The Inner Sanctum (14 page)

Suddenly Captain Nichols felt the incredible G-forces strain his entire body as the parachute opened, responding to the electric pulse from Commander Pierce's remote. His body flipped almost upside down against the snap of the ropes, then settled comfortably beneath the parachute, and he floated gently to the desert floor.

For several moments he lay on the sand beneath the chute, sobbing, then felt the material being pulled from atop his body and sensed someone kneeling down next to him. Then he heard the voice.

"You will remain silent on this matter for the remainder of your life. You will be incarcerated for six months, at the end of which time you will be dishonorably discharged from the military. You will accept that punishment without question. Any attempt by you to interfere with that exact course of events and the parachute will not open next time. Do you understand that, Captain Nichols?" Commander Pierce spoke calmly.

Nichols lifted his head slowly, still blindfolded. "Yes," he moaned. Then his head fell back to the sand and he blacked out.

Two hours later, just as dawn was breaking over the Nevada desert, Captain Nichols was back on base, physically no worse for wear. But his nerves would never be the same.

Pierce watched with satisfaction as Nichols was hustled into the cell by the men of his rogue group. The commander's lips curled into a quick smile. Malcolm Walker's Area 51 informant had been neutralized.

** Chapter 14

Jesse watched Todd from across the table as he salted his french fries. He was tall and well built, with a strong, tanned face framed by long brown hair. It wasn't a face that would ever grace the cover of Gentleman's Quarterly, but he had something. Perhaps it was the sheer force of his outgoing personality, his caring nature, the crooked smile, or the way he looked at her with those eyes. God, those eyes. They actually changed color and could be steel blue or dark green depending on the day. She found herself gazing at them, thinking about the possibilities, then looked away quickly. It couldn't be. That had been Becky's consistent advice.

"It's good to see you, Jess." Todd never pronounced the last e of her name.

"It's good to see you too."

"Did your mom tell you I stopped by last week?"

Instantly Jesse thought back to her own visit with her mother, and how the chance meeting with Father McCord and the discussion of her mother's money problems had reminded her so vividly of her stepfather.

"Are you all right, Jess?" Perhaps it was only his imagination, but she seemed distracted.

She nodded quickly. "Yes. It was nice of you to check in on her."

"Well, I'm just a prince of a guy, aren't I?" He laughed.

"Yes, you are," she said quietly. "How's everything going for you?" She knew about his dangerous hobbies.

"Great. Well, a few weeks ago I was jumping from a friend's Cessna and my chute didn't open until a thousand feet. I landed in the top of a pine tree, twisted my ankle, and ran into a feisty woodpecker who wasn't very glad to see me. The ankle is still a little sore, but otherwise I'm fine." One side of his mouth rose noticeably higher than the other as he smiled. "What about you, Jess? How's life for you?"

She knew about his inability to make commitments too. Still, after all this time she was dangerously attracted to that smile, though of course she could never tell him that. He might try to spark what had lingered just below the surface for so long, and that could prove disastrous. It might break the delicate balance of her emotions and bring everything tumbling out into the open.

"Jess?"

He had been there for her that terrible night twelve years ago. It didn't seem fair that he had to be precluded from being with her because he had been the one to help, the one who had cradled her as she cried. But Becky had assured Jesse it had to be that way, that Todd could not be anything more than a casual friend. Not if Jesse wanted to keep the hostility under control. Not if she wanted to keep it from her mother forever. Too much contact with the past and it would all come spilling out, Becky counseled over and over. And Todd was an intricate part of that past. Of that night.

Jesse grimaced. Becky would be upset to learn Jesse had come to Todd for help again and that there was a strong chance they would be seeing each other more than just infrequently now. But there seemed to be no other choice to Jesse. Once more, Todd was the one she had to turn to.

"Jess," Todd said loudly, "what's going on over there?"

She suddenly realized he was trying to get her attention. "What?"

"Where are you?"

"I'm sorry. I was thinking about something I have to do at work."

"I think you're just overwhelmed to see me again."

Jesse shook her head. She didn't want to give him an excuse to push. Or did she? Was that really why she had called him?

"Well, I guess we should get this over with." Todd reached down to his plate, picked up several french fries, and put them in his mouth, smiling as he chewed. "We go through it every time we get together. Which is not often enough, I might add. Of course, you'll get mad at me. But what the hell?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Can we start going out?" Todd's smile became wider as he saw her shake her head automatically. "See, I told you." He pointed at her. "I ask you the same thing every time we get together, and every time I ask, you say no."

"Todd, stop it."

"I think my problem is that you're dating those guys in suits and ties. You think they're the answer, but they aren't."

She looked away without responding.

"Enough of the boring bankers, Jess. You need somebody who doesn't sit behind a desk all day feeding irrelevant numbers into a computer."

"Todd, stop it!" Suddenly Jesse became aware that the other patrons were watching them curiously.

"What's wrong?" He was still smiling, enjoying flustering her.

"I called you because I need your help."

"And here I am, at your service, ready to leap tall buildings in a single bound."

"Be serious." Jesse folded her hands on the table in front of her plate. Perhaps it hadn't been such a good idea to call him after all.

"I'm sorry." He could see her irritation quickly turning to anger. "I just get a little crazy when I see you. You know that."

Jesse tried to hide her smile. He could always do this to her. She couldn't stay mad at him, no matter how hard she tried.

