Dark Ambition Read Free Page B

"Call nine-one-one right now. I'm on my way back."
    "Oh, God!"
    As the news sank in, Jennifer didn't shed any tears. Why should she? She was glad the bastard was dead. "Go out front and tell the guards. And don't touch a thing."
    * * *
    She drove the maroon Ford Taurus into the entrance of Washington's Reagan National Airport, taking care to avoid being stopped in the speed trap set to catch travelers late for a plane. Everything was proceeding like clockwork. While the two guards had seen her leave the house, they had never seen her pull away in the Taurus because she had parked around the corner. She had immediately driven into Rock Creek Park. Inside the car, in a deserted parking lot for a picnic grove, she had peeled off the cap, wig, tie and trench coat. The man's outfit was replaced by a maroon skirt and pale pink blouse that she had hidden under the car seat.
    She had been dressed as a woman when she stepped out of the car in that picnic grove, but it didn't matter. No one was around to see her. She opened the trunk and put on the camel's-hair coat that was inside. Then she carefully placed the man's clothes, the gun, and the briefcase in the green trash bag in the trunk.
    Now, twenty minutes later, she was in the flow of traffic moving toward the main terminal. Not nervous or tense, but horny as hell. Killing always did that to her. She had seriously thought of fucking Winthrop first, maybe even strangling him after she came and just when he was in the throes of orgasm, but she didn't dare take the chance of leaving bodily traces behind. DNA and other types of medical testing were too sophisticated these days. She would like to have called Chip Donovan. An hour in his bed would have been great, but she couldn't risk that either. They had trained her too well to behave stupidly.
    So she followed the plan like a good soldier. She parked the Taurus on the first level of the garage. It was Saturday, and with the garage half-empty, she had no difficulty finding a space against the back wall, as she had been instructed. She left the parking ticket in the glove compartment. Later, the car would be removed, but that didn't concern her. At the Delta Shuttle counter, she paid cash for a ticket to New York, using the name Nancy Burroughs and a phony driver's license.
    Waiting for the plane to board, she rewarded herself for a job well done with a double Absolut Citron on the rocks. The alcohol felt good going down. It deadened her senses, took her mind off sex. "I'll be back in Washington soon, Chip," she thought. "I'll call you then."
    After takeoff, she reviewed the evening ahead. She'd exit the plane at LaGuardia, looking like a member of the Westport Junior League, which she was, and pick up her Jeep Cherokee. The traffic would be light heading back to Connecticut on the Merritt. She'd be home in time to join Paul for dinner at the Bradleys'.
    After that, there'd be bridge, with Paul bidding aggressively as usual, and she, the conservative member of the team, taking very little in the way of risks. "It's just a game, Gwen," Paul frequently lectured her. "You should gamble a little. You're too risk-averse."
    At eleven o'clock, Peggy Bradley would turn on the news, because she always did that. And no one would have any idea that their little suburban housewife neighbor was responsible for "the hour's top story."
    * * *
    Chaos was giving way to order. Ann was upstairs recovering in bed. Jennifer had managed to reach Ann and Robert's son in San Francisco and their daughter in Philadelphia. Both were now en route to Washington. She had tried to call President Brewster with the news, but the closest she got was Jim Slater, his chief of staff.
    With Ann resting, Jennifer went downstairs to the den and watched with curiosity as Arthur Campbell, senior detective with the District of Columbia metropolitan police force, a tall, thin black man dressed in a gray flannel sport jacket and tie, went about his business with quiet efficiency.