Vortex

by Catherine Coulter

  Kent stared at her. “Run you down? You believe I tried to kill you? Don’t be ridiculous. Yes, I see some bruises on your face, but I have no idea where you got them. With your mouth, I wouldn’t be surprised if someone you insulted went after you.”

  “As I said, either you or Alex was driving that car. Believe me, Kent, I really don’t have any other enemies who would like to do away with me.”

  “I did not try to run you down!”

  Juliet rose. “The police are tracking the car on the CCTV cams. And they just might see the driver. They might see you, Kent. Listen, Kent, your threats won’t work anymore, it really is over. I’m not paralyzed any longer by what you and Alex did to me. I know now how really vile both of you are. I will do my best to see you both pay.” She paused, cocked her head. “Listen to Mia, Kent. Alex is a monster, and in the end, I suppose you’re his victim, too. It could go much easier for you if you go on record and tell us the truth. Special Agent Sherlock is in the waiting room now. She can help you.”

  “I’ve put up with more than enough of this. Get out. You’ll be hearing from my lawyers.”

  They left Kent standing in front of his desk when Mia quietly closed the door behind them. She said low, “Pretty much what we expected. Now he’ll be calling Alex.”

  40

  Olivia and Savich

  Safe House

  Thursday afternoon

  Agent Gaylin sat forward, his hands fisted on his knees. “Look, Savich, I think your plan is good; it even has a more-than-even chance of succeeding. But you and Olivia know as well as I do it’s dangerous, lots of chance involved, and unknowns, moving parts, people acting and reacting a certain way to make it work. No, I’m not shooting it down, but it should be me, Savich, not you.”

  Olivia said, “Gay, you know why it has to be Dillon. Not only is it his idea, his people from his Criminal Apprehension Unit are a part of it. Believe me, I’ve met some of them, they’re a well-oiled machine, they know what they’re doing. You know we can’t take a chance of involving the CIA, too many questions and talk about unknowns.

  “Give it up, Gay. You know it’s our best chance to find out what’s going on here.” She lightly touched her hand to his shoulder. “It will be all right.” She gave him a crooked grin. “I thrive on unknowns and the unexpected, you know that.

  “Now suck it up, Gay. We have to get a move on. Dillon, do you have anything to add before you winter up, and we’ll see if you pass muster. Gay’s gear is in the front closet.”

  Savich said, “Gay, I know exactly how you feel, but trust me, this is the best way to proceed. Think of it as a chess game; we’re good, we’ve thought it all out, prepared. All our pieces are in play and the odds are excellent the opponent will make the moves we’re predicting.”

  Gay sighed. “Yeah, yeah, you two should be lawyers. I understand, but I don’t like it. Both of you, be careful, all right?”

  As Savich donned Gay’s coat and scarf, Olivia went down on her knees and hugged Helmut close. “I know you want to come with me, but I’m not about to put you in danger. You and Gay will guard the house. I’ve left you water and food in the kitchen, you know the drill. Sorry, Gay, but I didn’t leave you any food or water.” She gave Helmut a last big hug, felt his tongue lap over her face. She kissed his forehead, straightened, and turned to study the winterized Dillon. “Not bad. Wrap the scarf more around the lower part of your face. With the sunglasses and the knit cap, you look enough like Gay to me. For at least two minutes.”

  Savich turned to Gay. “Do I look like your brother, at least?”

  “No.” Gay sighed. “You’re taller than I am and I have twenty pounds on you. As for my brother, he’s short, too heavy, and bald. Okay, like Olivia said, you could fool people for maybe two minutes, from a distance.”

  “Good enough. We’re lucky it’s so cold.” Savich’s cell sang out “Whatever It Takes” by Imagine Dragons. He listened, disconnected. “Agent Noble says it’s time. The car’s still out there, tucked away near a driveway, half a block away.” He looked at Olivia, who’d slipped on her coat, scarf, and knit cap. “You ready?”

  Olivia nodded. “It’ll be all right. Helmut, stay. Gay, you stay, too.”

