by David Pepper
“Jesus, so hacking them means you control any elections you want.”
“If you know what you’re doing,” Tori said.
Cassie went quiet, the gravity of the plot sinking in.
“So you want me to just walk in and tell them they’ve been hacked?”
“Not exactly.”
CHAPTER 42
YOUNGSTOWN, OHIO
I’ve got a problem, Chief.”
The soles of Chief Santini’s polished black shoes stared at me from the top of his desk as he leaned back in his swivel chair.
“You always have problems, my friend.”
“True, but this one’s a law enforcement problem.”
His knees creaked as he lowered his feet to the floor and sat up straight. The grave expression of a twenty-four-year beat cop replaced the troublemaking smirk that had crossed his face only seconds before.
Despite the soothing sunset, I’d tossed and turned for hours before falling asleep at the cottage. And that’s because I could see what was coming. After I’d bailed on my scheduled interview with the Dane County Sheriff’s Office, they’d soon go to a judge and secure the warrant they needed to trace my cell phone’s location. They would then reach out to nearby police forces to have me apprehended. No doubt, that broad call would generate the type of chatter that a capable mob operation would detect, meaning whoever hired the Albanian would soon know exactly where Tori and I were holed up.
So, rather than waiting for the inevitable, I preferred jumping the gun.
“I need you to call the police in Madison, Wisconsin, and tell them you’ve arrested me.”
He jerked his head back.
“What the hell, Jack? For what?”
“You pick the crime. But it has to happen right away. You know that Albanian guy we talked about? If we don’t act quickly, his buddies are going to figure out exactly where I am.”
“His buddies? What about him?”
“He’s dead.”
A vein popped up on the chief’s forehead. “Jack, what the hell’s going on?”
We went back years. He’d helped me out of a few prior jams, Youngstown-style. So I trusted him enough to explain it all and ask for this inappropriate favor.
“All you and the girl did was call 911 and report a kidnapping, right?”
“Right.”
“Just tell them that. You shouldn’t have run, but they’re not gonna do anything to you.”
“The minute we go down that road, I’m back in Madison, right where the bad guys will be waiting. Chief, you’re the one who called the guy a howitzer. They want to bury me and the girl right alongside that poor kid.”
He nodded, getting it.
“How much time do you typically hold people in your jail for other jurisdictions?”
“Anywhere from hours to weeks. It all depends on what crime they committed here and what they’re wanted for in the other place. And how bad the other place wants them back.”
“So if I did something really serious here, or you said I did, you could keep me here?”
He tossed his right hand forward. “Jack, that’s totally inappro—”
“Chief, I’m not bullshitting. Something big is going on and I need a week to figure it out. I either have a couple hours if you don’t help me, or you can get me that week.”
He raised both hands in the air. “Okay, okay. But even if you’re here, those Madison cops are going to want to talk to you.”
“Can’t you ask their questions for them?”
He gave an ambivalent shrug. “I can see if they’ll go for that. I wouldn’t.”
He stared past me for a few seconds, chewing his lower lip, then looked directly at me. He’d made up his mind.
“I’ll try to buy you a week. But I may be getting myself in more trouble than you.”
“Thank you, Chief.”
He laughed out loud. “You never thank me.”
“What do you mean—”
“Jack, just tell me what else you need.”
He knew me too well.
“Those cops will be tracking down the identity of that other kidnapper. The attractive brunette.”
“With an accident that bad, it may take a few days. They’ll need to hunt down her dental records.”
“Well, when you talk to them, see if they’ve made any progress there.”
“Jesus, Jack. Do I at least get a byline this time?”
CHAPTER 43
GENEVA-ON-THE-LAKE, OHIO
Sporadic drops of rain pelted the paper-thin roof above.
“Let’s think this through,” I said, leaning back in Dad’s old rocking chair as Tori and I huddled in the main room of the cottage. “What’s at stake on the ballot that would justify what we’re seeing?”
Tori, seated at our old cedar kitchen table, shrugged. “Maybe it’s not about this year at all. Maybe it’s about the president’s reelection in two years. A bigger prize.”
Definitely possible. Lots of powerful forces wanted Moore gone. If she ever had the votes on Capitol Hill, she’d cost some of them a whole lot of money. But if this was about the president’s reelection, we had all the time in the world to solve it.
“Let’s assume this is about this November,” I said. “Why would you need access to both national voter files?”
“Because you’re doing something nationwide.”
“Right. So what’s at stake nationwide?”
“The House is the big fight right now, right?”
“It definitely is,” I said. “But that would be a stretch. Speaker Paxton is in good shape.”
The party not in the White House always fared well in the midterms, so that alone bode well for Republicans to pick up seats. Plus, the big-money forces were all in for the Speaker, thanks to his willingness to stand up to the president. Super PACs and other dark-money groups were already blitzing the Democrats’ strongest challengers and weakest incumbents while Paxton flooded the campaign accounts of his priority candidates with lobbyist money. Because of the acrimony, no one anticipated a wave election. But in the targeted swing districts, Republicans were rightfully optimistic.
