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Maslick spotted someone with a tray of nachos and made a beeline toward it. Rapp took advantage of the lull to retreat toward a cooler set up next to the kitchen door. He grabbed a beer and after draining half of it started to feel a little more centered.
“I suppose I owe you an apology,” Kennedy said, approaching with a glass of wine in her hand.
“For what?”
“For sending you into a trap.”
“It’s not like it was a surprise.”
She sighed quietly. “When I’m done cutting the cancer from the Agency, I’m starting to wonder if there will be any healthy tissue left.”
“We knew that getting rid of President Cook wasn’t going to be the end of it. But it was a good start. How’s the new guy?”
Anthony Cook had been replaced by his vice president, Terrance Adams. Rapp had never met him, but he had the reputation of not being a complete scumbag. It was probably why Cook had chosen him. A mousy policy wonk with decades in Washington was just what he’d needed to soften his image.
“He’s a decent man, but a bit naïve. Not a fatal trait in Congress, but less than ideal in the White House.”
“Trainable?”
She shook her head. “He never wanted to be president. He took the job as VP in hopes of keeping the Cooks from running off the rails.”
“I see what you mean by naïve. Still, though. An improvement.”
“Definitely. And he listens. But only for the next three years, because he’s made it clear that he won’t run again. Hopefully, we won’t find ourselves right back where we started.”
Rapp nodded and took another swig from his beer. There was no question that US politicians were becoming increasingly autocratic, discarding all pretense of governing in order to focus entirely onclinging to power. But that was a problem for the Irene Kennedys of the world. Not for him.
Rapp strode down the hallway, peering into each bedroom as he passed.
“Anna! What’s your status?”
“Teeth brushed! Pajamas on!”
“And your homework?”
“I did it all.”
“I didn’t hear you!”
“Done!”
“Okay, then. Get in bed. Your mother will be up to tuck you in momentarily.”
Two of Mike Nash’s sons were in the next room. The older was lying on the floor scrolling through something on his phone, while the younger was under the covers reading a comic book.
“Rory. Don’t keep Jack up all night with that thing.”
“I won’t, Mitch.”
He found Shannon, a teen like Rory, similarly enrapt by her screen.
“It’s already after ten and oh-six-thirty’s going to come pretty early,” Rapp warned.
“Just one more video. I promise.”
“One,” he agreed, fighting against his true nature. Normally, the phones would already be confiscated and the lights off. But he found himself handling them with kid gloves. Children were resilient, but the loss of a father wasn’t something you just walked off.
When Rapp arrived back in the kitchen, Claudia had opened another bottle of red from the cellar. There was a sway to her gait that appeared when she’d had a little too much.