  It was thirty-three degrees, the sky a gray bowl overhead, bare tree branches were being whipped about by gusts of a bitter wind. Olivia and Savich ran to Gay’s Honda, jumped in, fastened seat belts. Savich shot her a look, saw she was hugging herself, and switched the heat on high; right away warm air blasted into their faces. She met his eyes and nodded. “Never thought I’d be grateful to be freezing my butt off in mid-March.”

  He laughed. “We couldn’t have ordered up better weather.”

  “I can feel them watching. Do you see them in the rearview?”

  “No, but they’ll follow.” Savich slowly backed out of the driveway. “I’ll pretend I’m trying to evade, but not enough to lose them.”

  Olivia’s last view of the house was of Helmut sitting on his haunches watching her from the living room window.

  A dazzling slice of sun burst through the gray. Savich nodded. “Now even our sunglasses make sense. Keep an eye out, Olivia, but try not to be obvious.”

  “Yeah, yeah, you’re saying this to a CIA agent? You were right; they’d know right away where the new safe house is. And I didn’t tell anyone.” She fretted with her leather gloves. “So it has to be someone at Langley, someone with access. Gay knows it, too, and it really pisses him off.” She paused, turned to face him. “I hate it’s someone I’ve trusted with my life, Dillon. And I hate it even more that some of them still believe Mike is a traitor. Even Gay, though he didn’t come right out and say it because he felt sorry for me.”

  Savich shot her a grin. “No, if he kept it to himself, it’s because he didn’t want you to deck him.”

  He took another left turn, then another. Not much traffic on a Thursday afternoon, most people not out of work yet, heading home or to their favorite watering holes. “You know some of the questions about Mike’s loyalty were disinformation, Olivia, purposefully planted, and watered with great care. But it’s no longer a problem. Ah, there they are, the big dark blue passenger van, the Chrysler Voyager. Ruth said the license plate is muddied over, a pity.”

  Olivia pulled out a makeup mirror and angled it so she could see the trailing cars. “I can’t make out the license plate, either, and CIA agents are trained to see through mud.”

  Savich laughed, took another left, then right. “That should be enough. They’re good. If I didn’t know they’d be following, I might not have seen them yet.”

  He turned on Wilton and drove straight toward High Point Mall, three miles ahead.

  Olivia turned in the seat to face him. “I can’t believe I’m about to run an operation out of the ladies underwear department at Macy’s.”

  “Makes sense. You couldn’t go back to your house for more clothes, so you talked Gay into taking you there to pick up a few necessities.”

  Olivia drummed her fingertips on the dashboard. “I wonder how many there are? There was that man at my house on Monday, he could be one. And the Frenchman from yesterday. So at least two of them.”

  “If I were running their side, I’d want to keep it small and tight, maybe three, four max. We’ll see soon enough.” Savich drove for three blocks, then slowed to turn onto Southby, which fronted the High Point Mall. Savich said, “He’s there, still hanging back.”

  As Savich drove the Honda toward the Macy’s, the anchor store at the north end of the mall, Olivia felt her heart begin to thud. She was both excited and terrified. Today it would all end. And she prayed.

  Savich parked the Honda halfway down a lane in the open parking lot, thirty yards from the Macy’s entrance. He said, “Olivia, we both know this is dangerous since we don’t even know all the players. No, let me finish. I know you’re a pro, you understand the risks. If the worst happens and we lose you, the tracker you’re wearing will at least let us know where you are. It’s goo
d for another twenty-six hours.” He lightly touched his hand to hers. “Know I’d come for you. Are you ready?”

  “More than ready, Dillon, let’s go. I want this over with.”

  They walked together, heads down against the wind, and stood in front of a window a moment, Olivia pointing to a pair of running shoes. Savich paused and looked again, just as Gay would. He saw nothing, made a big deal of gesturing her into the store. Once inside, Savich’s cell played Jimi Hendrix’s “All Along the Watchtower.” He listened, then ended the call. “Davis has the Chrysler van four cars away from the Honda. Two men, one driving, the other in the back seat. Both men are looking at us, not moving.”

  They rode the escalator to the second floor, to the lingerie department, a place no man would go unless he had a gun to his head. Savich took a seat in one of the two chairs thoughtfully placed nearby for waiting men and looked long-suffering. He saw women carrying shopping bags, heard their voices, some laughter. One woman paused, sent him a little wave. He answered his cell twice. Ten minutes later, Olivia walked out with a Macy’s bag. “Underwear and flannel pajamas, in case they want to look,” she said, patted the bag.

