Chapters (46)
- COVER PAGE
- PRAISE
- DEDICATION
- ONE
- TWO
- THREE
- FOUR
- FIVE
- SIX
- SEVEN
- EIGHT
- NINE
- TEN
- ELEVEN
- TWELVE
- THIRTEEN
- FOURTEEN
- FIFTEEN
- SIXTEEN
- SEVENTEEN
- EIGHTEEN
- NINETEEN
- TWENTY
- TWENTY-ONE
- TWENTY-TWO
- TWENTY-THREE
- TWENTY-FOUR
- TWENTY-FIVE
- TWENTY-SIX
- TWENTY-SEVEN
- TWENTY-EIGHT
- TWENTY-NINE
- THIRTY
- THIRTY-ONE
- THIRTY-TWO
- THIRTY-THREE
- THIRTY-FOUR
- THIRTY-FIVE
- THIRTY-SIX
- THIRTY-SEVEN
- THIRTY-EIGHT
- THIRTY-NINE
- FORTY
- ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
- ABOUT THE AUTHOR
- SNEAK PEEK: EXIT .45
Vincent had nothing that counted as a pressing engagement, so he started the day after the interview. They wouldn’t give him the pay he’d requested, but they settled on twenty-five hundred per week. Not bad, given that the job came with free accommodation. All he had to do to move in was collect his duffel bag from the motel.
The house was on four levels, and he had half the bottom floor to himself. The apartment had AC, brand-new furniture, a sixty-inch TV, and appliances with German brand names. He could come and go via the internal stairs, or just use his private sliding door that accessed the pool area.
His digs had gone up a notch, but his standing in Freeman’s eyes seemed to have declined. Vincent guessed his attire was a prime concern. Lamar had told him the suit was unnecessary, so Vincent designated t-shirts and shorts as his new dress code. Freeman was obviously partial to a more corporate look, and made a point to stop and watch Vincent pass whenever he saw him, letting the silence and the slow turn of his head say it all.
He hadn’t met the daughter yet. Erin was her name. He’d seen her a few times, coming and going in her car, a black Range Rover chauffeured by the man who read the New Yorker. If she were a public figure, as Freeman had put it, then Vincent didn’t recognise her. He’d done some Googling and found a news item from a week ago. SECURITY TIGHT FOR JOURNALIST ON COLLEGE TOUR. There was a photo of Erin Jones at a lectern, and another one of her getting out of the Range Rover. A crowd of pissed-off twenty-somethings surrounding the vehicle, and a dozen guys in blue—maybe campus security—keeping them back. Then some photos of a building in flames, people in masks throwing rocks at windows. Apparently she’d been scheduled to speak in Claremont—a liberal arts college down there—and an antifascist group torched the library in protest. Vincent wondered if he was missing something.
He scanned some op-ed pieces she’d written. There was one from way back in 2003—a Vanity Fair column—in which she said invading Iraq was a bad idea. Then two weeks ago, she was writing in the Wall Street Journal that neo-cons had something of a point. Hence the anti-fascist outrage. Vincent figured he could tell her some stories that would change her mind back again.