The Guardian

  “Regarding the timeline, we’ve got a few more pieces filled in. We know Connor took a flight to Chicago the evening of July 5; he booked those tickets on July 1.”

  Marcus flipped open his notebook on the desk and added the details to the calendar clipped inside. “One day after we know Frank was seen at the hotel.”

  “It plays. Frank was the advance man; he determined a hit at the hotel would be possible, and Connor booked to come out.”

  “Connor is going to argue it was the merger discussions suddenly getting serious that caused the abrupt decision to be in Chicago,” Marcus replied, thinking as the defense attorney.

  “If we can show Connor saw the brief and then sent Frank out to look at the hotel, we can at least establish a pattern of conduct leading up to the hit.”

  “We’ve got motive—we have to nail down means. How are we doing at establishing Connor’s movements at the hotel the night of the murder?”

  “I just talked to Mike. They’ve found three people who can confirm he was in the banquet room when Judge Whitmore gave his speech, and two that will testify they saw him leave as the speech concluded. That’s obviously significant. After that—the security guard confirms Connor was at the merger discussions late that evening. So there’s an open three-hour window to nail down.”

  “What do Connor’s hotel room door logs show?”

  “They muddy the waters. The door to his hotel room opened and closed with a card key five times during those three hours. He claims to have been discussing merger details on the phone with a partner in New York, that he went to the vending machine, stopped to buy a paper, then set out a room service order for the next day. For all we can tell, it could’ve been Frank using Connor’s hotel room and providing an alibi of activity.”

  Marcus sighed. “No surprise there; we knew they planned this in detail. He’s going to have reasonable doubt alibis in place. Where are we at on locating Frank Keaton? Anything?”

  “The last confirmation we have on his location is from an FBI surveillance tape taken at the Potomac Shipping Company. He was seen there on Wednesday, July 19, accompanied by another man who works for Titus.”

  “Two days before the shooting at the funeral.”

  “We haven’t been able to turn up anything suggesting Frank’s whereabouts after that. Assuming we are right and he did make the attempt on Shari at the church, he appears to have fled immediately afterwards.”

  “Or something happened to him.”

  “How Titus reacted to the failure is hard to predict. Word is out on the street to see if we can get a clue.”

  “What was Frank driving?” Marcus asked.

  “I checked. It was a light blue sedan, not the SUV we’ve been looking for.”

  There was a tap on the door and it opened. Marcus waved Quinn in to join him. “Anything at Frank’s home?”

  “We could charge him on a few weapons violations; he has a small arsenal that is unregistered—ballistics is checking them against prior unsolved cases—but other than that nothing useful.”

  “Dave, we know who did it, we know why, there just has to be a way to conclusively prove it. I gather Connor is no longer talking?”

  “Titus had a lawyer here shortly after Connor was brought in. Now that guy is someone who is scary. A check of his past cases gives a Rolodex of names for people you do not want to know. Connor has been strikingly silent since having a conversation with his new lawyer.”

  “Find Frank,” Marcus decided. “It’s our best hope of breaking this case open. And focus on linking Connor to that brief.”

  “Will do.”

  “Have they convened the grand jury?”

  “It’s set for Saturday, September 2.”

  Another nine days. Marcus was relieved it wasn’t any longer. “We’ll arrange to fly out the night before the grand jury testimony. I don’t want to leave this secure site before I have to. Could you arrange to come out with Kate and Lisa? I want to review this case from top to bottom one last time. I could use the additional manpower for the flight east.”

  “Good idea. I’ll see what I can arrange and call you back.”

  Marcus concluded the update call and leaned back against the desk. He was weary to the soul with the twists and turns this case was taking. He looked over at his partner. “It is not supposed to be this way. Someone murders a judge; we’re supposed to be able to do something about it. They take out Shari, he gets away with having murdered a judge.”

  “She’ll testify.”

  “If we can get her there safely,” Marcus replied. “What else can we be doing to find Lucas Saracelli? There has to be something.”

  Quinn tossed his hat on the table. “Good question, Marcus. I wish I had an answer. We have at best an old picture; at worst one that will no longer be close if he’s had surgery done. We know the unique signatures of his MO. But the rest is a bunch of maybes—possibly American born and military trained because of the type of rifle and ammunition he favors; a probable residence in Europe as most of his contracts have been there. The few clues from the scenes of his hits show he is a man who plans in great detail, studies the area before each hit, and takes as long as he deems necessary to fulfill a contract.”

  “I hate this.”

  “Do you want to move her again before the grand jury convenes?”

  Marcus thought about it, then finally shook his head. “No, you’re right about this being the safest place to defend. Moving her will only leave another trail that’s fresh. I would rather have our trail go very cold on him.”

  Going over the problem again wouldn’t get a different answer. Marcus pushed away from the desk. “It’s late. You missed dinner. I’ll let you get to it.”

  “Shari’s in the library. You might want to stop by.”

  Marcus raised an eyebrow. There was an unexpected note of concern in Quinn’s voice. “Thanks, I’ll do that.”

