The Jefferson Key (29 page)

Bolton lunged forward, apparently taking the words as a threat, then stopped, realizing that the gun, though lowered, was still in Hale’s hand.

“You’d sell us out,” Bolton said. “Just to save your own hide.”

“Never,” Hale said. “I take my oath to the Articles seriously. It is
you
that I take lightly.”

Bolton faced Surcouf and Cogburn. “Are you going to stand there and let him talk to us that way? Does either of you have anything to say?”

CASSIOPEIA
RODE
WITH
EDWIN
DAVIS
UP
THE
INCLINED
ROAD
toward Monticello’s main house. Buses up and down had been halted, the local sheriff called. They wheeled into a parking lot in front on the mansion. The estate manager waited at the end of a paved walk that led to a columned portico. Twenty meters away, people were being herded onto another bus.

“Where’s Cotton?” she asked.

“Inside. He told me to seal the house and let no one in.”

“What’s happened?” Davis asked.

A
swoosh
could be heard from inside, followed by a bright flash of light that illuminated some of the windows.

“What was that?” she asked.

“There’ve been others like that,” the manager said.

She ran down the walk toward the house.

“He said for no one to enter,” the manager called out to her.

She found her weapon. “That doesn’t apply to me.”

A loud retort echoed from inside.

That sound she knew.

Gunfire.

MALONE
DROPPED
TO
THE
FLOOR
JUST
AS
WYATT
FIRED
,
THE
bullet shattering one of the wooden spindles. He beat a hasty retreat on all fours toward the back wall, away from the railing, using the angle below for protection. Another shot and a bullet came up through the floorboards a few feet away, the two-hundred-year-old timbers offering little resistance.

A third shot.

Closer.

Wyatt was searching for him.

Something arced through the air and bounced on the balcony floor. He’d seen this movie before and quickly shielded his head as the light bomb did its thing, adding a fresh wave of smoke to the confusion.

He sprang to his feet and found the hall that led back to the stairs he’d taken earlier. Spying movement below, he stared up toward the third floor and decided to reverse the roles.

Time for Wyatt to play rabbit and for him to be the fox.

WYATT
CREPT
UP
THE
STAIRS
,
GUN
LEADING
THE
WAY
,
SEARCHING
through the smoke for Malone.

Two things happened at once.

He heard the house’s main doors open and a woman yell, “Cotton.”

Then, up above, he caught sight of Malone.

Climbing to the third floor.

KNOX
WAITED
FOR
CAPTAINS
SURCOUF
AND
COGBURN
TO
ANSWER
Bolton’s question.

“I don’t know, Edward,” Surcouf finally said. “I’m not sure what to think. We’re in a mess. Frankly, I don’t like what either one of you proposes. But I have to wonder, Quentin. There’s no way you’re depending totally on Daniels caving simply from embarrassment.”

“If it were me,” Cogburn said, “I’d call the wife a lying whore and hang her out to dry. Nobody would have any sympathy for her.”

Typical, Knox thought. Cogburns had long viewed the world in black and white. He wished life were that simple. If it were, none of them would be in the mess they were in. But he, too, doubted that the tactic alone would pressure the White House into doing anything productive.

“I still have Stephanie Nelle,” Hale said.

“And what are you going to do with her?”

Knox wanted to hear the answer to that question, too.

“I haven’t decided. But she could prove valuable.”

“Talk about a thing from the past,” Bolton said. “Do you hear yourself? A hostage? In the 21st century? Like you told us about the assassination attempt. Are you going to call up the White House and say you have her? Let’s make a deal? You can’t do diddly-squat with that woman. She’s useless.”

Unless her corpse could be shown to Andrea Carbonell, Knox thought. Then, she was worth a great deal.

At least to him.

“Why don’t you let me worry about her value,” Hale said.

Cogburn pointed an accusing finger. “You’re plotting something else. What is it, Quentin? Tell us or, by God, I’ll join with Edward and make your life a living hell.”

CASSIOPEIA
COULD
DISTINGUISH
LITTLE
THROUGH
THE
SMOKE
. The two-story entrance hall was enveloped in a gray fog. She sought cover close to the wall, behind a pine table, beneath a wall dotted with antlers.

She realized what she had to do.

Not the smartest move, but necessary.

“Cotton,” she called out.

MALONE
CAME
TO
THE
TOP
OF
THE
STAIRWAY
ON
THE
THIRD
floor. He’d made no attempt to disguise his path. Surely Wyatt had seen or heard him and was headed this way.

Or at least he hoped.

He heard his name called out.

Cassiopeia.

WYATT
HAD
NO
IDEA
AS TO
THE
WOMAN’S
IDENTITY
,
BUT
SHE
obviously was connected to Malone. He should simply descend to the cellar and leave, but he recalled that the staircase before him led down, not into a public area, but into a private room the staff utilized. He wondered if any of them was still there, or if they’d been told to evacuate. The one thing he did not want to do was shoot anyone. That would bring immeasurable grief his way. Better to be a simple thief, inflicting nothing more than a little property damage.

He stared up.

The third floor contained the room beneath the dome. Only the north and south staircases led there. Malone was clearly drawing him that way into a confined space.

Not today, Cotton
.

He crept away from the stairs to the end of the corridor and peered out into the entrance hall. The woman had taken cover on his side of the room, behind a table, near the front windows and door. He aimed the gun above her head and obliterated a set of eighteen-paned windows directly behind her.

