The Collective (46 page)

“Cait, it’s Anne Monteforte. Please don’t hang up.”

She heard a sharp intake of breath on the line.

“Please,” Monteforte said. “I know you must be having a hard time trusting anyone right now. After last night, I feel the same. Everyone is lying, including the FBI. But the truth is being buried so deep, and I can’t let that happen. I know you’re not the bad guy, Cait. Please, let me help.”

A sigh. “How can you help, Detective?”

“I don’t know yet. I just … I want the truth.”

“I’m sorry about Detective Jarman. He was a good man.”

“He was,” Monteforte agreed. She bit her lower lip to fight down the emotion welling inside her.

Another pause, and then: “How far are you willing to go for the truth, Detective?”

“Wherever it leads me.”

“Then put Sarah back on.”

Monteforte did as she was asked. Sarah took the phone from her, said “Hello,” and then listened for perhaps a full minute, glancing at Monteforte from time to time.

“That’s do-able,” she said. “Is Jordan … I told you—whatever you need. I flatter myself that I’m a good reporter, Cait, and that means knowing when something smells like bullshit. Someone’s after you—and your
baby
, for God’s sake. The only thanks I need for helping you is for you to try to keep the bullets flying away from me, instead of toward me, if it comes to that.”

Despite her brave talk, the reporter looked shaken. But she stayed on the line and Monteforte thought she would be true
to her word. After giving Cait several more reassurances, she handed the phone back.

“I’m here,” Monteforte said.

“There’s something you can do. I was going to ask Sarah to try to pull it off by herself. It’ll be the biggest story of her career. But it will probably work a lot better with you along.”

“All right.”

“You can’t tell anyone,” Cait said. “You can’t trust anyone. And if you change your mind, if you fuck me over, then Leyla and I are as good as dead. Do you understand that? Do you understand that these people outrank you, and that there is nothing you can do as a police officer to make justice happen here?”

Monteforte felt a chill go through her. “I do.”

“And you understand that I don’t want anyone else dying, but that it isn’t up to me?”

Monteforte thought about the pull it would take to make bodies just vanish from a crime scene, to play the FBI like puppets, to kill indiscriminately and have the government close its eyes.

“I get it, Cait.”

“Have you eaten breakfast, Detective Monteforte?”

“No.”

“You can pick something up on the way.”

“Where am I going?” Monteforte asked.

“To Hoboken.”

“New Jersey?”

“Get yourselves some coffee and something you can eat on the run. I’ll call Sarah back in half an hour and give you the whole rundown. But if you’re going to bail on me, do it now. Because I’m only going to have one chance at this.”

Monteforte held her breath a moment, realizing what she was risking. Her future. Her career. Her life. But Jarman had been her friend as well as her partner, and he’d fought for justice for so many over the years. He deserved nothing less.

“I’m not going to bail.”

“All right, then,” Cait said, sounding tired but grateful. “I’ll see you soon.”

Monteforte handed Sarah the phone. A change had come
over the reporter. All of her confusion had evaporated. She bounced with a kind of nervous energy.

“You’re really on board for this?” she asked.

“Are you?” Monteforte replied. “I mean, I know why I’m going along with it. But what about you?”

Sarah stared at her as if she hadn’t understood the question. “These are good people.”

“But you don’t even know them very well.”

“I guess I don’t. But they don’t have anywhere else to turn or they wouldn’t be calling me. Someone’s trying to kill Cait and her daughter, and now Jordan, and to paint them as terrorists. You told me yourself that you don’t believe that’s true, and I’m with you. I don’t believe what’s being reported, and that means someone is hiding the truth. Getting to the truth, finding the secrets the bad guys don’t want the public to know and exposing them … that’s my job.”

Monteforte studied her. “But these people are willing to kill to stop you from doing that job.”

“I get that, Detective.” Sarah managed to muster a slightly nervous smile. “Must be some pretty big secrets.”

“Okay, then,” Monteforte said. “Let’s get moving.”

Sarah opened the door. As Monteforte walked through, she wondered how much of herself she had left behind in that conference room. But she kept walking. Jarman was dead. Cait and Leyla were being hunted and she couldn’t just let that happen. There was no turning back now.

More than anything, Josh wanted to knock the smug look off Roger Boyce’s face. The guy had an officious air about him that Josh suspected was not unique to this morning. From the way the other man in the room, Brian Herskowitz, looked at Boyce, he must be a joy to work with.

“Mr. Boyce,” Agent Chang said, “I’m not sure you’re clear on your position here.”

Soft and bespectacled, Boyce did his best to smile, but it was almost a sneer. “We disagree on that, Agent. I think I’ve made my position very clear.”

Herskowitz tried speaking up. “Roger, I think what she meant—”

Boyce shot him a withering glance. “I
know
what she meant.”

Josh had been observing the dynamic between these two. Though Boyce had the authority in the room, it was clear that the subordinate, Herskowitz, was both smarter and more rational—and knew it.

“Look, I’m not sure what else you think we can tell you,” Boyce continued. He spread his hands theatrically, as if to show he had nothing to hide. “I’ve told you about Sean McCandless’s duties here, and Brian has very patiently answered all of your questions about McCandless’s state of mind the past few weeks.”

Herskowitz narrowed his eyes at the use of Sean McCandless’s last name, as if offended by the callous tone.

Boyce sat behind his desk, trying to look in charge. He had been attempting to assert control of the situation since the moment just after eight-thirty when he had entered his office and found Josh and Chang waiting for him, drinking coffee the receptionist had thoughtfully provided and occupying the surprisingly comfortable guest chairs set before the desk. Boyce had been on edge at first, nervous, and had seemingly called in Herskowitz to bolster his version of the truth. Josh had no doubt that Herskowitz knew Sean McCandless, even considered him a friend. The man wasn’t faking his sorrow over McCandless’s death.

