The mood in the Situation Room was somber and tense. Cabinet level officials and staff (including Adrian and Natalie sans their children who were left in the staff nursery) sat stunned at the news that Sharon Grier had been murdered. They had just been with her in a cabinet meeting earlier that week, but now she was gone. Adding to the strain was that nobody knew a possible motive. Was this someone she knew and perhaps quarreled with? Or was this a more general attack, directed at the government? With all of the shenanigans going on in the country, and no known suspect for the bombings, they all wanted answers.
Deputy Director Kennedy appeared the most broken up of all the group. Second in line at the FBI, he worked closely with Grier throughout her tenure and was the assumed heir apparent for the role of FBI Director. He nearly collapsed when the word came out that she was killed ,and now sat in still silence waiting for the President to enter the room and announce that he was being brought into the inner sanctum of the intelligence world.
They were about to have their second surprise
All eyes were on John Stoddard as he entered the room with Vice President Neil Cole, Attorney General Matt Fitzhugh, and a longtime friend of the President, Attorney David Abramson.
Abramson was a 72 year old semi-retired lawyer from Richmond, Virginia. He had served in the nation's Fourth Circuit court of appeals for over 40 years, and before that worked as a prosecuting attorney in various venues in DC, Boston, New York, Chicago and Atlanta. A widower, he was known as the "Silver Eagle" for his love of country and his keen perception in legal matters. Stately and yet disarming in appearance, he could slit your throat in court and you wouldn't know it until you turned your head.
"Good Morning." The President said as he took his seat. "Or should I say 'greetings' as there is obviously nothing good about this morning. By now, I know you all have heard about the unfortunate demise of FBI Director Grier. It is my understanding that the press has heard of it as well, which means, gentlemen…and ladies (he said, looking over at Natalie who sat at the periphery of the room), in a few moments you will exit this building and will likely be peppered with questions concerning this matter. You may say one of two things. 'No Comment.' Or 'The administration is investigating this matter and will have more information for you at the press conference today at two o'clock.' Questions?"
"Sir, do we have any idea who did this?" asked DHS lead Susan Fleming.
"No, Director Fleming we don't." said the President. "We do not at this time believe that is related to the recent bombings throughout the country, though we are keeping all options on the table and have ruled nothing out."
"Did…did she suffer?" asked Kennedy, with tears beginning to form in his eyes.
Natalie and Adrian both thought it an odd question to ask, but did not let on.
"I don't believe so, Kennedy, at least not for long. Death would have been fairly sudden." The President replied. "Anything else?" he asked.
Nobody said a word.
"Alright then. The challenges facing this nation are immense. Domestic terror is on the rise. We obviously can not leave a post such as the FBI Director unfilled for any length of time. Therefore, I would like to announce that I am nominating David Abramson here as my pick to head up the agency." Said Stoddard.
Mouths dropped open and eyes turned to Kennedy who looked blankly at the President.
"Abramson comes to us with over 50 years experience in the nation's legal system, including in some of the key areas where we have recently had trouble. It is my belief that having a fresh set of eyes working with Deputy Directors Kennedy and Monk, as well as Ms. Fleming, will help expedite the solving of the IED case as well as Ms. Grier's death.
Kennedy, this in no way reflects on your performance. But, I believe given the circumstances that it is best to not put you in the spotlight since you and Grier worked so closely together and there is likely some grieving to do.
Now, if there are no other questions, I have a meeting with the Prime Minister of Canada in the Oval in a few minutes, so I need to be heading out."
After the meeting, Adrian and Natalie walked over to join Garrison Kennedy and Acting Director Abramson for a short discussion concerning game plan. Garrison seemed more stunned than when they saw him after the announcement of Sharon's murder. It would appear that John's tendency to make decisions about people's careers and lives in a vacuum had continued unabated.
Abramson was a name that was familiar to Adrian. He remembered him from televised trials on Courtroom TV in the mid 80s where he argued for the state in some rather high-profile cases before the Appeals Court. The fact that he was John's friend was really secondary to his appointment as FBI Director. He was a darn good lawyer and someone that Adrian had taken note of through the years.
"Deputy Director Kennedy, Associate Director Monk, I'm very pleased to meet you and look forward to working with you. I just happened to be in town visiting my daughter when I received the call from John this morning. I was as shocked as the rest, I assure you, and need a few hours to get my bearings. I would like to meet you at the Hoover building this afternoon at 4:00 PM if you don't mind?" he said. "We can go over the most pressing priorities before us and discuss responsibilities, if you're available."
"We're available, sir." said Adrian. Kennedy said nothing.
"Does that sound okay to you, Kennedy?" Abramson asked.
Kennedy seemed distracted, but looked up. "Yes…yes, that is okay."
"Great! I'll see you then!" said Abramson, as he walked off towards the main hall of the White House.
