Iron House (46 page)

“Son of a bitch.” The senator studied it for a long time. “Who are you? And don’t give me that
Julian’s brother
shit. What do you have to do with Kaitlin? How’d you get that damn file?”

He was furious, embarrassed; Michael understood. Like a lot of public figures, the senator had unfortunate tastes. Prostitutes. Pages. Cocaine. “Stevan offered you a trade,” Michael said. “My life for the file.”

“Actually, he wanted you alive. He was very specific.”

“Whatever. The trade is off. I’ll keep the file, and you keep your toy soldiers to yourself.” Michael stood, put down his glass. “Thanks for the drink.”

“What? You’re leaving? Just like that?”

“I’ve said what I came to say. I plan to be here until I know Julian’s okay. In the meantime, I don’t want any more late-night visits.”

“What about the file?”

“What about it?”

The senator struggled. “What are you going to do with it?”

Michael smiled darkly as he thought of the phone call he was about to make. “Whatever I please.”

Michael was gone; the room was empty, door closed. Randall Vane stood in a raw, blind fury. Those Kaitlin fuckers had blackmailed him for sixteen years, the threat so personal and damning that he’d had no choice but to pay. Some of the worst pictures went back years, to a time when very few people knew about pinhole cameras and fiber optics. God, the shame! If the pictures came out, he would never survive it. Politically. Socially. Suicide was a real possibility.

He pulled the photograph from his pocket.

Shuddered.

Taken fifteen years ago, it showed him with a seventeen-year-old page named Ashley, a beach girl from Wilmington with blond hair and an all-over tan. They were naked in a Washington hotel room, the bed a puddle of wrecked sheets. She was laughing as he snorted cocaine off the smooth swell of her right breast.

“God…”

He burned it in the fireplace, stirred the ashes until they were dust. When he’d heard that Otto Kaitlin was dead, he’d dared to hope. But the son called a day later, Stevan Kaitlin, who wanted Michael dead. The senator didn’t even know who this Michael guy was. He’d never heard of him. Didn’t know. Didn’t care.

But Stevan did. And Stevan still had the file.

He’s coming to you. And when he does, you bring him to me.

Why?

That’s none of your business.

And the file?

Yours, if you do as I say.

It should have been so simple. Bring in some hired guns, people he could trust. The guy was a dishwasher, for God’s sake! But now ...

The senator poured another drink, spilled it as his hands shook. In spite of what Michael had said, the photograph with Ashley was not nearly the worst. Otto Kaitlin had sent copies years ago: photos of him with prostitutes and attractive young lobbyists, some hard-core, graphic stuff. But the sex was not the worst of it—hell, he could survive a good sex scandal. There were financial records, too, a paper trail of payoffs and sold votes. Not all of them, but a few. It would only take one, and he had few friends on the ethics committee. “What do I do, what do I do, what do I do…”

It would start over. The payoffs. The worry. The fear. He would be forced to yield, forced to bow. Another puppet master would take the strings, and the great Randall Vane would be made to dance.

Again!

Again, again, again!

The fire tool came alive in his hands. It smashed vases and crystal, tore great, white streaks in all his lovely wood.

“Shit!” He threw the heavy metal against the wall. “Shit, shit!”

“Senator?” The door opened a crack. “Are you okay?”

“Yes. No. Get in here.” Richard Gale entered warily, eyes moving over the damage. “I want you to follow that motherfucker. Find out where he is, where he’s staying. I need that file.”

Gale kept his distance. “You told us to let him go. He’s already through the gate. He’s gone.”

“Gone? You stupid idiot.”

“That’s uncalled for, Senator. The instructions were yours—”

“Get out. Just get the hell out. No, wait. Where’s my wife?”

“Your wife?”

“Are you deaf?”

“No, but—”

The senator grabbed his lapels.
“Where’s my fucking wife?”

Abigail sat in an antique chair before a Victorian dressing table. She felt disconnected from a day that was too big. From the past week. From her life as she’d made it. So, she sought comfort in the familiar. She applied makeup with a deft touch. She kept her shoulders square, but felt the shame of her weakness. She was drunk, and she was needful. Her heart was breaking as her lips moved in a low, fierce whisper.

