“I’m sorry, Becca, but there’s not going to be any forever yet,” Thomas said. “Krimakov got what he wanted. I’m out in the open now. The problem is that you still are, too. Now I’m going to make that call.” Thomas walked out of the hospital room, his head down, deep in thought, as he pulled out his cell phone.
The Feds arrived forty-five minutes later.
The first man into the room came to a fast stop and stared. He cleared his throat. He straightened his dark blue tie. He looked as if he wished his wing tips were shinier. “Mr. Matlock, sir, we didn’t know you were involved, we had no idea, didn’t know she was related to you-”
“No, of course you didn’t, Mr. Hawley. Do come in, gentlemen, and meet my daughter.”
He leaned over her and lightly touched his fingertips to her cheek. “Becca, here are two guys who want to talk to you, not batter you like the NYPD detectives, just talk a bit. You tell them when you’re tired and don’t want to talk anymore, okay?”
“Yes,” she said, her voice so thin Adam swore she was fading away right before his eyes. If he hadn’t been worried sick, Adam would have enjoyed watching Thomas turn his power onto the FBI guys, but he didn’t. Now Adam wondered how Thomas knew Tellie Hawley, a longtime FBI guy who had a reputation for eating crooks for breakfast. He never cut anyone any slack. He was sometimes very scary, sometimes a rogue, admired by his contemporaries and occasionally distressing to his superiors.
“Hey, Adam,” Hawley said. “I guess I’ll find out soon enough why you’re here. Where’s Savich?”
“He and Sherlock will be in a bit later.” Adam nodded then to Scratch Cobb, a tough-looking little man who wore elevator shoes that brought him up to Adam’s chin. He got his nickname years before, when it was said that he scratched and scratched until he found the answers in a high-profile case. “Scratch, good to see you again. How’s tricks?”
“Tricks is good, Adam. How’s it going, my boy?”
“I’m surviving.” Adam took Becca’s hand and lightly squeezed it. He leaned close and whispered in her ear, “The guy standing to the left has hemorrhoids. The big one with the mean eyes, Hawley, will want to cross the line, but he doesn’t dare try it, not with your dad here. Actually, he has five dogs and they rule his house. Now, go get ’em, tiger.”
If she were a tiger, she thought, she was a very pathetic one, not worthy of the name, but still-She smiled, she actually smiled. “Hello, gentlemen,” she said, and her voice wasn’t as paper-thin now. “You wanted to speak to me?”
“Yes,” Hawley said, stepping forward. Adam didn’t move, just smiled a feral smile at him that could make a person’s teeth fall out.
“Adam, I’m not going to bite her. I’m a good guy. I work for the U-nited States government. You don’t have to stand guard.”
“I’m supposed to be protecting the lady, Tellie. The thing is, I screwed up, and the bad guy got her, drugged her, and dumped her right in front of One Police Plaza.”
Hawley nodded, then said, “Okay, so you’re not going to budge.” Hawley continued smoothly, coming one step closer, watching Adam from the corner of his eye. “This guy who kidnapped you and drugged you and put you out of his car, who is he?”
“I don’t know, Mr. Hawley. If I did, I would have announced it to the world via CNN. You know that I reported his stalking me, calling me, threatening to kill the governor. It started in Albany and he followed me to New York. Then he killed that old woman in front of the Metropolitan Museum.”
“Yes,” Tellie Hawley said, and he shifted from his left foot to his right. “But what we want to know is who this guy is, why he tried to kill the governor. We need to know why and how you’re involved in all this-”
Adam said very quietly, “The governor was shot, just like the guy threatened to do, and then the aide to Governor Bledsoe turned out to be the one who told the cops that Becca was an obsessed liar. He was murdered. Did you know that, Tellie? Did you know that the guy who killed him ran him down in a car he’d stolen in Ithaca, after he’d murdered the owner? Did you know that the cops have impounded that car with its dark-tinted windows so no one would be able to identify him when he ran down Dick McCallum? Hey, do you and your fed techs realize that you can go crawl all over it right now?”
“Yeah, okay, we know all that.”
“Then why are you pretending it didn’t happen?”
“We’re not pretending it didn’t happen,” Hawley said, his hands fisted, anger creeping up over his shirt collar to redden his neck. “But there’s no damned reason for him to have picked Ms. Matlock out of the blue, that he targeted someone as unlikely as she is. It only makes sense that she must know something, that she must be aware of his identity, have some idea who he is and why he’s doing this. This is big, bad stuff, Adam, and she’s slap-dab in the middle of it. I hear there’s all sorts of doings in the CIA, but I can’t find out what’s going on. I’ve heard that it involves this case, but no one will tell me anything, even my bosses. Let me tell you that it burns my ass to be kept on the outside. Now back off, Adam, or I’ll burn your ass before they get mine.”
Thomas stepped up. “I wanted to avoid this but now I don’t see a choice. I believe it’s time for official talks. You people haven’t been let in on what’s going on here, and it’s time.”
Thomas raised his hand when all of the men would speak at once. “No more hotdogging, Adam. Mr. Hawley, if you like, you and Mr. Cobb here can come to Washington. We’re going to be meeting with the director of the FBI and the director of the CIA, that is, if I can manage to get the two of them in the same room without bloodshed. I’ll have to pick a meeting place where neither of them will get his nose out of joint.”
Hawley gaped at him. “Both the CIA and the FBI? But why? I don’t understand, Mr. Matlock.”
“You will,” Thomas said. “Now, go make arrangements to come to Washington, if your bosses want you to stay involved.”
“We’re New York FBI, Mr. Matlock,” said Tellie Hawley. “Of course we’ll stay involved. We’re the primary players. I’ve heard that there’s some really, really deep shit going down and Cobb and I want to be part of it.”
“Just call the director’s office in a while and find out when and where.”
After the FBI guys had left, champing at the bit to find out what was going down, Thomas closed the hospital door and turned to Becca. “No way will they be allowed to come to Washington, but at least we got rid of them for a while. Now it’s time to play with both the big boys, not just Gaylan Woodhouse. I’m hoping he’ll see reason and get Bushman at the FBI to work on it. Everyone needs to know what’s going on now.”
“First thing,” Adam said, “is for Savich to find that apartment Krimakov rented. Then we send our own people over to Crete and take the place apart.”
“Agreed,” Thomas said. “Let’s do it. Now, Becca, Tommy the Pipe, Chuck, and Dave will all be here to protect you until we get back.”
“No,” Becca said, coming up on her elbows. “I’m coming with you.”
“You can barely walk,” Adam said. “Lie back and calm down. No way our people will let him get near you again.”
“No more orders, Adam. Now, sir, there’s no way you’re going to face this alone.” Becca calmly pulled the IV lines from her arms. She pushed back the hospital sheets and swung her legs over the side of the bed. “Give me another drink of water, ask Sherlock to buy me some clothes, and we’re out of here. An hour. That’s all I need.”
“I think,” Thomas said slowly, stroking his long fingers over his chin, “that there is perhaps a bit too much of me in you.”
Becca grinned at him. “That’s what Mom told me, many times.”
“Then I’d best clear your leaving town with our local cops,” Thomas said, and wanted to pat her cheek, but didn’t because she wasn’t a little girl anymore and she barely knew him. The thought of that made him clear his throat.