"I want to hear Dave, Quinn, and Mike's opinion's first, but probably. I would like to get a name to go with the face first. The media's all over this?"

Luke nodded. "News got out about twenty-five minutes ago. We've made all the networks. The phone lines have been jammed with the volume of TV crews and print reporters. We've implemented our contingency bank of isolated numbers. So far they know it was Judge Whitmore killed; they know there were others hurt. It hasn't leaked yet that there's a witness and so far we've been able to suppress the Hanford name, but I don't expect that to hold."

"Neither do I. Grant is coordinating all press information?"

"Yes."

"Get a copy of the sketch to him as well. And tell him to do what he can to kill the witness information somehow. The shooter knows Shari saw him, but I'd rather not keep reminding him of that fact."

Luke handed over two manila folders. "Carl's threat file and what there is so far on the Hanford family."

Marcus flipped open the file on the Hanfords. They had pulled together a lot in a short time: pictures, bio sketches, newspaper clippings. He focused on Shari's personal friends. She needed someone with her tonight. If he could get it arranged, all the better. "Luke, track down Governor Palmer of Virginia for me. He'll have heard by now, I'm sure. Tell him I want to speak with him about Shari."

"I'll get him for you and forward the call."

The number of newspaper clippings on Shari was thick and this was only a brief set compared to what would come with time. A good rule of thumb: Anyone in the news this often had enemies. "We need someone focused solely on building Shari's file. She's our only known witness and I don't like the look of this file. She is way too public a figure-these are news articles not social page clips. That means trouble. Tell them to pull everything for the last three years and get it to me fast." "News footage as well as print?" "Yes."

Marcus opened Judge Whitmore's file. Carl's threat file was indeed slim-twelve threats in five years. Marcus skimmed the codes on the index page. Three death threats, but none of them in the last couple years. He frowned. There wasn't much here to work with. "Anything at all on Whitmore's personal life? Relatives, background, finances, anything?" "They are digging."

"Have someone track me down as soon as it comes in."

"Will do. There's a growing list of calls coming in for Shari and her family. The hospital knows not to give out information, and the hotel has been instructed to simply take messages. Any change to that?"

"No, keep that blackout in place. I'll ask Shari if there is a family friend she wants to have return calls on their behalf. They are going to need a family spokesperson to deal with the press. Quinn is upstairs?"

"Yes. Nothing turned up in the floor sweeps."

"The shooter's gone." The clock was a harsh master.

"We'll plaster the city with the sketch. You know the local cops will do a full-court press to be the ones to bring him in."

"There is that," Marcus agreed, just wanting the guy found. "I'm going to touch base with Dave and Quinn, then head back to the hospital. Page me if we get anything."

He stepped out of the Belmont Room and literally bumped into his sister Jennifer. He automatically reached out a hand to steady her. "Jen, what are you doing here?" He was surprised, not only that she was here, but that she was inside the security zone.

"I patched up Quinn while he growled at me. Your partner doesn't like doctors. I-Ie's as bad as some of my pediatric patients."

"How bad was he hit?"

"Sixteen stitches, but he bled for a good hour and a half before he paused to let me fix him up. And he would have refused the local if I hadn't told him to shut up."

"It sounds just like Quinn."

"He'S stubborn as a mule," Jennifer agreed. She took a deep breath.

"Actually, Marcus, I'm glad I bumped into you. I've got a 9:00 P.M. flight, and I need to talk to you sometime before then."

He went still. "You came over with Kate for dinner."

"Yes."

"What's wrong?" Kate, who knew what was going on, was very worried. He brushed back her hair, tipped up her chin, and tried to read her expression.

"Nothing that won't keep until later today,"

"Jennifer-"

Her hand settled firmly on his forearm. "It will keep; I'm serious." She gave him that tolerant smile he had come to know only too well as she talked people into what they didn't want. "I promise we'll talk before I have to leave."

Trivial things did not have Kate pacing the floor. Marcus was not about to let this be pushed aside. Unfortunately, at the moment Jennifer was right, there were competing demands on his time he couldn't ignore. "You're sure?" "Yes. Do you need any help at the hospital?"

