Milstein handed Mrs. Sinclair her card.
"Don't hesitate to call me if you think of anything," she said, touching Mrs. Sinclair lightly on the arm. "My cell number is on the card."
When the hotel room door closed, Milstein turned to Assad and gave him a sardonic smile.
"Your girlfriend Dakota Cameron has some explaining to do."
Downtown Washington,
hen Griffin Nash stopped at the crosswalk at the corner of F and Eleventh streets, McKenna made his way through the small cluster of umbrellas.
"Griffin," he said.
Nash turned around. The traffic light changed, and the crowd at the corner began crossing. Several looks, and a voice or two, chided them for blocking the flow of pedestrians.
Nash's eyes darted over McKenna's shoulder.
"What is it, Griffin?" he said, turning to look.
But a sudden hard shove from behind sent him stumbling toward Nash. And in almost the same instant, a man wearing a camouflage jacket was there, thrusting his arm toward Nash's chest and abdomen in quick, repeated jabs. Looking perplexed, Nash fell forward, and he and McKenna hit the pavement hard, a pool of red already seeping through Nash's suit jacket and onto McKenna's hand and shirt.
Before McKenna had time to process what he had seen, the man who had stabbed Nash began pointing at McKenna and shouting, "He stabbed him! He stabbed him!"
Between the hammering thumps of his own heartbeat, McKenna thought he heard screams. And for reasons he would never be able to explain, he ran.
U.S. Supreme Court Building, Washington,
he first Monday in October had passed, but the Supreme Court still had only three of nine justices. The clerk had announced that the court would not sit until it had at least a quorum of six. As the most senior surviving member of the high court, Justice Gillian Wilson Carmichael was the informal acting chief, charged with handling the court's administration until the president nominated, and Senate confirmed, a successor to Chief Justice Kincaid.
Carmichael took the elevator from the ground floor to the Great Hall on her evening stroll around the building. It was a ritual she had started after Black Wednesday to break the monotony of the seemingly endless administrative tasks required of the chief. She thought it might also help with the loneliness, but the coldness and silence of the so-called "marble palace" had the opposite effect.
Alone in the elevator, she glanced critically at her reflection in the bronze doors. Her once striking red hair had dulled to a flat auburnbrown, with some gray around the temples-nothing like the elegant white tresses she had so admired on her grandmother. And though her green eyes still brimmed with intelligence, they were less noticeable than the deep wrinkles around them. For a woman in her late sixties, she was fit, thanks to a lifelong commitment to exercise, but some days her aching joints made her feel like an octogenarian.
Once in the Great Hall, she walked slowly, lost in thought, her heels clicking on the polished marble. She stopped now and then to gaze at one of the busts of former chief justices that sat in niches along the way. During one of these strolls, she had decided to authorize a memorial to the slain justices. Working with the court's curator, Carmichael had commissioned a bust of each of her fallen brethren to be displayed together at the center of the Great Hall near where the six caskets had lain in repose.' he sculptures would be dedicated in a ceremony on the first day that the court filled all of its vacant seatshopefully, soon. The nominees were supposed to be announced on the first Monday in October, but last-minute dickering with the names on the three-three deal had delayed the process. She had learned just yesterday that the announcement would be this week.
She didn't approve of the names rumored to be on the list-every one of them a thoroughgoing ideologue, many of them brash and altogether lacking the gravity befitting the high court. She may not
"Don't hesitate to call me if you think of anything," she said, touching Mrs. Sinclair lightly on the arm. "My cell number is on the card."
When the hotel room door closed, Milstein turned to Assad and gave him a sardonic smile.
"Your girlfriend Dakota Cameron has some explaining to do."
Downtown Washington,
hen Griffin Nash stopped at the crosswalk at the corner of F and Eleventh streets, McKenna made his way through the small cluster of umbrellas.
"Griffin," he said.
Nash turned around. The traffic light changed, and the crowd at the corner began crossing. Several looks, and a voice or two, chided them for blocking the flow of pedestrians.
Nash's eyes darted over McKenna's shoulder.
"What is it, Griffin?" he said, turning to look.
But a sudden hard shove from behind sent him stumbling toward Nash. And in almost the same instant, a man wearing a camouflage jacket was there, thrusting his arm toward Nash's chest and abdomen in quick, repeated jabs. Looking perplexed, Nash fell forward, and he and McKenna hit the pavement hard, a pool of red already seeping through Nash's suit jacket and onto McKenna's hand and shirt.
Before McKenna had time to process what he had seen, the man who had stabbed Nash began pointing at McKenna and shouting, "He stabbed him! He stabbed him!"
Between the hammering thumps of his own heartbeat, McKenna thought he heard screams. And for reasons he would never be able to explain, he ran.
U.S. Supreme Court Building, Washington,
he first Monday in October had passed, but the Supreme Court still had only three of nine justices. The clerk had announced that the court would not sit until it had at least a quorum of six. As the most senior surviving member of the high court, Justice Gillian Wilson Carmichael was the informal acting chief, charged with handling the court's administration until the president nominated, and Senate confirmed, a successor to Chief Justice Kincaid.
Carmichael took the elevator from the ground floor to the Great Hall on her evening stroll around the building. It was a ritual she had started after Black Wednesday to break the monotony of the seemingly endless administrative tasks required of the chief. She thought it might also help with the loneliness, but the coldness and silence of the so-called "marble palace" had the opposite effect.
Alone in the elevator, she glanced critically at her reflection in the bronze doors. Her once striking red hair had dulled to a flat auburnbrown, with some gray around the temples-nothing like the elegant white tresses she had so admired on her grandmother. And though her green eyes still brimmed with intelligence, they were less noticeable than the deep wrinkles around them. For a woman in her late sixties, she was fit, thanks to a lifelong commitment to exercise, but some days her aching joints made her feel like an octogenarian.
Once in the Great Hall, she walked slowly, lost in thought, her heels clicking on the polished marble. She stopped now and then to gaze at one of the busts of former chief justices that sat in niches along the way. During one of these strolls, she had decided to authorize a memorial to the slain justices. Working with the court's curator, Carmichael had commissioned a bust of each of her fallen brethren to be displayed together at the center of the Great Hall near where the six caskets had lain in repose.' he sculptures would be dedicated in a ceremony on the first day that the court filled all of its vacant seatshopefully, soon. The nominees were supposed to be announced on the first Monday in October, but last-minute dickering with the names on the three-three deal had delayed the process. She had learned just yesterday that the announcement would be this week.
She didn't approve of the names rumored to be on the list-every one of them a thoroughgoing ideologue, many of them brash and altogether lacking the gravity befitting the high court. She may not
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