David Baldacci - True Blue

“You mentioned that but didn’t tell me why.”

“Beth didn’t know why but she was pissed about it. She and Mona Danforth had words about it while we were at Café Milano. But the thing is, whoever’s investigating Meldon’s death should have retraced his steps too. They could’ve found something or knew that he was meeting with Tolliver. And let me tell you, if their deaths aren’t connected it’s like the mother of all coincidences. And I don’t believe in coincidences anyway.”

“So we find Diane’s killer, we get Meldon’s murderer too.”

“That’s sort of the plan.”

“Any way to find out who is investigating Meldon’s homicide?”

“If I ask Beth she’ll want to know why. I can try a couple other sources. Meantime we need to follow up our own leads.”

“But that waiter could call the cops and tell them what he just told us.”

“He could but I doubt he will.”

“Why?”

“He’s probably forgotten about it. It just comes with the chronic ADD mentality of that generation that believes that twittering actually constitutes personal interaction.”

“Hey, that waiter was about the same age as me.”

“Sorry. So can you find out where Diane worked before Shilling?”

“Yeah. But let me write it down. Otherwise I’ll probably forget we even had this conversation because of my generational ADD.”

“Oh, Roy, at least you make me laugh.”

“Well, while you’re laughing I also just remembered where I saw the initials DLT.”

“DLT?”

“It was at the bottom of the last e-mail Diane sent me.”

“I saw that. Just figured it was her initials.”

“That’s what I thought too, but she never signed any other e-mails that way.”

“Okay. So what else could it mean?”

“I’m betting DLT stands for Daniels, Langford and Taylor.”

“And they are?”

“The escrow agent that Shilling & Murdoch uses for all of its closing transactions. Their offices are up on K Street, right in the middle of Lobbyist Alley.”

“And they’re significant why?”

“They do the money wire transfers for our deals. Billions of dollars go through their office, at least electronically. Billions.”

“Okay, billions of anything always gets my attention. What do you think you can find out?”

“I can check the firm archives for a start. I can look through closing docs for the deals that Diane and I worked on, check escrow letters, electronic funds transfer confirmations, that sort of thing.”

Before he walked inside she said, “Call me with whatever info you can get on Diane. I’ll follow it up from there. But you need to focus on repping the Captain. With Mona on the other side waiting with fangs bared, you’re going to really need to bring your A-game.”

She roared off, leaving Roy to trudge into the building, his briefcase smacking against his leg.

Ned nodded to him from the security desk.

“You okay, Mr. Kingman?” he asked.

“Never better.”

MACE DROVE BACK to Abe Altman’s place and checked on Alisha and Tyler. She found the pair in Altman’s study going over specifics of the program Altman had designed. They looked up when she poked her head in. Ty still had the basketball and was bouncing it in a corner.

“Where’s Darren?” Mace asked.

“He left,” said Alisha. “Didn’t say where he was going and didn’t say when he be back. I’m worried about him.”

“Hey, Razor can take care of himself.” This was a lie, Mace knew. When it came to people like Psycho you’d need an Army battalion to take care of yourself. She walked back to the guesthouse, went up to her bedroom, and pulled something out of her closet. It was the baggie of shell casings the honor guard had given her at her father’s funeral. She sat back on the bed and held the bag on her chest, staring at the ceiling. It was so stupid of her to have opened the coffin. Every time she thought of her father, it began with that horrifying image before she could manage to push it aside.

She rattled the metal in the bag.

Okay, Dad, what do you think I should do? Let Beth run with this or keep chugging on? I want to be a blue again, Dad. I have to be a blue again.

She rattled the casings some more, as though trying to get better reception. There was no answer. There would never be an answer. She wasn’t a little girl anymore who could run to Daddy for help. These were her problems to solve. Only there was no right or wrong answer. There were only choices. Her choices.

She put the precious bag of used ordnance away, slipped over to the window, and looked over the grounds. Her gaze, by habit, sought out all places of potential danger. Entry points, the shadowy spaces under trees, a secluded corner. She thought for a second that she had seen Rick Cassidy flit by, but it happened so fast she couldn’t be sure.

Feeling suddenly lethargic, she scooted down to the kitchen and made some coffee. She brought it back up to the bedroom with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with sliced bananas on toasted wheat that she’d made with her own two hands. It undoubtedly would not have met Herbert’s high culinary standards, but it tasted damn good. Finished, she lay back on the bed with the thought of just resting her eyes. She hadn’t really slept in a long time. It was finally catching up to her. Just a few minutes…

The vibration woke her. She sat up groggily and looked around for a moment, disoriented. A moment later she snatched her phone from her pocket. As she hit the answer button she noted the time.

Damn, I’ve been asleep for hours.

“Hello?” She glanced out the window where a gentle rain was starting to fall.

“It’s Roy.”

“I didn’t recognize the number. Where are you calling from?”

“My health club. Just call me paranoid. If they can tap computer cameras, you know?”

“I know. So what’s up?”

“Got something to write with?”

She grabbed paper and pen off the nightstand. “Shoot.”

“Okay, just so you know, everyone in the firm hates my guts.”

“And how magnanimous you’ll be when you turn out to be right.”

“No, I won’t. I’ll tell them to eat shit and die. Anyway, I checked out some stuff and talked to some people. I’ve got Diane’s ex-husband’s name and number. He lives in Hawaii so you can call him today if you want. It’s morning there now.”

“Okay. What else?”

“Apparently the divorce was not all that amicable. I’m hoping that the ex can give you some more info on that. Maybe the name of the lawyer who represented Diane.”

“And the connection to Meldon?”

“No clue at this point, but at least it’s a start.”

“What about DLT?”

“I’m planning to sneak down to the archives tonight and poke around.”

“Listen, Roy, you staying there after hours alone is not a good thing.”

“I’m not sure if anyone here is involved, so I can’t exactly waltz down to archives and start going through boxes. I’ll find what I can and take the stuff home.”

“Why not come to Abe’s instead? We’ve got real security here.”

“You think he’ll mind?”

“I think the place is so big you could roll in with a tank brigade and he’d have no clue you were even here.”

“Okay, maybe that’s smarter.”

“And that way we can both go over the docs you found. It’ll be faster. Are you going back to see the Captain?”

“As soon as I’m done here. They just notified me that the presentment is tomorrow morning at Superior Court. I need to go over some details with him to the extent he can remember any.”

“The presentment’s pretty perfunctory, right?”