High Treason

by John Gilstrap

  “He’s a source,” Cantrell said. “He’s an unnamed knowledgeable insider. If you need to sweat someone, he’s the one.”

  David pulled up short. “Why would he help me? He doesn’t know me from Adam.”

  Grayson shrugged. “It’s what confidential sources do. They talk.”

  “Only when they trust you.”

  Grayson donned the condescending smile that suited him so well. “David, my boy, there are only three reasons why sources talk to reporters, and none of them are rooted in trust.” He counted them off with his fingers, starting off with his thumb. “One: They leak information that their bosses want them to leak—the policy statement that comes with full deniability. Two: They realize that their careers aren’t going the way they want them to, and they see opportunity in betrayal. The common denominator there is the advancement of their own careers. We journalists are merely their vectors.”

  David felt anger brewing in his gut. “Wow, you really are the cynic, aren’t you?”

  “I prefer the term ‘realist.’ And we listen to them for the same reason. Their betrayals give us the stories that make our careers. And as a class, I have to say that we reporters are not all that incentivized to determine whether the underlying facts behind the leaks are truth or fiction. The fact that an important person said it is itself newsworthy.”

  David shook his head, a rattling motion to make the loose pieces fall into place. “Why are we having this conversation?”

  “Because you asked about motivation, and you made a speech about getting the facts right. You’re wading into deep, deep waters, and I wanted you to know how much different the rules of the game are from what you think they are.”

  “Because I’m naïve.”

  “I was going to say idealistic, but naïve works, too. This is Washington, David. There are no legitimate high horses to mount, and all houses are made of glass. Never forget that. Leave the speech making and the lofty phrases to the politicians. They deliver them better, and no one believes them anyway.”

  “What does this have to do with this Zaney guy?”

  “It’s Zanger. William Henry Zanger of Concordia, Kansas, via Northwestern University. He lives in Lake Ridge, Virginia, with his public school teacher wife, Barbie, and baby daughter, Hope. Lake Ridge isn’t quite the end of the world, but you can see it from there.”

  “This is important?”

  “Damned straight it’s important. Billy still owes eighty-seven thousand dollars to Northwestern for his English literature degree. On top of that, they’ve got a two hundred ten thousand dollar mortgage on their tiny little townhouse. That’s almost three hundred thousand dollars in debt to be paid for from combined incomes of under a hundred-fifty-K a year. Do the math.”

  “How’d he qualify for that kind of mortgage in this kind of market?” Even as he asked the question, he realized that he’d locked on to the wrong detail.

  Cantrell saw it, too, and laughed. “Lending institutions have done very well by currying favor with this administration. But this brings us to the third and most powerful motivation to talk to a reporter.”

  David saw it, but was horrified. “Money?”

  “Money.”

  “You pay sources? That’s unethical.”

  This time, Cantrell’s laugh was pure derision. “Now you’re definitely being naïve.”

  “The Washington Enquirer, the city’s leading newspaper, allows you to buy information from sources?”

  “Of course they don’t allow it. But they also don’t look all that carefully into the ‘miscellaneous’ category on expense reports.” He used finger quotes.

  “And Charlie Baroli knows you’re doing it?”

  A shrug. “I can’t say that we’ve ever discussed it, but yeah, there’ve been winks along the way. It’s how the system works.”

  “But if you’re buying information, how can you ever trust what you get?”

  “How can you not? If the information is good, the buyer keeps coming back. If it’s not, then the game ends quickly. Simple supply and demand.”

  David felt sick.

  “Come on, David. Don’t look so devastated. Our relationship to politicians is equal parts symbiotic and parasitic. Neither can flourish without the other. Keeping the pump primed is good for business.”

  David wanted to move on. “So you have this symbiotic parasitic relationship with Billy Zanger. How does that help me?”

  “That’s the beautiful part, the part that gives us scribes the upper hand when all is said and done. One could argue that by buying information, we violate some universal ethical code. Clearly, that’s what you think. But when they accept the money, they break the law. That fact—and the fact that we can expose them for what they are—gives us ownership rights.”

