Until the Dawn (12 page)

“Sure. I’ll get the key.” Flora pulled open her desk drawer and extracted a ring filled with them.

“My lord, Flora. What the hell are all those for?”

She grinned. “Lots of security. The Speaker has increased it over the years to the point where he told me to carry these with me all the time.” She jiggled the metal pieces

’til they rang like chimes.

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Until the Dawn

“Good thing you are always on the job.” Maddie tried to smile.
Good thing you were
here to let me in.

Flora led the way past two more desks piled high with paperwork toward the back of the suite and the Speaker’s private office. “
Si
, good thing, too, because you could not open his computer without my key.”

Is that so? Since when did Trask lock up his private computer here? Weren’t the encrypted
systems imposed since 9/11 enough to deter criminals and terrorists? Or did Trask have files
here he wanted no one to see?

“Here you go.” Flora swung open the door and marched to the desk and the computer standing there. The screen was dark.

“Unlock that for me, please, Flora.”

“
Si, no problemo
.” In a minute she had turned the key, pushed the boot button to the mainframe and made her way toward the door. “I will close this,
si
?”

“
Si, muchas gracias,
Flora.”

Then Maddie pulled out Trask’s chair and sat down to delve into the files of a man she had worked for, trusted and on whose integrity she had built her entire professional career.

The usual files were there. Committee reports. Voting records of all Congresspersons in their party. White Papers from consultants. Including Dan’s latest on transportation issues, rolling stock coming through Trask’s district from Mexico and where it all originated.

Maddie fell back in the chair and exhaled. She looked up at the clock on the far wall. She’d been at this for over an hour.

“Nothing,” she said for the sake of Dan and the team. “Can’t find anything in the regular files.”

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She decided to see who was in the Capitol office this morning and picked up the phone on Trask’s desk. But no sooner was it in her hand than she put it back in the cradle.

Her gaze came up. Fastened on the far wall. The pictures of Trask with President Hamill. With the previous Speaker. With other Texas Congressmen.

Her gaze ran over the plaques, too. The awards from the Chambers of Commerce.

The Man of the Year Awards from this organization or that. The Cattlemen’s Association Award for Good Citizenship. And then her eyes landed on the one plaque she remembered. The one that had dogged her memory. Kept her guessing what the nagging sensation was at the back of her brain whenever the term Norseman was mentioned.

She rose and walked toward it.

Put her hands up and touched it. Traced the words. “The Sons of Norway of Texas honor Congressman Paul Trask for his service to the Chapter.”

Trask was a Norse name. Trask was a Norse man.

“Trask,” she said for the edification and enjoyment of her lover and the team of people with whom she would now work, if she had the good fortune to survive this debacle, “is a Norseman.” And just for the record, just to engrave the knowledge on her mind, just to embed the full rage she felt at Trask’s betrayal of himself and their country, she repeated what she’d just told them all. Then she raised her wrist and pushed the button on her amazing little watch to take a picture of the plaque. “And now I have to find anything else I can that gives me more proof.”

* * * * *

Within the next hour, she had talked to Julia in the office in Washington. All hands still in town were on deck in the Speaker’s office, the receptionist reported.

“Glad you are back from Cancun,” Julia told her.

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Until the Dawn

“My presence means nothing if I don’t know where Trask is, Julia.” Maddie wondered if the woman knew where Paul was. Over the years, she’d had the intense feeling in odd moments that Julia was more involved in Trask’s life than any of them knew or understood. Now was the time to explore all such instincts. “I need to get to him. If you know where I can find him, you must tell me.”

“He told me not to say…” the receptionist sounded conflicted.

“Tell me, Julia. The man is next in line to succeed. He cannot stay bundled away somewhere. Not without me!”

“Carstairs’ Ranch. Rick Carstairs.”

“Here? West of Del Rio?” Maddie knew this rancher. He owned the largest spread in Trask’s district. On the edges of Big Bend. He was also a major contributor whom Maddie had met many times when he came to talk with Trask in Washington.

“Yes, he said he’s having a meeting there of supporters.”

“When, Julia?”

