The Jefferson Key: A Novel Read online

  Straight out the main doors.

  SIX

  WYATT WAITED IN THE GRAND HYATT’S BUSY LOBBY, FILLED with tourists here for a weekend in the Big Apple, now made that much more exciting by someone trying to kill the president of the United States. He’d listened to snippets of conversations from a nearby lounging area and learned that no one knew if Daniels had been hit, just that he sped from the scene. Some recalled the Reagan assassination attempt from 1981, when only after the president was headed into surgery had an official statement been made.

  At least a dozen New York City police and half that many Secret Service were now racing through the two-story lobby. Voices were raised and positions were assumed near escalators and exits. Hard to say where Malone would make his move, but the paths out of this hotel were limited to an entry down one floor, to his left, that led out onto East 42nd Street—as well as another set of adjacent glass doors that opened into a tunnel connecting with Grand Central Terminal—and a second set of glass doors one level up, which he could observe from his vantage point. If he knew his adversary as well as he thought he did, Malone would simply walk out the main doors. Why not? No one had seen his face, and the best place to hide was always in plain sight.

  He realized the authorities would love to clear the hotel, but that could prove impossible. There were simply too many people on the twenty-plus floors. With the usual six months of prep time for a presidential visit, the Secret Service would have been able to handle this. As it was, they’d barely had eight weeks, their main tactic secrecy since no travel announcement had been made until this morning, when the White House simply said that Daniels would be in New York on a personal visit. The precedent for that came from a past president who’d made an unannounced trip with his wife to see a Broadway production. That jaunt had gone off without a hitch, but Danny Daniels was probably kicking himself right now, provided his organs weren’t failing or he wasn’t losing large quantities of blood.

  Wyatt loved it when people screwed up.

  It made things so much easier.

  More than likely Malone had fled upward, at least initially. He’d yet to exit any of the elevators Wyatt could see. He certainly would not be using the stairs, as the police would have those sealed first thing. But the note he’d left in the room should drive Malone forward. He’d be the Lone Ranger, as always. Good and faithful to his beloved Stephanie Nelle.

  He liked being back in the fray.

  It had been a while since his last contract. Work had come less frequently the past few years, and he missed his job as a full-time agent. Eight years now since he’d been forced out. Still, he’d made a living peddling his services, which seemed the future of the intelligence business. Fewer agents on the payroll, more hired by the job—independent contractors who offered deniability and required no pension. But he was fifty years old and should have risen, by now, to deputy administrator, or maybe even head of an agency. He’d been called one of the best field agents ever.

  Until—

  “What are you going to do?” Cotton Malone asked him.

  They were trapped. Two gunmen had them pinned from above, and another two were positioned in the dark recesses that stretched before them. He’d suspected a trap and now that fear had been confirmed. Thankfully, he and Malone had come prepared.

  He reached for the radio.

  Malone grabbed his arm. “You can’t do that.”

  “Why not?”

  “We know what’s out there. They don’t.”

  They were three agents told to watch the perimeter.

  “We have no idea how many guns are here,” Malone said. “Four we know of, but there could be a lot more.”

  His finger found the SEND button. “We have no choice.”

  Malone yanked the radio from his grasp. “If I agreed with that, we’d both be wrong. We can handle this.”

  More rounds came their way. They kept low, among the crates.

  “Let’s divide,” Malone said. “I’ll take the left, you the right, and we’ll meet in the center. I’ll keep the radio.”

  He said nothing.

  Malone stared out into the blackness, seemingly assessing the danger, readying himself to advance.

  Wyatt decided on another course.

  One swipe of his gun across the temple and Malone slumped to the concrete, out cold.

  He retrieved the radio and ordered the three men to move in.

  A loud voice snapped his mind back to reality.

  Another wave of police had invaded the lobby. People were now being herded toward the exits, the hotel staff assisting. Apparently, somebody had finally made a decision.

