Savich said in an equally soft voice, “Oh yes, I know. However, I hope you will understand that we must follow every lead we get, we must know every scrap of information even peripherally related to this. As a Justice of the Supreme Court, surely you must demand every pertinent fact from your law clerks on any given case. Surely you question all the lawyers who try cases before you as closely as you need to. Surely you must understand that I must operate in the same way.”
Justice Wallace gave Savich a long look. Then he shrugged. “Very well. This will not go beyond the two of us, Agent. Do you understand me?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Very well. It is painful, but I will tell you. Margaret had told Stewart I had tried to kiss her in the kitchen during a party some months ago. However, it was a lie on her part. The fact is Margaret wanted to sleep with me. I didn’t want it, mind you, but she was insistent. Understand, everyone got a little drunk, so she really wasn’t herself. She kissed me and I kissed her back. Stewart was understandably angry and confronted me outside the gift shop, as Bobby Fisher told you.”
“What were the papers he was waving against your chest?”
“Papers? I don’t remember any papers. Stewart always carried papers, his notes on whatever he was thinking about at any given time. Oh yes, I remember, he pulled them out of his pocket and began waving them around. I have no idea what they were, Agent Savich, no idea at all.”
“Did you tell him the truth about Margaret?”
“Certainly not. I accepted his anger and apologized.”
Savich thanked him. He wondered how much he’d just been told was the truth. It had been a very long day. He needed to go home and play with Sean before he went to bed. He wanted to give Lily a chance to be with Simon Russo and enjoy herself without having to worry about a little boy stuffing polenta in his nose.
They took their leave about five minutes later. Callie saw them to the front door.
“We’ll do a very quick detour to headquarters,” Savich said to Ben. “I’ll give you some of MAX’s data to look over tonight, then try to relax,” Savich said. “I want your brain fresh in the morning. Oh yes, there’s something else all of you need to hear.” But he didn’t tell them about his conversation with Justice Wallace until they were outside.
“Incredible,” Callie said. “He actually accused my mom of coming on to him?”
“You don’t believe him, do you?” Ben asked.
“At this point,” Savich said, “I have no idea what to believe, but your mother, Callie, she seems gold-plated to me.”
“She is.”
When Savich pulled his Porsche into the garage at home at just after eight-thirty, he said, “After we play with Sean until he’s snoring, I’m thinking some big fat hair rollers might be fun. What do you think?”
“You’re teasing me. You know very well the moment Sean is down, you’ll spend three hours with MAX.”
“Hair rollers first,” he said, kissed her again, and grinned.
She rolled her eyes and climbed out of his sexy Porsche.
CHAPTER
21
SAVICH LAY ON his back, staring up at the ceiling, Sherlock tucked against him, asleep, her leg sprawled over his belly, her soft curly hair brushing against his jaw. Her breath was warm and steady against his neck. He should have been asleep, but Danny O’Malley’s girlfriend, Annie Harper, filled his mind. He wished there’d been time this evening to visit her at the hospital, to judge her state of mind, to see how coherent she was. To walk in and find your boyfriend’s murdered body, it was a ghastly experience for anyone, particularly an innocent young woman.
Well, there hadn’t been time. Tomorrow morning, first thing, he’d see to it. Savich knew that Annie had to know something, even if she didn’t realize it, he was sure of it. But right now he had to slow his brain down, had to get some sleep. First thing in the morning, he’d call George Washington University Hospital—
He was suddenly aware he was dreaming. He was also very strongly aware of himself being in the dream. Sherlock was there with him, pressed against him, but it wasn’t Sherlock he felt, it was a change in the air itself. It seemed suddenly heavier somehow, a bit more difficult to draw into his lungs. It wasn’t particularly frightening, just different, something he’d never experienced in a dream before. That heavy air seeped slowly into him, and with it, something that should have been solid, but wasn’t. He was no longer alone inside his mind; he was filled with something that stirred the hair on his arms, something he recognized because she was full-blown, right there with him.
It was Samantha Barrister.
How interesting that she was able to simply plug herself right into his brain. He still felt no particular fear, it was a dream, after all, nothing more. But he felt her fear, and her urgency, a dreadful urgency. She was waiting for him to acknowledge her, to let her know he was aware of her.
In that instant he saw her clearly. Her black hair, long and straight, nearly to her waist—an old hippie style from the early seventies when women parted their hair in the middle. She was wearing the same summer dress, the one she’d been wearing that night in the Poconos. She was very pretty, with dark blue eyes. Black Irish, that’s what she was, although he didn’t know how he knew. He’d been barely older than Sean when she’d been murdered.
He focused on Samantha’s white face, and said in a whisper so as not to awaken Sherlock, “I’m here, Samantha. What’s wrong? What’s happened?”
She didn’t answer him, just looked at him, afraid.
“You’ve got to know that I’m an FBI agent, Samantha,” he said quietly. He spoke aloud because she seemed to understand him that way. “You’ve also got to know that my wife and I were called away from Blessed Creek when that Supreme Court Justice was murdered. I have to deal with that, no choice. But I haven’t forgotten you. I’ve got my laptop—” Suddenly she looked perfectly blank, and he very nearly smiled because her confusion was quite clear to him. “It’s a computer, a really smart machine that can look up old records, something that wasn’t around back in the early seventies. Computers are fast now, part of our daily lives. Well, never mind that. I’ve gotten my computer started to find out about you—as soon as I can, I’ll help you. I promise you that.”
“My boy, my precious boy.”
“Samantha, what is going to happen to your boy?”
“Dillon?”
Savich jerked awake, opened his eyes wide. He shook off the dream. There was a sliver of streetlight coming through the bedroom window, not much, but he could see that around the bed at least there was no one there. Well of course she wasn’t standing at the end of his bed, beckoning to him with ghostly fingers he could see through.
“Dillon?” Sherlock’s hair tickled his nose as she raised her head, her eyes instantly focused on his face, but her voice still a bit slurred from sleep. “Who are you talking to? Were you dreaming? Are you okay?”
Then she stopped cold, her eyes alert, her elbows locked over him. “Were you dreaming about Samantha again?”
“Yes. I’m okay, I’m awake now.” The heaviness in the air was gone, and she wasn’t in his brain anymore. He was awake, but oddly enough he sensed a sweet smell that lingered, jasmine, he thought. He smelled jasmine. He kissed Sherlock. “I can’t let this go on any longer, Sherlock. In my dream, she was worried about her boy. I could be crazy, but I’ve got to deal with this. I’ve got to get up and go to MAX.”
She kissed him quickly, let him go when he pulled away.
He paused in the doorway. “I was awake, thinking about what Annie Harper might know. I’m going to see her first thing in the morning. I’d like you to go to headquarters for me, coordinate all the information for MAX with Ollie.”
He pulled on a pair of jeans, and then he was off to his study, top button open on his jeans, wearing nothing else. Sean liked the house warm, so jeans were all he needed.
Sherlock turned over and tried to go back to sleep—big fat chance of that happening. The strange thing was
