Julie made her brother and cousins jump through verbal hoops for quite a while before she finally agreed to go home. Reese had the feeling she’d been planning to go anyhow; she just enjoyed toying with them. But even her surrender was on her own terms. “I can’t come out this week,” she said. “I’ve got a meeting with the attorneys in the morning.”
“Why, what’d you do this time?” Tim prompted.
“Oh, shit,” Spencer said over him. “Is that tomorrow? Gram’s thing?”
“Yeah,” she answered, very quietly.
“Shit.”
“Wait,” Greg said. “That’s tomorrow? And you weren’t going to say anything?”
“There’s nothing to say.”
“Really? You don’t have some big ‘I’m way richer than you guys will ever be’ dance routine figured out? Some kind of flash mob or something?”
“No.”
“Because we totally would,” Tim said. “We’d have billboards and those airplanes with the message banners and all of that.”
“Yeah,” Spencer said, “and that’s probably why none of us are getting the money.” The other boys grumbled, but nodded in agreement. The boy sobered. “You miss her, don’t you?”
“I really do,” Julie admitted.
“Finch?” Reese said. “All this emotional energy, the running and the swimming? I don’t think it’s about Ingram. At least not all of it.”
“It’s about the grandmother,” Finch agreed. “Miss Morgan said they were extremely close.”
“The boys are all about the money, but not her.”
Finch hesitated. “Julie’s husband died the day before her grandmother. Which would have been today.” He pulled up the record and checked. “Six years ago today. Maybe that’s why she’s having trouble disconnecting from Will. If she genuinely cares about him, or if she believes she does, letting him go so close to these particular dates might be impossible for her.”
Reese nodded. “She threatened me with a Skilsaw for getting too close to him, Finch. I’m willing to believe she genuinely cares about him.”
Julie took a long pull on her beer. “It’s weird. I met this guy yesterday who reminded me of her. A lot.”
“Was he a hundred years old?” Tim asked.
“Not like that. But you remember when we were little, you’d be telling Gram some story about how it wasn’t your fault your church shoes were muddy, because your brother pushed you off the sidewalk?”
The boys nodded. “Or why it’s not your fault you pushed your sister out of the hay loft, because your brother dared you to?” Greg added.
“Or why it’s not your fault you totaled the Camaro, because your cousin put his hands over your eyes on the highway?” Tim contributed, elbowing Spencer.
“Yeah, those stories.” Julie nodded. “And she’d get that look in her eyes, and you knew damn well that she knew every word was bullshit, but she was much too well-bred to call you out on it?”
“I remember,” Spencer said, and the others nodded. “You could lie to Mom all day long, but not Gram.”
“He was like that,” Julie continued. “Like he totally knew half of everything I said was a lie, but he was letting me get away with it because he was just too polite not to.”
“She is a very observant girl,” Reese said.
“Yes,” Finch agreed. From his tone, he rather liked the way the girl was describing him.
“It was like having Gram back for a minute. It was nice.” She grinned. “Of course, it was in that ‘Oh, shit, I am so busted’ sort of way, but still … nice.”
“You miss Gram,” Spencer said again. “So after you meet with the lawyers tomorrow and have official status as new richest bitch on the block, you should come home and spend some time with the family you have left. Not next week. Tomorrow.”
“Yeah,” Greg agreed. “Because God knows some day all of us will be gone, too.” He rolled his eyes.
“You guys breed like bunnies,” Julie countered. “You will never all be gone.”
“But the ones of us you really like might be,” Tim pointed out. “Because Aunt Stef will kill us if we don’t find a way to talk you into this.”
The girl shook her head. “How did you know I was here, anyhow?”
“Mom bribed somebody,” Spencer said blithely.
“Of course she did.”
Greg drained his beer, thumped his bottle on the table. “Okay. You coming home tomorrow, or do we need another round?”
“Oooh, we could get her drunk and just throw her ass in the car,” Tim offered.
“Sure,” Spencer said. “Remember what happened last time we got into a drinking contest with her?”
“No,” his cousin admitted.
“None of you do,” Julie told him dryly. “Not until you all woke up under the table. With no pants.”
“I do remember that,” Greg admitted.
She sighed heavily. “Next week. Thursday or Friday. Just for the weekend, and only if you don’t bug me about it between now and then.”
“You promise?” Spencer urged.
“I promise. But can we not get all over-the-top with this?”
“No barbeque?” Greg said.
“No fireworks?” his brother added.
“No orchestra?” Spencer chimed in.
“I remember now why I never come home,” Julie said grimly.
