think the kid had cancer."
"Yeah, leukemia," Pacini said.
Wentworth nodded. "Very sad story. On the upside, it made his confirmation a lock, since it gave him the sympathy vote." He paused, seeming to realize that he had perhaps said more than was prudent.
Pacini probed for twenty minutes on Nash's enemies. He was hated by many, but Wentworth was right-partisan battles rarely prompted the prissy Capitol Hill crowd to get blood on their manicures. Besides, McKenna was at the scene-and ran. As Wentworth said, "Solving Nash's murder really doesn't look like rocket science."
"You said your boss was hoping to get some information from us?" Pacini said.
"Yes. Only tangentially related, but we understand the commission has taken jurisdiction over investigating the murder of Judge Petrov's law clerk?"
"Yes."
"We're going to announce the nominees for the Supreme Court soon,"Wentworth said, leaning forward in his chair, hand on his chin. "It's been six months since the assassinations. There's a lot of pressure now that the first Monday in October-the opening of the new term-has passed, and the Supreme Court can't really do a thing. Confidentially, we're looking at Judge Petrov as a nominee to the court. Parker Sinclair was Petrov's law clerk, so we wanted to ask if the murder investigation has turned up anything of concern about either Sinclair or Petrov. The last time we had a vacancy, we were forced to remove Petrov from our short list for political reasons. We just don't want any surprises."
Pacini turned to Assad and Milstein.
"It's early, but nothing we've seen suggests any concern about Petrov," Assad said. "He granted us full access to his chambers, and his staff is pulling computer files for us now without requiring a warrant. We can't guarantee Parker Sinclair's murder is unconnected to the assassinations, but we've seen nothing that should cause any worries about Petrov. He's gone out of his way to help."
"That's what I wanted to hear," Wentworth said, steepling his hands. "Anybody hungry?"
"I could eat," Pacini said, and Assad and Milstein nodded in agreement.
"Excellent. The White House mess whips up one of the best omelets in town."
Wentworth escorted them out of his office and down a hallway, stopping at a stairwell that led down to the White House mess. Holding his iPhone in his right hand, he said, "Mind if I respond to an e-mail right quick? We get no reception in the mess-the signal's blocked from the Situation Room."
"No problem," Pacini said.
Wentworth had already turned his shoulder to them and begun clicking away with both thumbs. The message to his boss, the White House chief of staff, read, "They don't know re: Justice Carmichael."
Northeast
cKenna and Kate sat in a booth at Stella's Diner, picking at their greasy eggs and hash browns. Although McKenna still had the cell phone, no cabbies were willing to enter the Hamilton Heights projects, so they had walked a mile and a half before stopping at the diner.
McKenna looked around; theirs were the only white faces in the packed diner. Trying to lighten the mood, he said, "Maybe not the easiest place to keep a low profile." He rubbed the knot on the back of his head as he watched Kate.
She looked down at her plate, absently chewing white toast and jelly. She hadn't said much since they left the alley.
"Do you want to talk about it?" McKenna asked.
She kept chewing.
"Let's eat and get you a cab home," McKenna said. "I want you to go to work like any other day. Pretend none of this has happened. Make up something about where you were."
"I can't go back like nothing's happened," Kate countered. "Once your friend Seabury tells them about Douglas Pratt, they're going to find out you were at his apartment with a woman who looks a whole lot like me."
He knew she was right.
"I think we should consider turning ourselves in," she said.
"I can't, not yet."
"Why, Jefferson? Do you really think you can figure this out on your own? We don't even know who those men are that grabbed us. We need to face reality."
"What do I have to gain by going in?"
"You can respond to the allegations. You can look like you're not hiding out."
"We've been through this," he said.
"If you have nothing to hide, I don't understand why we don't just tell the FBI what we know. This is what they do."
"So you think I have something to hide?"
"I didn't say that."
McKenna gave a dry laugh. "You didn't need to."
"I'm not trying to pick a fight, Jefferson. I just see no point in this. What's the endgame?"
Not knowing when he would eat again, he forced down the last of his eggs. "Why don't you go home and call our contacts on the commission?" he said. "If they suggest you've done something wrong, say I held you against your will. I promise that's what I'll tell them."
"They're not stupid."
"Say I threatened you-no, wait ... Say you believed me at first, but once you thought I was running, you left me. If they haven't issued a warrant yet, there's not much they could do to you." McKenna put the cell phone on the center of the table. "Call the cab."
Kate eyed the phone for a moment but then said, "I'm not going without you."
He gazed at her. She had once told him that he was the only man she had ever truly loved, words McKenna either had not believed or had just not been ready to hear. But in the past eight hours, she had been abducted, mock-executed, and nearly raped, yet she wanted to stay with him. And he wanted her to stay.
"What's the plan?" she said.
McKenna pulled out a crinkled business card from his pocket and flattened it on the table.
"this Milstein is a homicide detective. Seemed like a straight shooter and has no connection to federal law enforcement, so maybe we can trust her-which is more than I can say for anyone on the commission right now."
