Political Suicide (21 page)

Her reaction lit the room. “Hogarth! Dammit, it’s dedicated to Spencer Hogarth!”

“I couldn’t believe it when I saw it.”

“So, what do we do now?”

This time it was Lou who grinned.

“What?” she said. “What’s so funny?”

“You just said ‘we.’ That’s all. You said, ‘Well, what do
we
do now?’”

“Okay, you got me. We’re a ‘we’ on this thing starting right now. That said, I think I should start with an apology of my own—an apology for treating you the way I have.”

“You can say what you want, but I believe I already know.”

Sarah’s eyebrows rose. “Have you been doing research on me, too?”

“No,” Lou said, “but my thirteen-year-old has.”

“Smart kid.”

“You don’t know the half of it. Thirteen going on thirty, she is. I told her you and I weren’t getting along too well, and I didn’t know why. She went online and learned about your unfortunate experience with … with your husband’s doctor.”

“Fair enough. I’m dealing with it the best I can, but sometimes the whole thing just pops out. That’s about the most I can say.”

“That’s more than enough. If you ever want to talk about it, I’m here.”

“Thanks. So, what now? We can’t use this thesis to go and get subpoenas. A decent judge would laugh me out of her chambers.”

“No,” Lou said, “but we can try to figure out if something on that missing CD cost Elias Colston his life.”

“Like what?” Sarah asked, flipping through Lou’s notes on Wyatt Brody.

“Like Reddy Creek,” Lou said.

Sarah looked up at him. “Explain.”

“I don’t have much. Colston asked Hector if he knew anything about someplace called Reddy Creek, but he didn’t—or at least he said he didn’t. Colston said he read in some reporter’s blog that two Mantis soldiers were killed there, but I don’t think he gave any more details. I looked it up. No blog that I could find, and I looked pretty hard. It’s a military armory in Raleigh, North Carolina. That’s all I’ve learned so far. I can’t find any mention of soldiers being killed there at any time.”

“How did Colston know they were Mantis?”

“No idea, except Hector told me that each member of the company has an identifying tattoo of a praying mantis on the inside of his forearm.”

“You said the blog that’s vanished was written by a reporter. Any idea what paper?”

“Not really. One in Raleigh, I suppose.”

“Do you think it’s important?”

“I’m not sure. Maybe Colston was fishing. I don’t think
he
could find any official report of two dead Mantis marines, either.”

“Two dead marines at a U.S. armory … a blog written by a reporter … and no trace of either now. I smell cover-up.”

“Then I’ll keep looking.”

“No, let me take this one. We’re a ‘we,’ remember.”

“You going to start online?”

“Actually, I thought I might start with my boss, Grayson.”

“Why him?”

“Over the years, Grayson has made just about every connection that’s worth making. A newspaper in Raleigh and two dead marines sounds like it would be duck soup for him. Grayson Devlin knows everybody, and if anybody can find this missing reporter from North Carolina, then my money is on my boss.”

“Terrific. I’ll wait to hear and keep digging on Brody and Hogarth. Meanwhile, if there’s anything you want me to convey to Gary, just let me know.”

Sarah’s eyes sparkled. “You did it, Doctor!” she exclaimed. “You did it.”

“What did I do? What?”

Her smile was a thing of dreams. “Rather than charging off to meet with Gary, you asked.”

CHAPTER 28

Another graveyard shift came and ended, this one fairly serene. Buoyed by thoughts of his new connection with Sarah, Lou packed his stuff and headed out of the hospital to the doctors’ parking lot. Despite the early hour, he felt charged. At the head of his to-do list was purchasing a ticket from Dulles International to Minneapolis, and arranging for the rental car he would drive to the Pine Forest Clinic in Shockley, eighty minutes north of the city. The medical director of the clinic, Dr. Gerald Sherwood, had agreed to give him a one-hour consultation, but to get even that, Lou had been forced to bend the purpose of his visit.

The clinic, according to a modest Web site, was an exclusive facility for the diagnosis and treatment of medical and neurological disorders. Even after researching the place, Lou was uncertain of its scope. It appeared that privacy and discretion were at the center of its services. Sherwood was board certified in internal medicine and neurology, and educated at the Mayo Clinic and other top-notch training hospitals. Pine Forest was in its twentieth year. Insurance did not cover the initial one-hour consultation, he was told before being scheduled with Sherwood.