Greg gestured for another round of beer. Julie switched to water; Reese didn’t know if she was being cautious or simply calorie-conscious. The way she worked out, she could drink all the beer she wanted. The young men continued to talk. Julie largely dropped out of the conversation. She didn’t seem exactly unhappy with her companions. She laughed at the jokes, listened to their stories. But she stopped participating. Withdrew.
They were drinking beer, snacking, joking, laughing.
She was mourning, alone in the crowd.
John Reese knew exactly how she felt.
_____________________________________________________________________________
2000
Nathan Ingram walked into the office like a man who’d just staggered home from the wars.
Harold glanced up from the keyboard. “So, how was the big move-in?” he asked.
Ingram went to the side table and picked up a water glass from the tray. Then he went to his desk, opened the bottom drawer and brought out a bottle of insanely expensive Irish whiskey. He poured the water glass half full. He glanced at Harold, with a raised eyebrow of invitation.
Harold shook his head. “Like that, was it?”
Ingram knocked back half to the whiskey. “He hates me.”
“He doesn’t hate you,” Harold assured him. “He’s going through a stage.”
“He’s been going through this stage for, what, sixteen years? Since he learned to talk?” He threw back the rest of the liquor and refilled his glass. “He hates me.”
Harold left the keyboard and went to stand beside the desk. “It’s called sipping whiskey for a reason, Nathan.”
His partner scowled at him, but he put the rest of the bottle back in the drawer. “Everything I say to him is wrong. Everything is critical. And even the things I don’t say are wrong. He knows I hate his hair, even though I’ve practically bitten my tongue out not to say anything, he knows I hate it because of the way I look at him.” Ingram started to take another slug, turned it into a big sip, and then another one. “The way I look at him is wrong, Harold. Jesus Christ.”
“He’s trying to be independent, Nathan. To find his own way.” He rested his hip on the edge of the desk. “It can’t be easy, being the son of a very wealthy man.”
“Don’t even get me started. Poor little Will, so many things he can’t do because his daddy has money. My God, Harold, if he had to spend one day without all the things that that money buys him, if he ever had to miss a meal because there wasn’t any money … I’ve done everything for that boy.” Ingram gestured to the office around him. “All of this, my whole life, so he wouldn’t ever have to know what it was like to be without … and he hates me because I never spent enough time with him. What the hell does he want from me, Harold?”
“He wants you to be everything, at all times, in all places.”
“Thank you,” Nathan sniped. “That was very helpful.”
Harold ignored the sarcasm. “He’s a young man now, Nathan. He’s trying to get himself launched into the world, and to do that he has to push off from you. Didn’t you have fights like this with your father, when you were his age?”
“My father would have knocked me through a wall.” Ingram sipped his drink again. “You?”
“No.”
Nathan knew him well enough not to pursue that question. He took another drink, put his glass down on the desk. “I’m scared to death, Harold,” he admitted. “He’s so impulsive. He gets these ideas in his head and he just goes with them, he never stops to think anything through, to think about the consequences.”
“That’s a function of his age, Nathan.”
“And it’s bad enough when he’s at home, where I can watch him, head him off, get him out of trouble before he hurts himself … but now that he’s at college? Who’s going to head him off now? By the time I find out he’s in trouble it will be too late.”
Harold knew this wasn’t entirely true; Ingram had a security detail watching his son around the clock. But there were kinds of trouble that armed men couldn’t “ or wouldn’t “ intervene in. “Nathan, listen to me. Will’s headstrong, like his father. He’s going to make mistakes. And some of them are going to hurt. But he’s smart, and he’s got a good heart. And you’ve taught him well.”
“I haven’t taught him a damn thing, Harold. I’ve been here with you instead.” He stopped, shook his head. “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded.”
“I know.”
Nathan looked around the office. He had meant it, Harold knew, in some ways. And he was right.
He picked up the glass and drank deeply. “You were saying. Smart, good heart.”
“He’ll get through this,” Harold continued. “He’ll probably need some help, and he’ll probably screw up. He’ll certainly fight with you along the way. But he will get through this. And on the other side, he’ll be a fine young man that you’ll be insufferably proud of.”
Nathan looked at him for a long moment. Then he looked out the window, to the north, where far away his only son was settling into his first dorm room. “I already am, Harold. Maybe that’s what makes this so damn hard.”
Harold nodded. He was out of words. He put his hand on Ingram’s shoulder for a moment. Then he straightened, went to the side table, and brought back his own glass.
_____________________________________________________________________________
2012
When the boys finally left, Julie strolled into the park across from the hotel and dropped onto a bench. She took out her phone out. Reese got in a long line at the coffee stand and waited patiently.
