Tail Spin

He kissed her hair, her ear. “Don’t you think it scared me spitless when she fired at you? And she looked at me the instant before she turned to you.”

“I love you, Dillon. I loved you even when I kicked you into the wall mirror in the slam room.”

“I won’t forget,” he said, and kissed her eyebrow. “We’ll deal with this in the morning, Sherlock. Go to sleep.”

THIRTY-ONE

Washington, D.C.

Thursday morning

Jack and Rachael were nearing the Hart Senate Office Building on Constitution Avenue for their nine o’clock appointment with Greg Nichols in his new position with the senior senator from Oregon, Jessie Jankel, when Ollie called. “Turn on your radio, Jack, you’ll want to hear this. It’s Savich holding an FBI press conference.”

Jack said to Rachael as he flicked on his turn signal, “I bet he’s speaking this morning because he has an agenda,” and he turned up the volume on the radio. “He’s got to address all the crap that went down yesterday at the Barnes & Noble, but then, it’s his show.”

Savich had an agenda. He stood at Jimmy Maitland’s elbow, looking out over the sea of media faces from newspaper, radio, and TV, most of them familiar to him, seated in their folded chairs, the TV people well-groomed, sharp, camera ready, the newspaper reporters looking on the seedy side in jeans, more like real people. He glanced over at Sherlock, gave her a smile and a nod. When Mr. Maitland introduced him, he stepped up to the mike, and looked out at the avid, hungry faces, ready to hurl their endless questions at him, eager for a sound bite or two.

“I suppose most of you have heard about the disturbance at the Barnes & Noble bookstore in Georgetown yesterday afternoon.”

There was a wave of laughter since every reporter in the room had swarmed over Georgetown, interviewing everyone within ten blocks of the Barnes & Noble. Steve Olson, the manager, had closed the store and stood out on the sidewalk to take their questions. It had been a special report weaving in and out of regular programming throughout the evening, some of the speculation rivaling the truth, which was strange enough.

Savich said, “The woman we arrested in the Barnes & Noble died at Washington Memorial Hospital at around midnight. An autopsy is scheduled for this morning.”

“Agent Savich, why an autopsy? Didn’t she die of bullet wounds?”

“Did you shoot her yourself ?”

Savich said, “So far, our preliminary information is that her wounds weren’t fatal. Did she die from surgical complications? We’ll know today.”

“But she’s still dead. Hey, wait a minute. You think she was murdered?”

“How many times did you shoot her?”

“What did she do? Who was she?”

“Why did she run into the bookstore?”

“What’s her name?”

Savich finally held up his hand.

The room fell silent. “Her name was Pearl Elaine Compton. She was an established assassin, a very good one, according to our information, also a very long-lived one, given she was forty-one years old at the time of her death.

“She had three cohorts. One is dead, one is in the hospital, and the third is still at large. I’ll say it again—we’ll know the cause of her death today.

“As you might have heard, there was a lot of alarm and panic, all understandable, until one of the agents brought her down right after a teenage girl she was using as a shield was smart enough to bite Compton’s forearm and escape.

“It took two shots to bring the suspect down, shoulder and arm. She stayed down and we evacuated her to the hospital.

“No one else was hurt—no customers, no employees, no one in law enforcement.” He leaned even closer, cupped the mike between his hands. “The manager of the M Street Barnes & Noble is Steve Olson, a man I know personally. He was a great help at calming everyone down. He did complain to me, however, that they only now finished reshelving at least five hundred books.”

A bit of laughter. All of them were straining to get closer.

“What this all boils down to is that we escaped tragedy on this one. I sincerely hope my next visit to the bookstore will involve only a cup of tea and looking through the new best sellers. Okay, does anyone have any questions?”

Every single hand shot in the air, voices already escalating. Savich gave them a look. He nodded to Mercer Jones, longtime crime reporter for the Washington Post. Mercer had planted a couple of stories for him over the years. Mercer said in his deep, plodding voice, “Agent Savich, why is the FBI involved in a shooting in Georgetown? Why not the Washington police? What’s really going on here? Why were you after this Pearl Compton?”

Mercer was good, bless him; Savich had always recognized it. Mercer had given him the perfect lead-in. Savich said, “Good questions. Let me give you some critical information.” He looked at Jimmy Maitland, who nodded.

“As you all know, Senator John James Abbott recently died in an automobile crash that was ruled accidental.” He paused. “We now believe it’s possible that Pearl Compton, the assassin who died last night, was involved in his death. We’ve reopened the case.”

No need to mention Rachael, and Mr. Maitland had agreed. After all, this performance was to protect her. Why kill her if the FBI already knew everything she knew? The media would go haywire, dig into all of it. They’d find Rachael, but it would take a while. Whoever in Senator Abbott’s family was behind it, they had to be afraid. Fear meant mistakes. As he expected, there was a moment of stunned silence, then pandemonium.

Milly Cranshaw, host of Night Lights on PBS, yelled out, “Agent Savich, the official ruling was that Senator Abbott had been drinking and he lost control of his car. You’re saying someone hired this woman to assassinate Senator Abbott? Who would do that? Why?”

Savich smiled at her. Trust Milly to load up with a half-dozen questions so he could pick and choose.

“Pearl Compton was hired to make it look like an accident?” added Thomas Black of CBS, bushy gray eyebrows raised nearly to his hairline.

“What I’m saying is, we’re investigating whether Pearl Compton was involved.”

“But who would want to kill Senator Abbott?”

“Do you think it was a terrorist act?”

Mercer shouted out, “But no one took credit.”