that it was dyed and so heavy with gel that his hairdo resembled a lacquered cap.
“That’s no way to greet a fellow member of the bar,” Schatz said as he flashed a self-satisfied smile.
“You can take your ass out of here right now, Bobby, or I can have you thrown out.”
“Temper, temper.” Schatz held out a rolled-up document. “This is the court order to which Agent Leveque referred, and it says I get access to my client and you don’t.”
Crawford grabbed the papers. The more he read, the redder his face got. Crawford looked ready to explode by the time he finished.
“Satisfied?” Schatz asked.
“No, Bobby. This piece of shit tried to blow up a stadium full of decent citizens, and you’re here to help him get out so he can kill more Americans.”
Schatz was unfazed by Crawford’s tirade. “What happened to the presumption of innocence? Were you absent the day they discussed that silly concept in your Intro to Crim Law class?”
Crawford ignored the jibe. “How did you know where to find this scumbag?” he demanded.
“Now, now, Terry, you’re asking me to violate a confidence.” Schatz handed Crawford a letter. “I am informing you by this letter, which I have filed with the court, that there is to be no further questioning of my client unless I am present.”
Schatz surveyed the room and spotted the camera.
“I want that turned off, along with the mikes.”
For a second it looked as though Crawford might assault Schatz. Then he rolled up the letter and the court order and muttered, “We’ll see about this,” as he stormed out of the room.
As soon as the door closed behind the lawyer, Schatz sat in the chair Crawford had vacated and smiled at Tolliver.
“Don’t let Terry’s bad manners bother you. He and I have been butting heads since he was a fledgling prosecutor. He’s never gotten over the fact that I handed him his first defeat in court, and that wasn’t the only time I kicked his ass.”
Schatz laid a business card in front of the prisoner. Tolliver didn’t look at it.
“Bobby Schatz at your service. Perhaps you’ve heard of me? I’m the best defense attorney in Washington, D.C., and this isn’t the only place I practice. I’ve been hired by clients all over the U.S. because I take no prisoners.”
“Did my parents hire you?” Tolliver asked.
Schatz stood up and walked around the desk. When he was next to the prisoner, he bent down and whispered a few words of Arabic in his client’s ear. Tolliver sat up straight. Schatz smiled, walked back to his seat, and sat down.
“I have no idea whether Crawford can go up the food chain and get another judge to block my access to you, so let’s start discussing my plan to win your case.”
T erry Crawford stalked down the hall to the room where Jorge Marquez was manning the camera feed and sound equipment.
“How did Schatz find out that we had Tolliver?” Marquez asked.
“He must have made an educated guess. The big question is, who hired that sleazy cocksucker?”
Crawford looked at the monitor. It was blank.
“Why did you turn off the camera?” he demanded.
“He had a court order.”
“Turn it back on, and the sound equipment, too.”
“But…”
“Just do it. We’re talking national security, Jorge. Did you forget what happened at FedEx Field? This asshole tried to kill thousands of people. I am not going to take the chance of missing information that can help us stop another plot or lead us to the people who are running him.”
“What if this screws up our court case?”
“It won’t, because we are the only people who know the mikes and camera are still on, and neither of us is ever going to tell anyone, do you understand?”
Chapter Thirty-six
Ginny was nervous during her walk to the Department of Justice. She kept searching the crowds for Clarence Little even though Brad had assured her that the escaped serial killer was on the other side of the continent. When she entered the building through the Pennsylvania Avenue entrance, a security guard asked her for her identification. She showed him her badge before swiping it across a scanning device. Then she stepped into a glass-walled security area. When she left the area on the other side, another security guard checked to see if her face matched the photo on the badge.
Getting in today was a lot easier than getting in the first day she’d showed up for work. She didn’t have a badge, so the guards wouldn’t let her in, and she wasn’t on any list. She had called Human Resources, but the person she’d dealt with was on vacation. Finally, Ginny had stopped a kind soul on his way into the building and explained her problem. He had taken pity on her and told her boss that a newbie was waiting on the sidewalk.
Life hadn’t gotten much easier once she was inside. She had her own desk, but no computer or telephone for almost a week, and she shared an office with two other new trial attorneys. The good news was that she got along with her office mates, and the work was more interesting than her work in the big firms she had left.
Ginny had been placed in the Fraud Section, where she helped prosecute health-care scammers, telemarketing schemes, and identity theft. It wasn’t as sexy as taking down organized crime figures or terrorists. Mom-and-pop credit-card fraud wasn’t the subject of many big-budget movies or TV shows. Still, she felt good about protecting citizens as opposed to well-heeled corporations.
Ginny also appreciated the manageable hours she put in at DOJ. She wasn’t paid as much as she’d been paid at Rankin, Lusk, but she didn’t come in to work at seven and leave at ten, either, and her weekends were usually free. The people she worked with were just as bright as the Rankin, Lusk crowd, and they were definitely more dedicated. Very few of her fellow associates at her Portland and D.C. firms were enthusiastic about looking up property records at two in the morning or combing through corporate accounts for weeks on end. And her fellow prosecutors were more fun. Friday-afternoon happy hour at one of the watering holes in the neighborhood was a common occurrence, and it was not unusual to find a deputy chief mingling with the troops. On the rare occasion when the associates in her Oregon or Washington firms had been able to leave work in time for happy hour, no senior partners had deigned to rub shoulders with them.
The main drawback to working Fraud was the travel. She hadn’t been sent on the road yet, but she’d been told that she could expect to go to Omaha, Nebraska, in a few weeks to work with the local United States attorney on a major health-care scam. She wasn’t looking forward to being separated from Brad or living in Nebraska during the winter.
Ginny said hello to her office mates before booting up her computer. She had barely gotten comfortable when her door opened and Terrence Crawford walked in. He was dressed immaculately as usual, but there were dark shadows under his eyes, and he had the look of someone who had not slept much. Ginny’s office mates were both women, and he looked at each in turn.
“Striker?” Crawford barked.
Ginny had never met Crawford, but he had a scary reputation, and she raised her hand timidly like a first- grader called on to recite to the class on the first day of school.
“Pack up your stuff,” he ordered. “You’re moving over to CTS.”
Ginny blinked and her office mates gave her an odd look. The DOJ was organized into nine divisions, Criminal being the biggest. The National Security Division included Counterespionage (CES), the Office of Intelligence (OI), and Counterterrorism (CTS). Ginny couldn’t think of a single thing in her background that qualified her to be in the Counterterrorism section.
Ginny’s first impressions of her new boss were not very positive. Crawford ignored her as he led the way to the second floor, making Ginny feel like a stewardess bag the deputy assistant attorney general was reluctantly
