The Expediter (48 page)

His secretary of state wanted to object, but she got up with the others and headed for the door.

“Mr. McGarvey, would you and Dick remain for a minute?”

When everyone else was gone, including the chief who had run the computer link, the president sat back in his big leather chair. “Okay, what’s next?”

“We need to find the source of his money,” Adkins said. “Otto Rencke is already working on it. That should give us the why.”

“We had the most to lose,” McGarvey said. “Whoever engineered this wanted to hurt us worse than 9/11 and worse than shipping a hundred pounds of polonium 210 across our border.”

“If you’re suggesting al-Quaeda, I don’t think it’ll turn out to be that simple,” Haynes said.

“I don’t think so either, Mr. President,” McGarvey said. He was bone weary, and wanted to quit and go home, yet he knew that the U.S. wasn’t out of the woods yet. Not by a long shot. “We might have had the most to lose, but India could have stepped up to the plate as our most important trade partner, taking China’s place. Or Russian oil interests might have wanted to keep China out of Iran. Even the Taiwanese would have benefited because a crippled China wouldn’t be as great a threat as she is now.”

Haynes sat back. “If you’re right, and I suspect that you are, it means that our hands are tied until there’s another overt attack against us,” he said.

“We need to find out where the money is coming from,” McGar-vey said.

“From the drug cartel?” Adkins suggested.

“The U.S. is their biggest customer, they wouldn’t want to destroy us,” McGarvey said. “The source is right here.”

The president was startled. “What do you mean?”

“The money is coming from inside the U.S.”

Haynes shook his head. “Who?”

“I don’t know,” McGarvey said. “But I’m going to find out and deal with it, Mr. President. You have my word on it.”

It was well past midnight when the cab dropped McGarvey off in front of the Hay-Adams Hotel across Lafayette Square from the White House and one of the doormen met him. “Good evening, sir.”

McGarvey hesitated. He was dead tired. It seemed like months since he’d slept last. Yet his mind was alive with a thousand separate possibilities and scenarios for where McCann had gotten his money and why. All he needed was a start, which Rencke had provided for him from Turov’s computer, which had among other things listed the name of one man other than McCann here in the States. Both had been erased from the hard drive and had not been brought up at the White House meeting.

“I have to take a walk first,” McGarvey told the doorman.

“It may not be safe at this time of the evening, sir.”

“That’s okay, he knows how to take care of himself,” Katy said, coming out of the lobby. She linked her arm in her husband’s and they headed down the driveway and crossed the street to the park, the White House lit up like a jewel.

“How long were you waiting in the lobby for me?” McGarvey asked.

“Actually I just got back from the hospital and I was debating whether I should have a nightcap in the bar. When I turned around you were getting out of the cab.” She held his arm a little tighter. “Is it over, Kirk?”

“The dangerous parts.”

“No war?”

“No war,” McGarvey said.

They stopped under a light and she studied his face. “Honest injun?”

He smiled and nodded. “Honest injun,” he said, hating the lie.

“But there’s more, isn’t there,” she said as a statement, not a question.

“There’s always more, sweetheart,” McGarvey told her. “We’re going home in the morning and getting the boat ready for the Keys.”

She chuckled from the back of her throat, her contented sound. “Not Vladivostok?”

He laughed. “If you prefer.”