VIRGINIA COUNTRYSIDE
The United States marshal served the papers after the quiet night in Virginia. Gabriel and the others, including Leonard, finally got seven good hours of sleep. The evening and then into the late night, there had been no activity with President Hadley, who was still in and out of consciousness. Unable to speak or to even move, he was still being fed intravenously. It was past eight in the morning when a light knock sounded on Gabriel’s third-floor bedroom door, and Kennedy answered with a towel in his hands.
“Madam First Lady,” he said as he turned and tossed the towel, where it snagged on the corner bedpost.
“Mrs. Hadley will do; the title always made me feel old for some reason.”
Gabriel poked his head out of the door and looked left and then right, and then his thoughts turned to devilry. He must have been hanging out with Damian a little too much. “I would ask you in, but that may start rumors we would just as soon avoid.” He smiled and waited for her to state her business and see if she had a reaction to his probing wit.
“I understand your reference to the rumors in Washington, Professor; you shouldn’t watch so much of that reality television you’re so fond of berating. Now if you will follow me, we have some business to discuss before your team meets this morning. I believe this may have some bearing on how you proceed.”
Kennedy reached for his coat and then followed Catherine Hadley down the stairs. On the second-floor landing, he looked down the hallway, and everything seemed quiet. He saw Julie Reilly dozing in a chair next to three standing hostage rescue team agents and smiled. He told everyone they didn’t have to keep watch, that the FBI could handle it for a night, but Julie insisted that they be close for observation. No better eyes than their own, she said. But after Kelly’s death, Gabe had a hard time leaving anyone remotely close to that bedroom.
When he reached the bottom of the stairs, he saw the First Lady’s assistant standing in the foyer talking with a bear of a man in a brown uniform shirt and faded Levi’s. He held a white cowboy hat in his right hand, and with his left, he battled with a too-small china teacup. The assistant saw Catherine Hadley and then quickly excused herself after relieving the man of his troubling cup. Gabriel stepped up to both as he cleaned his glasses.
“Ben Hyatt, United States marshal, Professor Gabriel Kennedy,” Catherine said as she smiled and stepped back.
“Professor, I am officially serving you this warrant. You are to cease and desist all your study of the president. He is to be transferred to Ringwald Clinic in New Hampshire by three o’clock today.” The burly man handed him the folded document. “Have a good day, sir.”
The United States marshal turned and left with a dip of his head at the former First Lady. Gabriel unfolded the warrant and scanned it. He took a deep breath and then faced the woman who intimidated all she ran across, much like her husband had. She learned well.
“You people were the ones who requested we take part in this. Why didn’t you just order us out?”
Catherine smiled and then went to the credenza and straightened out a vase of freshly cut roses. She acted as if she were fussing with them.
The front door opened, and Damian entered. He had been gone since the afternoon before when Kennedy had sent him out to dig up some information. Gabriel had surmised that Catherine could keep a lot to herself, but she had one requirement that any wife has—she had to obey the law. Damian went to find out what she had waving in the wind, legally speaking.
“I see that the marshal was just here,” he said as he removed his ever-present raincoat and then the fedora and tossed them on an expensive Hamilton chair next to the credenza. “I imagine you were surprised when he served you with papers?”
“Quite surprised,” Gabe said as he absentmindedly handed Damian the order to release Hadley to the New Hampshire hospital.
Damian smiled as he read the warrant. The large black man then lowered the paperwork. “You know this hospital in New Hampshire?”
“Yes, it’s well known. A place for the rich and famous to go and die quietly so as not to embarrass the other rich and famous. It’s a vegetable-monitoring station.” Gabriel turned and watched Catherine and her roses and then stepped up to her. “You know your husband is still functioning rather well upstairs, right?”
“Is that what you call it?” she said as she straightened and turned. The smile was no longer there.
“Why?” Kennedy asked.
Leonard and Jennifer stepped off the last stair and saw John Lonetree exit the pantry with a cup of coffee. They remained silent as they watched the drama they had stumbled onto play out. They knew when not to talk.
“She had to prove to the world that she was actually making an attempt to help her ailing husband. Otherwise, what would people in polite society think of our poor First Lady?” Damian said as he turned and went toward John and relieved him of his coffee. It looked like the former state police officer hadn’t slept in three days, which was completely accurate. He sipped and then winked at the even larger Lonetree. He turned back to Gabriel and Catherine, who stood amused. “In the time we have been here, Mrs. Hadley has been using her time well. At least her lawyers have. She got the injunction late last night after a conference call with a superior court judge, Lyle Buellton, a friend from many years ago. Thus, your service of writ this morning, Gabe.” Damian drank again and then smiled up at Catherine.
“So, we’re fired?” Leonard asked as he rubbed his eyes after joining the group. Even a few of the doctors and nurses were gathering to see the outcome. At this point, Gabriel could see that Catherine was becoming uncomfortable with so many people hearing their speculation on her motives.