"Come on, Jess, who's your friend?" Todd smiled mischievously.

"Stop it." She felt her smile coming on again and didn't want to give him the satisfaction of seeing it.

"Who's your buddy?"

"Stop it."

"Who's your pal?"

She could fight it no longer. "You are." She put a hand to her face to cover her grin.

Todd laughed. "It would have been better if you had said you get a little crazy when you see me too, but I know you have a difficult time saying things like that."

"What do you mean?"

He pushed out his lower lip, as he always did when he was thinking deeply. "You're kind of uptight sometimes."

"I am not."

"Yes you are." He said it with such conviction there was no reason for her to protest any further. "But then you probably have a right to be."

He knew her so well. "I try not to be."

Todd picked up several more french fries. "You just need to spend more time with me. I'd loosen you up."

"I'm sure."

"What's that supposed to mean?" he asked quickly.

"Nothing."

Todd watched her for several seconds, tempted to push further. He had sensed an opening, a subtle signal from her that maybe she was finally ready to take a chance. But it was probably just his imagination. "What can I do for you?" His tone became businesslike for the first time since they had sat down. "I'd like to think you really did call just because you wanted to see me, but I have to believe there's another reason. You sounded a little jittery on the phone."

The words at the end of Robinson's memo flooded back to Jesse. Trust no one. But that was impossible. She couldn't follow up on Neil's memo completely by herself. She needed someone's help, and though Todd could be irresponsible and reckless at times, he was as trustworthy a human being as there was in the world.

"It might be dangerous," she said.

"Look at me--I'm shaking."

"I'm not kidding. It may involve some powerful people."

He nodded. Jesse wasn't prone to exaggeration, and he sensed this might be something more than just an active imagination. "Tell you what. Let's finish lunch, then take a walk."

"Okay."

They ate quickly, paid the lunch tab, and walked out of the diner. Five minutes later they were standing at the end of a long observation pier jutting out into Baltimore's harbor.

Todd leaned against the railing. "So, what's the deal?"

Jesse moved closer to him. A man seated on a bench twenty feet away seemed to be taking too keen an interest in their conversation, and she would take no chances that anyone other than Todd might hear this. "A few nights ago my boss, Neil Robinson, died of a heart attack in the lobby of the Grand Hyatt," she began quietly. "The next morning I received an E-mail message from him, sent on a delayed basis, asking for my help and citing a conspiracy he believed he had stumbled onto. He told me he had hidden a file at his river house, and I was to pick it up."

"Did you get it?"

"Yes."

"What was in it?"

Jesse looked at the man again, but he seemed to be paying no attention now. "Elbridge Coleman's personal and corporate tax returns for the last few years. And notes Neil had taken during a conversation with someone he doesn't identify. Apparently Neil had suspicions about Elbridge Coleman's election campaign."

Todd raised his eyebrows. A Senate election campaign. This might be interesting after all. "What kind of suspicions?"

"That Coleman is simply a front. That he's being funded by people in this country who want to get rid of the man currently holding the Senate seat Coleman is trying to win."

"You mean Malcolm Walker."

"Yes."

"Why would these people want to get rid of Senator Walker?"

"According to the notes, Neil believed the motive lies in the fact that Walker is an outspoken critic of the military. They want to get rid of him because he's waged war on the Defense Department since he was elected to the Senate six years ago."

"Waged war on the Defense Department. That's an interesting way to put it."

"Yes, I guess it is." Jesse smiled. "Anyway, he's been on a one-man crusade to hack the defense budget and has enjoyed some success during his first term. Neil wrote in his notes that he and his unnamed source believed Coleman was being funded by people friendly to the defense industry. People who would like to see the defense budget grow instead of shrink."

"Was Neil specific about who these people might be?"

"No."

"Was there anything else in the file?"

"No."

"That's it?" Todd was suddenly annoyed. "That's all you have? Just a few tax returns and your boss's notes?"

"Yes."

"Jess, I mean no disrespect to your boss, or to you for that matter, but I think he was just a little off his rocker." Todd held his thumb and forefinger so that there was a small space between them. "Look, people have suspicions all the time, but nine times out of ten, probably more, there isn't anything to them. Believe me, I see it constantly in my line of work. This is most likely one of those times. It's sad that he died, but you need to let him go."

"I would agree with you except . . ." Her voice faded.

"Except what?"

"Someone else came to Neil's house on the Severn the night I was there getting the file. I assume he was looking for the file as well. And this was not a friendly person."

"What do you mean?"

"The guy chased me through the woods to my car and shot out my windshield."

"My God, were you hurt?"

"Just some small cuts on my arms." She pulled up the sleeve of her blouse to show him the scabs.

"Do you think he saw your license plate?" Todd's skeptical tone disappeared.

"I don't think so. My headlights were in his eyes, and then I cut them as soon as I was past him."

"Did you report the incident to your superiors or the police?"

"No. I really didn't have anything concrete to tell them, and I figured someone might be able to trace me that way. If I filed a formal report, I mean."

He nodded. "Did you take your car into a shop to have the glass replaced?" Todd asked the questions rapidly.

"No. I didn't think that was a good idea either. I thought maybe someone could track me down that way too. Sara Adams, another woman in the branch, is giving me a ride to work. We live close to each other."

"I remember Sara. You introduced me to her last year when I came by your office."

"Oh, that's right."