“The American people, of course.”
Reeder grabbed the drone’s arm again. “Listen to me, you son of a bitch...”
With surprising ease, the drone plucked Reeder’s hand off and flipped it away. His voice came back with a new, menacing edge: “No, Mr. Reeder. You listen to me.”
On and on, it rang.
“... I’m listening.”
“Walk away from your investigation, if you want your life back. That is, if you want that life to be a safe one for you and yours.”
Reeder backhanded him.
Briefly, something vile flickered on the drone’s face, then his pleasant expression returned as he dug a handkerchief out to touch the blood at one corner of his mouth.
The alarm bell did not let up.
The drone’s eyes were on Reeder but he was speaking to her now: “Agent Rogers, I believe I have good news for you. I have it on good authority that an Assistant Directorship will be opening up soon. Could well be yours... if you and your friend here can find something constructive to do... such as: nothing.”
The drone punched the button that released the elevator and they started down again.
The alarm bell ceased.
“Not interested,” Rogers said, soft but firm.
“Sorry to hear that,” the drone said. “A wrong decision can get a person into trouble. The wrong outlook can even get a person killed.”
Reeder grabbed the drone’s Men’s Wearhouse jacket by its lapels, and shoved him against an elevator wall.
Though he was clearly rattled, the drone said calmly, “Agent Rogers is the one at real risk here. You, Mr. Reeder, are a public figure. An American hero, and eliminating you would draw an unfortunate amount of attention. That would be less a concern for, say, your wife and daughter. They can’t stay in hiding forever, unless you three are prepared to live in exile.”
Letting go of the drone, Reeder backed away, visibly shaken in a way Rogers had never observed in him before.
The doors swished open and the drone knifed through a group waiting for an elevator that had taken a terribly long time to arrive.
Soon Rogers and Reeder were outside in the sunshine, but gloom nonetheless shrouded them.
“Did that really just happen?” she asked.
“That was a very real and serious threat, Patti, made by someone not afraid to carry it out, if need be.”
They tucked themselves against the outer wall of the building; the sidewalk butted almost up to the building here.
She asked, “Is he who we’re after, do you think?”
Reeder shook his head. “We’re looking for more than one rogue player, and your GAO pal seems more a messenger.”
She was flushed. “I don’t care if Briar is the Director of the Secret Service, I’ll put him in custody and haul his ass to the Hoover Building into an interview room and—”
“No.”
“... No?”
“We take a frontal approach like that, we’ll be lucky to be alive tomorrow. And if that prick knows my wife and daughter are in hiding, he just might learn where.”
“You’re not suggesting we walk away?”
“No. Not at all.”
“Then...?”
“We go to ground.”
Rogers frowned. “But I need my task force to get anywhere on this thing, and access to my resources at the Bureau, and—”
“Where did you first see our GAO friend?”
“At Fisk’s office.” She looked at him agape. “Oh, come on, Joe — you’re not saying Fisk may be compromised!”
“The Director of the Secret Service seems to be. And Fisk is just an Assistant Director.”
“She gave me full support on this investigation!”
He just sent her one of those frustratingly bland looks. “How better to keep an eye on you and your people?”
Government employees trouped by on the sidewalk in either direction. Employees of a government that Rogers could no longer trust...
She said, her voice sounding as small as a child’s, “What do we do?”
His response seemed a non sequitur. “You care about Kevin.”
“What? Yes! Of course.”
“Then we need to get him somewhere safe. You make him vulnerable, and he makes you the same.”
She willed herself to say calm. “Okay, so we get Kevin somewhere safe. What about us?”
“The same. Off the grid. Way off. We’ll pull Miggie in, too, so he can work his computer magic and help us get the identity of our GAO buddy. That son of a bitch is our way inside to whoever’s behind all this.”
“What about the rest of the team?”
“For now, they stay on the job. We’ll pull them off at some point, and get them to ground, too... but for now they make a show of continuing the Yellich investigation, only they won’t get anywhere that they share. Otherwise, anything they come up with, anything they accomplish, could be known by the rogue group.”
Soon, with Reeder at the wheel of his Prius, Rogers kept an eye out for a tail. After last night, the agent who lost his flag pin would not likely still be on the job, but someone else obviously could be. Right now they were going south on Ninth Street NW.
“We need somewhere to work from,” Reeder said, “a shadow HQ for an investigation of a shadow government. And we have to stay in the city, because that’s where the enemy is.”
“We need a safe house,” she said.
“Yes. And that’s where we’re going.”
He drove up the ramp for I-395 and headed east. They rode in silence for a while — she would let him think, even as her own mind was spinning. When he merged onto I-695, she finally asked, “Not the Navy Yard?”
“Not the Navy Yard. Too many security cameras. Someplace better.”
He parked on Ninth Street SE, with greenery to their right as he got out of the car and so did she.
“Where are we?” she asked.
“Near where we’re going. But it’s best we walk.”
They skirted Virginia Avenue Park, then turned back down Tenth toward the Navy Yard and into a sketchy area where they passed a vacant lot between two brick buildings. The one on the corner of M Street, a tailor and pawnshop below, had a fire escape up to the floor above.
Reeder took the ’scape, surprising her a little, and she followed him to a landing where awaited a steel door with an overhead security camera... and a doorbell. As if the bell weren’t there, Reeder pounded on the steel.
In a moment, a voice came over a speaker: “Closed for bidness.”
“I got after-hours money, DeMarcus.”
“Who that with you?”
She said, “Special Agent Rogers.”
The voice said, “You shittin’ me, Reeder? You bring Five Oh to my door?”
“Five Oh is city, DeMarcus. My friend here is federal, but she isn’t DEA or ATF, so don’t sweat it.”
“Go away, man. I don’t know you no more.”
“Ten thousand dollars.”
The speaker fell silent.
Then: “Fifteen.”
“DeMarcus, you don’t even know what I’m buying yet.”
“I know you brung a fed around.”
“I need two minutes. We come to terms and I got ten K for you.”
“Like you got that much on you.”
Rogers goggled at Reeder as he withdrew a major wad of cash from his pocket like Bugs Bunny producing an anvil from somewhere. He held up the wad with one hand and the fingers of the other riffled through bills.
The door opened. Half-opened, anyway.
The skinny African American guy who peered suspiciously out at them looked to be in his early twenties; he wore Georgetown University gear, though she doubted somehow that he was enrolled.
“Patti,” Reeder said, “this is my friend DeMarcus. DeMarcus, this is my friend Patti. You can call her Agent Rogers. Be nice. She’s armed.”