“What’s up, Jules?” a man said on the phone.
“Hey, Joe,” Julie answered. Her voice was very calm. “You’re fired.”
“What?”
“I want a new handler,” she answered. “Start the paperwork today.”
There was a small pause. “Jules, what the hell are you talking about?”
“I told you not to talk to my family.”
“Jesus, Julie, they just want you to go home for a while. Calm down.”
“Do I sound hysterical, Joe?”
She didn’t sound hysterical to Reese. She sounded like she was completely in control. And furious. Her handler knew it, too. “Jules, where are you? I’ll come pick you up. We’ll talk about this.”
Reese’s eyes narrowed. He’d considered Kemp on a long list of suspects. Those words, ‘I’ll come pick you up’, shot him to the top of the list.
The girl didn’t take the bait. “We don’t need to talk about anything, Joe. This is very simple. You have one chance to keep your job and your pension. Start the paperwork, right now, and get me transferred to another handler.”
“Or else what?”
“Or shortly after noon tomorrow I take my old ID with my old name down to Washington, plant my ass on Madam Secretary’s couch, and tell her my long sad story about how you betrayed me. She likes me, you know. I used to roll Easter eggs on her front lawn.”
“Damn it, Jules …”
“I warned you, Joe.”
“Just go home, Julie. Just go up to the farm for a couple days, see your folks, see your brothers and sisters. Just get the hell out of the city and go home.”
“We’re not discussing this, Joe.”
“Your mother just wants to spend some time with you. It’s been a year …”
“Joe,” Julie snapped. “I’m done talking to you. Do the damn paperwork.”
She hung up her phone and put it away.
Reese paid for his coffee, took a sip. Watched the girl. She sat very still for a long moment. Then she stood up and walked over to a man on another bench. She stood a few feet away and didn‘t look at him. “Anything, Vince?”
“Haven’t seen him since this morning,” the motorcycle mechanic/bodyguard answered.
“Sure he’s still in there?”
He glanced at her. “Yeah, I’m sure.”
“Sorry.”
“Got any idea how long this will go? I’m not complaining, just need to line the guys up.”
“I don’t know. At least …”
The woman snapped her head around, toward a spot north of Ingram’s hotel. She froze and stared very fixedly at a little cluster of trees around a fountain a hundred yards away. Reese followed her line of sight, but he didn’t see anything that should have alarmed her. After a very long moment she shook her head and relaxed. “Maybe just through tonight. I’m going to see about getting a pro team in. I’ll let you know.”
“Will do.”
She stared at the fountain again. Then finally she turned and walked back toward her hotel.
Reese stayed where he was. Though their encounter the night before had been remarkably pleasant, he doubted that a second one would be as friendly. She didn’t have handcuffs anymore; she’d probably have to shoot him.
He guessed she was in the mood to shoot someone right about now.
After she went back into the hotel, he looked toward the fountain again. A full five minutes after she had gone, the blond man from the car slipped out from the shadow of the trees and walked swiftly the other way.
Reese whistled softly to himself. Nothing wrong with the girl’s instincts. Nothing at all. He wondered if she’d known he was in the park, too. Or chasing after her and the boys. It wouldn’t have surprised him.
The motion-activated camera on the candy box peeped. Reese brought out his tablet and watched the video feed while he sipped his coffee. The box was still on the coffee table, and he could see the young woman only up to her waist. She paced the living room a couple times, and then she placed another phone call.
There was an odd little static of tiny beeps, the sound of his phone figuring out which feed to prioritize, and then there was Finch’s voice in his ear. “Harold Wren.”
“Mr. Wren,” Julie said politely, “this is Julie Essex, from the State Department. We met yesterday?”
“Of course. I’m not likely for forget you any time soon, Miss Essex.” Finch’s voice was full of charm and warmth, and Reese had heard it enough to know that not all of it was faked. “How are you?”
“I’m well. And you?”
“Better now that Will’s home, I’ll admit.”
“How’s he doing?”
Finch hesitated. “He’s still a bit .. unnerved, I suppose. But he seemed better today. I saw him for breakfast, in fact, and he was much calmer.”
“Good. I’m glad somebody’s making him eat. He forgets.”
“I can tell. What can I do for you, Miss Essex? I’m sure this isn’t a social call.”
“Actually … it sort of is.”
“Oh?”
Reese continued to watch the monitor. The girl continued to pace. “What are you doing, Julie?” he murmured to himself. “You’ve done so well this far. Don’t screw it up now.”
“This is not by any means an official State Department call,” she said clearly. “I am not calling in any official capacity. I’m just Julie right now. I’m just Will’s … friend.”
