The Reform Artists: A Legal Suspense, Spy Thriller (The Reform Artists Series Book 1) Read online

  Instead, this evening Martin received a cold blast of air from the freezer as he inspected the assorted frozen dinners he had picked up at the supermarket over the weekend. He took one out and started to pry open the lid while he listened to messages on the flickering answering machine. There was nothing from Katie, just a concerned call from his mother checking to see if he had heard anything yet.

  Martin put the video disk on the kitchen table and fixed himself a frozen Salisbury steak dinner. He ate it alone, in silence, staring at the disk. After a quick clean up, he headed for the den.

  Martin placed the disk in the entertainment center and pushed “play.” He grabbed the remote and sank into the leather couch, not knowing what to expect. The screen went dark for several moments. Then the phrase, “Decoding Image Overlay,” appeared in red at the center. He watched as the words gradually faded to black and the screen dissolved into the image of a middle-aged man in a dark-gray business suit.

  The man sat alone in a leather armchair, his face partially obscured by shadow. He appeared to be speaking from a private, residential study. He looked to be in his late fifties or early sixties, had short-cropped gray hair and the proud bearing and rugged build of a professional athlete or soldier. As he started to speak, a small register of white numbers appeared at the bottom right-hand corner of the screen and steadily began counting down from 300.

  “Hello,” the man said. “Please excuse me for not introducing myself, but, for security reasons, I must remain anonymous. We even have altered my voice, slightly, to prevent identification. I don’t know who you are or the year in which you are viewing this. I may not even be alive anymore. But the underground organization my associates and I started, an organization uniquely equipped to help you right now, lives on.

  “Since you’re viewing this video, we can assume that my associates have determined that you are currently facing some imminent form of personal threat. My guess is that sometime within the next twenty-four hours, you will learn the details. Don’t be surprised to discover that at least one branch of our government may be involved and that it will attempt to deprive you of certain protections guaranteed by the Bill of Rights.

  “You may think you are immune to government assaults on your liberties, but I assure you, you are not. Every member of our organization previously has had his or her hand bitten by government institutions we supported and, in many cases, bled to defend.

  “We formed our volunteer network to stop these kinds of civil-liberties abuses. We love this country and we would never harm it. But we will not allow its sacred institutions and principles to be turned against the very citizens our founding fathers intended for them to serve.

  “That’s why we’ve contacted you. Very soon, you will need our expert help, and we’re prepared to give it, provided you are willing to meet certain conditions.

  “One of our operatives will contact you within the next forty-eight hours. This is important: We will only give you one opportunity to meet with us and accept our assistance. Should you refuse our help, we will withdraw our offer immediately—and forever.”

  “Good luck.”

  With that, the image turned to snow. Martin got up and pressed “play” again several times but nothing happened. He even restarted the entertainment center and reinserted the disk: still nothing. Martin sat there on the couch staring at the snow-filled screen for some time, before finally switching it off.

  The silence that followed should have filled the room with a comforting, reassuring peacefulness. But that night Martin sensed something altogether different. A hungry, uneasy dread had somehow slithered inside the house, and Martin could feel it weaving its way toward him among the shadows.

  At first, Martin thought it was the man’s warning that had set him on edge. But gradually, he realized he was worried about this self-proclaimed patriot and the mysterious, underground group he represented. For reasons still unknown to him, these people—an organized and determined outlaw element—had him in their sights and, quite possibly, under surveillance.

  Martin suddenly stood up, strode to the front door and switched the floodlights back on. Then, he returned to the den where he poured himself a tall glass of Scotch. As he put the cap back on the bottle, Martin caught his reflection in the bar’s mirror and stopped dead in his tracks. His face was drenched in sweat.

  He fumbled in his pocket for a handkerchief and used it to wipe his face and forehead. Then he killed the lights and slowly sank back down into the couch. There, in the comfort and anonymity of total darkness, Martin polished off his drink in one long, hot, desperate gulp.

  Chapter 3

  Martin had heard that sound before, he was sure of it, but where? Then, he remembered. It was the sound of the back porch door smacking against the wood frame of his grandparents’ summer beach house in Cape Cod. It always did that before a squall, if he or his brother, Jeb, forgot to secure the latch when they went out. Where was Jeb, anyway? Maybe he had gone looking for shells again. Martin knew he was going to have to get up, eventually, and fix the latch, but he was too comfortable to do so at that moment. “Jeb did it,” he muttered to no one in particular. “Ask him.”

  “Mr. Silkwood! Mr. Silkwood!” voices shouted as the banging continued.

  Martin shot up, alert, awake and terrified. This wasn’t the beach house after all, and it was far too dark for late afternoon. He heard the men’s voices and the pounding again, and he realized he was back in his suburban Maryland home. He was a grown man of forty-one, not a thirteen-year-old, and the pounding sounds and strange voices were coming from his front door. Could they have found him already?

  “Sir, we know you’re in there!” a voice shouted. “We need to speak with you. Police business.”

