Indispensable Party (Sasha McCandless Legal Thriller No. 4) (26 page)

She would keep her promise and
could only hope that he kept his.

As soon as she turned onto the
main business artery, she looked for a spot to pull over. But the snowplows had
been through. The parking lanes were buried under piles of snow.

She zipped across the Beltway and
merged onto Interstate 270, grateful for the light traffic, no doubt thanks to
all the weather-related cancellations.

Once she had the SUV up to
highway speed, she hooked her phone into the vehicle’s Bluetooth system and
told it to call Will Volmer.

Will had moved from the
prosecutor’s office to run the white collar criminal practice at Prescott &
Talbott, Sasha’s former employer and one of Pittsburgh’s most prominent law
firms. In the aftermath of the Lady Lawyer Killers case, he’d been asked to
take over the management of the firm.

He was a skilled advocate, an
ethical and upstanding lawyer, and a genuinely kind person. It was a trifecta
of qualities possessed by only a handful of Prescott’s eight hundred attorneys.

“Good morning. Mr. Volmer’s
office,” Caroline Masters, Will’s capable assistant said in a polished voice.

Sasha hesitated. Despite her warm
feelings for Will and Caroline, Sasha’d spent the past two months studiously
avoiding everyone and anyone who had even a tenuous connection to the Lady
Lawyer Killers case. And Will and Caroline had been deeply enmeshed in the case
and the ensuing scandal.

“Hello? You’ve reached Will
Volmer’s office, may I help you?” Caroline said.

Sasha took a centering breath and
said, “Sorry. Hi, Caroline, it’s Sasha.”

The older woman’s pleasure was
immediate and real. “Sasha, it’s so good to hear from you. Things are well, I
hope?”

Sasha plowed ahead. “Actually,
Caroline, I’m in a bit of jam. I need to talk to Will, urgently. I’m not trying
to be rude, and I would love to catch up. I know I owe you several phone calls.”

“Yes, you do,” Caroline chided
her. Then, she said, “But, I forgive you. Will’s in a meeting, but I know he’ll
interrupt it for you. Hold the line, and I’ll put you through. It may take a
few moments for him to clear everyone out of his office, okay?”

“Yes, that’s fine. And, thank you
so much,” Sasha said, suddenly feeling ashamed of herself for having brushed
off Caroline’s social overtures.

She resolved to invite Caroline
to lunch—just as soon as she got her boyfriend sprung from federal custody and
tracked down her wayward private investigator, and provided they weren’t all
casualties of a pandemic.

“Sasha, Caroline tells me you
have a problem,” Will’s deep, thoughtful voice came across the line. “How can I
help?”

Sasha glanced at the speedometer.
She’d accelerated without realizing it. She was now pushing eighty miles an
hour and riding the bumper of a minivan. She signaled to move into the left
lane then swung past the minivan, while she tried to gather her thoughts to
explain enough to Will to make sure he understood the gravity of Connelly’s
situation without divulging the information that Connelly had learned
confidentially.

“It’s a long story, but the high
points are that Leo Connelly’s been taken into federal custody as the result of
a multi-agency investigation into a classified national security matter. He
needs a D.C.-barred attorney, fast. Someone who has some clearances, or the
feds are never going to talk to him,” Sasha explained.

“Her,” Will corrected her. “Colleen
Young-Wetzel fits the bill, and she’ll take very good care of Leo. She’s the
best.”

“Great. Can I get her number?”

“Let me call her and explain who
you and Leo are. I mean, she’s probably heard of you from your past exploits,
but if I call I can impress upon her just how important you and Leo are to me personally,”
Will said.

Sasha didn’t think she could feel
any lower than she had when she’d talked to Caroline, but, as it turned out,
she could.

“Thank you,” she said simply.

“You’re more than welcome,” Will
replied. “Should Colleen reach you on your cell phone?”

“Please. And, Will?”

“Yes?”

“I’m sorry for brushing you off
since October. There’s no excuse, I know. I’ve just been struggling—”

“Sasha, please. No apologies are
necessary. You’ve been through a great deal in the past year. You need to deal
with that however you can. It’s okay,” Will assured her.

