Wrong Town: A Mark Landry Novel (16 page)

Forty-six

“And we are off the air,” barked the producer.

The bright lights went dark and the crew immediately began adjusting their equipment for the next interview.

“Thank you for your time, Senator McDermott.”

She nodded in his direction as she ripped the lapel microphone from her blouse and dropped it on top of the seat cushion. With her head held high, she strode out the door of the Capitol Building media room and headed down the long, marble corridor toward her office. She ignored the young assistant who was scurrying after her.

“Senator … wait … please. Senator, that was my fault. I should have prepped you.”

No response.

After several turns, they arrived at an office. The plaque on the wall next to the door read,
Senator L. McDermott – Connecticut.
Someone had drawn a smiley face on a yellow sticky note and placed it next to the plaque. She pulled it off, crumpled it in her hand, and tossed it onto her secretary’s desk as she entered the office.

“The minority leader’s office is on the phone,” announced the secretary.

“I’m not surprised,” answered McDermott as she passed the desk and headed toward her private office.

Once inside, she stood with her arms folded staring out the window. When the door closed she turned to face her chief of staff.

“I’d say that didn’t go very well. What do you think?” she asked sarcastically.

Thirty-year-old Meghan Sullivan bowed her head as she spoke.

“I’m sorry. That was my fault.”

“You fed me the line about skin in the game but you didn’t bother with some pretty basic fact checking.”

“I know. And I’m sorry. I’ll reach out to Johnson’s staff and smooth things over.”

“And what about the rest of the country? How do we smooth things over with the people who just watched me make a complete ass out of myself on national TV?” she asked rhetorically.

Meghan sat down on the only piece of furniture besides the Senator’s desk and chair, a small loveseat tucked into the corner of the tiny office. She removed her bargain-basement pumps and rubbed her aching bare feet into the thick carpet for a few moments before answering.

“Mom, I said I was sorry. It won’t happen again.”

Senator McDermott shook her head and thought out loud as she sat back in the soft leather chair left behind by her predecessor.

“Sure, I’ll run for office. The Senate? Why not? How hard can that be?”

Meghan groaned.

“You’re doing fine, Mom. It’s your assistant who needs work. I feel horrible, but I promise I’ll do whatever damage control I can to keep a mistake from becoming a tragedy.”

Tragedy. McDermott bristled at the word. For more than a decade, rarely had a day passed without her having to hear her name in the same sentence as that word.

“I know you will. And you can start by dealing with the minority leader’s office. If they ask for me personally, tell them I’ve left the country.”

“Will do. But please don’t leave the country without me. You’re all I have.”

When Meghan closed the door behind her, the Senator kicked off her shoes under the desk and reached for the framed picture that sat next to her computer monitor. She and her husband Jack stood side by side, bookended by their beautiful twin girls.

You would have been so proud of her, Jack. She’s been my rock.

And then the highlight reel started to play again in her head.

She is at home catching up on housework. The girls are at school. The phone rings. It’s Jack. Lots of noise and commotion in the background. A poor connection, but she’s able to make out the words “I love you” and “tell the girls.”
The phone goes dead.

She tries unsuccessfully to call him back. She paces until the phone rings again. A panicked friend asks, “Are you watching this?” She turns on the television to see images of the Twin Towers engulfed in flames. People are leaping to their deaths. Jack’s remains are never identified.

Grief turns to frustration and anger. She walks for peace at countless antiwar rallies alongside her two girls, their fingers tightly entwined.

“This is the toughest thing you will ever have to deal with,” her therapist says mistakenly. …

“Are you watching this?” asks a different friend a few years later.

Images of an elementary school on lockdown. A gunman on a mass killing spree. Caroline, a first-year special-needs teacher, is killed while shielding her students. A mother stands over the bullet-riddled body of her daughter.

The only hand left to hold is Meghan’s.

More protests and demonstrations. Antiwar. Gun control. Transparency. A silent activist becomes a nationwide keynote speaker. The speaker becomes a candidate with no chance. Another school shooting two days before the election. The underdog rides into office on a wave of public emotion.

Now what?

Staffing. Budgets. Arcane Senate procedures. D.C. power politics. Whispers behind her back.

“Do you really think someone with no experience or political capital can make a difference inside the beltway?” asks the Sunday morning broadcast journalist.

“Yes. If I can prevent one mother from losing her child in a school shooting—if I can prevent one foreign intervention that preserves American service members’ lives and avoids the inevitable terrorist attacks on American soil that come in response to those interventions—then I will have made a difference. It’s that simple.”