But Josh doubted everything else the two men had said.

“Agent Chang and I aren’t running on much sleep,” Josh said, and a flash of memory from their morning, the soft curve of Nala’s breast, the urgency in her eyes, gave him pause. He smiled, not caring how Boyce interpreted that. “So let’s not fuck around here, Mr. Boyce. Spin Sean McCandless’s death however you want, but everyone in this room
knows he didn’t just have a heart attack, and that the government cremated him to hide that fact.

“I don’t know what he really did for you people besides play with satellites, but the word
intelligence
is part of your agency’s name. You spy with a satellite or you spy on the ground. Honestly, I don’t give a shit about any of that. There isn’t a shred of doubt in my mind, or Agent Chang’s, that Sean McCandless’s murder had nothing to do with his work for you and is instead connected to a larger threat to his family, and possibly to a lot of other American families.”

Boyce glanced at Herskowitz, then looked at Chang. “Not to credit any part of this fantasy of yours, Agents, but if you’re so certain of these assertions, why are you even bothering to talk to us?”

Chang shifted her legs in the seat and sat forward, drawing Josh’s eye. From the moment they had showered and dressed and left his apartment, they had been working hard at pretending nothing at all had happened between them, but the air between them felt electric. Josh felt a prickling static at every nerve ending. They needed to have a conversation, but both of them knew where their priorities lay.

Yet when she moved, he couldn’t help watching her.

“Why are we here?” Chang said. “That’s your question?”

Boyce nodded, supercilious air firmly in place. “Essentially.”

One corner of Chang’s mouth lifted in a sardonic smile. “Maybe you really are as stupid as you look.”

Boyce started to rise. “That’s enough. Both of you can—”

“Sit the fuck down,” Josh said. He spoke without raising his voice, but his tone froze Boyce halfway up from his chair. “Now, Mr. Boyce, or the next time your phone rings, it will be the director of Homeland Security on the line.”

Herskowitz, properly chided, had been standing in the corner like a naughty schoolboy all this time. At last he spoke up.

“Roger …”

Boyce glared at him, but sat back down.

“Now,” Josh said, taking both men in with a glance. “Once you confirm what we already know, then you can start telling us what we
don’t
know. What do we want? Every detail of the investigation into Sean McCandless’s death, anything
that might lead us to the people who killed him, because those same people have been murdering babies and children all across this country, and we want to get to them before they can kill Cait McCandless and her daughter.”

Boyce’s arrogance finally shattered. “Babies? What the hell are you talking about?”

Josh and Chang exchanged a look but didn’t answer, both choosing to let the question, and Boyce’s confusion, hang in the air.

“The media’s calling Cait McCandless a terror suspect,” Herskowitz ventured.

Josh cocked his head, studying the man’s face. Something was off about the tone of the question. He knew more than he was saying.

“You don’t believe that,” Chang said.

“No, I don’t,” Herskowitz said.

“Brian—” Boyce began.

“Fuck off, Roger,” Herskowitz said, focusing on Chang again. “Sean was my friend. I’ve met Cait a couple times. I don’t believe for a second that she’s some kind of terrorist. And I’m getting the impression you don’t believe that, either. Why is that?”

Again, Josh and Chang remained silent.

“Look, I appreciate what you’re saying,” Boyce said, “but if you have questions or concerns about the answers you’ve gotten here, you’re more than welcome to go up the ladder and see if you get anything more to your liking.”

Josh sighed, his patience at an end. “This is a whole different kind of cloak and dagger than you’re used to, Boyce. Now, you
think
you don’t have to tell us the truth. Maybe you think the truth is above our pay grade or our clearance, but the best thing about working for the InterAgency Cooperation Division is that my jurisdiction is what I say it is, unless and until my boss calls me off the scent.”

“Josh,” Chang said, “we don’t have time to waste on this.”

He nodded and pulled out his cell phone. “You’re right.” He looked at Boyce. “I’m not kidding about your phone ringing, Mr. Boyce. But don’t worry about it. It isn’t about screwing your career. I just want to expedite this whole thing.”

“Hold on,” Boyce said.

Josh started scanning his contacts list.

Boyce rose from his chair, pulling out his own cell phone. “I said hold on. Just give me a minute, all right?”

Josh nodded. “All right.”

Boyce looked as though he expected them to leave the office to let him have a private conversation, but nobody moved. Finally he scowled and headed for the door, stepping out into the corridor and shutting the door behind him.

The moment it closed, Josh and Chang turned to Herskowitz. The man had been quiet and deferential with Boyce in the room, but now Josh saw a different person in his place. His gaze had hardened, his chin lifted in grim determination, and Josh realized that though he might work in an office, the man had been forged by his work in intelligence.

“Sean
was
murdered,” Herskowitz said. “Poison. But we don’t know a damn thing about who or why.”

Josh glanced at the door, hoping Boyce didn’t rush back. “You’re sure there’s nothing that would give us a lead?”

“Nothing,” Herskowitz replied. He seemed to be studying them, gauging how much he could say. “Do you really want to help Cait?”

“Yes,” Chang said, with a quick glance at Josh. “We really do.”

“I take it you realize there are some pretty powerful people who don’t want you to help her?”

“The people who are calling her a terrorist, for instance?” Chang said. “Yeah, we know. But we’re here, asking the questions they don’t want asked.”

“Why?” Josh asked, sitting forward in his chair. “Do you know where she is?”

Herskowitz wrestled with the question for several seconds, obviously weighing the risks to himself, perhaps even to his life, if he answered truthfully.

“No,” he said at last.

“Damn it—” Josh started.

Herskowitz stopped him with a look.

“But I know where she’s
going
to be.”