“How do we get in?” Sam asked Freddie as they stood at the gate.
“There’s an intercom over here.” He pressed the button.
“I’d expect a pretty serious doorbell at a place like this.”
“I’ll bet it’s ringing inside the house.”
The intercom beeped. “Yes?” The single word contained a world of testiness.
Freddie answered for them. “Lieutenant Holland and Detective Cruz for Gretchen Henderson.”
“She’s not available.”
“Tell her to get available,” Sam said. “This isn’t a social call, and we’d be glad to come back with a warrant if need be.”
Gretchen herself replied next. “What do you want?”
“We’re investigating the murder of Sergei Ivanov. We can do this here or at our place downtown. Your choice.”
After a long pause, a buzz sounded, and the gate unlocked.
Followed by Vernon, they went up the sidewalk to the front porch, where Gretchen met them at the door, looking vastly diminished from the regal aura she’d projected as vice president. She wore a denim shirt with black sweats. Her hair was in a ponytail, her face devoid of makeup and her eyes puffy from either crying or a lack of sleep—perhaps both.
Without a word, she led them to a formal living room. On the way, Sam noticed stacked boxes farther inside the house and thought about how the White House didn’t mess around when it came to moving people.
Gretchen gestured for them to have a seat on a plush royal blue sofa. Framed portraits of her children were the only decoration in the room.
Sam recited Gretchen’s rights and expected her to request a lawyer, but when she didn’t, Sam dove right in.
“We’re investigating the murder of Sergei Ivanov, and we understand he was a close friend of yours.”
“You understand that,” she said with a huff of ironic laughter. “I’m sure your husband took great joy in telling you all about how I know Sergei.”
“I can assure you my husband is taking no joy from any of this, especially the part about the Russians bombing my workplace and killing four of my colleagues so they could steal Sergei’s body from our morgue.”
“That’s who bombed your building?”
“Yes.”
“How do you know that for sure?”
“Because Nick told the ambassador to return the body and the innocent bystander who was apprehended at the same time or the bombing would be treated as an act of war. The body and the bystander were back in our custody within an hour, and the men responsible for the bombing have been turned over to the FBI.”
“Those sorts of thug moves are the very thing Sergei was trying to eliminate from his country’s discourse. It’s right out of Petrov’s playbook.”
“How did you know Ivanov?”
“We went to Oxford together.”
“And you were casual friends, roommates, lovers, what?”
“We dated for a time.”
“And you’ve stayed in contact ever since?”
“We were very close in graduate school, and we reconnected after I became vice president. He called to wish me well.” She glanced down at the floor. “I still can’t believe he’s gone.”
“I understand you spent time with him before he was killed.”
