Erased (31 page)

“He was telling the truth,” Sara muttered. “Konrad told me Paolini did it to protect her stock.” She held up the article. “It says here that Wendy Paolini is the CEO of E.L.S.?”

“Yep. She’s a busy woman. She’s going to have some explaining to do tomorrow. I have a feeling that there will be congressional hearings after she’s released from the hospital.”

“Hospital?”

“Yeah. Stryker got a little rough with her tonight.”

Sara chuckled. “That’s too bad,” she said sarcastically.

“Come on,” Brandy said. “Let’s get you out of here.”

Sara followed her out into the hall. “What am I going to do?” she said absently.

Brandy turned to face her. “What do you mean?”

“I don’t know. I just… I don’t have anywhere to go. I can’t go home. I can’t.”

“Come on,” Brandy said. “You can crash at my place tonight.”

Chapter 57

Monday, 10:00 AM

Sara sat in the passenger seat, idly staring at the line of oaks in the distance. Brandy was driving. Dust billowed up behind them as they sped down the narrow road through the old Montano Zin vineyard. Sara hadn’t been there in a couple of years, and it was comforting to see her family’s home. It looked different, peaceful. In the past, it had always seemed too isolated, too far north. Too far away from the city.

The Montano vineyard was one of the oldest farmsteads in Dry Creek Valley. Sara’s ancestors had lived there for more than a hundred years. They’d worked the farm for several decades leading up to the depression. During prohibition, when most of the winemakers were forced to rip out their vines and plant citrus -or go out of business- the Montano family purchased the place from their employers and planted pears. Sara’s father didn’t replant the grapevines until 1971.

The Montano residence was an old farmhouse built in the 1850’s. The yellow three-story Victorian appeared before them, and Sara felt a nervous apprehension building in her chest. It was still hard to believe that she hadn’t seen Scott and Bree in three months. It didn’t seem real. In Sara’s mind it was like she’d only seen them a few days ago.

She knew that things looked differently from Scott’s perspective. Three months ago, she’d left him. Sara didn’t even remember doing it, but she’d told him that she never wanted to see him again. It scared the hell out of her that he might feel the same way about her now.

When they pulled up, Bree came running down the front steps. She had been waiting. “Mommy!” she screamed. “Mommy, Mommy!” Sara jumped out of the car and caught her up. Bree threw her arms around Sara’s neck and squeezed. She was impossibly small, impossibly delicate. It was terrifying to think that Bree had been getting along without her all this time.

“I missed you sweetie,” she said. Warm tears flowed down her cheeks.

Bree pulled away and touched Sara’s face. “Why are you crying, mommy?”

“I’m just so happy to see you,” she said.

Sara glanced at Brandy. She was looking towards the house. Sara followed her gaze up to the top of the stairs, and saw Scott standing there. Her stomach lurched anxiously. Her heart ached. She wanted to run to him, to throw herself into his arms, but she couldn’t. She didn’t know what to expect. Sara couldn’t blame him if he screamed at her and chased her off the property. She couldn’t blame him for never wanting to see her again.

Sara approached the house, Bree still tight in her arms. Scott looked down on them, his face unreadable.

“It’s good to see you,” Sara said. She climbed up until she was just two steps below him. Scott’s face was serene, his eyes moist.

“I saw you on the news,” he said. “You must have quite a story.”

“You wouldn’t believe it if I told you.”

Scott reached out to her. “Try me,” he said.

Chapter 58

Brandy was at her desk when the congressional committee concluded their hearings a month later. The committee findings were televised, and Brandy heard an uproar in the break room. One of the other agents gestured her over. Brandy peeked through the doorway and saw Paolini’s face on the television screen.

“This is a great day,” the senator said into the field of microphones. “I have been found innocent of any wrongdoing, which is just as it should have been. While this whole investigation has been a setback for E.L.S., I assure you we will work hard to restore the public trust and prove the invalidity of those fraudulent documentaries.”

“Are you saying that the laborers in those films weren’t E.L.S. employees?” one of the reporters asked.

“I’m sorry, I don’t have time for any questions. I’m delivering a speech at the E.L.S. headquarters in San Jose at three o’clock this afternoon. Admission isn’t free but there will be a question and answer session.”

A general round of groans went up from the reporters.

Brandy turned away and found herself facing her boss, Ashcroft. The room went silent. He gave Brandy a pat on the shoulder. “You can’t win ‘em all,” he said. “Regardless, you did a good job on that case, agent Jackson.”

“Thank you, sir.” With that, Ashcroft turned away and disappeared down the hall.

When Brandy got back to her desk, the phone was buzzing. “Hello?”

“Mrs. Jackson, you have a guest in the front lobby.”

“A guest? Who?”

“Her name is Sara Murphy.”

Brandy ran to the elevator. When she got to the lobby, Sara was staring out the front windows. “Sara, is everything all right?”

She turned and offered Brandy a broad smile. “Everything’s great,” she said. “I guess I can thank you for that.”

“I’m glad to hear it. So you and Scott…?”

“We’re back together. Not in Marin, though. We sold the house. I’m, uh, I’m a farmer now.”

Brandy laughed. “Taking over the family business?”

“Yes and no. I’m taking over the business part of it. My father is trying to teach me to make wine but everything I touch turns to vinegar. But I’m pretty good with numbers, and being a lawyer doesn’t hurt.”

