With Malice Page 13

  "Not at all," Grant said firmly. "I'm as worried about the American farmer as anyone. But I'm also worried about our fishermen, and worried about our children and grandchildren. We don't want to leave them seas that are devoid of fish."

  "Oh, I doubt that will happen," Youngblood scoffed. "The oceans are huge."

  "Right. And we still nearly fished cod into extinction. It's essential that we keep our coastal waters clean enough to sustain a healthy habitat." He turned back to Olafsen. "It's actually the same kind of problem you're talking about, Bill. Our fisheries are under the gun every bit as much as the farmers. But the fishermen can't fertilize the ocean. The only way their crops can be enhanced is to cut back on nitrate runoff."

  Olafsen frowned. "So it's either-or?"

  "I don't think so. The studies I've read suggest that we can find less polluting ways to keep crop yields up. What I'm proposing is that the government take it on the chin and support the farmers during the transition period, so we can bring our coastal waters back to life. So we can restore the wetlands that are so essential to so many species."

  Somebody else spoke, a woman in black velvet with large diamonds in her ears. "Why should the government pay for all this, Senator?"

  "Well, Ms. Reilly, it seems to me that the government is responsible for the present mess by ignoring ecological concerns for so many years. We seemed to think it was okay to plunder the land and seas any way that occurred to us, and we, the government, allowed a very bad situation to be set up. Now it's time for taxpayers and the government to solve the growing problems without causing any individual hardship that we can avoid."

  Youngblood shook his head. "Somebody always pays, Senator. If S.R. 52 succeeds, Americans will be paying more for food, and more of it will be imported from countries that don't have your ecological conscience. And the American farmer will wind up on subsidies at taxpayer expense, and probably find it nearly pointless to go out and plant a poor crop that won't even return enough to pay for seed."

  "And I," said Grant firmly, "think you're catastrophizing, Randall. I'm not talking about rapid changes, I'm talking about slow and cautious ones. I'm talking about developing alternatives to nitrates for fertilizing."

  "Like what?" Youngblood asked, an unexpected note of humor in his voice. "The heads of the fish that no longer exist, according to you?"

  Laughs came from all around, and the sense of growing tension was eased. Grant laughed with everyone else, and Karen managed a smile, although she was annoyed by the way he was being attacked. Then she reminded herself that she wasn't here as a partisan.

  "Well," said Grant, "I hope we can find something less smelly than fish heads."

  More laughter.

  "But," Grant said, his tone becoming once more serious, "we need to find a way to save our fisheries and save our farmers. I don't want to sacrifice either of them. And I'd really like to restore the climate in my state so that all of you don't have to go to the Caribbean for Christmas."

  More chuckles. Karen, who was watching Youngblood closely, noticed that the tightness seemed to ease a bit around his eyes, as if he were letting go of the argument for the time being. But as the others drifted away, Youngblood remained. He seemed to want to speak with Grant, but not in front of Karen.

  After a moment she stepped away, giving them privacy, although at that instant she wanted nothing more than to have a wire on Grant Lawrence. She found something about Youngblood to be distinctly threatening, although she couldn't put her finger on it. Perhaps it was that he seemed to have a lot of negative emotion vested in his arguments, whereas Grant seemed very positive.

  She was mulling that over when Grant rejoined her. "Seen enough?" he asked.

  "What did he say to you?"

  He hesitated, then his electric blue eyes seemed to smile ironically. "He just told me he's going to bury me."

  * * *

  They didn't leave the party immediately, of course. They stayed on for several more hours as Karen watched Grant work the room, talking to as many people as he could, focusing on their interests and concerns, talking about the amendments they'd tacked on to S.R. 52 and how they might reach some compromise that would keep from burying the bill under its own weight.

  But even as the discussions went on, she realized that Grant made no firm promises other than, "I'll look into it."

  Very smooth. Very convincing. Almost like polite horse-trading, except there was nothing he could be held to.

