Silken Prey

you go on the job today.”
    “Will this get me fired?” she asked.
    “Maybe. I’d try to keep you out of it, but if it’s a murder . . .”
    “The thing is, disloyalty in one job might keep me from getting
any
other job.”
    “I’m trying to tell you the truth,” Lucas said. “I can’t absolutely guarantee that it wouldn’t get out.”
    After a moment, she said, “There’s a Caribou Coffee halfway between my place and Taryn’s. I could meet you there at seven-fifteen. I’m on the job at eight.”
    “I’ll see you then,” Lucas said.
    •   •   •
    A LICE G REEN WAS DRESSED in green when Lucas arrived: a green blouse the color of her eyes, a much darker green jacket in a kind of knobby fabric, and black slacks that appeared to be form-fitting until you looked closely. She was paying for a cup of coffee, and Lucas looked closely, and realized that everything she wore was functional, nice-looking but tough, rather than luxurious, and well suited to a fight; the jacket was long enough and loose enough to conceal a pistol.
    She paid, walked toward a far corner; saw him, nodded, but kept going. Lucas got a Diet Coke and checked the other customers before he walked over to her table, where she was blowing on a paper cup full of dark coffee. She said, “If anybody I know comes in, I’ll have to shoot you.”
    Lucas sat down: “I need to talk to Carver, alone, I think. I’ve found a lever that might convince him to talk with me. I’ll call him unless you think it would be a terrible idea.”
    She considered for a moment and then said, “Well, it would be a terrible idea, but talking to either one of them, Dannon or Carver, would be a terrible idea. I assume you’ve got your back against the wall.”
    “It’s my last shot,” Lucas said. “I’m almost certain that Dannon was involved in placing the porn on Smalls’s computer. If Tubbs and Roman were killed to cover that up, then it’s at least possible that he was acting alone and Carver could give me some insight into how to get him. Or, it’s possible that Carver cooperated, but would take a plea. Also, I’ve got something on Carver that might convince him to cooperate. So, I’m looking at Carver.”
    “I doubt that he’ll crack,” Green said. “He’ll stonewall. So will Dannon, for that matter. There’s not much choice there.”
    Stonewall. She picked the same word as Elle had. “If you
had
to make a choice . . . which one would you choose?” Lucas asked.
    She thought for a moment, sipping at the coffee, and finally said, “If I had to choose, I guess I’d have to agree with you: I’d go with Carver, if you’ve got some leverage. He’s not as smart as Dannon. It’s barely possible that you might confuse him enough to get something. I don’t think that would be the case with Dannon. Also, Dannon’s got another reason to stonewall: Taryn has started sleeping with him. If you take him down, she’d go down, too. At least, he’ll see it that way. So he’ll stonewall.”
    “It’ll be tough either way,” Lucas agreed.
    “I’d say you’ve got no chance with Dannon, no matter how involved he is, and you’ve got a five percent chance with Carver. Or two percent.”
    “Off the top of your head . . . what are the chances that Grant knows what they did? That she’s involved, that she directed it or approved it?”
    Green shook her head: “She’s a smart woman. I’d be surprised if she was involved. But . . . and I say
but
 . . . she’s obviously a sociopath. It wouldn’t bother her that people died to get her into the Senate. It
would
bother her that she could go to prison for it. She’s made that calculation, too. That’s why she gets so angry when she sees you.”
    Lucas nodded, and said, “Okay,” then leaned forward, his forearms on the table. “If I drive a wedge between Dannon and Carver, what would happen?”
    “I don’t know. They’re colleagues, but not exactly friends,” Green said. “Dannon is somewhat . . . disparaging . . . when it comes to Carver, because Carver was a sergeant, an enlisted man, and Dannon was an officer. He treats me more as an equal because I was with the Secret Service. Carver feels it. It pisses him off.”
    “What’s Carver’s relationship with Grant?”
    “He’s become . . . overly familiar. I don’t know what happened, but yesterday I heard him call her ‘honey,’ when he thought they were alone. I pretended not to