  They took the escalator back down, walked through a cloud of perfume spritzed on a customer by a saleswoman in towering heels and bright red lipstick. They stepped out into the frigid cold and walked quickly toward Gay’s Honda. Nearly there, and Savich stopped cold, felt around his neck, looked chagrined. He raised his voice. “Olivia, I left my scarf in the store. Get in the car and lock it, turn on the heater, I’ll be right back.” He looked around the parking lot again, nodded, saw the two men in the Chrysler had slid down so the van looked empty. He whispered to Olivia, “Showtime,” turned, and headed back toward Macy’s at a fast trot.

  41

  Alex and Kent

  East Sixty-Seventh Street

  New York City

  Thursday evening

  Alex opened his front door, frowned at Kent, looked down at his Piaget watch. “What’s going on with you? Why did you call? You know I’m busy with the campaign. What is it?”

  Kent stepped in, forcing Alex back. “We need to talk. Now. I wasn’t about to do it over the phone.”

  Alex had never seen Kent look so upset. “All right, I can guess what this is about. It’s that bitch reporter, isn’t it? What did she do now?”

  Kent followed Alex numbly into his newly redecorated black-and-white living room. It was signature Pamela, the walls stark white to match the carpet, the furniture all black, the only splashes of color a single blood-red pillow on the black leather sofa and the orange flames shooting up in the hearth. Even the paintings on the walls were lined up like soldiers, all of them white with a single black streak across the middle that lined up perfectly with the next canvas. Kent couldn’t look at them, they made him mildly nauseated. Alex claimed he liked the new look, but Kent didn’t believe him. Standing in this room Kent felt like the life was being leached out of him. He took off his coat, tossed it over the back of the sofa, and sat down. He picked up the red pillow, began fretting with the fringe. He managed to say calmly enough, “Not only the reporter. I couldn’t believe it, Alex. She brought Juliet to my office. Juliet!”

  Alex eyed him. Kent looked pale, shaky. “Juliet? You’ve got to be kidding me. What did she want?”

  Kent sat forward, squeezed the pillow between his hands. “They know, Alex, they know everything. They even claimed there was an FBI agent waiting outside.”

  Alex felt a punch to the gut, but he wasn’t about to let Kent see it. He shrugged, looked dismissive. “Get a grip on yourself, that’s impossible. So Briscoe got Juliet to come to New York. Now, that does surprise me. Pleasant, shy, nonconfrontational Juliet. Wonders never cease. So what did she say to you, Kent? Wait up a minute, you need a drink first. You look like you’ve been shot.” Alex turned and walked to the glossy black sideboard, splashed whiskey into two glasses. He handed one to Kent, tapped his glass.

  Kent downed the two fingers of whiskey in one gulp, savored the jolt of heat in his gut, and leaned back against the leather sofa. He hated he was afraid, hated it. He closed his eyes and saw Aolith—her face blurry from passing time—but there she was, excited, laughing up at him. Then he saw Mia Briscoe’s bruised face. His eyes flew open and he jerked forward. He saw Alex had moved to stand behind a winged chair, his whiskey in his left hand, looking impatient. With him? Of course with him.

  Kent said, “Mia had bruises on her face, Alex; it was obvious she’d been hurt. I couldn’t believe it when she asked me which of us tried to run her over last night, you or me.”

  Alex jerked back. “What? Run her down? That’s ridiculous. Sure, I saw the bruises. She told me it was an accident, most likely some drunk. Now she’s accusing one of us of trying to kill her? Why would either of us do that? That’s beyond stupid, it’s crazy. Kent, I’m running for mayor of New York City!”

  He looked both insulted and disbelieving. Was Alex that good an actor? Kent could never be sure if Alex was telling the truth since they were three years old. He remembered the first girl Alex had roofied as a lark at Bennington. She was sixteen years old and her nickname was Perky. She’d been unconscious for eighteen hours, and it scared the crap out of everyone. But not Alex. Not that he let on anyway. When she surfaced, she didn’t remember a thing. Alex had calmly told Kent what he’d done then, that now he knew to use a smaller dose. The two of them could have at it, a banquet lay spread out in front of them. And Kent had gone along. No, Kent could never be sure if Alex was telling the truth. But to try to kill Mia Briscoe? Could he be that reckless?