Survival, strength, perseverance.

It had been her mantra since childhood. She closed her eyes, and said it again.

Normally, it centered her, gave her the balance to drive her life with the precision it required. But when she opened her eyes, she saw the face of a child, a small girl beaten bloody and trying hard not to cry as she dabbed and cleaned and wondered why her mother hated her with such passion. It was a terrible image, and terribly real: the bruises and torn skin, the raspberry dimple where pale, blond hair had been ripped out at the roots. She closed her eyes before the tears could find her, swayed in the narrow chair as the room faded to a bare, cold shack, and she heard a baby cry.

Survival, strength, perseverance.

Her hands spread on the table, eyes squeezed tight as her fingers touched a silver brush, a comb with ivory teeth. She tried to find herself, but could not. Julian would be arrested, and Jessup didn’t love her. The past was rising up.

Survival, strength, perseverance.

Survival, strength—

No.

The comb was pink plastic, tears hot on the girl’s face as she tried to comb wisps of hair over a weeping, wet bald spot the size of her mother’s fist. Her feet were cold and bare under a cheap print dress stained black from lack of soap. The mirror was cracked through, large streaks of silver gone so that in places it was like staring into nothing. But where there was silver, there was fear, raw and fresh and caught in wide, green eyes. She tried to blink the world away, but the room smelled of fatback and collards; she heard her mother’s step in the door, the call of that precious child ...

“What’re you waiting for, you little shit monkey?”

The girl held herself very still. Her mother moved into the room, brought the smell of hairspray and sweet tobacco.

“No, Momma.”

“Do it before I do the same to you.”

“Please don’t make me—”

“Do it!”

“No, Momma. Please.”

“No-good ingrate.” Fingers twined in her hair. “Worthless, selfish brat.” Face slammed into the table. “Do it!” Slammed again, nose bloody.

“Please…” The girl saw broken teeth on checkered wood.

“Do it!” Face against wood. “Do it! Do it! Do it!”

Until another lump of hair came free and the world went black. The next thing she remembered was sitting wet on the bank of the creek, blue with cold and blinking in the flat, winter sun. The dress clung to her narrow chest, water in her nose. Her hands were shaking, and strange noises came from her throat. On the bank beside her, her mother was hard-faced and satisfied. “Now you’re mine forever.”

The girl looked down.

And saw the thing she’d done.

Abigail jumped when she heard the doorknob rattle. A small cry escaped, and she cast a worried, guilty look at her reflection. Her eyes were still wounded, but the mirror was flawless and the comb in her hand worth eighteen hundred dollars. She dabbed at her eyes, and smoothed herself.

“Yes?”

“It’s me.”

“Randall, what?”

“Open the door.”

“Give me a moment.”

The knob rattled harder, wood vibrating in the frame. Abigail crushed the past, as she had so many times, then opened the door for her husband. He stood large and winded, his hands so fisted that bone showed at the knuckles. He came into the room and shut the door.

Abigail stepped back, wary. Her husband had never been truly violent toward her, but there was something in his eyes like a hot, cherry glow. “What is it, Randall?”

“Where’s Michael?”

“What do you mean?”

“Don’t play with me, Abigail. I need to know where to find him.”

“I’m sure I don’t know.”

“That’s a lie. You two are thicker than thieves.”

He stepped closer, and Abigail gauged the impatience and suppressed rage. She knew her husband’s moods, and this was a bad one. “I’ve answered your question,” she said carefully. “I don’t know where he is. You should go.”

“It’s not that simple this time.”

“I don’t know—”

“Bitch!” He struck a table hard enough to crack wood. “I don’t have time for games or lies or your misplaced, overprotective nature. This is important, so I’ll ask again. Where is he staying? What hotel?”

“I don’t know.”

“He has something I need, Abigail, something very, very important. Do you understand? I need him. I need you to help me.”

“Why?” She stepped back, got her hands on the desk chair.

“Because he wants to hurt me, so I have to hurt him first. Because if he hurts me, he hurts you. Because if I don’t find him, it’s over. Everything. You get it? Everything I’ve worked for. Everything I am.”

