"Wyatt?"
Sandra spoke his name in a whisper. He turned. She'd taken a seat on the edge of the bed. The light skimmed her hair. Wyatt blinked.
"I talked to Uncle Olson this morning."
She went on to explain her conversation. Both the FBI and Senator Rutledge's men were looking for them. It was no longer only him. They knew about her. He didn't know whether the senator would sacrifice his own daughter for whatever that system they had meant, but it was too late to send her away. Whether he wanted a partner or not and whether he liked the way she made him feel or not, she was tied to him.
He should have been upset. He knew if he got into a mess it was better not to think about anyone except himself, but he'd been alone for so long and never even realized it until he'd found her in that cabin.
"What are you thinking?" she asked quietly.
Wyatt set his cup on the nightstand. Near the bed was a royal-blue velvet Queen Anne chair. Wyatt pulled it close to the bed and sat in front of Sandra.
"We have to get out of here." He took her hands in his. They were small in his large ones. "If your uncle told the FBI that you're with me, your life is being processed through every computer network inside the government. They already know everything about you—where you've been, who your friends are, and who their friends are. They'll know about this house and they'll come here."
She shuddered, pulling her hands back. He held them until she relaxed.
"They're the FBI. Aren't they on our side?"
"I don't know yet," he answered honestly.
He didn't know who was friendly and who wasn't. Until he did, the best thing was to proceed with caution. "We need to get out of here."
"All right." She stood up so abruptly, Wyatt had to move back. "There's only one more thing I need to do before we leave." She started for the door. He got up to follow her. "Stay here," she stopped him. "Take off your clothes and lie down on the bed."
***
Sandra signed the registration card at the Best Western Motel on New York Avenue as Martha Dandridge. She smiled at the irony of using Martha Washington's maiden name.
"Here's your key, Mrs. Dandridge." The uniformed desk clerk smiled as she handed her the computer card. "It's around back, end of the second row of buildings. Enjoy your stay."
Sandra accepted the key to Room 178 and bent to pick up her suitcase.
"Oh, Mrs. Dandridge," the desk clerk called her. "Your receipt." The woman extended a small slip of paper. Sandra wasn't used to checking into motels, and the times she had, she'd always paid by credit card. Today she'd paid in cash. She looked like a tourist coming to the capital for a few days. A camera hung over her shoulder, and she carried a bag with new clothes for both her and Wyatt. He'd agreed to meet her at the room as soon as she called him with the number.
She found the room and went inside. It was standard motel decor, two double beds, a long dresser with a mirror, a round table suitable for making notes after a business meeting, and a bathroom with a double sink and mirror outside.
She dropped the camera on the bed near the wall and set her suitcase on the floor. Taking her key and purse, she left the room and found a pay phone near the closed pool area. She called Wyatt, who was waiting at another pay phone not far away.
He was there in no time. Sandra swung open the door and helped him to the bed. "We can stay here for a few days then we'll have to move again," he said, helping him out of his coat.
"Don't worry about moving now." She found the bottle of Tylenol she'd bought when she'd picked up the suitcase and clothes. Tearing the paper away from the hotel room glasses, she filled one with water and gave it to him.
"What's this?"
"It'll help the pain," she told him. Even though she wasn't a doctor, she knew it was too soon for him to be running about the city after being stabbed. She'd removed the stitches this morning before they restored her grandmother's house to its unoccupied state and hailed a taxi on 16th Street.
"Rest now."
"I can't rest." He sat up, wincing. "We have to see your professor friend."
"We've got time." She took the glass and pushed him down. "Rest a while. We'll see him at the end of the day."
Within minutes he was sleeping peacefully. Sandra removed his boots. John's boots. Wyatt had worn them since they'd fled the cabin in a hail of gunfire. It seemed a lifetime had passed since then, yet it was only twenty-four hours. She'd only known him for a week. Could a person fall in love in that amount of time?
She watched Wyatt for a long while. When she'd met John, her attraction hadn't been instant. It had taken a while. They had grown comfortable with each other. They had met frequently and almost drifted into love. Her wedding day had been the happiest day of her life. Together they had envisioned an idyllic life, but two years of trying to conceive sent them to the doctor's office, where they found out John had leukemia. Only six months had elapsed from the day the doctors uttered the dreaded death sentence to the day she had stood by his open grave.
She was alone then, having trouble filling her days and even more filling her nights. Sandra didn't want to return to the Washington scene, although her parents wanted her to come back and stay with them. She resumed her job at the university and plodded through the semester. Then Sandra decided to enroll in the doctoral program and immersed herself in studying and teaching. She filled both her days and nights so as not to allow herself time to think about John and the future they had lost.
Then Wyatt fell, bleeding, into her lap. Just his presence changed her. She had loved John, but it was a different kind of love. She and John had a comfortable love. They shared the same thoughts and beliefs. Their life was warm, without issues or complications. They laughed together, played together and loved together. Wyatt made her heart pound, and his presence in a room seemed to dominate it. She loved watching him, trying to find out the secret behind his eyes. He stood out in a crowd with the strength of personality. Her attraction had been instant. Sandra shuddered to think that they might never have met if his search for her father hadn't led him to her door. She trembled thinking that she might never have known what it was like to feel wonderfully alive.
