Triple Threat

by Jan Coffey

  Ellie didn’t have the strength to explain. She just continued to stare out at the stores flashing by. He’d covered her with his own body. Nobody had ever done something like that for her.

  “It’s good he was right there. With all their fancy equipment and everything else, I bet by the six o’clock news they’ll announce what was it that happened exactly.”

  Another tear trickled down her face. There had to be other people inside those buildings. She tried to recall if there were any apartments above the shops, or if the old guy with the dog had had enough time to get away from the explosion. The driver of the delivery truck couldn’t have escaped. Traffic came to a standstill just past Temple University. Ellie reached into her purse, took out a ten dollar bill and stuffed it through the sliding window separating her from the driver.

  “I’ll get out here.”

  “Are you sure? Your husband said—”

  She didn’t wait for change, and she was on the sidewalk in a moment. The warm sun and the pavement beneath her shoes made her feel alive again. Nate would be okay, she told herself. Unconsciously, she reached inside her purse, took out her cell phone and started dialing his number to check. But she realized her own stupidity and disconnected.

  Anger replaced worry three blocks down. Mad at herself and Helen and Nate and Hawes and the world for getting her involved in this sordid business, she lengthened her strides. She was happy with her life. Finally, she had the things she’d always wanted. Financial security. Status. Connections with important people. She was no longer the hungry little girl on the sidewalk, gawking at the beautiful people inside the stores, restaurants and clubs. Ellie was now on the inside, and these people had no right to shake up her life like this. They had no right to make her care about things that she had no control over.

  Homeless Jack was sitting in his wheelchair on the shady side of Pine Street when Ellie went by. Seeing her, he called and asked if she was okay. She waved her answer and noticed for the first time that her clothes were covered with dust and debris. Again, the image of Nate and his bloody shirt flashed before her eyes. She was complaining about the disturbance to her lifestyle, while Nate was putting his life on the line by going back to those burning buildings to save lives. By the time she reached the shop, Ellie had worked herself into a knot of worry and guilt.

  “What happened to you?” Brian asked, rushing to her as she entered. There were no customers in the shop.

  Vic was on the phone, and as he turned around, his eyes rounded with worry.

  “She just walked in,” he said into the receiver. “But let me see if she can talk to you right now or not.” He pulled the phone down. “My God! Did you have an accident?”

  “Who’s on the phone?” she asked, hoping for some news of Nate.

  “I don’t know. He wouldn’t give me his name, but he said it has something to do with one of your clients….”

  She took the phone. “Hi, may I help you?”

  “Ms. Littlefield?” There was a pause in the line.

  Ellie didn’t recognize the voice. The accent was vaguely British. “This is she. Who is this?”

  “That’s not important. But I should very much like to verify that you have a bona fide client who is interested in an original Betsy Ross flag.”

  “I might.” She plopped down on the stool next to the register, suddenly feeling very, very tired. The weight of everything that had happened in the past hour sat directly on her shoulders. She couldn’t shake off the image of Nate, hurt.

  “‘Might’ is not exactly the answer we are looking for, Ms. Littlefield.”

  “Well, I’ve had a very tough day. Do you have the flag?”

  “There will be an auction for the item I referred to very soon. I should tell you, however, that the list of those invited to bid will be quite exclusive.”

  “Are you conducting the auction?”

  “If you would confine yourself to answering my queries…” The man’s tone reflected a growing impatience.

  “I do have a client…a bona fide client…who’s interested. But how can I even attempt to prequalify him when I am not told the terms, conditions or time of this auction?”

  “The terms will be the usual ten percent, the starting bid will be thirty million U.S., and we shall need verification that twice that amount is available in your client’s bank account prior to the actual day of the auction. Of course, you do understand that the hammer price could easily be twice or thrice that.”

  “Having that much cash sitting idle in a bank is stupid. The time frame will be critical to my client.”

  “That is understandable. I can tell you that we hope to conduct the event prior to the month’s end. But again, there will be no guarantees.”

  “Where would the auction be held?”

  “That is not necessary for you to know at this point.”

  “But it is. My client is planning to depart—”

  “I can tell you it will be somewhere on the East Coast,” the man interrupted. “Now, I suggest you contact your client and pass on these terms and conditions. If he is interested, then we shall see about adding his name to the list.”

  “How do I reach you with the answer?”

  “We shall contact you, Ms. Littlefield.”

  Ron Kent stood by the window of the Oval Office, looking out at the beautiful Washington afternoon. His chief of staff stood by the president’s desk.

  “What do we want out of this meeting, George?”

  “We want to withhold any indication of your position, Mr. President. We want to keep it informational.”

  “And our strategy going in?” He glanced over his shoulder at the younger man.

  “Our best strategy would be to keep the discussion from becoming personal, sir.”

  “That’s impossible. Graham Hunt’s favored technique is to get down and dirty, make it personal, to bully and blackmail if need be, but win at all costs.”

  “That’s true, sir. Which is exactly why we insisted on inviting the Vice President, Senators Kennedy and Schumer, Congressman Fattah, the Agriculture Secretary, and the Interior Secretary and Undersecretary.”