  Throughout the rest of the evening, she didn't sense anything else like the momentary animosity she had felt from Randall Youngblood. But his animosity might well be meaningless. He just might be the kind of man who took his cause very personally. Given that he was a cane grower himself, that would make sense.

  And he might mean nothing at all by his threat to bury Grant Lawrence. Then again…the rumors that had been surfacing back in Tampa and the whole setup of the crime at Grant's house predisposed her to think a politically motivated break-in had gone wrong. She couldn't imagine Randall Youngblood as his own hatchet man, though.

  Slowly, she worked her way back to Youngblood. When he saw her, he smiled, and after a moment he broke away from another conversation. "So," he said, "now you've heard both sides of the bill."

  "Superficially, I suppose I have."

  He laughed. "How much more depth do you want? I can bury you in paper."

  The similarity of the phrase to what he had said to Grant seemed to indicate that he said things like that frequently. She wondered nonetheless.

  "No thanks," she answered, smiling. "I have enough of my own paperwork."

  "I thought you might." He sipped his drink.

  "What's it like being a lobbyist?" she asked him, hoping she sounded ingenuous.

  "Miserable, if you want the truth. I'm just one of hundreds begging for an ear."

  "Then why don't you hire someone to do it?"

  His look expressed humor. "We tried that. Unfortunately, he didn't care as much as we do."

  "I can see how that might be a problem. Well, you certainly seem to be getting plenty of ears."

  He shrugged. "Let's just say I'm getting the ears of people who agree with me. The others are harder."

  She would have nodded, but she didn't bother, because he wouldn't have seen it anyway. His gaze was surveying the room, probably considering who next to buttonhole. She, after all, wasn't important to him in any way. He was merely being courteous to her.

  But then his gaze lit on Grant Lawrence, and the way his expression altered, however subtly, caused every instinct in her body to go on full alert.

  "Excuse me," he said, giving her a distracted smile.

  She watched him work his way through the room until he reached the senator from Idaho.

  "Interesting man, yes?"

  She turned and found that Jerry Connally had joined her. "What do you think of him?" she asked bluntly.

  He shrugged. "I think he's a desperate man."

  "Over this bill?"

  "Over the bill, over whether he'll lose his grip on the cane growers' association, whether he'll still be the front man for the agribusiness coalition he's built over S.R. 52."

  "You think this is about power?"

  He nodded. "What isn't?"

  "That's cynical."

  He shrugged with a smile. "Maybe I've been hanging around this town too long. But power is everything, Detective. Without it, you're a nobody, just a simple cane grower from South Florida."

  "Just how far do you think he'd go?"

  Connally hesitated. "Do I think he's capable of murder? Is that what you mean?"

  "It could be."

  He laughed. "You're not fooling me. No, I don't think he's capable of murder. But I think people who work for him might be."

  * * *

  Grant Lawrence ushered Karen into his limo and told the driver to go to her hotel first.

  "It must be nice," she remarked, "to be driven everywhere this way."

  "I'm lucky I can
afford it," he agreed. "It allows me to work on the way to and from my office, and considering the traffic around here at rush hour, that's a blessing. I'd just get impatient and nasty otherwise."

  "Worse than Tampa?" she asked him.

  He laughed. "Far worse. It's the primary reason I chose not to live farther out." He turned in the seat, looking at her directly. "Did you learn anything tonight?"

  "I may have. Do you think that Randall Youngblood would be capable of starting rumors about you?"

  "Hell yes. That's politics as usual. It's ugly, but a lot of people seem to consider it part of the game."

  "Do you think he hates you?"

  He opened his mouth, then closed it and looked out the car window at slowly passing buildings. "You know, until Abby's death, I'd have said no one hated me. Now, I don't know." He looked at her. "The thing is, Randall and I have always been friends, even when we disagreed. I don't think he hates me. But someone on his staff could. And we don't always know what our staffs are up to."