Given the circumstances, he had to accept the change of subject. "Yes, I think I will. Can I page you? Will you be around the hotel?"

"Yes, I'll be here. Go to work."

Marcus had no choice. "I'll page." He headed to the elevator.

The crime scene had extended to encompass the entire ninth floor. An officer assigned to serve as case scribe recorded Marcus's badge number, name, and time of arrival to the floor. With the guests evacuated, the floor now effectively sealed off, only necessary officers remained.

Two crime scene technicians were taking a powerful light down the hallway, looking for evidence that might have been missed on the first pass. Dave came to meet him. "How are Josh and William doing?"

"Still in surgery, but holding on. How's it going here?" Two men from the medical examiners office were waiting with a stretcher and a folded body bag; Judge Whitmore hadn't been moved yet.

"It's under control."

Marcus followed him into the Hanfords' suite. The crime scene technician videotaping the scene paused to change cassettes, mark the first one into evidence. It was necessary to walk with care; yellow numbered evi dence tags marked items slated to be collected once they were photographed.

He stopped at the connecting door. His sister Lisa was kneeling beside Judge Whitmore's body, studying his left hand. Marcus was surprised to see her, then realized it made sense. This was as high a profile case as you could get. The medical examiner and the state crime lab commissioner would have talked, assigned one of the central staff to coordinate the scene. "Lisa."

She glanced back. "Hi, Marcus."

"What do you see?"

She rocked back on her heels. "Very light powder burns. He tried to block the first shot."

She wore latex gloves but was spinning a gold pen. Marcus had learned to leave her pens alone. She liked gold because the blood would wipe off. On the clipboard tucked under her arm, he could see part of her preliminary scene sketch.

"We've just started to actually process the scene. It will be another hour before we can move his body, probably five or six hours on evidence. Dave said you were the one who entered this room in the initial minutes after the shooting."

"Yes."

"I need your shoes."

His shoes. Of course. "My room is downstairs. Can I get another pair, then bring these back?"

She frowned back at him. "I suppose, seeing as how you've been over to the hospital and back in them."

"There's a hole in my sock."

"Is there?" She was amused at that. She looked back at the area of carpet in front of her. "Thanks for sealing the scene as early as you did. This place is a treasure trove."

"What have you found?"

"Your shooter made a mistake." She gestured with her pen, indicating an oval area to her left. "There's a gun powder residue pattern here, and he walked through it when he crossed over to the connecting door to shoot the Hanfords. And over there-" she pointed to the right-"he put his right foot down on a blood splatter arc. Inside the door he's left the edge of a shoe print with blood on it. We've got blood traces in the hall coming from the sole of his right shoe."

"Can you tell me anything about him?"

"Sure. He'S not a very good shot." She indicated the shots that had killed Judge Whitmore. "Look at the spread of these three hits."

Marcus had never figured out how things that made even cops queasy Lisa could work around without a qualm. Death didn't bother her.

"Other than that, not much. Ask me again after I get the autopsy finished and start putting together the forensic data. I'll have to put some geometry into the entry and exit wounds, the blood splatters. Give me enough time and I'll probably be able to give you the shooter's height, weight, and what he ate for dinner."

She wasn't being facetious. In a case last year she had figured out the killer liked clams from a toothpick found at the scene. In a town with one seafood restaurant, it had been useful information. "Shari said his shoes were highly polished," Marcus told her.

"Really? Useful. I may be able to get you a brand name on the shoes.

Think she might be able to remember details?"

"I'll ask."

"This is a nice, tight, dense weave carpet. We should be able to get some good images with a high contrast photograph." While she spoke, Lisa collected several samples of Carl's blood, sealing it into vials. It was a harsh reality, but by the time the body reached the morgue to be autopsied, most shooting victims had bled almost totally out.

She got to her feet, careful to step back on the black tape. "If you have to enter the room, stay by the tape," she warned. "We've done a fiber lift from there so we can move around, but the rest of the room is still unprocessed."

