President Elect, page 21
“Do you want to tell us what kind of dirt O’Brien has on you?”
She hesitated. “Yes. I have to put a stop to this. Gerry O’Brien threatened to leak to the media that I am a prescription drug addict.”
“Are you?”
“Yes.”
Susan watched Karen White weeping now on national television. It was as though she were seeing Karen for the very first time. These early-morning new shows were watched by millions of people getting ready for work. Karen had just made a whale of an admission.
“Wow,” Susan said. “That was brave.”
“And it just about torched Gerry O’Brien,” Kat said. “Monroe must be having a stroke.”
“Careful,” Kurt said. “They’ve weathered worse storms than this. We don’t know how much legitimacy Karen White has in the eyes of the public. If I’m not mistaken, people generally see her as a fool, a sort of comedy relief. That’s usually how I’ve seen her. Although I’ll admit she’s a lot better without the funny hats.”
“What will you do now?” the TV host was saying.
“I need to go away for a while and get some help,” Karen White said. “I know that. I’ve been running and running for years, working too hard, and what I never realized was I wasn’t running toward my goals, I was running away from myself. I need to stop doing that. If it takes three months to get better, or a year, or eighteen months, so be it.”
“And if your job in the Congress is no longer there when you return?”
Karen nodded, as if she expected the question. “Then I’ll do what I should have been doing all along—raising awareness about this terrible problem that I have, and that so many millions of other Americans also have.”
The host looked directly into the camera. “Karen White, Speaker of the House of Representatives, and briefly, Acting President of the United States. We wish her the best in her battle with drug addiction. More after this.”
“I don’t know,” Susan said as the next wave of commercials came on. “I for one am taking her a lot more seriously today than I was yesterday.”
Outside the house, a sound caught her attention. Suddenly, Chuck Berg and the other Secret Service agents were on the move. One agent stayed behind.
“Susan, hold tight,” he said. “If I get the word, we’ll go straight to the panic room and lock ourselves in.”
The sound resolved itself into the whirr of helicopter blades.
In the doorway, Chuck Berg was holding a large black walkie-talkie. He looked back into the house and nodded. “It’s okay. It’s Pierre.”
Susan rushed to the doorway. The chopper was small and white—not at all the kind of helicopter Pierre normally rode in. The words CHANNEL 6 NEWS were stenciled in red on the outside. Quite a disguise.
The chopper landed on the pad, and before the blades had even stopped, Pierre jumped out. A moment later, Susan’s heart leapt as Lauren and Michaela, her two beautiful twin daughters, climbed out after him.
Not for the first time, the thought occurred to her: there’s more to life than being President of the United States. A lot more.
And yet…
“I think we should announce that I’m alive,” she said to no one in particular.
CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE
8:05 a.m.
Palomino Ranch
Ocala, Florida
“I’ve been waiting for someone like you to come,” the man said.
Luke and Ed stood in the front yard of the sprawling ranch house, looking up at the man on the porch. The man was middle-aged, owlish in round glasses, with a vaguely pear-shaped body. He was Stephen Douglas Lief, former United States Senator from Florida, former primary candidate for President of the United States.
Luke worked to focus on the man, but he had to admit he was distracted. When the plane had landed, Luke had a new text message on his throwaway cell phone. It was from Gunner.
Dad, it said. I’m glad you are alive. I was worried. I want to see you. Gunner.
No mention of the word “love” in there, but it was real progress. His son wanted to see him! His heart raced at the thought of it. He would see Gunner – as soon as he could, just as soon as this operation was over.
Now, Ed was holding his badge up. “Sir, I’m Agent Edward Newsam with the Federal Bureau of Investigation. This is my associate, Agent Luke Stone.”
Luke didn’t say a word, or offer a badge. He didn’t have one anymore.
Lief waved all of that away. “Yes, yes, of course you are. Please come in. Would you like some coffee? If you haven’t eaten, I’m sure our cook would love to whip you up some bacon and eggs, or anything you want. The food is very good here.”
“Coffee is fine,” Ed said.
“Sure, coffee would be nice,” Luke said.
They followed Lief through the house to a large veranda in the back. Rolling green pastures extended as far as the eye could see. It was shaping up to be a warm day. The sun was bright and hazy. Half a dozen horses galloped and played in the near distance.
“Won’t you please sit down?” Lief said, offering them seats at a rough wooden table.
They did as he asked, and a moment later, a young black woman in a domestic uniform brought their coffee on a silver tray, with cream in a decanter and sugar cubes. Once the coffee was on the table, the woman evaporated as fast as she had appeared.
Lief indicated the horses with a tilt of his head.
“We raise them. Quarter horses. Chargers. Also, sometimes thoroughbreds come and retire with us after racing, and sire the next generation. It’s really a wonderful place to be a horse.”
Luke nodded. The man’s small soft hands told him everything he needed to know about who raised the horses around here. “That’s nice.”
“I assume you aren’t here to arrest me,” Lief said. “I imagine there’d be a bit more fanfare for an arrest. Anyway, my security team would never have let you come up the driveway if I thought it was that.”
