Supreme Justice (3 page)

He booted his computer, then opened his e-mail and loaded the video Bishop had sent. Pushing a button, he got the image up on the wall monitor. He watched the holdup men enter and go into their routine; he fast-forwarded until he saw Venter fall. Then he backed up the footage to watch from a couple minutes before the perps entered.

The view from the rear faced the bar. Venter and his clerk, Blount, were at the far left of the frame, other tables of customers nearby. He couldn’t zoom in to get a better view of the pair, but even from this wide perspective, it was clear that, despite the social setting, the Associate Justice and his clerk were having a serious if cordial talk.

Paying no attention to the others in the room, Reeder concentrated on the two men. Venter reacted first, eyes widening to look toward the bar, followed by his clerk’s head turning—the younger man sitting with his back nearly to the intruders.

Though concentrating on Venter and Blount, Reeder remained aware that the other diners were reacting, as well. One nearby customer stood, then—on what was probably an order from one of the robbers—sat immediately back down.

Despite the lack of sound, Reeder could tell exactly what was going on. The thieves were doing all the talking, the gist of what they were saying easily discerned.

Slowly, the holdup man with the pistol made his way around the bar collecting valuables from the customers, working inexorably toward Venter and Blount.

As the holdup man approached, Blount was looking back at the other perp. When the kid turned, the pistol was aimed between his eyes, the young clerk’s terror obvious. As Blount fumbled for his wallet or maybe his cell, Venter rose, but before the judge got fully to his feet, the gunman swiveled, set his feet, and fired. Justice Venter went down, the room erupted in panic, and the shooter paused to pistol-whip Blount, knocking the clerk to the floor. Then the two gunmen exited the way they’d come in.

Bishop had tagged footage from an outside camera onto the tail of the clip, showing the ski-masked intruders sprint out and climb into a black SUV parked at the curb, front and back seat. The driver could not be seen, the SUV’s windows tinted. Then the vehicle eased away as nonchalantly as if those within had just enjoyed a good meal at the famed Verdict. No view of the license plates.

Reeder watched the security footage at regular speed several more times. Then he slowed it down, going frame by frame, starting from Blount seeing the pistol in his face through where Venter rose. Venter’s hips were turning slightly to the left, toward the fire door,
not
the gunman.

The Associate Justice was rising not to attack, but to make a break for it.

Reeder stopped the video, reran it, then watched the Justice again. Based on Venter’s expression, his overall body language, Reeder had no doubt:
Venter was trying to save his ass, not his clerk.

The judge had panicked, and was going for that fire exit.

The next time he watched, Reeder concentrated on the shooter. As the man turned and blasted Venter, he was calm, not panicky, and took time to set his feet and aim. Hell, the shooter even slowly exhaled before he fired. This wasn’t a stickup artist reacting to movement, freaking, and shooting.

No.

Reeder knew with deadly certainty that he wasn’t watching a robbery at all; he was witnessing a cold-blooded execution. He shook his head in disbelief.

The urge was to call Bishop right away, but he made himself take a step or two back. He watched three more times, and the longer he studied the video, the more he realized that he’d been right from the start.

Last night, at the Verdict Chophouse, a sitting Supreme Court justice had been assassinated.

“
There is no friend like an old friend, who has shared your morning days, no greeting like his welcome, no homage like his praise
.”

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court.
Section 5, Grave 7004, Arlington National Cemetery.

THREE

When he called Bishop’s cell, Reeder got relegated to the homicide detective’s voice mail. No way he was leaving this kind of message. He phoned the precinct, was told Bishop was unavailable, and left word for the detective to call him ASAP.

But as the time neared to meet his daughter for dinner, Reeder had still heard nothing from the DC cop.

When caller ID finally flashed Bishop’s number, Reeder jumped on it.

“Where the hell have you been?” Reeder asked.

“Serving and protecting,” Bishop said, with barely any sarcasm.

“Don’t give me a high-priority errand and then go out of pocket.”

“You are such a pleasure to know, Peep. Look, the Feds are here, and they’ve already ‘cooperated’ our asses into following them around like beaten puppies.”