“Today. In fact…it starts in twenty minutes.”

“Great! Thanks! But, wait! How do I get there?”

“The ranch is off Route 10. I’ll send you directions. Or wait, you are at Paul’s computer?”
Paul
’s computer.
Intriguing.
“Yes, I am, Julia.”

“I always get directions wrong, you know I do. I know Paul—the Speaker, I mean, has directions on his desktop.”

Maddie searched the screen. “I don’t think so.”

“Oh, try this. Log off. Then do you see a username that says PT?”

“The Speaker’s initials?” Maddie backed out and saw an icon for PT. “I do.”

“Open it.”

Maddie did and got a security screen.
Damn, damn.
“Do you have the password?”

“Viking.”

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“Viking as in Norseman?
”
Maddie frowned, her gaze drifting up to the Sons of Norway plaque, then typed in the password. “It’s opening.”

“Great!”

What was greater was the variety of items spread before Maddie on the screen. She fell back in her chair, overwhelmed with the wealth of materials.

File folders labeled Donors, Scheduling, Network. Opening just the Donors folder was like opening an ant hill with dozens of more folders. She could never copy them all.

On gut instinct, she opened Scheduling and found one titled, Norsemen.

A hundred or more documents stood before her. Invoices. Lists of shipments.

She opened Network and found a document that was a copy of an email from Trask to someone whose email address was fisherman2. The email was dated yesterday. She skimmed it and she caught her breath. Then she read aloud to Dan the words on the page.

“Rover and Charger are down. Next stage is a go.”

Rover, she knew, was the Secret Service’s code name for the president. And Charger belonged to none other than the vice president.

She snapped a picture of the email and felt her heart hammer against her ribs.

That was proof Trask had a network that cared about Rover and Charger’s illnesses and had a next stage of some plan he was approving for implementation.

There were so many more documents to read and copy. God, she would be here for
days
.

She had to find a flash drive. Quickly. She began to rummage in Trask’s drawers.

Clamping a hand to her mouth, she paused.

“There’s too much here to copy,” she said to herself and Dan. “I don’t have time!

The meeting is in twenty minutes.”

She closed her eyes.
Stop. Think.

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She heard voices in the outer office. She cocked an ear. One of them was a bass, another a baritone and the third?

She jumped to her feet. Froze. If this was Trask…. It couldn’t be!

Dan? Help me.

* * * * *

Dan ran a hand through his hair. Christ! They’d caught a few breaks and they were still behind the eight ball! Too many files to copy. Not enough proof to convict. But at least now they knew that Trask was behind the Norseman holding company along with his pals. Terrific.
Now, we have no idea who’s in this meeting.

Dan had left the car and now kneeled down behind a berm near a cluster of yuccas and palms across from the building where Trask’s office was. “Did you get all that, Caleb?” he asked the team leader.

“I did. What’s more I’ve got the directions to Carstairs’ ranch,” Caleb’s bass voice came at him through the wireless. He read the directions to Dan who repeated them back to him. “I’ll take the team of over there and set up posts. I think that’s our best bet—to get ahead of them. You follow her, Dan, when she comes out.”

“Roger, that, Caleb.” And to Maddie whom he knew could not hear him, he whispered, “Come on, baby. Snap a few pics and get the hell out of there.” He heard a rustling in the trees to the left. “Whoa. Caleb? You there? I think we have company.”

He began to crawl on his belly toward the cover of the largest yucca. He saw a camo boot, heard a scurry and felt the thump of impact in the fleshy part of his triceps.

“Who the hell?”

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“Maddie, you just can’t keep your nose out of everyone’s business, can you?”

Trask’s voice was edgy with anger as he dragged Maddie out the back entrance of his office, into the elevator. “Good thing my office is semi-soundproofed. We won’t disturb any of the nice folks out in front.” He punched the button for the parking garage. His hand over her mouth muffled her cries while his other arm banded her arms to her sides.

Dan! Where the hell are you? You promised you’d be here for me. Did you run out again?

Are you going to turn out, in the end, to be someone I can’t count on?