  * * *

  Shari was curled on the couch in the library. Without the lights on. That was a bad sign. Marcus leaned against the door frame, trying to decide what was best. She had become noticeably quiet over the last week and it hadn’t been easy to draw her out. “You want company?”

  His question startled her. She turned to look back, then reached over to click on the table light. “Sorry. Come on in, Marcus. I was just thinking.”

  He had misinterpreted the situation. He had been afraid she was fighting tears, but her voice was steady.

  “What are you thinking about?”

  “How much can change in a short time. A month and a half ago I didn’t know you, there wasn’t someone trying to kill me, I had a family intact.”

  Her tone of voice bothered him; it had a bitterness he had never heard before. But he understood her emotions so well, was glad in a way that she was finally letting heaviness bleed off rather than try to accept it. The stress of what had happened was still coming, was going to break her or refine her before it was over. And the fact she was letting him see the emotion was itself a sign of trust that was a gift to him.

  “This was a day Carl always celebrated—the anniversary of his first day on the bench.”

  The memories—he understood so well how they would appear unexpectedly from the past and bring back the pain. “Shari—I’m sorry.”

  She sighed, rubbing the back of her neck. “Sit down, I could use that company.” She tossed the unopened pad of paper and pen she held onto the couch beside her. “You choose the topic tonight. I’m pretty morose.”

  He chose instead to simply take a seat and share the silence.

  “You want to know something funny?” Her voice didn’t sound amused.

  “Sure,” he quietly replied.

  “I’m really getting tired of chocolate ice cream.”

  It took a moment for it to sink in, and then he leaned his head back and burst out laughing. “Oh, Shari.”

  “What are the odds that you can get some pralines and cream ice cream out here in the middle of nowhere?” br />
  “Are you sure you don’t want something easy, like maybe fresh lobster?”

  “If that was an offer, I won’t turn it down.” She turned her head, shared a smile, and then gave a sigh. “I miss my family.”

  “I know. I miss mine too.”

  “Did you hear from Jennifer?”

  “She sounds very tired. They were doing another round of bone scans today.” He reached in his front pocket for a folded envelope. “Here. I think you ought to see this.”

  She reached over and accepted it. “What is it?”

  “Rugsby’s ransom demand. My part of it anyway.” She unfolded the note, bit back a grin, but not before he saw it. His suspicions had been right. Either Jennifer or Rachel had recruited her. “Now I wonder who gave them that idea?”

  “It’s just a sketch,” she replied.

  Marcus folded his hands across his chest and watched her. “Sure it is,” he said softly.

  “I have to admit, I’m not sure I’m up on my Snow White and the seven dwarfs, but which one does this make you?” She looked at the sketch of the character, then back over at him. “Sleepy?”

  “Try Grumpy,” he replied with a gentle threat.

  She giggled. “So if all the O’Malleys got tagged with a seven dwarf character as their clue, how does this get back Rugsby?”

  “Turn it over.”

  “‘Deliver Snow White to me or Rugsby dies. Signed, The Wicked Witch.’ Ohh, this is good. Who’s Snow White?”

  “Guess.”

  She looked at him, then looked back at the note, startled. And then she started laughing as she held up her hands. “No way. I’m not getting in the middle of this. Your family makes jokes an art form.”

  “You started it. Grumpy indeed.”

  She passed back the note. “If I’m stuck here, you can hardly be expected to deliver me on the date specified. Who’s the Wicked Witch?”

  He folded the note and slid it back into his pocket. “At the moment I could label just about any of the O’Malleys with that title,” he replied dryly.

  She had a hard time stopping the laughter. “Marcus, I needed that.”

  “We both did.”

  He relaxed on the couch and simply watched her. “This will eventually be over.”

  “Not soon enough.” Her expression turned sad again, tired. “I’ve been praying for patience. So far it hasn’t worked. Or maybe it has and I’m just having to learn to appreciate the answer.”

  “Just take it a day at a time, Shari. That’s all you can do.”

  She picked up a document from the stack beside her. He recognized her now dog-eared copy of the brief she had written recommending Carl for the court. “I can understand the hatred that drove Connor to kill. But I don’t understand why he followed through with it when he did, where he did.”

  “Shari, trying to understand Connor’s rationale—it will never really make sense.”

  “Was my family part of his plan?”

  “No.”

  She looked over at him, moodily. “Did he want to make a public statement? Is that why he killed at the conference and not back in Virginia?”

  “We don’t know,” he said quietly.

  “Carl was killed because he was going to make the short list. Daniel had been dead nine months. The timing had to be significant.”

  He wouldn’t lie to her, but he wouldn’t support a conclusion that was only a speculation, not when it would hurt her. “If he chose the conference for any specific reason, it may simply have been for the confusion and the time it gave him to escape. We have no reason to believe he ever saw your brief, that he had any way to know Carl had made the short list.”

  “But you’re looking for that link.”

  “We’re looking.”

  Marcus watched with concern as she set aside the brief and leaned her head back to look up at the ceiling. How he wished he could strip away the pressure and give her some peace.

  “Marcus, how do you cope with the sense of incompleteness? The sense that their lives were cut short? Both Carl and Dad? Time keeps running across events. It’s not just the holidays and birthdays, it’s the baseball games we had tickets to go see, weekend vacations we had planned.”