Not quite under his breath, Reeder said, “Shit.”

“Shit indeed. Do you have something that could get me back in the game?”

Obviously he did, but should he share his take on Venter in the security footage now that the FBI would be on the receiving end? Anybody from the Bureau who knew him from White House days still viewed him as a selfish prick, even a traitor. And many agents considered kinesics smoke-and-mirrors bullshit.

But he knew he was right, and if he didn’t share that knowledge, the FBI would come out of the gate on the wrong track—searching for armed robbers was a far different task than searching for professional assassins.

“You still there?” Bishop asked, at last.

“Oh yeah,” Reeder said.

“Okay, then, Mr. Hot to Fuckin’ Trot. What did you see on that security video that mere humans might miss?”

“. . . You may not want to mention where you got this.”

“Got
what
?”

“It wasn’t a robbery.”

“How could it
not
be a robbery?” Bishop demanded. “Nearly everyone in the place got cleaned out. That is by
definition
—”

“It wasn’t
just
a robbery. I think the holdup was a blind.”

“For what?”

Nothing to do but to dive right in. “Henry Venter,” Reeder said, “was the target.”

“Of the robbery?”

“Of an assassination.”

Phone-static silence separated them like an electrified fence.

Finally, Bishop managed, “You mean . . . they took the place down just to get to Venter. To make a hit seem like collateral damage.”

“Why aren’t you chief, with a mind like that?”

“Screw you, Peep. Can you prove this?”

“It’s an opinion.”

“An informed opinion. An educated goddamn opinion from an expert who—”

“Who nobody in federal law enforcement would piss on if he were on fire.”

The electricity-charged silence was back.

“But you are an expert in the field,” Bishop granted, “and former Secret Service. Is what you saw enough for me to kick this to the Special Agent in Charge?”

“It’s a risk. If your SAIC is somebody who has me on his shit list, my opinion may send him in the robbery direction out of sheer spite.”

“Well, maybe we drew a lucky card this time. The SAIC is Gabe Sloan. Don’t you two go back a ways?”

That they did. In fact, if Reeder had one friend in the FBI, it was Gabriel Sloan.

A relieved Reeder said, “Better lucky than smart. Absolutely you can tell Gabe. He believes in me, and he believes in kinesics.”

“And fairies and Santa Claus?”

“What great man was it who said, ‘Screw you, buddy, and the horse you rode in on’?”

Bishop laughed. “Seriously, Peep, I appreciate this.”

They said good-bye and clicked off.

Checking his watch, Reeder realized he had just enough time to make his dinner with Amy.

Wedged between a tiny dress shop and a BB&T Bank branch, DC Subs on Wisconsin Avenue Northwest was bigger than Reeder’s office, but not by much. Standing just outside the restaurant, waiting for his daughter, Reeder reflected on Amy’s birthday in a few days, and he still had no damn idea what to get her.

He spotted her not quite a block away, coming from the direction of Georgetown University, where she was a freshman. Amy might as well have been her mother, a million years ago. Same brown hair, worn long like Melanie’s when she and Reeder first met. His nineteen-year-old daughter had her mom’s tall, slender frame, as well, wrapped up in a navy Georgetown sweatshirt with bulldog mascot, jeans, and running shoes.

On her arm, goddamnit, was Bobby Landon.

Reeder made his grimace turn into a smile as the couple approached.

A twenty-year-old sophomore with dark hair nearly as long as Amy’s, Landon had been dating her since last October. He wore jeans, sneakers, and a T-shirt for some apparent band under an unzipped hoodie with the Georgetown seal.

Like most kids that age, Landon knew everything already. His save-the-world, far-left brand of progressive liberalism was already creeping into Amy’s conversations with her dad. Several past conversations with Amy and her boyfriend had devolved into near shouting matches.

In Landon’s eyes, Reeder was the worst kind of liberal—a middle-of-the-road Clinton type. And in Reeder’s eyes, Landon was a naive joke. This kid thought that by taking all the guns and dumping them in the Grand Canyon or something, you could end gun violence. Sure, and if you just buried all nuclear weapons at the bottom of the ocean, the threat of nuclear war would disappear, right?

