AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Because there is no one on the planet more motivated to find President Walker than me.”
Marshall is silent as he takes me in. His expression is flat, and he’s unnaturally still.
“The briefing was scheduled two days ago, and the route wasn’t confirmed until yesterday morning.”
“And you shared the president’s route with the CIA?”McClintock asks.
“With the director, yes.”
“Dean, if this is an inside job, what are the odds we’ll see a public message from the kidnappers? Does this seem like a situation that will end in an execution video uploaded to YouTube in a few hours?” Marshall’s words are nails hammered into my brain.
McClintock’s sixty-six years seem to blow out of him. “How am I supposed to answer that, Mr. Vice President?”
Marshall doesn’t blink.
McClintock’s hands spread. “If they knew to detonate the SUV and scorch the scene, they’ll know enough to stay one step ahead of our investigation. My gut says we may be looking at a situation where the president is just gone. Maybe he’s already dead, or maybe whoever took him is trying to make the body disappear. What would be worse? A martyr or a missing man?”
“You can still cut down a missing man,” Marshall muses. “Martyrs live forever in the people’s mind.”
“I don’t know what would be better for President Walker at this point: for us to find his body or for him to vanish.” McClintock’s jowls bulge, spreading out over the collar of his white shirt. He keeps sinking into himself, one big ball of cantankerous old cuss.
I’m three seconds from charging the room, hauling him off the sofa, shaking him until he takes those words back, until he fucking apologizes—
“What if it’s something else?” Sheridan blurts out. He hadn’t said a word since we walked in the door. He’s the most junior person in this room, and he’s not supposed to let anyone hear him breathe, let alone open his mouth and speak. “Is it possible President Walker was able to escape whatever happened this morning?”
“You’re suggesting he’s on the run?” Britton shakes his head.
It’s a decent idea, but Sheridan doesn’t know I already had it and discarded it. If Brennan were on the run or needed help, the very first call he’d have made would be to me, and I’d already be at his side.
Brennan has one of the most recognizable faces in the world. If he were out there, someone would have seen him. No one would leave the president in the gutter or an emergency room and not pick up the phone.
What if he can’t call? What if he’s unconscious in the park? What if he’s facedown in the dirt—
In 2001, an intern working at the Capitol was murdered and dumped not far from the crash. Her remains weren’t found for over a year.
I can’t read in the newspaper, some indefinable day from now, that two bodies were found in the depths of the park. Recovered with the skeletonized remains are a Secret Service badge, a rusted nine-millimeter pistol, and gold cuff links with the presidential seal—
No, the NPS and the Marines will be sweeping through Rock Creek Park as soon as the sun rises. They’ll put a bird in the air with a thermal scope and then visually check everything with a heartbeat, walk a grid search, turn over every leaf and blade of grass.
The door to the Outer Oval opens. No one enters without permission, especially not in the middle of something like this. Matt stumbles in, tears still streaming down his face. Marshall briefed him with the basics before Sheridan and I arrived, which is why he’s gulping down sobs and not waiting for Brennan to walk into his office.
He clutches a folded piece of paper in his shaking hand, and then passes it to Marshall. Marshall squeezes Matt’s arm as he reads, which would seem comforting if Marshall weren’t behaving like a vulture circling the remains of Brennan’s presidency.
Marshall refolds the note and tucks it into his jacket, then tilts his head, looking my way again. “Fourteen people know the truth about President Walker, Agent Theriot. How long can you keep it that way?”
“My people don’t talk.”
“How quickly can you figure out what happened? How soon can you find President Walker?”
Give me a loaded gun and a few hours. Give me Director Liu and a locked room. Give me permission to unleash my heartbreak. Give me the power to rip the world from its axis and shred electrons out of atomic orbits.
“I’ll know double what I know now in an hour, sir. Double that in another hour. And double that in the next. I will have whoever did this on their knees before the end of today.”
Marshall arches an eyebrow and stares me down.
Two can play that game.
“That message was from Director Liu,” Marshall finally says. “A member of his team who was supposed to be at the briefing with the president last night is missing. An intelligence analyst, Clint Cross.”
