Cold Pursuit

Thirty

Grit had spent the day shaking every tree in Washington, and he found his way to the attractive suburban street where Thomas Asher lived just as the sun went down. He’d had to do a combination of bus, cab and walking to get there.

The house was a Dutch Colonial with mature gardens and shade trees. Nice place even in the November gray, Grit thought. Earlier in the day he’d been to the Bruni house in Georgetown. It was smaller but more expensive, more elegant. Law enforcement had already done their thing there, and it was quiet when Grit went by. But he figured it was probably still under surveillance and his presence had been duly noted.

Just like now, he thought as he headed up the brick walkway.

The front door of the Asher house opened, and a woman who looked to be in her early forties stumbled out and ran down the steps. She stopped abruptly and stared down at pink and white impatiens drooping at her feet along the edge of the walkway.

Grit started to introduce himself, but without acknowledging him, without even looking at him, she said, “I played hopscotch with my daughter out here when she was three. I can see her now. She was such a sweet little girl. I remember one day when Thomas came home early and joined us. We laughed and laughed. Such a simple thing.” Tears shone in her eyes as she finally focused on Grit. “We were a happy family. I don’t care what anyone else thinks.”

“You shouldn’t,” Grit said.

“You’re one of Thomas’s friends?”

“No, ma’am. My name’s Ryan Taylor. I know Elijah Cameron-”

“Elijah?” She seemed confused. “From Vermont?”

“That’d be the one.”

She took in a breath through her nose and collected herself. Carolyn Asher Bruni, Grit had learned, was successful in her own right, even compared to her second husband. But she held all that in check right now, clearly exhausted and grief stricken despite her self-control. “I only know Elijah by reputation,” she said. “I’ve met his brother A.J. and his sister, Rose. They’re lovely people. I’m sorry. I’m not myself. You’re not from Vermont, though, are you?”

“No, ma’am, I live here in Washington.”

She glanced back at her former house. “I threw away a good life, Mr. Taylor. I didn’t expect to come out here, but here I am. Do you know what I want right now more than anything else? Just to go back in time-to be here, playing hopscotch with my daughter.”

Unspoken was what was going on in Vermont. What had happened a few miles away in Washington. “If anyone can keep Nora safe,” Grit said, “it’s Elijah. I don’t know Jo Harper-”

But Carolyn Bruni wasn’t listening. “I stayed home with Nora the first few years. Thomas and I never had other children. We got caught up with other things.”

“I guess that happens.”

“Alex was so ambitious, so driven. I loved that about him. Thomas is more laid-back. I thought being here…” She took a step forward, her shoulders back as if she were steeling herself against a hard wind. “It doesn’t matter now. Alex is gone, and Thomas is no longer part of my life.”

“He’s still your daughter’s father.”

“Nora’s barely a part of my life anymore, either,” she said with a trace of regret, maybe bitterness, too. “She’s eighteen. She’s taking a break from school right now, but she’ll go back.”

“I’m sorry for your loss,” Grit said simply.

“You want to know if I have a clue as to who killed my husband.” She got combative and raised her chin at Grit. “If I killed him. Isn’t that what everyone wants to know? I don’t, and I didn’t.”

“Mrs. Bruni-”

“Some days I wondered who wouldn’t want to kill Alex. I don’t mean that as an insult. He could be very intense, exacting, tough. He didn’t demand of anyone what he wouldn’t demand of himself.” She shook her head, some of the fight going out of her. “I’m so jet-lagged, and upset, obviously. I barely know what day it is. Maybe it’ll all turn out to be just a terrible accident.” She narrowed her tired eyes on him. “Why are you here?”

He wasn’t all that sure himself. “Just trying to help. Your daughter-”

“Nora knows what she’s doing. She’s very capable. She’s young, but she’ll find her way.”

“You’re not worried about her going off on this camping trip by herself?”

“I’m concerned about how she’s handling Alex’s death, but no, I’m not that concerned about her camping in Vermont. She’s very levelheaded. She and Alex got along all right, but they didn’t see that much of each other. If you’re wondering if she hired someone to kill him, that’s ridiculous. She wouldn’t know the first thing about how to do such a thing.”

“You just said she’s capable.”

“In the woods, not with hired killers.” Her cheeks reddened suddenly, but she remained under control. “I should go. I don’t normally pour out my soul to a perfect stranger.”

