Henry
Saturday, 17th November, 2018
10:13 AM
Sunlight spooled in through the window of the spare room and illuminated the motes of dust that spiralled through the air, but as Henry ended the call and placed his cell phone—(the upgrade he'd been wanting, the upgrade he wished he'd never needed)—down on the window sill, the beams carried with them more chill than warmth.
"So...what did they say?"
Henry's heart lurched, and he spun around.
Jason leant in the doorway, his arms folded loosely across his chest and crumpling the open fronts of his plaid shirt.
"Hey, Jase." Though Henry's heart continued to pound, he tried to pass it off with a smile. "I didn't see you there."
He picked up the fitted sheet that was folded into a sort of square at the end of the bed, and he flicked it out so that it billowed like a market stall canopy caught in the breeze. It released a waft of laundry detergent, a sting of synthesised lavender.
"Give me a hand, will you?"
But Jason didn't budge. "What did they say?"
"What did who say?" Henry tugged the corners of the sheet over the edge of the mattress one by one. His back ached as he stooped down.
"Come on. I know you call them every morning."
Henry glanced over his shoulder. "Call who?"
Jason gave an exaggerated eye roll. "The neural health facility."
Henry chuckled and he smoothed out the non-existent creases in the sheet. "Is that what we're calling it now?"
"Thought that was more PC than nuthouse or asylum."
Henry shot him a look. He chucked a pillow at him, followed by a second. "Do these." He pointed to the pillowcases that rested on the wicker chair in the corner of the bedroom.
Jason grumbled, but he trudged into the room, snatched up the pillowcases and slumped down into the seat. The wicker creaked beneath his weight. He stuffed one pillow into its cover, and then wedged it by his side and grabbed the second from where it rested between his feet.
When the pillows were done, he chucked them back at Henry. "Seriously though, how is she?"
"She's fine." Henry plumped up the pillows. A faint mustiness bloomed from them, a reminder of how infrequently they had guests. Then he set them at the top of the bed.
The wicker squeaked as Jason eased up from the chair. He sidled closer to the bed, and his arms came to rest across his chest once more. He lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper as he shot a quick glance towards the door, towards the hum of the television and the thump of footfall against floorboards that drifted up the stairs. "Look, I get that you don't want to scare the girls, but I know why she's there, so you don't have to try and protect me."
"She's fine, Jase." Henry cast him another look, and then fed the corners of the duvet into the teal-and-pink-chequered cover. He held the duvet up and shook it out until the opening in the cover fell down to the bottom, and then he laid it out on the bed and squashed the remaining corners inside before doing up the poppers. Each one released a snap into the silence.
"How's she ever meant to talk about it if you won't?"
"I will talk about it—" Henry adjusted the quilt so that its edges draped evenly across the mattress. "—with her."
"But why not with us?"
With his hands on his hips, Henry surveyed his work. He took a deep breath. Should making a bed really work up a sweat? And then he pivoted to face Jason, who met him with a scowl, the one that definitely belonged to Elizabeth.
"Come here." He motioned to the end of the bed. He sat down, and as the mattress slumped beneath him, his body gave a sigh of relief.
When Jason continued to hover, he patted the space beside him.
"Why?" Jason gave a stilted shrug. "You're just going to patronise me."
"No, I'm going to talk to you."
Jason's scowl persisted for a moment or two longer before it eased, just a fraction. Then he perched at the edge of the mattress next to Henry.
Henry clasped Jason's shoulder. "Look, Mom's going through a tough time—"
Jason snorted.
Henry's grip tightened. "—but she still has her right to privacy. You wouldn't want me going round telling people things you'd told me in confidence, would you?"
"No..."
"And this is just the same."
Jason hung his head, and his lips drew into a pout.
"Just give her a little time at the...neural health facility—" Henry squeezed Jason's shoulder until Jason yielded and the hint of a smile lit his face. "—and once she's home, we can talk about it then, if that's what she wants." His touch lightened, and he looked Jason in the eye. "I'm not trying to hide anything from you, the truth is I just don't really know what's going on with her right now, and I don't want to speak for her. Okay?"
Jason bunched his lips to one side, as though he were fighting back all the arguments that leapt to his tongue as to why that wasn't okay, but he nodded. He fiddled with the cuff of his shirt sleeve, and his gaze dipped towards the tuft of blue threads that barely clung onto the button. After a moment or so, he met Henry's eye again. "Do they tell you anything?"
The landline wailed downstairs and sharpened the pause, a counterpoint to the surrounding silence.
"Some things." Henry's lips quirked into no more than half a smile. "She's mainly been catching up on sleep."
"Snow 'em and stow 'em."
