54
The Westbrooke Place Apartments are located at 2201 N Street NW and promote themselves as one of the few unquestionably correct addresses in Washington. Gabrielle hurried through the gilded revolving door into the marble lobby, where a deafening waterfall reverberated.
The doorman at the front desk looked surprised to see her. 'Ms. Ashe? I didn't know you were stopping by tonight.'
'I'm running late.' Gabrielle quickly signed in. The clock overhead read 6:22 P.M.
The doorman scratched his head. 'The senator gave me a list, but you weren't-'
'They always forget the people who help them most.' She gave a harried smile and strode past him toward the elevator.
Now the doorman looked uneasy. 'I better call up.'
'Thanks,' Gabrielle said, as she boarded the elevator and headed up. The senator's phone is off the hook.
Riding the elevator to the ninth floor, Gabrielle exited and made her way down the elegant hallway. At the end, outside Sexton's doorway, she could see one of his bulky personal safety escorts-glorified bodyguards-sitting in the hall. He looked bored. Gabrielle was surprised to see security on duty, although apparently not as surprised as the guard was to see her. He jumped to his feet as she approached.
'I know,' Gabrielle called out, still halfway down the hall. 'It's a P.E. night. He doesn't want to be disturbed.'
The guard nodded emphatically. 'He gave me very strict orders that no visitors-'
'It's an emergency.'
The guard physically blocked the doorway. 'He's in a private meeting.'
'Really?' Gabrielle pulled the red envelope from under her arm. She flashed the White House seal in the man's face. 'I was just in the Oval Office. I need to give the senator this information. Whatever old pals he's schmoozing tonight are going to have to do without him for a few minutes. Now, let me in.'
The guard withered slightly at the sight of the White House seal on the envelope.
Don't make me open this, Gabrielle thought.
'Leave the folder,' he said. 'I'll take it into him.'
'The hell you will. I have direct orders from the White House to hand-deliver this. If I don't talk to him immediately, we can all start looking for jobs tomorrow morning. Do you understand?'
The guard looked deeply conflicted, and Gabrielle sensed the senator had indeed been unusually adamant tonight about having no visitors. She moved in for the kill. Holding the White House envelope directly in his face, Gabrielle lowered her voice to a whisper and uttered the six words all Washington security personnel feared most.
'You do not understand the situation.'
Security personnel for politicians never understood the situation, and they hated that fact. They were hired guns, kept in the dark, never sure whether to stand firm in their orders or risk losing their jobs by mule-headedly ignoring some obvious crisis.
The guard swallowed hard, eyeing the White House envelope again. 'Okay, but I'm telling the senator you demanded to be let in.'
He unlocked the door, and Gabrielle pushed past him before he changed his mind. She entered the apartment and quietly closed the door behind her, relocking it.
Now inside the foyer, Gabrielle could hear muffled voices in Sexton's den down the hall-men's voices. Tonight's P.E. was obviously not the private meeting implied by Sexton's earlier call.
As Gabrielle moved down the hall toward the den, she passed an open closet where a half dozen expensive men's coats hung inside-distinctive wool and tweed. Several briefcases sat on the floor. Apparently work stayed in the hall tonight. Gabrielle would have walked right past the cases except that one of the briefcases caught her eye. The nameplate bore a distinctive company logo. A bright red rocket.
She paused, kneeling down to read it:
Puzzled, she examined the other briefcases.
Marjorie Tench's raspy voice echoed in her mind. Are you aware that Sexton is accepting bribes from private aerospace companies?
Gabrielle's pulse began racing as she gazed down the darkened hallway toward the archway that led into the senator's den. She knew she should speak up, announce her presence, and yet she felt herself inching quietly forward. She moved to within a few feet of the archway and stood soundlessly in the shadows… listening to the conversation beyond.
55
While Delta-Three stayed behind to collect Norah Mangor's body and the sled, the other two soldiers accelerated down the glacier after their quarry.
On their feet they wore ElektroTread-powered skis. Modeled after the consumer Fast Trax motorized skis, the classified ElektroTreads were essentially snow skis with miniaturized tank treads affixed-like snowmobiles worn on the feet. Speed was controlled by pushing the tips of the index finger and thumb together, compressing two pressure plates inside the right-hand glove. A powerful gel battery was molded around the foot, doubling as insulation and allowing the skis to run silently. Ingeniously, the kinetic energy generated by gravity and the spinning treads as the wearer glided down a hill was automatically harvested to recharge the batteries for the next incline.
Keeping the wind at his back, Delta-One crouched low, skimming seaward as he surveyed the glacier before him. His night vision system was a far cry from the Patriot model used by the Marines. Delta-One was looking through a hands-free face mount with a 40 x 90 mm six-element lens, three-element Magnification Doubler, and Super Long Range IR. The world outside appeared in a translucent tint of cool blue, rather than the usual green-the color scheme especially designed for highly reflective terrains like the Arctic.
As he approached the first berm, Delta-One's goggles revealed several bright stripes of freshly disturbed snow, rising up and over the berm like a neon arrow in the night. Apparently the three escapees had either not thought to unhook their makeshift sail or had been unable to. Either way, if they had not released by the final berm, they were now somewhere out in the ocean. Delta-One knew his quarry's protective clothing would lengthen the usual life expectancy in the water, but the relentless offshore currents would drag them out to sea. Drowning would be inevitable.
Despite his confidence, Delta-One had been trained never to assume. He needed to see bodies. Crouching low, he pressed his fingers together and accelerated up the first incline.
Michael Tolland lay motionless, taking stock of his bruises. He was battered, but he sensed no broken bones. He had little doubt the gel-filled Mark IX had saved him any substantial trauma. As he opened his eyes, his thoughts were slow to focus. Everything seemed softer here… quieter. The wind still howled, but with less ferocity.
We went over the edge-didn't we?
Focusing, Tolland found he was lying on ice, draped across Rachel Sexton, almost at right angles, their locked carabiners twisted. He could feel her breathing beneath him, but he could not see her face. He rolled off her,
