by Stephen Frey
“You don’t have to rationalize anything for me. Bottle’s inside there,” he said, pointing at a small cabinet in a far corner of the room. “Need a mixer?”
“No.”
“Wow,” he muttered, raising one eyebrow as he began reassembling the gun, “hard-core. Well, get yourself a glass and some ice from the kitchen, and have at it.”
Moments later she was back and filling her glass to the lip with vodka. “How many people are guarding the house tonight?” she asked, going through the pile of discs beside the CD player on top of the cabinet.
“Fifteen, and all armed with Heckler & Koch MG5 submachine guns.”
“Jesus,” she whispered, “submachine guns?”
“And we’ve got a few more tricks up our sleeves if that’s not enough. A few of them are even packing—”
“Frank Sinatra?” she shrieked, grabbing the CD when she saw the name. “You listen to Frank Sinatra?”
Dez spread his arms wide. “Just because I’m black, I can’t listen to the Chairman of the Board?”
“I love Ol’ Blue Eyes,” she said, holding up the disc. “Can I put this on?”
“Sure.”
She moved back to the couch as “The Way You Look Tonight” began playing. “Do you want a drink?”
“Nope.”
“Come on.”
“Not while I’m taking care of you.”
Victoria sat down on the sofa, aware that she was a little closer to him than before. Watch it, she told herself. The first few sips were already affecting her. “So we’ll never be able to have a drink together?”
“Never say never, but not anytime soon.”
“I love this song,” she murmured, watching him finish putting the Glock back together. “You ever get scared, Dez? I’ve wanted to ask you that question ever since we met.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t think you do. It’s like you have no fear of anything. I’ve only known one other person like that.”
“Your father?”
She smiled at him. “How’d you guess?”
“It wasn’t hard.” He took a deep breath. “Sure, I get scared sometimes. Just like your dad did.”
“Were you scared when we were attacked on the driveway at my house?”
He shook his head as he eased back onto the couch. “I know how this’ll sound, but I didn’t have time to be scared. I was afterward. I always get scared after when I think about what just happened, how close I came to dying. It was the same for me when I was a SEAL. I never got scared during a mission, but always after.”
She bit her lower lip gently. “I miss Cam.”
“I know.”
“It’s my fault he’s gone.”
“No,” Dez countered deliberately and firmly, “it’s not. It’s the fault of the people who are trying to kill you. You’ve got to get off that road.”
“Do you ever get lonely?”
“You’re full of interesting questions tonight.”
“Do you?”
“I love what I do.”
“That doesn’t mean you don’t get lonely. Is there a future Mrs. Dez Braxton up in Washington?”
“Maybe … but I haven’t met her yet.” He gestured to Victoria. “Are you lonely?”
As the song faded, she felt for a moment like an ordinary person, not Virginia Lewis, former governor. It usually took cocaine to make her feel this way. “You know I am, Dez,” she finally whispered, “very lonely. It seems like I’ve never had time to get really close to anyone.”
“Make time.”
She shook her head. “I can’t. Not yet.”
“Why?”
“There’s still too much to do,” she said as “My One and Only Love” began to play. “Oh Lord,” she murmured as the slow song drifted through the room. “This is my favorite Sinatra. It gives me goose bumps every time I hear it.” She held her forearm out so he could see.
He glanced at her arm, then into her eyes. “Dance?” he asked, standing up and holding out his hand.
“Yeah,” she answered taking his hand, “I’d love to dance with you, Dez.”
She laughed softly as she blended into his body perfectly, and they began to move as one.
“Am I that bad?” he asked.
“You’re awesome.”
“Why’d you laugh?”
“I don’t even know where you’re from, and I’m living in your house and dancing slow with you.”
“But why’d you laugh?”
She pressed her face to his chest. “I guess I always figured you Special Forces crazies all come from the same tough-as-nails small town in Texas or Montana or someplace wild like that.”
Dez leaned back with a confused expression. “What?”
“Where are you from?”
“I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you.”
“Blah, blah, come on.”
He shook his head as she pressed her face back to his chest. “I’m serious. There’re some nasties around the world who’d love to find that out, so they could get to my family and get their revenge. I was involved in some very classified stuff.”
She looked up at him again. “You’re kidding, right?”
He shook his head.
“So is your name really Dez Braxton?”
He smiled widely. “What do you think?”
PART THREE
CHAPTER 40
VIRGINIA BEACH, VIRGINIA
“Please state your name, sir,” the prosecutor requested in a friendly tone as he walked out from behind the long table.
He paced across the courtroom toward the witness stand, soles clicking purposefully on the buffed hardwood. His steps broke the breathless silence, which filled every corner of the courtroom. A courtroom packed to capacity, save for the jury box … which was a ghost town.
The prosecutor couldn’t keep himself from glancing in that empty direction. It was odd not to have a jury sitting to his left as he approached the witness stand; unsettling not to have them follow his every move and hang on his every word as he constructed his case; eerie to realize they were all watching him through a lens from two hundred miles away, like so many voyeurs.
He cleared his throat twice to erase any nerves that might be loitering in his voice. “For the record, sir.”