  “Even knowing that, Hunt is still coming in.” Kent chewed on that for a moment. “What’s going on, George? Graham isn’t one to waste his time or mine. What exactly does he have that he thinks will keep me onboard?”

  Street paged through his notes. “The meeting agenda that I included in your packet, sir, indicates only a clarifying discussion of the Water for America project, but my sources tell me that they’d like to push an additional bill through the Appropriations Committees to expand the scope of the project.”

  Kent turned and glared at Street. “Expand it how?”

  “Hunt and his cartel want to make it a national project versus regional. I believe he thinks an expansion will give it broader appeal. In fact, I know Hunt has two New York advertising execs standing by, in case you’d care to see their new ad campaign.”

  “How are they going to make this a national project?” Kent planted both hands on either side of the packet of information that Street had prepared for him. “I have no time to read through all of this, so just give it to me straight. No smooth ad slogans or fancy graphic presentations. Just tell me what the hell they want to do.”

  “They’re proposing the creation of enormous underground water-storage basins in different parts of the country. Different states could be allocated federal money to fund the pipelines from these locations to their own potential drought regions or to recommended industrial development areas.”

  “Let me get this straight. Basically, they’re just expanding the size of the original project.”

  “Yes.”

  “Originally, we were planning only to pipe…say, Colorado River water and water from the National Forest lands to where we wanted it. Now, we have basins.”

  “Underground basins.”

  “Who owns the basins?” Kent asked, walking to the center of his office.

&nb
sp; “Hunt and his cartel. In the new project, we now pay these companies to store it, keep it safe and pump it out when it’s needed.”

  “And they make a hell of a lot more money.”

  “That’s the idea.” George nodded. “But they also make it look better for the American people…and you.”

  “How is it better for me?”

  “It allows you to undercut the opposition’s argument. You can sign the original bill, get elected on the merits of expanding it, and if the opposition party doesn’t pass the expansion bill, they’re the ones who look bad. That’s what the New York PR guys are here for. They’ll sell the idea that in going this route, no one in the country worries about drought or economic favoritism.”

  “Okay, what are the negatives…other than the costs and the fact that Hunt and his friends are the chief profit-takers?”

  There was a knock on the door, and the President’s personal assistant poked her head in. “They’re ready for you in the Cabinet Room, Mr. President.”

  “Thank you,” Kent said, not taking his eyes off of his chief of staff.

  Street tucked his own folder under one arm, waiting for the door to close. “Well, there certainly could be dangers to the desert ecosystems, since that’s where most of these basins need to be built. Then you have the danger of controls for over pumping. There is no guarantee that we won’t deplete the underground springs and kill off wildlife in those regions. Should I go on?”

  “No,” Kent replied, starting for the door. “I understand what’s going on now.”

  Fourteen

  Philadelphia

  Wednesday, June 23

  The explosion and the fire received Section C coverage in the Inquirer newspaper account. The six o’clock news had a twenty-five-second report on the incident, saying that several people were injured in a fire in the city’s Northeast section. By eleven o’clock, it was confirmed that two were dead and seven more injured. The dead were identified and the next of kin notified.

  With potentially record-breaking numbers of visitors supposedly en route to Philadelphia for the opening ceremonies of the Spirit of America celebration, no one wanted to throw a wet blanket on the planned festivities.

  Nate tried not to think too much about the strange coincidence of Theo Atwood being one of the dead.

  After the fire was contained, Nate had worked all afternoon and through the night with the investigators on the scene and later at the station. So far, they were going on the assumption that a faulty gas line inside the tuxedo shop was the cause.

  Nate didn’t believe in coincidences, though.

  It was a little before five in the morning when he finally left the fire commissioner’s office downtown. The predawn air was damp, and the smells of the city hung heavy in the streets. His body ached. They’d had to dig a shard of flying glass from his back, and the stitches the ER doctor had used to close the cut felt like they were standing out two inches. The stiffness in his knee was as bad as the early days after his surgery. He looked up and down the deserted street, hoping for a cab.

  A sleek black BMW turned the corner and raced down the street, pulling up smartly at the curb. He took a step cautiously toward the rear of the vehicle as the passenger window slid downward. Then he relaxed, seeing Ellie in the driver’s seat.

  “Climb in.”

  Baseball hat, no makeup, a sleeveless T-shirt, a pair of old jeans. She was a sight for sore eyes.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I said climb in,” she said again. There was tension in her voice.

  Nate forgot about all his aches and pains, and opened the door. He remembered the stitches, though, when he leaned back against the seat. She took off as he was still fumbling with his seat belt.

  “You are the most irresponsible, selfish jerk I’ve ever met,” she exploded, sailing through a yellow light. “I couldn’t sit still. I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t sleep. I had to cancel my meeting with Augusta Biddle last night for this fund-raiser I’m doing because I was incapable of thinking of anything other than how badly you were hurt.”

  Nate watched her profile as she drove like a mad-woman through the city streets. Her cheeks were glowing. Her knuckles were white on the steering wheel.

  “What did I do?”