  Then he said something that astonished her. "Believe it or not, this is the loneliest job in the world."

  "How so?"

  "Everyone's a piece on the chessboard. Ally or foe. No real friends. Everyone has an agenda."

  Much to her surprise, she felt herself ache for him. It wasn't a place she wanted to be. It wasn't a feeling she could dare to have, certainly not while on an investigation. But she had the worst urge to reach out and hug him. "You must have friends who aren't in politics."

  "Oh, sure. A few. But I tell you what. I could use a couple of brothers right about now."

  There was an instant, just an instant, when she actually thought he moved toward her, as if he wanted to hold her, or be held. And for that instant, just that instant, she ached so hard for his touch that she thought she might shatter.

  Then it was gone as if it had never been.

  "Sorry," he said. "I must sound like a whiner. I chose this career, after all. And most of the time I love it."

  She could have said that she understood, that people often chose to get into things without fully understanding what it would mean. After all, she'd done the same thing. But, at that moment, it seemed wisest to say nothing at all.

  She heard the screech of brakes an instant before the impact. In the last moment before her head snapped back against the window frame and the world went dark, she heard Grant shout.

  12

  Grant heard, rather than saw, the popping of flashbulbs outside the open door of the limo. His eyes still registered only the blinding flashes that came from within, spurred by the tearing pain in his knee. In the fleeting moments of clarity, he realized he was on the floor of the limo, sagging to his side.

  "Are you all right, Mr. Senator?"

  The pain eased long enough for him to focus on the open door. A man stood there, one hand holding a cell phone to his ear, the other holding a microcassette recorder. Behind him, another man snapped photo after photo.

  "Mr. Senator?" the man with the cell phone asked again. "Are you hurt? I'm on the line with the cops now."

  "My knee," Grant said, fighting out the words.

  "I think he's hurt," the man said into the phone. "His knee. Get an ambulance here. Fast. Please?"

  The man closed the phone and looked at him. "Do you remember what happened, Senator Lawrence?"

  Grant shook his head to clear it, then turned. "Who are you?"

  "Stan Potter, Washington Herald. We heard the crash from around the corner. Is your girlfriend okay?"

  Grant felt something warm against his cheek and turned. It was Karen's calf. As his thoughts cleared, he remembered where he was.

  And what this looked like.

  Oh shit.

  Karen was unconscious, the left side of her hair matted and shiny in the dim glow of the overhead light. He reached up and felt the side of her head. His fingers came away sticky and wet.

  "Oh no," he said.

  The rising wail of the ambulance was soon matched by the world flashing red. But for Grant, that was far in the background. He could see only Karen's face, still and pale. He was still searching for a pulse as a paramedic wrenched open the far door.

  "She's hurt," Grant said. "Her head."

  "How about you?" the paramedic asked.

  "My knee. But I'll be fine. She's unconscious."

  "We'll take good care of her, sir."

  He pulled Grant's hands away and touched her neck, first at the carotid for a pulse, then around to the back.

  "We'll need a back board and a cervical brace," he said to his partner. "Call Sibley and tell them to prep for possible skull or spinal."

  The words hit Grant like a sledgehammer. Abby. Stacy. Now Karen.

  * * *

  Karen was roused by the itching on the inside of her elbow. Her eyelids felt like lead weights as she opened them and reached to scratch.

  "Can't do that," a woman's voice said. "And good morning, Ms. Sweeney."

  The source of the itch came into focus, paper tape holding an IV needle in her vein. She looked up at a nurse in white slacks and a blue print top. Mavis, R.N., the name tag read.

  "Where am I?" Karen asked.

  "Sibley Memorial Hospital," the nurse answered. "And don't worry about the IV. It's just a glucose drip, to keep you hydrated."

  "My head hurts."

  The nurse stifled a chuckle. "That's no surprise. You had a nasty concussion. You may have headaches for a few days. And the staple may itch some."

