Three Jack McClure Missions Box Set (131 page)

“Doesn’t sound like much.”

“No,” she said, “indeed it doesn’t.”

Jack considered. “So you can’t get to him.”

“He’s become a protected entity,” she said. “Just like your friend, Alli Carson.”

Jack heard the slight rebuke in her voice. “Alli was framed. Believe me, she’s got nothing to do with this.”

“You can’t deny that her frame was the trigger for three, maybe four homicides.”

Now they were skirting too close to Annika for his comfort. “All I’m saying is that pursuing her is going in the wrong direction.”

“Agent McKinsey doesn’t think so,” Heroe said.

“Can you think of a better reason to look elsewhere?”

*   *   *

Three minutes after exchanging cell numbers with McClure, Heroe pulled up outside Rachel Cowan’s house. She figured she’d have to work ten lifetimes to afford that kind of mansion. Plus, the only black people around here were probably housekeepers and gardeners. The nannies were all young girls from Ireland or the Baltics.

She opened Naomi Wilde’s file, which she had obtained from Naomi’s superior, and read it again. Thirty-six years old, born in Wheeling, West Virginia, moved to D.C. when she was four. One living sibling, Rachel, two years her senior. Graduated with honors from Georgetown University, majoring in criminology, minoring in psychology. Tried her hand at forensic pathology before applying to the Secret Service. Partnered with Peter McKinsey for six years. Assigned to protect the FLOTUS following the election of Edward Carson a year and a half ago. Commendations, highest marks, et cetera, et cetera. Heroe decided that she was looking at the jacket of an exemplary agent, and she felt a particular pang of sorrow, of loss, as if Naomi Wilde were her own sister.

She got out of the car and, checking out the sprinkling of A-list cars, went up the steps and rang the bell. She had a flash of a uniformed maid opening the door, but it was Rachel Cowan, ragged as a battlefield pennant, who greeted her and ushered her inside.

The interior did not disappoint. It was a breathtaking display of egregious consumerism run rampant. They stood in the vast living room. Rachel was either too aggrieved or too rude to ask her to sit down. Glancing around, Heroe didn’t know whether she would want to. This level of consumerism gave her hives.

“I apologize for disturbing you at what must be a difficult time,” Heroe said.

“And yet you did.”

Not a promising beginning.

Rachel, perhaps appropriately dressed in the color of dried blood, stood with her hands clasped in front of her. There were deep circles under her eyes, which were red and raw-looking. She looked exhausted, as if she hadn’t slept in days, and her eyes kept darting here and there. Heroe wondered whether she was on some medication, or ought to be.

“No matter,” Rachel continued as if there had been no pause. “What is it you want?”

Heroe took out her pad, giving her a bit more time to assess her subject. She strongly suspected that she needed to strike the right tone to get Rachel to open up.

“I understand your sister was here to see you yesterday.”

“That’s right.” There was a wary note in her voice.

“Can you tell me about it?” Heroe said as casually as she could.

Rachel turned gimlet-eyed and she crossed her arms over her breasts. “Why? Are you investigating her or something?”

Heroe gestured. “It’s nothing like that, I assure you.”

“Because if you are, there isn’t a better or more dedicated agent in the Secret Service.”

“Your loyalty is admirable, Mrs. Cowan, and I appreciate your opinion. But not to worry, we’re interested in Naomi’s partner.”

Rachel seemed to relax somewhat. “I doubt I can help you, then. Peter stayed in the car while Naomi and I were together.”

Heroe made a notation. “You mean he drove her here?”

Rachel nodded. “That’s right.”

“So you didn’t see her car?”

“They came in one car, that much I saw, and it wasn’t hers.”

Interesting,
Heroe thought.
So it stands to reason that Wilde and McKinsey went from here directly to the place where she was killed, otherwise she would have retrieved her cell from her car.

“Do you know McKinsey well?”

Rachel made a sound, as if releasing a puff of air. “I don’t know him at all, beyond meeting him a couple of times.”

“Your sister never spoke to you about him?”

“Naomi never spoke to me—or anyone, for that matter—about anything pertaining to her work. She made that clear to every person she knew, including me.”

Heroe wrote that down, but she needed to be certain, so she said, “Did your sister mention Peter McKinsey yesterday in any context whatsoever?”