“My name is Jack Hoffman.”
“What is your occupation?”
Hoffman gave a curious, uncertain look. “Um … I’m unemployed.”
The prosecutor winced. A terrible gaffe and he’d practiced this opening many times at home before the bathroom mirror. He had to relax and let things flow naturally. But the stage had never been this daunting. There was so much riding on this trial. It would make or break his career. That had been made very clear.
The fundamental challenge for him was that Angela Gaynor’s high-powered attorney team had steamrolled this case into court very quickly—because of the election. He hadn’t been allowed anywhere near the normal time to prepare, and he was a painfully deliberate man, always had been. So he wasn’t confident in his facts or his witnesses. The doubts were fueling his nerves.
He inhaled deeply to calm himself. “What was your most recent occupation?”
“I was the chief executive officer of Gaynor Construction Incorporated before I was terminated.”
“Where is Gaynor Construction headquartered?”
“Virginia Beach, Virginia.”
“Who owns that corporation, Mr. Hoffman?”
“Angela Gaynor. One hundred percent.”
“Is she in this courtroom?” Now he was finding his rhythm. His breathing was becoming normal; his chest was relaxing; his thoughts were coming quickly.
“Yes.”
“Could you please identify her?”
Hoffman pointed to the defense table, arm and forefinger fully extended. “She’s right there,” he said loudly, without hesitation, as Angela Gaynor’s eyes narrowed to slits.
Out of habit, the prosecutor glanced
at the jury box, but he quickly redirected his gaze to the camera aimed at the defense table. He hoped the jury had gotten a clear view of Gaynor’s angry reaction to her former CEO’s demonstrative and committed identification. He hated them not being in the courtroom.
“Let the record show that Mr. Hoffman has identified the defendant as the owner of Gaynor Construction Corporation,” he said loudly.
Twenty-nine years old, the prosecutor was a child of the technology era, unlike his middle-aged associates in the DA’s office. He should have been more comfortable with the new arrangement. But he was still having trouble transitioning to the jurors’ invisibility. He liked seeing their faces. More importantly, he liked seeing that they liked him—as most juries apparently did, based on his outstanding won-lost record. Would he have that same winning effect through a screen?
“Mr. Hoffman, please give the court a brief description of Gaynor Construction’s activities.”
“The company builds a variety of large commercial structures including office buildings, high-rise apartment complexes, warehouses, and sports venues.”
“In fact, during your tenure as CEO, didn’t the company begin construction of the new Hampton Roads Sports Arena?”
“We did.”
“What is the cost of that facility, Mr. Hoffman?”
“When it’s finished, the total cost will exceed two hundred and fifty million dollars.”
A gasp raced around the courtroom.
Even the judge seemed impressed, the prosecutor noticed. “So, Ms. Gaynor will make a quarter of a billion dollars on that—”
“Objection!” the lead defense attorney shouted. “The prosecutor knows full well that what something costs has nothing to do with what Gaynor Construction will actually make on a project. What the company makes on that project, if anything, will be far less than the amount he’s citing.”
“Sustained. The jury will disregard.”
“Mr. Hoffman,” the prosecutor continued—certain he’d deftly made his point despite the objection—“did Ms. Gaynor direct you to make cash payments to three Hampton city council members and the mayor in order to ensure that Gaynor Construction would be named the prime contractor on the project?”
“No.”
The prosecutor’s gaze raced from the camera aimed at the witness stand to the witness. “Excuse me?” he asked, doing a horrible job of masking his shock. They’d been over and over Hoffman’s testimony. This one wasn’t his fault. Had someone gotten to Hoffman? Was he recanting?
“She directed me to make three payments. She made the fourth payment herself.”
“Objection! Hearsay!”
“Sustained. The witness will—”
“Ms. Gaynor made that bribe personally to the mayor of Hampton,” Hoffman continued loudly over the judge’s warning. “It was for fifty thousand dollars.”
“Objection!”
“The other three I made were for twenty-five thousand each. Twenty-five thousand so we could make two hundred fifty million,” Hoffman kept going.
“Objection!”
“She forced me to make the payments, or she told me she’d fire me!” Hoffman yelled bitterly as the judge hammered the bench with his gavel. “I had to do it. I have a family. I have e-mails that prove everything! Who to bribe, how much to pay, and that she’d can me if I didn’t!”
“He’s lying!” Angela screamed over her lawyer and the gavel, shooting up from her chair so fast it tumbled over backwards. “He’s lying about everything! Not just about the mayor’s payment. I knew nothing about any of this.”
The defense team pulled Angela back down after righting her chair. But the damage had been done.
“Don’t do that again,” her lead counsel begged. “It only makes you look guiltier,” he whispered … just as the courtroom went silent.
“Guiltier?” she asked loudly, her words echoing around and around the room.
The prosecutor muted a grin as he watched the scene playing out at the defense table. Jackpot.
That testimony about Angela delivering the mayor’s bribe herself was strong, incredibly strong, even if it was technically hearsay. But where had it come from? This was the first he’d ever heard of it.
He’d find out later.