“Melanie Kendall went up to Vermont with your ex-husband,” Grit said. So far, his turning-over-of-rocks and shaking-of-trees hadn’t turned up much on the fiancée and future stepmother.

Carolyn Bruni’s gaze steadied on him. “Good for her.”

“Nora get along with her?”

“I have no idea. We haven’t discussed Melanie. She has absolutely nothing to do with me. Good to meet you, Mr. Taylor.” Carolyn Bruni paused and gave him a cool, superior smile. “Perhaps you and Elijah Cameron should mind your own business.”

She marched past Grit, got into a little BMW parked on the side of the road and sped off.

Moose fell in next to Grit on the walkway. “The mother’s conflicted,” Moose said.

“Well, I guess she is. She’s also a Type A control freak who thinks her daughter hates her and she deserves to be hated.”

“She has regrets. Big regrets. It’s tough living with big regrets.”

Grit breathed out. “Yeah. It is.”

He noted a surprising lack of security at the Asher house. He could have gotten inside in seconds. Instead, he walked down to a dark sedan parked a half block from the spot that Carolyn Bruni had just vacated. His leg wasn’t hurting much today. He liked walking.

A window rolled down, and Grit said to the beanpole of an FBI agent behind the wheel, “I’ll save you the trouble of trying to figure out who I am and what I’m up to. I just need a ride back to town. I took the bus, and my leg-”

“Get in the car.”

He climbed into the backseat. Up front next to the beanpole FBI agent was a very cute female FBI agent who turned a little in her seat and gave Grit a steel-melting look. “You’ve been talking to a lot of people today, Petty Officer Taylor.”

“You know my name? I’m flattered. You’re-”

“We’re the ones driving you back to Washington.”

“Guess you don’t need directions to my place, do you?”

Not even a twitch of a smile. “You were outside the vice president’s residence today,” she said.

Grit didn’t respond. The street he’d been on was a public street, and they all knew it. He’d begun to wonder if maybe the assassins theory was just the product of a bored genius kid with an Internet connection, but that didn’t feel right to Grit, mostly because of Myrtle and the Russian and the poisoned toothpaste. Myrtle didn’t get bored. She didn’t make up stuff.

“We appreciate your service,” the cute FBI agent said when they finally pulled up to his dump of a building. “Now mind your own business.”

“Mrs. Bruni said the same thing, except she didn’t add the platitude-”

“It’s not a platitude.” She seemed chagrined.

“You don’t want to know my assassins theory, do you?”

“No. Good night, Petty Officer Taylor.”

One thing about his military service, Grit thought dispassionately, was how good it had made him at detecting when people were hiding things. Even those people who were good at hiding things.

The two FBI agents already knew about assassins.

The beanpole glanced in his rearview mirror at Grit’s reflection. “You okay back there? Your leg…”

Grit opened the door and got out. He wasn’t getting into the nuances of transtibial amputations with the guy. Besides, he’d spotted Myrtle hiding behind a sick cedar tree on the corner of his building and figured she wouldn’t really want to talk to the FBI.

After they left, she stepped out onto the street and shuddered. “Holy moley. I just saw a rat the size of a raccoon.”

“Ah. Little fella.”

“Why do you live like this?”

“Like what?”

“Never mind. I’d go in, but for all I know, you have pets, and I can only just imagine.” She nodded at the retreating car. “Feds?”

“I caved and gave you up after the girl fed batted her eyes at me.”

“Are you ever serious? Don’t answer-I know. You’re a man of action. Words mean nothing, so you might as well be irreverent.” Her lavender eyes stayed on him a fraction longer than he would have preferred. “I did more research on you, Grit. It wasn’t easy. You and your friend Elijah Cameron are a couple of ghosts, but you’re both bona fide, indestructible American heroes.”

He thought of Moose, who really was a hero. “No one’s indestructible.”

“Figure of speech,” Myrtle said. “You know what I mean. Let me buy you a cup of coffee. We can talk about the vice president’s son, a dead ambassador, his best friend, his stepdaughter and assassins.”

“And Drew Cameron,” Grit said.

Reporter that she was, she pounced. “Who?”

“Coffee first.”

“Not here. We’ll take my car,” she said, eyeing the cedar tree. “I don’t do well with rats.”