“All right,” Finch said cautiously.
Julie froze in her tracks, and even without seeing her face, Reese knew she was about to lie. “Mr. Wren, there’s been some very low-level chatter on the wire about Will. It’s nothing significant. It’s nothing that even rises to the level of notice for my superiors. Honestly, it’s probably nothing at all.”
“But it’s caused you to be concerned,” Finch supplied.
“It has.” She began pacing again; this next part was true. “I’m probably over-reacting. I tend to get over-involved with my assignments and to perceive danger where none really exists. But in this case, and given the events of the past week, I wondered if I could … ask a rather … enormous personal favor.”
“You want me to reinstate his security team.”
“I do, yes, sir.”
“Immediately. While he’s still in the US.”
“Yes, sir.”
“You think he’s in danger?”
Julie sighed. “Mr. Wren, I honestly don’t know. I feel like he might be, but I have nothing concrete to anchor that feeling in. I probably shouldn’t have called you at all.”
“No, no, no,” Finch said quickly. “I’m glad you called. Please. Where Will’s safety is concerned, I would much rather err on the side of caution. Even if this ‘chatter’ of yours amounts to nothing “ heaven knows there are plenty of ways to get in trouble in New York City. I think it’s a very good suggestion.”
The girl stopped pacing again. Both her body and her voice seemed to relax.
“I believe you recommended that I retain Skydd again, didn’t you?” Finch continued.
“They’re the best there is,” she affirmed. “I know they’re very expensive. If cost is an issue …”
“It’s not,” he said quickly. “Believe me, it’s not even a consideration.”
“Good.”
“I’ll call them right away,” Finch promised. “They can probably have a team by morning. Or immediately, if you feel that’s necessary.”
“Morning should be fine. Thank you, Mr. Wren.”
“No, no. Thank you. I’m very glad that you called.” He paused. “Ms. Essex?”
“Yes?”
“When I spoke to Will this morning, he mentioned that he’d tried to call you, and that you hadn’t returned his call.”
The pacing resumed. “I’m sorry, Mr. Wren, but I can’t …”
“I understand,” Finch interrupted, “that you need to break off this relationship cleanly. I do, believe me. I agree that it’s for the best. And I’ve tried to convince Will of that. I’ll continue to try.”
“Thank you.”
“There is one thing, though, that he was particularly distressed that he couldn’t say to you. One thing that was very important.”
“Mr. Wren …”
“When you told me yesterday that he needed to hate you for a while? He wants you to know, whatever else, that he never hated you. And that he never could.”
The girl froze again. Reese thought he heard a little catch in her breath. Her voice, when she spoke, was very small. “Thank you, Mr. Wren. That … thank you.”
“You’re very welcome. Thank you for calling.”
The call ended, and Reese’s earpiece beeped softly and reset itself.
The candy cam moved swiftly. Reese looked away from the screen to avoid the vertigo it induced. When he looked back, the angle was higher. He couldn’t see the young woman anywhere; the cameras were pointed toward the window and the far end of the couch. Both views rose up and down softly, rhythmically. An arm passed by the couch-side camera, very close, up and the down again. He heard the television set in the background, soft voices and a laugh track. The video feed shook wildly, then settled back to the slow waves. There was a soft chewing noise from above.
Julie Essex, Reese realized, was slumped on her couch with the box on chest, soothing her battered feeling with fine chocolates.
Will Ingram’s instincts weren’t usually very good, but this one time, at least, they’d been dead on.
_____________________________________________________________________________
An hour later, Julie’s phone rang again. It was the freelance bodyguard, Mauer.
“Hey, Vince,” the girl said.
“Hey. These guys just pulled up in back of the hotel. Two of them, young, kinda shady lookin’. One went up to Ingram’s room.”
The candy box moved again, landed on the coffee table with a thud. “Driving a loud blue convertible?”
“That’s them. Kids that age got no business with a car like that.”
“Yeah. They’re Ingram’s friends, kinda.”
“Kid’s comin’ out with them now. You want me to follow them?”
“No, I’ll get it. I know where they’re going. Just chill for a while, I’ll let you know when he’s headed back.”
“You sure? You’re payin’ an awful lot of money for us to be layin’ around a hotel room.”
“Worth every penny to me. Enjoy. Get some room service, whatever.”
“Lobster?”
“Absolutely. Hey, listen, the pro team will be there in the morning. Skydd guys.”
Mauer whistled. “You payin’ for them, too?”
“Not me. Once they get here you’re done. We can settle up them. But, um, they don’t know you’re there, so try to back out easy, okay?”
“You got it.”
“Thanks, Vince.”
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