The Test (31 page)

Conrad Welton paced the confines of his townhouse on Rittenhouse Square. The property he'd once thought spacious now felt claustrophobic. But soon he'd be back in the Parnell mansion. He'd just got off the phone with C. W. Crane. Ashley had been confirmed alive, in New Mexico. A car was now on its way to take Welton to the airport, and he'd be with Ashley by late that afternoon. All he had to do now was contain his excitement and postpone the wrath he'd focus later on Crane.

“Take her out of that house, by force, now,” he'd ordered his investigator.

But Crane had balked. “No way, doc,” he'd said. “I'll keep her under surveillance. Once you get here you can do whatever you want, but I'm not risking my license on an abduction charge.”

When the phone rang, Welton grabbed it, picking up his overnight bag. “Be right down.”

“Dr. Welton, it's Crane. I have bad news for you. The Parnell woman is missing.”

“Missing? Missing, like where?”

“I can't answer that, doc. She must have left during the night. I arranged for surveillance starting at five in the morning. Everything was quiet. Then around eight thirty there's company at the place. One of the Parnell brothers arrives with a P.I. from Philly. Name's Jack Preston. Guy with a good rep.”

“I don't give a fuck about anybody's reputation but yours,” replied Welton. “I'm paying top dollar. You're supposed to be the best. Right? You tell me you have Ashley under surveillance. Now you tell me she's missing? You better explain that. Better than that, find her!” Conrad was
shouting. His body started to shake and he felt a surge of pain starting in his neck and spreading to his left temple.

“Only a matter of time. I just wanted you to know so you wouldn't rush down here. Could be she's left the area. I talked to the woman where she was staying. She's pretty shaken. Won't say much. But does admit that it was Ashley, her nanny, that is.”

“Nanny?” Welton yelled. “Find her.” He tossed the phone onto the couch. With one hand he massaged his neck. This stress was not helping his already elevated blood pressure. His racing heart meant he had to get into a relaxation space.

When he reached the bedroom, Conrad put a cool compress on his forehead and began the self-hypnotic routine. After a minute, the phone rang. He let it ring and tried to deepen his trance until he could no longer ignore the pounding on his front door.

“Dr. Welton, your limousine is waiting, sir,” the doorman reported. “I tried calling up, but—”

“Dismiss it,” Welton ordered. He needed time to think, but first he had to concentrate on getting rid of the throbbing pain in his neck. He returned to the softness of his bed and attempted to reenter his trance. He checked the time: eleven a.m.

It was one p.m. when Conrad awoke, comfortable and pain-free. His heart rate was slow and steady. Calmer now, he showered and changed from his dress slacks and sports jacket to jeans. He checked his pulse. Again, he reminded himself that he must control his rage. Rage triggered symptoms. Physical or psychological, he wasn't sure. He'd seen a cardiologist who'd ordered more tests.

Taking a deep breath, he called Crane. “What do we know?”

“She took off in her boss's car.” Crane's voice sounded confident. “She bought gas and food at a convenience store. We don't know where she's headed.”

“What do the Parnells know?”

“Not more than I do, doc,” Crane said.

“Have you talked with them? Their investigator?”

“No. Do you want me to?”

“Why not? We all want to find her, don't we?”

Welton didn't care who found Ashley. All he wanted was to get her
in close proximity to him. He'd implanted enough threatening suggestions that once she was back with him, it would be easy to enforce those messages. This time there'd be no excuses, no delays. They'd head immediately to Nevada, where they wouldn't have to wait for a license. His plan for the rest of the greedy Parnell family was ready to activate. With Ashley so unreliable, he couldn't afford to rely on her performance on the test. He had no choice but to eliminate her competitors.

“It would help, doc, if you suggest to the Parnells that we team up.”

“I'd call the senator, but you said he's already down there.”

“No, doc, it's the other brother, the one from Florida, Dan Parnell.”

“What?” Welton did not think that Dan had the commitment to get involved. Wasn't he a recluse? Then he remembered his aggressive son. And how Dan had forced Conrad out of his home.

