country for a time, then England, France, Japan, China and all the other typical high-level assignments. She did her best turning others. She recruited Solomon, secretly married him and turned him against his country. His treachery cost America dearly.”
“How do you know they were married?”
“Let me correct that. We
“And he killed himself?”
“That’s what the file says, yes. I believe it was both from guilt at what he’d done to hurt his homeland and also the fact that we were closing in on him.”
“But you said before that ‘we’ got him. So did we kill him and the suicide was window dressing? Or did he really commit suicide?”
“Whether we did it or he killed himself, it doesn’t really matter; he would have been executed for treason in any event.” From Gray’s tone it was clear he was not going to say any more on that particular subject, even to the director of CIA.
“I looked at the file. There seem to be some gaps in it.”
“We didn’t have reliable computers back then. And paper files are notoriously incomplete from that era,” Gray replied smoothly.
The director apparently gave up on this line of inquiry. He had actually worked under Gray years ago and wasn’t nearly as smart as the man, and he knew it. “Fine, Carter. And you’ve alerted Senator Simpson?”
“Of course. He’s well-prepared.”
“Anyone else?”
“There was another man who was part of the team, a John Carr, but he’s long dead.”
The meeting ended there. It was obvious that Gray hadn’t told the entire truth. He had astutely gauged that that was for the best because no one wanted to hear the entire truth anyway. The country had too many current problems than to bother with what really occurred over thirty years ago to a man remembered only as a traitor.
Gray personally loathed what had happened to Solomon, but he could do nothing to change it. He had to look ahead, not to the past. And that meant finding a killer before he struck again. And Lesya, too, finally had to be run to ground.
The result of Gray’s meeting with the director was that a regiment of agents in the field were officially now “looking into the matter.” Though innocent-sounding, it actually meant that they were doing their best to find whoever was killing ex-CIA agents. And their orders were to terminate the person or persons responsible. No one wanted a trial on this. They simply wanted a body.
CHAPTER 42
HARRY FINN ESCAPED the third graders relatively unscathed. They’d asked a lot of questions, though, and once or twice Finn actually wished he
When he’d finished Susie had given him a hug and said, “You have a really great rest of the day, Daddy.”
She sounded so grown-up, for a moment he felt like his heart would burst. His former SEAL team members would have been astonished to learn that beneath Finn’s stainless steel skin was a heart as vulnerable and susceptible to emotion as one could find. His only defense, his only way of keeping going, was to block it out. He led two lives and never let either of them mix. What he did for his mother would never wash over into his own family. And what he did with his family would never become part of his other life. At least he prayed to God it wouldn’t.
He drove to the office and met with his team to go over the hit on the Capitol. The session lasted for several hours as they carefully mapped out their strategy and then did more prep work. Toward the end of this meeting, Finn, whose mind worked best when multi-tasking, had reason to smile. He had just thought of a way to kill Simpson.
He grabbed some lunch and headed to his storage unit. He had a bomb to build.
Jerry Bagger screamed into the phone, “Nice going! That’s just great. Why don’t I come back to town and kick your asses too.” He calmed down when he heard the next bit of news. With a little more digging they’d ascertained that the little guy had won a ton of cash. And in a casino that meant one thing that was as certain as death: In order to get your money you had to fill out what amounted to a 1099 so Uncle Sam would know you’d won the money in case you forgot to pay tax on it.
Bagger took down this information and said, “Wait a minute, the guy’s from England?”
“That’s what it says.”
“Did he sound British?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know! Does anybody know?”
“I’ll have to check,” the man said nervously.
“Yeah, well after you
CHAPTER 43
WHEN STONE WALKED OUTSIDE the next day, a bleary-eyed Annabelle was sitting on the front steps of the B amp;B.
“What do you want from me?” she said bitterly.
“Nothing. What do you want from yourself?”
“Don’t play shrink with me.”
“Your father was in jail when your mother was murdered.”
“He was still the reason she was killed.”
“All right. But what’s wrong with giving him the benefit of the doubt and believing that he never intended your mother to be hurt by Bagger?”
“What’s wrong with that? What’s wrong with that is that my father is a liar who has never cared about anyone except himself.”
“So he was really bad to your mother? Beat her, starved her?”
“Don’t make this into a joke!”
“I’m just trying to understand the situation.”
“No, he never abused her.”
“So he might have loved her.”
“Why are you doing this to me? Why are you taking his side?”
“I’m not taking sides, Annabelle. The man is dying. He was at your mother’s grave paying his respects. You thought he’d set your mom up but he didn’t.” Stone spread his hands. “All I’m saying is you might want to reconsider the situation. Life is short. Family is not forever. I know that as well as anyone.”
Annabelle slouched against the car, hands tucked into her armpits.
“It took me two years to plan my hit on Bagger. Two shorts and then the long. I put nearly every dime I had into it. Took more risks than I ever had before. One little mistake in front of Jerry and I’d be dead. And I loved every minute of it. Do you know why?”
Stone shook his head. “Tell me.”
“Because I was finally getting back at the son of a bitch who killed my mother. After all those years he was finally going to pay. And I did it, I won. I conned more money from him than anybody ever had. Enough to really hurt him.”