He picked up the cell phone, but Kate grabbed it out of his hand. "They can track us once they capture the signal."
"I know," McKenna said, and taking the phone back, he started dialing.
Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, D.C.
fter breakfast, Pacini, Milstein, and Assad thanked Brad Wentworth, went out the iron gate surrounding the White House, and hailed a cab. Pacini, in the front seat and talking on the phone, turned to the cabbie and said, "First Street and Maryland, the Supreme Court." As Milstein and Assad exchanged a glance, Pacini turned around and said, "You two are getting quite the tour today."
Milstein watched out the cab window as one concrete government building after another went by. Each one gray and drab just like the next, matching the sky.
"What are you thinking about?" Assad asked.
Milstein glanced at Pacini, who was barking orders into a cell phone. Softly she said, "Just wondering about agendas we're not privy
The cab maneuvered around the concrete blockades and closed streets surrounding the Capitol building and pulled to the curb a block from Union Station.
"this is the closest I can get you," the cabbie said. "They've closed most of the streets to cars around here since the judges were killed."
They slipped out of the cab and walked toward the high court, passing the Russell and Dirksen Senate Office Buildings, the Capitol dome rising in the distance to their right. They stopped at the sidewalk in front of the Supreme Court. Even though the court was not hearing cases, a few protesters stood on the sidewalk. One held a sign that read, "STOP THE 3/3 DEAL OR WOMEN WILL DIE."<
br />
Milstein marveled at the grandeur of the structure as they walked up the first flight of steps to a raised gray and white marble plaza flanked on either side by circular fountains and bronze flagpoles. She gazed up to the top of the next flight of marble steps. The building, with its long portico supported by sixteen towering marble columns, reminded her of a Roman temple. Inscribed on the pediment above the columns were the words "EQUAL JUSTICE UNDER LAW."
Pacini guided the two detectives, not up the steps to the portico but to a side entrance at the far right.
Just before they entered the building, Milstein's cell phone rang. Pacini and Assad, ahead of her, kept walking until they heard her say, "Mr. McKenna?" Milstein held up her finger, as if to prevent them from snatching the phone away from her.
"Detective Milstein, I won't waste your time and tell you that the things they're saying about me are lies," McKenna said.
"Then why don't you come in? We can talk. If it's true, we can work this out."
"Listen," McKenna interrupted. "Last night I was abducted, beaten, and threatened by men associated with the Hassan case. Call Jake Seabury, a lawyer at Harrington & Caine in D.C.-he can explain some of this. You also need to find a man named Douglas Pratt. He was a law clerk for the Supreme Court, and he knows something. You should search his apartment; there's something I think you'll find interesting under the dresser in his room. When they took me last night, they also took Pratt. I don't know what happened to him."
"Mr. McKenna, again I urge you-"
"Detective," McKenna cut in, "I didn't kill anyone."
When McKenna hung up, Kate said, "Why didn't you tell her about Justice Kincaid's widow? Or the man at the Watergate?"
With an impish smile, he replied, "We need something to do."
10:10 a.m. United States Court of-4ppeals for the Second Circuit, New York
he call to Judge Petrov had been short and decisive. He was to come to Washington immediately, tell no one about the visit, and bring attire suitable for a television appearance. It could mean only one thing: the announcement of his nomination as a justice on the high court was imminent.
Before leaving his chambers, Petrov instructed his law clerk, Dakota Cameron, to finish taking care of the detectives' requests for Parker Sinclair's e-mails. He had already been contacted by FBI agents who wanted access to the servers, but he wanted to get them hard copies right away. It was important to send the message that he was forthcoming, cooperative, and responsive. He told Dakota not to bother with showing him the documents before they went out, but to send him a memo summarizing anything noteworthy. Petrov told the rest of his staff that he would be working from home for the next few days-something he did often.
As with Petrov's visits to Washington during the interview process, the White House had already arranged a room for him at the Willard Hotel, reserved under a fictitious name. The press, knowing that the three-three deal was finalized, had staked out the more obvious accommodations at the Hay-Adams Hotel, directly across the street from the White House. As in the past, at the appropriate time, Petrov's handlers would escort him to the Treasury Department building where they would take a little-known tunnel leading from Treasury into the White House. The cloak-and-dagger secrecy made it all the more exciting. Petrov smiled when told the name he should give at the hotel reception desk: John Jay-the first chief justice of the United States.
Stopping at his apartment on the Upper West Side, he packed his best suits and informed Katherine that she needed to accompany him immediately to D.C. He had been advised that if the three-three deal was ever finalized, it would be implemented quickly, and she may be needed to make appearances with him. The longer the administration waited, the more closely the nominees would be scrutinized, the more time the interest groups would have to go on the attack, and the more likely the deal would fall apart. If he got this call, he had been told, it would be a whirlwind. It was happening. It was finally happening.
Dakota Cameron had spent the morning reading all her former lover's personal and business e-mail correspondence for the past year. After their breakup, Parker Sinclair had become increasingly possessive and hostile, parking in front of her apartment, daily hang-up calls, and randomly showing up at her regular haunts. It had gotten so bad that she often chose to work in the library rather than their shared office. The final hostile e-mails he had sent her would not reflect well on him.