Sasha felt hot tears stinging her
eyes. She’d been operating under crisis parameters: Focus on getting the help
Connelly needed. Move forward. Don’t fall apart. But now Will’s kindness
threatened to topple her.

“Thanks, Will,” she said,
blinking away the threatened tears.

“I’ll have Colleen call right
away,” he promised before ending the call.

Sasha drove in silence for
several minutes. She needed to call and let Naya know about Connelly, and she
also needed to track down Gavin, wherever he was. But she wanted to talk to
Colleen Young-Wetzel first.

She left the phone charging and
just drove. She’d gone about five miles down the uninspiring ribbon of highway
that cut through Maryland headed for the Pennsylvania Turnpike when her phone came
to life. She hit the button to connect the call through the Bluetooth device.

“Sasha McCandless,” she said to
the empty interior of the SUV.

A female voice, husky but clipped
and businesslike, came through the speakers. “Sasha, this is Colleen
Young-Wetzel. May I call you Sasha?”

“Of course. Thanks for reaching
out to me so quickly,” Sasha said.

Colleen brushed off her
gratitude. “Listen, I’ve known Will Volmer since his sons were in short pants.
Will said you need the best criminal representation available in D.C. and you
need it now. So, you’ve got it.”

Colleen’s voice oozed competence
and confidence. Sasha felt her shoulders relax.

“Okay, how much did Will tell
you?” Sasha asked, searching the road ahead for a convenient place to pull off
the road.

She didn’t want to split her
attention between the road and this conversation. A green milepost sign
informed her that Frederick, Maryland sat at the next exit. She and Connelly
had stopped in Frederick once before. There was a diner that served breakfast
all day. She had no appetite, but this wasn’t the time to let her energy flag.
She eased the car into the far right lane.

“Will said that your friend is a
former federal air marshal who had been assigned to an internal affairs role
within the Department of Homeland Security until October, when he left to take a
position as the chief security officer for a pharmaceutical company. As I
understand it, this morning, he was taken into custody in conjunction with a
coordinated, cross-agency national security investigation. That’s what I know.”
Colleen recited the background in a brisk, dispassionate voice.

“Before we get into the details,
would you just confirm that I can tell you this stuff without breaching any
government secrets?”  Sasha asked, as she slowed and took the exit ramp toward
Frederick’s business district.

She navigated by memory to the
diner, which stood at the foot of a mountain.

Colleen answered, like any good
lawyer, with a question of her own. “Your friend has, or had, security
clearances, I’m sure, but do you?”

“No.”

Sasha brought Connelly’s SUV to a
stop in a parking space near the diner’s door. Judging by all the empty spaces,
she’d hit that sweet spot between the breakfast rush and the lunch crowd. She
killed the engine.

“Well, in that case, nothing the
government told
you
is classified. If, hypothetically, Leo came into
possession of classified information, he may have breached security by telling
you. Too bad you aren’t married.”

“Excuse me? Oh, spousal
privilege?”

“Right, I mean, it’s still a
crime to share the information, but you couldn’t be compelled to testify
against him. But, listen, at this point, that’s the least of your worries. We’ll
proceed as though this is a privileged and confidential conversation between
the two us, okay?” Colleen sounded impatient to cut to the chase.

“Okay. Well, the first bit I know
because I am—or, I guess, was—representing Connelly’s employer in a civil
matter. Serumceutical has a government contract to deliver a killer flu
vaccine. An employee who falsified her references disappeared along with more
than twenty-five hundred doses that were supposed to be sent to the government
stockpile. The company believes a competitor called ViraGene was behind the
theft. My primary responsibility was to file a temporary restraining order
against ViraGene. But I was also counseling my client to self-report the theft
of the vaccines and the breach of the supply contract that resulted from that
theft to the government.” Sasha paused to give Colleen a chance to ask any
questions she might have.

“Go on.”

“Over the weekend, Connelly
learned that the mutated killer flu virus had been stolen from a French
research facility, one of the French researchers had been killed, and our
government believed the stolen Doomsday virus was either en route to the U.S.
or already within the borders.”