“True. You couldn’t alter the House results without it being so blatant, everyone would see it.”
“And the truth is,” I added, “the Senate isn’t all that different.”
Although the Senate was split 52 to 48 in the Democrats’ favor, Democrats were stuck defending a number of vulnerable seats. Republicans were again expecting a decent year: maybe two or three pickups if things went right, and the states in play were so big it would be hard to meddle with them. It was in two years, when Moore was up again, that the Republicans risked losing seats.
My phone buzzed from the kitchen table. I stood up to grab it, the wooden chair rocking back and forth in my absence.
“Chief! What’s the word?”
“I talked to Dane County. You were driving drunk, ran over a little old lady, and drove away.”
“Did she die?”
Tori looked over at me, her blue eyes widening.
“Unfortunately, she did,” the chief said. “We brought you in, and then you fessed up to running from the cops in Madison.”
“Perfect. And what’d they say?”
“They get why we’re keeping you but definitely want to talk to you.”
“Will they let you do it?”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
“Anything on the brunette?”
“Not yet.”
“She’s key, Chief.”
“I get it, Jack. I get it. I’ll see what I can find.”
I put the phone down. “We have a few days,”
The rainfall picked up, drops now bouncing off the roof more steadily, each hitting with a dull thud. Up from Dad’s chair, I started pac
ing.
“So neither the Senate nor House makes sense. Obviously a whole lot of governorships are up, along with other state offices.”
“Doesn’t each state have completely different issues at stake?” Tori asked. “Outside of the parties themselves, who would care about winning thirty governor seats?”
“There might be a few issues that stick out. Around energy. Different types of regulations. Worker and wage issues. Taxes. Someone might take a shot. Those governors together control a hell of a lot.”
“But even if you elected them all, could you get them all to move in the same direction?”
“Wouldn’t be as easy as Congress, but maybe on some issues.”
Tori had good instincts. Thinking back to the governors of Ohio I’d covered, each had assumed he was on the path to the presidency, considering other governors his prime competition. Rigging nationwide gubernatorial elections in the hopes that they’d follow some uniform direction would be a shaky plan.
Sounding like a train passing by, the roof suddenly roared under a heavier downpour.
“You sure this cottage can take this?” Tori asked, glancing up at the ceiling while speaking more loudly.
“Oh, we’ve been through worse than this.”
Outside, curtains of rain raced from left to right across the lake. Small bursts of white exploded on every square inch of the dark, waveless water. Not far from shore, a small boat sped westward, its driver and passenger huddling forward, no doubt seeking shelter at the docks on the other side of the nearby state lodge.
“Jack, how about state legislatures?” Tori asked. “They’re up across the country.”
I stopped pacing to consider it as the boat disappeared to the west. I knew state legislators best of all.
“Yeah, but they’re the messiest by far. Thousands of elections. A bunch of minor-league politicians. And talk about herding cats: Who the hell knows what they’ll do after you elect them?”
“But can’t that be a good thing?”
“Can’t what be a good thing?”
“That there’re so many. And so messy.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because, unlike congressional, or senatorial, or even gubernatorial races, not a lot of people are sitting around watching these elections. There’s not even polling for ninety percent of them when there are far bigger races on the ballot.”
She had a point.
“So interference would be less noticed,” I said.
“And there’d be no basis to challenge the outcomes. Just like our Wisconsin court race. Who the hell knows why someone wins or loses a close race for the Oshkosh statehouse seat?”
“Or Chillicothe.”
“Exactly. So it may be easier to steal statehouse seats than any other positions,” she said, sitting up straight. “But that again begs the question: What do you get out of statehouses that’s so important nationally?”
Her question took me back to Columbus, Ohio, the state capital that I knew best, both as a reporter and as a son. Even when Dad had served there, the sausage making hadn’t been pretty. But it was worse now than ever. Gerrymandering had long ago meant that few of the pols walking the halls of the statehouse had had to win a general election to get there; they’d simply emerged successfully from their primary. And all they had to do to stay in office was stave off any challenge in their next primary.
Then came term limits. As popular as they were, they’d changed the place, and not for the better. With politicians cycling in and out of Columbus rapidly, lobbyists now ran the place. They understood the levers of power and how and when to pull them. They had the money. And they lingered a lot longer than any of those elected by the people. So Columbus was their town now. The politicians were short-term guests hoping to gain from their short stays, often by becoming lobbyists themselves.
So the typical statehouse session involved two tasks: enact a steady stream of extreme legislation designed to fend off primary challenges, and usher through lobbyist-backed legislation to cater to the special interests and donors. Then repeat the drill, year after year.
