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SEATTLE (Monday, Dec. 3, almost midnight) — Howard Parker nursed a brandy, holding up the snifter to the lights from the city streets below. Sitting in a comfortable chair looking out the glass doors of the penthouse suite of the Ambassador, Parker felt relaxed, safe. The Ambassador was an old hotel, immaculately restored with marble tile floors, high ceilings, and all the gracious amenities. Brand new was not for him; he liked the old-fashioned services and feel of the Ambassador. He liked the fact that he was greeted by name and treated as royalty. He kept the suite rented year-round. He and his wife came here after events at the SAM or Benaroya Hall. He stayed here often when he was in town, sometimes never going to the lake house at all.
He liked it better than home, than any of the homes he owned actually. Perhaps because at home were family members with all their own wants and whiny demands. Here there were only his chosen few. Here was peace and quiet.
“Your young attorney should be here soon, shouldn’t he?” Parker said, turning to the attorney who sat in the chair beside him.
“Should be,” Jake Dugan, a partner in Blackwell, Tsuga and Bledsoe, said comfortably, examining his own brandy snifter. “You should have come to me a whole lot sooner, Howard.” It wasn’t the first time he’d said it.
“Apparently,” Parker said, avoiding the eyes of the third man in the room.
Dugan wasn’t the dashing young Marine he’d been when he and Parker first met. He wasn’t even the sardonic assistant to the Defense Secretary he’d become. Now, Jake had perfectly cut gray hair, a solid but heavy body that was the result of pampering instead of exercise. He appeared to be the successful corporate attorney he was.
He’s lost his edge, Parker thought. He’s settled in. He and Jake were the same age. They’d been Marines together from the beginning, what? Thirty years ago? More than that. A long time.
C.J. crossed his mind, and he winced. A different generation of Marine, but no less loyal. They had discussed the need to get Brown if they lost control of Maxim, but he hadn’t expected it to come to this. He felt as if he’d sacrificed a knight to get his opponent’s pawn. He hadn’t expected Davis to kill C.J. Killed him pointblank, the others said. They were all disturbed by what happened. Freaked out, one of them termed it. It had been like an execution.
Parker looked into his snifter as if he’d see answers there. What kind of young man could do that? Walk up to a former sergeant and shoot him? He’d read the dossiers on all three of the young Marines — Maxim, Davis and Brown. He had not seen this coming. He ought to order Davis taken out just as you would a dog gone feral. Shot Kellerman point blank. Jesus!
A knock at the door pulled Parker out of his musings. The third man eased his jacket back away from the gun holstered under his arm and went to check the door. When Joseph Stein identified himself, he let him in.
“Well?” Dugan asked.
Joseph Stein took out the signed pages and handed them to his boss. “All done, sir,” he said. “They argued a bit, but they took the checks, signed the papers saying that they would not pursue the investigation.”
Jake Dugan looked through the signed forms and nodded. “I expected a bit more struggle,” he said.
“The death of Danny Brown seemed to have taken the wind out of them, sir,” Stein said. “Davis said that without the records Brown hid there was no story and he might as well recoup something. The others seemed to follow his lead. Maxim fussed a bit. Maxim challenged the Security Act bit, but I explained that he was revealing secrets he had sworn not to reveal. That deflated him.”
Dugan nodded.
“They say anything else?” Parker asked, not looking at the young man.
“The young woman, Kristy, said she wanted to tell you to fuck off for having her brother killed. But she said she thought having the money for his burial was more important.”
Dugan hid a smile. “Thank you, Joseph. I appreciate you spending your evening on this.”
“Not a problem, sir.” Joseph Stein recognized the dismissal and left without looking at Parker.
There was silence until the door locked behind Stein.
“You think this is really going to stop them, Jake?” Parker asked.
Dugan shrugged. “They really don’t have anything to go on. Oh, Maxim and Davis could probably stir up some publicity if they went public with their story, but they really don’t have much. The records could be duplicated, I suppose, but I think Brown’s death took the drive out of them. Pay them off.”
“We’ll have them watched, of course.”
The third man nodded. “Yeah, I have them under surveillance. And we might not want to drop the charges against Davis right away,” he said. “Make sure he’s going to stay bought. Once they’re dropped, we will have the devil’s own time bringing them back.”
“Davis,” Parker said. His jaw tightened, and he shook his head.
The three men sat in companionable silence for a while longer. Finally, Jake Dugan struggled to his feet. “This has been a pleasant evening, Howard. Don’t be a stranger. Judy would like to see you, too.”
Parker rose to his feet smoothly, conscious of the difference between he and Dugan now. Go to the gym for God’s sake, he wanted to scream at his friend. And not just for the massage. He said nothing of the kind. He shook his hand, promised to join him and his wife for dinner soon, and closed the door behind him.
He leaned against the door. “Well?”
The third man shrugged. “Buys us time,” he said. “They should relax. We eliminate some loose ends — Ms. Davis is likely to be satisfied with her settlement and not pursue police investigation. Ms. Brown will be too busy settling her brother’s estate and arranging for his burial. She will return to Shreveport. That leaves Davis and Maxim.”
“You think they’ll let their guard down now. Separate,” Parker said, pouring himself another brandy. He held up the bottle. The other man shook his head. Parker sat down, looked out over the city again. “I wasn’t sure you were going to be with me on this,” he said.
His companion shrugged. “You did what you could to bring my Dad home. You took care of Mom, when the Marines denied her benefits. When she called, said you needed my help, how could I refuse?”
“Your Dad was a good man,” Parker said. “He died doing what Marines do. The Marines should have taken care of your Mom.”
The man nodded. He sat quietly for a few moments, then reverted back to the current situation.
“Both of Maxim and Davis have some real messes to clean up in their own lives,” he said. “We’ll keep some pressure on Davis, he’s the dangerous one, I think. Maxim will go back to D.C. to Murray’s office.”
Parker nodded, thinking it through. “I’ll make a call or two in the morning, get Davis back at work on other stories.” He stressed the last. His guest laughed.
Parker shook his head. “Who would have guessed. A goddam reporter. In Seattle.” He’d said it, thought it many times before. Now he said it without rage, just a kind of bemusement. He hurt over C.J.’s death. Time to mourn later, he told himself. Couldn’t go soft now.
“There is something else.”
“What?” Parker sat his drink down.
“Maxim says someone brought him a file just before we busted up his place. There may be more than his own notes in those lost records.”
“A file?”
“Yeah. You got other skeletons in the closet?”
Parker sighed. “I ran covert ops for the Marines. Then 10 years of covert ops for the CIA. There is nothing I’ve done that I’m ashamed of.”
“But?”
Parker laughed. “There isn’t much I haven’t done, either.”
“I wonder what’s on that computer disk? Maxim didn’t have time to look before he started playing hide and seek.”
“A computer disk?” Parker felt growing alarm. “A computer disk! Where did he get this stuff?”
“He isn’t sure. A source he never saw. He isn’t sure what’s on it. I’m sure he knows more than he was telling. So, is there stuff out there that can sink this nomination? Besides the New Mexico operation?”
Parker sighed, feeling suddenly old and very tired. “I don’t know anymore,” he said. “I just don’t know. But we’d better find out.”
Parker sighed again. “You also should know one of the Marines that was there today says Davis told C.J. that he knew where Brown hid the files.”
“Was he telling the truth?”
“Your guess is good as mine,” Parker said sourly. “You are monitoring Maxim and Davis?”
“I know every move they make,” said Stan Warren from the other chair. “If they find out something, I’ll be the first to know.”
Parker nodded. “Good. That’s good.”