CHAPTER 21
A
fter returning from New York to their townhouse in Georgetown, James and Kate headed upstairs and slept for a few hours, sort of. Kate watched as he got out of bed and walked into the bathroom.
“Nice tush!”
He looked over his shoulder and smiled. “I have to get ready.”
“For what?”
James had placed a call on the train to his friend, Thomas Lynch. He was relieved to have been able to reach him when the call was patched through. After James conveyed a sense of urgency, Thomas agreed to see him.
“I’m meeting Thomas Lynch for drinks in an hour,” James said. “He asked about you. Be delighted if you’d join us.”
Her demeanor changed somewhat. “You go ahead. I’m sure the two of you have a lot to talk about. I’d just be in the way.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” he said from the bathroom. “He’s a well-connected guy. This is a good opportunity.”
Kate shifted in the bed. “I agree. You go on ahead. I’m going to stay in, maybe learn something about this Max Baer guy.”
“Okay. Suit yourself.”
Showered and dressed, James climbed on his motorcycle and rode through the narrow, cobbled streets of Georgetown. He enjoyed the wind in his face, the agility of the motorcycle affording effortless navigation in heavy traffic. He thought about Kate and her disapproval, the powerful bike was an expression of his boyish inclinations.
Minutes later he pulled alongside a curb near the intersection of 15th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue, a block from the White house. He dismounted the bike, entered the lobby of the W Hotel and boarded an elevator which ascended to the eleventh floor. The doors opened directly onto the P.O.V. Rooftop Terrace restaurant.
A hostess brought him to a roped-off section at the southern edge of the terrace where he sat at a table. A waiter approached and James ordered a glass of red wine. He glanced at his watch, noticing that Lynch was late, but this did not surprise him.
A common trait among the rich and powerful.
Ten minutes later James looked up to see his friend approach the table. He rose from his chair to shake hands.
“James. So good to see you. Have you been waiting long?”
“No. I was enjoying the view.”
Thomas took a seat opposite James, and when he turned and looked across the railing, a panoramic vista of the city unfolded—including all the major landmarks. Seated in his chair, he felt as though he could reach out and touch the Washington Monument.
“It’s one of the best in town,” declared Thomas. His eyes locked on a very attractive woman standing at the bar on the opposite side of the terrace.
James had noticed her. She had been there all of five minutes, and already she was surrounded by a hungry wolf pack.
“Nice crowd. By the way, how’s Kate?”
“She’s great,” he lied. “Thanks for asking.”
The waiter came around and Thomas ordered an expensive bottle of red wine. “So, how was your trip across the pond?”
“That’s what I need to talk to you about. Kate and I appreciate your lending us the Challenger for the crossing last week.”
“No problem, buddy. What’s mine is yours.”
“I was thinking about asking a favor.”
“Name it. Anything I can do for a friend.”
James lowered his voice and leaned in closer.
“It has to do with the Senate.”
“Oh that, what a mess. Terrible.” He adjusted his posture. “It was sad to hear about Daniel. He’s a good man. How’s he doing?”
“Stable, but in a coma still.”
“The poor chap. It can’t be easy for his family.”
“We’re all pulling for him.”
James leaned in closer still, spoke in a hushed whisper.
“I won’t get into details, but I can say, unequivocally, that these events were not random.”
Thomas looked surprised. He locked eyes with James.
“Are you on to something?”
The waiter appeared, opened a vintage bottle of wine and set two glasses on the table. As they allowed the wine to breathe, James focused his attention on Thomas. “Kate and I are following a man’s trail. But we need to move quickly. Discreetly. And it involves traveling overseas.”
“Tell me what you need.” Thomas lifted the bottle and poured two glasses of wine.
“Air travel, the confidential kind. We need to move around and be invisible. Know what I mean?”
“Sure I do.”
“You would have plausible deniability.”
“Right.” Thomas smiled and raised his palms. “I have no knowledge here whatsoever.” He looked around, adding, “The Challenger is at your disposal.”
“Thanks, buddy.”
“Anything I can do for my country,” Thomas replied. He glanced at his watch. “I’m really sorry James, but I have to run.”
“Got a hot date?”
He grinned. “Something like that.” He stood and extended a hand to shake. “Take care my friend, and be safe.”
James watched the playboy tycoon stroll across the terrace, flashing a smile and winking at the young woman by the bar on the way to the elevator. She reciprocated with a come-hither smile. When Thomas disappeared behind the elevator doors, she redirected her gaze toward James as he sat alone.
Soon a waiter approached and asked him if he would like to join the attractive woman at the bar. He stood and walked over to her, explaining that he found her dazzling, but he was a married man. Glancing down at his hand, she noticed he was not wearing a wedding band. Actually, the absence of a ring was more of a professional necessity than an indication of his marital status.
