Death of Secrets (6 page)

"Whatever." The cop turned back to Kathy. "Miss
Kelver, I’m going to be honest with you. Due to the complete lack of a body or
any evidence of a crime at the location you specified, my chain of command
believes I should issue you a citation for calling in a false alarm. Unless you
can provide any further corroborating evidence of your story, I’m going to have
to do that."

Kathy’s jaw dropped. "What? You can’t do that! If you had
any idea what I’ve been through over that…" She stopped, and thought about
Mike. If she started telling the cops this story, she’d end up getting him
involved. Besides, would this fat slug even believe her?

Heck, she thought. I don’t even believe this myself.

"Yes?" Franken asked.

She shook her head. "Nothing. Nothing now. Maybe
later…"

Franken bit his lip. "That doesn’t do me much good with my
shift commander."

Kathy shrugged. "I’m sorry. I just don’t have anything I
can show you, but I might find something more out soon."

"You sound to me like you’re looking for something
specific."

Her eyes shifted away from his and over to John’s, where there
was no help for her. "Nothing."

"Miss Kelver, if something’s going on you should tell us.
If you know of a crime, you’re required by law to assist the police."

"I already did that, and you want to give me a
ticket!"

"Not if you can prove there’s a crime. It sounds to me like
you might be able to. Or at least you might have some information I should
have."

She shook her head emphatically, but didn’t say anything. She
was thinking of Mike. He had very strong feelings about keeping control of all
this information. The cop stood up. "OK, then. I’ll talk to my commander.
You may get a citation in the mail." He walked away after throwing two
bucks on the table to pay for his coffee.

***

Nathan Jacobs joined Mike and Tilman for lunch, easing into a
chair and waving at the waitress for a cup of coffee. His memories of the
hearing were unpleasant ones.

The public and the press just hated his agency these days. That
bothered him. He did the work because he wanted to serve people. But no one
seemed to believe he was doing that. It seemed like everyone in that hearing
saw the NSA as a threat, not a protector.

Jacobs said as much, and Tilman nodded. "Yeah, well, the
screeching about privacy intrusions went on forever, but in the end we’re going
to be able to beat that."

Mike grunted. "Not like I’m a hundred percent comfortable
with how much electronic snooping you guys do."

"Worth it, Mike. Better this than another September
11th." Tilman responded.

"I know, I know, I've heard that a time or two," the
Congressman replied.

Jacobs chimed in. "Look, we all ask ourselves questions
about it now and then. I know I do. I mean, how much surveillance do we really
need? But what we do makes a difference."

"Hey, you know I’m on your side. I’m just saying…"

The businessman nodded. "Yeah, I know. National Security
costs a lot, and not just money."

Jacobs asked Tilman, "What can we do to improve our odds
of getting this through?"

Tilman replied, "I'm going to educate some people about
the cost-benefit analysis. It’s slated for bright and early Monday
morning."

Vincent rolled his eyes. "What is it about the power
breakfast that Washington likes so much?"

Tilman patted him on the back. "Don’t come if you don’t
want to. The main people I want there are the opponents."

"That’s a relief. My scheduler was throwing fits. I have a
PAC fundraising breakfast too that morning, she didn’t want me to have to
shuttle between them."

"Speaking of her, what’s got your schedule so busy
tonight?" Tilman asked.

Mike took his time replying. Tilman was just going to prod him
when Mike finally spoke. "I’m in way over my head," he said, looking
down into a lunchtime beer.

Tilman kept silent, waiting for his friend to go on, but Jacobs
asked, "What’s wrong?"

"OK, this will sound crazy, I know. I wouldn’t believe it
myself except that I’ve lived it."

Jacobs raised an eyebrow at his friend. "Try me."

"Thing is, Nate, it’s a lot more up your alley than mine.
You guys know that girl at the club, Kathy?"

Tilman grinned. "Of course! Anything involving her can’t
be all bad news for you."