  His gaze raked the mayhem.

  The main elevators opened on the ground floor and people streamed out. One of them was Cotton Malone.

  Wyatt smiled.

  Malone had ditched his jacket, just as Wyatt knew he would. That would be one of the things agents would be looking for. He watched as Malone melded into the crowd and hustled across the lobby to the escalator, riding it down toward the hotel’s main entrance. Wyatt stayed back, using a tall curtain for cover. The agents and police were making their way toward where he stood, gesturing for everyone to leave.

  Malone stepped off the escalator and, instead of leaving through the center doors, turned right and headed for the exit that led into Grand Central Terminal. Wyatt drifted toward one of the hotel meeting rooms, closed for the evening, and reached for the radio in his pocket, already set on the frequency being used by the Secret Service.

  “Alert to all agents. Suspect is wearing pale blue buttondown shirt, light trousers, no jacket at this time, presently exiting Grand Hyatt hotel from main lobby into tunnel that accesses Grand Central Terminal. I’m headed in that direction.”

  He waited an instant, pocketed the radio, then turned toward the lobby.

  Malone disappeared through the exit doors.

  Secret Service agents elbowed their way through the crowd in pursuit.

  SEVEN

  KNOX LEFT THE PLAZA HOTEL. HE KNEW AT LEAST THREE MEMBERS of the Commonwealth were bordering on panic. As they should be. What they’d authorized came fraught with risk. Too much in his opinion. Always before they’d worked with the encouragement and blessing of the government, their actions and authority sanctioned. Now they were renegades, sailing stormy, uncharted waters.

  He crossed the street and entered Central Park. Sirens blared in the distance, as they would for hours to come. Still no word on the president’s condition, but the whole thing had happened less than an hour ago.

  He’d always liked Central Park. Eight hundred plush acres of trees, grass, lakes, and footpaths. A backyard for an entire city. Without it Manhattan would be one unbroken block of concrete and buildings.

  He’d made a call from the Plaza and requested an immediate meeting. His contact had likewise wanted to talk—no surprise there—and was nearby, so they chose the same bench past the Sheep Meadow, near Bethesda Fountain, where they’d met before.

  The man who waited for him was unremarkable in nearly every way, from his forgettable features to his plain manner of dress. Knox walked over and sat, immediately disliking the smug look on Scott Parrott’s face.

  “The man hanging out the window,” he asked Parrott. “One of yours?”

  “I wasn’t told how it would be stopped, only that it would be.”

  The answer raised more questions than it resolved, but he let it go. “What now?”

  “We want this to be a message to the captains,” Parrott said. “We want them to know that we know everything about the Commonwealth. We know its employees—”

  “Crew.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “The crew works the company.”

  Parrot laughed. “You’re a bunch of friggin’ pirates.”

  “Privateers.”

  “What the hell’s the difference? You steal from anyone you can.”

  “Only from the enemies of this country.”

  “It
doesn’t matter what you are,” Parrot said. “We’re all supposed to be on the same team.”

  “It doesn’t look that way from our perspective.”

  “And I sympathize with your bosses. I know they’re being squeezed. I get it. But there are limits. You have to understand that. They have to know that we would never allow them to kill the president. I’m shocked that they’d think we would. Like I said, this is a message.”

  Which the National Intelligence Agency apparently wanted him to personally deliver. Parrott was Knox’s contact with the NIA. A year ago, when it became apparent that factions within the intelligence community had decided to destroy the Commonwealth, only the NIA had stood with them.

  “The captains will wonder why you’re sending them messages. Why you interfered.”

  “Then tell them I have some good news. Good enough that they should thank us for what we did today.”

  He doubted that, but he was listening.

  “The solution to your Jefferson cipher should be loading on my laptop as we speak. Our guys solved it.”

  Had he heard right? The key? Found? After 175 years? Parrott was right—the captains would be thrilled. But there was still the matter of the foolishness that had just occurred. He could only hope he’d covered their tracks with no mistakes. If not, no cipher key would matter.