  David wasn’t sure that he understood.

  “I can trade him,” Cantrell said.

  David felt his jaw drop open.

  Cantrell laughed again. David was getting tired of that sound. “It’s the dirtiest of businesses, isn’t it?” He clapped David on the shoulder. “Anyway, he’s yours if you want him. Believe it or not, his address is in the book.”

  Cantrell offered his hand. “Good luck, David. I’ve got to get back to resting on my laurels.”

  David shook, and felt oddly ashamed for doing so.

  CHAPTER NINE

  “All of her enemies are accounted for,” Venice said. It was just shy of 10:00 A.M. “Everyone in the database who is identified as a subject of the FBI investigation is still in prison, due largely to the testimony delivered by Yelena Poltanov. What’s your next theory?”

  Behind him, beyond the glass wall, the door to the Cave crashed open, announcing Boxers’ arrival. “Have we decided who to shoot yet?” he quipped. It was his way of saying good morning.

  Jonathan caught him up in a two-minute soliloquy. It doesn’t take long to relay that there’s nothing to tell.

  “What about her friends?” Big Guy asked.

  “What about them?” Venice replied.

  “Well, if her enemies are all accounted for, what about her friends? Maybe they have something to do with this.”

  Jonathan scowled. “What are you suggesting?”

  Boxers shrugged with one shoulder. “Wasn’t it Sherlock Holmes who said that when the unlikely is all that is left, then it is probably the answer?”

  “No,” Venice said. “The quote is that when you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”

  “Welcome to English class,” Jonathan said. “Big Guy’s larger point is worth looking at.”

  “Why would the First Lady’s friends be trying to kill her?” Venice asked.

  “Why would she be in a bar meeting with enemies?” Jonathan countered. “Maybe the kidnapping was secondary to a happy meeting with friends.”

  “Or maybe friends and relatives of the people she put in jail are looking for revenge,” Venice said.

  “Mine is quicker to research,” Jonathan said. “The clock is ticking here.”

  “I didn’t know we had a clock.”

  “There’s always a clock, Ven. You know that. Mrs. Darmond has been missing for nearly thirty hours now, and still there’s been no word. That’s concerning at multiple levels, and we’re still one hundred percent in the dark. Let’s swing at the easy pitches first, shall we?”

  Clearly annoyed that Jonathan had taken Boxers’ side against her, Venice turned back to her keyboard and got lost in the keystrokes.

  Boxers capitalized on the silence to ask, “Have you given any thought to the resources we might need if this thing goes hot?”

  Jonathan sighed. It was always in the back of his mind, but until there were details to pin on the possibilities, weapons and equipment were hard to specify. “At this point, I think we prepare for the worst,” he said. “The normal complement of small arms, a couple of claymores, some grenades, and GPCs.”

  Boxers nodded. He appeared to agree with Jonathan’s
assessment. “Okay, then. I’m gonna head down to the armory and start assembling the go bags. I need something to do anyway, and this has the feel of an op where the balloon’s gonna go up fast.”

  Jonathan couldn’t disagree.

  The armory for the covert side of Security Solutions lay underground in a tunnel that ran the length of the yard and parking lot that separated the firehouse from the basement of Saint Kate’s, and contained enough weaponry to sustain an invasion of Mexico. Jonathan considered it a sanctuary of sorts—a place to relax, enveloped in the aroma of gun oil while smithing weapons to improve their function or merely to erase the signatures of previous operations. For Boxers, the armory was less about the poetry than the practicality, but Jonathan envied his escape.

  As Big Guy exited the War Room, Jonathan turned back to Venice, whose face at once showed annoyance and amusement. “What?”

  “I hate it when Boxers is right,” she said.

  “What’ve you got?”

  “One of the guys in the photos you looked at—Albert Banks—lives out in Warrenton, Virginia. I took a look at him because he’s local, and guess where his cell phone was night before last?”

  Jonathan felt a tingle of hope in his spine. “Southeast DC?”