  Alex said finally, “So somehow Briscoe got Juliet to come to New York, got her to come see you. Tell me exactly what happened. And don’t tell me Juliet threatened to go public, accuse us.”

  “She’s not the Juliet we knew two years ago, Alex.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “She was calm, angry at me, at you, for what we did to her. She seemed strong, more determined.”

  “So she put on a good show, what with the reporter there propping her up.” Alex smirked. “It doesn’t matter; at her core Juliet is the same. Who she is will never change. I know she couldn’t handle going public, no way could she stand up to what would happen next. Her pleasant little world would crumble around her. Her career would go down the toilet. You know she’d never subject her parents to that kind of scandal.”

  “You didn’t see her, Alex, you didn’t hear her speak.”

  Alex actually laughed. “Juliet knows very well what I’d do if she went public. I’d tell the world she’s a bitter, vengeful woman and this is her revenge for my dumping her. I’d bury her, Kent, blow up her world. Don’t doubt it. I know she doesn’t.” He paused a moment, searched Kent’s face. “All right, tell me exactly what Juliet said to you.”

  Was that worry Kent finally heard lurking under the bravado? “She accused me to my face of raping her, Alex, and she asked me why I did it. She said she knew why you’d raped her, for revenge, to humiliate her. Did you want her to remember, Alex? Did you lighten the roofie so you’d be able to look at her and smile later, knowing she wouldn’t say a word?”

  Alex saluted him with his glass. “You have me there. Juliet was always about herself—just listen to me play, listen to all the people applaud me and worship me.” He took another sip of whiskey, shook his head. “You want the truth about Juliet? I thought she was a beautiful cow, exquisite to look at, like a beautiful painting to be admired, nothing more, but boring to be with, and as uptight as her mother. She and that ridiculous piano she polished herself every frigging day. What we did to her—it served its purpose. Don’t try to tell me now you didn’t want her, that you didn’t enjoy that gorgeous body. You had her two times.”

  Kent said nothing.

  Alex stepped away from the fireplace, looked off in the distance. He wondered again how Briscoe had gotten Juliet to New York. He’d have sworn Juliet would take what he and Kent did to her to th
e grave. He’d never underestimate Briscoe again. Briscoe had taken Juliet to see Kent first because she’d read him, seen what he was, and she’d used Juliet to frighten the spit out of him, hoping he’d break. And there he was, sitting in Alex’s living room, a scared little boy. Alex raised his glass and toasted it toward Kent, a smile playing on his mouth. He remembered taking Juliet, seeing how pliable she’d been. He remembered kissing her hard, biting her lip, not caring if he hurt her.

  Kent said, “If she did go public, it would end your campaign. You’d be blackballed at the slightest hint from her of what we did.”

  Alex said, “True enough. And yes, my parents would hate that, but they’d believe what I tell them, Kent. They’d back me to the hilt, particularly my father, and he’s the one who counts. Of course there wouldn’t be a trial, there’d only be speculation, and sooner or later it would all die down. You know as well as I do my family has the power and the money to spin anything Juliet accused me of. So stop your worrying, I don’t think she’ll say a word publicly. Not the Juliet then, not the Juliet now.”

  He watched Kent worry the pillow fringe some more. How could he be so weak, like a hysterical woman? Alex took another small drink of his whiskey. “Kent, think about it. Even if Juliet did accuse us, Briscoe’s paper couldn’t print anything she said except as an allegation, without proof. And there is no proof and there never will be.” Still, he had to give Briscoe credit, figuring out what happened to Juliet, but he knew the only reason she’d been able to was those damned photos. She’d somehow put it together.

  He said, “Briscoe somehow managed to get Juliet down here hoping to frighten you, to manipulate you into panicking, maybe even confessing.”

  “I didn’t. I told her I didn’t know what she was talking about.”

  Could he believe him? Alex said, his voice very quiet now, “Good. Because they went to you hoping to turn you against me, to put us at odds. Don’t you understand? If they had any evidence, they wouldn’t have approached you. Why would they?”