Morris was listening to all this with the hangdog expression of the captive that he was.
Reeder and Rogers went over to Miggie, who looked up from his tablet at them in frustration. They spoke low.
“Something?” Reeder asked.
“Someone,” Miggie said, and his eyes went to Rogers. “Fisk. She’s wondering why we seem to’ve dropped off the edge of the world.”
“Shit,” Rogers said.
Reeder frowned at Mig. “She contacted us how?”
“She didn’t exactly contact us. I hacked my work e-mail, where she sent me a memo. Seems Ivanek’s checked in with her, and Bohannon, too... but she hasn’t heard from the rest of the team and that’s making her nervous.”
Amused despite the situation, Rogers asked, “You hacked your own e-mail?”
Shrugging, Miggie said, “You guys tell me be careful, I’m careful.”
She asked, “Can we get back to Fisk and not give ourselves away?”
“You don’t trust her?” Miggie asked.
“I barely trust myself.”
Reeder reached for a shelf and came back with another of DeMarcus’s untraceable burner phones; handed it to Rogers. “Get her on this, Patti. Best not mention our guest.”
“You think?”
With a dry chuckle, Rogers headed out onto the landing and shut the door behind her.
Reeder sat on the edge of the desk and asked Miggie, “Fisk say anything else about Ivanek?”
“Just that he checked in.”
“How about Bohannon?”
“Just that he said everything was cool. Jerry knows enough not to tell the AD he’s been sitting surveillance for us on Ivanek’s place... but whether he and Trevor have connected, I got no idea.”
Reeder let out a big sigh. “Our communication system leaves something to be desired.”
“Burner phones are better than tin cans and string,” Miggie said, “but just. Hey, when you wanna go sub rosa, things get harder. I did get a text from Jerry, though, on my burner.”
“And?”
“He’s been looking hard at Secretary Yellich. You told him and Wade to look for anything odd, remember?”
“And?”
Miggie handed his phone over. “And read this.”
Reeder did: *AY not CD*
“What’s this mean?” he asked the computer expert.
“No clue.”
Reeder curled fingers at Wade, who was duct-taping Morris back into the kitchen chair after a bathroom break. The big man came over and Reeder showed him the message on the burner.
“He’s your partner, Reg — what do you make of this?”
Wade read it, shook his head. “Typical Bohannon shorthand shit. Maybe a third of the time I have to ask him what the hell he means. ‘AY’ is probably Amanda Yellich.”
Miggie said, “I texted him for clarification but haven’t heard back yet.”
Reeder turned toward the nearby door. “Isn’t Patti done yet?”
Miggie glanced at the clock on his tablet. “It’s been a good five minutes, anyway.”
Reeder went outside, found the landing empty, and something cold traveled through him. From the top of the stairs, he quickly scanned the area, saw nothing and no one, then rattled down the metal stairs and started for Tenth Street.
Muttering, he walked at a hurried pace, hand over the butt of the nine mil in his waistband, and when he got to the corner, he turned it and about ran headlong into Rogers coming the other way.
“What the hell?” she asked, backing away.
He let out a breath. “Sorry. Panicked a little — worried you’d been gone too long.”
“It’s nice to know you care. But after I talked to Fisk, I figured I’d better ditch the phone.”
“What did you do with it?”
“Burial at sea.”
The Anacostia River ran past the Navy Yard, with access to the water just to the west.
They started back.
He asked her, “What did Fisk say?”
“Ivanek’s at his desk at the Hoover Building. We’ll leave him there, until we know where everybody is.”
“Ignorance is bliss, I guess. And Bohannon?”
“He’s headed back to the Hoover, too, she says.”
They were at the stairs now, and started up.
“So,” Reeder said, “for now we leave them on the bench.”
“For now,” she said.
They went inside. Miggie was at his tablet, Wade guarding the prisoner, who gestured to Reeder with an up-and-down motion of his head.
Reeder walked over and planted himself before the captive. “What?”
The accountant’s smile was a joyless thing, but it was there.
“I have a suggestion,” he said.
“It is difficult for the common good to prevail against the intense concentration of those who have a special interest, especially if the decisions are made behind locked doors.”
Fourteen
Patti Rogers joined Reeder who, hands on hips, stood before their taped-in-a-kitchen-chair prisoner.
Sweat beaded Morris’s forehead, though it wasn’t particularly hot in the loft apartment. Fear practically radiated off the accountant. Rogers knew the feeling — even the captors here were in a tight, untenable place.
Reeder said, “I’m listening.”
Morris swallowed and the earnestness he summoned was almost painful to see. “I wasn’t there when your agent was taken. But I have a good idea where she’s being held.”
“Still listening,” Reeder said.
“Then... we have a deal?”
“A deal?”
Morris nodded; sweat flew. “I tell you where I think she’s being held, and you let me go. You do that because if I were to tell my people I’d been captured, they might consider me compromised, and that could be fatal.”
“You give us an address,” Reeder said, a faint smile tracing his lips, “and we let you walk? That it? After all, you acted in good faith.”
“Yes!”
“No,” Reeder and Rogers answered as one.
“Then... then what incentive is there for me to help you? And please don’t insult any of our intelligence by racking that weapon and threatening me with a hole in the ground. I think we’re past that.”
Rogers said, “Are we?”
Reeder resumed his seat in the chair that faced the captive. “Here’s how this is going to play out. You tell us where you think they have Agent Nichols. We go check it out. If we don’t die in the attempt, and actually free her, we return to discuss your future.”
“What... what kind of future?”
Rogers said, “You’ll be lucky to have any. Seven Americans have died already.”
Morris summoned an air of confidence, though he was trembling. “That’s what I mean — you consider me a traitor. From my point of view, I’m a patriot. What I propose is that if you’re successful in your rescue, we all go our separate ways, no harm, no foul.”
This coming from a man taped in a kitchen chair.
Reeder said, “That’s a possible outcome.”
Rogers would have rather thrown this excuse for a human down those fire-escape stairs, chair and all. But she would follow Reeder’s lead.
“Where?” Reeder asked.
“Burke. Burke, Virginia. It’s... kind of out of the way.”
“What makes you think she’s there?”
Morris relaxed within his bonds; he seemed assured of the information he was about to share.
“I was given the task,” he said, “of pinpointing government safe houses that are seldom in use. That was a part of my normal work for the GAO — looking for properties that could be sold off by agencies that no longer used them. One of these was a house the ATF used in Burke. 124 Jennings Circle.”