  "Staple?" Karen asked.

  The nurse touched the side of Karen's head gently. "Two of them, actually. Nice little cut you had there. But the doctors say you'll be fine."

  Karen tasted grit in her mouth and tried to swallow. "Can I have some water? And a bowl or something?"

  The nurse handed her a glass of water and a nausea tray. Karen took a swig of water, swished it in her mouth, and spat in the tray. Tiny white flecks floated in the water.

  "You chipped some teeth," the nurse explained. "Like I said. Nasty hit on the head."

  "I don't remember it."

  "That's not unusual, Ms. Sweeney. Give yourself a few hours, or even a few days. The MRI was clear, so you should be fine. Just a little…"

  "Scrambled," Karen said.

  "Exactly."

  * * *

  She was still feeling scrambled when Jerry Connally walked into the room. "How are you?" he asked genially enough, although his face held no kindness.

  Something in his eyes gave her pause.

  "How's Grant?"

  He smiled thinly. "He'll be okay—physically. They had to scope his knee again."

  "Physically?" she asked.

  By way of an answer, he handed her the tabloid he had tucked under his arm. The cover photo showed Grant on his knees in the limousine. Between her legs. Crashing the Party? the headline screamed.

  "Oh shit," Karen said.

  "Oh shit is right," Jerry answered. "The question is, how do we save Grant from this crap?"

  She couldn't even answer. They'd been in a car accident as far as she could remember, and the tabloids had turned it into this? She stared blindly at the paper, then at Connally.

  "Actually," said Connally, "there's no way to save him from this crap." He tossed the paper into a nearby trash can.

  "Why not?" she asked, realizing for the first time that her jaw was sore, as sore as the scalp wound, which chose that moment to start throbbing.

  "The tabloids say and do what they want. Grant's a public figure, and there's not much he can do about it. You, on the other hand, are not a public figure."

  "Meaning?"

  "You could hire a lawyer to sue them."

  She let her head fall back on her pillow, wincing even from that light pressure. "Why? It would only keep it on the front page."

  "True." He sat in the chair beside her bed. "Or you could sue Grant because you were in his limo when it happened."

  "I don't want to sue anybody." God, her head was banging. "I jus
t hope I don't lose my job."

  "No reason you should. The real story is on the wires. The truth, as the cliché goes, is out there."

  At another time, she might have smiled faintly. Right now, she was too uncomfortable. And besides, concussion or no, she was getting suspicious of Connally. "Why did you bring that for me to see? What is it you want?"

  "I wanted to know how much trouble you're going to make for the senator."

  Well, that was blunt. "I'm not going to make trouble for anyone. The world may not believe it, but I was on business. Accidents happen. End of subject."

  "No," he said slowly. "Not quite end of subject."

  Her eyes met his. "What do you mean?"

  "It wasn't an accident."

  She began to wonder if the concussion was making her truly crazy. "Of course it was an accident. Unless you're saying the driver tried to kill us."

  "No. He was driving too slowly. Thank God he was driving slowly. But he remembers what happened. And he's saying a car pulled out directly in front of him, causing him to swerve. He hit the front end of the other car."

  "Were the occupants hurt?"

  "That's the funny thing, Detective. You see, there were no occupants in the car by the time anyone else got there. And it was a stolen vehicle."

  Headache and concussion notwithstanding, Karen instantly understood the ramifications. "Who would want to kill him?"

  "I'm not sure anyone does. But they might have wanted to cause him some serious embarrassment." His gaze drifted over to the wastebasket, where a corner of the tabloid still protruded.

  "God." Karen couldn't believe her ears. "They might have killed us."

  "No. Grant's driver always goes slow. They probably knew that."

  "Or it could have been some joy riders with no agenda at all."

  "Stranger things have happened. Except the press was there, right around the corner, because someone had called them with a tip. Only the tip turned out to be phony."