  Now, Martin’s head was reeling. Police business? What do the police want with me? Have those subversives done something to Katie and the kids? He rose and felt his way through the dark, along the edges of furnishings and walls, until he had reached the door.

  “Hold on. I’m coming!” he shouted. He put his eye up to the peephole and saw the tan, festooned hat that he was sure only Maryland State Troopers wore. He opened the door and found himself confronted by two sheriff’s deputies.

  “What’s the matter?” he asked.

  “Are you Martin Silkwood?” the younger, taller deputy asked as he held up his Sheriff’s Department I.D. and pointed a flashlight in Martin’s face.

  “Yeah, that’s me,” Martin said. Out of the corner of his eye, he could have sworn he saw the older deputy unfasten his gun holster.

  “Mr. Silkwood, we have a court order demanding that you vacate this house. You have fifteen minutes to gather your belongings and go, sir.”

  “What, are you crazy?” Martin protested. “This is my home. I’m not going anywhere!”

  “Sir,” the younger deputy said, handing him a stack of papers. “Your wife has sworn out a petition for a protective order against you. Take your time and read it, if you like, but you have to leave.”

  Martin took the stack of hand-filled forms and official-looking papers from the deputy and began flipping through them. The first page was a Temporary Restraining Order, signed by a district court judge. It required him, the “respondent,” to vacate his house and refrain from contacting his children, visiting their schools—including their Sunday school—and from going anywhere near his wife or her place of work for the next seven days. The reason given was his “repeated acts of violence, threats, and abusive behavior” against his wife and children.

  The judge, the documents said, had awarded his wife temporary custody of the children and exclusive use of their home, pending a hearing on the charges. The judge had not required him to surrender his car—since his wife had one of her own, and he had not yet specified any child support amount. But the issue of enforcement was quite clear. If Martin violated the Temporary Restraining Order to any extent, the document said, he would be held in contempt of court and subject to arrest, fines and imprison
ment.

  “I can’t believe this,” Martin said, as he turned the page. “Not one word of this is true!” He looked intently at the deputies. “How can something like this happen?”

  The deputies stared back at him awkwardly. Martin’s hands already had started shaking from the panic-induced adrenalin rush, when he flipped to the page in the petition that his wife had filled out against him and had signed under oath. As he read it, shock turned to panic and panic to nausea. He thought he was going to vomit.

  Martin could not believe what he was reading. His wife, the woman he had been married to for eight years, the person he had trusted more than anyone else in his life, had accused him, under oath, of committing repeated “escalating acts of physical and verbal abuse” against her and the kids. What’s more, she wrote, “the police have been called to the house on numerous occasions.”

  “What’s this about the police being called here on ‘numerous occasions’?” Martin asked the deputies. “As far as I know, the police have never come to our house, at least, not when I was here.”

  The younger deputy directed him to the next page, where his wife had elaborated on her charges. There, he found a chronology of fictitious, or at best, grossly distorted accounts of past arguments they had had. But far worse, he found four occasions on which his wife claimed he had been so abusive and threatening that she had called 911 and had the police come to the house. Then, he noticed something strangely familiar about those dates.

  “My God!” he said, looking at the deputies. “Every time she says she called the police, I’ve been out of town on audits. I’m a senior partner in an accounting firm, and we routinely take audit teams to our clients’ businesses to review their books!

  “Didn’t anyone check out the facts about these ‘alleged’ incidents before issuing her a restraining order? And, shouldn’t I have, at least, been present in court? Don’t I have the right to tell the judge my side of the story?”

  Now, the deputies were looking a bit uncomfortable. “It was an ex-parte proceeding,” the older deputy said. “See there, where it says that?”

  “Ex parte? What’s that?” Martin asked.

  “In cases of alleged domestic abuse,” the deputy said, “the courts routinely hold emergency hearings with just the party seeking protection. This ruling’s only temporary. You have a right to a hearing within seven days. It’s all there in the papers.

  “See,” he said, taking the report from Martin and flipping to the appropriate page. “You’re scheduled for a hearing before the judge at 9:00 a.m. next Monday, a week from today.”

  “This is unbelievable,” Martin said. “What am I supposed to do until then? And what about seeing my kids?”

  “You’ve got to vacate, sir,” the younger deputy repeated. “I’d suggest checking into one of those low-cost, extended stay motels until the hearing. Or, if you have family in town, you could arrange to stay with them. But you cannot see your kids.”

  “Wait a minute,” Martin said. “She signed this under oath, right?”

  “That’s right, sir,” the older deputy said.

  “So, she’s committed perjury! She’s going to have to answer for that, isn’t she?”

  By now, the deputies seemed to have lost all enthusiasm for their work. “Well,” said the older one, “I suggest you contact an attorney as soon as possible, sir. He or she can advise you about what to do. But, we’ve really got to get going. We have a whole stack of these to serve tonight.”

  “But this is nothing but a pack of lies!” Martin protested.

  “It’s not that uncommon,” the older deputy said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’d say, on average, about half of the Temporary Restraining Orders we serve are based on bogus charges.” The deputy smiled sheepishly as he wiped the back of his neck with a handkerchief.