Henry chuckled. "I'm pretty sure that's not PC."
"So, what are you going to tell Aunt Maureen?"
Henry drew in a breath that rolled to the bottom of his lungs. He massaged the back of his neck, his fingers pressing the knots, and then gave a shrug. "The story's that she's staying at the hospital with Uncle Will after he's suffered complications from food poisoning."
Jason's nose crinkled. "Food poisoning? Seriously?"
"I think it's Russell Jackson's idea of a joke."
"Well, it gets an F for creativity."
"Speaking of Russell—" Stevie's voice came from the doorway, and Henry's head jerked up to find her clinging to the door frame as she leant against the wood. "He's here."
Henry frowned. "Here?"
Stevie nodded.
"Now?"
Her lips bunched to the side and she nodded again. "Says he needs to speak to you."
Henry pushed the cuff of his sleeve up his arm, the cotton grazing his skin, and he glanced at his watch. "I'm meant to be collecting your aunt from the station in just over half an hour."
"I can go."
Henry looked up at her. A pause. "You sure?"
"Of course. Just give me a chance to put something proper on." Stevie tugged at the front of her kimono dressing gown and set the silk shimmering in a cascade of flamingo pink as it caught the sunlight. "You should've seen the look Russell just gave me when I answered the door looking like this. Anyone would think I'd skinned the Snowths."
***
"How the hell do you have time to read all these?" With his hands on his hips and pushing back the open fronts of his black overcoat, Russell pivoted towards Henry and then back to the bookshelves that dominated the wall of the study.
The door roared against its runners as Henry slid it shut behind him. "Hello to you too, Russell."
"Seriously." Russell glanced at him again. "The only way I have time to get through a book nowadays is if I listen to it on audio, and even then I only get a third of the way through because the narrators are so goddamn irritating."
Henry perched against the front edge of his desk and crossed his arms over his chest. He gave a shrug. "I guess we all have different priorities."
"Well, you can save the lecture on priorities for your wife." Russell stepped away from the shelves and stood in front of Henry. His gaze flickered for a moment, as though skittering over a grid of words as he plucked out the ones to line up on the tip of his tongue, and then his look locked on Henry. "I hear she's not engaging in therapy."
Henry's breath froze—one second, two seconds, three—and then he let out a huff and shook his head to himself. "I don't know why it surprises me that you know that already."
"She needs to start doing something, and quickly."
"I'm sorry if her being unwell doesn't fit into your schedule—"
"It's not about my schedule."
Henry raised his voice. "—but it's not exactly what I had planned either. So stop 'checking in' on her and give her a little privacy."
The front door sighed open and then clunked shut. It sent out a reverberation that caused the net curtains on the opposite side of the room to tremor. Alison strode along the hallway, her high heels clomping off the wood, whilst her head bopped and grooved in time to the beat that pulsed from her earphones.
Both Russell's and Henry's gazes followed her until the clunk of footsteps faded upstairs. Then Russell turned back to Henry. "Funny you should mention privacy."
He twisted around and picked up the manila folder that rested on top of the State Department files stacked at the corner of Elizabeth's desk. He prised back the cover and pulled out a wad of glossy sheets that he then extended to Henry.
A frown unfurled across Henry's brow as he stared at the offering suspended between them. He could take them and look for himself, but the subtle churning at the pit of his stomach, like the first eddies that fed into a maelstrom, told him that he wouldn't want to see. "What are they?"
"Tickets to see Taylor Swift. What do they look like to you?"
He snatched the photographs from Russell's grasp. Their glossy finish tacked to the pads of his fingers and thumbs, and the rasp of paper scraping over paper filled the air as he frowned down at them one by one and cycled each to the bottom of the pile.
The street outside beneath the purple blush of twilight, whilst the smoulder of lamp posts rained down and simmered cold in the windshields of cars; Stevie with her hair slicked into a high ponytail, her cheeks flushed, and her palms rested against the pillar of the porch as she stretched out her legs post-run; a line of three black SUVs, smudged by a blur of grey as a car sailed past; Alison stood beneath the frame of the front door, with white light flooding out around her as she held out a banknote snapped between her first two fingers to a man in a crimson pizza delivery uniform; the rain-beaded image of Kat and Jay hovering at the side of the road, huddled in their black woollen overcoats with collars flipped up; a golden glow that bled out through the curtains of the study and dissolved into darkness, but blocked by a shadow, the outline of Elizabeth, her knees hugged to her chest, her head falling back to rest against the wall behind; a close-up of a licence plate, and another, and another; Dr Sherman with one hand laid against the trunk lid of her car, whilst the other hoisted Elizabeth's bag inside; Elizabeth swathed in black, except for the powder blue of her pyjama bottoms that peeked from beneath the hem of her coat and that shimmered in the amber haze of street lights; Elizabeth swathed in black, a darkness that swamped her, that embraced her, that seeped into her eyes; Elizabeth swathed in black, her lips downturned, her brow pinched, her cheeks concaved; Elizabeth swathed in black...I'm sorry that I lied.