HALE
DEBATED
WHAT
TO
SAY
IN
RESPONSE
TO
COGBURN’S
THREAT
. For the first time, he saw a semblance of backbone in one of these men.

So he opted for the truth.

“I am solving the cipher,” he told them.

“How?” Cogburn asked, clearly not impressed.

“I made a deal with the head of
NIA
.”

MALONE
STOOD
JUST
INSIDE
AN
OCTAGON-SHAPED
ROOM
WITH
bright yellow walls, crowned by a dome and a glass oculus. Circular paned windows in six of the walls allowed bright morning sun inside. Little smoke had, as yet, drifted to this floor.

He debated how best to confront Wyatt.

Gunfire erupted below.

KNOX
KEPT
HIS
COMPOSURE
,
BUT
WHAT
HE’D
JUST
HEARD
SENT
a chill down his spine.

Carbonell was playing every angle. Squeezing him. Dealing with his boss. Had he been compromised? Was that why he was here? He readied himself to react, but Hale still held a gun and he was unarmed.

“What kind of deal have you made?” Bolton asked Hale.

“The
NIA
has solved the cipher.”

“Then what’s the problem?” Surcouf asked.

“There is a price.”

The other three waited for him to tell them.

“Stephanie Nelle has to die for us to obtain the solution.”

“Then kill her,” Cogburn said. “You’re always chastising us on being blood-shy. What are you waiting for?”

“The
NIA
director is not to be trusted. And we can, of course, only kill Ms. Nelle once. So that death has to produce the desired results.”

Bolton shook his head. “You’re telling us you can end this simply by killing that woman in the prison? We’ll all be safe? Our letters of marque fortified? And you’re playing games?”

“What I am doing, Edward, is assuring that, if that happens, we will indeed be safe.”

“No, Quentin,” Bolton said. “What you’re ensuring is that
you
will be safe.”

CASSIOPEIA
CROUCHED
LOW
,
USING
THE
TABLE
AS
COVER
.

Two retorts.

Close by.

And the windows behind her shattered from bullets.

She recovered and sent a round in reply, aiming for the spot in the fog where she’d spotted muzzle flashes.

BY
ELIMINATING
THE
SET
OF
WINDOWS
BEHIND
THE
WOMAN
, Wyatt had provided her an easy escape route. They stretched six feet from the floor, like doors, an easy matter to step through.

But she wasn’t leaving.

He aimed his next shot at the table she was using for cover.

On the fourth round, he might not be so generous.

MALONE
HAD
TO
RETURN
TO
GROUND
LEVEL
AND
SEE
ABOUT
Cassiopeia. She and Wyatt were engaged in a gun battle. But the south stairway, to his right, the one he’d used to ascend, was not the way. He decided to head to the north side of the building and the second set of risers.

He quickly found them and descended.

CASSIOPEIA
DECIDED
THAT
RETREAT
WAS
THE
SMART
MOVE
.
TOO
many bullets, too much smoke.

How many assailants were there?

And why had Cotton not answered?

She fired another round, then darted out the open frame behind her, leaping from the portico.

WYATT
SAW
THE
WOMAN
FLEE
AND
DECIDED
TO DO
THE
SAME
.

Malone was surely on his way back down.

Enough of this.

MALONE
FOUND
THE
FIRST
FLOOR
. A
SHORT
HALL
TO
HIS
LEFT
led back to the entrance hall, but he avoided that and stepped into what appeared to be a dining room.

A large parlor opened through another doorway, the interior walls dotted with paintings, the exterior lined with draped windows and a set of doors, the air inside consumed by swirling smoke.

He entered and peered through another set of glass doors, back out into the entrance hall.

CASSIOPEIA
ROLLED
ONTO
THE
PORTICO
,
STAYING
LOW
,
ADVANCING
to the shattered window.

She had to get back inside.

She came to her feet and pressed her body close to the outer bricks, then slipped into the smoke-filled hall.

Her gaze raked the murky scene.

On the opposite side, beyond a set of glass doors, in another smoke-filled room dotted with windows and portraits, she caught movement.

She aimed and fired.

BATH
,
NORTH
CAROLINA

HALE’S
PATIENCE
ENDED
.
THESE
THREE
IMBECILES
HAD
NO conception of what was required to win this war. It had been that way from the start. Hales had always dominated the Commonwealth. They were the ones who’d approached George Washington and the Continental Congress with the idea of coordinating the privateers’ offensive efforts. Before that, vessels had operated independently, doing what they pleased when they pleased. Sure, they’d been effective, but not like what happened after they unified under a single command. Of course, for their trouble Hales derived a specified cut from every seizure, partnering with privateers from Massachusetts to Georgia, ensuring that attacks on British shipping continued unabated. Surcoufs, Cogburns, and especially Boltons had been there, but had not done nearly as much as what the Hales did. His father had cautioned him to cooperate with his fellow captains, but also always to keep a distance and maintain his own connections.

You can’t rely on them, son
.

He agreed. “I’m about sick to death of being accused and threatened.”

“We’re sick to death of being kept in the dark,” Bolton said. “You’re making deals with the same people who are trying to put us in prison.”

“The
NIA
is our ally.”

“Some ally,” Cogburn said. “They’ve done nothing to stop any of this. They then cultivated a spy within the company and interfered with our move on Daniels.”

“They solved the cipher.”

“And have not, as yet, provided it to us,” Bolton said. “Some friend.”

“What effect has that traitor had on your dealings with NIA?” Surcouf wanted to know. “Why would they need a spy among us?”