Adrian and Natalie watched as Kennedy stumbled over to where his notebook still sat on the table. He picked it up as if in a daze and then began to make his way towards the door. The Monks intercepted him.
"Garrison. Are you..are you okay?" Adrian asked.
"I, I'm fine." He said quietly, not looking up.
"You don't seem fine." Said Natalie. "You loved her, didn't you?"
Adrian looked over at Natalie, surprised by her boldness, and then looked back at Kennedy.
Kennedy looked up and around the room to see if there were any other listening ears. Then he spoke slowly and measuredly. "No, Mrs. Monk. I didn't." he said. "I hated her."
Natalie's lips parted in surprise and her eyes widened.
Adrian tried to make sure he heard right. "You hated her?" he asked, with furrowed brow.
"Sharon Grier was a wicked and manipulative witch. If she felt she could get something from you, she would cozy up to you and pour on the charm. If you were of no use to her, however, she would toss you away like yesterday's news." He answered.
"Yet, you worked for her for years." Said Natalie.
"I had to." He said.
"Had to?" asked Adrian.
Kennedy looked disturbed and began to turn away. Adrian grabbed him by the arm. "Please explain what you meant by that, you had to?" he asked.
Kennedy looked at him, not with the look of steel from moments prior but of regret and sadness. "You work in this town long enough and it changes you. You…you do things that you normally never would have considered. You…you end up owing people that you never would have associated with in your former life. You lose who you were." He looked down, and then back up with a look of fear. "Adrian, Natalie…you are good people. This is not a good place to work. Please, for your sake and your children's sake get out before it is too late." He said. "Now, if you'll excuse me. I have to go. I've already said too much. I'll see you this afternoon."
Natalie and Adrian picked up some Mexican food and took it back to Preacher's where they ate lunch. They had picked up the babies from the White House Daycare and dropped them off at the Vice President's residence where Neil Cole's teen aged daughter Emily had agreed to watch them in order to earn a little "mad money" for an upcoming trip out of town. This allowed them time to regroup and revisit the cases as they stood before the afternoon meeting.
Kennedy's warning still weighed heavily on their minds. He knew something, or was involved in something that he felt he couldn't get out of. Emotionally, he was quite volatile. They had seen him go from seeming grief to defiance to fear within a short time frame. Was he being blackmailed? It seemed that way. They discussed things and agreed that they would only tell him things that they believed he had a need to know, since they weren't sure whether he could be trusted or not.
While Adrian reviewed news reports concerning the bombings, Natalie looked for evidence from Sharon Grier's crime scene photos that she had the DC police send to her cell phone. The pictures weren't easy to look at, for they showed Sharon's nude corpse, blindfolded and submerged in water with a single hand up to the side of the tub against the wall, as if she had briefly tried to get out of the death chamber; but, Natalie was doing her husband a favor by being the one to look at them and felt like it allowed her to be truly useful in the case.
"Honey, can you make this out?" Natalie asked, pointing out a small tattoo of a wine glass with a star in the middle of it on Sharon's left shoulder. The tattoo had some writing underneath.
Adrian stopped what he was doing while Natalie pointed out the area. Using the zoom on his cell phone, he looked at the writing, and then took a picture.
"La révolution n'est pas une fête" he said.
"French?" she asked.
"Yes. My French isn't good. La Revolution is obvious for "Revolution", nest pas…"is not"…une…"a or an"..what is une fête?" he asked.
"I don't know. Mom knows French though, I'll text her." she said.
About a minute later a return text came in and Natalie read it out loud, "Revolution is not a party."
Natalie looked at Adrian perplexed, but Adrian looked off to the left in recognition.
"What?" she asked.
"You know where that comes from – or something very close to it?" he asked.
"No. Where?" she responded.
"I want to get the exact quote right. Let me look this up on the Goggle World Wide Web Internet Search Tool." He said.
"You're doing that on purpose." She grinned, knowing by now that he knew what Google was and was getting pretty good at using the internet.
He looked back at her while he typed and gave a slightly flirtatious grin, raising his eyebrows up and down.
"Okay, search tool go searching... Here we go." He said. "A revolution is not a dinner party, or writing an essay, or painting a picture, or doing embroidery; it cannot be so refined, so leisurely and gentle, so temperate, kind, courteous, restrained and magnanimous. A revolution is an insurrection, an act of violence by which one class overthrows another. – Mao Tse-Tung."
"As in Chairman Mao?" Natalie asked.
"Yeah...one and the same." Adrian said, disturbed. "Grier was a Communist?"
"Whoa! The FBI Director? And the access that woman had? What about that part of an act of violence? Do you think she was involved in the recent events?" Natalie asked.
"Nothing shows that at this point, but nothing surprises me either. The tattoo is old. Probably from her college days. I'll tell you what, use those research skills of yours and find me whatever you can on the background of Sharon Grier. I want to know everything the woman was up to from high school forward." Adrian said. "This all is just too weird."
