Closure (Jack Randall) (6 page)

Jack looked around the table. “Guess I better make a phone call.”

•      •      •

“Deacon.” The Deputy Director was at home on his secure phone. “What do we know, Jack?”

“Our shooter is a professional, sir, a good one.” Jack gave him the news he didn’t wish to hear. “He hid his tracks very well; we have next to nothing here.”

“The letter?”

“We just need one thing to confirm it.”

“Yeah, another body.”

The state of Colorado holds 19,671 inmates in its prisons.
Approximately 13,179 are repeat offenders.

—SIX—

“T
his could be my ticket to the
Post.
”

The thought was always in the back of Danny Drake’s head, but the minute he saw the scene it resurfaced immediately. As he pecked out the story on his laptop, his mind was already working on the blanks. As far as he knew, he had been the first reporter on the scene. He’d been dating the girl in the records department at this small suburban police station for six months. They had worked out a system where if she overheard something juicy from the dispatcher, she would text him with the address. Since her desk was two feet from the dispatch room door, which never closed to let the air conditioner reach inside, she overheard a majority of the traffic. She knew it wasn’t something Chief Sanchez would like, so she kept the texts to a minimum. She knew of Danny’s ambition to work for the
Washington Post
someday and was starting to think he might take her with him. Danny had yet to consider that.

What currently was occupying Danny’s mind was what he saw at the scene. He had arrived in time to see the Chief remove a large envelope from a tree. The fact that the Chief took a picture of it first raised his curiosity even more. Sanchez did not look happy with the contents, which he carefully bagged and put in his car before Danny’s fellow journalists arrived. Thinking ahead, Danny kept his mouth shut, and let all the others shout their questions at the very brief statement the Chief had made. There was no mention of the envelope, and Danny did not inquire. Everyone seemed to accept the car-jacking story without question. When his photographer had informed him he had shot everything and was going back to the office, Danny asked to borrow a camera. “Just in case, I think I’ll hang out for awhile,” he had said. After a few hours, the telephoto lens provided Danny with his first live look at Special Agent Jack Randall. Danny read the
Post
every day, and Jack’s picture had been a regular one in the past year. Why was the FBI here? Why would they send one of their best agents, and their own crime scene investigators to Florida on such short notice for a flubbed car-jacking? What was in the envelope? Sure, the victim was one of the rich and famous, but why did he warrant this kind of attention from the FBI? Too many holes in this story, Danny thought. But if he could fill them before somebody else did, he may be able to get out of this paper and into a real one. He checked his story for errors and with a keystroke sent it to his editor. Now, who should he call first?

•      •      •

Sam lay in his daughter’s bed looking at the ceiling. The glow-in-the-dark stars that he had spent an afternoon pasting up shined like newly discovered constellations. He had made an effort at a Big Dipper and Little Dipper, but he was off a little. They were more like ladles, his wife had joked. She was right. But his daughter would stare at them with intent interest when they put her to bed, and that had made it worth the effort. She was usually long asleep before the stars lost their glow. He looked around his daughter’s room. The plants were still alive. Paul must be taking care of that, too. The room was the same, no one had moved anything. The toys were still on the floor with shoes and books among them. The little clothes still hung in the closet. The night-light glowed in the hallway to keep the monsters at bay should a nocturnal visit to the bathroom be necessary. SpongeBob grinned at him from a poster. Who would have thought that little kids would find a talking yellow sponge so entertaining? Sam had watched a few episodes with his daughter, both of them stretched out on the floor. He laughed when she did; she seemed to get it, he was obviously too old. The clock she had just learned to read claimed it was 3 a.m. when Sam pulled his daughter’s blanket over him. SpongeBob was still grinning. Sam thanked him and fell asleep, curled in a ball on the tiny bed.

•      •      •

Deputy Chief of Staff Charlie Parker was in the Roosevelt room of the White House with Senator John Harper and his many aides. Why the man had to have an entourage of ten people everywhere he went was beyond his scope of understanding. Most things about the Senator were. A senior Republican from the state of Georgia, John Harper fit the bill of the stereotypical southern politician. He was big on God, justice, and of course, the topic of the meeting, guns. The Senator had a long and close relationship with the gun lobby. Anything that was vaguely related to the Second Amendment drew his attention. He had fought waiting periods, Teflon bullets, trigger locks, and background checks; all with success. The bills had either been defeated, or negotiated to the point of ineffectiveness. His current target was the President’s new crime bill. The first bill had been defeated before it had even reached a vote. It was offered as a campaigning tool; so the President could be seen as tough on crime, yet hamstrung by Congress. It had worked. The President had won the election, and the party had picked up some seats in the House. Now that the President was in his second term, the bill had been rewritten bigger and broader. They were now going after the big prize: handguns. The Senator was pulling out all the stops to defeat it.

It was Charlie’s job to find a way to make it happen.

“Senator, these figures are a year old, but they still can’t be denied. Last year we had over 21,000 handgun-related deaths in this country. If we take away the suicides and the deaths ruled accidental, that still leaves us with over 19,000 handgun deaths. We have around 65 million handguns in this country, with a death rate of 13.7 per 100,000. That’s three times the rate of Canada. On top of the homicides, this also shows that handguns are used nine out of ten times in robbery, assault and rape. The American people are tired of all these loophole-filled laws, Senator. The President wants this bill passed.”