"Well, yeah, it does have a silver lining. I’m getting to
know her a lot better. But listen, she found this flash drive. She was walking
home from work two nights ago and found a guy who’d been shot, and she goes to
help him and the guy hands her this flash drive. She goes for help, calls 911,
comes back and the body is
gone
. Then all of a sudden people are
breaking into her dorm room, trying to
kill
her, and since she’s dragged
me into it they’re trying to kill me, too, in the process. It’s like James Bond
or something. They broke into
my
house last night, for pity’s sake! And
we can’t even read whatever’s on the flash drive to see what’s so bloody
important about it."

Tilman gritted his teeth and clutched the edge of the table.
Nathan gasped. "You got broken into? Was anything stolen?"

"No, but the whole place is full of bullet holes!
Bullet
holes, Nathan!
I had a
gunfight
at my house last night. I’m not
crazy and I’m not pulling your leg! It’s the most insane thing I’ve ever
seen."

Both his friends blinked at the same time, and simply stared at
him. Nathan was the first to speak. "Um, Mike… I don’t mean to be a jerk,
but the girl
is
a cocktail waitress. Has it occurred to you that she’s
got, like, drug trouble or mob trouble and concocted this flash drive story to
get you to get her out of it?"

Michael sighed. "Yeah, that would be possible, except for
two things: one, I know the girl, and she’s aboveboard. You’ve just got to take
my word for that. Two, the guy who came after us last night asked her
specifically about the flash drive."

"Seriously, Mike," Tilman said. "This
is
bizarre. You haven’t spoken to the police, have you?"

Mike shook his head. "I haven’t yet. You taught me better
than that. Control the story.

"It’s taken me a while to get a grip on all this, you
know? And I keep thinking I’ve got to manage this flawlessly, or I’m going to
wind up all over the front pages with some kind of destructive headline about
‘Congressman and cocktail waitress in gangland shootout.’ But I decided this
morning that I need to just call the cops and take whatever happens like a man.
It’s a good job, this, but I’m not exactly ready to die for it, y’know? And
after last night, it kinda sunk into my head that whoever these people are,
they’d have no compunction about killing me. At least if I tell the cops,
they’ll have some idea where to start if I get shot."

Tilman shook his head. "Listen, Mike, I don’t want you to
go down the tubes. A lot of people don’t want you to go down the tubes. First
and foremost, you’re a good man, and it’s rare to get one of those in Congress.
I’d like to see you stay.

"Second – and don’t get mad, in no way am I suggesting
this is more important than the first – your career is something more people
care about than just you. You’re under thirty years old, wealthy, good looking
and smart. The party sees you as an investment, and so does a lot of the
political community. Having come so far at such a young age, there’s a
lot
that you might accomplish yet. You’re a real rising star, Mike, and I think you
know it, even if you’re not going to admit it. If you blow your career now,
lots of people are going to be mad.

"You know what I taught you from day one," Tilman
concluded. "If you don't control how the news comes out, you lose."

Mike scowled, and Tilman shifted uncomfortably in his seat. His
younger friend always struck the balance between idealism and pragmatism
somewhat differently. "None of which is to suggest you should let yourself
get killed. Of course. But I’m sure between the three of us we can work out a
way that involves you
not
getting killed, but also
not
going to
the cops and ruining your career. Besides, if everything is as you say it is,
this is probably way above MPD’s head anyway."

Nathan spoke up now. "Tilman, I understand where you’re
coming from about this. A lot of parties have pretty high hopes for Mike’s
career, and frankly my office happens to be one of those parties. He’s a
friend, and it’d be nice to have a friend rise to high places. But he’s also my
friend, not just the NSA’s. And as a friend, that story of his tells me he’s in
real, honest-to-goodness life-threatening danger."

Nathan turned his gaze to Mike. "I think you’ve got to go
to the cops. I mean, look. Whatever that flash drive is, you don’t go around
shooting at people for nothing, especially a member of Congress. To be honest,
your James Bond idea is probably right on. It sounds like something espionage
related, either government or corporate. That makes it actually my business in
a way. I’d talk to law enforcement if I was you."

Tilman snorted. "Are you kidding? Nathan, no offense, but
working with the NSA, you of all people ought to appreciate the concept that
you can’t trust the government. Mike, if you go to the law, a year later you’ll
be getting a call from The Man saying ‘Vote for my budget or your constituents
learn you’ve been chasing college girls at a night club with a bad
reputation.’"

