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He cedes command of the scene to me without argument, reaching for his radio and relaying orders to send up the DC Metropolitan choppers and cordon off the airspace. Secret Service helos will be here soon, too, but we need now, not soon.
“What’s the status of the fire?” I shout over the roar. “When will it be out?”
“Fire chief says an hour, as long as the winds don’t pick up. They’re bringing the foam out.”
More wasted time. If I could, I’d douse this fire with the force of my fury alone.
“Lemme take you to the chief.” He sets off at a jog, leading Sheridan and me to a DC Fire vehicle parked by the engines. Firefighters shout to each other, struggling to smother the white-and-blue flames roaring out of the burning SUV. Hoses snake across the pavement. The air is soaked and humid. Water is vaporizing against the edge of the blaze.
“Chief! Secret Service is here!”
A middle-aged woman in a captain’s uniform barely takes a second to frown at me. “Chief Mallory,” she grunts. I flash my badge. So does Sheridan. She’s unimpressed. “If you’re here, can I assume that vehicle is yours? We’re having a hell of a time putting out the fire. It would make a lot of sense if it was one of yours.”
There is a lot extra in our SUVs. They’re fire-resistant, but one of the cruelest ironies in life is, once something fire-resistant finally catches, it will burn like hell itself. “It is.”
“We are going to need an hour to put this out—”
“Putain de merde, we don’t have an hour. We need to get down there right now and rescue—”
“There’s no one down there for you to rescue.”
“You don’t know—”
“My firefighters can see remains.”
Her words are a fist closing around my heart. Brennan. “Where exactly are the remains located? What seat?”
“There’s at least one body inside in the front. A second appears to have been ejected from the driver’s side.”
My vision swims until I see four of her. Sheridan spits out a string of curses. “There were three people in that SUV.”
“I can only confirm two sets of remains right now. We need to wait for this blaze to come down before we can do anything else.” She goes back to listening to her radio. Sirens fill the air again, red lights bouncing off overhanging branches as three fire engines roar up the road.
She turns aside, and there’s nothing more I can do. All I’m doing is getting in her way.
I key my wrist mic and snap orders for my people to set up a perimeter and close all the roads into and out of Rock Creek Park. “Escort the fire department as they need. They have full access, but absolutely no one else is allowed in. Not Metropolitan PD, not the FBI, no one. Someone call headquarters and get the best forensic team and a crime scene unit from Uniformed Division out here ASAP.”
Clicks sound, affirmations coming back.
One voice cuts through the static choking the radio band, asking the question no one else dares to. “What about medical response, sir? How many ambulances do we need?”
It isn’t just the president down there in that inferno. It’s not only my Brennan. Two damn good men were in that SUV with him. Henry, my right hand, my best friend. Stewart, the good-natured jokester who held the distance record in the Secret Service sniper ranks and spent more years holding post on the White House roof than Sheridan has been alive.
“None. We need body bags.”
* * *
An hour later,the flames are finally down to a smolder.
There’s a charred crater surrounding the SUV, and the ground is obsidian black beneath the soggy foam. Crime scene tape loops through the trees and around the roadway a hundred yards out in all directions. Parts of the tape withered in the heat, falling to the ground in dabs like yellow candle wax.
The fire burned white- and blue-hot, hot enough to destroy the reinforced frame of the SUV. Melted ballistic glass lies in puddles.
Whatever ignited blasted right through our millions of dollars of safety measures that should have prevented exactly this from happening. Everything that made that vehicle a fortress turned on us and created this horror show.
We control the scene with an iron fist. Every alphabet agency and law enforcement unit that isn’t us is out of the park. DC Metropolitan police are clustered outside the gates. Three FBI teams are cooling their heels at our checkpoint and complaining over the radio. A company of Marines has come to reinforce my agents holding the perimeter.
No one, not even the FBI, is daring to cross our line. Incandescent anguish pulses from each of my agents.