“Your services, though appreciated deeply by me and my husband, are no longer necessary.” She turned to leave.
Leonard got Gabriel’s attention and waved a large file and then raised his brows.
“May we conclude our exit exam?” Gabriel asked, acting as if he had acquiesced to her decision. “Just to close out our files.” He smiled. “Legalities, you know how they are. Five hours alone, and then you can whisk him away.”
“Four hours, Professor. The helicopter arrives this afternoon to transport him to New Hampshire.” She nodded and then left them all to stand there feeling used and very much the underdog in this fight.
Kennedy immediately went to Leonard, who turned and went back inside the study. The others followed.
“That was my coffee, you know,” John said as he beat Damian to the twin doors of the study.
“Next time, less sugar.” Damian smiled as he paused at the doorway. “I’m sweet enough.”
Lonetree gave him a dirty look as Jenny patted him on the back as she too went inside.
Damian went to Gabriel before Leonard got to him. “That phone call last night”—he shook his head—“what in the hell happened?”
“I’ll have Julie catch you up. We informed Kelly’s father in Brooklyn. It wasn’t easy to tell a man that he lost his daughter and that we don’t know exactly how it happened.”
Damian placed a beefy hand on Gabe’s shoulder. They were joined by John as the others sat at the long table. Jackson looked at Kennedy and then John in turn.
“I haven’t said this in many years, at least since that night in the Poconos, but by God, Gabe, this is enough. We have no real idea what we are doing here. Kelly’s death proves we don’t know enough about reality, much less the supernatural. We’re babes in the woods, and now someone has paid the price for it. Let’s shut this down and get the hell out of here.” The words were whispered, but they carried well to the others. “Sorry, but I liked that girl, even though I didn’t show it a lot. She had guts, and that’s something I appreciate. Do right by her, Gabe.”
“That’s what this is for,” Leonard said as he finally got Gabriel’s attention and slapped the file into his chest. “This came through last night.”
“What is it?” Kennedy asked as he watched Damian finally moving off to the table.
“Gabriel—”
Kennedy ignored John; he knew what he was going to say, and he didn’t even want to go there. He gestured for John to sit down.
When he opened the file, his eyes widened. “Leonard, this would have been good if we were after the First Lady, but this doesn’t do anything to stop Hadley from being transferred.”
“What is it?” Julie asked as she stood and started pouring coffee for everyone. Jennifer assisted just to do something.
“It seems the former chief of staff, the now deceased Herbert Avery, assisted Mrs. Hadley in acquiring a little bit of clout. Avery was about to try three months ago before the president began showing signs of insanity, giving her full power of attorney. All his holdings in the Hadley Corporation, according to Mr. Sickles here.” Gabriel tossed the file on the table and looked at Leonard. “We’ll turn this over to the FBI for a possible criminal case, but it doesn’t help us”—he looked up toward the ceiling and the bedrooms there—“or him. Besides, as I said, she no longer needs power of attorney; she’ll get everything anyway.”
Leonard became frustrated and then snatched the discarded file from the tabletop. He opened it and then slammed his palm down upon it.
“As I mentioned yesterday, Sacramento Security has only three holdings. One now, after the state took over two of those properties. There is only one property requiring security, and they require security, as I said, 24-7. I found the payroll outlay for two employees on a long-term contract. I even found their marriage license in the State of California records. The security team actually married.”
“Well, being cooped up together twenty-four hours a day will do that to people,” Damian said as he sipped coffee.
“Leonard, what are you saying?” Gabriel asked.
“It’s the lead we needed.”
“Why?” Julie asked as she finally placed a cup of coffee in front of Gabriel and then sat down.
“It’s what they had been contracted to secure.”
“Come on, Sickles. Stop playing this out,” Damian said, trying to get the frustrating kid to get on with it.
“Who hires people to watch an entire town?” Leonard said with an impish grin.
“Town?” Kennedy asked, confused but now more interested.
“Yep. It’s called Moreno, and let me tell you, this place has a history. And guess what?”
They all stared at Sickles, not saying anything and surely not rising to his climatic bait.
“The town was incorporated after World War II—1947, to be exact, when the first real business went in. Moreno, California, was the first investment of one Robert Hadley, the father of the president.”
Gabriel smiled. He finally sat down. “Go on.”
“I figured the key here may not be Dean Hadley but his father. His past isn’t that well covered, except for a few specific areas in his wartime service. Can’t get much out of the system because those war years are so highly classified that even I couldn’t get into the army’s file at the main database in St. Louis. But I did get into a system that stores payroll information for an agency that didn’t think past payroll was a high priority for security. Robert Hadley was a spook during the war.”
“A spook?” Jenny asked.
“A spy, worked for the old OSS, and served his last few months in Europe in Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia. What he was doing there, no one says on paper. But guess who came home from the war a rich man?”
“Robert Hadley,” Gabriel said as his smile grew. He wanted to stand up and give the small black man a kiss.
