The Assassin (Max Doerr Book 1) by Jay Deb Page B

out of the line of sight of a security camera that ought to be
present somewhere nearby. He sauntered along the sidewalk of Fifth Avenue and
saw three ambulances racing by with horns blaring. He had no doubt about where
they were heading.
    Doerr
took a cab to his apartment. He went straight to the fridge and took out a
Michelob beer bottle. He sat on his sofa, turned the TV on and turned the
channel to CNN. As expected, there was some breaking news. It was not the first
time that he had done something that had appeared on TV within an hour. In the past,
he had watched this sort of thing with mixed emotions.
    He
pressed the beer bottle to his lips, took a sip, and then he looked at the TV.
He froze. The blonde anchor went on, “There was a murder in Central Park today.
Chuck Jones, DEA Administrator, was killed by a single gunshot to the head. Police
think it was a sniper job. From the initial analysis, they are sure that the
bullet must have come from one of the high-rise buildings by the park on Fifth
Avenue.”
    Next,
a photograph of a face appeared on the TV; it was all too familiar to Doerr. It
was the face he had seen through his crosshairs just an hour ago.
      
     

Chapter 8
    Alan
Brushback, the successful lawyer, had graduated from Lousiana State University and
received his law degree from Stanford Law School. He joined Brownton LLC, a
reputed law firm in San Francisco, as an intern, and never looked back. He
worked there for seven years before becoming a partner. After working as a
partner for five years, he didn’t know what to do with the millions he had accumulated.
    The
Republican incumbent congressman in the seventeenth district in California was
under pressure for spending too much time in Washington; he was reviled by many
voters, who considered him to be distant and out of touch. A few of Brushback’s
friends suggested that he ought to run for the office.
    Brushback
had never thought becoming a congressman would be so easy.
    Initially,
he hesitated, but soon he was completely committed, after realizing that an
opportunity like this was rare. He made a few phone calls, gave speeches at a few
rallies, and went door to door for a few weeks before the Democratic primary.
He defeated his rival by a margin of forty-seven to thirty-three percent.
    At
the start of the run-up to the General Election, he was trailing his opponent forty-seven
to fifty-one. But he knew when to up the ante and when to sit calm. That was
how he had won all his cases in court, by knowing when to attack and when to
sit back and let the prosecution and its witnesses mess up their own cases.
    When
the election season started, Brushback struck with a barrage of negative ads
that detailed how many days his opponent had spent in Washington during the last
two years and how many in his own district. The ads showed photographs of the
incumbent going on hunting trips with large rifles and dining with rich
businessmen in expensive restaurants. The polls showed that the ratings were in
dead heat, so Brushback tactically released a series of ads where he took the
high road and detailed to the voters which specific bills he would support and
which projects would receive finance if he won the election.
    And
boom! He became the congressman from the third district in California.
    He
won with a margin of two percent, and his opponent conceded by midnight on Election
Day. The next day he took a victory tour through his district, visiting the state
offices and police stations, urging the folks to contact him about anything – no
matter how small the issue was.
    In
the evening, he was exhausted when he reached home. He opened a twenty-year-old
bottle of wine, filled two glasses and waited for his wife, who was freshening
up in the bathroom.
    “Don’t
get too perky, though.” His wife, who was also a lawyer, came back and sat on
the sofa and picked up her glass of red wine. “A congressman hardly has any
power.”
    “Really?”
Brushback asked. “How