“Charlie, I understand that the President would like me to get on board, but I just don’t think I can. His bill is placing all the blame on a few violent people. What about all the other law abiding gun owners? Besides, you aren’t going to stop people who are prone to violence just by taking away their guns.”

“No we can’t, but we can make them less lethal. The study states it’s not the fact that they
are
violent; it’s the fact that they have easy access to handguns when they decide to
be
violent. The guns don’t kill people, people kill people line is crap and you know it. The truth is, people without guns injure people, and people with guns kill them.”

Senator Harper smiled. He had heard that line before and he attempted to switch the focus of the debate.

“I cannot get behind anything that will cost this nation and my district alone hundreds of thousands of jobs. You’re talking a lot of votes that I can’t afford to lose. Not to mention a loss of millions in taxes. How’s the President going to explain that?”

Charlie looked at his aide. The aide quickly opened a file and started reading out loud. “Our current numbers show an annual cost of four billion dollars to cover immediate medical care of gunshot wounds. That was last year, up 12% from the year before. Lifetime follow-up care and economic loss due to gunshot injuries is estimated at 20 billion per year. None of this cost is subsidized by the gun manufacturers. Pistols and revolvers account for over 80% of these injuries.” The aide looked up and smiled at the Senator.

John Harper did not return his smile. Having the Deputy Chief of Staff lecture him was one thing, having this kid do it was another. He shifted his gaze to Mr. Parker. The two of them had done battle on many occasions, but they at least had a mutual respect for one another. The Senator had won more battles than he had lost, but that was before the last election. The Democrats had picked up more seats in the House this term, and defeating the bill this time would be harder than before. He was still kicking himself for falling for the last bill offering. The ruse had sucked him and his followers in and made them look bad compared to the President, the result being a loss of the majority in both the House and the Senate. Fortunately, there were still a lot of people on the fence in regard to the bill, and he and Charlie Parker both knew that the last headcount was still in his favor. This meeting was nothing but a fishing expedition. Charlie needed to know if there was room to negotiate, or if it was just plain war.

He was not going to like the Senator’s answer.

The state of Connecticut holds 19,846 inmates in its prisons.
Approximately 13,296 are repeat offenders.

—SEVEN—

D
anny broke the yokes on his triplet of over-easy eggs and spread them around. Susan watched with some degree of amusement. For some reason he was excited about something. She blew on her cup of coffee, and waited for the explosion of words that was just a few bites away. Breakfast with Danny was a rare offer, but it was usually in conjunction with a request for information. It was also something of a spectacle to watch. Danny was the second youngest of eight, and always ate like someone was going to come along and snatch his plate away. Slice of toast in one hand to shovel the fork full of eggs, bacon, pancakes, sausage or a combination of all four, interrupted only by quick trips to the coffee mug that somehow remained upright. She was careful not to sit too close; she didn’t wish to be stabbed with the fork. She just worked on her bagel and coffee and waited.

The fork finally hit the plate, and the last of the toast was used to sop up the remaining egg yoke. A quick swipe of the napkin and Danny was off.

“So have you heard anything interesting around the office?” He grinned.

She couldn’t help but grin back at him; he wasn’t even going to try to hide it. “About what?” she replied innocently.

“About what? The dead lawyer, what else is there?”

“I haven’t heard anything, not even in the break room. For some reason the boys aren’t yakking it up as usual over this one. Even Donna is in the dark. If she doesn’t know anything, I sure as hell don’t.”

As much as he was disappointed, he wasn’t surprised either. Obviously the FBI had put a lid on the case and told everyone to keep their mouths shut. Donna was the Chief’s secretary and she and Susan often had lunch together, another fringe benefit of his relation with Susan. He thought about this for a moment. The envelope contained something, something worthy of the FBI’s attention, and worthy enough for them to send one of their top investigators; an investigator that worked directly for Mark Deacon, the Deputy Director of the FBI. The case was no doubt big, or had big implications. He needed to know what was in the envelope. He looked at Susan. She did not look too happy with him right now. This was going to take some finessing on his part.

“Are you free for dinner tonight?”

•      •      •

Paul waited as long as he could before he headed upstairs to wake up Sam. Sam needed all the sleep he could get. The appointment was for one o’clock, and they had about an hour to get there. Today would not be bad; it was the next few that would be the hard ones.

To his surprise, he heard the shower running. Sam was up. Paul went to the bedroom to check on the laundry situation; time to do some towels. He stopped to scrutinize the bed. The pillows were still on it. Not the regular ones, but the decorative ones that his sister had bought. Sam always left them on the chair if he made the bed. Paul picked up the laundry basket and moved down the hall. The door to Katie’s room was open. Everything was still in place, but Sam’s shoes were lying on the floor next to the bed. Paul turned and went downstairs. He loaded the laundry into the washer and added the appropriate powders. He’d have to remember to transfer it into the dryer when they got back. He was sitting at the table with a cup of coffee when Sam walked in.