Capitol Reflections (28 page)

Read Capitol Reflections Online

Authors: Jonathan Javitt

Tags: #Thriller

BOOK: Capitol Reflections
10.89Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
“I was getting a headache, but it seems to be dissipating very quickly thanks to you. Your boss can be so aggravating sometimes. Downright smug, in fact.”
“He’s on your side, Gregory. He’s a bit taken with himself, but you can count on his loyalty. He always comes through.”
“He damn well better.”
Roberta slipped her thigh over Randall’s right leg as the CEO ran his hand through Roberta’s lustrous hair.
“Here, darling,” said Roberta, handing Randall a glass of Chardonnay.
Randall sipped from the glass and handed it back to his paramour. Relaxed, he stared straight ahead for several minutes. It wasn’t long before he turned on his side and drifted off to sleep, his back to Roberta.
The senator’s aide waited fifteen minutes, after which she slid from under the covers and tiptoed to the upholstered chair where Randall’s briefcase rested. With her thumb and index finger, she silently twisted the gold fastener and opened the black case of soft Italian leather. She lifted a manila folder from a slim compartment and took it to a table opposite the bed. Removing a small digital camera from her purse, she carefully photographed each document in the folder before returning them to Randall’s briefcase.
Roberta slipped back into bed, gently laying her slender frame down onto the mattress so as not to cause the slightest movement. If Randall had seen her, he surely would have killed her.
35
 
 
Subj:
RE: Lunch?
Date:
8/04/05 11:33 a.m. Eastern Standard Time
From:
[email protected]
To:
[email protected]
 
 
Meet me tomorrow at 517 E Street for lunch. 12:30 p.m.
Looking forward to it.
~Mark
 
 
How, Gwen wondered, did Mark get her private e-mail address? Getting her FDA e-mail address off the Internet would have been relatively simple, but he’d chosen to make contact through her personal Yahoo account. She smiled, though, when she recalled how Mark had once gained admittance to a formal White House dinner by forging an invitation and pretending to be the ambassador from Argentina, complete with bogus accent. He was one of the premier reporters in the country and probably had ways of obtaining information that went far beyond consulting online e-mail directories or the phonebook.
She wrote back that she would see him at the designated time, adding, “It’s a date.”
No. Bad move. She hit the backspace button and deleted the sentence, replacing it with “See you there.” It certainly wasn’t a date.
Of course she thought of Mark from time to time. Everyone entertained occasional daydreams of running into an old boyfriend or girlfriend, right? And she’d continued to read his columns, though she learned quickly that she couldn’t discuss them with Jack. Jack and Mark saw the world differently and Mark’s writing irritated Jack to the extreme. Gwen wondered if Jack would be anywhere near as irritated by Mark’s writing if she wasn’t the journalist’s ex-girlfriend.
No, Jack wouldn’t approve of Gwen’s call to Mark, but she needed someone other than her husband and his federal law enforcement pals to help her. The government obviously had some thick mud caked on its shoes. Since reading McMurphy’s memo to Snyder, she’d become convinced that any satisfactory resolution of the investigation would have to come in the form of a journalistic exposé. She just hoped Mark hadn’t thrown his lot in with the yuppies. His piece on Pequod’s had been awfully soft and bore no resemblance to his usual satiric style. Mark Stern, on the side of a corporate giant? Highly unusual. What she needed was Mark Stern, the quintessential doubting Thomas who would go to any lengths to show how “the man” routinely stuck it to the little guy.
She hoped he still existed.
She’d find out soon enough.
Jack Maulder sat at his PC, surfing the web to find out what kind of information people were posting about tobacco litigation. Sure enough, he found details of endless numbers of pending suits despite industry payoffs to millions, as well as company pledges to educate the public about smoking. Big Tobacco had reached a landmark settlement thanks to the tenacious state attorney general of Mississippi, who had put several companies on the ropes in the nineties, forcing the industry to make unparalleled concessions after the discovery that the industry suppressed damning research on nicotine for almost thirty years. Many citizens had opted out of the class action suit, and the settlement had therefore not deterred smokers from continuing to sue the tobacco giants.
Nothing unusual there. Still, two entries on antismoking message boards caught his attention:
My wife was young and had only smoked for a year before she died. What kind of poison are the tobacco companies using now?
 
