Edge (42 page)

My hand was cramping—my left hand, not the one I used for shooting—and I was half rising from cover. I sucked in air. I realized that I hadn't been breathing for a good thirty seconds or more.

The teams converged, screaming, as they were instructed to do, “FBI, FBI, on the ground, let me see your hands! Let me see your hands!”

“We've got—” one started to radio.

A long pause. “Team Three to Tac Op Leader. Need you here. Now.”

What was going on?

“I don't get it. . . .”

“Shit.”

My heart sank at the transmissions, hardly what you would have hoped for in a successful operation.

And, moving from cover, I made a deduction that proved to be true. The two men sneaking up on Omar were displaying what appeared to be law enforcement shields. They were, of course, detectives from Prince William County, here to investigate the reports of a drug deal or cries for help that Loving had undoubtedly called in the minute he hung up from speaking with Zagaev.

A call made to distract us while he orchestrated his escape.

I WAS SPEAKING
to Claire duBois.

“Loving's on the run. He might be driving but I think he wants to get clear of the area. Data mine flight reservations. I want to know anybody who bought a ticket, after he talked to Zagaev—about three p.m.—for travel today. Maybe from Dulles, National or BWI but I think he's still going to be avoiding them, especially now that he suspects we've turned Zagaev.”

“Amtrak?” duBois asked.

“Freddy's told the police at Union Station to look for him. But I'm betting he wants to put more distance between us faster than taking a train.”

“I'll get right on it.”

Zagaev had no clue where Loving might have gone, except to add that the flight to Charleston, West Virginia, had taken him about five hours, which suggested he was based somewhere on the West Coast, though possibly Mexico, the Caribbean or Canada.

The tactical officers were assembling their gear. We talked to the county detectives but it was no surprise that the call that had brought them here had been anonymous and from an untraceable phone. “The caller said he'd seen somebody selling ‘army
guns' from the back of his car. What were we supposed to do? Jesus, you guys scared the shit out of us. Flash-bangs? Messed up my eyes, I'll tell you. I'm talking to my commander about this.”

I realized Loving's choice of a crime was smart. Had he reported a drug deal or a girl's shouting for help, as I'd thought originally, a standard patrol car with uniformed officers would have shown up. Selling weapons brought plainclothes detectives, which tricked us into believing they were Loving and the partner and prolonged his chance to escape.

Freddy said, “How'd he know we turned Zagaev?”

“Years and years of doing this shit.”

The agent lifted an eyebrow. “A sense of humor
and
you're cursing, son.”

Ten minutes later duBois called back. “Five minutes after Zagaev and Loving hung up, a man named Richard Hill bought an e-ticket to Seattle from Philly. It was the next available flight.”

“Why do you think it's Loving? That's not a known alias of his.”

“Well, for one thing, because Richard Hill is dead. His birth certificate was used to get a driver's license two years after he died.”

“Ghosting.” This was a common technique for establishing a false identity.

“Exactly. But mostly we know because the airline records the calls; I got the clip. Voice print matches.”

“Flight time?”

“Little under three hours from now.”

“One ticket?” I was thinking of the sandy-haired partner.

“No, two. Another fake name. That person's dead too.”

I told her I'd get back to her, disconnected and then gestured Freddy over and told him. He grunted. “Your girl data mines better'n my girl. Tell you, Corte, I might hire her away from you.” He called the Bureau's Philly field office and briefed them. He disconnected and turned back to me. “They'll be on site in twenty minutes.”

“Subtle, Freddy. Call them back and tell them to be subtle. They need to stay invisible till the last minute.”

“They'll be subtle.”

I cocked my eyebrow.

“I'll call 'em back.” Then he gave me a rare grin. “You coming along for the hunting party?”

I thought of Rhode Island. I thought of Abe. The idea of being present at Loving's arrest was immensely appealing.

How badly I wanted to go . . .

But I said, “I'll leave that to you folks. I'm going to head back to the safe house, keep an eye on my principals.”

“What for? The case's over with, Corte.”

“That's true, Freddy. But the fact is they still need guarding.”

“We got the sole primary in custody and the lifter's headed for the hills. Who'd they need protecting from?”

“Themselves.”

THE ATMOSPHERE IN
the Great Falls safe house suggested that what I'd told Freddy was true.

I walked into the middle of a fight between the sisters. It was intense and even my arrival, presumably with vital information about the case, didn't deflect the jousting. Ryan was nowhere to be seen.

“I was upset.” Joanne slapped her thighs. “What do you think? People say things when they're upset they don't mean. Come on. How can you move out?”

“I'd planned it already.”

“Not with Andrew,” Joanne said.

“He's changed.”

“Oh, please, Mar. Men like that don't change. They say they do, they recite crap from twelve-step programs. But they don't change.”

“I don't want to talk about it.”

“He put you in the hospital.”

“Enough!” Maree snapped, waving her hand.

After a dense silence both women turned toward me.

I said, “I'd like to talk to you for a few minutes, tell you what's happened.”

Joanne looked once more at her sister, a glance
both sorrowful and frustrated, and turned to me, dropping onto the couch.

“Where's Ryan?” I asked.

“Here,” he said, walking into the living room. He was drinking coffee, it seemed, though I supposed it could have had whiskey in it. I couldn't smell any, though. He walked past his sister-in-law and his wife and took a straight-back chair in the corner of the room. He ignored the women and kept his attention on me.

I called Lyle Ahmad and Tony Barr in as well and told the assembly, “We've got the primary and Loving's on his way out of town. We confirmed it was Zagaev. Not a terrorist issue, not directly.” I looked toward Joanne. “He was trying to extract information from you and then sell it.”

Ryan Kessler said nothing, didn't even look at his wife.

“So it's over with,” Maree said. Then she added, “I'd like to go home—go back to their house—and get my things.”

