Page 29 of State of Retribution (First Family #9)
A fter Nick left, Sam sent the text to Avery and then sat back against the pillows, feeling unsettled at the thought of working from home while the rest of her team worked on the new homicide.
Nothing like being the absent commander.
With the distractions and interruptions to her work piling up, was it time for her to step aside to let someone else lead the Homicide division?
The very thought of it broke her heart into a million pieces. If she had her way, she’d spend at least twenty more years in this role before she contemplated retirement. But events outside her control might conspire to move up the timeline. Perhaps that was the goal of this entire thing.
With those thoughts in mind, she called Captain Malone.
“Morning,” he said. “How’s it going?”
“Just great. We added to the victim count overnight.”
“I was just reading the report. It’s tragic.”
“I think all these things might be related.”
“All what things?”
“The four murders, the drones, the abduction of Archie’s friend, the shooting yesterday.”
“What’s the common thread?”
“Me.”
“I don’t get it.”
“What if someone is killing people because they know I’ll do exactly what I do every time?
What if that person is using me to get at Nick with the thought being, if something happens to me, he’d resign?
Or if they shoot and nearly kill an agent on my detail, it’ll run me out of the MPD?
I’m not sure which one of us they’re after. Perhaps both.”
“That’s insane. There’re a million other ways to run Nick out of office, if that’s the goal.”
“This would be the quickest. Think about all the publicity we get for our mushy marriage, from Saturday Night Live to political cartoons to nonstop coverage in the celebrity news of everything we do and say. The whole world knows I’m his Achilles’ heel and that it wouldn’t take much to get to him through me. ”
“It’s preposterous, Sam.”
“Murder often is. Think about it, Cap. From the day he took the oath, what’s been the undercurrent that surrounds him?
He’s too young, too inexperienced, unelected, illegitimate.
It goes on and on. Even the Joint Chiefs of Staff betrayed him.
Why in the world is it preposterous to think someone would try to get at me to push him over the edge and out of office? ”
“When you put it like that, it seems less preposterous than it was at the outset.”
“Someone else whose opinion I trust put a different spin on it. What if it’s someone who wants me off the job, and it has nothing at all to do with Nick?”
“You’re saying someone wants that badly enough to kill four people, kidnap and assault another, send drones to the White House and shoot a Secret Service agent?”
“If there’s one thing we know after all these years on the job, it’s that anything is possible.”
“I don’t know, Sam. It still feels like a reach to me, especially the part about someone wanting to run you out of here.”
“I’ve made a list of all the people who’d potentially be part of something like this—his people and mine.
I want a dump of Ramsey’s phone from the weeks leading up to his most recent arrest. He’d be an excellent consultant for filling in the blanks of how I work and what we do whenever we have a new case to investigate. ”
“I’ll request a warrant.”
“So you think this theory has merit?”
“I’m reserving judgment until you get me some proof. Until then, let’s keep working the cases and putting the pieces together.”
“I’ll do what I can from here and consult with the others on next steps.”
“Sounds good.”
“Cap.”
“Yeah?”
“You promised you’d tell me if I became too much of a distraction on the job.”
“Yes, I did.”
“Are we there yet?”
“Not as far as I’m concerned. I’d still rather have you and everything that comes with you in that role than anyone else.”
“Is my presence putting people in danger? That shot Jimmy took was meant for me. It could’ve killed him or Freddie, who was standing right next to us.”
“You were shot at before you were the first lady, and you’ll be shot at again due to the nature of your job. It goes with the territory.”
“Are we attempting to defend the indefensible here, Cap?”
“I’m not. Are you?”
“Sometimes I feel like I am. Jimmy getting shot on a sidewalk in Adams Morgan has me rattled. I’m not going to lie.”
“This could have nothing at all to do with you or Nick or your official roles and everything to do with someone trying to get attention for God knows what. It could be someone wanting to shoot at cops for the sport of it and could have nothing do with the incident on Monday.”
“It’s weird that the federal government’s top law enforcement officials are no closer to knowing who sent those drones than they were on Monday, isn’t it?”
“Someone went to a great deal of trouble to make them untraceable.”
“Don’t people usually want credit for something like this? They want everyone to know they’re the ones who did it.”
“Not when the full weight of the federal government is poised to rain hell down upon them.”