Payment of $1,000 had to be in cash or cashier’s check at the time of the visit. Lou discarded the notion of mentioning James Styles of Bowie, Maryland, the name on the envelope he had found in Elias Colston’s drawer, and went instead with his brother Graham’s address and vitals. If necessary, he might hit up Graham for the thousand as well. Including airfare, the cost of the trip and the appointment would put a dent in Lou’s discretionary bank account, but he sensed it was a move he had to make. Like the framed Medal of Honor turned to the wall, the envelope bearing Styles’s name seemed significant.

As he wended his way between buildings to the doctors’ lot, he became immersed in memories of the morning of his first night as an intern at Eisenhower Memorial. He had dragged himself out of the hospital to the doctors’ lot after a tense, grueling shift marked by more uncertainty, anxiety, and insecurity than any one person should ever have to bear. His ancient Chevy was up on blocks, and three men were expertly spinning off the wheels.

“Hey, what are you guys doing?” Lou had managed.

“You keep out of this, Doc,” one of them said. “This doesn’t concern you.”

“Of course it concerns me. That’s my car.”

“Oops. Hey, guys, it’s the doc’s car. Sorry, there, Doc.”

The three nonchalantly replaced the wheels, tightened the lugs, lowered the car, and wheeled their jack away.

Welcome to Eisenhower Memorial.

This winter morning, with dawn having just made an appearance, there were no men stealing his tires. What there was instead, was a uniformed cop, slipping a ticket beneath the driver’s-side windshield wiper. His cruiser was parked a few feet away.

“Hey!” Lou shouted as the cop turned to leave. “What’s going on?”

The officer, strong-jawed with eyes deeply set beneath the shadow of his hat brim, tilted his head back to give Lou a curious look. “You’re a doctor here?” he asked.

“Of course I am. We have our own security people. They don’t give tickets.”

“The hospital asked us to handle this. You haven’t got a sticker. That means you get a ticket.”

Lou’s hopeful mood evaporated. “Nobody has a sticker, just look around.”

“Well, they will.”

“This is ridiculous.”

“Look, pal, I don’t make the laws, I just enforce them. This is just a notice, but now we have your license plate number. If you don’t see the parking office and get a sticker, next time will be a twenty-five-dollar fine.”

“This is totally ridiculous,” Lou said.

The cop sheathed his ticket book like he was holstering a gun, climbed into the cruiser, and opened the window nearest Lou. “Have a great rest of your day,” he said. “And make sure you look your ticket over carefully. It summarizes all the new regulations on the back.”

The patrol car turned into an open row and then drove away.

Bryzinski,
Lou was thinking.
This harassment must have something to do with that crooked cop.

He slid the ticket out from beneath the wiper, brought it into the car, and turned on the interior light. One side looked like a standard orange ticket. On the other side was a note, printed in a heavy, masculine hand.

Dr. Lou Welcome,

You have to be very careful, but you also have to trust somebody. You can trust me. The police officer who gave you this ticket is a marine and a good friend of Elias Colston and me. We want to get to the truth about Elias’s killer. If it is Wyatt Brody, we will nail him and he will pay. Meet me Tuesday at the following coordinates: 38.84783,-76.73744. Nine P.M. sharp. Stay hidden beyond the wood line. You’ll know when I arrive.

Your friend,

Steve Papavassiliou (Mark Colston’s Papa Steve)

CHAPTER 29

You’ll know when I arrive.

Creepy.

What in the hell had Papa Steve Papavassiliou meant by that? Judging from the way he had chosen to deliver his message, and the use of map coordinates to specify their meeting point, the man was either an inveterate game player or paranoid, possibly both. Even though Lou’s life with Emily had turned him into a pretty good game player himself, he did not feel particularly trusting of Papavassiliou. Nevertheless, he had decided to play.

Not that surprisingly, a Web site allowing him to input the GPS coordinates pinpointed the ninth hole of a public golf course in Midwood, Virginia, twenty-five miles outside the district.

Creepy.