“No, she didn’t.”

“Okay, I guess that’s it, then.” Heroe thought a minute. “By the way, Mrs. Cowan, did Naomi mention where she was going after she left you?”

“Work, she said.” Rachel shrugged. “That’s typical of her; work is where her head always is.” She said this without rancor.

Heroe looked up, her inner radar suddenly on high alert. “So she wasn’t going home.”

“No, I told you. Work, work, work.” Rachel bit her thumbnail, her eyes turned inward. “Something I’m quite certain I’m going to have to look into now.”

Heroe nodded and moved toward the entryway. “Okay, thank you, Mrs. Cowan. You’ve been very helpful.”

The compliment appeared to stir Rachel out of her dark ruminations, and she turned toward the chief detective. “Really?”

Heroe knew when to turn on her smile, whose wattage was considerable. “Really.” She paused. “By the way, did Naomi by any chance tell you where she was going, specifically?”

Rachel wrinkled her brow. “She did, actually. Now what was it?”

“You mean
where
she was going, specifically.”

“I
said
what and I
meant
what.” Rachel clicked her fingernails on the crown of her diamond-studded gold watch. “Let me see. What were she and I discussing? Oh, yes. The secret bank account my husband keeps. The moment I mentioned that her face lit up.” She laughed, and for a moment the years, and with them the care and worry, seemed to slip off her face. “I knew that look. I knew it would be useless to ask her to stick around.” Then she pointed. “Now you’re doing it.”

“What?”

“Lighting up like a beacon.”

With good reason.

“A bank, you say.” And Heroe thought,
Middle Bay Bancorp
.
Bingo!

26

“Jack, I need to talk to you.”

Alli came and sat next to him. The 737 had been in the air for forty minutes. It would be less than twenty until they set down at a secured airstrip outside Vlorë. Since speaking with Chief Detective Heroe he had been sunk deep in thought. His mind wanted to go to his upcoming reunion with Annika, but it kept slipping back to Naomi. He felt her loss acutely. She had been of great help to both the FLOTUS and Alli after the accident in Moscow that had killed Edward Carson, proving herself quick-witted and unflustered by even the most grievous of events. Afterward, she had kept in touch with him. She always asked about Alli’s emotional state. He could still remember how genuinely happy she’d been by the news that Alli had decided to go to Fearington.
“Finally,”
she’d said,
“she’s on a path that will serve her well.”

In addition, he was concerned by the widening gyre of the conspiracy he found himself investigating. The mission given Dennis Paull and, by extension, him, was on the surface a simple one: Track down and terminate Arian Xhafa. And yet, now, only days later, it wasn’t simple at all. If Naomi was dead, it was at the hands of her partner. McKinsey had been extracted from the Metro police by Andrew Gunn, not McKinsey’s boss, who had somehow been neutralized. McKinsey and Naomi had been pulled out of Secret Service and seconded to Henry Holt Carson. Why them? Was McKinsey secretly working for Carson, as Gunn seemed to be? The odds seemed to favor that theory. But how did these people tie in to Arian Xhafa and his American representative Mbreti? And then there was Annika’s involvement.

Every investigation had a trajectory, but Jack’s mind worked in three dimensions. He saw the layers at work here: Carson, Xhafa, Annika. He now knew Annika’s connection with Xhafa, but not what she had been doing in D.C. For the life of him he couldn’t see the connection between Carson, Gunn, McKinsey, and Xhafa. Was it the Stem? The sex trade? And who the hell set out to frame Alli? The puzzle, complex as it seemed, had nevertheless taken on dimension and feel. It was the context that was missing. He was too close to the trees to see the forest. He needed to pull his perspective back and look at the disparate pieces as a whole.

At the same time, another part of his mind was busy working on the name equation he suspected would lead to Mbreti’s real name. Grasi = Thatë; Mbreti = X. Despite his best efforts, it remained unsolved. And yet, he couldn’t help believing that the solution was right in front of his face. If only he could see it.

Turning his mind away from these conundrums, he smiled at Alli, grateful for the distraction. Let another part of his brain unravel them, he thought, while she engaged him in conversation.

“You’ve done extremely well with Edon,” he said. “I’m proud of you.”

She seemed stunned, and sat back in the seat. “Huh! No one’s ever said that to me before.”

