Masquerade (23 page)

He fell forward. His eyes closed, and he couldn't open them. Someone jerked away the shopping bag. Someone picked him up and dragged him back onto the sidewalk.

“Out of the car, lady!”

He heard sobs. Leslee. And then the squeal of tires and the stink of exhaust. But she was too late. They'd have her license number. They'd find her. What a fool he was. He'd lost everything after all. The world was different, and he'd mislaid his place in it.

Hughes Bremner was called into the DCI's office at Langley only minutes after he'd received confirmation from Sid Williams of Lucas Maynard's death, which gave him no time to savor it. He had no doubt the DCI's summons was about Maynard; word traveled with ballistic speed in Washington, especially when the news was that ATF agents had publicly killed one of your own people in a drug bust right on the State department's steps.

He was sure the director knew nothing about why Maynard had died, or about Langley's connection to Sterling-O'Keefe, or about M
ASQUERADE
, or about the imminent success of G
RANDEUR
on Monday. But Bremner was a prudent man, careful and cautious, and there was no hint of a smile on his patrician face as he entered Arlene Debo's office.

The first female director had been in office for a year, and the general consensus was she had bigger balls than most men. Her suite was on the elite seventh floor at Langley, the same floor as Bremner's, but her office had double the windows—two rows that met at a corner. Her view was so panoramic it seemed to extend all the way to the Lincoln Memorial. Of course, this was impossible, but the idea appealed to Hughes Bremner.

The two-room suite was decorated in antiques picked up as Debo had moved from office to office, rising in the National Security Agency and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. She was waiting for him behind her big mahogany desk, dressed in an expensive, tailored business suit. A square woman, smooth around the edges, she had gray hair, full cheeks, and an abundant chest. She gave the appearance of fluidity and solidity. A woman going places, but someone you could count on every step of the way.

When she gestured, Hughes Bremner took a seat in an armchair before her desk. Three large telephone consoles waited on a table beside her. Photos of her with the President, world leaders, and her family decorated the walls. On her desk stood stacks of striped folders with color-coded legends signifying the degree of sensitivity of the enclosed intelligence summaries from U.S. agents, assets, and satellites around the planet.

Arlene Debo's short forehead was wrinkled beneath her gray hair. “Can't you keep an eye on your people, Hughes?” she demanded. “Good lord, Lucas Maynard was pushing dope! And we didn't even catch him ourselves. Embarrassing as all hell. What have you got to say about it?”

“Absolutely right, Arlene.” Bremner nodded solemnly. “I put surveillance on Lucas a few days ago. I'd suspected something about him had changed.” He never underestimated her. Not only was she occasionally liberal, she kept introducing reforms into Langley's well-greased wheels. She was dangerous.

The DCI said nothing. She glowered and drummed her fingers on her mahogany desk.

Bremner continued, “Lucas had a lonely life, and his diabetes depressed him. He was near retirement age. What did he have to look forward to? Our pensions are generous, but not enough for a man who spent money like water. We heard he used prostitutes. High-class,
very
expensive ones, for what he liked done. So he went into drugs. I sent out our men with the two from ATF to make sure the arrest was handled properly, but Lucas drew his weapon. Hell, he killed one of the Treasury people. It was almost as if he was begging to be killed himself.”

The DCI pursed her lips. Again she said nothing. Bremner sensed she was trying to decide whether to discipline him for not overseeing his domain better.

But the DCI had more. She glowered again. “Why in hell haven't you contacted me about the Carnivore?”

“I have. There's nothing new. He and the woman have demanded to be brought in Sunday, and I've given orders to accommodate them.”

Arlene Debo pushed a computer printout across her desk. It was the Carnivore's latest deciphered revelation: Five years ago
the assassin had been hired to kill the president of Beni-Domo, a Japanese corporation that was also the world's dominant computer builder. The president's protégé had been Taru Mukogawa. It was he who had hired the Carnivore to kill the president, and when the president was dead, the younger man had taken over. Now Mukogawa was Beni-Domo president and chairman of the board. In Japan, where business was war, the cunning and ruthless Taru Mukogawa was considered the nation's most powerful businessman. Besides that, this week at his party caucus he'd announced his plans to run for Prime Minister.