Henry tugged at his mouth and sank further back against the desk, letting it bear all of his weight, whilst the peach sunlight that infused the room turned a shade darker, as though a shadow skulked outside. He thumbed back to the picture of Elizabeth, curled up on the window ledge, no more than five paces away from where he stood right now, and as he looked up and stared past Russell into the window bay, he could almost make out the ghost of her image, as though her presence lingered on from that night, as subtle yet as insinuating as the perfume that clung to their bedding, his clothing, every fibre of the house, and like the perfume, it carried a sting, though this sting came not from the pain of a promise unfulfilled, but from the realisation that he had not been there to witness that image in life, that most likely he had been fast asleep.
But someone else had seen.
Someone else had been waiting on the other side of that glass, ready to capture that snapshot of her suffering, to snatch up that piece of the puzzle and secret it away. They had stolen it from him, they had denied him the chance to help her, denied him the chance to stop the events that would unfold the following night. Will's not dead...not yet...but I should be.
Or at least that's how it felt. But perhaps it was just a salve for the blame, for not seeing what a single image could show so clearly. Or maybe just a stark reminder: You can't watch her twenty-four hours a day.
He lowered the photographs at the top of the stack so that they hid that picture, burying it beneath what ought to have been more prominent in his mind. Someone had been watching their house, someone had been documenting their movements, someone had been lurking just metres away. With his jaw clenched, he forced out the words. "Is she safe? Are our children safe?"
Russell gave a curt nod. "Yes."
Henry's voice rose, and he swept one hand towards the street outside. "But if the people who poisoned her have been—"
"They're not the ones who took the photographs."
Henry stopped. He shook his head and his frown deepened. "What do you mean?"
Russell pulled another picture from the file, adding a crisp swish to the silence, and he held it out to Henry. "That would be this man."
The photograph showed a close-up of a man, either a heavy smoker or in his late forties, or so said the loose skin that sagged beneath his eyes. He sported a rat's nest of grey hair, a ten-day stubble, and a mouth made for a snarl.
Henry eyed the image as the page bowed into the gap between them, but rather than taking it and resting it atop the pile, he declined it with the wave of a hand. "Who is he?"
"Just another link in the chain." Russell placed the picture on the desk behind him, and then arched his fingers atop it. "We picked up David Bailey here and brought him in for questioning. At first he refused to talk, some noble idea about protecting whoever hired him, even if that meant doing jail time. But when we informed him he was being interviewed in connection with an assassination attempt...well, turns out even he has his limits."
He produced another sheet from the folder. "Told us he was hired by this guy." This time he held up the photograph, rather than offering it to Henry. "And the payment record confirms it."
"And who's he?"
With thick-rimmed glasses and a pasty complexion, as though he hadn't seen sunlight since Conrad's first inauguration, the man could have passed for the other one's weedy younger brother.
"A DC staffer," Russell said, "and working for none other than Senator Morejon."
In the silence, Russell's lips quirked into a kind of glum smile.
"I don't understand." Henry pinched the bridge of his nose. "Senator Morejon sent someone to spy on our house? To take pictures of everyone who came and went?"
Russell leant back against the edge of Elizabeth's desk. He clasped the folder in both hands in front of him and gave a half-shrug. "We knew he'd been digging around, trying to find out what was going on, but we didn't think even he'd sink this low."
"But why? What could he possibly have to gain?"
"You must've heard his daily sermons on Elizabeth not being fit for the job, calling for Dalton to fire her. And he never bought into the story about her taking time with the family. Who knows what he was hoping to find, but you can sure as hell guess what he was thinking when he saw a picture of her looking like that—" Russell stabbed a finger at the photograph on top of the pile still clutched in Henry's hand, the one of Elizabeth leaving for the clinic. "—and learnt that she was getting into a car with a therapist, one of whose specialties is addiction."
"But she's not being treated for addiction."
"And she didn't murder the Assistant Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs for Timor-Leste." Russell's eyes bugged. "Do you really think Morejon gives a crap about the truth? All he cares about is tarnishing this administration and ruining her hopes of running in the next election."
