Call to Treason - Tom Clancy [133]
"Impossible. That would have showed up on her background check,"
McCaskey said. "She never would have been allowed near Congress."
"Unless someone had the file buried and told her one day there would be payback," Herbert said. "A real-life Don Corleone."
"Orr or Link," McCaskey said. "So how did you find the record?"
"I didn't," Herbert said. "Routine check of her college years turned up a bust at the frat house where Lucy lived. Her name wasn't mentioned. I called one of the kids who did time. She said, hell, yeah, Lucy was with her in the clink."
"She would have known how to give the injections," McCaskey said.
"That's one more reason to believe she is the killer."
"Most likely. You're an aspiring journalist who screwed up, someone rescues you, gives you all kinds of access there are people who would kill to protect that," Herbert said. "There are people who have killed for less."
"True, though I'm not going to sign on to that until I talk to the woman," McCaskey said.
"I agree."
"Speaking of which, if we don't find her at home, you have any suggestions where we should try next?" McCaskey asked.
"I sent Stephen Viens over to the NRO," Herbert said. "He's got an hour on the Auto-Search program in the Domestic Surveillance Platform."
The DSP was a new Homeland Security satellite. It was located in a geostationary orbit and kept pointed on the metro D.C. area. It had the ability to pinpoint cars by shape, weight, and the specific configuration of the dashboard electronics. Once spotted, the onboard camera could zoom in to read the license number. If suspicious individuals were seen getting into a particular vehicle or renting a specific car, the DSP could find and track them with relative ease.
"How did Viens swing time on that?" McCaskey asked. "The DSP is Homeland's baby."
"All I know is that Paul made a call," Herbert told him. "He got us the hour."
"Impressive," McCaskey said.
"I guess someone figured they owed us one or else felt sorry for us,"
Herbert said. "Anyway, Ms. O'Connor drives a red Mustang convertible.
If she is on the road, we will find her."
As Herbert was talking with McCaskey, he got an instant message on his borrowed laptop.
Viens 1: We have your car. It is just crossing the Woodrow Wilson Memorial Bridge headed west.
"Darrell, we've got your perp," Herbert said. "She's on 95 crossing the river. She could be headed to the airport." The irony of Lucy O'Connor being on a bridge named W. Wilson was not lost on him.
"We're on 395 east now," McCaskey said. "I'll turn and go for an intercept. Can Viens stay with her?"
Herbert forwarded the question to Viens, who wrote back that the NRO's Homeland Security liaison, Lauren Tartags, said he could take the time, barring a crisis. Herbert told Viens to thank Ms. Tartags for her generosity. Op-Center's imaging expert wrote back:
Viens 1: It's not kindness. She says she has no choice.
That was odd, but Herbert did not worry about it now. The intelligence chief told McCaskey to remain on the line. He said he would forward any new information immediately.
Through the open line Herbert could hear McCaskey and his wife conferring. The mutual respect he heard in the exchange made him smile. Maria was a tough, swashbuckling, headstrong, old-school law officer. She was the kind of cop who did not knock on doors but kicked them in. She was a perfect counterbalance to the more meticulous McCaskey.
He was happy for them. And he envied them.
Despite receiving data from the new satellite, Herbert felt as if he were back in the technological Stone Age. Before the electromagnetic blast, he would have been sitting in his office looking at the images being forwarded directly from the DSP. He could do that in the Tank, but that would mean hanging with Paul Hood. That was something he did not want to do right now.
Especially when he could still do his work out here and let the mechanized odor of the parking lot transport him to another time and place. To a point in his life when he had the best team