The Abduction (16 page)

The office suite of the attorney general was on the fifth floor of the Justice Building, overlooking busy Pennsylvania Avenue. Unlike many of her predecessors, Allison had resisted the urge to turn her small private office into a self-congratulatory shrine. No plaques, commendations, or laminated personal correspondence from the president covered her walnut-paneled walls. A colorful impressionist landscape brightened one wall. Over the fireplace hung a portrait of former Attorney General Robert Kennedy walking on a New England beach. The furniture was early American, some period, some tasteful reproductions. Legal and literary volumes filled the bookshelves behind her desk. Perched above the door was a framed needlepoint inscription that her proud mother had stitched. It quoted the stone-chiseled motto outside the Justice Building, with an added parenthetical: “‘Justice is the great interest of man on earth,’” it read, “(and of at least one woman).” An eight-by-ten photograph of her husband graced her leather-top desk. On the credenza, next to the telephone, rested a small framed portrait of a younger Allison Leahy holding her infant daughter.

The intercom buzzed. “Mr. Abrams is here,” announced her secretary.

“Send him in, please.”

The door opened. Allison welcomed him, offering a seat on the couch. She took the chair facing the window, then laid an expandable file on the coffee table.

“This is what I wanted you to see,” she said.

Harley reached for the file, but Allison withdrew.

“A little background first,” she said. “Confidential background, I would add. What I’m going to tell you, I haven’t even told my husband. I feel since you and I talked last night that we have an understanding. A bond of trust. I hope I’m not wrong.”

Harley looked her in the eye. “You’re not wrong.”

She flashed a thin smile of relief, then spent the next ten minutes telling him about Mitch O’Brien, the awkward reunion at the Fountainbleu Hotel in Miami Beach last August, and the disastrous follow-up a week later in Washington at the gala—including Mitch’s drunken blowup and her fear that someone may have overheard.

“About two weeks after that,” she continued, “I received this in the mail.” She removed a large manila envelope from the file. “You can see it was addressed to my home, marked personal and confidential. Since there was no return address, I brought it to the Justice Building the next morning to have it X-rayed. It checked out, so I opened it. And this is what I found.”

Her hand shook—just as it had the first time, more than a month ago—as she removed an enlarged black-and-white photograph. She laid it on the table.

“That’s me, obviously.”

He leaned forward for a closer look. The photo
had been defaced. In bright red strokes, the letter A had been scrawled across Allison’s forehead.

“Obviously the artwork was the handiwork of whoever mailed me the photograph. As is the message on the back.” Allison flipped it over, revealing a handwritten message in the same red scrawl.

It read,
Doesn’t stand for attorney general, bitch.

Harley looked up. “What did you do with this when you got it?”

“I just kept it.”

“Why didn’t you give it to the FBI?”

“Like I said, I get plenty of these threats. The last thing I wanted was a scandal that would have the FBI beating on my ex-fiancé’s door. I was pretty convinced it came from Mitch, who I saw as harmless. I just let it go.”

“So why dig it up now?”

“Because now I’m not so sure it’s harmless.”

Harley leaned back. “What’s your thinking?”

“I’m sure you’re aware that my recent political troubles didn’t start with Kristen’s abduction. They started with phony accusations of adultery after the last debate.”

“Yeah, so?”

“I figured that if this scarlet letter photograph related to anything, it might relate to the recent adultery scandal—which all started less than a month after I got this photograph. But then just this morning I overheard my running mate make this bad joke. A slogan, actually, that went something like this: Allison Leahy, the scarlet letter president—don’t think adultery, think abduction.”

Harley glanced again at the photograph. “So you’re thinking that when your secret admirer
scribbled on the back of this photo that the A doesn’t stand for attorney general, he didn’t mean it stood for adultery.”

“It stood for abduction,” said Allison. “Maybe it was a warning or a foreshadowing of things to come.”

“Seems a stretch.”

“It does in the abstract. But think of it in the context of your theory that the same person who abducted my Emily also abducted Kristen Howe. Then it’s not such a stretch. It’s a bridge between the two.”

