Chapter Thirteen
“What do you mean we can’t find him?” Nick asked FBI Director Sally Monroe hours after he’d first ordered that Sergei Ivanov be found.
“We’ve had people investigating every corner of this city and have had no luck in locating him. We’re continuing to look, but if he’s in the District, it’s possible he’s aware that we’re looking for him and has gone underground.”
“So we have a rogue Russian with personal ties to the ex-vice president effectively missing in the nation’s capital. Excellent.”
“We’re doing everything we can to locate him, Mr. President.”
Christina Gonzales came into the Oval Office. “Pardon the interruption, Mr. President, Director Monroe, but the Metropolitan PD has issued an alert looking for information about a John Doe who matches the description of Ivanov.”
“The former vice president can confirm his identity,” Nick said.
“We’ll get right on that, sir,” Monroe replied before she left the office.
“This is un-fucking-believable,” Nick said to Christina.
“It certainly is.”
“Have you reviewed the statement I plan to make about Gretchen’s resignation once we locate her Russian pal?”
“I have, and I think it’s spot-on. You put the onus firmly on her, and she’ll have to answer for her relationship with him.”
“I’m worried about her getting defiant and telling her own version of the story once she’s no longer in office.”
“I’ve thought of that and wanted to suggest you make her sign some sort of nondisclosure agreement that prohibits her from publicly discussing internal conversations or other privileged information after her resignation. She’s frightened right now. It’d be a good time to nail that down.”
“Good thinking. Ask the counsel’s office to draft and execute it right away.”
“Will do, Mr. President.”
“Will this take me down, too?” he asked his longtime friend and trusted aide.
After a second or two, she said, “It shouldn’t. You had no knowledge of the friendship or anything to do with him.”
“People will say I should’ve known. They’ll say it doesn’t matter if I had no contact with him. If my VP did, then my administration was involved with him.”
“Your statement clearly spells out that her dealings with him were entirely personal in nature and had nothing to do with her role as the VP.”
“And you think people will believe that?”
“Well, it helps that it’s the truth. You’ll probably take a beating for a few days, but it’ll die down when something else happens. You know how the cycle goes. If I could add… I think it helps that he was promoting resistance to the Petrov regime rather than working on his behalf.”
“How do you think Petrov has taken the news that the guy who’d like to see him deposed was hanging out with my VP at her official residence? Even if I didn’t know about it, he certainly did.”
“Probably not well, but again, Ivanov wasn’t there on official business.”
“So she says. Who knows what they were up to?”
“I know this is a huge disappointment, but better to find out now that she’s compromised than later when Ivanov was turning his plans into action.”
“I guess so.”
Terry came in, looking as stressed as Nick had ever seen him. “Monroe said the FBI is checking out a John Doe at the MPD as possibly being Ivanov?”
“Right,” Christina said.
“I don’t know whether to hope it’s him or that it isn’t,” Terry said.
“I’d rather he was alive to say his visits with Gretchen were based purely on an old friendship,” Nick said, “and not an effort to recruit the United States government into supporting an overthrow of Petrov, even if I’d like nothing more than to see the end of that son of a bitch.
We’re not in the business of foreign regime changes. Not on my watch, anyway.”
“You should say something to that effect when you’re asked whether you support Ivanov’s cause,” Christina said.
Nick sat behind the desk and ran a hand through his hair, still in disbelief over this unreal day. “I will.”
“Are you okay, sir?” Christina asked.
“I’m exhausted by this place.”
She sat in his visitor chair. “That’s understandable, especially when the drama is coming from inside the house.”
“Who investigates this if it turns out to be him?” Nick asked.
“As far as we can tell, he had no special diplomatic status, so it would fall to the MPD to investigate,” Christina said. “As a thorn in the side of the Russian government, they wouldn’t offer him any kind of protection.”
“Lindsey sent me a photo of the John Doe,” Terry said. “I’ll take it to Gretchen. Be right back.”
While they waited, Nick read a text from Sam and replied, The day from hell continues. Will tell you more when I see you. Be safe out there. Love you more.
She’d argue with him that she’d won that fight, that she loved him more, and he’d let her win because being loved by her made his life worth living.
How he wished they were floating together in the ocean somewhere rather than dealing with the nonstop bullshit they faced every day in their ridiculous jobs.
