No Safe Place by Patterson Richard North

Author:Patterson, Richard North [Patterson, Richard North]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: thriller, Mystery, Politics, Suspense, Crime
ISBN: 9780345404770
Amazon: 0345404777
Goodreads: 168648
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Published: 1998-01-01T08:00:00+00:00

It was nine-thirty in San Francisco before the weary band of reporters reached the Saint Francis Hotel, another hour before Nate was able to retrieve his luggage and locate his room. That made it one-thirty a.m. in Washington; when he called his editor at home, it took her five rings to answer, and her voice sounded thick and dazed.

Without apology, Nate said, “Your message read ‘urgent.’”

“Yeah,” Jane answered. “There’s something more.” Abruptly, she seemed to have awakened. “Sheila Kahn talked to one of Costello’s ex-neighbors—a retired army colonel who detests Kilcannon’s politics and told Sheila he ‘knew the little bastard on sight.’

“Anyhow, this man claims he was walking his greyhound one fine spring morning, and who should come out the front door of the building but Kerry Kilcannon, wearing a tuxedo. Kilcannon saw him, the colonel says, and looked the other way. Then he walked to an old compact car with New Jersey plates saying ‘USS’ and drove off.”

Was it that night, Nate wondered. “Did this guy ever see him with Lara?”

“No. Never with her. And only that once.”

Nate lay back in his bed. That the memory was so clear did not surprise him; in a white evening dress, Lara had looked so slim and elegant that she had, figuratively speaking, stopped his heart. It was the moment when Nate had stopped deluding himself and begun wondering what to do. “This would have been three years ago,” he asked, “right?”

“How did you know that?”

“Lara and I were both at the Times. She’d invited Kilcannon to the Congressional Correspondents Dinner—a real coup for a rookie. But I didn’t figure they were fucking.”

“Well, they were, it seems. Staying over at her place wasn’t smart.”

For another moment, Nate was quiet. He could also remember when Lara had first mentioned Kerry Kilcannon, months before that dinner. How soon after that, Nate wondered, had Kilcannon begun to see Lara as he did?

“It’s not enough,” Nate said at last.

“Of course not.” Jane’s tone was filled with impatience. “But surely for a question, or to catch Kilcannon in a lie. When are you meeting with him?”

Nate could feel his own frustration. “Kit Pace is stonewalling me. When I tried to tell her this was for his ears only, Kit did the old ‘tell me why I should bother him at a time like this …’”

“Because you’re you,” Jane snapped. “And from News-world, not the fucking Wichita Bugle. Don’t they know what we can do?”

“Of course. I even gave her a deadline—seventy-two hours.” Pausing, Nate made himself sound less defensive. “Maybe Lara’s told Kilcannon. Kit figures we can’t run this without telling them what it is, and she’s playing for time.”

There was silence on the other end. “She’s right,” Jane answered tersely. “And we don’t have time. Tell Kit that we want Kilcannon tomorrow, and what we want to ask him. In case Kit’s forgotten what she already knows.” Jane’s voice filled with real anger. “It’s totally unethical: Costello’s not a reporter, she’s Kilcannon’s fifth column. She deserves whatever happens as much as he does.

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