Bremner had already read the deciphered message. It was good intelligence but had no direct bearing on him, Mustang, M
ASQUERADE
, or G
RANDEUR
.

“Beni-Domo plays hardball,” Arlene Debo rumbled. “For years their executives have obstructed U.S. companies from going into Japan. Every chance they get, they grab us by the short hairs.” She smiled, a crack in her stony exterior that revealed her savvy. “With our balance of trade with Japan sucking big time, this information was important for me to know instantly. It's leverage. When the time's right, we'll tell Taru Mukogawa what we know, and you can bet he'll make sure Beni-Domo—and Japan's Diet—give the United States what we want.”

What the DCI left unsaid, but Hughes Bremner realized, was she could easily have overlooked this information in the intense activities of her day. It was Bremner's job to bring critical intelligence to her attention, but he'd been distracted with M
ASQUERADE
and Lucas Maynard's disloyalty. Only by chance, because she'd spotted it herself, could she now take the information to the President and look good. It gave the United States an edge, especially if Mukogawa became Prime Minister. Someday it might even be leaked to the press. A scandal to bring a competitor nation up short was sometimes just what the United States needed.

Bremner had made a mistake. The DCI leaned forward, and her chin jutted. “Why in hell didn't you bring this to my attention? Are you getting sloppy?” Her voice was icy, and Bremner sensed hazardous shoals ahead. “I went out on a limb for
you with the President on the Carnivore business. He's still worried he'll hurt the ethical tone of his administration by giving that murderous assassin sanctuary. He'd much rather the Carnivore go to one of the other bidding countries. You know the agreement—”

“No leaks,” Bremner said quickly and smoothly. “I guarantee it. The press—the public—
no one
will ever know we're taking in the Carnivore. It's all under control—”

“Is it? When you neglect to bring to my attention something as basic as the Beni-Domo intelligence, I'm concerned. Don't give me any reason to be unhappy, Hughes. Believe me, before I let you fuck up the Carnivore's coming-in, I'll take it away from you, seniority or not—”

“I get the picture, Arlene.”

“Good. Memorize it.”

Leslee Pousho could still see the scene in her mind, a slow-motion horror film: Lucas stumbling down the steps, the men in dark glasses relentless in pursuit, the shock of pedestrians and tourists.

The men firing.

Lucas firing in return, his bullets hitting them.

And then that other man shooting Lucas from across the street. Killing him.

Hot tears streamed down her face. She'd see that scene and hear those words the rest of her life. She'd never escape it, but she could stop the treachery that had corrupted Lucas and eventually killed him. Treachery that could still kill her.

She said his words aloud, “I'm dead . . . go. . . . I'm dead . . . go.”

She hoped the sound would make her believe them. It had been no more than a half hour, and as she drove north from Washington she wanted him back with all the raw pain of fresh, appalling loss. Tomorrow when she'd begun to accept his death, she'd miss him even more. Next week, more than that.

But now she had to deal with the present, with what she had
to do next. Lucas had told her to get out of there. Leave before they got her, too. He'd said they'd get her license number.

She passed a Gold Star Rent-a-Car outlet. She had to get rid of her car. As she gazed back at the rental agency in her rear-view mirror, she had a glimpse of her white, drained face and terrified eyes. She lit a Pall Mall and inhaled deeply.

She thought about Lucas. He'd been a man of contradictions, and that perhaps more than anything was what she'd found appealing about him. When she'd first met him, he'd been like a granite boulder—heavy, immovable, trapped beneath too much flesh and too many wasted years. Their relationship had started with a fight.

She'd told him the disease was our government. It operated on a premise of corruption. Trade-offs lined pockets. Deals served the deal makers first, the constituencies last, if at all. Our government lied to us, their willing, gullible public.

Lucas fought back, but he'd already begun to question his own life. She was a born reformer, and he wanted to be reformed. She had a fine mind, accustomed to short shrift from men, but he respected and was attracted to her intellect. He actually wanted to understand her.