Tension radiated along Henry's jaw. Who cared about the administration or the election? If Elizabeth found out people were printing these allegations, if she found out people knew she was at the clinic... Shame had burned her face at the thought of sharing with him—her husband, her friend, her confidante—just a hint of what was going through her mind, but if it were splashed across the tabloids for the whole world to see...
"Please tell me this hasn't leaked."
"We shut it down. And these—" Russell gestured to the stack of photographs. "—are the only copies."
The tension that gripped Henry's body eased, though nowhere near completely, just enough for a tremble to falter through his legs as he pushed himself away from the edge of the desk and placed the pictures in Russell's outstretched hand.
Russell turned his back on Henry, jostled the photographs together atop Elizabeth's desk, and crammed them into the folder. "Rather than having the balls to make the allegation himself, or perhaps knowing that no credible news outlet would run a story based on some paparazzi-style photo, Morejon decided to feed it to a blogger and let him make the accusation instead. From there, it would have trickled up into the mainstream, ready for him to add his own comments and call for her resignation, as though he weren't the one to orchestrate the whole damn thing in the first place. And another time, it might've worked, had the blogger not been strapped for cash, and had he not gotten himself tangled up in the investigation." He shot a glance over his shoulder. "You might want to thank Mike B and his DC Irregulars, by the way."
"I'm sure Elizabeth will be thrilled to hear that." Henry leant back against his desk again, and folded his arms across his chest. "So, what happens now? To Morejon."
"I'm glad you brought that up." Russell shrugged off his coat and tossed it onto the armchair in the corner of the room before he turned to Henry once more. He rested his hands against his hips, and his shoulders gave a flinch, as though to nudge himself into whatever he had to say next. "I spoke to DoJ and they don't think we can make any charges stick—"
Henry opened his mouth, though the protest was no more than an incoherent surge.
Russell held up one hand. "There's nothing concrete to prove that Morejon ordered his staffer to hire the photographer, and all Morejon would have to say is that he had no idea what his staffer was doing, that he's appalled by his actions and that he'd never condone such behaviour. Plus, a case like this...it could get messy."
"So, what? We're just going to let him get away with it? He already knows something's going on, so what's to stop him from doing it again? Or finding out where she's staying and taking it straight to the press? You go on about Elizabeth needing to get better and quickly, but in order to do that, she needs her privacy."
Russell crept half a step closer, one hand still raised, a star to push back those thoughts. "I'm not suggesting we let him get away with it."
"Then what?"
Russell paused. Then another flinch. "Oppo."
"Do it."
Or at least, that's what Henry wanted to say. And he would give a casual shrug, just to emphasise how easy his mind told him such a decision ought to be. After all, Morejon had sent someone to watch their home, to pry into Elizabeth's suffering, to exploit her vulnerability, as though such things made her weak. To use oppo against him would only be fair, a kind of retributive justice, Exodus 21:23-25.
But what of the Sermon on the Mount? Or more to the point, what of Elizabeth's wishes?
He had often wondered, both to himself and aloud, Why him? When Elizabeth could have picked anyone she wanted to start a life with, what made him the one that she chose? I guess I have a thing for desert boots, she had joked once, before her expression sobered and she drew him close, Because you're a good man, Henry McCord.
But despite all that, the temptation remained. It was the right thing to do, surely. To protect her, to give her privacy, to allow her the space she needed to recover, to return to them, to make it through this and become all that much stronger. Could he—No. Should he debase himself by lowering himself to the standards of Carlos Morejon?
Henry shook his head. "No."
Russell's eager look withered into decay. "What do you mean 'no'?"
"There has to be another way, one that doesn't use oppo."
"What? Like beating Morejon to punch by having the White House release a statement saying that she was poisoned, but when that didn't work, she thought she'd finish the job herself?"
Henry's jaw clenched, and as the trundle of footsteps bundled down the stairs, he lowered his voice to little more than a hiss. "Being flippant and making jibes about her mental health aren't going to sell me on the idea, Russell."
"Then what will?" Russell's eyes widened, a genuine question, as though Henry could have whatever he wanted, if only he would name it. "She doesn't need to be defined by this, Henry, but if we do nothing, Morejon won't stop until she is."
"That doesn't change the fact you know how she feels about oppo."
"She's opposed to it. I'm painfully aware. In fact, her morals are the only reason that creep's still lurking around DC. Makes the whole situation kind of ironic if you think about it. For God only knows what reason, she's always defended the guy, but the moment she's out of the picture, he tries to take her down, and now there's no one left to protect him. Except for you, apparently."
"Then why even ask me? You're going to do whatever you want anyway."
Russell gave a stilted shrug, and his gaze fell away to the woven diamonds of the rug beneath their feet. "Thought you might like the chance to stand up for her for once. The guy's trying to destroy your wife's career, for crying out loud."
