Black Friday

CHAPTER 52

"How did you find out my name?" Henry Lee wanted to know, but Maggie could see he was pleased rather than upset about it. "And how did you find me?"

"There's a consult room next door. Security key card entry only," she told him in the same calm voice she might use had she really been one of his wife's doctors, updating him, comforting him. "It's already been swept for bugs. We have it for the next twenty minutes."

He stared at her as if she were speaking a foreign language and he needed an interpreter. Finally he nodded. She waited while he tucked his wife's hand under the covers. He had been holding it all this time and looked reluctant to let go. Then he followed Maggie without further hesitation.

"I'm sorry about your wife," Maggie told him as they settled into comfortable chairs in the next room. "It sounds like she made it through surgery quite well."

"That's what they keep telling me." He sounded like he didn't believe them.

She reminded herself that his wife's condition wasn't her concern, though she admired his obvious devotion to her.

In the short amount of time since his phone call, Maggie had learned quite a bit about Henry Lee. With David Ceimo's connections as the governor's chief of staff, he had been able to track the anonymous phone call to Maggie's cell phone. The call had come from a waiting room in Saint Mary's Hospital's ICC.

In their brief conversation the caller had let it slip that his wife had just had surgery. On the day after Thanksgiving, there were no planned surgeries. Maggie had been able to find out that there were, in fact, only two emergency surgeries. One, an appendectomy. The other, a triple bypass. Another quick phone call to ICC—this one a bit of a finagle—and Maggie was able to get the patient's name. From there she discovered her anonymous caller's name. While David Ceimo took care of getting her hospital credentials and security clearance, Maggie searched everything she could find about Henry Lee by using her smartphone's Internet connection.

Turned out the man had an outstanding reputation as a business mogul, taking several companies and building them into national Fortune 500 successes. Now retired and remaining chairman of his empire, he used his clout to lobby for homeland security measures. He was far from the wacko she had expected.

"I'll only tell you what I know if I'm promised immunity from prosecution." He said it like it was something he had memorized, perhaps rehearsed. There was none of his earlier passion in this request.

"I don't have the authority to make that promise."

In the past A.D. Cunningham had backed her up with any deals she believed necessary. She was pretty sure A.D. Kunze would not.

"I can assure you that I'll talk to the authorities about your cooperation," she told him, "but that's as much as I can promise."

He studied her with tired and hooded, watery blue eyes. She could see him evaluating his options. She waited while his eyes left hers, darted down to his wringing hands then back to hers.

"They have my grandson," he said and cleared his throat, an unsuccessful attempt to hide the hitch in his voice. "Will you at least try to get him back?"

"I'll do everything in my power to try to get him back."

Then Maggie sat forward and waited, not wanting to throw out questions that might limit the information he gave.

"I'm a patriot," he chose to open with.

It surprised Maggie, but she kept from showing it. One of the companies Henry Lee owned was a security provider. From the brief background search, she had expected to come here and get information from him that might involve some breach of security or perhaps a failure to report a warning.

What Maggie O'Dell didn't expect was a confession.