While the special agent poured a solvent into a test tube, I said, “Thank you both. Didn’t hear your car over the wind and the sound of the drawbridge. I thought I was alone.”
The sheriff said, “We took the long route to the Visitor Center, like you wanted. When we didn’t see your car on the parking lot and couldn’t reach you by phone, we backtracked along the road you said you’d take. Ended up at the bridge.”
“Just in time,” I said.
We all glanced at Jennifer locked in the rear of the patrol car. Her head drooped down, her shoulders slouched, but she seemed fine where she was. Anger and shock surged in me, but then I felt cold and hollow inside, like the core of an immense cavern. The woman I had brought into my life and with whom I shared a bed last evening had just tried to kill me. The river beneath the bridge flowed slowly toward the bay. The crabs in this swamp would have to scavenge for a meal tonight other than me.
Wolanski said to me, “All right, Mr. Seagraves. What exactly happened here?”
I explained the confrontation on the drawbridge to the special agent and the sheriff, as well as my relationship with Jennifer, whom I now fully suspected was an undercover operative for Russian intelligence. While listening to me, Wolanski’s gloved hands spritzed Jennifer’s bottle into the solvent in the test tube. The clear fluid in the tube turned dark crimson.
“Cyanide,” the special agent announced, his eyes turning to me. “Highly concentrated. You’d have been dead seconds after hitting the ground. Did she get any on you? Face? Clothes?”
“No, don’t think so, but close.”
Wolanski dropped the spray bottle into an evidence bag. “Same as what killed Kostas. We got her. Okay, Mr. Seagraves, go on.”
I went through my theory that Jennifer and her partner, Yulian, had killed Richard Kostas over the plans for the Remora Shadow. Then I veered off into an area that the special agent might not have liked. I described Wolanski’s connection with Oscar Yoshida, as well as the trap they had set to catch Kostas and his foreign handlers. I hit each of the bullet points. The made-up story about a stealth underwater drone that could take out submarine fleets. Project Transparrior as their patsy spreading the news. Surveillance equipment all over the county disguised as speed cameras. How dead-drops prevented a quick arrest of the spy handler. This all was an FBI counterintelligence sting gone wrong, starting when the body of Richard Kostas landed in the Chesapeake Bay.
Wolanski stood like a statue until I finished. Around him, the green marsh grass waved and tossed like a roiling ocean in a gale. Toward the west, a few whitecaps dotted the gray waters of the bay that seemed to hold up a sky of pale azure.
Not expecting him to answer with words, I asked, “So I got it right, Agent Wolanski?”
I studied his reaction. He set his jaw and tightened his lips.
“I thought so,” I replied. “That’s exactly what happened.”
Wolanski said, “And you understand you won’t be telling anyone about this. You either, Sheriff. National security. Now I’ve got a spy to interrogate. Mr. Seagraves, you’ll need to make a full statement back at …”
“Hold on,” I said. “I’ve got to get back to court. I’m in the middle of a hearing and the judge will call the case in …” I checked my watch. “Oh, wow, ten minutes. I can’t stay, but I’ll make a statement after court. But, Agent Wolanski, you have to phone Benton Dynamics or their attorneys and call this off.”
“This is a counterintelligence operation, Mr. Seagraves. I’ve got more important things to do.”
“No, you don’t understand. Oscar Yoshida is still on the stand. I’ve got a duty to my client. I have no choice but to cross-examine him about my theories and expose all this, unless you come clean and tell E.J. Nielsen what really went down.”
Wolanski took a step forward and glared at me. “There’re national security implications to this case. If you compromise our investigation, you’ll pay the consequences. Criminal charges. Your law license.”
“Then I’ll pay, but I have to defend Marisa Dupree, so fix this, all right? I’ll cooperate with you. My client will, as well. A win-win. You’ve got the murderer, and you’ll be interrogating her all afternoon. One quick call. Your investigation hits its mark, and my client is out of this lawsuit.”
“Helping your client is not why I’m here, and I think you’ll do the right thing, Mr. Seagraves. I could hold you as a material witness.”
“Sure, you could, but then we’d both eventually explain all this to Judge Arnetti. All in the public record. You’ll have my cooperation and my silence, if you own this thing now and end it.”
Wolanski stared at me, unmoved.
“Marisa Dupree’s life hangs in the balance. Her career. Her security clearance. What next? Criminal charges. You know she’s not involved. And you know what I’ve got to do.”
Wolanski stood silently, but I was out of time. Knowing that he might take me into custody, I turned slowly toward my car. “No time for debate. I’ve got to go, but I will be in touch.”
The FBI Agent did not stop me from reaching my Barracuda or starting the ignition. He simply walked over to the patrol car that held Jennifer as I pulled away. Once I was out of sight of the bridge, I floored the accelerator and headed back to the Chester County Court House as fast as I could. My clock read only a few minutes before one o’clock, when Judge Arnetti would begin the hearing again and possibly sanction me over the KEL Drive. I
