Power Play (An FBI Thriller) (20 page)

H
er uncle didn’t meet her eyes. He studied his fine Italian loafers, frowned. Barnaby said smoothly, “The senator is in Washington because he was invited here by very powerful people who would like him to run for the United States Senate. He has appointments”—he looked at his watch in a beautifully studied motion—“very soon now, so the senator cannot give you much more of his time.”

Perry, no expression on her face, said, “Would these people you’re meeting with still want you to run for the U.S. Senate if you lost the race for your state senate seat in Massachusetts?”

Milton cleared his throat, said, calm as a statesman, “It would certainly be beneficial were I to run for the U.S. Senate from a position of power.”

Davis had had enough of the slither and slink. It was time to confront him head-on. He said, “Senator Holmes, don’t you think we should tell Perry what we both know?”

It was as if an electrical charge passed through Milton. He snapped up straight, threw his head back. “You know nothing I care to hear, Agent Sullivan. There is nothing I have to say to Perry. I want both of you to leave now. I have people to see.”

“I will show you out,” Barnaby said, and started toward the door.

But Davis didn’t move, and neither did Perry. He didn’t look away from Milton’s face. “Actually, there is a lot more to your uncle Milton being here in Washington, Perry. He hopes to promise the party power brokers he will have all the money he needs in his campaign coffers, that he won’t need their financial support if they back him as a candidate in two years. You see, your uncle Milton had a plan.” He waited for a moment, but Milton didn’t say a word.

Davis continued, “Natalie told me he came to see her at the house. He told your mother he would continue to back her publically, give her all the support he could, if she financed his campaign or convinced your grandparents to do it. What was wrong with their helping each other, after all? Otherwise, he told her, he would be more blunt, shall we say, with the press, separate himself from her troubles, cut the parachute lines. His reasoning being that if her own family expressed doubts about her mental health, her truthfulness, where would that leave her?”

Milton’s face was alarmingly red. Davis hoped he wouldn’t stroke out. He said, “We talked, sir, Natalie and I.”

Milton roared to his feet. “So Natalie told you! I knew I couldn’t trust her word, even though she promised me she wouldn’t say anything to anyone. She’s always been a liar and a cheat.”

Davis smiled at him and slouched against the sofa cushions, a ploy meant to enrage. “What she promised you was not to tell your parents, Senator Holmes. That would be too humiliating for all of you.

“Your mother told me, Perry, that once he’d ended his spiel, she laughed at him, told him to do his worst. She said it was sad, really, that it would end his own career if he tried to disgrace his own sister. She wasn’t sure if he believed her.”

Perry stared back and forth from Davis to her uncle. She simply couldn’t get her head around his betrayal. She’d always thought of Uncle Milton as pleasant, a bit ineffectual, maybe, rather pompous, and always in the shadow of his sister, and no wonder. Natalie Black’s charm and intelligence shined like a beacon compared to her brother’s occasional flicker. She didn’t want to accept his treachery. It was almost too much to take in.

She noticed Barnaby from the corner of her eyes. He appeared nailed to the floor, his eyes on her uncle’s face, and she saw the same leveling betrayal in his eyes she knew must be in her own. She said into the cold, deafening silence. “So what you said about Mom to us, you were following your script, to see how we’d react?”

Uncle Milton stayed silent.

“No, I wouldn’t say anything, either, Uncle Milton.” Perry slowly rose, stared down at him. She heard Barnaby clear his throat behind her, but she didn’t turn. “Don’t you say anything, either, Barnaby.” She said to her uncle, her voice cold, utterly damning, “You are a pathetic worm, aren’t you? I disown you.” She paused for a moment, then added, “Did you try to run my mother down in Buckner Park? Is it you who have been threatening me?”

His face was ashen. He stretched a shaking hand out to Perry. “What? What did you say? No, of course not. Because my campaign needs money, you suspect me of trying to kill my own sister, and of threatening you, my niece? The situation is not what you think, Perry, really, it isn’t. Listen to me, you must understand. You know you can’t get elected in this country without lots of money. Of course I need money to run a successful campaign, and you know your grandparents have so much money, more than they can spend. But they refused me, their only son! How many men could get themselves elected to the General Court in
Massachusetts as I have? But it wasn’t enough for them.” He paused, panting now, red in the face.

Milton looked straight at Perry. “Your grandmother told me if I had half your mother’s talent, your mother’s brains, I could manage to back my own campaign, not mooch off them and their friends.” He was still panting, his mouth working, and the words hurled themselves out: “Father told me he thought the whole idea of my running for the Senate was planted by my wife.” He paused, tried to get control, drew in several deep breaths.

He’d memorized what his parents had said to him, Davis realized, memorized it word for word.

Amazingly, Milton’s years of training kicked in and his voice sounded more reasoned. “But I would never hurt your mother, or you, Perry. I admire Natalie, always have. It’s your grandparents’ fault this happened.”

Perry was drowning in his excuses, in his bitterness and rage at everyone she loved, in his inability to take responsibility for what he’d done. Her stomach roiled and twisted. She swallowed bile. Barnaby moved toward her, and she saw his face was leached of color, pale as death. Like hers? She asked her uncle again, “Did you try to kill my mother in Buckner Park? Run her down?”

“Of course not! Why would I? I don’t even drive in this benighted city!”

