Dead on Arrival - Mike Lawson

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and he immediately begin to relax. The last two months had been very hectic. He was so glad to be home.

      For two months, he’d worked like an absolute slave. He’d spent hours on the Internet and had taken trips to Washington, New York, Philadelphia, and Trenton to observe people who often lived in minority neighborhoods and where, being a small white man of fifty-three, he’d felt quite vulnerable. And then there’d been the meetings with the two government people. Those meetings hadn’t taken long, but they’d been extremely stressful, by far the riskiest part of his assignment. But now it was finally over and he’d been successful, and Mr Lincoln had been very pleased.

      He didn’t know why Mr Lincoln had asked him to do what he did, but that wasn’t at all unusual. He would be given a task – typically research, sometimes surveillance, frequently duties as a courier – but he would rarely know how his role fit into Mr Lincoln’s grand design. Come to think of it, it seemed as if this time he knew much more than he normally did. He was certainly able to see a pattern in his research, and the government men – well, in order to bribe them, although bribe may not be the correct term, he had to be very specific regarding Mr Lincoln’s expectations.

      Yes, he could definitely see the outline of Mr Lincoln’s plan. He couldn’t see every detail – not how it would be executed, or why or when or by whom – but he could see enough that it made him feel uncomfortable.

      In most respects, Mr Lincoln was an ideal employer. He paid well, he was invariably pleasant in conversation, and his directions were always perfectly clear. But he had always suspected that knowing too much of Mr Lincoln’s plans could be dangerous – terminally dangerous – and right now he had this little mental itch, this tickling sensation at the back of his brain, that said maybe, just maybe … ?

      Oh, quit being such a nervous Nelly, he told himself. He’d worked for Mr Lincoln for years. He was a trusted employee. A valued employee. And he’d been paid. He patted his chest and felt the reassuring lump of cash in the envelope in the inside pocket of his blazer. Mr Lincoln certainly wouldn’t have paid him if his plan was to harm him. That would be illogical, and Mr Lincoln was never illogical.

      The cab stopped at his address. He tipped the driver exactly fifteen percent and stood for a moment on the sidewalk admiring his home. He privately thought of it as a cottage – loved his small patch of lawn, the ivy crawling up the chimney, the daisies that grew near the door – and he didn’t care one whit that his white picket fence was considered by some a cliché.

      He unlocked his front door, dropped his suitcase in the foyer, and silenced the alarm. It was so, so good to be home. His only disappointment was that Mabel wasn’t there. But he’d pick her up from the kennel later, and then he and his cat would spend the next week reading, relaxing, and cooking – and thinking about how they’d spend the money in the envelope. Maybe they’d take a trip to Martha’s Vineyard; they hadn’t been there in years.

      He walked into the living room. The first thing he thought when he saw the woman sitting on the loveseat holding a silenced automatic in her hand was not How did she get in without setting off the alarm? No, his mind leaped right past that question.

      His first thought – and his last thought – was that the person Mr Lincoln had sent to kill him was very beautiful.

       8

      DeMarco figured the best way to get in to see the secretary of Homeland Security was to get up at 4:45 A.M. and be waiting outside the man’s office at 5:30.

      DeMarco was not a willing early riser. Regardless of what time he went to bed the night before, he found that if he woke up any time before 7 A.M. his head felt as if it were stuffed with barley. His brain didn’t work; his fingers couldn’t button his shirt; he couldn’t find his wallet or watch or keys or anything else that he needed. And his stomach just recoiled at the thought of food.

      But rise he did. He knew that General Andrew Banks, secretary of Homeland Security, arrived at work early, usually before 6 A.M., and once at work the man’s calendar would be completely full. DeMarco also knew he would never get an appointment to see Banks unless Mahoney made the appointment for him, and Mahoney had made it clear that he didn’t want to be connected with this assignment.

      So DeMarco drove to Banks’s office and convinced the security guards that he was a messenger from Congress. He showed them his congressional ID, looked humble and messenger-like, and held up a manila envelope on which he’d written in Magic Marker: GENERAL BANKS, EYES ONLY. He had underlined eyes only. The guards made him walk through the metal detectors, copied down the information on his ID, and then allowed him to stand outside Banks’s office door.

      At five-forty-five, DeMarco saw Banks striding down the hall like a man who could hardly wait to get to work and start kicking ass. He had a gray crew cut, a prominent nose, and wore wire-rimmed glasses over a pair of hostile gray eyes. He was tall and, though in his sixties, his stomach was still hard and flat. DeMarco suspected the maniac rose every morning at daybreak and performed those same masochistic exercises that he had once done as a midshipman at Annapolis. His first words of cheery greeting to DeMarco were, ‘What the hell are you doing here?’

      Banks wasn’t particularly fond of DeMarco, although DeMarco wasn’t sure why. It may have been because Banks was an ex-marine, a retired three-star general, and considered that DeMarco would never have met the marines’ few-good-men standard. Or it could have been because DeMarco had once done some work for Banks. The case had been a complicated one involving an assassination attempt on the president in which the Secret Service had been involved, and it had concluded with Banks, Mahoney, and DeMarco knowing a secret they should not have kept from the public but which they did. This, DeMarco figured, gave him a certain amount of leverage over the general, which was why he had decided to talk to him instead of to the FBI. He knew the FBI wouldn’t tell him anything unless Mahoney made them, but because the Zarif incident was terrorist-related, he figured Homeland Security would know almost as much as the Bureau.

      ‘I need a favor,’ DeMarco said, answering Banks’s question.

      ‘What kinda favor?’ Banks said, his eyes narrowing into suspicious slits. But then he would have been suspicious if DeMarco had asked him the date.

      ‘I need to talk to one of your guys about the Reza Zarif thing.’

      ‘Why?’ Banks asked.

      ‘I can’t tell you.’

      ‘Are you out of your goddamn mind?’ Banks said. ‘Do you have any idea how much heat I’m under because of everything that’s happened lately?’

      ‘I think so,’ DeMarco said.

      ‘But you still think I’ll let you waltz in here and start poking around without telling me why?’

      ‘General, I swear I’m not going to do anything to cause you a problem,’ DeMarco said. ‘I just want—’

      ‘Forget it,’ Banks said, and started to unlock his office door. So much for prior association.

      DeMarco had to say something to get Banks to help him, and he was pretty sure Banks wouldn’t talk to the press because he hated reporters. At least DeMarco hoped he still hated them.

      ‘Okay, look,’ DeMarco said. ‘Mahoney grew up with Reza Zarif’s father, and he’s known Reza since he was born. He just wants to know a little more about what happened, something so maybe he can understand why the guy did what he did, but he doesn’t want to ask the Bureau because they blab too much.’

      Banks stopped turning the key in the lock and DeMarco watched as he mulled things over. He knew Banks didn’t particularly like Mahoney either, but he also knew that Mahoney had been helpful to Banks and his department in the past.

      ‘And I swear, General,’ DeMarco said, ‘if I learn anything that reflects poorly on Homeland Security, I’ll tell you and no one else.’

      ‘Shit,’ Banks

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