Luke pictured the driveway—it was a mile-and-a-half-long dirt road.
“We’re just here to talk,” Ed said.
“In that case, please do,” Lief said. “I’m all ears.”
“You were Jefferson Monroe’s opponent in the primaries,” Luke said.
Lief nodded. “Naturally.”
“And we understand it was a vicious campaign.”
Lief’s owl eyes opened a little wider. “You understand that, do you? Did you not follow the campaign?”
Ed shrugged and offered a ghost of a smile. “Agent Stone and I both spend quite a lot of time on assignment. We can be out of the news loop for long periods.”
“Of course,” Lief said. “I understand. In that case, I’ll tell you a little about it. I’ve been in politics my entire life, and it was the worst thing I’ve ever seen. Jefferson Monroe and his right-hand man, Gerry O’Brien, are the two dirtiest campaigners in modern American history. Monroe doesn’t open his mouth without lying. And O’Brien…” Lief shook his head. “Suffice to say that’s a man who knows where the bodies are buried.”
“So there’s no love lost between you?” Luke said.
“Love lost? That’s putting it mildly. I hate Jefferson Monroe. He has brought politics in this country to a new low. His rise is a tragedy for the United States. I was raised to believe that civility in the public sphere was important. We’re all Americans, and as much as we might disagree on issues, we’re all trying to do the best for our country. Monroe doesn’t care about things like that. He doesn’t care about honor or tradition or mutual respect. He didn’t call me by my name, not once, during the entire campaign. He referred to me at various times as Mr. Nice Guy, The Sellout, and The Trust Funder. His supporters ate it up. Ate it up.
“Monroe represents a strain of anger and resentment that rears its head from time to time. His version of it is the worst I’ve seen. I understand that there are people who feel they’ve been left behind. And as a country, we need to do better for them. But the United States is, and since its inception has been, a nation of immigrants. My family has been in this country since the 1600s, but even we came from somewhere else. And because I believe immigrants inject new energy and innovation into this society, and because I believe that free and open trade can bring prosperity to all people… this makes me the Sellout?”
“In that case,” Ed said, “I wonder if you wouldn’t mind telling us how Jefferson Monroe won the election?”
“The primary?” Lief said.
Ed shook his head. “The general election.”
Lief’s eyes became very wide indeed. “How he won…”
“When we first arrived, you thought we might have come to arrest you,” Luke said. “There was a reason for that. We believe it’s because you know how Monroe beat Susan Hopkins, despite the odds against him. You know a lot about certain techniques he used. Inadvertently, you might even have helped him win.”
Lief looked at Luke, then turned to Ed, then came back to Luke.
“Ah,” he said.
Ed nodded. “Yes.”
“Care to take a walk?” Lief said.
* * *
They let Lief tell it his way, and in his own time.
They walked with him through the fields. Many of the horses knew him and came close when they saw him approach. He patted them and called them by name. When the horses came to him, he slipped them each a large sugar cube from a bag he kept in the pocket of his riding pants.
“When you’re Stephen Douglas Lief,” he said, “not becoming President of the United States means you’re a failure.”
“Tell us,” Luke said.
“My great-grandfather owned all the land you see here, and much, much more. A hundred thousand acres, much of it citrus farms. My grandfather was sent north to East Coast private schools, and became a Wall Street titan. He was one of America’s first billionaires, back when a billion dollars was a lot of money. My father went to Harvard Medical School, and he practiced as a doctor for a little while, but found politics more to his liking. He was in the Senate for thirty-six years. He became a fixture in Washington for nearly four decades. So who was I to become, if not President?”
“Pablo Picasso,” Luke said.
Lief laughed. “You have to have some talent to do that.”
Luke didn’t bother to mention that he had worked directly for the President, and she was one of the most talented people he had ever met.
“No, I was going to become President. And until Jefferson Monroe appeared, it really seemed like there was just one person I needed to beat.”
“Susan Hopkins,” Ed said.
“Yes. Susan was popular, certainly, but our polling against her was strong. In a head-to-head match-up, it looked like it could go either way. The election would be about the battleground states, as it always is, but the margins would probably be so slim that victory would come down to a handful of key districts in just three states. And even in those places, the difference would be a razor’s edge. To gain the Presidency, you had to somehow tip the scale in those districts.”
“Or put your thumb on it,” Luke said.
Lief shook his head. “More subtle than a thumb. At the last second, a housefly had to come and land on your side of the scale.”
“Hack the voting machines,” Luke said.
“Yes.”
“Turn the votes in your favor by the narrowest of margins in just a few crucial districts, and make it impossible to detect that you had done that.”
“Yes.”
“You’d need a pretty sophisticated hacker for that,” Ed said.
Lief nodded. “I had one.”
“And after you lost the primary by a wide margin, he introduced himself to Jefferson Monroe.”
Lief nodded again, but said nothing.
“We need to talk to that man,” Luke said.
