Джеймс Паттерсон - The 13-Minute Murder

“I do,” Susan said. “They’re a security company.”

Graham snorted. “The guy who installs your burglar alarm is a security company. This isn’t some rent-a-cop operation. Damocles is one of the biggest private military contractors in the world. They do billions of dollars’ worth of business with the government. They’re basically a small army.”

Susan reached over to Graham’s computer and typed the name “Damocles” into a search engine. A list of articles popped up.

“And they’re in trouble,” she said. “I was listening to this on NPR just the other day. The Senate is investigating them for cost overruns, corruption, and even torture and murder. They’ve got a lot of friends in high places, but they’ve been getting hammered in the hearings. Do you really not know this, Randall?”

“If these are the people after you, then you picked a hell of a fight here, Dr. Beck,” Graham said.

Beck looked at some of the headlines. Susan was right: he hadn’t been paying attention to any of this.

“I’ve had other things on my mind,” he said. But he wasn’t completely oblivious.

There it was. There was the connection he was looking for.

He pointed at one of the articles on the screen.

The headline read:

SENATOR ELIZABETH PIERCE DEMANDS ANSWERS FROM DAMOCLES

“That’s who’s leading the hearings,” he said.

Senator Elizabeth Pierce. Ranking member of the Senate Committee on Intelligence. And currently, the leading challenger in the upcoming election against the president of the United States.

Twelve hours.

The woman’s voice on the phone. She’d told Beck to be quiet for twelve hours.

What’s happening in twelve hours?

Then Beck remembered. At Georgetown tonight. He wasn’t as out-of-touch as Susan thought.

“The presidential debate,” he said.

“What?” Graham asked.

“The presidential debate. That’s why she told me to stay out of the way for twelve hours. Senator Pierce is debating the president tonight. She’s beating Martin in the primaries. And if she wins, Damocles could lose billions of dollars when they lose their military contracts.”

It all made sense to Beck now.

“There’s an assassination plot,” Beck said. “But it’s against her. Damocles is going to kill Senator Pierce.”

Chapter 23

“You’d better be damn sure about this, Dr. Beck,” Graham said for what seemed like the tenth time. Beck had lost count.

They were in Graham’s unmarked sedan, driving through the thick downtown traffic, heading toward Senator Pierce’s campaign headquarters.

Beck had explained it to Graham and Susan several times. Susan believed it made sense. Graham took more time to convince.

“You know what this means, don’t you?” Graham asked Beck. “You’re accusing President Sharon Martin of plotting to kill her opponent in the primary elections. Because there is no way that the Secret Service cooperates with Damocles without her knowing about it.”

“I don’t know,” Beck admitted. “Maybe. Probably. I don’t know where the president fits in. All I know is that these people are killers, and we have to stop them.”

Beck knew this was probably an abuse of the doctor–patient relationship. Graham never would have bought this story if it was coming from some perp he’d arrested on the street. But Graham decided to put aside his skepticism and believe in Beck mainly because Beck had believed in him . Beck had refused to give up on him when he was at his lowest point. And that got Beck a lot of credit with the cop.

So Graham made a few calls to some friends on the force, who’d given him the names of some people he could trust inside the Secret Service. Good people, he promised Beck.

Beck was nervous about that, but Susan had taken him aside and whispered to him, “He trusted you. It’s time for you to trust him.”

So Beck did.

After an excruciating hour of waiting and muttered conversations on the phone, Graham had put on a suit jacket and tie and put his Glock 19 into his shoulder holster.

They were going straight to Senator Pierce. With any luck, they would get to her in time.

“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Beck asked.

Graham, next to him in the driver’s seat, honked his horn impatiently and squawked his siren at a driver who was too slow to move at a green light. “I’m sure,” he said. “Even if the Service is corrupt, the men and women next to the senator—the ones on her personal detail—they will not be in on this. You have to agree to take a bullet for the people you protect. You don’t betray that on a whim. Trust me. I know some of these guys. They become like family. There’s a real loyalty there.”

“I hope you’re right,” Susan said from the backseat. She was looking at the laptop again, staring hard at the log-in screen, as if she could see inside the machine’s circuits to unlock the password.

“Susan, we’re not going to figure it out,” Beck told her, again. “Scott was in covert ops. It’s probably a string of random characters.”

“You’re probably right,” Susan said, but she kept staring at the laptop, ignoring the traffic around them.

Beck sagged in the front seat. He checked his own pulse. Neither Graham nor Susan noticed. It was thready. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath and tried to force himself to be calm.

Just let me live long enough to do this, he thought. He wasn’t sure whom the thought was directed to, really. But he thought it again anyway. Just let me live long enough.

The car slammed to a halt. Beck opened his eyes. They were outside the offices of Senator Pierce. The front of the building was covered with her campaign logo, and posters of her face smiled from every window.

Graham hopped out. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s go ride to the rescue.”

Beck looked back at Susan, who nodded, and they both got out of the car.

Let me live long enough to do this, Beck thought again, then followed the cop inside.

Chapter 24

Senator Pierce’s campaign headquarters was controlled chaos. Every manner of electronic device was beeping and pinging, demanding attention. Multiple screens showed every news channel, each one with a constantly scrolling stream of information. Volunteers ran from one cubicle to the next, as a dozen other people talked urgently into their phones. Dozens of pizza boxes layered a long table, and empty coffee cups overflowed the wastebaskets.

They were united in a cause. Beck could almost see the excitement and purpose binding them all together, like a warm glow in the air despite the cheap fluorescent lighting.

Then someone shouted, “QUIET!” as the latest poll numbers hit the screens. A blond, tanned anchorwoman on CNN announced, “And the latest polls show upstart challenger Senator Elizabeth Pierce within striking distance of President Sharon Martin, with just a few days to go before the crucial Super Tuesday primaries.…”

The cheers drowned out the rest of her words. People were hugging and high-fiving, before returning to their work with renewed purpose.

Beck overheard someone say, in a tone of disbelief, “Holy crap, man, we could actually win this thing!”

Only if the candidate survives, Beck thought bitterly. He once believed that assassination plots and conspiracy theories were just for his patients and bad TV. That was this morning.

Now he knew better.

Graham pulled him through the packed room.

“The senator and her detail are willing to meet with you,” he said, keeping his voice low. Beck had to strain to hear. They stopped in front of an office. Graham turned to Susan, looking slightly sheepish. “Sorry, can you wait in here? The agents are a little nervous about too many strangers getting close to the senator right now.”