The woman persisted.
“My place is right around the corner,” she entreated.
Knowing that this woman could not possibly fathom the intense connection he had with Kate, James bid her a polite farewell and headed for the elevator. He descended to street level and climbed on the motorcycle. Cruising across the smooth blacktop, his mind turned to Max Baer.
Will we get to him in time? Maybe Kate has come across something.
CHAPTER 22
A
fter James climbed the basement stairs of the townhouse and walked into the living room, he immediately noticed Kate’s anxious expression.
“I just talked to Nicolas in Paris,” she said.
He took a seat on the sofa next to her.
“Please say you have good news.”
Kate had been busy. Papers were strewn across the coffee table and her laptop was sitting there conspicuously, images shouting at them.
“Nicolas spoke to Andre, you know, the computer geek in France …”
“Right.”
“Well, he talked him into going on another expedition. Andre went undercover into the Casino de Paris and lifted a copy of their surveillance videos. He just sent them to me.”
“Keep going.”
“I compared them to the ones from the bank. Hold on a second,” she said, her fingers zipping across the keyboard. “I’m just finishing this up.”
James rolled his eyes.
As he waited, he thought about whether he and Kate could get the Brits to finger Max Baer. More than likely, he had been employed directly by the British Armed Forces or the British Secret Intelligence Service. Then he realized the futility of it. As far as records were concerned, the guy probably didn’t exist.
Kate finally said, “Got it.”
“Okay, go.”
“I opened the videos from the casino in Paris that Nicolas sent,” she said, pointing at the laptop. “Here they are in split-screen alongside the bank videos. Do you see the tall man walking toward the gaming tables?”
“Yeah.”
“Notice the limp in his stride?”
“I see it.”
“I wrote a nifty software program to calculate his height. It compares him to objects in the video with known dimensions. The shoes he’s wearing are the same in both locations, so this data is precise.”
She paused.
“Go on.”
“He’s six-feet one.”
“And you’re sure the results are the same in both videos?”
“Positive. It’s the same person.”
James smiled.
“Max Baer has surfaced. He’s on the grid!”
“There’s more.”
“What?”
She pulled up a video from the casino and played it. There he was, sitting at a gaming table, and beside him, an attractive woman laying her arm across his back; mid-forties, a lot of mileage on her, and judging by their body language, the two were lovers.
“That’s his girlfriend,” Kate said, pointing at the laptop. “I extracted the best footage and converted it into photographs.”
She hesitated.
“Come on, Kate, what happened next?”
“I sent the photos of Max Baer and his girlfriend to Nicolas. He showed them around to casino employees, and it wasn’t long before someone recognized her.”
“Who is she?”
“A cocktail waitress at the lounge in the casino complex. Nicolas got her home address. It’s an apartment in Paris.”
He kissed her.
“Nice work, sweetheart.”
“Anything I can do to help,” she said, closing the laptop.
James went into the kitchen and grabbed two glasses and a bottle of red wine.
“We have to move on this,” he said, “and fast.”
CHAPTER 23
O
n the first floor of the U.S. Capitol building a man was sitting in the senate dining room at a corner table. Henry Ward had finished having breakfast with some of his colleagues.
And he now wanted to be alone.
He recalled a conversation between the Deacon and himself which happened about a year ago. The focus of their discussion centered on an ingenious, and audacious, plot to gain control of the U.S. Senate.
At first, Ward thought the idea was preposterous, but eventually he began realizing that the Deacon was deadly serious. Given the man’s relentlessness and virtually inexhaustible resources, Ward came to believe the scheme was doable.
Maybe the Senator was influenced by his desperate longings to retire a wealthy man with Tiffany, his mistress, or perhaps it was the Deacon’s persuasive discourses. In any event, Ward was all in.
Crafty, experienced and savvy in the ways of Congress, he knew every trick in the book.
Indeed, he had written the book.
His thoughts were interrupted when a waiter approached and asked whether there was anything he could get for the influential man.
“No,” he snapped, “and I do not wish to be disturbed.”
The server quickly spun on his heels and disappeared.
The dining room bustled with some of Washington’s top powerbrokers, but Ward could not have cared less.
He thought about the Senate, the world’s most powerful deliberative body, and the fact that it had one hundred senators total, and each had a single vote.
If he could somehow get 13 more votes, he and the Deacon would reach the magic number of 67—the amount of votes needed to gain control of the Senate.
The Deacon had been angling for months, paving the way for his plans. Tremendous influence was being brought to bear in assuring that the plot succeeded.
Ward’s eyes suddenly began darting, here and there, at other people in the dining room.
Are they reading my thoughts?