Never mind that the technology was, hell, everywhere. Any asshole with a Wi-Fi connection could learn how to make a plastic gun, a dirty bomb—anything a twisted brain could come up with. Recent history was pockmarked with the reality of that.

Shaking away such thoughts, Reeder kept smiling, nodding as they neared.

Breaking away from her date, Amy came up, gave her dad a hug, and planted a tiny kiss on his cheek. “Dad, you don’t mind Bobby tagging along . . . ?”

He minded, all right, but said, “Not at all. A pleasure.”

Reeder nodded toward the young man, who managed a nod and a “Hey, Mr. Reeder” in return.

The sub shop was, as usual, crowded, but they soon had their sandwiches, Reeder paying the bill—you’d think Landon could have at least offered, but then far lefties never paid for anything, did they? Then they managed to find a table in a corner.

Reeder asked his daughter how her classes were going.

Landon was absorbed in his veggie sandwich, aware that the father-daughter conversation didn’t include him.

Amy shrugged. “Not bad. Okay.”

“How long till finals?”

“Started yesterday.”

“Ready for ’em?”

She just looked at him.

Amy had been a straight-A student since birth. Such scholastic-oriented questions Reeder needed never to ask. But he was her father, and always did.

With school matters covered, Reeder had no idea what to say to his only child. The apartment he’d set her up in near campus was not a good point of conversation. She had rather blatantly manipulated him into pressuring her mother to let her live off campus, alone.

If only. Che Guevara here was probably sleeping over most nights, something Reeder didn’t want to think about, much less inquire over, and every time he brought up the apartment, Amy thought he was trying to control her with it, since Daddy paid the rent.

Anyway, that’s how she’d reacted when he’d moved to Georgetown, to be closer to her, the result of which was that he saw her even less frequently now.

“How’s your mom doing?”

“Fine,” Amy said, giving him a noncommittal smile.

“You have a birthday coming up.”

“I do.”

“So what can I get you? You don’t want to leave it to me, do you?”

She glanced at Landon, who had abandoned his sandwich at midpoint and was surfing the Net on his phone. The kid gave Amy a look that had a shrug in it.

“I’d kind of like to get away for a few days,” she said. “We have a break coming up.”

What, with this fuckwad?

“What do you have in mind, hon?”

“Cabo San Lucas maybe. Puerto Vallarta is nice.”

“Why, have you been there?”

“No, but I’d like to.”

“Just get away. By yourself?”

“No. I, uh . . . might go with a friend.”

“Well, I might finance a getaway for you, sweetheart. But your friend?
She
would have to pay her own way.”

Landon smirked to himself, eyes on his cell.

Amy nodded. “Let’s talk about it later, okay?”

“Okay.”

They finished their sandwiches in silence.

Conversations between Reeder and his daughter were rarely much longer. Not since the divorce, anyway, four years ago. Reeder had gone along with Amy living with her mother, though he and his ex-wife shared custody. His and Melanie’s relationship had gone wrong, but Mel was always the right kind of mother.

Then two years ago, Mel remarried. Reeder’s replacement was Donald Graham, a political lobbyist who at least was a liberal. Reeder liked Graham just a little less than he did Bobby Landon. Wasn’t that Graham was a bad guy, really, just that Reeder disliked lobbyists on general principle.

He also disliked men sleeping with his ex-wife on irrational principle.

But at least Graham had supported the notion that Amy get her own place, citing the need for her independence. Of course, Reeder figured Graham realized his own seas would be calmer without Amy around.

Reeder’s cell chirped. He snatched it off his belt, checked caller ID:
Gabriel Sloan
.

To Amy, he said, “I better take this.”

“Sure,” she said, long since used to that.

“Where are you?” Sloan asked, an edge in the familiar mellow baritone.

“Dinner with Ames and Bobby,” Reeder said. Years ago, he and Sloan, her godfather, had started referring to Amy as “Ames,” like her high school girlfriends. Amy disliked the nickname now, and Reeder rarely let it slip out anymore except to Sloan.

