Supreme Justice

Chapter Fifty-nine

Dana called Brad half an hour after Keith Evans left. She was upbeat, which was unusual for her.

“I just got some good news,” Dana told Brad. “Jake called and he’s coming home this week.”

“That’s great. Let’s get together.”

“Will do. So, what’s going on with the case?”

‘ “Lezak still can’t talk. If she doesn’t, Keith thinks Masterson may walk. The judge is determined to push for a congressional investigation. That might not lead to an indictment, but it will make the China Sea incident public.”

“That’s the main reason I’m calling. I promised Pat Gorman a scoop, and I’d like to deliver, but I need the judge’s permission to go public. Can you see if I can get it? I’ll keep the judge’s involvement quiet. Tell her if she wants to shine a big spotlight on Dennis Masterson, a story in Exposed will do that in spades. Exposed’s motto is ‘All the innuendo Pat sees fit to print.’ ”

Dana and Brad talked a little longer before they hung up. She was looking forward to exposing Dennis Masterson, but she was frustrated by her inability to develop a plan that would put Masterson and Bergstrom in prison. She was also stressed out because she was balancing her investigations for her clients with the tail she’d put on Bergstrom.

When she needed to, Dana employed retired policemen or moonlighting cops to help her. She was doing that now so she could watch Bergstrom, who spent most of his time at home or at a gym where he pumped iron and practiced mixed martial arts. Dana’s financial resources were limited, and the strain of twenty-hour days was starting to show. She knew she couldn’t keep up the tail much longer or her business and her health would fail, so she had decided to end her surveillance of The Swede. If nothing happened that night, the Congress and the press could deal with the problem.

That evening, Bergstrom broke his routine and left his house at ten. He headed toward a rural area of Virginia where farms outnumbered housing developments. Bergstrom turned off the highway onto a narrow country road, and Dana took a chance by turning off her headlights. She followed Bergstrom into a small village and saw him turn into the deserted parking lot of a closed general store. Dana pulled into a side street a block from the store. She had brought several weapons with her, and she checked them before taking a video camera with a long-range directional mike out of her backseat.

Dana approached the general store through a narrow alley. When she arrived at the end of the alley, she could see Bergstrom sitting in his car. Ten minutes later, headlight beams illuminated the street. Bergstrom got out of his car when a nondescript Buick pulled into the lot a space away from his car. Dana activated the video camera and the mike when Dennis Masterson got out of the passenger side of the car. She began to listen.

“Why the meeting?” Bergstrom asked.

“They operated on the woman I placed on the Court. The word I get is that she’ll be able to talk soon.”

“Has she given the cops any information so far?”

“No, but she’s been out of it since she was injured.”

“Is this someone you’ve worked with before?”

Masterson nodded.

“Then she knows the drill.”

“She killed a Supreme Court justice. No one will show her mercy. People are unpredictable when they’re facing death and are given a way of avoiding it.”

“Maybe so, but what do you want me to do about it?”

“You can get to her, silence her.”

Bergstrom laughed. “Are you nuts? She’ll have an army guarding her.”

“You’re the only one I can count on to do this.”

“Then you’re in trouble. I don’t do suicide missions.”

“You don’t understand. She can put us in prison.”

“Correction, Dennis. She can put you in prison. She doesn’t know me.”

Masterson stared hard at Bergstrom. “We sink or swim together, Tom.”

Bergstrom sighed. “I thought you would say something like that.”

What happened next happened so fast that Dana wasn’t certain of what she’d seen until she viewed the DVD. Bergstrom hit Masterson in the throat with the rigid fingers of his left hand, stunning him. At the same time, he whipped out a gun with his right hand and fired through the passenger window, killing Masterson’s driver. After shooting the driver a second time, Bergstrom fired a third shot between Masterson’s eyes. When he was certain both men were dead, The Swede dropped the weapon next to Masterson’s car, took off his gloves, and drove away.

For a moment, Dana toyed with the idea of following Bergstrom and taking him out. But the plan was far too dangerous, considering what she’d just seen. Dana backed into the shadows in the alley and checked the DVD. She’d turn it over to Keith Evans and let him get the credit for catching the man who’d killed one of the most powerful men in the country.