“Still… The scumbags who’d pull off something like this—or nearly pull it off—always want credit for it.
Why isn’t anyone saying anything? Could it be because they don’t intend to stop with that?
I heard the Secret Service thinks yesterday’s shot came from another drone.
How can it not be related to the drones that were targeting the White House? ”
“Anything is possible, and I can tell your brain is exploding with all these theories. Now you have to prove them. Let’s see what the dump of Ramsey’s phone shows and go from there.”
“Thanks for the support, Cap.”
“You got it. Stay calm. We’ll figure this out the way we always do—one step at a time. I’ll reach out when I get the warrant.”
“Sounds good.”
She ended that call feeling moderately better than she had when she first woke up. Of course he was right. A theory was only that until it could be proven.
Her phone rang with a call from Avery. “Hey.”
“Hey, yourself, and what the actual fuck?” Imagine those words said in the sweetest of Southern accents.
“I know. I need you, Agent Hill.”
“I’m here.”
“You’re feeling okay? Back to full speed?”
“Not quite, but I’ve got you covered on this. The full resources of the FBI are engaged in the investigation into the drones as well as yesterday’s shooting, which we suspect may have also come from a drone.”
“I heard that.”
“We need to keep that info close to the vest until we know more.”
“What do you think of my theory?”
“Normally, I’d think it was too crazy to be considered, but I’ll add it to the briefing I’m due to make in an hour. Everything is on the table in a case like this, even the crazy stuff.”
“Thank you and the rest of your team for what you’re doing. We appreciate it.”
“I’ll keep you in the loop as much as I can.”
“I appreciate that.”
After they ended the call, she texted Gonzo to ask if they could do a phone meeting when everyone was ready.
Will call you in twenty minutes, he replied.
Sam sent a thumbs-up and used that time to shower and get dressed.
In the shower, she noted huge bruises on her left hip and shoulder, which had taken the full brunt of Jimmy tackling her to the sidewalk the day before.
At least she hadn’t fallen on her right side, where the impact might’ve been enough to refracture her healing hip.
The bruises were a small price to pay for not getting shot.
She’d need to get the twins up right after the meeting with her team, so she kept an eye on the clock while she waited for the call.
When the phone rang, she put it on speaker so she could multitask. In deference to the Secret Service meeting at nine, she applied some makeup while she listened to the update on the latest victim.
“Joshua Saulnier, age twenty-four, originally from San Diego. Attended undergraduate at George Mason and was pursuing a master’s in public policy at American University.
By all accounts, he was a hardworking young man with big dreams to work in public service after graduation.
His fiancée, Mandy, had recently moved to the District to live with him while he finished school.
They were due to be married in October. She was so distraught after we notified her that we had her transported to GW. One of their friends went with her.”
“What about the parents?” Sam asked.
“We were able to track them down and notify them. They’re on the way here now, along with Mandy’s parents.
Like the other victims, Joshua died of blunt force trauma from a single blow to the back of the head.
Again, the assault took place in a poorly lit stretch of sidewalk, on Nebraska Avenue.
Sergeant Walters is pulling film from the area, but we’re not optimistic that we’ll find anything that helps. ”
“Who went to notify the girlfriend?” Sam asked.
“Carlucci and Dominguez.”
“Are they on this call?”
“We are, LT,” Carlucci said.
“Did you notice anything odd or concerning in the area of the apartment when you were there?”
“Nothing that stood out.”
“No lurkers or loiterers nearby?”
“Not that we saw.”
“What’re you thinking, LT?” Detective Charles asked.
“It’s a stretch, and just a theory at this point,” Sam said, before she laid out her theory—or Vernon’s theory—that all the recent events could be related to some sort of campaign targeting Nick or her—or both of them.
Her commentary was met with dead silence.
“Look, I know it’s a stretch, but like I said, it’s a theory. Malone is pulling a warrant for Ramsey’s phone to see what he was up to prior to his most recent arrest. I’ve got a list of others I want to look into who’d have something to gain by doing something like this.”
“The blows to the back of the head… That’s how Elaine Myerson was killed,” Charles said. “Maybe Ramsey got the idea for a quick easy murder technique from that case.”
“That’s a good thought,” Sam said.
“What would he have to gain by killing innocent people?” Freddie asked.