“Exactly. His newfound wealth started the Hadley Corp Gauge and Meter Company of Moreno, California, in the summer of 1948. It employed over three hundred workers, who were set up nicely in Hadley housing and basic services. The man basically owned these people and housed them too.”
Leonard turned and paced as he left the file on the table. “Now we know his son was born before the war ended. Now we know he went to Chino High School and not Chaffey, as his official record states, but why there? Well, Moreno was large enough for kindergarten through eighth grades, but there weren’t enough older students to justify a high school class, so they were bused to Chino, eighteen miles away. We now know it was all a lie. Real records show he went to Chino High School and graduated in 1963. Now let’s assume that Chino is somehow relatable to Moreno.” Leonard turned one of the computer monitors around and then pointed at a Google map. “Here’s Chino, Ontario, Pomona, Corona, and here is”—he tapped the screen hard—“Moreno. Eighteen miles away in the hills surrounding the valley.”
“I’ll be damned; it was right there,” Julie said, admiring Leonard.
“What happened to the town?” Gabriel asked as he examined the screen.
“Industrial explosion. The equipment they made used mercury, the deadliest heavy metal. The building exploded one night and killed thirty-six factory workers. The fire rained down on the town below, where many more were burned and killed. The town was officially declared dead in 1965 because of groundwater contamination from mercury poisoning. The security is there to supposedly keep the town off limits to squatters.”
“When did all of this happen?” Jennifer asked as she reached out and took John’s hand. She didn’t like the way he was listening to Leonard’s report.
“That is the real capper here. The plant exploded on one of the busiest nights of the year. Halloween 1962. It seems the town had a kids’ holiday and the adults had another.”
“What do you mean?” Gabe asked.
“The Cuban Missile Crisis had just ended. For weeks, the population thought they had seen the last days, but instead, at the last minute, reprieve from Armageddon.” Sickles finally sat down. “Everyone was happy. The kids, the mothers, the fathers. Then it suddenly turned into a town of death. One night wiped out a whole community, and the world never even noticed.”
“Hadley had that much clout?” Damian asked, incredulous at the idea.
“No, he didn’t. But the people who owned the old winery and mission in town did. Those were the two properties that the State of California took over in the seventies. The Santa Maria Delarosa mission, and the winery occupying the same property, were owned by none other than the United States government at the time, and then Moreno later, at least until the State of California sued Hadley Corp and wrested the property from them for historical sake.”
“When did the U.S. government go into the historical preservation business?” John asked, with his hackles rising.
“They didn’t.” Leonard pulled out a sheet of paper from the file and slid it down the table to Kennedy. “As far as I can see, the government was working with Hadley Sr. on something, and whatever that was revolved around this property. That something was important enough that he was well compensated for his trouble. Compensated well enough that he became one of the richest men in the world through that initial seed money from Uncle Sam.”
“Anything else?” Gabriel teased.
The computer whiz looked taken aback and then caught on and smiled. “Remember, this is mostly speculation.”
“Your speculation is better than hard evidence sometimes, kid,” Damian said as he fixed Leonard with his police officer’s eternal stare.
“As a matter of fact, a little article online caught my attention. It seems our Hadley Sr. influenced his son from the start for a career in politics. That’s from Hadley’s own mouth, and the interviewer at the time felt the future president was not all that pleased about being pushed in that direction. I guess he had changed after that night long ago—if he was even there, of course, which we cannot prove at this time. That’s all I have, and I don’t think the feds will give us any more. Everyone here knows what eventually became of the old OSS, right?”
“The Office of Strategic Services?” Julie said with a quizzical look on her face.
“The CIA.” Damian helped her place the history. “And I don’t think our little criminal friend can get into their system all that easily.”
Sickles gave Damian a dirty look. “Give me time and that would change, copper.”
The room became silent as Leonard finished.
“You know and I know how we can fill in the blanks,” Lonetree said as he angrily slid the coffee cup toward Gabriel. “And we only have four hours to stop that transfer from taking place.”
Gabriel Kennedy looked around the table until he finally settled on Jennifer. He raised his right brow above the rim of his glasses as he asked the silent question. She closed her eyes and nodded. Kennedy angrily slid the folder away from him and then stood.
“Okay,” Gabriel said with a resigned sigh. “Get the prep work started, and I’ll clear out the bedroom of the security detail. I’ll get some alone time with the president. I think it’s dangerous, as this thing is more powerful than any one of us could have imagined. Since this is likely to kill not only John but Hadley also, I should have no trouble in getting the First Lady to agree. Let’s move. Leonard, get a computer upstairs in case John relays something we need you for. Damian, you’ll act as security.”
“Yeah, since all these heavily armed men has helped thus far, I’m thrilled.”
Gabe smiled as did the others, and they prepared for one of the more dangerous scientific experiments ever conducted.
It was time for John Lonetree to dreamwalk with an insane man.