Now all he had to do was introduce the stack of incriminating e-mails Angela Gaynor had sent to Hoffman—and this case was over. Gaynor would be heading to a state penitentiary—not to Washington, DC.
And his career was about to take off.
JURY TOWN
Racine shifted in his chair at the back right of the jury box as the testimony continued.
He glanced at the defense table, which was on the upper right-hand screen affixed to the opposite wall. Angela Gaynor was so compelling. She seemed smart, hardworking, and honest. And he related easily and completely to the struggles she’d endured and conquered on her way to making Gaynor Construction a force. He hoped Excel Games would ultimately perform as well as Gaynor Construction had.
He liked Angela Gaynor. He wanted her to be innocent.
But the evidence was piling up against her. As jury foreman, Racine would maintain his neutrality until the bitter end. He would show no bias either way, unlike several of the most outspoken jurors who were already muttering about her “obvious guilt.” But he couldn’t help starting to believe she’d end up serving prison time. That perhaps the outspoken jurors were correct. Key people were testifying against her. And the jury was about to see the e-mails the prosecutor kept alluding to. E-mails Gaynor had allegedly sent to Hoffman, which proved her complicity in the conspiracy beyond a shadow of a doubt. If the e-mails were as damaging as the prosecutor claimed, that would clinch her guilt.
Racine’s thoughts wandered as Jack Hoffman stepped down from the witness stand. He wondered how Excel Games was performing with the money from Mao Xilai—and how Bart Stevens was coping with everything by himself. It was horrible, being unable to speak to Bart, even worse being cut off from Claire. He had to keep reminding himself he was doing the right thing, that it was all for her even if she hated him when he came out.
As he refocused on the proceedings, Racine realized that Sofia had just glanced over her shoulder at him from the front row of the jury box. They’d been spending a great deal of time together since they’d arrived at Jury Town, eating most meals together. She was teaching him how to play pool—she was surprisingly good—and he had to admit he was having feelings for her. But she was still in mourning for her murdered husband, and he didn’t want to push.
He smiled at her when she glanced over her shoulder again—and she smiled back.
WASHINGTON, DC
“We got to the mayor as well,” the man from the NSA explained from the other end of the phone. “He’ll plead to a three-year sentence, but we’ll get him out in less than two months.”
“Excellent. About the same time we get Hoffman out.”
“Hoffman testified today that Angela Gaynor had physically made the payoff to the mayor herself. We got to him just before he went on the stand to let him know about the mayor, and it was beautiful. Gaynor started screaming and yelling in the courtroom. It made her look very guilty.”
“Nice.”
“In return for getting him out of prison so fast, the mayor will testify tomorrow that Gaynor paid him directly, even though she’s never been anywhere near him in her life, much less with fifty grand.”
“Even though she never even knew any bribes were being made,” the man from Homeland Security said, chuckling. “She thought she’d hired a loyal man as her CEO.”
“Money has a way of disrupting loyalty.”
“Money has a way of disrupting everything, and thank the Lord. If it didn’t, we’d be hurting.”
“Jack Hoffman will have eight million dollars waiting for him when he gets out. Twice what the jurors will get. I thought that was appropriate.”
“And he’ll make it in much less time. Love it. Victoria Lewis can’t beat us.”
&nbs
p; “The mayor’s testimony and the e-mails we planted on the company network will put Angela Gaynor away for at least a decade. She’ll learn her lesson sitting in that cell.”
“As long as the jury sees everything the same way we do.”
“It’s a done deal. Chuck Lehman will be running unopposed when this trial is over.” The man from the NSA laughed. “I guess we have a new plan. If we can’t rig juries, we manipulate witnesses.” His voice turned somber then. “One more thing. From what I understand, George Garrison may have had a change of heart since he’s been sitting in jail.”
“Oh?”
“It sounds as though he may be willing to be more forthcoming about whose orders he was acting on when he instructed Billy Batts to influence Felicity West.”
“No way to get to Garrison?”
“Victoria Lewis has effectively insulated him from us by having him incarcerated in Northern Virginia as he awaits trial on violating his contract with her.”
“Are you concerned that Rockwell wasn’t as careful as he should have been about contacting Garrison?”
“Yes. If Garrison can lead Ms. Lewis to Rockwell, Rockwell could lead them to us, especially if he’s looking at serious time. He hasn’t found Walter Morgan yet, but we know he’s found the rest of us.”
VIRGINIA BEACH, VIRGINIA
“How many years have you been building and securing corporate computer networks, Mr. Abrams?” the prosecutor asked.
“Seventeen.”
“And that would include all facets of interfacing, including construction of Intranets as well as, obviously, linking networks to the outside world.”
“Of course,” Abrams answered.
“You’ve also been intimately involved in building and maintaining network security.”
“Yes, as I stated before.”
“You’re an independent consultant?”
“Yes.”
“You aren’t employed by one company because you can make so much more money on your own. Many, many companies request your services.”
A self-conscious expression rose to Abrams’ face.
“It’s okay,” the prosecutor prodded. “Take credit where credit is due.”
“Well, yes, that’s right. I’m very fortunate.”