Dead Watch

into a desk drawer when she heard the doorknob rattle, perked up, and smiled at him. He smiled back and said, “I’m here to see Alan Green.”
    She was pretty, peaches-and-cream complexion, blue eyes, hair done in a French twist. “Do you have an appointment?”
    “No, I don’t. I’m a government researcher, visiting from Washington. It’s quite important.”
    She picked up her phone. “What branch of the government?”
    “The executive,” he said. He took his White House pass from his wallet and handed it to her. She looked at it for a second, then put the phone down and said, “Just a moment.”
    She disappeared through a door into the interior. Jake waited, ten seconds, fifteen, she was back. “He just has to get off a phone call.”
    At that moment, they both heard, faintly, the flushing noise from a toilet, and she got a little pink: Jake said, “I would have told me the same thing.”
    “It seemed better than the alternative,” she said. Then, “When was the last time you were at the White House?”
    “Last night.”
    “Did you see the president?”
    “No. But once I did, and he nodded at me.”
    “Must give you a feeling of power,” she said, tongue-in-cheek.
    “I repeat the story whenever I can,” Jake said. “I’ve been to a half dozen dinner parties on it.”
    They were still chatting, the girl a little flirty, but way too young, Jake thought—twenty, maybe, twenty-two—when Alan Green popped through the interior door. Green was short, bald, and burly, wide shouldered and narrow waisted, like a former college wrestler or gymnast. He wore khaki slacks, a white dress shirt, and striped tie, the tie loose at his thick neck, and a corduroy jacket with leather patches at the elbows. He smiled and asked, “Mr. Winter? Can I help you?”
    “I need to speak to you privately,” Jake said.
    “Could you tell me the subject?”
    “Lincoln Bowe.”
    “I heard the news. The news was terrible,” Green said. “What is your involvement?”
    Jake glanced at the receptionist, then said, “I can tell you here, or privately. If I tell you here, you may pull this young lady into what’s about to happen.”
    Green’s smile faded. “What’s about to happen?”
    “You should know that as well as I do, Mr. Green. The, mmm, package is about to break into the open. A number of people think it may be the motive for this murder.”
    The blood drained from Green’s face, and Jake knew that he’d connected. He looked at the receptionist, who shook her head, confused, and Green said, “You better come in. Katie, stop all my calls. Call Terry and tell him I can’t make it. I’ll call him later. Tell him I had an emergency.”

    Green’s office was a twenty-by-twenty-foot cubicle furnished with a cheap Persian rug over the standard gray business carpet, leather chairs, and photographs: the faces of fifty politicians, ninety-nine predatory eyes and one black eye-patch worn by the former governor of Colorado, all signed. There were ten more of Green with two presidents and a selection of Washington politicians; and three personal photos, all of striking young men.

    “What about this package?” Green asked. He picked up a short stack of paper, squared it, put it in an in-box.
    “I have a general outline of what the package is, the highway deal,” Jake said. “I don’t yet have it. The package has apparently caused at least one and perhaps two murders. Very likely two. I’m coordinating with the lead investigator for the FBI on this, a man named Chuck Novatny. You can call him if you wish.”
    “I don’t know this package,” Green said.
    Jake let the annoyance show on his face: “Don’t bullshit me, Mr. Green. I got your name from one of the principals in this case. And if you really didn’t know, we’d still be talking out in the hallway.”
    Green blinked. He’d felt the trap snap. Jake continued: “We can handle it as a political issue or we can handle it as a criminal matter. Once this package gets out there, nobody’s going to much care about the route—but they will care about who tried to suppress it, who tried to keep it undercover, because those are the most likely motives for the murders.”
    “I don’t know . . . What murders? Lincoln Bowe, I’ve heard there’s some question . . .”
    Jake shook his head: “There’s no question. There are people who’d like you to believe it was a suicide, but he was alive and heavily drugged when he was shot through the