Thinking about being with her in Bora Bora, or anywhere, for that matter, was a nice mental respite while he waited for Terry to return with a verdict on whether the MPD’s John Doe was their missing Russian.
Terry returned to the Oval. “It’s him.”
U.S. Marshal Jesse Best went into his bedroom to check on his guest, fellow Marshal Memphis Rose Costello, who was recovering from a gunshot wound to the thigh that’d nearly killed her. “You need anything?”
“Nope. I’m good.”
He’d refilled her iced tea, doled out her lunchtime meds and made her a sandwich that she wolfed down. He was thankful that her appetite was returning and her complexion wasn’t quite as ghostly pale as it’d been in the hospital. Seeing her like that had terrified him.
“I’m fine, Jesse,” she said. “You can stop hovering over me like an old woman.”
Goddamn, she made him madder than anyone ever had.
So why was it that he loved her so ferociously?
Hell if he knew. But nearly losing her had served as a major wake-up call for him, which was why he’d taken a leave of absence from work to nurse her back to health.
Not that she was making it easy on him. Of course she wasn’t.
“Stop scowling at me. It’ll give you wrinkles.”
He took a deep breath, praying for patience. “I have a podcast interview in ten minutes. Do you want to go to the bathroom while I’m here to help you?”
“I can do it.”
“I don’t want you to fall when I’m not there to pick you up.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“Let me help you.”
“I don’t have to go yet!”
“Fine, but don’t fall, you hear me?”
“Yes, sir. Anything else?”
“No. Text me if you need me. I mean it. They can pause the interview.”
“I won’t need you. Focus on the interview and telling your sister’s story. That’s the most important thing right now.”
He looked at her in all her fiery glory and wanted her desperately in every possible way he could have her. Since he’d acknowledged the powerful feelings that he’d tried so hard to deny, it was like someone had turned on the lights and taken him out of the darkness. She’d done that. “Okay.”
“Jesse…”
“Yes?”
“I’m fine, and I’m going to continue to be fine. Okay?”
“You promise?”
She flashed that glorious smile. “I do.”
“All right, then, off I go.”
“Break a leg.”
“Too soon, babe.”
He left her laughing and marveled at how everything had changed since she’d been grievously injured.
A “situationship” with a subordinate, which could get him fired at any moment, had evolved into one of the most important relationships he’d ever had.
Now, he needed to go talk about the other one, with the sister who’d been missing for twenty-six years.
His friend and colleague Lieutenant Sam Holland had suggested, via her savvy partner, Detective Cruz, that he consider reaching out to some of the top true crime podcasts to get his story—and Jordan’s—out to a wider audience.
Today was his first hour-long interview with Cold Case, the podcast that Detective Cruz had thought would be best suited to his story.
They’d been thrilled to land a U.S. Marshal with a personal story to tell about his missing sister.
As he logged in for the interview, Jesse hoped it wouldn’t be a waste of time, but he’d run out of avenues to pursue and was desperate enough to do whatever it took to finally get answers.
He donned his earbuds and waited for the host to welcome him.
A woman named Alicia, who’d been looking for clues in her grandfather’s murder for fifteen years, had founded the podcast to help other victims of violent crime cases gone cold get justice for their loved ones.
The show drew a weekly audience of more than three million across multiple platforms, including YouTube and Spotify.
He’d shaved off a week’s worth of whiskers to be camera-ready.
Jesse listened to her detailed intro in which she referred to his career as a U.S. Marshal as “long and distinguished” and how his quest for justice came from a deeply personal place.
“Marshal Jesse Best, we’re so happy to have you as our guest today.”
“Thanks for having me.”
“Before we begin, can you tell our listeners a little about what the U.S. Marshals do?”
“Sure, the U.S. Marshals Service provides security for federal courts and judges, manages the Witness Security Program, transports federal prisoners, seizes assets in criminal cases and serves federal court orders. But we’re probably best known for our work in finding fugitives from justice.”
“That sounds like a fascinating job.”
He chuckled. “It can be. More often, it involves boring stakeouts and finding criminals who are trying to avoid federal prosecution.”
“You spend a lot of your time looking for people, which makes your personal story that much more poignant.”
“The irony isn’t lost on me. I’ve been looking for my younger sister, Jordan, for twenty-six years, since the day she went missing from our home in West Virginia.”
“I’m so sorry for you and your family.”