He stroked his chin, apparently warming to the idea. “Let me take everything over to headquarters for analysis. I also think we should track down Mitch O’Brien, find out once and for all if he sent it. Is he still in Miami?”

“As far as I know.”

“I’ll send out a couple of Miami field agents.”

“Let me at least try to reach him by phone before you call out the troops. The history is kind of complicated here.”

“I’d prefer to catch him cold. He is a lawyer, after all. Give a lawyer time to think about it, and they’ll never talk to law enforcement. But catch them cold, and they’re often as stupid as the rest of us. We don’t have time to dance with this guy. Time is of the essence.”

“Yeah,” she scoffed, thinking of the presidential election less than five days away. “You’re telling me.”

“By the way,” said Harley. “I’ll do my best to keep the history between you and O’Brien under wraps, but sometimes these things have a way of leaking. I just mention that, since you said you haven’t even told your husband about your…
your recent interaction. He probably wouldn’t appreciate hearing thirdhand that your drunken ex-fiancé was virtually stalking you, professing his undying love for you one day and then cursing you out the next, maybe even sending you threatening mail. He could even think there’s more to it than that.”

“I realize that,” she said with a sinking sense of dread. “I guess maybe it’s time Peter heard the truth. From me.”

General Howe entered the White House through the east side residence gate so as not to be seen by the press corps hovering in front of the West Wing, near the Oval Office. The president’s personal assistant led him to the Map Room, though he knew the way.

The last time Lincoln Howe had visited the inner sanctums of White House power, President Sires was midway through a tumultuous first term, urging the general to withdraw his resignation as deputy secretary of defense. Sires had assured him that the existing secretary was on his way out, and that the top job at the Pentagon would be his within six months. Howe had yet to declare himself a member of any political party. Although presidents sometimes did look outside their own party to fill their cabinet, Howe had chosen not to remain part of a Democratic administration once he’d resolved in his own heart that he was a Republican with presidential aspirations of his own.

Howe sat in the armchair near the fireplace. Over the mantel hung a small map of Europe with red circles and blue markers. The plaque beside it said it was the last situation map of the Allied and
Axis armies that Franklin Roosevelt saw before his death, just weeks before the Nazi surrender. The general thought it fitting that nearly all great presidents had served in times of war or were themselves war heroes. Washington. Lincoln. Both Roosevelts. He was of the same great tradition. Sires, he knew, was not.

“I saw your speech last night,” said President Sires. He was wearing a dark suit and striped tie, his power look. He lowered himself into the matching silk armchair, half-facing Howe, half-facing the fireplace. “Very high drama.”

Howe showed no reaction. “It wasn’t intended to be dramatic. You just never know how you’re going to react in these situations. Until it happens to you.”

“Still, it surprised me. I’d always heard that Lincoln Howe is the kind of general who had learned from his experience in Vietnam. Never declare war without a clear set of objectives. Never fight a war you can never win.”

“I think my objectives are clear. It’s time this country protected its children.”

“I’m not talking about your declaration of war against child abductors. I’m talking about your declaration of war against this administration.”

Howe bristled. “I’m not sure I follow you, sir.”

“Lincoln, I’ve worked hard over the past eight years to become the education president. I’m proud of my record. As a lame duck president, my record is all I have. Education is my legacy.”

“With all due respect, the use of military forces to combat child abduction has nothing to do with education.”

“No. But the challenge you issued last night to this administration is a direct attack on my legacy.
You put me on the spot on national television and asked me to sign an executive order that directs the military to round up child abductors. I’m sure plenty of people at home are thinking, yes, let’s do it. They forget about the Nazi concentration camps. They forget what our own country did to Japanese Americans during the Second World War. They suddenly need to be reminded that using the military against civilians has a rather catastrophic track record in the course of world history. Your rhetoric puts me in a no-win situation. If I sign this order, the final and most memorable act of my presidency will in the long run leave me branded as the reactionary fool who pandered to hysteria and tried to turn the United States into a fascist military state. You know I’m not going to do that. But by the same token, I don’t want to be remembered in the short term as the bleeding-heart liberal who was soft on child abductors.”