She heard Trask speaking in a low tone, as if into a lapel mic, and then the elevator door opened and Goliath was standing there—a tall, heavily muscled man in camo pants and t-shirt with a holster strapped to his shoulder.

“Here.” Trask shoved Maddie at him. “Get rid of her. I’ve got to see what damage she did and then get to the Carstairs Ranch. And let Starling know what happened here.

Damn it, anyway.” He turned his head toward his collar. “Mike, come on back here. I’ll need you.”

If Maddie had thought Trask was strong, the man he handed her over to was off the charts. His arm around her was so tight she could hardly breathe and his thick fingers dug into her face as they clamped over her lips.

“I’ll take care of it,” he assured Trask. “Here’s Mike. But he looks disturbed about something.”

Dan! Oh, Dan. Now would be a good time for you to restore my faith in you.

Why hadn’t Dan or any of Nikki’s men picked up Trask’s arrival?

They probably did but thought he was alone because the windows in his car were darkened. Or he and his pals had been in the building already.

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Until the Dawn

Maddie’s mind was working furiously as she tried to figure out where everyone might be, what had happened to Dan and where Nikki’s men had gotten to. Taking the ride down to the parking level of the building was a descent to hell with this creep crushing her ribs and killing her hopes.

She heard Trask raise his voice to the man jogging toward them but the man holding her dragged her toward a black SUV and threw her roughly into the front seat, then down on the floor. She tried to scramble up and opened her mouth to scream but Goliath just clipped her on the jaw.

“Shut up.”

Her head jerked, her mind spun and she realized what people meant when they said they saw stars. She cupped her jaw, forehead to the seat. Then she heard the engine start up and they were moving, heading up, around and out of the garage. She swallowed back the rising nausea and tried to hitch herself up on the seat. The windows were darkened but she saw daylight as they headed out of the garage toward the street.

Suddenly the vehicle skewed wildly and Goliath swore creatively as he wrestled with the wheel. The car jolted again and they fishtailed more.

“Son of a bitch.” He looked down at Maddie. “You open your mouth and you’re dead meat.”

He opened the door and climbed out. Maddie clawed her way up to watch him as he walked around to the front of the vehicle to see what was wrong.

“Damn it,” Goliath shouted, just before a tall dark shadow clipped him behind his ear and he folded neatly to the concrete.

Maddie gasped at the sight. Reached for the door handle.

“Come on, Maddie!” Dan was suddenly there, yanking open the passenger door and towing her across the street to his car. “We need to get the fuck out of here.”

She scrambled into the front seat and opened her mouth to ask him where the hell he’d been and why he’d hung her out to dry. But her jaw still hurt from where Goliath 95

Desiree Holt & Cerise DeLand

had hit her and her stomach still wanted to bring up its contents. So it took her a minute, fumbling with her seat belt and trying to string words together to take a good look at Dan as he climbed in behind the wheel and realized he had blood on his right hand.

“My god!” she cried. “You’re hurt. Where? How?”

That’s why he didn’t show up when I needed him. I should learn to have more faith.

“Where are you hurt?”

“Left arm.” He winced. “I think it’s a through and through. Good thing it’s not my shooting arm. “Got blood on my hand putting pressure on the wound. I’ll live.” But the words slid out between gritted teeth as he started the car and pulled away from the curb. “I think I’m angrier at my own stupidity than anything else. My stupidity almost got us both killed.”

“You’re shot? Holy hell, Dan. What happened?”

“Too many things for people supposed to be professionals in this game. We didn’t cop to the fact that Trask wasn’t alone because we couldn’t figure out what his MO

was.” He made a sound of disgust. “You’d think seasoned agents would be a lot smarter. Then I let Caleb take the team and head for Carstairs’ ranch because I thought I could handle Trask.”

“I was scared to death when he grabbed me,” she told him. “I’ve never seen him like this.”

“When you want to be president it changes your personality.” They were out of town now and on the highway. “Anyway, I was trying to get closer to the building when one of his thugs spotted me and took a shot. I’m lucky it only hit my arm. I pretended I was out cold so I could see what happened next.”