After taking out duplicate e-mails, she whittled the batch down to an even seven hundred-a neat, orderly number befitting Parker Sinclair himself. She created an Excel spreadsheet logging the documents, sorting them by date, sender and recipient, and potential relevance to the investigation. Dakota packed six hundred-ninety-nine pages into a file box and left a message for Detective Assad that the documents were available. She would destroy the seven hundredth document when she got back home tonight.
US. Supreme Court, Washington,
ilstein and Assad sat waiting for the interim Supreme Court Police chief in an office on the ground floor while Pacini made a flurry of calls about Jefferson McKenna's contact with Milstein. They were already tracing the call, which would allow them to track the cellular signal and location of the phone whenever it was turned on. Though they had no reason to believe McKenna's account of his alleged abduction by men associated with the Hassan case, there was something that gave credence to his story: Douglas Pratt had not shown up to work today at his law firm. Of course, that could also mean any number of things, including that McKenna had done something to Pratt.
A distinguished-looking woman wearing a conservative blue suit approached them.
"Good morning," she said. "I'm the Supreme Court's marshal, Penelope Teasdale." An African-American woman in her forties, Teasdale spoke with a refined English accent. "I take it you know Jim Peckham," she said, nodding to the stocky man standing beside her.
"Of course," Pacini said. "We just saw each other yesterday at the commission meeting. Jim, I don't think you've met Detectives Milstein and Assad-they're on loan to the commission from the NYPD."
"Pleasure to meet you," Peckham said.
"Jim was career Secret Service before joining the Supreme Court force," Pacini explained to Assad and Milstein.
"I understand you would like to meet again with some of the law clerks?"Teasdale asked.
"Yes, if that's possible. I know it's on short notice," Pacini said.
"Of course. I've told Jim to give you whatever assistance you need," Teasdale said. "If there's nothing else you need from me, I'll leave you in his capable hands."
After thanking Teasdale, Pacini, Assad, and Milstein followed Peckham out of his office and into the hallway.
"Thanks again for fitting us in," Pacini said as they walked briskly down the hall.
"Not a problem. I've got us a room to meet with the law clerks."
"How many are there?"
"Each justice tends to hire about four clerks, for a total clerking pool of about thirty-six, who stay for one year. Justice Carmichael asked nearly all the outgoing clerks to stay on an extra year to help prepare for when the new justices arrive, so if you add in the new class who were hired before Black Wednesday and started this summer, there are about seventy clerks working in the building right now. We've had to open up some space on the second floor for them, since the offices adjoining the justices' chambers are equipped for only about thirty."
"Can you get us a roster of the clerks?" Pacini asked. "I have a list of those who were here on Black Wednesday, but not sure I have the new
"Absolutely. Before we meet with the clerks, would you like me to walk you through the crime scene?" Peckham asked, looking at Milstein and Assad.
"Yes," they replied in unison. They had been out of their element since arriving in D.C. Walking a murder scene, though-that was something they knew. And although Pacini had spent months painstakingly studying the events of Black Wednesday and knew every inch of the room, he seemed happy to let them familiarize themselves with the c
rime scene.
Peckham took them up to the Great Hall on the main floor. The name fitted the vast room with its towering columns and its floors and walls of Madre Cream marble. He walked them to the end of the hall farthest from the massive oak doors that led into the courtroom chamber.
"We think the shooter entered from here-the front entrance to the building," he said. "It used to be closed to the public for security reasons, but Chief Justice Kincaid felt that allowing the public to walk about the plaza and climb the steps was part of the experience, and ordered it reopened. Against my advice, Justice Carmichael has insisted on honoring his wishes." Peckham began walking down the Great Hall toward the courtroom chamber. He pointed to his left. "That's the coat check. The visitors to the courtroom have to check their coats and bags there. They also check all cell phones and other gadgets. There used to be self-serve pay lockers, but we took them out after the shootings. Now everything's checked and scanned."
Peckham walked them past busts of the former chief justices, set alternately in niches and on pedestals along the side walls, and pointed out the new memorial containing busts of the six slain justices. He stopped when he got to the security screening station in front of the doors leading into the courtroom.
"These new screening devices are state of the art. We also now scan everyone with a handheld metal-detection wand before they enter the room-no exceptions." Peckham invited the officers stationed at the courtroom entrance to wand him and his guests after they each walked through the detectors. Then an aide opened the doors to the courtroom.
"The renovations of the courtroom have been done for about a month," Peckham said. "They replaced the carpet and bench, but everything's the same as the day of the shootings. They worked hard to maintain the historic integrity."
though grand, the courtroom was smaller than it had looked in the newspaper pictures after Black Wednesday. It was magnificent nonetheless, with its thirty-foot-high Ionic columns lining all four sides, heavy velvet drapes, and everything else seemingly of marble or mahogany.
The Last Justice Page 10