  Venice smiled. “I can dial it in even closer than that. He was within two hundred feet of the Wild Times Bar.”

  When Venice continued to grin, Jonathan knew there was more. She loved savoring her Big Reveals. “You look like you have a gas pain,” Jonathan said.

  “Steve Gutowski was in the area, too.”

  Another name from the FBI’s list of friendly contacts. “Interesting,” Jonathan said.

  “The question is why would her old friends be out to kidnap her?”

  An idea bloomed in Jonathan’s head, triggering a smile. “Maybe it was a reunion,” he said. “And the shootings were an attempted three-fer.”

  “An attempted what?”

  “Three-fer. One more than a two-fer. Revenge times three. If word got out to bad guys that the old friends were out reliving their past lives, what better time to take them all out?”

  “That would mean a big leak in the Secret Service. If Boxers’ theory is right, maybe they were there to help her get away from Washington.”

  “And the shooting?”

  “Random coincidence?” Venice read the expression on her boss’s face for what it was and quickly added, “They do happen, Dig. I know you don’t like to admit that, but sometimes they do.”

  It had long been a central underpinning of Jonathan’s life that when two or more unusual events occur simultaneously or in quick succession, they were directly related until proven otherwise. He’d seen too many people get hurt—hell, he’d seen too many wars start—when people ignore the proverbial elephant in the room.

  “You said Albert Banks lives in Warrenton?”

  Venice spouted off the address, as if Jonathan had memorized every street in the Union. “I’ll upload it to your GPS.” She had already figured out that he was planning to pay a visit.

  On his way out the door, he called over his shoulder, “I’ll stay in touch.”

  “I’m sorry, sir, but Mr. Banks isn’t in the office today.” The voice coming through the speaker was young and far too chipper.

  Jonathan didn’t understand why everyone wanted to sound like a cheerleader these days when they answered the phone. “When do you expect him? I have a very important matter to discuss.”

  A pause as papers shuffled in the background. “I don’t see any appointments on his calendar,” Melinda replied. He thought that’s what she’d said her name was. Or maybe Belinda. Just Linda?

  “I didn’t make an appointment,” Jonathan said.

  “Was he expecting you?”

  We’re done with this. “Let’s get back to when you expect him.”

  “He won’t be in at all today.” The effervescence in her bubbly voice had dropped by half. “Who’s calling?”

  “This is Special Agent Horgan with the FBI.”

  Next to him, in the driver’s seat, Boxers fanned the fingers of his right hand and waved from a limp wrist. Hubba hubba.

  “Oh, my goodness. Is everything all right?”

  Jonathan went Joe Friday on her. “I prefer to be the one asking the questions,” he said.

  “Oh, yes. Of course. I’m sorry. He called in sick today.”

  “Do you know if he’s at home now?”

  “I presume so. Is he in trouble?” All the bubbles were gone now.

  “Ma’am, do you know what obstruction of justice is?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Obstruction of justice. Ever heard of it?”

  “It’s a crime, right?”

  “A serious crime,” Jonathan clarified. “It comes complete with serious jail time.”

  “Oh my God, is that what Mr. Banks did?”

  “No. It’s what you will have done if I arrive at his home and find that he’s not there anymore because you warned him.”

  “Oh, Mr. Horgan, I would never—”

  “Agent Horgan,” Jonathan corrected. Hey, if you’re going to play a role, commit to it, right? “The very best thing you could do right now would be to pretend that this conversation never happened.”

  “Oh, I will, sir. I wouldn’t dream of calling him or warning him. I won’t even tell Mr. Grossman about the call.”

  As if he knew who the hell Mr. Grossman was. “Thank you for that.”

  “Are you going to need me to testify?”

  Jonathan brought the fingers of his free hand to his forehead. “We’ll see.” He was already finished with the conversation. Now he just needed a way to shut it down. “Thank you so much for your help.”

  “Don’t you need my contact information?”