She closed the vials in a biohazardous evidence bag, sealed it with a bar code, initialed the tag, and passed the sack to a technician to document. "We should be done with the photographs within the hour, then the real work will begin. Between the fiber evidence and the fingerprints, we'll be here well into the day,"

There were shell casings numbered. Holes in the plaster circled with black marker. Mistlike blood splatters typical of gunshot wounds. Marcus saw evidence marker number 74 set beside the overturned phone. "The bloody fingerprint on the phone is likely Shari's. She was the one who called the desk."

"A lady that can keep her cool."

"Yes."

"Whenever you can make the unobtrusive request, I'll need her fingerprints and those of her family"

"I'll arrange it."

"Dave, I'll need fingerprints of everyone who entered the room, including the paramedics."

"I'll get them."

"What's this?" Marcus asked. A black circle had been drawn on the carpet.

"We've got one bullet that ended up in the hotel room one floor below," Dave replied.

"How did that happen?"

"A fluke of bad construction. We were lucky; the room was unoccupied."

"Am I the only one already beginning to think this case is going to be bad luck around every corner?"

"Quinn would agree with you. I-Ie's growling."

"He hates getting shot at, not to mention not being able to track his quarry"

The hotel lounge off the sixth floor atrium was abuzz with word that there had been a shooting. Connor sat at a window table, sipping his drink, ignoring the commotion.

The judge was dead. tetribution was a beautiful word.

"Did we negotiate a great deal or what? They folded, just like you predicted, more concerned with the size of their own golden parachutes than the final terms of the sale." His panner in the merger talks was in festive spirits. When the formalities concluded tomorrow on the 43 million dollar merger of the two law firms, the man would personally walk away with almost 4 million. "Having the talks under the cover of this conference was a stroke of brilliance. There won't be anyone cutting in to steal this deal away"

Connor turned the glass in his hand, only half listening. The merger could have gone in the trash for all he cared. The discussions had already accomplished what he hoped for-they had given him an alibi that would be very hard to penetrate. He watched the officers down below on the street look for him: a well-dressed man with thick black hair and thin mustache.

His premature gray and receding hair, lack of mustache, dark glasses, and rumpled shirt showing the affects of working marathon sessions for the last three days had not merited him more than a passing glance by the cops moving through the hotel. Even with the sketch he envisioned they would eventually have, they were in for a rude surprise. Tomorrow he would stroll out of the hotel, just another guest. The gun was locked in his room safe. What better way to protect the evidence than to let the hotel do it for him?

Did they realize he was still sitting in their hotel? Personally, he thought that was the most brilliant portion of his plan.

There should not have been a witness to the actual shooting and he scowled again at that memo Their presence had cut severely into his escape time and had nearly gotten him caught. Now the excitement was over. He had always assumed someone would see him near the judge's room and had used that to his advantage. It was the best principle of deception. They were looking for him, without realizing they were looking for someone who looked only vaguely like him. And a lot like someone else.

And all they needed to do was bring in one suspect, conduct one eyewitness lineup based on that misleading information and he would be able to discredit any eyewitness testimony they tried to use later, leasonable doubt allowed for so much useful maneuvering.

Only one person had really seen him, and he had seen her. He had tonight to figure out how to deal with that. And he would.., he most certainly would. Daniel had warned him it took only one mistake.

His father would be horrified. His good son had just gone irreversibly bad. Connor smiled at his drink. He'd never wanted to be the good son. By the time Titus realized what he had done, all the loose ends would be wrapped up. Even Titus would not be able to deny him his rightful place in the business then. Connor had earned his place.

He raised his drink and silently drank a toast to his dead brother Daniel. May he now rest in peace.

Five.

S.

hari leaned against the wall beside her mom's hospital room window and watched traffic flow on the street below, red taillights breaking the darkness marking outbound traffic. Two A.M., and still the city did not sleep. She had been down in traffic like that before, rushing home only to turn around and come back to work while it was not yet dawn. In the intense last few months of campaigns, life ran at a seven day a week, twenty-four hour a day pace. She wished her life was that simple again, when being rushed for time was the biggest stress in her day Someone murdered Carl. Who? Why?

Her dad and brother being shot were incidental to him. He destroyed her family and it was incidental to him. She wanted this guy Desperately And while she knew the marshals would be all over this case because Carl had been killed, she couldn't leave it there.