The Last Justice (34 page)

McKenna made his way to Colin's headstone. Kneeling on the damp ground, he pushed aside some tall grass near the stone, but there was no package. He ran his hand over the smooth white stone and was brought back momentarily to their last hug, when his little boy had died in his arms at the hospital.

Colin's weak voice whispered in his head: Ire you stealing my good, Daddy?

He lingered there for another moment, then moved to Isabel's headstone. Again he searched the grass, but there was nothing. Either the agents had found the package or the messenger had never delivered it. No matter-it was time to turn himself in.

Kissing his hand, he touched the stone and said, "I'm obviously doing really well without you, Isabel. I miss you." Then he stood up, and was turning to leave when his eye caught something next to a miniature American flag planted near Isabel's father's gravestone.

The package.

It was a brown envelope wrapped in a plastic bag, protecting it from the rain. McKenna tore open the top. He was reaching inside when a voice stopped him.

"Hello, Jefferson."

A man with a pockmarked face and camouflage hunting jacket was walking toward him.

Hart Senate Building, Capitol Hill

he Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing on the six nominees to the high court was about to begin. To expedite the proceedings, the eighteen committee members had agreed to forgo their traditional opening statements, which, in past hearings, had taken a full day.

By agreement, there would be no harsh questions, no witnesses for or against the nominees, no written report to the full Senate. It would be a perfunctory rubber-stamp session, a throwback to the days before the nomination process had become so politicized.

The six nominees sat in a row in comfortable seats at a large table draped with bright red skirting, facing the senators. A dozen press photographers knelt in front of the nominees, clicking frantically away before the hearing began.

Chairman Tye Goldman, a Republican senator from Florida, sat tall against a backdrop of the Senate seal affixed to the marble wall behind him. He adjusted his microphone, signaling that he was about to begin, and waited as the room came to order. He looked out at the full hearing room. Behind the nominees were their family members and the "Sherpas" assigned to guide them through the process, and members of the press filled the long tables to the far left and right of the room.

"Good morning," Chairman Goldman said, waiting another moment for silence. "Today we are gathered for a historic event: the hearing to address the president's nominees for chief justice of the United States and associate justices of the U.S. Supreme Court. We welcome the nominees and their families."

The six nominees thanked the chairman.

Goldman took a sip of water and said, "I'd like to begin this hearing by acknowledging the families of our fallen heroes. If you could please stand ..." The families of the justices killed on Black Wednesday stood up in the gallery, and the room filled with applause.

When the clapping subsided, Chairman Goldman said, "I hope you know the pride and gratitude the nation feels for the great role your loved ones played in safeguarding our democracy. If they were here, I think they would be proud of the bipartisan effort and unparalleled cooperation that resulted in these fine individuals being chosen to continue their legacies."

There was more applause.

"Having had the privilege to know some of the late justices personally, I can say that they would appreciate that we are expediting this process and forgoing the usual practice of allowing each member of the committee to provide an opening statement."

Light laughter filled the room.

"Now, before we begin, I would also like to acknowledge that there are some who have been critical of this proceeding and complain that we should have several days, or even weeks or months, of hearings for each of these fine nominees. The argument for that approach, as I understand it, is that the hearing today and vote in the Senate tomorrow are happening at an unprecedented speed and pursuant to an unusual bipartisan agreement. I disagree. I'm reminded of a story about Abraham Lincoln." Chairman Goldman paused for effect.

"In 1862, there was a vacancy in the high court, and members of the House and Senate came together and nearly all signed a petition urging Lincoln to nominate a man named Samuel Miller to the Supreme Court. There was no partisan battle or media circus then. And it didn't take weeks for the president or the Senate to act. After getting the petition, Lincoln nominated Miller, and the Senate confirmed him by voice vote-thirty minutes later. I say this to stress that today's bipartisan effort is not unprecedented. It harks back to a day when what mattered was not politics, not opinion polls. Rather, what mattered was whether the nominee was the best person for the job. Certainly that is the case with the nominees today. So without further ado, I welcome Cynthia Edward King, Brook Paterson, Ivan Petrov, Victoria Prado, Henry Stanbery, and Reuben Walworth, our distinguished nominees for the United States Supreme Court, the greatest court in the world, in the greatest country in the world."

Arlington National Cemetery, Virginia

he knife darted toward McKenna's chest. He managed to dodge it, only to set himself up for a hard punch to the base of the jaw, knocking him to the ground. When he came to seconds later, a blurry figure was kneeling over him, the knife upraised. With his knee bent and his foot against the turf, he thrust himself aside, and the dagger sank into the dark sod.

Pivoting, McKenna punched his attacker in the groin as his other hand pulled the gun from his waistband. But the blow did not slow down his attacker, who grabbed McKenna's hand and slammed it against the gravestone, and the gun went flying.

McKenna scrambled after the weapon, while the other man clawed at his legs. He kicked out and felt his foot connect, and heard a grunt.' with the pistol not three feet from his grasp, he felt a sharp pain in his calf

Suddenly, the man was on top of him, straddling his midsection, plunging down with the blade. McKenna bucked, and as his attacker fought to keep his balance, the knife hand veered in mid thrust, long enough for McKenna to grasp the man's wrist, stopping the blade from coming down on him. The blade quivered in the air just inches from McKenna's throat. The assassin put all his weight into it, pressing the blade toward home, and McKenna felt the bite on his neck.

"Time for you to go see your dead bitch and gimp son," he said.

McKenna took in the words, staring into the empty, soulless eyes. He was not going to die this way ... not here . . . not like this. He guided the blade rightward and pitched his attacker off and onto the wet grass. Still holding the knife hand tight, he felt the man's wrist torque backward, and the blade fell beside him. He jumped on top of the man and began hitting him rhythmically with both fists, breaking the nose, unhinging the jaw, pounding blindly.

He stopped only when he realized that his opponent was no longer moving. Standing, he again felt the sharp pain in his left calf as he limped over to the package. As he picked it up and turned to go, something moved in his peripheral vision. The man in the camouflage jacket had crawled to the gun, which lay against Colin's headstone. His face soaked in blood, he took a shot.

McKenna dove to the ground and scrambled toward the knife which still lay nearby. He heard another shot, and jumped to his feet. Before the next shot came, he charged toward his attacker.' man with the pockmarked face directed the gun at McKenna, but before he pulled the trigger McKenna dropped onto him, driving the knife into his chest.

He heard shouting. A hundred yards out, several men in blue windbreakers were running toward him. With the package tucked under his arm, he hobbled toward the cemetery's entrance.

Limping across a courtyard to a retaining wall at the front entrance, he fell to the sidewalk, dizzy and exhausted. His left pant leg and both sleeves were bloody. He could hear sirens, and someone was calling his name.

"Jefferson!"

Squinting, he saw the blurry outline of something big and round and redder even than the blood on his clothes.

"Jefferson!" Aiden Porter said, opening the visor of his motorcycle helmet. "Can you hold on?"

McKenna nodded, and Aiden helped him up onto the back of the motorcycle, kicked the bike into gear, and roared away as men in blue windbreakers ran yelling after them.

Wilson High School, Brooklyn, New York

etective Assad wondered how many mold spores he was sucking in with every breath in the dank, musty basement. They had pored over volume after volume of high school yearbooks, scanning the pages for any mention of Britney Goodhart, flipping page after page of proms, basketball games, and smiling headshots.