High Treason by John Gilstrap Page B

things through rationally. But where? His parents’ place was out because that was too logical. How freaking sad was it that after a lifetime living in DC, he couldn’t think of a single person to call to take him in?
    There had to be someone. Then he got it.
    David leaned in close to the taxi’s security barrier as he pulled his wallet out of his back pocket and withdrew a bill. “Excuse me, driver.”
    The cabbie met his eyes in the mirror.
    “Here’s five bucks. Can I please use your cell phone?”
    The cabbie reflexively moved the phone from the center console where it lay and placed it on his lap. “No,” he said. “Use your own phone. I saw it in your hand.”
    “I can’t. That probably sounds crazy, but it’s really complicated. C’mon, five bucks for one phone call. Two, actually.”
    The cabbie was clearly uncomfortable with this. “I will take you to a pay phone.”
    “No, no, no. You’ve got that look in your eye. The second I step out of your cab, you’ll drive away.” David pulled another bill from the wallet. “Here, then. Twenty-five dollars. For two phone calls. I could call the moon and you’d still make a couple of bucks. All I need is directory assistance and then a local call. I swear. C’mon, please let me borrow your phone.”
    The cabbie studied what he saw in the rearview mirror, his eyes leaving David only to check his progress on the road. “Fifty,” he said at last.
    “Fifty! For a phone call?”
    “Twenty-five for the call, twenty-five to use my phone.”
    This was outrageous. No wonder the world was at war with these guys. David went back to his wallet and retrieved the appropriate bills. As he handed them through the opening, he also handed the driver his iPhone. “Here,” he said. “A little extra something for your effort.”

C HAPTER F IVE
    T he universe that Jonathan Grave cared about resided on Virginia’s Northern Neck of the Potomac River in a waterfront burg named Fisherman’s Cove. He’d grown up there, and as a teenager he’d fled from there, only to return many years later to prove the old saw, “lo the memories be painful, there’s no place like home.” Or something like that.
    Commercial fishing still thrived in the Cove, as did the dozens of businesses that supported fishermen and their families. Thanks in no small part to anonymous deep-pocketed finagling by Jonathan over the years, the big box stores that had consumed so much of tranquil America were still far enough away to give local small businesses an even shot. Tourists streamed to the Cove during the summer months, but those who were looking to stay in a major chain hotel had to shift their sights to local establishments, including a few bed-and-breakfasts that reset the definition of peace.
    There was a nightlife if you knew where to look for it, so long as said nightlife didn’t extend beyond 10:00 P.M. Monday through Thursday and midnight on Friday and Saturday. Fisherman’s Cove was the wrong place to go looking for nightlife on Sunday.
    The two most impressive structures in Fisherman’s Cove were Resurrection House—a residential school anonymously endowed by Jonathan Grave for the children of incarcerated parents—and Saint Katherine’s Catholic Church, Saint Kate’s to the locals. The two buildings sat adjacent to each other on Church Street, on the long hill that led down to the waterfront. At the end of the block, facing Water Street, sat the three-story converted firehouse that served as Jonathan’s home on the first two floors, and as headquarters for his company, Security Solutions, on the third.
    To their major corporate clients, Security Solutions was a high-end private investigation company that specialized in getting information that few others could obtain. It was all done legally, but it was also done aggressively, using means that sometimes pressed and bent—but never broke—the letter of the law. When a billion-dollar merger was in play, a board of directors