Nathan sighed. That was a hard point to rebut after some of the
recent revelations about government surveillance programs and their political
ties. He felt it himself. If he let his mind wander at work, he found himself
conscious of the stuff on his own computer he wouldn’t want the NSA looking at.

Tilman continued. "Listen, Mike, between the three of us,
we can think up something that’ll keep you safe
and
keep your career
safe. To me, the obvious thing would be to pull yourself into a hole for a
while – hide, and be impossible to find. Your first instinct was right, you
can’t go to the cops. And you’re also right about being in over your head. If
you can’t fight and you can’t call for help, the only other two options are
‘run’ and ‘hide.’ I’d try hiding first before running."

"That makes sense," Mike said, looking down into his
beer. "That’s the best I’ve been able to come up with too. I guess I’ll
have to think up a good place to hide. Don’t be surprised if I’m not around for
a while, guys."

"Of course, there’s the small problem of being in
session," Jacobs reminded him.

"Yeah, missing a few roll call votes won’t help
much," Mike admitted. "But it’s less of a scandal than going to the
cops would be. I’ll have to work on that part."

After a few moments of nervous silence between the three of
them, Tilman muttered, "All this kinda makes me feel guilty for worrying
so much about my own problems."

The Congressman chuckled wryly. "Sorry, I’ve been hogging
all the sympathy. What’s wrong in your world?"

"Nowhere near the same scale as your problem, Mike, but
one of my guys died yesterday."

Vincent’s eyes went wide. "One of your employees? That’s
really serious. What happened?"

"Guy goes up to the roof every single day to smoke. He’s
been doing it for the whole year I’ve had him on board. And yesterday he falls
off." Tilman made a dropping motion with his hand. "Just like that.
Coders," he sighed. "Always in their own intellectual world, seeing
the numbers and the logic but not the ground in front of them apparently."

Nathan spoke up. "Wait a minute… heavy smoker? It’s not
Krupotnik, is it?"

"Yeah, but don’t worry, Nate. GigaStar is OK. The code’s
all written already."

Nathan didn’t push the matter, but he didn’t like it much,
either. Trouble on the GigaStar project would be bad news if Congress got wind
of it. And since Tilman just told Mike, Congress now had wind of it. Mike was
on their side, to be sure, but he was still part of "The Hill," and
letting him know about that wasn’t smart. Their lunch broke up without much
more conversation.

***

John and Kathy made the walk back toward their hotel. The cobblestone
streets of Georgetown felt surreal to her. This was Kathy's normal life – the
place she lived and played each day. This area was ordinary to her. And yet
last night hadn't gone away, it was still real. She kept hoping she’d somehow
wound up in the twilight zone, and any minute now she’d get zipped away back to
normality. Being in Georgetown made it clear, that was not going to happen.

Back at the hotel, she and John took an elevator to their
floor. Maybe John had been feeling the same chill she had, Kathy thought.
Whatever the reason, neither of them seemed inclined to talk a lot as the
elevator carried them up.

The doors opened with a bell and they started down the hall.

As they did, a man closed the door to a hotel room midway up
the corridor and turned a corner into a maintenance stairway.

Kathy froze, and grabbed her friend’s arm. "John, did that
look like our room to you?"

He only nodded, and took another tentative step forward,
wrapping an arm around Kathy’s back. As they neared the door they’d seen the
man come out of, they could see their own room number on it. Kathy’s hand flew
immediately to her mouth, but she managed to stifle her scream.

Simultaneously, their heads swiveled to trade glances. Waving
at Kathy to stand back, John got the door open and stepped in, scanning around
the room for an intruder. He found none, and wasted no time in taking advantage
of the fact that they’d been lucky and missed the pursuers. "We need to
leave," he said. "Now."

Kathy thought, This isn’t going to just go away, she thought.
I’m not getting zipped away to the real world. If we want it to end, we’ll have
to do it ourselves. "Wait, John," she said aloud. "That guy who
just went down the stairs is probably one of them."