  She slammed on the brakes at a red light. “You think you can tell people you’re going to do something and then just forget it?”

  “What did I forget?”

  She burned a stretch of rubber twenty feet long when the light turned green. “You were supposed to call me, to let me know you were okay, dammit!”

  “I was working.”

  “You said you would call.”

  Nate reached for the phone at his belt and started dialing. Three seconds later the cell phone in Ellie’s purse started to ring.

  She slammed on the brakes at the next light and snatched his phone away. Without uttering a word, she threw it on the floor at his feet. She gunned it again when the light turned green.

  Her phone kept ringing. Nate’s gaze fixed on her flushed face and parted lips. Ellie was mumbling curses under her breath. When she slammed on the brakes at the next intersection, he reached over, slipped a hand behind her neck and pulled her face toward him. Before she could form the next complaint, he sealed her lips with his own. She remained rigid in his arms for only a second. He felt her press a hand to his chest, and he wondered fleetingly if she intended to push him away, but then those same fingers clutched at his shirt as her lips moved beneath his.

  Nate pushed the hat off her head and kissed her deeply. His fingers delved into her hair, his mouth taking and giving to the play of their mouths. He lost himself in her intoxicating taste. He hadn’t even known how much he wanted to kiss her.

  The loud horn of a truck behind their car tore them apart. The light was green. Ellie pressed her foot on the gas and accelerated through the intersection.

  “Have I told you today how annoying you can be?” she asked under her breath.

  “No, but you just showed me.”

  The blush on her cheeks had deepened and stretched down her neck. He reached up and traced the delicate lines of her ear with the tip of his finger.

  “Don’t,” she snapped.

  Nate stopped, but he couldn’t tear his gaze away. Maybe it was the lack of sleep or the post-traumatic stress, but he couldn’t remember the last time, if ever, a kiss had stirred him so much.

  The car pulled up in front of his hotel.

  Nate didn’t ask how she knew where he was staying for the same reason that he hadn’t asked how she knew where to find him this morning. She had her ways.

  “He was in there, wasn’t he?” She didn’t look at him. “Dead.”

  “Yes. The investigation is still ongoing, but it appears that Atwood was in there.”

  “Great.”

  She was silent for a moment. Nate waited until she was ready to talk.

  “Yesterday afternoon,” Ellie said finally, looking straight ahead, “when I got back from the northeast, I got a call from someone about the flag. I assume it was the auctioneer organizing the sale. No specific details, but I got what we need to do for you to be qualified as a bidder. Through Sister Helen, I passed on the information to Hawes. He called me back to say they didn’t see any problem with following their directions.”

  “Which is?”

  “Verification of a minimum of sixty million in a bank account in Nate Moffet’s name.”

  “Even if he said there was no problem, Hawes must have choked on that amount. When is the auction?”

  “I don’t know. And I don’t have a name. And I even did a star sixty-nine check to get the last incoming number, but no good.”

  “We can get that, but it probably won’t help. He could have used somebody else’s line.” He thought a moment. “Did you give all of this to Hawes, too?”

  “Yeah.” Ellie sent him a side glance. “There’s no way I can say that this guy was legit or not. But I have a phone call in
to Ray to see if he’s heard anything in the past couple of days.”

  Nate had talked to Hawes a couple of times last night, but each phone conversation had been brief and only pertinent to the explosion at the tux shop.

  “How is your father taking it…about Theo Atwood?”

  “I assume he’s okay. I haven’t seen him. Sister Helen gave him the news.”

  “I’d like to go over there and talk to him some more about other possible contacts. Also, it would be good if he could tell me anything he can about Atwood. Like who might have wanted to see him dead.”

  “I thought it was an accident.”

  “Maybe. Maybe not.” He undid his seat belt. “But first I need to shower and get out of these clothes.”

  Ellie’s gaze moved down to take in the front of the navy-blue T-shirt he’d changed into. The words Fire Police were emblazoned across the chest. “I don’t know, you look so much in character wearing this.”

  He was happy to see the twinkle of mischief back in her eyes. He also couldn’t stop himself from thinking about how good she’d tasted. “Want to come up?”

  “What for?”

  “Breakfast. I’ll order room service.”

  “No thanks. I can get my own.”

  “I’ll show you the stitches in my back. They’re pretty ugly.”

  “You needed stitches?” she asked, worried.

  “Yeah, but they said I’ll live.”

  “I’m sorry that you were hurt.” Her expression softened.

  “Sorry enough to come up?”

  She shook her head. “I’ll pass.”

  “How about a couple of hours’ sleep? We could both use it.”

  “We could both use a lot of things, but we’re not going to let ourselves be tempted.” She picked up her baseball cap and pulled it on low.

  “Not even when it comes to sex?”

  The blush was back. “Not too romantic, are you?”

  “Just asking a hypothetical question,” Nate replied, feigning innocence.

  “Is that right?”

  “Absolutely. Temptation and doing something about it are two different things. I am honest enough…no, maybe tired enough…to say what is running through my head. Of course, if you were hopping out of this car and running ahead of me toward my hotel room, then my sanity might have returned, and I’d be trying to talk you out of it.”