“Tell her I said hey,” Sloan said.

“Gabe says hey,” Reeder said.

That got a smile from Amy, and she held out a hand. “Can I talk to him?”

Reeder shook his head. “Business.”

“Hi, Gabe!” Amy shouted, and several other patrons were startled into glancing their way. “Call me!”

Even Reeder had to smile.

“Tell her I will,” Sloan said.

“She probably just wants to remind you her birthday’s coming.”

Amy threw a wadded napkin at her father, but she was smiling.

Sloan asked, “Is the dipstick boyfriend along?”

“Oh yeah.”

“So they’ll be ditching you soon.”

“You always were a detective. You want to get together, right? The FBI needs my help? I thought this day would never come.”

“Go to hell. But I need you to go over what you told Bishop. Who knows? Might be something to it.”

“No ‘might’ about it. If you trusty G-men can spare a moment from running off in the wrong direction, I’ll be glad to straighten you out.”

“When? Where?”

“My place, an hour. I’ll have the Nationals game on—you bring the beer.”

“See you then,” Sloan said.

Soon Reeder was walking Amy and Bobby back to the street. He gave his daughter a peck on the cheek and shook her boyfriend’s damp hand. The couple strolled off, arm in arm again. He supposed he should cut Landon a break—at least the kid hadn’t spouted any Marxist nonsense tonight. Amy must have put him on his good behavior.

Darkness was settling in, and a distinct chill sent Reeder’s hands into his pants pockets as he took the short walk to Thirty-Fourth Street Northwest and the million-dollar town house he called home. Selling a 49 percent interest in ABC to investors had, to say the least, left him better off than staying in government service, and best of all, he still maintained control of the company.

The two-story white-brick building was finally starting to feel like home to Reeder. Built in 1900, the town house appealed to his sense of history, but had been renovated to meet his twenty-first-century needs. He stopped, got his mail, then unlocked the red door and was greeted by the annoying beep of the alarm timer. He punched in the seven-digit PIN.

A pleasant female voice said, “Disarmed, ready to arm.”

“Thanks, Rosie,” he said to the alarm voice, which he’d named after the robot maid from a cartoon show his father had watched as a small boy.

From the entryway Reeder took a left into a white-walled living room, footsteps echoing off hardwood as he moved through the dining room, dropping the mail off on the table before entering the galley kitchen. He opened the stainless steel refrigerator, grabbed a Heineken, twisted off the cap, took a long damn pull.

Reeder was not a heavy drinker, not anymore, but he lived for a beer at the end of the day the way he once had the after-dinner cigarette that had stopped almost twenty years ago—when Melanie found out she was pregnant, Reeder quit cold.

He rarely watched TV in his living room, but since he was expecting Sloan, he dropped into one of the easy chairs, grabbed the remote, then turned on the large screen over a fireplace whose mantel was arrayed with framed pictures of Amy at various ages. Soon he was watching the Washington Nationals game. Pittsburgh was in town, and wily veteran Stephen Strasburg was on the mound for the Nats.

Raising his bottle to the TV, Reeder said, “Never fear, Stephen. Experience and cunning can beat youth and skill anytime.”

The game was in the top of the first, no one on, two outs, and a two-two count on the third hitter in the Pirates’ lineup. Confirming Reeder’s salute, Strasburg threw a changeup to the hitter, who was so far off balance he almost fell to a knee trying to hold up his swing.

By the top of the fourth, Reeder had taken his empty bottle to the kitchen and wondered if he shouldn’t just go on upstairs. He had all but given up on Sloan—the FBI agent said an hour, and it’d been almost two.

Reeder was reaching for the remote when the doorbell chimed.

There, on Reeder’s doorstep, was Gabriel Sloan holding up a six-pack of Guinness dark. Wearing half a grin, he said, “So I’m late. Peace offering.”

“You’re
fucking
late. Peace offering accepted.”

Reeder stepped aside, and Sloan strode straight through into the living room, set the beer on the floor in front of the coffee table, yanked a bottle out, and plopped into the chair next to Reeder’s. The only light in the room was the screen and bleed-in from the dining room.