“I’m sorry you see it that way.”

“No you’re not,” he said sharply. “No one who has devoted his life to defending this country’s freedoms could be sincere about a plan to turn the military against its own citizens.”

“You think I was bluffing?”

“I know you were. Using the military this way is probably illegal, but let’s put that aside. There are two ways we can handle this. One is for you to go back on television and bad-mouth me for refusing to call out the military in aid of your granddaughter and other defenseless children.”

“That has definite appeal.”

“And it has definite consequences. I would naturally be forced to respond in kind.”

“Not to be crass,” said Howe, “but just how do
you intend to hit a man whose granddaughter has just been abducted?”

“This is highly confidential, but my sources tell me that the FBI is actually considering the possibility that the abduction of Kristen Howe was planned and executed by your supporters. Possibly even with your blessing.”

“That’s bullshit,” Howe said in an icy, clipped tone.

“It’s not bullshit if it’s leaked from the White House.”

“Mr. President, you
know
that’s not the truth.”

He smiled wryly. “The truth? That’s such an elusive concept. I had a strategist once who had an interesting definition of it. The truth, he said, is that which cannot be proved false.”

The general stiffened.

President Sires leaned back in his chair. “Just four more days till the election, General. You think in four days you can prove that neither you nor your supporters had anything to do with an abduction that may single-handedly propel you into the White House?”

He glared. “What are you proposing?”

“Personally, I like alternative number two: You and I simply agree to say nothing more about this. I make no further comment on your granddaughter’s abduction. And you say nothing more about me signing an executive order to call up the military.”

“Surely the press won’t just let it die.”

“And our response will be firm but reasonable: In the interest of Kristen’s safe return, I will not comment on the investigation strategy at this time. You think you can say that, Lincoln? Or do
you want to see just how leaky that White House plumbing can be?”

“Is your legacy really that important to you?” he asked in disbelief.

“Is becoming the next president really that important to
you
?”

Howe grimaced, then rose from his chair and looked out the window. Finally, he drew a deep breath as he turned and faced the president, looking him straight in the eye.

“In the interest of Kristen’s safe return,” he said in the voice of an obedient soldier, “I will not comment on the investigation strategy at this time.”

Repo was out of breath as he raced in from the cold. The kitchen door slammed behind him. He leaned against it, clutching the plastic bag of groceries. He hadn’t wanted to leave Kristen alone with Tony and Johnny any longer than necessary, so he’d sprinted down and back from the convenience store at the corner. He checked the clock on the stove. The entire trip took only fourteen minutes.

Three times longer than it took those goons to kill Reggie Miles.

A wave of concern washed over him. He dropped the bag of groceries on the kitchen counter and pulled off his jacket, hat, and gloves.

“What did you get?” asked Tony as he entered the room.

Repo pushed the bag beyond Tony’s reach. “Just a few things.”

“Let me see.” He grabbed the bag and looked inside, then made a face. “Froot Loops? Hey Johnny, look at this. Repo went out and bought us some Froot Loops.”

Johnny strutted around the corner, smirking. He was wearing jeans and a muscleman’s T-shirt. “Froot Loops? Hell, I’m a Lucky Charms man, myself.”

Repo said, “It’s for the kid, asshole.”

“For the
kid
? You ran out in the freezing damn cold to buy cereal for the kid? What, you trying to get your cock sucked or something?”

“Don’t even joke about that.”

“What, you afraid Tony and me might get there first?”

Repo grabbed him and pushed him against the refrigerator. “I said
don’t
!”

“Hey!” shouted Tony, breaking them apart.

Johnny stepped back and shook it off. Repo was seething as he backed away slowly.

Tony tossed the cereal box on the counter. He looked at Johnny, then glared at Repo. “You went down to see her last night. I heard you going down the stairs.”