Split Second

Follow his lead but watch over him too.'

'Not to worry,' said Michelle, and she started to walk away.

'Oh, and Michelle, I was very serious when I implied these people we're looking for don't care whether you live or die. So while you're covering Sean's back, don't forget to watch your own. I wouldn't wantanything to happen to you. I can see that Sean is quite fond of having you around.'

Michelle turned back around. 'Well, some of us are lucky, aren't we?'

As Joan was driving off in her car, she placed a call to her office staff.

'I need all the background on and present whereabouts of Robert C. Scott, former Secret Service agent and detail leader for Clyde Ritter in 1996, and also on a man named Doug Denby, who was Ritter's chief of staff. And I need it ASAP.'

King and Maxwell drove to Richmond to see Kate Ramsey, who'd returned to VCU and agreed to meet with them. The Center for Public Policy was on Franklin Street in the heart of Virginia Commonwealth University's downtown campus. The center was located in a beautifully refurbished brownstone. The street was filled with such houses, which represented the old wealth of a bygone era in Virginia's capital city.

Kate Ramsey met them in the reception area and led them back to a private office that was filled with books and papers, posters detailing various protests and other activities as well as music posters and assorted sports equipment befitting a youthful scholar.

Looking at the clutter, King whispered to Michelle that she must be feeling right at home and caught an elbow in the ribs.

Kate Ramsey was of medium height and had the build of a runner, with tight, lean muscles. Four different pairs of jogging shoes in the corner of her office confirmed this observation. Her hair was blond and tied back in a ponytail. Her clothes were college standard issue: faded jeans, sneakers and an Abercrombie Fitch short-sleeved shirt. She seemed poised beyond her years and regarded them both with a very frank expression as she sat across from them at her desk.

'Okay, Thornton already called me, so you can just ditch the story about doing a documentary on political assassins.'

'We weren't very good at that anyway,' said Michelle. 'And the truth is just a lot easier, isn't it?' she bluntly shot back.

Kate's gaze shifted to King, who looked back at her nervously. He had, after all, killed the woman's father. What was he supposed to say?I'm sorry?

The young woman said, 'You've aged pretty well. Looks like the years have been good to you.'

'Not recently. That's why we're here, Kate. I can call you Kate, can't I?'

The young woman sat back. 'It is my name, Sean.'

'I know this is incredibly awkward.'

She cut in. 'My father made choices. He killed the man you were guarding. You really had no choice.' She paused and drew a long breath. 'It's been eight years. I won't lie to you and say I didn't hate you back then. I was a girl of fourteen, and you'd taken my father away.'

'But now,' said Michelle.

Kate's gaze remained on King. 'Now I'm a grown woman and things are a lot clearer. You did what you had to do. And so have I.'

'I guess you didn't have much choice in the matter either,' commented King.

She leaned forward and started moving things around on her desk. King noted that she placed the pieces-a pencil, a ruler and other objects-at ninety-degree angles, then started over again. Her hands just kept moving, even as her gaze remained on King and Michelle.

'Thornton said there was new evidence indicating my father hadn't acted alone. What new evidence?'

'We can't tell you,' said Michelle.

'Oh, that's great. You can't tell me, but you expect me to talk to you.'

'If there was someone else involved that day, Kate, it's important we know who it was,' said King. 'I'd think you'd want that too.'

'Why? It's not like it'll change the facts. My father shot Clyde Ritter. There were a hundred eyewitnesses.'

'That's true,' said Michelle, 'but now we believe there's more to it.'

Kate leaned back in her chair. 'So what exactly do you want from me?'

'Anything you can tell us about the events leading up to your father's assassinating Clyde Ritter,' said Michelle.

'He didn't suddenly come in one day and announce he was going to become a killer, if that's what you're wondering. I was only a kid at the time, but I still would have called someone about that.'

'Would you?' said King.

'What's that supposed to mean?'

King shrugged. 'He was your father. Dr. Jorst said you loved him. Maybe you wouldn't have called anybody.'

'Maybe I wouldn't have,' Kate said casually, then started shifting the pencil and ruler around again.

'Okay, let's assume he didn't announce his intentions. How about anything else? Did your father say anything that seemed suspicious or out of the ordinary?'

'My father had the veneer of a brilliant college professor but underneath was an unreformed radical still living in the sixties.'

'Meaning what exactly?'

'That he was prone to saying outrageous things that could be construed as suspicious.'

'Okay, let's get down to something more tangible. Any idea where he got the gun he used to shoot Ritter with? That was never traced.'

'I was asked all that years ago. I didn't know then and I don't know now.'

'All right,' said Michelle. 'How about anybody coming around in the weeks leading up to the Ritter shooting? Anybody you didn't know?'

'Arnold had few friends.'

King cocked his head at her. 'He's Arnold now?'

'I think I have the right to call him whatever I want.'

'So he had few friends. Any potential assassins lurking in there?' asked Michelle.

'That's hard to say, since I didn't know Arnold was one. Assassins don't tend to broadcast their intent, do they?'

'Sometimes they do,' responded King. 'Dr. Jorst said that your father would come in and rant and rave to him about Clyde Ritter and how he was destroying the country. Did he ever do that around you?'

In response Kate stood and went to the window that looked out on Franklin Street, where cars and bikes drifted by and students sat on the steps of the building.

'What does it all matter now? One assassin, two, three, a hundred! Who gives a shit?' She turned and stared at them, her arms stubbornly folded over her bosom.

'Maybe you're right,' said King. 'Then again, it might explain why your father did what he did.'

'He did what he did because he hated Clyde Ritter and everything he stood for,' she said vehemently. 'He never quite lost that drive to rock the establishment.'

Michelle looked at some of the political posters on her walls. 'Professor Jorst told us you're following in your father's footsteps as far as ‘rocking the establishment.' '

'Lots of things my father did were good and worthy. And what reasonable person wouldn't detest a man like Clyde Ritter?'

'Unfortunately you'd be surprised,' said King.

'I read all the reports and stories that came out afterwards. I'm surprised no one did a TV movie about it. I guess it wasn't important enough.'

King said, 'A man can hate someone and not choose to kill him. By all accounts your father was a passionate man who firmly believed in certain causes, and yet he'd never engaged in any violent act before.' At this Kate Ramsey seemed to twitch slightly. Kingnoticed but continued his line of thought. 'Even during the Vietnam War