“I'll call the senator. You find Ashley. Lean on Ruth Campbell,” Conrad instructed. “Ashley would trust her, more than her family.” She must have gone to New Mexico to be near her friend. When Conrad put the call into Frank's office, he was put on hold, then told that the senator was in Florida.

“At the Parnell home?” he'd asked.

“Um, sorry, sir, can't say.”

Welton called Crane back to tell him to verify whether or not Frank was staying at the family compound. If so, his job just became that much easier.

“So much for healthcare reform.” Two of Frank's aides and their boss packed up after a briefing session on the Healthcare Task Force. Frank was a member, but like his other responsibilities, he'd let his participation lapse and was now catching up. “Not a surprise with the focus on security and intelligence.”

The aides nodded in agreement as their briefcases snapped shut.

“We have to push for drugs for seniors,” Frank said, reaching for a handful of cashews. Once he had emerged from the deepest valley of depression, he'd started to gain weight. So back on Atkins. “The Clintons could have had this thing wrapped eight years ago. Healthcare was the focal point of their campaign, for crying out loud.”

“Right, Senator,” the young man said. “Dropped that ball like a hot potato.”

“I'd better stop my tirade. Judicial Committee's in forty-five minutes.” Frank rose to usher the pair out of his office. He'd been on the phone much of the morning about homeland security. He felt behind the curve since September eleven, but he was determined to catch up and earn his $150,000 annual salary.

His intercom buzzed. “Matt's here,” his secretary announced. “With lunch. If you can call what he's got for you lunch.”

Matt balanced a tray with a club sandwich surrounded by chips for him; a huge bowl of lettuce, a small plate of crisp bacon strips and slices of yellow cheese for his boss; a plate of dill pickles and two cans of Diet Coke. “I've got some stuff you ought to see.” Matt laid out the food on the conference table. As Frank doused his salad with blue cheese dressing, he guessed the “stuff” was family, not congressional.

“Your sister. You know that Preston tracked her to a train headed for
Beaumont, Texas. She bought a ticket in El Paso with cash, but she left the train in Sanderson, Texas. Then he lost her trail. Dan stayed in New Mexico, and Preston went to Sanderson, but—”

“Beaumont? There's nothing there but oil rigs. And Sanderson? What's going on there?”

“Beats me,” said Matt. “Dan had no clue, either. But we have some new info. Jack talked to a woman who sat next to Ashley on the train. Identified her from a photo. Old woman—the busybody type—said Ashley cried the whole way. And she seemed sick, looked pale, and spent so much time in the bathroom that passengers complained. Woman said she was not very friendly. But the woman was quite sure that Ashley did not return after the stop in Sanderson.”

Frank felt a twinge of queasiness. Guilt, or low blood sugar thanks to the Atkins diet? The thought of Ashley with no money and pregnant? Were they doing all they could to find her? How he missed Meredith; she'd know what to do.

“Jack's checking rental cars, airports, trains, buses. Twenty-four hours, she could be anywhere.”

“How tough is it to get a new identity?” Frank asked, reaching for one of Matt's chips. “Passport? Driver's license?”

“Costs money and you gotta have connections. She can't have much money. We know she hasn't tried to access hers.”

“She won't be able to get far. I still can't believe it—having to take care of somebody's house and kids?”

“Carrie and I were talking last night,” Matt said, crunching a potato chip. “Try to think like you're on the run, I told her.”

“And?”

“‘If I were that scared and if I had no money and if I were pregnant, I'd contact someone in the family,' she told me. ‘Pick the one I thought I could trust the most. Either that or show up at the Salvation Army or St. Vincent de Paul's.' We checked them out, too. No trace.”

“If it were family, we'd know,” Frank said.

“Maybe,” Matt said. “Unless ‘family' swore to keep a secret? Remember, not everyone in your family knows what's going on.”

“I keep thinking about Rory and Chan.” Frank paused to make
up his mind before making the commitment. “When Elise and I were having dinner last night, I had an idea. You're not going to like it. Means I'll be out of D.C. for a while.”

“Let's hear it, boss.”

“I'm considering taking Elise down to Longboat Key to be with her cousins for Thanksgiving. I could brief Chan there. And he could decide whether to tell Rory.”

