“I’m sorry, Alicia, I got hung up on something else.”

“Maybe we should just rethink the arrangement then.”

“I’m here,” Michelle said, rising from the floor, but still holding on to Viggie’s hand. “I’m Michelle Maxwell, Sean’s partner. Between the two of us we’ll be able to handle things now.”

Alicia stared at Sean for a long moment and then nodded her head at Michelle. “I see that you and Viggie have already made friends.”

Michelle smiled at the girl. “I think Viggie and I will be great friends.”

Viggie jumped up and raced to the piano in the other room. From the darkness they heard the song she was playing. Michelle turned to Sean. “Wow, that’s amazing.”

“It’s Viggie’s way of showing that she likes you,” Alicia explained.

“Why was she so upset?” Sean asked.

She said in a low voice, “That damn FBI agent, Ventris, came by earlier tonight. He started going into Monk’s death. And Viggie overheard him.”

“Oh, hell!” Sean exclaimed.

“You should’ve seen Viggie a few hours ago. She was inconsolable. I had to tell her the truth. I couldn’t lie to her, not when she was like that. I finally had the staff doctor prescribe a sedative for her. She was asleep when I finally went to bed, but I guess the meds wore off.”

Sean said, “What the hell was Ventris doing here talking to you?”

“He wanted to question Viggie at first, but I put my foot down. I don’t think he meant for her to overhear him, but he didn’t stick around to help with her either.”

“What did he want to know?” Michelle asked.

“If I had any idea why Monk Turing would have gone to Camp Peary. Or if he’d mentioned going there before.”

Sean and Michelle exchanged quizzical expressions. Sean said, “I was told that officially the Bureau thinks Monk killed himself.”

Alicia coaxed Viggie off the piano, but the little girl refused to go to sleep until Michelle took her hand, led her up the stairs and put her to bed.

After they said good night to Alicia, Sean and Michelle settled into their bedrooms. Sean came in and sat on Michelle’s bed while she was still unpacking.

“Don’t worry, it won’t take you long to mess up this place,” he commented.

“What a comedian you are. So what happened to Alicia’s leg?”

Sean explained about her experience in Iraq and her job here at Babbage Town.

“Amazing lady.” Michelle added, “It must have been horrible for Viggie to find out that way about her dad.”

“It must have been,” Sean agreed. There was a vibrating sound. He groaned and glanced at his phone.

Michelle smiled and said, “Let me guess, Little Miss Joanie? Are you going to ignore her again?”

“No, if I don’t answer this time she’ll probably head straight down to Babbage Town.”

“Wow, that would be a lot of fun,” Michelle said, as she slipped her pistol under the pillow. “Maybe you shouldn’t answer then. If she does come down, I could accidentally shoot her thinking she’s some predator looking for fresh meat. Oh, that won’t work, because she is a predator and my shooting her wouldn’t be an accident.”

“You’re not really helping matters. I have to reason with her.”

“Go ahead. But while you’re doing that I really want to hear you tell the witch off once and for all.”

Sean stood. “That witch is signing our paychecks, or at least mine. So let me just handle this misery in the peace and comfort of my own room.”

“Coward. Are you going to tell her I’m here?”

“I said let me handle it, Michelle.”

“What is it with men and confrontation? Women have no trouble at all going for the jugular.”

After he left, Michelle slipped down the hall and opened the door to Viggie’s room. The girl was sitting up in bed in the dark. “It’s me, Mick,” Michelle said.

In a tiny voice Viggie said, “Hi, Mick.”

“Like me to sit with you for a bit?”

Viggie held out her hand.

Michelle lay down next to the frightened child in the darkness. As the girl’s hand touched hers, Michelle felt a jolt as the fragments of a distant and unwelcome memory hit her. Another frightened little girl sat all alone in the dark trying to make sense of the indecipherable. In a flash the image was gone, leaving Michelle as puzzled, confused and scared as the little girl next to her.

CHAPTER 43

JOAN DILLINGER SCREAMED AT HIM for a full two minutes, though it felt longer. She even played the guilt card.

“I went out on a limb for you, Sean. And this, this is how you repay me?”

“I didn’t return your calls because I didn’t have anything to report. What’s the big deal?”

“I’ll tell you what the big deal is. My boss got a call from no one less than the DDO at Central Intelligence telling him in no uncertain terms that we better back the hell off, and he named you as one of the chief offenders. The Deputy Director of Operations for God’s sake!”

“Ian Whitfield didn’t waste any time getting that done. I wonder how he knew your firm was on the case.”

“They’re the CIA, Sean, they can find out things. Hell, half the people at my firm worked at Langley at some point.”

“I can’t stop the police from investigating a murder, Joan.”

“Oh and that’s another thing. So you’re telling me that you’re now affiliated with the police?”

“It gets me into places I wouldn’t otherwise be able to, which increases the chances that I’ll find out the truth. Isn’t that what I’m supposed to be doing?”

“Sean, when you were hired to do this job-”

Interrupting, he said, “Yeah, let’s get that straight right now. Who hired us?”

“Len Rivest.”

“He’s only the head of security. Someone had to authorize him to hire your firm.”

“Well, did you think of asking him?”

“It doesn’t matter if I did or not now. He’s dead.”

“What!”

“He’s dead. I’m surprised the DDO failed to let that little tidbit slip.”

“I can’t believe it. Len was a good guy. We went way back.”

Sean said, “I’m sure you did; however, his status as a good guy has not been established in my mind.”

“What do you mean by that?” she said sharply.

“He was murdered, Joan. And in my experience people get murdered for one of two reasons. One, because someone didn’t like them. Two, because someone didn’t want them alive to talk.”

“You think Len was involved in Monk Turing’s death?”

“Murders so close together tend to be connected.”

“It hasn’t been established that Monk was murdered.”

“Technically, it hasn’t been established that Len was either, but I’m sure that he was. And by the way, someone took a couple of shots at me. I think they came from the vicinity of Camp Peary.”

“Good God, all this happened and you never called me?”

I’ve been busy. So getting back to my original question: Who hired us?”

“I don’t know.”

“Joan, I’m tired and I’m totally pissed off at the world. So don’t play games with me. Len Rivest said, ‘countries would go to war’ for whatever they’re doing here.”

“He said that?”

“And you didn’t know?”

“I didn’t. I swear, Sean. From the little I knew of the case, I figured you’d pull a few days down there and it would be concluded that Turing killed himself on Camp Peary grounds. It’s happened before, you know.”

“Yeah, Ian Whitfield enlightened me on that point. But the dynamic has changed now with Rivest’s death.”

“If they are connected.”

“My gut tells me they are.”

“Then I’m sending down reinforcements.”

“I’ve already got someone.”

There was a long pause and then Joan hissed. “Are you telling me that she’s down there with you?”

“Who, Mildred?”

“Michelle effing Maxwell!” she screamed so loudly that Sean had to pull the cell phone away from his ear.

“That’s right,” he replied calmly. “She just showed up and reported for duty.”