  “If there’s anything that could help them climb out of the hole they dug for themselves today,” Parrott said, “this is it.”

  “Why not just tell us that?”

  The agent chuckled. “Not my call. I doubt you left a trail that will lead anywhere and we were there, ready to stop the attempt, so it doesn’t matter.”

  He kept calm and silently reaffirmed the decision he’d made on the walk over.

  It had to be done.

  “I thought maybe you’d buy me dinner,” Parrott said. “Something that once had parents. You can afford it. Then we can go back to my hotel and you can find out what Andrew Jackson had to say.”

  Could good fortune have actually come from this disaster? Even Quentin Hale, who should be furious, would be ecstatic to hear that the cipher had been solved.

  Knox had served as quartermaster for nearly fifteen years, earning the job his father once held. He’d always smiled when he watched pirate movies with their caricatures of the all-powerful captain who mercilessly inflicted pain on his crew. Nothing could be further from the truth. Pirate communities had operated as loose democracies, members deciding for themselves who led them and for how long. The fact that both the captain and the quartermaster were elected ensured that the treatment of those below them would be fair and reasonable. As a further check and balance, crew votes could be taken for a new captain or quartermaster at any time. And many a captain who went too far found himself banished to the first speck of dry land the ship spotted, another man elevated to leadership. A quartermaster walked an even tighter line, serving both the crew and the captain.

  A good one understood how to please both.

  So he knew what had to be done.

  “Okay,” he said, adding a smile. “Steak’s on me.” He reached over and patted Parrott twice on the shoulder. “I get it. You guys are in charge. I’ll take your message back.”

  “I was hoping you’d see it that way.”

  He withdrew his hand and tapped the exposed skin on Parrott’s neck, penetrating the short needle. A tad more pressure, then a squeeze, and the contents of the bubble syringe injected.

  “Hey.” Parrott’s hand reached for the pain.

  One. Two. Three.

  Parrott’s body went limp.

  Knox kept him upright, then gently laid him on the bench. The concoction he’d used was derived from a Caribbean reef fish. Karenia annulatus. A fast-acting, lethal toxin. Centuries ago, during the glory days when sloops roamed that southern sea, more than one enemy had been dispatched with its nearly instant effect.

  A shame this man had to die.

  But there was no choice.

  Absolutely none.

  Carefully, he arranged Parrott’s hands beneath his cheek, as if he’d dozed off. Nothing unusual for a Central Park bench. He patted Parrott’s trousers and found a hotel room key for the Helmsley Park Lane. Not bad. He’d stayed there a few times himself.

  Then he left.

  EIGHT

  MALONE CALMLY WALKED DOWN A LOW-CEILINGED PASSAGE that connected the Hyatt with Grand Central Terminal. He knew that, once he was inside the busy concourse, he could take a train back to the St. Regis, where Cassiopeia was waiting. Together they could figure out what to do next.

  Interesting that he thought that way.

  Together.

  For years he’d lived and worked alone. He’d met Cassiopeia two years back but only a few months ago, in China, had they both finally acknowledged how they felt. At first he’d thought their closer connection simply the emotional fallout from all that had happened.

  But he’d been wrong.

  They’d been combatants, competitors, then friends. Now they were lovers. Cassiopeia was confident, smart, and beautiful. They shared a pleasant, trusting intimacy, knowing that whatever one needed the other would provide. Like now, when a cadre of police, surely trigger-happy considering what had just happened, were on the hunt.

  He could use a little help.

  Actually, he could use a lot.

