The Inner Circle - Brad Meltzer [84]
It’s the same all around.
No trash in the garbage. No photos on the walls… or the end tables… The chocolate brown leather sofa on my left has no give in any of the cushions. Like it’s never been sat in.
What the hell is this place? Why aren’t there any signs of life?
I try to fight free, but my head nearly caves in. Whatever they drugged me with… the dizziness… it’s still taking its toll.
From the bathroom, there’s a rush of water from the sink. Underneath the door, a shadow passes and…
Click.
I spin back as my weight jerks the chair into a half-spin. The bathroom door opens and my attacker reveals—That smell… Of cherry rum.
Cherry rum pipe smoke.
“Man, I really messed up your chin, didn’t I?” Dallas asks, stepping forward, scratching at his little beard, and reminding me why he was always the most hated archivist in our office. “Sorry, Beech—we just needed to get you out of there. When I saw someone following—”
“What’re you talking about? What the hell’s going on?”
“I can explain.”
“You damn well better explain!”
My brain flips back to yesterday. When they were taking Orlando’s body out, I spotted Dallas with Rina, and they quickly ran for cover. Right now, though, he stands his ground, taking new pride in whatever it is he’s up to.
“Remember when you first started at the Archives, Beecher?”
“Are you about to make a speech right now? Because if I get out of these handcuffs, I’m about to kill you.”
“Listen to me,” Dallas insists. “Remember that first night when you worked late, and visiting hours were over, and all the tourists were gone—and you made your way down to the Rotunda, just to stand in the darkness so you could have your own private viewing of the Declaration of Independence? Every employee in the building has that moment, Beecher. But as you stood there by yourself and you studied those fifty-six handwritten signatures that changed the entire world, remember that wondrous feeling where you dreamed what it would be like to be a part of history like that?” Dallas touches the gash on my chin. From the pain, I jerk my head up. He gets what he wants. I’m now looking him right in the eye. The smell of his pipe seeps off him. “This is your chance to add your signature, Beecher. History’s calling you. All you have to do is help us.”
“Us? Who’s us?”
“The Culper Ring,” Dallas says. “We’re the Culper Ring. And with your help, we can catch the other one.”
“The other what?”
“The ones who did this. The ones who killed Orlando. The other Culper Ring, of course.”
51
It was cold and late—well past two in the morning—as Dr. Palmiotti stared at the drop phone that sat on his nightstand.
But as he lay there, wrapped in his down comforter, he knew he wasn’t even close to sleep.
For a while, he tried his usual tricks: visualizing a walk in the wide green stretch of grass in the arboretum behind his college dorm. He didn’t particularly like the outdoors. But he liked the idea of it. And he liked college. And usually, that was enough to do the trick.
Not tonight.
“Baby, you’re gonna be exhausted tomorrow,” Lydia said, rolling toward him as she faded back into her own slumber. “Stop worrying about him. If he needs you, he’ll call.”
He was still amazed to see her do things like that—to read him so clearly… to feel him being awake. He was lucky to have her. She understood him better in six months than his ex-wife did in nearly twenty years. And for a while, he thought about just that—in particular, about their night at the Four Seasons and the thing with the fishnet stockings she had done for his birthday—hoping it would be the key to his sleep.
But once again, the doctor’s thoughts wandered back to his friend, and the message the President had written, and to this nightmare at the Archives—which of course took Palmiotti right back to his nightstand, to the phone with the gold presidential seal on the receiver.
If he needs you, he’ll call.
It was good advice. But the one thing it failed to take into account was just how complex a President’s needs were. In fact, it was those particular needs that caused