But Abigail had stopped listening. “You want to hurt him?”

“He’s a threat.”

“You want to hurt Michael?”

“Where is he, Abigail?”

She was at the desk, one hand spread as her vision constricted and a low, dull thrumming rose in her skull. The room dimmed, but the senator was oblivious. Abigail’s head tilted, and her neck creaked. The thrumming in her skull grew louder, a hive of bees that swarmed until her skin prickled. Her hand found a letter opener on the desk, a gift from Julian. The handle was bone, the blade sterling. “You want to hurt my Michael?”

“Hurt him. Kill him. Whatever.”

She blinked and felt a swirl of dark current, a cold, wet blackness that rose up and roared into her skull.

Her eyelids closed, then opened.

Abigail went away.

Jessup made it outside and under the stars before he realized that walking away from Abigail would not be that easy. Something in her voice sounded broken, and she was not a woman to easily break. But she did not tolerate impertinence, either, and rarely appreciated help that came unasked for.

He stood for long seconds, then said, “Damn it all.”

He walked briskly across the broad drive, then entered through one of the smaller doors in the back. He passed through the kitchen, the dining room, and was in the grand foyer when he saw Richard Gale and three of his men coming down the stairs. He’d met Gale once or twice over the years—brief stints when the senator traveled overseas or during random periods of heightened security—and had measured respect for the man’s training and demeanor, both of which were professional. He was a mercenary, yes, but a good one. The man came, did his job and went. Jessup suspected that Gale found him provincial, but didn’t care. “Have you seen Mrs. Vane?”

They met at the lowest step. Gale looked up the stairs, thought for a moment, then said, “She’s in her suite. I believe the senator is with her.”

“Thanks.”

Jessup took the stairs two at a time, and when he was out of sight, one of Gale’s men said, “Shouldn’t we be doing something?”

“Like what?”

“Anything.”

“You know what?” Gale looked after Jessup, then smoothed his lapels. “I believe our job here is done.”

Abigail’s suite of rooms was at the far end of a long wing on the north side of the mansion. She’d moved in seven years after her wedding day: clothing, furniture, everything. No one said a word about it; no one asked. The staff adjusted, and life went on with the senator and his wife living apart. Jessup rarely came onto this hall, not only because doing so would look improper—it would—but also because it was the safe place to which Abigail withdrew, her personal space in a house that was not really hers. He admired what she’d done with it: the colors, the light. She’d made the entire wing a reflection of her own impeccable taste.

He hit the hall at a fast walk. It was empty and still, his feet quiet on lush carpet. Abigail kept an entire suite of rooms: bedroom, sitting area, music room, library. Her bedroom door was the last in a row of six.

He heard the scream from twenty feet out, hit the door at a dead run, tore it open and stopped cold. The senator was on the floor, screaming. Abigail had one knee on his throat, the blade of a letter opener jammed into the soft spot beneath his collarbone. “You’re going to hurt Michael?” She twisted the blade, made him scream louder. “I don’t think so.”

“Abigail, please…” He was begging, one hand on the floor, the other on her wrist. She twisted the blade again. “Ahh! Shit! What the fuck? Get off! Let go! Abigail!”

Jessup stepped inside. “Abigail…”

“Jessup. For God’s sake…” The senator reached out a hand. “Get this crazy woman off me!” Jessup hesitated, torn. He knew exactly what was happening. Had no love for the senator. “For God’s sake, man…”

Abigail leaned in close, pushed the blade deeper. “You touch Michael and I’ll kill you. You understand?”

Jessup stepped closer, eyes full of knowing and dread. “Abigail?”

She laughed, flicked her head so that hair swung out of her face. “You know better than that.”

“Oh, no.”

She grinned. “Say it.”

“No, no, no.”

“Say it you poor, sad man.”

“Salina.”

“Louder,” she said.

“Salina!”

She looked up, eyes bright over the same, sharp slit of smile. “You going to screw me this time?”

“Salina, don’t.”

“Salina? What the hell’s going on?” Vane tried to force her wrist up, but she leaned on the blade. “Ahh! Damn!”

She said, “Do that again and I push it all the way to your heart. You understand me, fat boy?”