McGarvey spent a couple of hours on one of the CIA computers trying to find Otto Rencke on several international Usenet news groups without luck. But he left word in enough places that he didn’t think it would take long for his friend to surface. It was a few minutes after eleven by the time he made it back to the hospital. The guard posted outside Liz’s room knew McGarvey but didn’t know where Kathleen had gone.
“She got out of here a half hotir ago, sir. Dick Yemm is with her, so if you want to know where she is right now I can call him.”
“Did she say when she was coming back?”
“No, sir.”
The hospital was very quiet at this hour. The nurses at the floor station across from the elevators talked in hushed tones. Liz was asleep, her television tuned to CNN, the sound very low. He watched her for several minutes, bile rising up in the back of his throat again thinking how close to dying she’d come, and finally feeling the pain of Jacqueline’s death hitting home. Doyle was right, he had been running away from commitments all of his life. If he had done what Jacqueline had wanted him to do, it would not have saved her life. But if he had forced the issue, forced her to stay in France, she would still be alive. At the time it had been another instance of ducking his responsibilities. He’d known in his heart of hearts why she followed him, what she wanted, and that was something he could not give to her. He was not husband material, not for Jacqueline, nor for Marta Fredericks, who’d lost her life chasing after him.
Liz stirred in her sleep, and McGarvey went to turn off the television.
“Don’t turn it off, it helps me sleep,” she said, groggily.
“Did I wake you, sweetheart?”
“I’ve been drifting in and out,” she said. “Just lying here is driving me nuts. When can I go home?”
“The doctor says in a couple of days. Can I get you anything?”
She smiled tiredly. “A Big Mac and a Coke.” Her expression suddenly darkened. “Jacqueline never had a chance, did she?”
“No.” McGarvey pulled a chair over to her bedside and sat down. He closed his eyes for a second, instantly reliving the moment when the bombs went off with a flash and bang.
Liz reached out and touched his face. “You look tired, Daddy. Maybe you should get some sleep.”
“I was on my way home. I just stopped by to check on you. Did your mother say where she was going?”
“Home to take a shower and change clothes. She said she’d be back in the morning.” Liz studied her father’s face for a long second. “Is Mom going to be okay? This has gotten to her pretty badly. She’s having a rough time of it.”
“She’ll be all right.”
“I don’t want to worry her, but I can’t change who I am.” She looked away. “After what you told us this morning, she can’t ask for that. It’s not fair.”
“Your mother sees it differently.”
“My mother is a manipulator,” Liz flared, and she instantly regretted the remark, her eyes suddenly filling. “Shit, what a dysfunctional family we are. Grandma and Grandpa were targeted by the Russians. Aunt Sally won’t talk to us. And my parents are divorced. What am I supposed to do, how am I supposed to act?”
“Take it easy, Liz.”
“If Mother were here, she’d make you say Elizabeth, not Liz.”
She wanted to continue being angry, but McGarvey grinned at her, which eased the mood.
“Are you taking over the DDO?”
One thing about his daughter, she never dwelled on any topic of conversation for very long. She’d been a dynamo from the moment she’d been born. “I told the general yes.”
“Thank God for that. With Ryan gone and you running the show upstairs, maybe the CIA will get back on track, because you’ve got to admit the Company has been dropping the ball a lot lately. Even I saw what was going down in Russia before anybody upstairs would admit there was a problem.” Liz blinked. “Whoever hit the restaurant is going to try again. They’ll probably go ballistic once the word gets out.”
He’d decided not to tell his daughter about the threats her mother had received on the phone. But Liz was bright enough to realize that they were in danger too. She’d seen the guards on the door and knew that her mother had left with one. “That’s a possibility we’re going to have to watch for.”
“As DDO you get a driver and a bodyguard, don’t you?”
“That’s my choice, but you’ve got a bigger one you’re going to have to face.”
Liz’s lips compressed and her eyes narrowed. She was digging in her heels, the same way her mother did when she knew she was going to be pressed on something disagreeable. “It’s the doctor’s call when I can get out of here and back to the Farm.”
“I want you to quit.”
“No way,” she said softly.
“Not the CIA, just fieldwork. I’ll put you on the Russian desk.”
“Where you can keep an eye on me.”
“That’s right.”
“What if I were a man?” she flared. “You’d jump at the chance to hire me, with my operational experience.”
“You’re not a man, and you’re not just somebody off the street, Liz.”
“That’s Mother talking. She wants me to get married, have babies and join the Junior League, take up tennis, volunteer for something.” Her voice was rising. “She wants me to settle down, and you want a son.”
The remark hurt. This was a lot worse that he’d thought it would be. “A son would have been nice,” he said slyly. “Of course, by now I would have taught him how to use a gun, how to defend himself, hand-to-hand combat, knives, clubs, fencing foils. He’d certainly know how to swear and spit and tell a good joke.”
She looked forlorn. “I can’t spit.”
He smiled, his heart filled with sadness for all the years he’d missed with her. “I was never good at it myself; Grandma and Grandpa didn’t approve.”
She raised her free hand to her eyes to hide her tears. “Oh, Christ, Daddy, I’m so scared. I don’t want to disappoint you or Mother.”
McGarvey got up, gently took her hand away from her eyes and wiped her tears with his handkerchief. “You could never disappoint us.” He kissed a spot on her forehead that wasn’t bandaged. “We love you for exactly who you are. And it’s I who’ve disappointed you, but I’m going to try to make it up to you, if you’ll let me.”
She held his hand tightly and searched his eyes. “I won’t quit,” she said in a small but defiant voice. “It’s what I am, what I want to do. Is that so wrong?”
“No, sweetheart, it isn’t,” McGarvey said tenderly. “I just wish you’d picked something else.”
“It’s what I wanted to be ever since I was a little kid in school. And I’m getting good performance reps at the Farm, at least as good as half the men.”
“You’re at the top of your class, and I’m proud of you, even if you’re just a girl.”
She finally managed a smile. “That part was your fault. I didn’t have anything to do with it.”
McGarvey looked at her for a long time, and he could feel his strength returning, flowing into his daughter by dint of his will. It wouldn’t heal her wounds, but it was all he could do for now. “I love you, Liz,” he said.
“I love you too, Daddy.”
“Now, I want you to get some sleep. I want you out of here as soon as possible.”
She nodded.
He kissed her forehead again. “Sleep, and that’s an order.”
“Yes, sir,” she replied, her eyes beginning to droop. “Maybe you should check on Mother. She could use a pep talk too.”
Sitting in his car in the country club parking lot across the street from Kathleen’s two-story colonial, McGarvey telephoned Dick Yemm’s mobile number. The Security Service agent’s van was parked half a block away. The upstairs bedroom lights were on, otherwise her house was in darkness.