Authors: Beyond Control
"Can we make some inquiries?" she said, reaching for a pad of paper.
"I'd better handle it myself," he answered.
Lindsay nodded, wondering if she would be able to get any of the information back to Sid Becker. Or whether doing that would be a bad idea. That depended on what Bridgewater found out. She thought about relaying Sid's specific concern. Then she decided it was a bad idea to get her boss stirred up about a nightmare disaster, when the problem at Maple Creek was probably nothing of the sort.
* * *
It was a lot like the five-and-dime store a couple of blocks from where Jordan had grown up in New London, except that there was a pharmacy in the back.
He had to step around a young woman on her knees stocking the shelves. She kept her gaze averted from him, and he saw that she was setting out boxes of condoms.
When he reached the pay telephone, he glanced over his shoulder, feeling suddenly as jumpy as a bullfrog on a stove burner.
Either one of his own phones would have given him more privacy, but he was gathering sensitive information, and some of the agencies he planned to contact kept electronic phone logs. Since he didn't want his inquiries traced to him, he was stuck with using a public phone.
That morning he'd made a list of all the sources that might be useful. The trick was to get information without tipping anyone off to his real purpose
Lindsay Fleming was a good bet. As an aide to Daniel Bridgewater, she had the inside track on special Defense Department projects—which would give him a legitimate reason for calling.
In the three days since he'd seen her, she'd continued to invade his thoughts. He'd looked her up on the Net and found out a great deal about her. She was the daughter of Harold Fleming, a former Connecticut state congressman. She'd grown up on a big estate outside Darien, with all the advantages he'd never had. Servants. Riding lessons. Ballet lessons. Art lessons. A top girl's prep school. Harvard. The Ivy League background was one of the few things they had in common, although she'd arrived by a much easier route.
After college, while he'd sent out a hundred resumes to newspapers all over the country, she'd spent the summer touring Europe, then come back in the fall and waltzed into a paid internship on Capitol Hill, courtesy of the strings her father could pull. Three months later she stepped into a regular staff vacancy.
Of course, he had to give her credit. She'd earned the promotion on merit. Since then she'd racked up an admirable record—changing jobs several times as she solidified her reputation for reliability.
She was cool, confident, and intense. In some circles, she'd earned the nickname "Ice Princess."
That was consistent with the brush-off she'd given him two days ago. And in truth, he found her intimidating. Certainly not the kind of woman who was going to be impressed by a guy who'd clawed his way into the middle class.
No, be honest. He was more than middle class. So far out of his parents' league that his dad had used his "snooti-ness" as an excuse to break off relations.
He knew his mom was secretly proud that her son was a respected journalist. But that didn't mean she was willing to buck her husband's orders and invite the prodigal son to Thanksgiving dinner.
So he was one of those displaced persons who inhabited the nation's capital. One of the throngs who had come here from Connecticut or New Mexico or Iowa.
Most of them made trips back home to see the folks. He didn't have that luxury. He'd been forced to make his own life. He'd never pictured himself settled down into a stable relationship with anyone, but now he'd met a woman he wanted to know better. Except that she was like his father— unwilling to give him the benefit of the doubt. Ironically, for entirely different reasons.
Still, he felt compelled to break through the barrier she'd erected between them. Although he understood that the compulsion was a good part sexual, there was another element that he couldn't name. A need to connect with Lindsay Fleming that was different from anything he'd felt before. Instinctively he knew that if he made any mistakes, he'd frighten her away.
The prospect left him feeling strangely empty. And edgy. He muttered a low curse. He was making a case of lust into something it wasn't. Still, he decided to wait on contacting her until he could think about his approach.
He shook his head. He knew how to get an interview with the Secretary of Defense, if he wanted it.
But he didn't know squat about the fine points of male-female relations.
Looking down at his notes, he picked the next name on the list. Ed Wilkerson, who worked at the Classified Archives. Maybe he'd like to get together for lunch, talk shop, and give him some leads.
He reached Ed on the first try and chatted about work for a few minutes before making a luncheon appointment for Monday.
He skipped the next few names and went for something more direct—the physician who had handled the pathology report on Todd Hamilton.
A woman picked up on the first ring. "Dr. Charles Lucas's office."
"Is Dr. Lucas in?"
There was a pause on the other end of the line. "I'm sorry. Dr. Lucas passed away yesterday."
He heard himself saying, "But I have a report he wrote a couple of weeks ago. How did he die?"
"It was heart failure."
Stunned, Jordan mumbled, "I'm ... sorry."
"We were all so shocked. He was such a young, healthy man. Nobody suspected he had a heart condition."
"Yes, I see."
"Would you mind holding for a moment?"
Jordan's hand tightened on the receiver. "Why?"
"We're transferring all of Dr. Lucas's calls to another extension."
"Oh, yeah?" Jordan stifled the impulse to fling away the receiver as though he'd accidentally picked up a poisonous snake. Instead he carefully replaced it into the cradle, turned, and strode toward the front of the store. Behind him, the phone he'd just used rang, but he didn't break his stride.
When he'd started this investigation, he'd thought that Leonard Hamilton was paranoid. The further he got into the subject of Todd Hamilton's death, the more he agreed that something strange was going on.
Controlling the urge to sprint down the sidewalk, he walked at a steady pace to the side street where he'd left his car. As he climbed behind the wheel and started the engine, he told himself that no one could dispatch an operative to a previously unknown location within seconds of tracing a call. Still, he felt the way he had when he'd been a small kid waiting for his father to punish him for some minor infraction.