“I’m afraid that won’t be possible,” Lief said. “He died two days ago.”
CHAPTER THIRTY SIX
8:50 a.m. Eastern Standard Time
The Situation Room
The White House, Washington DC
“Mr. President, make no mistake,” the man said. He was a former four-star general, slim and fit, with a flattop haircut, a man named Sanford Walters. “We will win a war with China. There are several ways we could play it, one of which is markedly preferable to the others.”
Jefferson Monroe stared at the man, but was having trouble focusing on his words. Walters was another cast-off from the Susan Hopkins days—he’d had some trouble with her, been forced into early retirement, and now they were bringing him back. He was old cronies with General Bob Coates, who had brought him in, touting him as some Asia expert.
What Jeff Monroe didn’t want was a bunch of has-beens that had been drummed out of service by the previous administration. When things settled down, he was going to get some real generals in here.
“Can you explain our options to me, please?” Monroe said.
Walters nodded. “Of course, sir. And glad to do it.” He stood and went to the large projection screen at the far end of the room. An image of China and the South China Sea appeared. Icons of missiles and warships came and went. Walters droned on about missile systems, strike forces, payloads, and megatons.
They sat around the conference table, Monroe at the head. He had Walters, Coates, numerous members of their staffs in the outer ring of seats, and Gerry the Shark. The young Marine with the nuclear football was gone. Sometime during the night, the Pentagon had taken him back—it was an astonishing breach of protocol, but they no longer trusted Jefferson Monroe with the nuclear codes.
Monroe shrugged that off. He could only handle one problem at a time.
Gerry was the major distraction today. Karen White was all over the TV news, telling the whole world that Gerry had extorted her into quitting. Monroe himself had watched her act on three different shows, beginning at 6:30 in the morning.
By the time he had finished dressing and eaten his breakfast, she was hinting about something quite a bit darker than blackmail—she seemed to suggest that Gerry O’Brien was somehow involved in the Hopkins and Horning assassinations. If that story got legs, it was going to be very hard to put the lid back on it.
Almost as bad, as far as Jeff Monroe was concerned, was he had taken a call from one of his earliest and best supporters this morning. Abe Becker was the president of Becker Industries, which was involved in infrastructure services for the energy industry—drilling rigs and ocean platforms, logistics like shipping and trucking, pipelines, heavy earth movers. Jeff had been friends with Abe’s dad, who had founded the company, and over the years he had also become good friends and partners with Abe. Becker Industries was on board with Jeff’s campaign almost before anyone.
Abe’s young daughter, Katie, had been a campaign aide, and had stayed on board right into the White House—until this morning, when she’d resigned. She had called her dad last night in tears, saying that Gerry O’Brien was mean to her personally, deliberately intimidated and bullied staff members, and told her point-blank that they were instigating a war with China so they could seize more power here in the United States.
“Jeff, what’s this war about anyway?” Abe had said over the phone.
“The people want it,” Jeff told him. “The people who elected us.”
“Are they still going to want it when their kids start dying? And if they don’t want it then, who are they going to blame? Themselves?”
“Abe, it’s not going to—”
“Jeff, when you set off on this adventure, what were you and I talking about? If you don’t remember, let me remind you. Business-friendly environmental and workplace policies. A lower effective tax rate for corporations and top-tier personal incomes. A tough but realistic negotiating stance with our adversaries. Basically, a return to the Reagan years. We said those two exact words over and over again, as I recall: Ronald Reagan. An older statesman with a firm hand. Since then, somehow this whole thing has morphed into talk of nuclear first strikes and goon squads attacking Chinese people in the streets. What happened?”
“Abe, I’m late for a meeting. I need to call you back.”
“Jeff, I’ve got a daughter sitting in her apartment crying this morning. I’ve got an ex-wife calling me, accusing of backing a lunatic and getting our daughter in over her head.”
Monroe shook his head. “This isn’t a sheltered workshop, Abe. Katie is welcome back any time, but please understand that Washington politics are hard-hitting. I’ve seen some thick-skinned people get their heads handed—”
“She’s my little girl, Jeff. And I was there for you when everyone else thought this was a joke.”
Monroe rubbed his eyes. “I know it.”
Now, in the Situation Room, he watched Gerry the Shark watching the general’s presentation. Gerry looked fresh and alert, dressed sharp in a three-piece suit. His shoes were so highly polished, the reflection of the overhead lights could practically set paper on fire. Gerry had been an asset to the campaign, there was no doubt about that.
But Gerry had also pressed for security fences around the Chinatowns—a project that was stalled, first because construction workers were walking off the job sites, and now because a federal judge in California had declared the whole thing unconstitutional late last night, and issued an injunction against it. As events stood, the Chinatown initiative was looming as a colossal failure and an embarrassment. It was going to be a major challenge to get it back on track—an easier, more effective approach might be to cut bait on the whole thing and move on to other agenda items.
Gerry was being accused of blackmail—and possibly murder—on national television by one of the highest ranking politicians in the country, the former Acting President and Speaker of the House.