Sandra moved to the bed where he lay. The bruises on his face had nearly faded. The swelling was completely gone and his handsome features were becoming defined. Wyatt lay on his side. She pulled a blanket over him. He shifted but didn't waken. She ran her hand down his cheek and over his chin. The roughness of his unshaven face rasped against her hand. She sat down. She didn't know how, but they were going to have to get over this. She was falling for this guy, but how could she love a man who'd implicate her father in anything as horrible as treason? There had to be another explanation. She hoped Jeff would be able to shed some light on the situation. In the meantime she'd try to reach her father again.
***
The Senate office buildings sat to the left of the Capitol Building on Constitution Avenue. It could be reached through a maze of tunnels or the underground subway system that traveled between the Capitol and several of the government complexes. Senator Rutledge had a suite of offices on the third floor. From his windows he could see the huge rotunda with the bronze statue of Freedom on its cupola.
Michael Waring had served in many capacities for the senator. Presently he was his aide, secretary, administrative assistant and general problem solver. Today and for the past week he hadn't seen or talked to the senator. He'd dodged questions as to his availability, canceled meetings that had been scheduled for months on the pretext of an unforeseen emergency, and concealed the fact the Bradford Rutledge's whereabouts were as remote a secret as the location of Senator Wyatt Randolph.
He'd accepted the abuse of disgruntled congressmen and constituents who happened to be in the city on vacation, but the hardest people to appease were the senator’s family. Yesterday Sandra had called. She called often, and Brad never failed to talk to her. Then Annie, the black sheep of the family, demanding information as
if she were some important government official. Finally, Dr. Rutledge, with her warm voice had been perturbed that she'd missed him before she left the city and hadn't been able to reach him since.
None of them, however, had posed as much of a problem as the caller he now had on the phone. "Mrs. Horton, I assure you I will give the senator your message as soon as he returns."
A call from Casey Horton was like getting a call from the President himself. He sat straighter in his chair and spoke clearly as if he were acknowledging an order. She'd stepped outside of the Washington chain of command and called the senator directly. Whatever Brad had gotten into, it was big.
"Thank you, Michael," Mrs. Horton said. "Give my regards to Rose and ask her to call me for lunch one day next week. I haven't seen her since the literacy reception last fall."
"I will do that, Mrs. Horton. She'll be pleased."
Michael replaced the phone with a smile. She was a truly gracious lady, and he was proud to call her a friend of the country. She had a terrific memory for details. He was sure she remembered everyone she'd ever met, including the names and birthdays of all their spouses and children. His wife would be glad she'd asked about her, and ecstatic the she wanted to have lunch with her.
Michael lifted the phone and punched in the number of his wife's office. Her happy voice helped lift his spirits. His first marriage had been a disaster, but in the last nine years of having Rose Gordon-Waring as his wife he had never tired of going home to her and finding her waiting. They had no children of their own, but at forty he still had hopes that she would conceive one of these days. He related the news of Casey Horton's invitation and as usual received an enthusiastic reply. Rose had met Mrs. Horton more than once, but had never been asked to a formal luncheon before. She said she'd call her this afternoon.
As Michael replaced the phone, his mind worked over why the President's wife suddenly wanted to eat with Rose. Was she trying to pump her for information that Michael had withheld? Was she acting with the President's full knowledge and consent? Was there something going on that involved the senator that he didn't know about? That was obvious he thought with a frown. Senator Rutledge hadn't made a move without him since the senator was a junior congressman. Michael felt as if he were a wayward child being disinherited.
The ringing of the phone cut into his thoughts. The senator's private number again. Only the family and the President called on this number.
"Senator Rutledge's Office, Michael Waring speaking. May I help you?"
"Michael, it’s Sandra. I'd like to speak to my father." "I'm sorry, Sandra, but the senator is not in at the moment."
"Where can he be reached?"
"I'm afraid I can't give out the information."
"Michael, it's me, for God's sake. For the past two days all you've told me is you can't give out that information."
Michael pulled at the collar of his shirt. He was a neat man. He liked being pressed and looking as cool as if he'd stepped off the pages of a fashion magazine. Generally, his job afforded him the opportunity, but this week of hedging was getting to him.
"You're his secretary, Michael. Where is he?"
"He's away, Sandra. That's all I can tell you." It was all he knew. If he knew more he would tell her. He knew how much the senator loved his family. He could remember when the girls were only children. Annie had changed her name to Suzanne and was a supermodel traveling all over the world and Sandra was about to complete her doctorate in mathematics.
"Well, when he does return tell him I have some very valuable information concerning a certain missing junior senator from the state of Pennsylvania."
Michael was suddenly on his feet. "What! Where are you?" Everyone in the country was looking for Senator Randolph. What could Sandra possibly know about him? She had to be lying. She was trying to get a rise out of him and he'd let it work.
