“So you just followed orders, without question.”
“Yes.”
“And killed Andropov and Chernenko, two innocent men?”
Lesya and Stone exchanged a long look. “Yes,” she said slowly.
Finn said, “Why would the Americans kill my father and try to kill you if you completed your assignment successfully? Why would they try to paint you as traitors?”
Stone answered. “Because the American government
“Yes,” said Lesya. “And what do you think they would do to prevent
Finn answered. “They’d kill anyone they had to.”
“And unfortunately we are David and they are Goliath,” Lesya added bitterly. “The Americans are always Goliath.”
“But David beat Goliath. And so can we if we get to them first,” Stone replied.
“Just the three of us?” Lesya said skeptically.
“We’re not alone,” Stone said. “I have friends.”
CHAPTER 80
ALEX HAD HAILED A CAB and he and Annabelle had driven off. He had decided not to wait for the other feds to show up. The charred truck and the floating corpses that awaited them would be self-explanatory in any event. He did call the FBI lead commander and let him know what had happened and that he and Annabelle were the only survivors. “If you need us, we’ll be at my house,” he told the man. “I’m in the book.”
The commander protested but Alex cut him off. “We’ve had enough for one day. Go and clean up the pieces and talk to us later. It’s not like you have to take Bagger to trial. He gets to go before a higher judge now.”
The cab dropped them off at Alex’s house in Manassas, a one-story rancher with a single-car garage, set off by itself down a gravel drive. Inside the garage was Alex’s fully restored ’69 fire red Corvette, the only extravagance the Secret Service agent had ever allowed himself. His fed cruiser was parked out front.
“You hungry?” he asked Annabelle, but she merely shook her head.
“I guess asking if you’re okay would be pretty stupid right now.”
“I’ll get through this.”
“I’m sorry, Annabelle.”
She sat down in a chair. “All these years I’ve hated my father because I thought he just let my mother die. Then I find out he didn’t…” Her voice trailed off.
“And now you lose him too,” Alex finished for her. “But at least you found out before he died, Annabelle. And he knew that you knew.”
“He could’ve gotten out of that truck. He could be alive right now.”
“For six months of the cancer eating him away?”
She stared up at him. “For six months of being with me. I would’ve taken care of him. I guess he thought blowing himself up was a better alternative.”
“No, maybe he wanted to get Bagger even worse than you did. Maybe he was willing to die to avenge his wife and your mother. At the very least you have to admire the guy’s courage.”
“I do,” she finally said. “But I still wish he hadn’t done it.”
“And he gave you that scar. He wasn’t the world’s greatest father.”
“But he was my father,” she said quietly.
“And a criminal.”
“Alex,
“Not to me, you’re not.” There was an awkward pause before Alex added, “You said you weren’t hungry, but I’m going to make some coffee. And when you’re ready to talk, we’ll talk. How does that sound?”
“Can I take a shower first? I feel really, really dirty.”
He showed her to the bathroom that was off his bedroom, and then he went into the kitchen, washed up, put on a pot of coffee and cleaned himself up. By the time he was done, she was out of the shower. She walked into the kitchen wrapped in one of his bathrobes.
“Hope you don’t mind,” she said.
Her hair was wet and hung down straight.
“Shower make you feel better?”
“Not even close.”
They drank the coffee mostly in silence. Then Alex built a fire in the living room fireplace, and Annabelle sat on the floor in front of it, holding her hands out to the flames.
She said in a low voice, “I guess the FBI will have a bunch of questions for me.”
“Some. But I can help you field them, if you want.”
“Thanks for helping me.”
“You put your life on the line too.”
She gazed up at him. “Can you sit with me? Just for a little while?”
Alex got down on the floor and they sat quietly in front of the fire as the flames slowly died.
Carter Gray was brooding. None of Carr’s people had been located. Then another possibility occurred to him: the Secret Service agent, Alex Ford. He and Stone were tight. They had been at Murder Mountain together. He knew as much of the truth about what Gray had done as did Stone. If he got Ford, used him as bait? It would be a little tricky. The man was a federal agent. He couldn’t just kidnap him. Or maybe he could if he somehow discredited him first. This was a favorite tactic of Gray’s. Destroy the reputation of the victim first-indeed, make him appear to be a criminal-and then seize him at his most vulnerable. It was far easier to do than most people would have thought. And by the time it was all figured out, it wouldn’t matter. Gray made a couple of calls and put the operation into motion.
He quickly received a call back from a mole of his at the FBI. The man there had some interesting news. He told Gray the details of what had happened that night with Ford and Jerry Bagger. And also that Ford had a woman with him, a woman apparently of questionable past. They had walked away from a fiery explosion in Washington. Ford had told the FBI that he would talk to them tomorrow. He had presumably gone home with the woman.
Gray thanked his spy and hung up.
This new intelligence changed things remarkably.
Alex Ford’s career was just about to take a nasty turn for the worse.
CHAPTER 81
AFTER ANNABELLE WENT TO BED, Alex sat up in the kitchen drinking another cup of coffee. He glanced every now and then in the direction of the bedroom as he thought things over. But what really was there to think over? The case was done, the bad guys vanquished. This was where the movie ended, the credits rolled and maybe some outtakes played. In the real world, of course, it wasn’t quite that simple. There would be enough paperwork to fill out to clear-cut a small forest. And then an internal investigation to ensure that nothing Alex had done had improperly led to a bunch of men getting blown up over the Potomac. Explanations would be made and corroborated and Alex was confident that relatively soon, many months from now, it would all be over.