  He took it and ignored it. After three phone numbers and two e-mail addresses, he said, “I have to move on now,” and he clicked off.

  Boxers laughed. “That’s one of your very best G-man impersonations ever.”

  Jonathan flipped him off. “We’re going to his house now. Not his office.”

  “Works for me.” They were maybe ten minutes out.

  Warrenton, Virginia, lay in the near part of Fauquier County, about an hour and a half west of Fisherman’s Cove. Twenty years ago, the sleepy little burg defined the leading edge of nowhere, but as people flooded to Washington, DC, and its suburbs in pursuit of government and computer jobs, there wasn’t much about Warrenton that was country anymore. Travel a mile beyond it, though, and you’d feel naked if you weren’t carrying a hunting rifle for food.

  They’d taken the Batmobile. With Boxers at the wheel—Jonathan never drove when they were on an op together—the trip took fifteen minutes less than it should have. With a right foot made of lead, the Big Guy seemed empowered by the FBI creds in his pocket. If you drove like Boxers, the get-out-of-jail-free badge was a significant benefit of impersonating a cop.

  “This guy’s a lawyer, right?” Big Guy asked. He weighted the word to reflect his disdain.

  “Civil engineer,” Jonathan corrected. A much nobler profession, he thought, since engineers made their living building things that never were, while lawyers made theirs by sticking their hands into the pockets of others.

  “How are we handling this?”

  “Softly. We’re going to talk and to learn.”

  “Suppose he doesn’t want to cooperate?”

  Good question. Banks might very well have a critical piece of information, or he may have nothing. Jonathan didn’t mind twisting information out of someone he knew to be a bad guy, but he needed to be really sure before he resorted to physical persuasion.

  “If it comes to that,” Jonathan said, “we’ll just have to wing it. For now, we’ll proceed on the assumption that he has Mrs. Darmond’s interests front and center in his heart.”

  “So you’re telling me you don’t have a clue.”

  “Pretty much.”

  Boxers’ laugh made a low rumbling sou
nd. “Just sidearms?”

  “Yes.” Jonathan made sure the answer sounded emphatic. The weapons and explosives locked in the compartment under the cargo bay weren’t the kind of hardware you could carry out on the street. Jonathan would make do with the Colt 1911 .45 on his hip, and Boxers with his ever-present 9 millimeter Beretta.

  “Our cover is just the FBI thing,” Jonathan said. “We’re there to ask him questions about why he was downtown last night.”

  “Suppose he denies it?”

  “Then we’ll know he’s a liar.” Effective planning was defined by baby steps.

  Venice had loaded both the work and home addresses into Jonathan’s GPS, so the shift in targets meant little. The residential neighborhood where Albert Banks lived might as well have been Levittown after a deep breath. The lots and houses were two or three times the size of those 1950s suburbs, but the sameness of the construction was nearly identical. Two stories instead of one, colonials instead of ramblers, but still the worst that suburbia had to offer. The yards were an equal shade of green, and even cut to a uniform length. Jonathan didn’t begin to understand what compelled people to live in a place where every house had the same floor plan.

  “That’s his up there,” Boxers said, pointing past the windshield. Banks’s iteration of the ubiquitous colonial sat on a corner before a cul-de-sac. Red brick, green shutters. His lawn had bald spots, though, which no doubt made him a pariah of the community.

  Boxers nosed the Batmobile into the driveway and parked it diagonally, blocking the whole thing in case Banks tried to make a run for it in the Subaru that sat parked outside the garage. A ridiculously heavy vehicle when it rolled off the factory floor, the Batmobile was so massively armored that the Subaru would shred itself if it tried to ram it. And it wouldn’t even scratch the Hummer’s paint.

  They climbed out of the vehicle and closed the doors quietly. Boxers thumbed the button on the key fob and the locks seated without a honk of the horn.

  Jonathan produced an earbud that looked remarkably like an invisible hearing aid and pressed it into his ear canal. It was a wireless transceiver mated to a radio on his belt. He pushed the transmit button on the radio and said, “Radio check.”