  He exited the tunnel, passing through a set of glass doors that opened into a concourse lined with busy shops. A street exit loomed 150 feet to his right. He turned left and entered the most recognized terminus in the world, nearly a football field long and a third that wide. The famous ceiling—a gold-leaf zodiac of stars atop a cerulean blue sky—soared a hundred feet above. Atop a central information booth rose the famous four-faced, brass clock. It read 7:20 PM. Hallways and passageways branched off in all directions, leading to train platforms. Escalators moved up and down to more levels striped by tracks. Beneath him, he knew, was a massive dining concourse overflowing with cafés, bakeries, and fast-food outlets. Farther down were the subway lines. His destination.

  His gaze searched the open restaurants that dominated two sides of the cavernous hall one floor up. He heard snippets of conversations from passing commuters. No word yet on Daniels’ condition.

  Two suits entered the terminal from the same passage he’d just negotiated.

  Three more followed.

  He told himself to stay cool. There was no way he’d been tagged. They had practically nothing to go on. They were simply reconnoitering. Searching. Hoping for a break.

  Three New York City cops rushed in from one of the street exits. Several more appeared to his right, emerging off escalators that led up to 45th Street.

  Wrong. They were zeroing in on a target. But what had Stephanie’s note said? You can’t trust anyone. He needed to head down two levels to the subway. Unfortunately, there was now no option but to head left and take the exit out onto 42nd Street.

  Had that been their plan?

  He crossed a wide pedestrian bridge that spanned a concrete walk. One of the police emerged from the far side of the information booth and rushed his way.

  He kept walking.

  No police or suits stood before him.

  A marble balustrade, waist-high, protected the bridge’s edges. He spotted a narrow ledge on the other side of the rail that led off the bridge and angled down to the walkway below.

  The unexpected always was best, but he’d have to move fast. The cop behind him was surely only a few steps away.

  He sidestepped, whirled, then brought a knee to the man’s gut, shoving his attacker to the ground. He hoped a few precious seconds had been bought, enough that he could evade the others still in the main hall.

  He leaped the marble railing and balanced himself on the ledge, cautious of the fact that the drop down was a good thirty feet. Too much for a jump. He hustled forward, arms out for balance, moving down, leaping off the ledge when the drop was less than ten feet.

  Agents and polic
e appeared above.

  Guns were drawn.

  Alarm spread through the people on the lower path as they saw the weapons and began to scatter. He used their confusion as cover and raced forward, beneath the overpass, out of the line of fire. It would take the cops above him a few seconds to dart to the other side of the bridge, which should be enough time for an escape. The Oyster Bar restaurant opened to his left, the main dining concourse to his right. He knew that a dozen or more exits led from the dining concourse to tracks, trains, stairs, elevators, and ramps. He could catch any one of the trains and buy a ticket once on board.

  He hustled into the dining hall and started for one of the exits on the far side. A maze of eateries, tables, chairs, and people lay in between.

  Plenty of cover.

  Two men appeared. They’d been waiting on the far side of a central pillar. They leveled weapons and an old cliché came to mind.

  You can’t outrun the radio.

  He raised both arms.

  Shouts came, ordering him to the floor.

  He dropped to his knees.

  NINE

  CASSIOPEIA VITT STEPPED FROM THE SHOWER AND REACHED FOR a terry-cloth robe. Before nestling her damp skin within its soft folds she did what she usually did after a bath, at least whenever possible—she weighed herself. She’d tested the digital scale yesterday, after rinsing away the transatlantic flight with another long hot soak. Of course, flying always added kilograms. Why? Something about dehydration and fluid retention. She wasn’t obsessed with her weight. More curious. Middle age was approaching, and what she ate and what she did seemed to matter so much more than five years ago.

  She studied the scale’s LCD display.

  56.7 KG.

  Not bad.

  She tied the robe and wrapped her wet hair in a towel. The CD player in the other room offered a classical medley. She loved the St. Regis, a legendary landmark smack in the heart of Manhattan, a stone’s throw from Central Park. It had been where her parents had stayed when they’d visited New York, and where she always stayed. So when Cotton suggested a weekend across the Atlantic, she’d immediately offered to arrange the accommodations.