"Find him, Michael. I need to talk to him."
Her tone had been serious. She hadn't said good-bye or given any salutation, just the click in his ear when she hung up. This was unlike Sandra. Did she truly know something about the senator or was this a ruse for him to get her father to return her call?
He swung around and stared through the window. The Capitol loomed in the bright January afternoon sun. All around him were the spoils of the rich. Dark cherry wood paneled the walls of his office. Built-in bookcases made him mindful of a lawyer's library. The lamp on his desk had a gold shine to it and had cost more than his first car. It matched the gold-tone accessories that Rose had given him when the senator was elected to office. He wielded a lot of power in his position, earning an income phenomenal for a poor boy from the streets of Camden, New Jersey. He had a wonderful wife and a large, rambling house in the Virginia countryside. Everything he could ask of life had been given to him.
But today he hated this job.
***
The phone on Clarence Christopher's desk rang. It wasn't the ring of Alexander Graham Bell's telephone but the new sound the had come into being when communications suddenly meant more than the simple picking up of the black instrument and talking.
The phone on his desk was a virtual station in itself. He could call any department he wanted with a three-digit code. He could call the President by pressing only one number or hold a conference call with a roomful of people on the other side of the world.
For the most part he liked the technology. He only wished he were young enough to be able to get his hands into the nitty-gritty of it.
"Christopher," he said.
"It's Agent Norman, sir. We have her on the line."
"I'll be right there."
Clarence left his office by way of the private elevator. In moments he was walking through the door of the communications room. He'd personally authorized the wiretap on Senator Rutledge's house and office. The waiting had nearly killed him. Finally, his daughter had called. He could only hope Waring had kept her on the line long enough for them to get a fix on her location.
"What?" he asked, coming into the room. The temperature there was controlled to suit the machinery rather than the people.
"Sorry, sir."
Agent Melvin Norman truly looked sorry. He replayed the tape of the conversation between Sandra Rutledge and Michael Waring.
"We'll have it analyzed for background noise and see if there's anything that can help us determine where the call originated."
"Thank you, Mel." Clarence was disappointed. He didn't have a thing to report to the President, and the two fugitives were making the FBI look as if it couldn't find its way out of a paper bag. "Keep me informed."
Clarence left the control room and headed back to his office. They were after the senator and Ms. Rutledge because they held the defense system, but someone else was after the senator. Someone else knew about the system and probably wanted it themselves. Clarence knew the President's primary interest was getting that system back. He would follow his instructions to the letter, but it was time he looked into the real reason Edward Jackson had been killed.
Wyatt Randolph was a fine man. There seemed no reason he would not bring the stones to the government, yet something or someone had changed his mind. Clarence wanted to know who that was. When he found out, he would have the man who killed Jackson, and Wyatt Randolph would have no reason to stay out in the cold.
***
Washington, DC had grown up and around the federal influence since George Washington mapped out the tract of land he thought should house the new nation. Small wooden houses had been built close to the influential, if young, government. When the city burned due to poor fire conditions and the abundance of wooden structures, a law was enacted requiring the use of inflammable building materials.
Bricks were more expensive than timber, so the houses were built attached to each other. This both contributed to savings on heating the household and the swelling population.
Jefferson Taylor, III, lived in one of the renovated brick buildings on W Stree
t in the northwest section of the city. The house was within walking distance of Howard University. Jeff liked living there. It afforded him the use of the university computers without the need to drive across town in the middle of the night as was often the case when he got involved in a problem.
Tonight he was involved in encrypting a file so the code couldn't be broken. He'd done it thousands of times for a company that wanted to have an edge on the market. They paid him tons of money in consulting fees for this service. The average hacker on the street couldn't break the code, but the company wasn't trying to keep them out. It was security against other manufacturers.
They'd asked him to come and work for them, but he'd refused. The work paid the bills and gave him the security of knowing his old age would be comfortable. It also afforded him the time to teach at the university. He liked standing in front of his classes and trying to get through to brains that ran on beer and hormones. Sometimes he did get through. The rush of actually penetrating a young mind was as much an aphrodisiac as sex to him. Of course, he'd never tell anyone that. He didn't want them thinking he was strange or anything, at least no stranger than an absentminded professor.
He'd been working on a new algorithm. This one was longer and more complicated than any he'd ever worked on for the Defense Department. Even the fly-boys in Intelligence wouldn't be able to break this one. Jeff worked vigorously. He heard nothing and nothing penetrated his mind other than the mathematically complex structure he was building.
He didn't know how long the doorbell had been ringing when he finally recognized it. He was expecting guests and wanted to get to the door before they left. Hitting the Save key, he got up and jogged to the front door.
"I don't think he's here. We should have called first," Wyatt said as they stood in the yellow wash of light over the front door. It was eight o'clock and pitch-black outside. Wyatt, thankful for the early darkness, was still inclined to check over his shoulder for assailants who might materialize out of the shadows.
Under the Sheets (Capitol Chronicles Book 1) Page 41