The Camel Club

Secret Service and NIC.”

“Gunshot wound to the mouth, guy was probably drunk, revolver right there and a note. What’s to investigate?”

“Suicide is what it looks like so far, and it’ll probably stick. Since it occurred on federal property and he was a federal employee, the FBI and Park Police are investigating. But we want somebody looking out for our interests too. If it was a suicide, we can handle the spin okay. But if it’s something else, well, then, we need to run that down. That’s where you come in.”

“Why Roosevelt Island? Was Johnson a T.R. freak?”

“That’s for you to find out. But don’t let the Bureau run you off.”

“So why am I so lucky, Jerry?” Alex asked. “I mean isn’t this something for the Inspections Division to do?”

“Yes. But I like you,” Sykes replied sarcastically. “And after all that time on protection, you really need as much real work as you can get.”

“Funny, that’s what they said when I went into protection detail.”

“Whoever said life was fair?”

“No one who’s ever worn a badge,” Alex shot back.

Sykes took on a serious expression. “You’ve seen the kids running around here. They’re good and they’re smart and they work their butts off, but their average experience is less than six years. You’ve got three times that. And speaking of baby agents, take Simpson with you. Rookie needs some breaking in.”

“I’m curious,” Alex said. “Has Simpson got any strings upstairs?”

“Why?” Sykes asked, although Alex thought he saw a smile flit across the man’s face.

“Because the crap duty doesn’t seem to stick to that rook, that’s why.”

“All I can say is Simpson’s the blessed relation of some big muckety-muck, and people tend to give ‘that rook’ a little slack. Do not feel so inclined. Here’s the file. The crime scene awaits you. Go get ’em.”

As Alex rose, Sykes added, “The ninety-day report cycle is out on this one. We want daily detailed e-mails. And just so you know, they’ll be going directly to the SAIC and HQ.”

“Okay.”

“Like I said, Alex, this one is hot, treat it accordingly.”

“I get the point, Jerry.”

Alex returned to his desk, hung his jacket over his chair and opened the file. The first thing he encountered was a photo of Patrick Johnson looking very much alive. There was a hand-scribbled note that said Johnson was engaged to be married. The name and phone number of his fiancee were underneath this note. Alex assumed the woman had already been told of the man’s death. Johnson’s employment history looked pretty routine.

Johnson had been with the N-TAC division of the National Intelligence Center, or NIC as the D.C. bureaucrats referred to it. In layman’s terms N-TAC put together information and strategies that cops could use to prevent everything from presidential assassinations to terrorist attacks to another Columbine. No Secret Service agent ever wanted to arrest an assassin. That meant the person you were guarding was dead.

Alex remembered the huge battle that erupted when NIC made clear it wanted to absorb N-TAC into its intelligence empire. The Service had put up a vigorous counterattack, but in the end the president sided with Gray and NIC. However, because the Service had such a unique relationship with the president, it had been able to keep some connection to N-TAC, which was why Johnson had still technically been a joint employee of the Service, if in name only.

Alex flipped through the rest of the file making mental notes. Finally, he stood and put on his jacket. He grabbed Simpson on the way out.

Jackie Simpson was petite and dark-haired with an olive complexion and strong facial features dominated by a pair of startling blue eyes. Though a rookie at the Secret Service, she was no novice when it came to detective work, having spent nearly eight years as a police officer before joining the Service. When she spoke, no one could miss Simpson’s southern origins, in her case Alabama. She was dressed in a dark pantsuit and carried her sidearm on a belt clip riding near her left hand. Alex raised his eyebrows at the three-inch blocky heels she wore that still left her six inches shorter than he was. Then his gaze took in the wedge of red handkerchief poking out from the lady’s breast pocket. That was a little fashion statement that could get you killed. Alex also knew that her pistol was a custom piece that she had somehow gotten approval for. The Service liked uniformity when it came to its agents’ weapons, in the event they had to share ammo during a shoot-out.

Like many people in a new job, she was full of bountiful enthusiasm as well as a startling lack of tact. When told of their new assignment, she responded, “Sweet.”

“It wasn’t too sweet for Patrick Johnson,” Alex pointed out.

“I didn’t mean it that way.”

“Glad to hear it. Let’s go.” Alex walked off fast, leaving Simpson to scurry after him.

CHAPTER

15

DJAMILA, THE NANNY, CHANGED the diaper of the youngest boy, then turned her attention and considerable patience to feeding the one-year-old’s two brothers, aged two and three. After she’d finished this task, she played with them and then put the boys down for naps. She took her prayer rug out of the bag she brought with her to work and prepared to perform the salat, or prayer, by undertaking the ablution, or wudu, of the face, head, hands, arms up to the elbows, and the feet up to the ankles. Barefoot, Djamila faced the qibla, the direction of Mecca, and performed her prayer. It was a ritual she did five times each day beginning two hours before sunrise and ending with the last prayer at nightfall, when the twilight disappears. This was Djamila’s second prayer of the day, performed at noon, when the sun begins its decline.

A few minutes after she’d finished, the boys’ mother, Lori Franklin, came downstairs and gazed admiringly at her well-kept house and then looked in at her sons sleeping very soundly in their respective berths in the large playroom. Franklin was barely thirty and very attractive, with a slim, yet curvy figure and well-toned muscles. She carried a small bag with her.

“Going to the club, miss?” Djamila said.

“Yes, Djamila; a set of tennis and then who knows.” She laughed lightly and drew a contented breath in the way that young, well-off people often did. She nodded at her sons. “I see you have the army down already.”

“Yes, they are good boys. They play hard and sleep harder.”

“They’re good boys with you. They aren’t so good with me, or the three nannies that came before you. Now I can actually have a life even if my husband works twenty hours a day. Men, Djamila, can’t live with them, can’t live without their W-2s.”

“In my country a man he is head of the home,” Djamila noted as she put some toys away in a storage box. “A woman’s duty is to help her husband, keep the home in a good way, and to take care of the children. But you must marry a man you respect and whose wishes you can carry out with a good conscience. Your husband is not your master; only God is.”

The American rolled her eyes. “Oh, men are kings here too, Djamila, at least in their own minds.” She laughed again. “And I gave George the family he wanted. And I give him his wishes when he really needs me to. It’s not such a bad bargain.”

“So you won’t be back this afternoon,” Djamila said, frowning, as she hurriedly changed the subject. She had found her employer far too frank sometimes.

“I’ll be here in time to make dinner. George is out of town again. You can eat during the day now, can’t you? Your fasting thing is over?”

“Ramadan has passed, yes.”

“I can never keep the dates straight.”

“That is because they change. Ramadan is celebrated in the ninth month of the Islamic year. It was then that