“So you won’t be disbarred?”

“No. Not now anyway. Steve withdrew his complaint from the Bar association after the story broke. The rumor is that they’re dropping the investigation.”

“That’s great. Well, what can I help you with?”

Sara reached into her pocket and withdrew a small media player. “I’m supposed to give you this,” she said.

Brandy accepted it, turning it over in her hands. “What is it?”

“I don’t know,” Sara said. “I don’t know what’s on it and I don’t know where it came from. All I know is that I was supposed to give it to you today.”

“Today? Does this have to do with the Paolini hearings?”

“I don’t know. Stryker said if you got this too soon, it wouldn’t work. He said the FBI didn’t know how to handle a case like this.”

“Have you been withholding evidence from me?”

“No,” Sara said. “I just found this and I thought it might belong to you.”

It was a lie and they both knew it. However, Sara had all of her bases covered. The FBI couldn’t possibly charge her with concealing evidence because they couldn’t prove Sara had knowingly done so. They also couldn’t prove she’d known what was on the media player. It appeared that Stryker had educated Sara pretty well in the few hours that they’d been together. Or maybe they’d worked it out together. Sara was a lawyer, after all.

“I’ll take a look at it,” Brandy said. Sara smiled and walked out the door.

*

The E.L.S. conference began at three p.m. Brandy arrived at three fifteen with a handful of federal agents. They just happened to time their arrival with Paolini’s speech. Wendy was on the stage when Brandy entered the room.

“We’ve had our setbacks,” the senator was saying, “but E.L.S. is committed to turning this around. What began as a P.R. nightmare will soon be one of our greatest moments.”

She paused as Brandy walked down the aisle towards the stage. Then she went on, a bit nervously. “Our representatives in China have given us solid proof that these videos were fraudulent. E.L.S. does not use slave labor! We are green, we are golden, and soon we will be back in the black!”

There was a solid round of applause, but it was cut short when Brandy walked up onto the stage and pulled her handcuffs. “Senator Paolini, you’re under arrest for conspiracy to commit murder.”

“What? You can’t… that’s impossible!” A hush fell over the room as Paolini stammered and stuttered. Then, ultimately, she accepted the handcuffs without a fight. Brandy proudly led her down the center aisle, right through the press seats. The reporters cheered. For once, they got their money’s worth.

Chapter 59

Campo Belo District,

Sao Paulo, Brazil

There wasn’t much news that interested Stryker, but he did like to browse the headlines each morning on his laptop as he drank his coffee. He liked to sit on the patio of the small Sao Paulo espresso cafe and soak up the free wireless internet that leaked from the Telecom offices a few blocks away.

The café was a beautiful place, with ancient stonework on the patio and a gorgeous park with a lake just across the street. The setting was beautiful; in fact, it was incredible compared to some of the slums just a mile or so away. The area was urban, clean, perfect. A little boring maybe, but Stryker was okay with boring. That made it easier to watch his back.

He had read the news about Paolini a few days earlier. He’d seen the results of the sham congressional investigation into Paolini’s business, and it turned out just about the way he’d expected it would. Washington insiders were all the same. They made a big show of attacking each other in front of the media, but when it came down to it, they always covered each others’ backs.

So it wasn’t a surprise that Paolini had walked away from the ethics charges and the stock manipulation charges and everything else the FBI had come up with. Despite the abundance of evidence against E.L.S., the congressional committee had decided there was no concrete proof of any wrongdoing. They could have actually flown to China and seen the brutalized and malnourished children themselves, but that would have required the lazy sons of bitches to get off their asses and actually do something. Instead, they let her off the hook.

Stryker put the news behind him as soon as he read it. He’d given Sara Murphy the means to set things right, and plenty of motivation to do so, but that didn’t mean she would do it. At the moment, he didn’t care too much either way. He would have liked to see Paolini put in her place, but he wasn’t going to come out of retirement and put his neck on the line just to make it happen.

That made it a pleasant surprise when he logged onto the internet that morning and saw a new article about Paolini. A grin spread across his face as he read. There was a new investigation, and this time the FBI was running the show. The recording of Paolini ordering a hit on Fortress was damning evidence, and no one in D.C. would go within a mile of her. There weren’t going to be any special favors or pulled strings this time.

Sara Murphy had come through. Stryker was surprised and impressed. He wondered if she’d done it because of his threats, or if she’d wanted payback as bad as he did. One thing he knew for sure was that there wouldn’t be many tears shed over Paolini’s incarceration. Moreover, if he knew the O.S.S. as well as he thought he did, she’d be dead inside of a year.

Stryker took a sip of his triple shot espresso and navigated to Marketwatch. He’d taken to investing lately. It eased the boredom of retirement, and gave him hope of living on something better than a rotting sailboat down at the coast in his old age. And it was actually fun.

Well, it was fun when he made money.

The stock market was looking good. The quarterly numbers were out and it seemed that the economy was turning around. Not for E.L.S. though, but he didn’t give a damn about them.

Unlike most investors, Stryker didn’t own any E.L.S. stock. He knew better than to invest in a shit company like that. Besides, the best thing they’d had going for them was Senator Paolini, and she wasn’t going to be around for a long, long time.

The End

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