Those sessions were always after dinner. Dad would make him choke down food before taking him into the bedroom and pulling his leather belt from its loops.
As he drove, he clenched his teeth, struggling to wipe away that image. Instead of turning up Nebraska toward his home office, he kept going down Wisconsin Avenue, past McLean Gardens. Where Lindsay lived. He knew because he'd made a point of getting her address.
Glancing in the rearview mirror every minute or so, he continued down the hill into Georgetown. Finally satisfied that he wasn't being followed, he made a right turn on P Street and started uptown again on a side street parallel to the avenue.
As he drove, he thought about the drugstore. It was understaffed, with only one clerk working the front register, one pharmacist on duty, and the woman replacing the condom stock. She hadn't wanted to look at him. The pharmacist had been filling a prescription. The clerk at the counter had been busy ringing up sales. So probably none of them would be able to describe the man who'd stopped in to use the phone.
He hoped.
Deliberately he turned his attention back to pathology reports—and heart failure. He'd once read a murder mystery in which a doctor had told a detective that any death could be attributed to heart failure.
Of course, Dr. Lucas's untimely demise could simply be a coincidence. The phone ringing ten seconds after he'd put it down could be a coincidence, too. But Jordan was willing to bet his next royalty check that neither of those assumptions was true. Someone had decided that Lucas's information on Todd Hamilton's death wasn't going any further.
And whoever had taken out the doctor was having the dead man's incoming calls traced so they could find if he'd talked to anyone.
Paranoid conclusions? He didn't think so.
Jordan slapped his palm against the steering wheel. Probably the smart thing to do was drop the investigation right now. Yet he sensed he was on to something big. Todd Hamilton had been killed by a drug used in an Army weapons-testing program called Granite Wall that was supposed to have terminated years ago. And it looked like the doctor responsible for the Hamilton pathology report had been murdered to protect the secret that someone was still working with the poison.
Jordan wanted to know why. And how. And who. And he was damn well going to finish what Leonard Hamilton had started.
JUST BEFORE THE phone rang, Lindsay felt a tingling anticipation.
"Hello?"
"This is Jordan Walker. We met at Sam Conroy's party."
"I remember." There was no way to forget, not after she'd conjured up an erotic dream about the man.
Now her heart had started thumping inside her chest at the sound of his voice.
"How are you?"
"You didn't call to ask the state of my health," she answered, trying to make her voice brisk.
He sighed and continued with slow deliberation. "I think we got off on the wrong foot. I'm trying to observe the niceties, if you'll let me."
She'd hardened her features. Now they softened. "Okay."
"I have some business to discuss."
She didn't know whether to be relieved or disappointed. "What?"
He hesitated for a fraction of a second. "I'd rather not say over the phone."
"If you're digging into my boss's background for a stinging expose, you're not going to get any help from me," she answered instantly.
"It's not about Bridgewater."
"Then who?"
Ignoring the question, he said, "Will you meet me for dinner after work?"
She should refuse. She hardly knew Jordan Walker. She told herself she didn't want to know him, even when she realized that was a lie. But the tone of his voice told her he had something important on his mind.
"Lindsay, don't turn me down."
Now he sounded like a man asking for a date. Whether or not the business discussion was a ploy to see her again, she found herself saying, "Yes."
When she heard him expel the breath he'd apparently been holding, she felt a little thrill of elation.
"I made a reservation at I Ricchi."
"That was brash of you."
"Yeah, well, I figured I could always eat a solitary bowl of pasta puttanesca if you said no."
"You may still end up doing that," she answered, realizing that she was enjoying the sparring, then added, "Don't pick me up."
"How did you know I was going to offer?"
"You're observing the niceties," she answered quickly, telling herself that was how she'd anticipated the offer.
"Okay. You know where it is?"
"Yes."
"Six o'clock."
"If I'm not there by six-fifteen ..."
"I'll figure you got stuck in traffic," he said.
Before they could continue the conversation, the light on her second line blinked. Welcoming the interruption, she said, "Got to go."
* * *
"I see there was a call to the doctor's office—from Washington."
"Yes," Swift answered. "From a public phone booth, as I noted."
"Where?"
"A drugstore on upper Wisconsin Avenue."
"Can the staff at the drugstore tell you who made the call?"
"Negative. All they can say is they think it was a man. That eliminates slightly less than half of the D.C.
population."
"I want to know who it was and why."
"As soon as I have anything, I'll get back to you."
"I want to know who ordered that pathology report. Go in there and get it."
"I'm on it."
Struggling to master his frustration, Kurt signed off. If anybody could unearth the identity of the mystery caller, it was Jim Swift.
And what if that was beyond even his top investigator's powers?
Kurt repressed a shudder. He'd never looked back during his climb to the heights of Washington power.
His work had become his life. His recreation. His mission. His fun.
And Swift and the others under him had become his family. He'd nurtured them, praised them, trained them, given them a sense of purpose. Like Calvin Crandall had done with him, he knew. Only he'd cultivated a more personal sense of loyalty. Nobody was going to sneak up behind him the way he'd gotten the drop on Calvin.
Anyway, there was no need for it. He wasn't going to lose his nerve—or his resolve. He was going to continue as Crandall's director into old age. And if he never got a medal for his service to the country, that was all right, because he was proud of his silent sacrifices and proud of the difference he'd made to national security.
The raid on Maple Creek had been a piece of bad luck. He would find out what the hell had gone wrong there— and set his world right again. He had no other choice. He had acquired too much power.
Stepped on too many toes.
And if one of his enemies caught the scent of blood, he was done for.
* * *