I said to her, “I'm sorry, not quite yet. We don't have Loving or the partner in custody yet. I'm ninety-nine percent sure it's okay but I want to keep you here, until we do.”

I expected to receive a taste of the testy attitude Maree was serving up to her sister, or at least another Tour Guide comment, but she looked me over with a softening face. “Whatever you think best.”

I didn't know what to make of her agreeable nature.

Or the coy smile.

Ryan asked, “And my daughter?”

I noted the singular possessive. Joanne must have too.

“She can join us. Bill Carter too. I've already called him, and one of the guards I know there is driving them to a pickup location. I'll go get them myself and bring them here.”

Joanne's eyes grew still and I guessed she was thinking that either she or her husband would have to have some serious discussions with the girl about Stepmom's former career.

I went into the den and sat in the office chair, which gave a comforting squeak. I learned from Freddy that the chopper had landed at the Philadelphia airport with the Bureau tactical team and that they were deploying in the garage and inside and around the terminal to begin surveillance. Assuming Loving was driving at legal speeds to the airport in Philadelphia, which I was sure he would be, he'd arrive within about ninety minutes.

I then called Aaron Ellis, to whom I gave the final details of the case.

He said, “Guess congratulations are in order.”

The word seemed to jar. I heard gravity in my boss's voice when he asked, “Corte?”

“Go ahead.”

“Senator Stevenson.”

“Yes?”

“He called me.”

I asked, “Directly? Not Sandy Alberts?”

“That's right. He called about you.”

“Hold on.” I rose, shut the door to the den and sat down again. Took a deep breath. Another. Then: “Go ahead, Aaron.”

“He was asking me questions I didn't know the
answers to.” Ellis paused. “I need the truth, Corte. Are you in Stevenson's sights?”

I couldn't forestall it any longer. “I'm in his sights.”

“Go on,” Ellis said grimly.

I organized my response. Finally, I said, “After Abe was killed, I wanted to get Loving really bad. But he operates off the grid better than anybody I've ever seen. So I managed to get Loving's name on some lists.”

“So?”

“It wasn't just watchlists. I added him to some wiretap warrant databases.”

“
You
added him.” Ellis was nearly whispering. “You mean, there was no judge involved?”

“No. I got into the integrated system myself. If I'd waited to go to a judge until we found him, it would have been too late. Look, it wasn't to collect evidence, Aaron. It wasn't for trial. It was just to find him.”

“Jesus . . . In the meeting on Saturday with Westerfield? He said they picked up the go-ahead order on a warranted tap. That was one of yours?”

My
illegally
warranted tap.

“That's right.”

“So when Alberts came in to my office to talk to you, what? He was fishing?”

“I would guess so.” I'd covered my tracks pretty well but in my zeal to get Loving I would have left behind trails about what I'd done. “He or Stevenson are probably tracking down instances of dicey warrants and some of them must've pointed to me. Alberts called Freddy too. About me specifically.”

I heard a creak. I pictured my boss rocking in
his office chair. His shoulders were exactly as wide as the leather back.

I said, “It's not going to matter to Stevenson that the Kesslers'd be dead now if I hadn't had the wiretap orders in place. I've been reading up on him. He's ideological. He's not holding the hearings because of reelection and he's not doing it to boost his party or for the press. He genuinely believes in law and order. And warrantless surveillance is a crime.”

As was, of course, forging warrants.

I remembered my dismay when I read what I'd learned about Stevenson and realized he was the worst possible enemy: a powerful man with a deeply held conviction that he was in the right. Especially when the person he was targeting, me, was so clearly wrong.

I'd felt dismay too at the fact that I'd found myself searching for a scandal or impropriety in Stevenson's life, anything I could use to discourage him from subpoenaing me—no, I'm not above using an edge like that myself. But there'd been nothing. He liked dating younger women, but he was single, so there was no problem there. His campaigns were largely funded by one of the biggest conservative political action committees in Washington. But all politicians' campaigns were backed by PACs; his just happened to be more flush than many others. Even his aide, Sandy Alberts, had been meticulous about severing all ties to all lobbying firms before coming to work for Stevenson.

No edge to threaten him with.

And there was nothing I could offer him to make him forget about me. I was exactly what he wanted
to expose: an agent of the government working for a shadowy organization and playing fast and loose with the laws of the country.

“Where did Stevenson leave it?” I asked.

“He wants to know about cases you've run in the past few years, where perps went to trial.”

To find out if any lifters or hitters I helped arrest were convicted on the basis of illegal taps. I told my boss, “It was only Loving. There weren't any others.”

“Apparently that won't matter to him.”

No, it wouldn't. A single incident of a crime is still a crime.

Aaron said, “You know if I don't deliver case files, he'll subpoena them. And he's going to get you on the stand in the hearings.”

Which would be the end of my career as a shepherd.

And perhaps the start of a very embarrassing trial, which would possibly end in a prison sentence.

“We're so close to Loving,” I said, sitting forward tensely in the chair. “Please. Do the best you can to keep Stevenson—”

My boss, normally as calm as I was, now snapped, “I'm doing a lot of fucking interference-running for you on this job, Corte.”

“I know. I'll cooperate with Stevenson completely—when Loving's in the can. I'll take whatever the consequences are.”

“You know this has put the whole organization in a real awkward position. We can't afford to be public, Corte.”

“I know, yes.”

“I'll stall for a day or two, if I can. But if the subpoena's delivered, there's nothing I can do.”

“I understand. Thanks, Aaron.”

I hung up and sat back, rubbing my eyes, feeling utterly depleted. What could I salvage from this mess? Even if I avoided jail, it seemed my career as a shepherd was soon to be over. I couldn't help but think about some of the assignments I'd run, about some of my principals.

About Claire duBois.