Barnaby cleared his throat, but his voice shook. “He doesn’t, Ms. Black, really.”

She said, her eyes on her uncle again, a man whose blood she shared, “Uncle Milton, I hope Mother tells my grandparents what you did. I hope they disown you, too.” And Perry marched out the door.

Davis didn’t say another word, simply followed her out of the
Lincoln Suite, down the long hallway to the elevator. There were two couples on the elevator, so they stayed silent. When they reached the lobby, Perry grabbed his sleeve. “You didn’t tell me.”

“No.”

She punched his arm. “Why not? You should have given me some warning about what he’d done so I wouldn’t be blindsided—”

Davis was aware of people looking toward them, so he kept moving. She was right on his heels through the hotel doors and out into the crisp air. Davis breathed it in, smelled the faint exhaust fumes that brushed the air. “I love this city.”

She grabbed his hand, shook it. “You’d better talk to me, Sullivan, give me a sink-proof explanation, or I’m going to pulverize you.”

He turned to face her. A thick hank of her hair had come loose from the fishtail braid and lay against her nose. Her eyes were dark with pain. He lightly laid his hand on her shoulder. “If I’d told you, you’d have gone after him the second you saw him. Come on, you know I’m right, you’d never have held it together. And having you with Uncle Milt when I told him was the best shot we had at getting to the truth, if there was a deeper truth and your uncle is involved. But he’s not. Let it go, Perry, let it go.”

She stared over his shoulder. “I want to kill him,” she said slowly.

“Then I’d have to arrest you.”

“He’s a dishonorable toad, and I should throw him into the Potomac with a cement block tied to his Italian loafers. Hey, I could write my freaking blog from jail, no problem.”

“Still, he didn’t try to run down your mom or threaten you, Perry. He’s all about politics, and he’s neither better nor worse than most of those yahoos in Congress. If you wanted to mete out
punishment, you’d run out of cement blocks. All there is to do now is walk away.”

He was right. She wanted to howl, to scream, but she didn’t. “If you think I forgive you, I don’t,” she said. “I’m heading back to the
Post
by myself.” She hiked up her computer bag on her shoulder and streaked across the street to the sound of honking horns and a few curses. She yelled over her shoulder, “And I’m going to buy up all the cement in the city.”

Davis didn’t move. He watched her until she reached the other side unscathed, got into a taxi that had pulled up, and took off. He was worried, since he didn’t know her well enough to guess how she’d deal with all that rage.

He was glad he hadn’t told Perry her uncle Milton’s money problems included a lady he paid each month and visited whenever he was in the capital.

Savich home

Friday night

B
lessed Backman wasn’t cold, since he’d bought wool-lined gloves as well as a thick fisherman’s sweater at Goodwill to go under the bum’s coat, but he was stiff again in his crouched position, so he stood and stretched. He took several steps toward the house, hugging trees and bushes, watchful for neighbors. Last thing he needed was for the cops to show up again.

Good thing he’d noticed the Hispanic lady watching him from the house that morning and he’d gotten out of there. It was dangerous to come back, even after dark. There would be cops around; he knew they were looking for him everywhere, and with his photo on TV, he had to be careful. But he couldn’t wait them out any longer. He had to act; he had to get it done so his mother would rest in peace. Was the guardian in his dreams really his mother, that disembodied voice so soft and pure, telling him he would succeed? It gladdened his heart to think so.

The two of them, Savich and Sherlock, were always together now, and he knew he’d have to take them on together, but he’d wait until they were unarmed, maybe when they were in bed, all
comfortable and cozy. He’d have to shoot Savich dead right away, and then Sherlock would be easy. He could have her shoot herself in the mouth, or blow off her own head, but he’d always wanted to strangle her, to see the life fade out of her eyes just as his mother’s eyes had faded to blankness the last day he’d seen her in that god-awful hospital.

He had to step back into the bushes when he saw two cars arriving, one pulling in Savich’s driveway, the other against the curb. He watched as three people went inside. He had no idea who they were, not that it mattered. Whoever they were, they were messing up his plans.

After some time, he made his way to the living room window and peered in. No one was in there, but he heard faint voices and laughter coming from another room. He moved along the house until he was looking into the dining room. He saw Savich, smiling and nodding, full of himself, chatting to a woman and the two men at the table. He couldn’t make out what they were saying, but he saw spaghetti, corn on the cob, garlic bread, and a big salad bowl on the table. He could swear he smelled the garlic. His stomach growled. He hadn’t realized how hungry he was.

Both of the men looked young and hard, like Savich, all sharp-eyed and confident, ready to take on the world. Probably FBI agents. One of them wore a black turtleneck sweater beneath a really sharp black jacket, the other a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. The young woman with them seemed buff enough to be an agent, too, he couldn’t tell. Weren’t they all having fun?

Agent Sherlock presided at the far end of the table, her thick red hair shining at him under the chandelier. She looked pleased and
relaxed, a forkful of spaghetti in her hand, nodding at something one of the men said. She looked magnificent, he thought. She would look that way until he closed his hands around her skinny little neck and squeezed the life out of her.

Blessed straightened. It looked to him like those people would be here for a long time. Should he take the risk and stay until they left, hoping no one would see him?

His stomach growled again. He had to eat, then he’d decide whether or not to come back.