This was all new, and she found herself drawn to him like a struggling flower to the spring sun. He showered her with tenderness and respect, and she forgot his age, his health problems, his career, and fell recklessly in love.

In the end, as he'd been dying, he'd worried more about her than himself. Dear Lucas.

A flood of tears streamed down her cheeks.

Angrily she wiped them away. She knew what she had to do.

She got off the George Washington Parkway and returned to it, heading in the opposite direction. She abandoned her car in long-term parking at Washington National Airport, rented a new Ford Taurus from the most convenient agency, Avis, and drove back to her apartment in Arlington. With luck, it would be days before Langley found her Volkswagen stored in the packed garage.

She patrolled up and down her street. She saw no one
suspicious. She'd moved to this apartment only six months ago. She hoped a new address would be enough to delay Bremner from tracing her license plate immediately.

She parked behind the building and ran up the back stairs. Nervously she lit a cigarette. At last she unlocked the door. The apartment was empty, untouched. She pulled out a suitcase and threw in some clothes.

She wanted to scream. To run.

Instead she coolly put out her cigarette and closed the suitcase. She picked it up with one hand, and with the other she grabbed her briefcase. It was full from this morning. A morning that now seemed so long ago. A morning when Lucas had been alive. She'd kissed him and believed he'd soon be under the protection of State. Safe. Doing what needed to be done. And then they could be together forever.

Now he was dead, and she was running for her life. With her secret.

He'd had his secrets from her, and now she had one from him. She wished he knew: She'd been so appalled by Sterling-O'Keefe and M
ASQUERADE
that early that morning, when Lucas had left to telephone State, she'd taken his secret documents to her office and Xeroxed them. All of them.

A copy was inside her briefcase. And no one knew.

She locked the briefcase and suitcase in the trunk of her rental car. Her eyes moved constantly, watching. She returned to the apartment for her laptop computer, portable printer, paper, pencils, Rolodex, and groceries. She loaded everything into the Ford, got in, and nosed the car out of the parking lot.

Then she saw him. The man who'd killed Lucas. He was with another man, and they were cruising up the street in a worn Honda Accord.

She slid lower behind the steering wheel, grateful she'd had the sense to rent this car. They parked around the corner from her building and rolled out of the Accord. One headed up the building's front steps; the other strode down the walk toward the back.

She shook with a sudden palsy.

At last she got the car into gear and drove off, heading for
Georgetown, where she stopped at a pay phone. She called her boss at the
Washington Independent
and set up a meeting in twenty minutes at a café near the National Gallery of Art. She knew the café slightly; her editor knew it not at all. That was best. It reduced the chances of either being seen by acquaintances.

“Why?” the editor demanded from the safety of her newspaper office.

Tears streamed down Leslee's cheeks as she thought once more of Lucas. Her voice shook. “I have a story we have to take public. It could get me killed.”

Chapter 26

As morning light spread soft and pastel across Denver, Asher Flores drove and thought. Whom could he trust at Langley? He'd better stay away from anyone at covert ops. He wanted to help Sansborough find out what was going on with the Carnivore, and he wanted to warn Langley about Bremner. For a moment he felt the dreadfulness of Bremner's deceit. He'd admired Bremner and had affection for him. It wasn't easy to feel fondness for such a cold, intractable man. That made the treachery even worse.

“Who'd believe us if we took this to Justice or even to the President?” Sansborough was doing her own contemplating on the seat beside him. He liked the way she'd handled herself. She was a beginner, and killing was still a shock to her. He hated it himself. That's why he stayed out of black work. But this time he'd had no choice. Damn Hughes Bremner and Gordon Taite.

What in hell was Bremner up to?

“I doubt anyone at Langley, much less the President, would believe us,” Asher said, watching traffic for tails. “Bremner's a longtime member of Langley's inner circle. He's got family connections up and down the East Coast. One of his cousins was Secretary of the Interior, and the last Vice-President is his wife's cousin. Then you figure Bremner's got medical proof you're loony. As for me, he's got my file under review because, as he said, I took field ops into my hands once too often.”