  “You loved them, Shari. There is no way to remove that void.”

  “I know God wasn’t surprised. But it doesn’t feel like there was much preparation beforehand for the shock that hit. I know it wasn’t an accident that had you and Dave and Quinn close by to help, but it’s so hard to accept I will never see Dad or Carl again. I still wake up of a morning and for a moment think everything’s fine, then remember.”

  “It would worry me most if you didn’t have this grief coming through. Do you still dream about that night?”

  She grimaced. “I’ve been shot in my dreams so many times I think it’s like a repeating tape.”

  “I wondered.”

  “The dreams no longer make me panic. Maybe that’s progress.”

  “It is. Good progress.”

  “How long will it last?”

  “Months, maybe years. I think your prayer for patience is the right one. You need time for the grief to heal, time for the memories to fade in sharpness, time to adjust your expectation for the future. Be gentle with yourself; you’ll make it.”

  She gave a slight smile. “At least here there is plenty of time to pray.”

  “I envy you your ability to believe,” he said abruptly, reopening a subject he had avoided talking about for the last week. He was searching for his way back, but it was hard. He had been rereading Luke. It was so hard to set aside the doubts. He just wanted some peace back in his life.

  She looked over at him, curious. “Marcus, why do the O’Malleys trust you?” She let him think about it for a moment, then answered her own rhetorical question. “They chose to trust you. You can lead them into harm’s way and they’ll charge behind you without question. You know that, which is why you carry your responsibility so seriously. That’s all I’m doing, choosing to trust Jesus even if I don’t understand what or why something is happening. Jesus wants you to choose to trust Him again. He won’t take that trust you place in Him lightly.”

  “Have you settled your turmoil about prayer?”

  “Part of it. I’ve at least settled my confusion on how to pray. Mom quietly trusts and accepts what God does; I want a specific answer and I pray with passion for that. I always thought my problem was that I had to be like Mom, and I’m not made that way. An issue that matters to me inevitably becomes something I am passionate about.”

  “What did you learn?”

  “Jesus was both. A simple answer, I know, but realizing it was a profound change. Jesus was both trusting and passionate. He brought His petitions with loud groans and tears. He acted like Elijah. ‘The prayer of a righteous man has great power in its effects.’ Wrestling powerful prayer. And conversely, there was the contentment of knowing He was speaking with the Father who loved Him. ‘Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me. I know that thou hearest me always, but I have said this on account of the people standing by, that they may believe that thou didst send me.’

  “I still don’t have contentment over unanswered prayer, but I no longer wonder whether God loves me or if He hears me. If it’s a prayer where I speak with passion, God’s okay with that, and if it’s the quiet trust of a child with a problem, that’s good too.”

  “I’m glad you found some of your answers.”

  “You’ll find your answers too.”

  “Trust isn’t easy.”

  “Marcus, who’s Jesus? What’s His character like? Answer that, it will help.” She rested her chin on the couch pillow she had picked up. “Can I ask you a personal question?”

  Surprised at the change in subject, he nodded. “Sure.”

  “What do you dream about for your future? The reason I ask—I’ve had nothing but a lot of time to think in the last few weeks, about what is important, about what I want to do when this is over. Do you eve
r do that too, when you’re stuck on assignments like this?”

  What he said was important to her, he could tell from the way she was studying him as she waited for the answer. He hadn’t talked about it much outside of the family, occasionally with Quinn. “I want to be director of the marshals one day. Move it forward as an agency, bring more mavericks like Quinn and Lisa in to help rein in the bureaucracy and keep the focus on the nuts and bolts of the investigations.”

  “You sound very sure of that dream.”

  “I know where I’m heading.”

  She glanced away. “What about personally? What about kids? I already know you like them. Do you want a family someday?”

  He smiled at the way she tried to make her direct question indirect. Yes, Shari, I would love to have a family with you. They weren’t at a place where he could say those words. “Absolutely. And I’ve thought a lot about someday adopting too. The O’Malleys would spoil them rotten.”

  “Six aunts and uncles. I can see what you mean.”

  “What about you?”

  “I would love kids someday.”

  He heard the wistfulness. “You’d make a wonderful mom.”

  “Mom would love to be a grandmother.”

  She’d walked herself into thinking about her dad. He saw it when it happened. Quietness washed over her. He didn’t try to break it. There would be no grandfather for her children.

  He finally spoke. “Let it go.”

  “Yes.” She looked across at him and changed the subject again. “I hope you don’t lose Jennifer.”

  He didn’t want to think about such a possibility, but he had to. He had to be prepared for it in order to be prepared to help his family. The sadness was overwhelming. And Shari understood it. He looked at her and felt the enormous emotions ease, just for being able to share them. “If the unspeakable ever happens, will you come to the funeral with me?”

  She nodded.

  “Thank you, friend.” He wished he had the right to wrap her in his arms right now. And if he wasn’t careful, he was going to say the wrong thing. “Come on, it’s time you turned in,” he wisely decided. She was not always going to be a witness. And that day was not going to come soon enough.