Page 35 of The Hardest Hit
“Eleanor Deveraux is trying to enforce her grudge against J.P. Granger,” said Taggert. “Now, I’m not saying he’s an entirely upstanding character—that’s for a jury of twelve fine men to decide. But that’s just my point. She’s using the Senate to do her bidding and we’re a democracy. We don’t work that way. We don’t roll over for anyone but Lady Liberty here.”
He jerked his thumb at the statue of Justice carrying her scales, and Jackson bit his tongue to keep from shouting out a correction of the statue’s name. Authority figures always brought out his childish side. Instead, he did what he figured Aiden would want him to do and turned around and went back inside. Unfortunately, one of the reporters was quicker than the rest.
“Mr. Deveraux!”
Jackson ducked into the stairwell, slamming the door on the pursuant sounds of “Mr. Deveraux!” He put on a burst of speed and went up two flights instead of down, jogged down the hall and went to the opposing stairwell, and then sped down the stairs, popping out in the parking garage. Only once he was in the car and well away from the courthouse did he breathe a sigh of relief. He had almost made it home when his phone rang.
“Visiting the courthouse today?” asked Aiden.
“Saw the news?” asked Jackson, wincing.
“I got a Google alert,” said Aiden. “So that’s fun. Ping! Your cousin did something stupid.”
“Well, admittedly this was not my best day,” agreed Jackson.
“Didn’t I say: don’t go to court?”
“I wanted to see Granger. And it would have been fine. I just didn’t know Taggert was going to be showboating on the courthouse steps.”
“That guy pisses me off so much!”
“So much,” agreed Jackson.
Aiden made a growly unhappy noise. “How was Granger?”
“Mad as hell,” said Jackson. “They let him stay on the outside. All of his assets are frozen. It doesn’t seem like he should be a threat, but…”
“But you don’t like it?”
“He hates us. I don’t mean that in any metaphorical, hyperbolic way. I mean, he actually hates us.”
“I tried to talk to Evan today,” said Aiden. “He says he saw some weird photographer.”
“Mm,” said Jackson. “Just Evan?”
“Apparently,” Aiden lied blithely. “Anyway, he was concerned that someone was digging into him. I thought you should know.”
“I’m looking into it,” said Jackson. “It’s some sort of low-rent magazine calledThe Intelligencer.I might need your help on it. I’ll send you an email. They’re taking too close a look into us, and Evan specifically.”
Aiden grunted unhappily. “I don’t like the sound of that. Anyway, I tried to talk to him about maybe not riding the train and he told me to fuck off.”
Jackson let out his breath in a gust. “Yeah. He’s stubborn.”
“It’s probably OK though, right?” asked Aiden hopefully. “It’s just one stalker photographer, that’s not exactly hitmen or anything. We can deal with that.”
“Yeah,” said Jackson. “I think so. I just wish I knew why they were focusing on Evan.”
Aiden was silent for a moment. “Yeah… Send me the details on this magazine. I’ll see about a cease and desist. Might as well get something on record even if it doesn’t go anywhere. You’re right. I don’t want them bothering Evan.”
Jackson smiled. It was nice to finally have Aiden as an ally.
14
Evan – Lunch
The photographer had not been seen since last week, but Evan still took the back way out of work and jogged across the inside of the parking garage to pop out on the far side of the block. He turned up the collar on his overcoat and shivered in the bright, brittle November sunshine. He usually tried to rotate his lunch spots, but Stavros and a warm gyro were calling to him again, so he headed uptown, keeping an eye for any tails in the windows of the buildings as he passed.
He picked up the pace as he caught the wafting scent of roasting meat and was already trying to decide if he would vary from his usual for the special when he heard the tinny beep beep of a vintage horn. He looked up and saw Jackson waving at him from Aiden’s sky-blue Aston Martin. The Aston Martin flipped a u-turn, darting through traffic, and wedged itself into an almost legal parking spot just ahead of him.