It was half past eight when Lou arrived at 38.84783,-76.73744. Sharpton Hills Golf Club was dark and completely deserted. He negotiated a steel pole security gate, concealed the Toyota behind a cart shack, and walked out onto the ninth fairway carrying a printout of the course layout. The night was cloudless and below freezing, and the ground blanketed with a thin layer of crunchy snow. Lou took up a position inside the nearby wood line and shivered away the cold.

The cloudless night and bright moonlight afforded him an unobstructed view of the par four ninth hole, and he wondered just how Papa Steve would make his dramatic arrival known. Too little snow for a dogsled. Just enough for cross-country skis. Too much for a golf cart. A snowmobile or ATV seemed the best bets. From his jacket pocket, Lou removed the folded-up parking violation and reread the first lines of Papa Steve’s note.

You have to be very careful, but you also have to trust somebody. You can trust me.

Lou thought back to what Detective Chris Bryzinski had probably done, possibly in collusion with Spencer Hogarth.

You have to be very careful.…

Reassuring or not, Lou was intent on keeping Papavassiliou at arm’s length until the man’s agenda became clearer. He and Sarah had discussed the note by phone and agreed it would make sense for Lou to go through with the meeting, but cautiously. Later, they would decide how far Papavassiliou could be trusted.

Lou had spent an anxious day catching up on Physician Wellness work, including progress reports and an especially unpleasant hour with his boss, director Walter Filstrup, whose rant against alcoholism being an illness was especially annoying.

“I have your last dictation regarding Gary McHugh,” Filstrup said. “Get this—your words: ‘Physician 307 seems to be on automatic pilot. It has now been more than four years since his last drink or drug. Random weekly urines have been negative. I continue to be concerned about his lack of reliance on recovery meetings and other forms of support, but no one can question his resolve to keep his illness under control.’ You really blew this one, Welcome. At least the man who had his illness under such good control is where he’s supposed to be. Behind bars.”

“Even alcoholics are human,” Lou had replied, “just like most of the rest of you.”

“Okay, Mr. Recovery, whatever you say. Meanwhile, McHugh’s given this program a hell of a black eye, and by association, so have you.”

“He didn’t kill Colston.”

“And I didn’t have scrambled eggs for breakfast this morning. Why don’t you go on back to work while you still have a job. If you run out of things to do, practice spelling
guilty.
”

“I’ll do that, but McHugh is innocent. And, Walter?”

“Yes?”

“You’ve got some of those scrambled eggs on your tie.”

Nine o’clock arrived accompanied by what felt like a ten-degree drop in temperature. No Papavassiliou. Lou pressed against a tree and said silent thanks for the replacement parka, watch cap, and gloves he had picked up at L.L. Bean. As each minute passed, he became more and more suspicious of a setup. What was Papavassiliou’s connection with Brody? Did he have evidence that would exonerate McHugh? Were the Palace Guards approaching from the trees behind him?

Ten minutes passed. Time to leave. Cautiously, Lou stepped clear of the wood line. The landscape was as cold and desolate as the moon. Maybe something had happened. Maybe Brody had found out about the note and sent the Palace Guards to stop Papavassiliou. Questions. More questions. Lou turned and panned the woods. Nothing. Not a sound. He cursed himself for not bringing a flashlight.

At that moment, from the distance, he heard a faint machinery thrum. Half a minute later, he saw the powerful lights of a chopper—like an alien spacecraft cruising low across the rolling landscape. The small, single main rotor helicopter stopped twenty feet from the ground and dropped down right in front of him, just below the ninth green.

You’ll know when I arrive.

Nicely put.

Lou shielded his eyes from the transient blizzard created by the rotor-generated winds. Quickly, the engine and light were cut off and the door to the small cabin opened. A tall, broad-shouldered figure jumped down, pulling up the fur-lined hood of his parka. Ten feet separated the two men when Papavassiliou pushed his hood back. Lou recognized him instantly. If he took off his jacket and rolled up his sleeves, Lou would have seen faded tattoos on his powerful forearms—one of a mushroom cloud explosion and the other of a calligraphic rendering of the letters
TNT.
All at once, the timely arrival of the police that night at the Mantis headquarters no longer seemed like a fortunate coincidence. Steve Papavassiliou worked on the base, and it was he who had saved Lou from Wyatt Brody.

Does that mean I can trust him?
Lou wondered
. Or was that an elaborate setup to earn my trust?