“Yeah,” agreed Matt. “Just in case Ashley does contact them.”

“Getting through the holidays is going to be tough for Elise.” Frank found it hard to believe that he was planning to spend a family holiday with the Stevens family. He'd spent so many years resenting them.

“Sounds good, Senator. Chandler Stevens is a good man.”

“Besides, we'll be in recess.”

“Let's hope there's not another attack,” Matt said. “I don't like those threats that Intelligence is bringing to the committee. Can I have that last pickle?”

“No. If it's zero calories, it's mine,” Frank grabbed it up. “My substitute for a Hershey bar. Osama bin Laden and the Taliban have Congress tied up in knots, but I think I can get away for a few days, even though I'm swamped.”

“Meantime let me fill you in on Preston's information about Welton.” Matt pulled a small pad out of his jacket pocket and recapped for Frank what they knew of Welton's past.

My dad wasn't the only one with a weird last testament
, Frank thought, and he asked, “What the heck happened to make him disinherit his oldest son?”

“Jack Preston found a high school friend of Jessica Long, Welton's mother. She claimed that Jessica got pregnant right out of nursing school. Married Welton, Sr., whom she'd dated the summer before. Speculation is that she was pregnant by somebody else. At some point Conrad Sr. gets wise.”

“Quite the soap opera. So who was the supposed father?”

“Not a clue,” Matt said, “but you have to get to that Intelligence hearing.”

Frank reached for his suit jacket and straightened his tie. “Things are heating up on Iraq. But, know what? I
will
take Elise to Florida. Why don't you come down, bring Carrie?”

Welton's only vestige of the Parnell largesse was the Mercedes he had appropriated. Peggy Putnam, guard dog of the Parnell assets, hadn't come for it. But the car only sat in the garage, eating up parking fees. Welton considered his finances: The $1,000,000 settlement from the Moore estate that had been spent long ago. His professor salary was barely enough to pay the condo fees and taxes. He'd borrowed against the condo equity to pay C. R. Crane $500 a day plus expenses. The dismal situation of his financial affairs made his heart skip a beat.

He reassured himself that he had taken his Cardizem. The day before, his cardiologist told him he had a serious arrhythmia. That he might need a pacemaker. That he'd need electrophysiologic tests to be sure. There was no time for that now. He needed to stay calm, steady, and cool to implement his plan. Either Crane or the Parnell investigator would find Ashley soon.

The phone on his desk rang.

“Doc, I've got news. The Parnell woman is still in New Mexico. What do you want me to do?”

“Where is she?”

“At that woman doctor's you told me about. Parnell showed up at her apartment a few minutes ago in a cab.”

“Do you think you can keep her under surveillance this time? I've got a plane reserved. Just keep her under wraps until I get there.”

From the balcony off her bedroom, Rory watched dolphins frolic in the Gulf of Mexico. She needed to limit her time outside to five minutes. Her head was completely bald, and even though the sun warmed her aching bones, she had to protect her delicate skin. All the cells in her body had taken a beating, especially the white blood cells that protected against infection. When the kids came in to see her, they had to wear masks. But they came more frequently now that she and Chan had talked to them—each individually—about her possible death, about how together they'd be okay. She'd be in heaven watching over them. Even Emily seemed to accept that her mother would not be there to see her grow up.

The decision to move the family to Florida had been impetuous. She'd simply mentioned to Chan that the cool weather gave her chills, and the next day he'd made arrangements to move into the Longboat Key compound. Chan had taken an indefinite leave of absence from his practice, and arranged for the kids to be home schooled. What he would do after her death, she didn't know.

“Time to come in, Mrs. Stevens,” Mrs. Tally announced. “Your doctor will be here any minute.”

Rory rose from the chaise lounge, pleased that she could make the short trip to her bed on her own. Today she'd find out the results of her last bone marrow test. In her heart, she felt that the news would not be good. She remembered Ashley explaining to her that she had the
not-favorable
type of leukemia. A tear made its way down Rory's cheek. Ashley had been her last hope for a cure.