  “Half?” Martin repeated, in amazement. “Then, why do you bother serving them at all?”

  “We have to, sir,” the younger deputy explained. “It’s our job.”

  “I don’t know how you guys can stand doing this kind of thing to people day-in and day-out,” Martin said. “Doesn’t it bother you?”

  “The judges make the rulings, Mr. Silkwood,” the younger deputy said. “Nothing’s going to change until they do. Please sir, we’ve got to get going. Can you get your belongings together now?”

  “I guess I have to,” Martin said as he gestured for the deputies to come inside. He went upstairs, quickly packed a suitcase and returned.

  “We’re sorry about all this, Mr. Silkwood,” the older deputy said.

  “That’s OK. I know it’s not your fault.”

  As Martin began leading them out the door, he suddenly stopped in his tracks and turned around. He had a look of panic on his face. “Hey guys, I just realized I forgot something really important. Can you give me just one more minute to go and get it?”

  The two deputies looked at each other. Already this stop had taken longer than they had expected. Then, the younger one sighed and turned to Martin. “Sure,” he said, nodding. “But please make it quick, OK?”

  Martin forced a smile. “Thanks!” He rushed up the stairs and went to the master bedroom. There, on the dresser, he found what he was looking for: two framed photos: one, of Justin, and the other, of Monica. He snatched them up, tucked them under his arm like a football and bounded back down the stairs.

  “OK, guys. I’m all set. Thanks, again!”

  Martin picked up his bulging suitcase and led them out the door. Then, when they were all on the front stoop, the older deputy paused for a moment and cleared his throat. “Uh, sir, we’re going to need your copy of the house key.”

  “Oh, of course,” Martin said. He nervously worked his key chain until he had removed his copy of the key and handed it to the deputy. Then, he waited while the deputies tried the key in the door and then locked up the house.

  Chapter 4

  Celia Gardner frowned when the doorbell rang at 8:45 p.m. Who could that be at this hour? she wondered, as she hurried down the main staircase of her sprawling Tudor home. Celia had just finished tucking her two-year-old daughter, Jessica, into bed.

  “Ted, are you expecting someone? Ted?” she shouted in the general direction of the great room, where her husband was preoccupied, watching an NBA basketball game. No reply.

  “Predictable,” she chuckled to herself as she looked through the peephole and saw Martin Silkwood standing on the doorstep.

  “Marty, what a nice surprise!” she said, opening the door. Celia flashed him a big smile as she shouted, over her shoulder, “Ted, it’s Marty! Did you hear me?” She adjusted the storm door’s sticky latch to get it open.

  “Come on in, stranger!” she said, grabbing Martin by the arm.

  A petite woman, with soft, delicate features, fashionably coiffed, shoulder-length brown hair and stunning, turquoise eyes, Celia looked considerably younger than her thirty-eight years. She stood on tiptoes to plant a kiss on Martin’s cheek as Buddy, the Gardner’s Labrador retriever, bounded toward them with eight-year-old Timmy close behind.

  Buddy barked excitedly, wagging his tail as he tried, unsuccessfully, to break his momentum by back-peddling his paws against the foyer’s highly polished marble finish. No such luck. He slammed into Celia, who quickly grabbed him by the collar to keep him at bay.

  “I’m sorry to barge in on you guys,” Martin said over the fray.

  “Don’t be silly,” Celia said, glancing up at him as she struggled with the dog. Then, turning to Buddy, who was drooling and still trying his best to get past her to Martin, she scolded, “Knock it off, you big galoot!”

  Little Timmy stepped forward. “Hi, uncle Marty.”

  “Hey, kiddo.” Martin said, rubbing Timmy’s mop of dirty-blond hair.

  Celia gestured in the direction of the great room. “Ted’s sitting in there, like a zombie.”

  Martin raised an eyebrow and stared at her blankly.

  “Wizards
basketball. Remember? Your buddy’s their biggest fan?”

  “Right!”

  “What’s with you tonight?”

  Martin shrugged. “Would you join us, Celia?”

  “Is everything OK?” she asked, following.

  “Not really.”

  Ted was seated on the couch at the far end of the great room, watching the game on a large, flat-screen TV that hung like a painting above the fireplace. The Wizards were closing in on the Nets with just two minutes left in the first quarter. The score: twenty-eight to twenty-two. He glanced briefly in their direction as Buddy wedged himself between him and the coffee table, licking his hand and angling for attention.

  “Hey, Marty,” Ted said. “Grab a seat!”

  “I’m going to join you too, honey,” Celia said, after Timmy had raced ahead and sat down on his dad’s left. “Marty’s got something on his mind.”

  “Can it wait till half-time?”

  “Sure,” Martin said.

  “Ted!” Celia chided. “Your best friend has come by to talk. Don’t you think that’s a little more important than—?”

  “It’s all right, Celia, really,” Martin interrupted. “Frankly, I could use the distraction.”