She arrived at the Sheraton, hands still trembling a little from the effort and the adrenaline of the chase. She went straight to room 306, and after giving Sam a quick hug, she went straight for the mini bar.
“That bad, huh?” Sam probed.
“Wasn’t easy,” she said, wearing a smile of satisfaction on her lips. She had pulled it off, on her own, and she felt proud.
“Did anyone follow you?”
“Nope,” she smiled.
“How come? I thought they were on you 24/7.”
“They’ve gone fishing. In the river. Or canal, or whatever. Really filthy. Cheers!”
“Huh?”
“They took their car into the river, too,” she winked.
Sam burst out laughing.
“Nice going, kiddo!” He extended a high-five, and she slammed her palm into his with enthusiasm. She took another gulp of Martini, finishing off the small bottle, then took the post-it pad from her laptop bag and started writing names on post-its, pasting them onto the hotel room wall.
“Blake Bernard just called, gave me four names, well, just three we didn’t already know, and some money trails.”
She explained to Sam what Blake had uncovered, and as she did, she pointed at the names on the wall, connecting them using other post-its with arrows drawn on them. The four names were lined up horizontally, under two separate sections, named ‘$ Makers’ and ‘$ Movers.’
“Do you see what we’re missing, Sam?”
“Yep, we don’t have their leader,” he replied, confirming her conclusion.
She took another post-it, wrote ‘X’ on it, and placed it on the wall above everyone else.
“Blake seemed confident their software would identify X at some point in time. I’m thinking X might be too smart for that. If he didn’t make a single mistake in so long, more than a year is what Blake said, it’s possible the bank’s anti-money laundering software will never catch him.”
“If he’s this good, he’d be using private jets with fake flight plans, cash, or use his staffers credit cards to pay for stuff, rotate through them often enough. It’s a possibility we won’t catch him,” Sam said.
“Until we know who X is and what he’s after we can’t assume we’re done, or that this threat has been averted or controlled. So far, no one even knows he exists, and he was able to plan the biggest electoral fraud in our history and get powerful business people to execute it. Our Mr. X is scary good at his game.”
“I agree.”
“What next, then?”
“I’ll make a couple of calls and see if these names ring any bells with my Mossad friends.”
...90
...Wednesday, September 21, 7:23AM EST (UTC-5:00 hours)
...Robert Wilton’s Residence
...Washington, DC
Robert Wilton dressed himself carefully that morning. White dress shirt, charcoal suit, silver gray tie. He was getting ready for what could turn into a day of unexpected outcomes. The Agency team had provided a solution, and they were working on tying up loose ends now, which meant the time had come for him to come clean. That could mean he could be arrested that day, minutes after having a conversation with his boss, Eddie Campbell. That could not be helped, and it didn’t matter. What mattered was Melanie. Alex and the Agency team had told him she was safe. As soon as he accepted the software from the Indian software vendor and released the final payment owed to them, Melanie’s life would stop being under threat. Alex reassured him that the UNSUB was going to have what she had called ‘bigger concerns’ right after that contract would end. He definitely hoped so.
He steadied himself, looking at his image in the mirror. His hands were shaking just a little bit. Quite understandable. He was pale, and dark circles marred his tired, troubled blue eyes. Also understandable.
He took a sealed envelope addressed simply ‘Melanie’ from his dressing room drawer and put it in the breast pocket of his suit jacket. He didn’t want Melanie to hear he had been arrested and understand nothing of it. He opened quietly the door to their bedroom and stood there, watching her sleep. Her skin had returned to the pink color of a healthy woman. She slept soundly, an arm thrown over his pillow, her hair covering her face. Robert felt tears coming to his eyes. Missing her, that was going to be the hardest part of what he had to do. Nonetheless, he still had to do it.
He approached the bed and kissed her gently on her hair. She woke up slightly and mumbled in her sleep. “What’s up, baby?”