right and that was that. I didn’t exactly play that case entirely by the rules but she steered fairly clear of those areas and once I’d talked to her there was really nothing left to say. She’s on the trail with the Thomson campaign now for NBC. If I end up having to talk with someone in the media about the case, I’ll probably talk to Heather.”
Wire took that advice to heart. “Maybe she’d talk to me too.”
“Heather?” Mac asked. “For sure. She’s ambitious as hell but she’s pretty discreet, at least with stuff like this.”
“What isn’t she discreet about?” Wire asked, catching the hint.
“Trying to bed me,” Mac replied casually, stuffing a fork full of ham and cheese omelet into his mouth.
A big smile came across Dara Wire’s face and she had to ask, “Really, Heather Foxx has been after you?” She was skeptical.
“I’m hurt,” Mac answered mockingly.
“Seriously? She was after you?”
“For a time, when she was working local news in the Twin Cities,” Mac answered nodding. “The fact I was with Sally didn’t seem to matter to her. She came onto me a number of times. It got a little awkward once or twice.”
“She had to be hard to resist.”
Mac nodded and smiled. “Yeah, she kinda was. A night with her would be one to remember.”
“But you never …”
Mac shook his head, “I know what it’s like to be cheated on, and I couldn’t do that to Sally. I didn’t want to do it.”
“Were you married?”
“Once,” Mac answered looking down. “I caught my ex having an affair with a partner in her law firm. Sally was married too and she thinks her ex, also a lawyer, did the same thing to her.”
“So you both have that baggage.”
Mac sat back in the booth, exhaled and nodded lightly. “The experience of it was devastating to both of us. So I just could never do that to her. I don’t think I could live with myself if I did.”
Wire smiled her approval, as she poured more coffee. “Sally is a lucky girl.”
Mac shook his head, “I’m the lucky one.”
“You both are,” Wire said. “I’m envious of you both. Don’t ever screw it up, McRyan.”
“I tell myself that every day.”
Mac was due back at the Hoover Building in a few hours and he wanted to get Wire into the investigation. She deserved it and he felt a little like he was on his own dealing with Director Mitchell and Attorney General Gates and could use the support of a partner. So when he called into the FBI director with the tip on the Bishop, he attributed it to Wire getting the information from Dixon. Mitchell said she should come in with him. “If you’re going to tell her everything to begin with, she might as well be here,” the director snickered. Mac let it roll off his back, his mission was accomplished.
“So you’re in,” Mac said. “Why don’t you tell me why you’re on the outs with the bureau to begin with?”
“Ever heard of the Giordano Crime Family in New Jersey?” Wire asked, sipping her coffee.
Mac shrugged, “Not really, sounds like the name of every other crime family.”
Wire tilted her head sideways. “I suppose it does. Anyway, about four years ago I had a guy undercover in that family, his name was Giovanni Franchesca. Somehow, the fact I had a man in the Giordano’s was discussed at a Washington DC cocktail party by none other than Donald Wellesley Jr.”
“The vice president’s son? Seriously?” Mac asked, surprised, as he filled her coffee again, settling in for the story.
“Yeah, he’s the one,” Wire answered bitterly, mixing sugar into a fresh cup of coffee.
“How’d he know about your guy?”
“Wellesley Jr. was tight with the then attorney general who was spouting off one night in his office about the case and how close we were getting to breaking that family open. The AG in his infinite wisdom mentioned we had the undercover in the family.”
“Nice,” Mac grunted with disgust.
“Exactly,” Wire added, shaking her head, looking out the front window. “About the only thing the AG didn’t do was disclose my guy’s name. In any event, at the cocktail party were a number of people in the New Jersey Congressional Delegation.”
“You’re kidding,” Mac blurted in disbelief, now knowing exactly where this was going.
“I kid you not,” she replied, exasperated. “Someone from that group, we never did find out whom, got word back to the Giordano’s and a week later my guy’s floating in the world’s greatest body