The only drama of the place involved personal scandal. On the one hand, the misbehavior was predictable, inevitably rooted in money or sex. The politicians—mostly from small towns, miles from home, suddenly seated at the center of power—couldn’t help themselves. But the drama each term was: Who fell, and how far? In the last year, three members had resigned, including the Speaker, and two more were under investigation.
That summed up Columbus, but from Albany to Sacramento, Ohio’s dysfunction was pretty standard.
I grabbed a can of Diet Coke out of the fridge and opened it.
“The lobbyists already control most statehouses. So what would you get by rigging the outcomes that you couldn’t already get through those lobbyists?” I asked the question out loud but was asking myself more than Tori.
She shrugged.
I glanced at the cedar walls of the kitchen. Framed, fading photos of Dad, friends, and family captured him doing what he loved: holding up a string of walleye, steering his sailboat, playing tennis. His hearty, openmouthed laugh centered every picture.
In all his career, through all our hard work to get him elected, was there a moment when any decision he’d made had gone beyond Ohio, impacting the whole nation? He certainly had been showered with attention every presidential primary, when his endorsement might have moved the needle for the candidate begging for it. And during general elections for the president, he’d stumped hard for the nominee—which mattered, since Ohio was a swing state and he was a big name in it. He even had spoken at two conventions, the highlights of his career.
But as a state representative, had he ever played a national role? Had his official votes ever carried a national impact? The sad answer was that, for all his hard work, for all he’d given to the party and to the statehouse and to the people of his Canton, Ohio, district, not one issue of national importance came to mind.
“Maybe it’s about the presidency after all,” I said. “In two years.” The tension in my shoulders eased. We had a lot more time.
Then I glimpsed back at Dad’s rocking chair. My dominant memories of it were his long, loud naps. While the rest of us played board games or read books on a rainy day like today, Dad would ignore the noise, tilt back, and snore away, his mouth open even wider than when he laughed.
But those had been the later years. The day’s rain took me further back. When he was a leader in the state legislature, that old chair had served as his northern headquarters, a hub of activity. He’d always hated working from here, but sometimes duty had called, and if it was raining, he couldn’t sail or play tennis anyway. So he’d rocked in the chair as he read reports, made phone calls, and dictated long notes to colleagues and constituents.
One particular memory flashed in my mind. One week, during one summer, when that duty had called more than usual. When Dad had been planted in that chair for days, including through perfect weather.
I remembered it well because he had stopped rocking altogether; planting his feet, he’d sit tall as he talked in the low tone that signaled something important was taking place. The calls had come not only from his fellow Ohio legislators but from national leaders. Washington. The House minority leader and he talked two or three times. Names I recognized from the Sunday news shows reached out. I had answered one of the calls myself—the House minority whip with his deep Texas twang—before nervously passing the phone to Dad. At one point we all had to step out of the cottage, dragging our dog with us, because Dad got a call from President Reagan himself only a few months into his first term. Dad didn’t want any distractions.
And why all the calls? As we huddled in our car during the presidential call, Mom explained that Dad faced a big decision. That the president and those congressional leaders needed Dad’s help.
And she’d be
en right.
As I later came to understand, with one vote Dad would be able to make their lives a lot easier. He would be able to help his party immensely, not just in Ohio but across the country—and for years to come. But I also remember Dad being unusually tense about the decision, snapping at us uncharacteristically as dark circles shadowed his eyes. He wasn’t comfortable with what the callers were imploring him to do.
I sat back down in the chair, curling my palms and fingers over and around the hand-carved handles. I rocked back and forth. The rain let up, the lake’s surface stilling to glass. The thunder on the roof faded, replaced by the rush of water streaming from its corners onto the deck.
Years later, in this very room, from this very chair, Dad had told me it was a vote he’d regretted. One of the few. That single vote was perhaps the most consequential of his career. But he’d come to believe it had made politics worse in Ohio. And in the country.
Seated where Tori was sitting now, I’d wholeheartedly agreed with his assessment. Then, and even more so now.
But that was beside the point.
Far more relevant was that that same vote, on the same issue, came around every ten years. And it was coming around again. After November, anyone who happened to be in Dad’s position—state representative—would face the same decision he had faced all those years ago. Not just in Ohio, but in statehouses across the country.
I placed my feet on the ground and stopped rocking. I should’ve seen it long before. Every muscle tightened as the implications raced through my mind.
“This isn’t about the presidency.”
“It isn’t?”
“No. It’s bigger.”
CHAPTER 44
WASHINGTON, D.C.
Is it true that the Democrats are running circles around you guys?”
It was the question that had landed Cassie the interview in the first place. Details on technology and data were generally not something party leaders would discuss with the media. But those same leaders also were maniacally competitive and eager to publicize how much better prepared they were than the other side. So when Cassie informed each party comms director that she was exploring who had the more cutting-edge operation, they couldn’t say no.