She quickly establishes herself as one of the National Rifle Association’s top public-relations threats. The spotlight intensifies. Jealous peers join in on the endless criticism. Hurtful lies. Sexism. Death threats.

Armies of private detectives and journalists digging for any hint of scandal or impropriety. Meghan’s husband exposed as a philanderer. She is publicly humiliated. They quickly divorce. He leaves her with nothing but his last name.

More death threats. The Democratic Party’s solution? Increased security. Surrounded by men with guns. Hypocrite.

From the other side, it’s standing ovations and endless condolences. Speaking offers. Book deals. All blood money as far as she is concerned. No, thank you.

I don’t want sympathy. I want to save lives.

The Senate Minority Leader rejects her letter of resignation and counters with a coveted seat on the Senate Committee on Armed Services. She accepts.

Jack always said to follow the money. She does, and she finds tens of millions of dollars funneled to classified units with funny names and phony addresses. Organizations with weaponry, operatives, and no oversight. Illegal entities run by criminals. Door after door gets slammed in her face. Stern warnings. Disconnected calls.

“For the love of God, I’m on the fucking Armed Services Committee! Don’t tell me this is need-to-know! Hello? Hello?”

She contemplated reaching for the locked jewelry box in the bottom drawer of the desk and stealing a quick glance at the photo she had kept secret for decades. A knock at the door brought her back to the present. The secretary popped her head around the door.

“It’s time for your security briefing, Senator. Whenever you’re ready.”

McDermott dusted off the frame and returned the picture to its place on the desk.

“Send them in.”

Let’s see who wants to kill me today.

Forty-seven

“Who was the nutjob standing behind us back there?” asked Mark.

Andy slowly maneuvered his jeep past a public works crew and briefly exchanged pleasantries with the two cops on detail.

“I’ll have to introduce you to those two guys sometime. Great guys.”

As he cleared the construction, he sped up and glanced at Mark.

“The idiot behind us at the Witch Hunt was William Lundgren.”

“The village idiot?” asked Mark.

“One of them. People who know him say he’s harmless – all talk. But he scares the shit out of me sometimes. Check out his video blog when you get a chance and you’ll get to hear his unfiltered wisdom on everything from immigration to Islam.”

“I think I’ll pass.”

Andy reached across Mark’s chest and pointed his finger out the passenger’s side window at the freshly mowed open field in the center of town.

“Founders Field. Remember, on July 4th my football players, other students, and I will be celebrating the town’s veterans. I expect you to be there.”

“You have my support, but please don’t ask me to participate. It’s nothing personal, Andy. I just can’t do it.”

“I figured you’d say something like that. What exactly is it that you do anyway?”

Mark took a moment to admire Founders

Field. Groundskeepers were planting fresh flowers while others trimmed branches from the few scattered trees.

“I can’t really talk about it much, Andy. But it’s nothing exciting. A lot of paperwork. Meetings. Typical bullshit like any other job.”

Andy laughed out loud and pounded two beefy hands on the steering wheel.

“My ass it is! You’re good, man. You’re very good at downplaying. I’ll give you that.”

Mark smiled and shook his head.

“You have no idea what you’re talking about. Regardless, it may not matter for very much longer. I might be ready to retire and settle down back here.”

“Interesting. And would Luci play a role in you settling down, Mr. Landry?”

“I hope so. But it’s not easy. She’s really making me work for it and I can’t say I blame her.”

Andy nodded slowly with an ear-to-ear grin.

“She’s worth it, Mark. She’s an extraordinary woman.”

Mark squinted and looked at his friend sideways.

“Dude, it sounds like you might have a little crush on her yourself.”

Andy turned onto Chestnut Lane and let the jeep coast down the hill toward Mark’s house.

“Mark, every man who knows Luci has a crush on her. She’s gorgeous, smart as hell, tough, and genuinely cares about people. Do the work. She’s worth it and I’d love to see you two living happily ever after right here in town.”

Mark unbuckled his seatbelt, hopped out of the jeep, and walked around to the driver’s side.

“I’ll be home watching the Sox game later on if you’d care to join me,” Andy offered.

“Okay. I’ll let you know. I’m not much of a sports fan but I appreciate the offer.”

“So what the hell do you watch? News?”

“No.
Magnum
,” answered Mark.

“You do know there’s much better shows on these days than
Magnum P.I.
reruns, right?”