Colleen let out a long, low
whistle, then she said, “I take it Mr. Connelly learned that information on a
confidential basis?”

“Right,” Sasha confirmed. “He
didn’t name his source, and I didn’t ask. He did tell the Serumceutical Board
of Directors that there was a threat, but he didn’t go into any details. We
wanted them to agree to let us share information with the ad hoc task force
that had been created to deal with the theft of the killer flu.”

“There’s always a task force,”
Colleen observed.

“Apparently. Anyway, we met with
the task force yesterday morning. We told them about the stolen vaccines and
that Serumceutical had filed a TRO against ViraGene. Lawyers from several
agencies were present at the meeting, and no one raised any objection to the
TRO. After the meeting, though, I got a call from the federal district court,
scheduling the hearing for that same day.”

“Let me guess. Some government attorney
showed up, claimed the feds were an indispensable party, refused to waive
immunity, and mentioned national security implications. In response, the judge
folded like a cheap suit and kicked your case. Off the record, of course. How’d
I do?” Colleen asked in a tone that was at once jaded and outraged.

“Nailed it.”

“Okay, so, what happened this morning?”

“We were headed into the
Serumceutical campus and ran into a road block. An FBI SWAT team was in
position waiting for us. They took Connelly into custody, a female agent patted
me down, but it was really cursory, and they searched Connelly’s SUV. I am told
they received a tip from an anonymous caller that Connelly had a bottle of the
stolen H17N10 virus in his desk drawer. They checked it out, and found a vial.”

“So, your working theory is Leo
was framed?”

“Definitely,” Sasha said.

“Do you think it was an inside
job?” Colleen asked.

“I honestly don’t know. Connelly’s
office door is locked and can be opened only with his personal key card. I don’t
know how the virus got there, but I know Connelly didn’t put it there.”

Colleen was silent.

Sasha waited a moment then said, “And,
it’s hard to explain, but I got the sense that, despite the display of power,
with the SWAT team and everything, that nobody was all that concerned about
Connelly. I mean, if they really, truly believed Connelly was responsible, they
should have impounded his car, right? And done a more thorough search of my
person and my bag?  The whole thing felt … superficial, like they were just
going through the motions.”

“Hard to say,” Colleen cautioned
her. “It could be that they didn’t want to deal with the maelstrom of grief an
attorney could bring down on their heads if they were aggressive with you. Or
they may be according Leo some professional courtesy because he’s a former Homeland
Security agent. Or your instincts are right and the whole scene was just
security theater. I’ll have a better sense after I talk to someone associated
with the task force and see how much they push back about getting me access to
Leo. Who are the lawyers involved?”

Sasha thought for a minute then
said, “There are a bunch of them, but take a run at Anthony Washington from the
Department of Justice. He seemed like the most reasonable.”

“Washington, DOJ. Okay. Now, you
hold tight. I’ll call you later today.”

“Thank you, Colleen. Oh, we didn’t
talk about your fees. You can bill me directly whatever your standard rate is
for this sort of work, seeing as how Connelly isn’t going to be getting a
paycheck until this gets cleared up,” Sasha said.

“Don’t worry about the fees,”
Colleen said. “I owe Will a favor, and I understand he owes you one.”

“Well, we can work it out later,”
Sasha said, hesitant to let the woman handle the matter without compensation.

Sasha ended the call and sat
looking out over the parking lot. She took several deep, slow breaths.

Colleen had relieved a lot of the
tension that had been building in a band behind her eyes. She was still worried
about Connelly, but she trusted Will’s friend to get a handle on the situation.
She would grab a quick bite and get some badly needed coffee, then she would
deal with the other man in her life who was contributing to her tension
headache—Gavin Russell.

Leo rubbed his
forehead with one palm. He was tired. He was a little bit sore from being thrown
to the frozen ground by an overenthusiastic rookie agent. He was worried that
whomever had hid an ampule of the Doomsday virus in his desk drawer was out
there, in the fading winter light, rolling a vial along a Metro car or leaving
one casually propped against a display in one of the Smithsonian buildings.