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Did this have to do with the grand jury?
Did this have to do with the Offseds? What had Kyle been ranting about? Was Kyle having a psychotic break at court, or was it an act? Is it possible he was part of a cult?
Yes, maybe this man was a cult member.
Knowing what Olivia knew about Candace’s story, she froze in space. The fear was a stranglehold.
“Do you know who did a good job with his attempted assassination? He drew his finger across Olivia’s lips.
Olivia forced herself to blink.
“There was the man in Brussels with the hostages on the train. Unfortunately, he went with only an ax. He wasn’t able to kill anyone, let alone his required number, before the police shot him. He died beautifully, though. His body was elegant as it fell.”
Elegant?
In court, Olivia looked at people’s clothing and listened to their word choices. From those clues, she decided how best to question them. This man was an enigma. He confused her. Bird-like, her thoughts jumped from branch to branch as she tried to find a place to nest, the right tune to sing.
Henrietta was scratching furiously at the bathroom door. Her shrill bark sparked Olivia’s high-voltage nerves.
“Sixty officers came. It’s a lovely number sixty. Round. I like the zero at the end. It feels complete.” He put his hands on her knees. “And there was the man in Bern. And another one in Rome. These were accomplished by a string of asylum seekers who tried to leave their countries behind. It turns out that their families' pain weighed heavy on them, so they did as they were instructed. Failed, obviously, but the attempt was made.”
Families? Aunt Jo? Jaylen? To whom was he referring to here?
“Do you know which country has not listened to a symphony of sadness for a while or in decades, really? Here. In your United States. It would be good for America to throb with grief.”
Throb?
He’d said, “Your United States.” He wasn’t from here. What was that accent? Canadian? But Canadians were known for being nice. This wasn’t nice.
“Olivia,” he whispered. “You know, don’t you, that last year the FBI stopped a terrorist plot here in Washington.”
Her case with the grand jury?
“The FBI spied on its own citizens with a digital spying authority. We waited until this year. Do you know what was happening this year? Congress is in disarray. The potential is that the foreign surveillance authority would be one of the many important pieces of US security that would fail to renew. And if that happened? We would have so much power to make so many vital changes in American infrastructure. Buildings would come down, subways taken offline, power grids could cease, and the beauty of a well-crafted assassination could be rendered.” He squeezed her knees and looked into her eyes. “The House acted, thwarting our hopes. And alas,” he shook his head. “our assassin was scraped up in the FBI’s net.”
Olivia swallowed.
Not Mickey. And not the Offseds. This was about her grand jury. Shit.
The FBI had done herculean work stopping domestic terror. And now it was on her team to put the would-be terrorists in jail.
“And so we need someone to take our assassin’s place. And we feel that you would be the person to do this. But first,” he smiled and tapped the recorder, “I was sent here to gather some understanding of who is talking to the grand jury, what they’ve said, and how we can find them.”
Chapter Thirty-Three
Nutsbe
Nutsbe parked two doors down. He did want to warn Olivia. He did want her to sleep somewhere else. But if everything was okay right now, he wouldn’t scare Olivia with lights pulling into her drive.
If he parked in his own drive, his motion-sensor lights would illuminate the backyard as he walked over her lawn.
And his gut was telling him to go in quietly.
As he moved up the street, he could see the steady glow through the corner window upstairs. Behind the drawn curtains, a human-shaped shadow shifted and bobbled on the right-hand side. Lights flashed on in other rooms downstairs in the front of the house.
Nutsbe moved up the walk and tried the front door.
Locked.