“I’m sorry I’m the first,” he said with a wry smile, “but I’ll have to do.”

Impulsively, she left her seat to give him a kiss on the cheek. “Thanks for believing in me.”

“Always.”

Alli returned his smile, but almost immediately she became serious. “Are you going to tell me about Annika?”

“She’s in Albania, that’s where we’re going now. The plane will drop us off, refuel, then take Paull and the children back to the States.”

“You said you’d never see her again.”

“No, honey,
she
said that.” He made a vague gesture. “She says she’s involved in this situation with Xhafa.”

Alli’s eyes rose to engage his. “Do you believe her?”

“I wasn’t sure—until I saw the scars on Edon’s back.”

“Yeah, they’re just like the ones on Annika’s back.” Alli licked her lips. “She’s after Arian Xhafa, isn’t she?”

He nodded. “I wouldn’t bet against it.”

“But you weren’t thinking about her when I sat down here.”

Jack sighed. “Alli, Naomi Wilde is missing. I spoke to a chief detective who thinks she’s been murdered.”

Alli’s gaze dropped to her hands, which fidgeted in her lap. “I liked Naomi,” she said after a time.

“Me, too.”

“D’you really think she’s dead?”

“No way to say at this point.”

She picked at her nails, which were already bitten short. “What’s gonna happen to Thatë?”

Jack shrugged. “That will be largely up to him.”

“You don’t have a plan for him? You have a plan for everyone.”

“I think you’re giving me too much credit.”

“Do you have a plan for Annika?”

He remained silent for some time. “It’s not just me who has a connection with her.”

When she gave him a startled look, he said, “What, did you think I wouldn’t notice?”

Alli was back to staring at her hands.

“Alli, talk to me.”

She heaved a sigh and shook her head as if to clear it. “Last year, when we were in the Ukraine, it was almost like…” Her words grew fainter and fainter until they faded out altogether.

Jack waited a moment, then leaned forward. “Like what?”

Tears grew in Alli’s eyes, glittering and fragile-seeming. “There were moments—at that awful restaurant, at the apartment—when we were like … like a family.” She almost winced when she said the last word. “Is that a horrible thing to say?”

He took her slim hands in his. “Why would it be horrible?”

She gave a tiny sound that was as much a sob as a bitter laugh. “Because, Jack. Because of so many things.” Her voice was a whisper. “Because she lied to both of us, because she murdered an American senator, because…” Her nails dug into his palms. “… oh, Christ, don’t make me go on.”

“Alli, look at me, we’re all of us angels and demons. We choose our paths, but there are forces, vast and hidden, that compel us into situations, sometimes against our will—”

“Are you excusing what she did?” It was less accusation than plea.

“I’m saying that when it comes to Annika the truth is always hidden, and when it does come to light—if it ever does—it’s far more complex, and conflicted, than we can imagine.”

She nodded. “That I can understand.”

He smiled. “I know.”

She withdrew her hands from his. He knew from experience that there was only a certain amount of physical contact she could tolerate.

“Where are we meeting her?” she asked.

“In Vlorë.”

Alli risked a glance over her shoulder. “There’s something I want to ask you. It’s about Edon. Her sister, Liridona, is in Vlorë. Edon doesn’t know what’s happened to her, but she’s deathly afraid that Xhafa’s people will get ahold of her; maybe they already have.”

“Alli, much as I feel for Edon and her sister, we can’t spare the time to—”

“You can’t,” Alli said. “But I can.”

*   *   *

There was a police boat waiting to take Heroe to Roosevelt Island when she pulled up at the dock in Georgetown. During the short trip over, she thought about Naomi Wilde and her sister Rachel. She herself had three brothers, scattered all over the world. One was a trauma surgeon in Oregon, another a lawyer at The Hague, the third an intel officer in Afghanistan. She had always wanted a sister, someone to help counter the testosterone barrage. She wondered how Rachel would take the loss of her sister. Coming after the betrayal of her husband it wouldn’t be good—by the looks of her she was already unraveling. She made a mental note to keep an eye on her in the coming weeks.

The patrol boat nosed into the island and Heroe hopped off. She turned on the GPS function of her phone.

“Give me a half hour,” she said, “before you come looking for me.”

The officer adjusted the boat’s GPS to home in on her signal. “What are you expecting?”