“Let me ask you something, Andy. That idiot back there got me thinking. I’ve seen some of the online comments and threats Luci gets over at the
Valley Insider
. She doesn’t seem too worried about it, but they are definitely pretty extreme. You know the people in this town better than anyone. What do you make of it?”

“Yeah, it bothers me too, but I wouldn’t put too much stock in anonymous comments. People can be idiots, especially when they feel threatened. The demographics of the town are changing; that’s just the natural evolution of things. You can’t stop it, but it will certainly change the local culture and that scares people. It’s always been that way. Like I said before, none of it’s really new.”

Andy stuck his head out of the jeep and backed out of the driveway as Mark climbed the steps and entered the house through the side door.

Forty-eight

Frank Tagala held the full report of the Russian arms deal in his hands and resisted the urge to scream. Fifteen printed pages of typed content littered with marks from Ashton Brown’s red pen. Fix this. Change that. Check your spelling. Be more specific.

You gotta be fucking kidding me.

He stuffed the report into his bag along with a laptop and headed for the elevator. Classified information was not supposed to leave the office, but if he made the corrections at home he could at least have a cocktail or two at the same time. But first he had to make a quick stop in the basement of the building where evidence is secured until trial.

Might as well add the serial numbers to the report and save Professor Brown some red fucking ink.

When the elevator door opened, he turned right and headed to the door at the end of the hall. He pushed the ringer and, a few seconds later, heard a voice from the small speaker mounted on the side of the door.

“Yes, may I help you?”

“Frank Tagala.”

“Ah, yes. Agent Tagala. May I see your credentials, please?”

Frank held his middle finger up to the tiny surveillance camera embedded in the top of the speaker.

“Thank you very much. You may enter,” said the voice.

The door jamb buzzed and Frank pushed his way into a small room with an additional security checkpoint. A heavy-set man sat at a desk on the other side of a reinforced chain-link fence.

“Good afternoon. May I help you, Agent Tagala?” he asked.

“Just open the fucking door. I’m not in the mood.”

“All right. All right. Hold your water, Frank,” he replied.

The cage door buzzed and Frank approached the desk.

“Bob, I need to see the hardware I brought in a few weeks ago.”

“From Russia with love? No problem. Third aisle. About halfway down on the left.”

“What are you doing, right now?” Frank asked.

“What does it look like I’m doing? I’m working my ass off here. Why? You need some help?”

“I’ll be out of your hair quicker if you write down the serial numbers as I read them off. I’ll owe you a beer. What do you say? Can you help an old friend on his way out of the agency?”

“Forget the beer. You getting out of my hair and the agency are reward enough.”

Frank waited patiently as his longtime colleague slowly wobbled his way down the aisle.

“Here they are. Right where I said.”

He unlocked the secured crates and stood ready with a notepad and pencil. Frank picked up the first AK-47, pulled the bolt to the rear to verify that it was unloaded, and read the serial number out loud.

“Slow down, Frank. These sausage fingers don’t work so well these days.”

Most of Frank’s patience was used up before he got through the serial number from the final AK-47.

“Okay, that’s it for the Kalashnikovs. Where are the Sigs?”

“I don’t know.”

“What do you mean, you don’t know?” Frank asked.

“They’re not here.”

“What do you mean, they’re not here? Where the fuck are they?”

“No idea. Not my job to keep track once they leave my facility.”

“When did they leave your facility?” asked Frank in an increasingly annoyed tone.

“A few days ago.”

“Are you going to tell me why and how, or are we going to play twenty fucking questions?”

The fat man sat down on top of an evidence crate and paused briefly before answering.

“I’m not supposed to say anything to anyone about it. But our fearless leader Ashton Brown and his right nut, Special Agent Stevenson, came in here a few days ago and took the Sigs. When I asked why, Stevenson started saying something about a sting operation. Mr. Ivy League cut him off and told me in no uncertain terms it was not my concern. Which is true. My job is to check shit in and out. So I checked them out and haven’t thought about it since.”

Frank rubbed his wrists and cracked his knuckles.

What the fuck do they need those for? What sting operation?

“Look, Frank. Seriously, don’t let anyone know I told you that. You’ve got only a few weeks left, but some of us still have a few years until retirement.”

Frank thought silently for a few moments. Then he leaned down and patted his colleague’s large potbelly.

“Don’t sweat it, Bob. It ain’t my problem either. Thanks for the help. I’ll let myself out.”