 
I’ve been smoking for four years and my whole body started shaking like crazy yesterday. What’s going on?
Jack stepped into the backyard and lit a Marlboro Light. In the absence of concrete answers, his brain was becoming quite vocal, and rationalization was its loudest song: Give me what I need. If you can’t find the necessary information, then give me something else. Nicotine, to be exact.
Jack gave in to his body’s cravings more and more with each passing day, though he knew it was crazy, especially given his current subject of investigation. Where was all that self-control he’d prided himself on? He knew his problem was stress and that little by little he was reestablishing an addiction that had taken him forever to kick. But that was his rational self speaking. His other half lit a new smoke with the glowing butt of the last one.
As he exhaled a plume of blue smoke into the summer air, Jack thought of the last message he’d read. Had the person who posted it actually been on the verge of going into a seizure? Was this another Marci? Jack decided it was time to call up a few friends at the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. He’d have them analyze a few different brands of cigarettes, starting with Compson’s, and see exactly what was rolled inside the thin white paper.
His attention pivoted. He walked through the side yard and looked at the street. He was sure he’d heard that same vehicle, that same engine, before.
He looked up and down the block. Nothing.
Back at the PC, he cut and pasted the two messages that had caught his attention into a separate file. He then decided to surf a bit more before going outside for what he promised himself would be his last cigarette of the day.
Her Public Health Service uniform with gold epaulettes would have stuck out like a sore thumb. Likewise, her own automobile would have been easy to follow if she were under surveillance. So Gwen changed clothes at the office and called a taxi before heading out to her luncheon engagement with Mark.
Finding the address proved difficult. After paying the taxi driver and stepping onto a Georgetown sidewalk, Gwen had no clue where to go. She was on E Street, but there was no #517 in sight. Gwen entered a nearby watch repair shop and asked for directions. The gruff clerk behind the counter, unfiltered cigarette dangling from his lips, gestured to a space between two brick buildings across the street as if he’d been asked the question a thousand times before. “The address is unmarked. Go down the alley and turn left. You’ll find it.”
Wearing sunglasses, a scarf over her head, and bleached Levis, Gwen felt she might have gone too far with the cloak-and-dagger. She was also more than a little nervous about seeing her old beau after so many years. She walked timidly into the shadowy alley, the heels of her shoes tapping the flagstones with each step. At the end of the narrow pathway, she found herself in a small courtyard with an oversized potted plant as its centerpiece. On her left she saw a restaurant called The Insider.
Opening the door and stepping in, she removed her sunglasses, expecting to see a room filled with faces staring at her suspiciously. Instead, a hostess in a black dress and high heels approached, smiled, and said, “Good afternoon. How many?”
“Two,” said Mark Stern, appearing from a waiting booth on the left as if from a parallel universe. “I’ve reserved one of the private rooms.”
“Certainly. Follow me, please.”
The hostess led Mark and Gwen through the main dining room into a narrow hallway where the payphone and restrooms were situated, turning at last into a corridor with several small cubicles attached, each containing a table covered with a linen cloth, silver-ware, and a slender vase with a single rose.
“Thank you,” Mark said to the hostess as he and Gwen slid into chairs and faced each other for the first time in eight years.
“Gwen Maulder,” he said with a boyish grin.
“Mark Stern,” Gwen said, unsure how her voice sounded.
They stared at each other for a long moment before laughing nervously. Gwen hadn’t expected to feel this awkward.
Remember, you have something hugely important to discuss with him. This isn’t about anything other than that.
“How did you get my cell number?” Mark asked, breaking her reverie.
“You’re not the only one with investigative skills, you know.”
Mark grinned again. “Obviously not.”
They both chuckled, but then another awkward silence ensued.
Gwen was rarely unsure of herself, but she was having trouble figuring out how to proceed here. Did she just dive into her story? “I can see why they call this place The Insider,” she remarked at last. “You have to be one to find it.”
“It’s where people in this town come to discuss things that aren’t meant for public consumption. That’s what I’ve heard from my colleagues. Speaking of which, tell me what’s going on.”
Gwen was so glad Mark decided to cut to the chase. She told him about Marci’s death and about how she had begun a personal investigation based primarily on instinct. She then filled him in on BioNet, the seizure stats, her reassignment to the AE files, and Jan’s disappearance. As she started talking about McMurphy, Iceland, and the Panamanian address, Mark interrupted her.
“What cities are we talking about as far as the seizure stats?” asked Mark.
“Chicago, Trenton, New York, Boston, D.C., Milwaukee, Kansas City, St. Louis, to name just a few.”
“When did the spikes occur in New York and Washington?”
“May and July, respectively.”
“What about Kansas City?”
“Um … I think the spike occurred in April. Why?”
“Just curious.”
“Personally, I think tobacco is somehow involved in all of this. Almost all of the seizure fatalities were smokers. There’s a definite correlation.”
“What about the nonfatalities?”
“They’re harder to gauge since we can’t rely on autopsy reports. I’m still betting tobacco.”
“How sure are you that it’s not just your do-gooder’s hatred of tobacco companies that’s driving you?” Mark paused. “With Marci being such a close friend, I can see why you’d go all out with this.”

Other books

Kiss of a Demon King by Kresley Cole
Long Simmering Spring by Barrett, Elisabeth
Devil Sent the Rain by D. J. Butler