“Checklist?” Sampson said.
“I’m ready if you are.”
We started going through every item we’d thought necessary for the twenty-nine-mile horseback trip deep into one of the last great wildernesses on earth and for the five-day raft ride we’d take out of the Bob Marshall on the South Fork of the Flathead River. An outfitter was providing the rafts, tents, food, and bear-proof storage equipment. Everything else had to fit into four rubberized dry bags we’d use on the river after he dropped us off.
We could have signed up for a fully guided affair, but Sampson wanted us to do a good part of the trip alone, and after some thought, I’d agreed. Six days deep in the backcountry of Montana would give Big John many chances to open up and talk, which is critical to the process of coping with tragic loss.
“How’s Willow feeling about our little trip?” I asked.
Sampson smiled. “She doesn’t like the idea of grizzly bears any more than Nana does, but she knows it will make me happy.”
“Your little girl’s always been wise beyond her years.”
“Truth. Bree liking her job?”
Thinking of my smart, beautiful, and independent wife, I said, “She loves it. Got up early to be at the office. Something about a possible assignment in Paris.”
“Paris! What a difference a career change makes.”
“No kidding. It was like the gig was tailor-made for her.”
“Maybe we should think about going into private-sector investigations too.”
“Pay’s better, for sure,” I allowed.
Before he could reply, my seventeen-year-old daughter, Jannie, poked her head in and said, “Nana says your eggs are getting cold.”
I put down my dry bag and went to the kitchen, where I found my youngest child, Ali, already finishing up his plate.
“Morning, sunshine,” I said, giving him a hug. He ignored it, so I tickled him.
“C’mon, Dad!” He laughed, then groaned. “Why can’t I go with you?”
“Because you’re a kid and we don’t know what we’ll be facing.”
“I can do it,” he insisted.
Sampson said, “Ali, let your dad and me scope it out this year. If we think you’re up to it, we’ll bring you along on the next trip. Deal?”
Ali scrunched up his face and shrugged. “I guess. When do you leave?”
“First thing in the—”
My cell phone began to ring at the same time Sampson’s chimed.
“No,” John protested. “Don’t answer that, Alex. We’re supposed to be gone already!”
But when I saw the caller ID, I grimaced and knew I had to answer. “Commissioner Dennison,” I said. “John Sampson and I were just heading out the door on vacation.”
“Cancel it,” said the commissioner of the Metro DC Police Department. “We’ve got a dead female, gunshot wound to the head, dumped in the garage under the International Spy Museum on L’Enfant Plaza. Her ID says she’s—”
“Commissioner, with all due respect,” I said, “we’ve been planning this trip for—”
“I don’t care, Cross,” he snapped. “Her ID says she’s CIA. If you want to continue your contract with Metro, you’ll get down there. And if Sampson wants to keep his job, he’ll be with you.”
I stared at the ceiling a second, looked at John, and shook my head.
“Okay, Commissioner. We’re on our way.”
Chapter
4
Tenth Avenue in Southwest DC goes under L’Enfant Plaza with a turnoff for monthly permit and public parking. The deceased, a big blonde in her late thirties with a gunshot wound to the head, was sitting upright in a corner of the third level of monthly permit parking.
A crude sign that said TRAITOR was hung around her neck.
“Someone had to have seen her get put here,” I said. “Cameras, anyway.”
Sampson nodded. “Maybe we will make our flight tomorrow morning.”
Valerie Jackson, a Metro patrol officer, met us at a band of yellow tape she’d strung around the crime scene. The spy museum’s director had discovered the victim when he arrived shortly after dawn.
“She has a CIA ID?” Sampson asked.
“Photo and everything. It’s still on her lap. Catherine Hingham of the CIA.”
We put on blue shoe covers and latex gloves before crossing to the deceased, who was dressed like a suburban mom out for a lunch date after yoga class. We saw how nasty the exit wound was, but we both noted how little blood there was around and behind her.