Henry's eyes narrowed, and with his arms still folded, he eased away from the edge of the desk. "You don't want to go against her, do you? You knew she'd say no, but you thought if you got my approval, somehow that would make it okay."
"I don't give a damn about your approval."
"But you do care about hers."
Russell paced away towards the armchair and grabbed his coat. "That's a nice assessment, professor, but I didn't need her approval before, and I certainly don't need it now."
"She won't forgive you for this."
"Forgiveness." Russell slung the coat over his arm. "Another thing I don't need."
He lifted the manila file from Elizabeth's desk, and then strode towards the doors that led into the entrance hall. But then he stopped and turned back to Henry. "Oh, and by the way, the FBI want to speak to her again. They need to go through—"
"No."
"God. Why does everything have to be a debate with you McCords?"
"Then how about we skip the debate? They're not interviewing her, Russell."
"Why not?"
"The last time they spoke to her, they all but blamed her for not being able to help her brother, told her that only she could help them solve this."
"That's because she's the only witness. And now that Morejon has led us down the long and winding path to nowhere, we're back to square one, only with the added knowledge that DS didn't have a clue that someone was watching the house, so God only knows what else they might have missed." Russell held his arms out wide, whilst his gaze bored into Henry. "Surely you want to catch this guy."
"Of course I do, but she's already told them everything she knows." Henry motioned towards the bookcase, to the trace of their conversation before. "You said she needs to think about her priorities, and right now that means focusing on herself, not going over the same old questions."
"They want to show her pictures from the restaurant, see if that might jog her memory."
"Traumatise her more like."
Russell's voice strained. "How are tables and chairs going to traumatise her?"
"I said no." Henry gestured to the manila file in Russell's hand. "You can do what you want with Morejon, that's up to you, but you and the FBI and whoever else will not be harassing my wife. End of discussion."
The rise and fall of an engine's roar and the swoosh of tyres on tarmac filtered through the window and filled the room, an underscore to the silence.
Russell studied Henry, his only movement the slight flicker of his gaze, and as he did, something in his eyes hardened. "You might think that you're protecting her, but wrapping her in cotton wool isn't going to help her, not in the long run."
Henry shook his head, slowly. "Not your call, Russell."
That obsidian look remained, and Henry steeled himself for another verbal spar. Going after Morejon was one thing, but disturbing Elizabeth, now especially—
"Not your call."
Russell held his gaze for a beat longer, until the look started to fracture, hairline cracks that splintered across the surface. Then he let his gaze drop towards the manila file, his shoulders slumping in time, and as he scratched the back of his head, he muttered, "No, I don't suppose it is."
After speaking to the clinic that morning and hearing the little that they would tell him, Henry had once again felt like there was nothing he could do to help Elizabeth, at least not directly. But having Russell back down? He'd take that. After all, wars were won in a string of minor victories.
"Fine. No FBI." Russell tucked the manila file beneath his arm and he stepped towards the doors again. "But, I have to ask... She didn't discuss anything over the phone with her brother, did she? Anything sensitive. Anything we wouldn't want getting out."
The door creaked as he rolled it aside.
Henry frowned and followed him out into the hallway. "No. I don't think so. Why?"
Russell stopped by the front door and pivoted back to face him. He took a breath that looked as though it stuck halfway down his chest, before he sighed it out. "His cell phone had been tampered with, and they suspect someone was listening in leading up to the poisoning."
Henry rubbed his brow as he fought to remember what she had said, if she had said anything to him about conversations with Will, and surely he would remember, because any conversation was bound to spark a tirade. He let his hand fall back to his side, and he met Russell's gaze. "She called to invite him to lunch the week before it happened, maybe sent the odd text here and there, a few emojis, but nothing sensitive, no."
"Good. That's the last thing we need on top of everything else." Russell grasped the handle and tugged open the door. "Well, I'll leave you to it. Stevie mentioned you have a guest."
"Yeah." Henry ran one hand through his hair, and he held the front door open as Russell stepped out onto the black and white tiles. "My sister's coming to visit."
"The sister-in-law, huh?" Russell shot a glance over his shoulder, his eyebrows raised. "No wonder Bess didn't fight them when they extended her hold."
He pulled open the outer door, and a bar of sunlight struck the wall, fanned out through the porch and flooded the hallway, but the warmth that it carried ebbed away as a chill gust tumbled through too.
The bite in the air prickled over Henry. "What did she say to you?"
"Well, if I told you that, I wouldn't be respecting her privacy." Russell strode away along the paved path towards the street. He raised the manila file in a wave. "Take care, Henry."