Or was he just paranoid?
It’s this damn cloak of secrecy. The stress is killing me.
He had reasons for being paranoid and stressed out.
Just last night his close friend, Senator Patricia Dietrich, gave him a commitment to swap her vote for a payday.
Shrewdly, she had held out for $15 million, deciding to avoid the fate of her three departed colleagues.
Henry Ward’s mouth curled into a devious grin.
We only need eight more votes.
CHAPTER 24
T
he location for the rendezvous would not be in a public place with a lot of people around as Tiffany preferred. Boris had a general aversion to public spaces, insisting the meeting take place behind closed doors. Against her better instincts, she relented and agreed to meet at her condo. When she heard the buzzer for the lobby door, she walked into the kitchen and pressed a button on the telephone.
The door buzzed and the hunchback entered the building.
Now inside the lobby, Boris stood before the elevator doors, waiting. Moments later an elderly woman entered from the street door and began moving toward the elevators. She caught a glimpse of the huge man as he stared down at her. Turning, she scurried out as quickly as she had come in. In seconds, her feet were moving along the sidewalk.
Meanwhile, on the twelfth floor, Tiffany heard the doorbell ring. Now at the door, she saw her visitor as he filled the peephole. When she opened the door, Boris lumbered by and let himself in. He stepped over to the window and turned to face her.
Not one for small talk, he asked, “What do you have for me?”
“I definitely have him tied around my little finger,” she replied confidently, referring to Senator Ward. She knew nothing of the surveillance equipment Boris had surreptitiously installed throughout her residence.
“I’m here to tell you that the Deacon will not tolerate any slip ups,” he said. “Senator Ward must be kept under control until we have finished with him.”
“Why doesn’t he tell me this himself?” The voice was brisk, exuding a confidence reflecting her role in the scheme. “Instead, he sends an errand boy.”
Boris continued to sneer at her, his expression fierce. “You’ll do what you’re told.”
“I want more money,” she demanded, her weight shifting to one foot. “This plot involving the Senate is monstrous. Given the huge amounts of money being thrown around, I’d have to be a fool to accept what the Deacon offered me.”
Boris felt a rage growing inside him. Slipping a hand in his pocket, he flipped a switch on a device he had brought along precisely for this situation. In a millisecond, electrons fired, switching off the electronic surveillance equipment inside the condo.
“You’re in no position to make demands,” he told her, his voice just above a whisper.
Imperceptibly, he advanced a step closer.
“You can tell the Deacon that I’m not taking any damn sucker’s share,” she declared in a typically brassy demeanor. “And you can tell him that if I don’t see some
real
money, and soon, I’m going to expose the fact that you’re using Senator Ward and that you’re using me to manipulate
him
.”
The humpback’s eyes narrowed. His pulse raced. Slowly, he inched forward, closing the distance between them by another step.
She’s asking for it.
His greedy eyes feasted on her flesh; the cleavage, the smooth legs, and her clothes were much too revealing, as usual. A fiery inferno boiled inside him.
“You’ll have to speak to the Deacon,” he whispered, “I have no authority to grant such things.”
Her manner haughty still, she spouted, “Like I said, an errand boy.”
Then he exploded.
She didn’t even see it coming. His movements swift and precise, his massive hand connected hard against the side of her face, landing above her right temple. The vicious blow spun her body around, sending her reeling across the room. There was a loud
thud
as she collided against a wall. A second later he was on her. His powerful hands grasped at her throat like a vice, his eyes dark pools of rage.
Filled with terror, she could think only of saving her life.
Jerking her limp body up by the neck, he glared into her eyes.
“You like to tie people up. Is that it? Now it’s
your
turn.”
He dragged her into the bedroom and flung her onto the bed. In his huge hand, he held a piece of nylon rope, one of four he had brought with him. He went about lashing her hands and feet to the bedposts.
He then proceeded to violate her.
Now finished, he stood and pointed his finger in her face. “Listen good, if you tell
anyone
about this, I’ll kill you.” He added, “I will see to it that you’re the victim of a most gruesome death. Do you understand?”
She managed a nod, streams of mascara running down her cheeks.
He removed a knife from his pocket and lingered over her. She stared up at him, squirming. His face broke into a crooked grin. He then cut the ropes that bound her. Ready to leave, he whispered in her ear.
“You have great lips.”
Alone now, Tiffany huddled in the corner of her bedroom, clutching her knees to her chest. She sat there for a long time. Her head throbbed.
Then the fog began clearing. She recalled her value, at least in the eyes of the Deacon.
He will take care of me. It’s worth it,
she told herself.
Repeating the mantra again, then again and again, she finally became convinced. For in her mind, the words began to acquire a ring of truth.