In the Company of Liars

ONE DAY EARLIER
SATURDAY, MAY 1

Jane McCoy looks over the expansive office of the FBI’s special agent-in-charge for the city’s field office. The desk is oak, large and polished like a military spit-shine, reflecting the ceiling lights. The carpet is blood-red. The bookshelves along the wall are immaculate, adorned with manuals and a few well-placed photographs. The guy wants to impress, he succeeded.

Irving Shiels has been the SAC for eleven years here in the city, having served overseas before that. She has always gotten along well with Shiels. There is a mystique about him in the office, something unapproachable, the strut in his stride, the cold stare of those dark eyes, but she has been able to reach him on a personal level. A lot of people get tongue-tied around a boss. McCoy, for reasons she cannot explain, is just the opposite. She imagines it’s a rather solitary existence, running an office like this, and anyone in Irving Shiels’s position would appreciate the occasional joke or informality, provided it doesn’t cross the line. A witty comment or personal anecdote can break the ice, and that is her forte. She remembers babbling to him on an internal elevator one day about one of her cases, an international child kidnapping case when she was new to the bureau, and realizing in retrospect that she had been doing all the talking. Shiels probably takes it for confidence, that someone like Jane McCoy could be so freewheeling around him. The truth is, McCoy is just a talker.

“The prosecution’s case ended yesterday,” McCoy says. “It’s everything we expected.”

“Right. Read it in the Watch. Looks bad for her.” Shiels leans back in his chair, a scowl playing on his face. He rarely lightens up, never seems to err on that side. He’s the classic straight shooter. Doesn’t drink, doesn’t smoke. Doesn’t smile, either. “So what’s up next?” he asks.

McCoy shifts in her chair. “Walter Benjamin is up next. The Flanagan-Maxx government guy.”

“Right. Benjamin.”

“I’ll be in the courtroom, sir. I’m sure it will be fine.”

“I saw where the daughter testified.”

“Yes, sir. Jessica was the prosecution’s best witness.”

Shiels runs a hand over his mouth. “I’ll bet she was. Okay.” He looks at the ceiling. “Tell me about the doctor.”

McCoy sighs. “As far as we can tell-”

“Don’t tell me ‘as far as we can tell,’ Agent. Tell me that we know exactly what is going to happen here.” A vein appears prominently in Shiels’s forehead. He is quick to heat, at least that’s what the other agents say. McCoy has never seen an eruption firsthand. But she can tell just by looking at him. His skin is damaged, broken blood vessels on his cheeks, worry lines on his forehead, a worn mask that ages him beyond his fifty-four years. He wears the authority well, but the skin doesn’t lie. Stress will take its pound of flesh one way or the other.

Sure, she understands. This is a career-maker or -breaker for both of them. But Jesus Christ, Shiels knows there are limits to their surveillance of Doctor Lomas. They can’t infiltrate the lab and they can’t bug his house.

“Sir,” McCoy begins again, choosing her words with care, “Doctor Lomas is going about his business as always. He has one messed-up life there, but when he’s in the lab, he’s going great guns. We’re hearing a couple of weeks, he’ll have the formula perfected.”

Shiels sighs and raises a hand, as close as he will come to an apology. “The doctor’s still clucking?”

“Yes, sir,” McCoy says, her tone indicating that she is as surprised as her boss. It continues to amaze McCoy that some cocaine addicts can function indefinitely in society. They teach their classes, make their deadlines, argue their cases in court. As long as they have their breaks for the occasional fix, they can go out and do their jobs. Some of them give in, are overcome by the addiction, but the truth is, what stops many junkies is the lack of money to continue their habit. And financial resource is one of the few problems that does not plague Doctor Neil Lomas.

“What about the other problem?”

McCoy shakes her head. “He’s not gambling anymore. He seems steady enough.”

Shiels seems okay with that, or maybe the momentary glazing over of his eyes is due to sleep deprivation. “What do you get,” he poses, “when you cross the murder of a lobbyist with a bribery scandal with a terrorist operation that could kill hundreds of thousands of people?”

“An ulcer?” she tries.

“Right. Yeah. Exactly.” He moves past McCoy and touches the chair by her shoulder. “And how is the loose cannon?”

Allison Pagone, he means. “Not loose at all, sir.”

“Are we sure we know everything there is to know about her, Agent?” Shiels is at his window now, looking over the downtown.

“I’m confident,” McCoy says, with a twitch to her gut. The truth is, shethinks she knows all there is to know about Allison Pagone. But she has been around the block. No matter the resources you employ, there is only so much you can know about a person, especially what’s inside her head.

Shiels turns and faces McCoy. “And what about the rest of her family?”

“It’s covered, sir.”

“Covered.” He moves his shoe over the carpeting, drawing with his foot, as far as she can tell, a tic-tac-toe pattern. Could be a crucifix. Shiels has seen a lot in his years with the government, and the fact that this thing has him so jumpy doesn’t exactly ease McCoy’s mind.

“We’re watching Allison,” McCoy adds.

“You were watching Sam Dillon, too.”

McCoy bows her head. A sore point, for all of them. Especially for McCoy. She will not repeat the mistake with Allison Pagone. She can’t. It would mean the end of her career, first of all. Maybe not an outright termination but an unspoken demotion, a reassignment, shitty casework. And her career is the least of her concerns. She took it hard when Dillon was murdered, took it personally, even though she had never so much as spoken a word to the man.

“Just what we fucking needed,” Shiels moans, pacing the room again. “A celebrity. It’s bad enough that all of this is connected. Bad enough we have the county prosecuting a murder case around all of this. Bad enough that Pagone could be telling her lawyer God knows what-”

“She doesn’tknow, sir-”

“-no, that’s not enough. No,this case has to involve a best-selling novelist. We only have about three hundred media outlets covering this story.”

“Don’t worry about Allison Pagone, sir,” says McCoy.

The special agent-in-charge looks at Jane, then sits on the edge of the desk near her.

“Agent McCoy,” he says, “we need Allison Pagone alive.”

“Yes, sir.” McCoy nods.

“This was your call, Agent.”

“Yes, it was.”

“And I backed it up to Washington. I told them Jane McCoy’s the one they want in charge of this operation. I backed up everything you’ve done on this. You think I don’t get a call from Virginia every single day on this? You know how many people think the Bureau is the wrong agency for this?”

“Sir, I won’t let you down. We’ll get them.”

“Good enough.” Shiels moves back to his desk, takes a seat and puts on his reading glasses. This is his way of sayingGet up, get out.

And don’t screw this up.