by Mary McBride
Her rice!
Suddenly Angela went from being a highly professional Secret Service agent to an amateur cook who was desperately afraid she'd ruin Mrs. Riordan's evening with burnt rice and lemon seeds in the carrots and chicken that wasn't cooked through. Good God. Salmonella. E coli. Could you get trichinosis from chicken, or was it only pork? She didn't even want to think about the infinite possibilities of poisoning the president of the United States.
There wasn't usually that much traffic on the blacktop heading out of town, but then the president didn't usually drop out of the sky above Hassenfeld. Bobby assumed they had set the chopper down on the road in front of the Riordan house, and were currently diverting the cars of the curious townspeople around the big vehicle a few at a time in each direction.
He pulled the Taurus onto the shoulder and tried his cell phone again. Angela wasn't answering, dammit, and when they picked up in the surveillance trailer, there was so much static it nearly blew out his eardrum.
At this point his options were slim, slimmer, and none. He could try to cram the Taurus, at fifty miles an hour, between the stopped cars and the deep roadside ditch for the next half mile. He could take the chance that there was a working phone in the run-down house he had passed a half mile back. Or he could hump it across the cornfield, which would take a quarter mile off the distance to the Riordan house, and hope like hell his broken rib didn't puncture his lung before he got there.
He picked his way across the steep ditch and took off through the corn.
When Angela brought the president's glass of ice water into the living room, she noticed that the professor was at it again with his handkerchief. This time, though, instead of polishing his eyeglasses, the poor old guy was mopping his brow and his upper lip. She empathized
completely, hoping her own deodorant hadn't failed her over an hour ago.
“It's Agent Holland, isn't it?” the president asked, smiling genially as he leaned forward from his seat in the center of the couch and took the tall glass of water from her hand.
“Yes, sir.”
Heaven help her, her mouth was dry, her hands were trembling, her heart was pounding like a jackhammer, and she felt this overwhelming urge to curtsy all of a sudden.
“My mother tells me you and Bobby have done a wonderful job, Agent Holland.” He aimed a sidelong grin at Mrs. Riordan. “Under difficult circumstances, I'd imagine.”
“I'm not difficult, William,” Mrs. Riordan snapped. “I'm precise.”
The professor chuckled and reached for Daisy's hand. “Your mother is a perfectionist, Mr. President, misplaced in an imperfect world.”
“Exactly.” Daisy Riordan gave a little snort, then smiled, first at Gerrard and then at her son, before she said, “It's fairly obvious why I'm fond of Gerald, isn't it?”
“I'd say so,” the president said.
“May I bring you anything else?” Angela asked, feeling awkward, not knowing how to take her leave and return to the kitchen.
“Not at the moment,” Mrs. Riordan said. “Thank you, Angela.”
The president glanced at his watch. “Were you planning on dinner, Mother? If so …”
“I'm planning on dinner at six-thirty, William, and not a moment sooner, as I told you on the phone. If you feel the need to leave, dear, you'll just have to bolt your food, won't you?”
Bolting sounded good to Angela, so she turned and quietly exited the living room. She still had to finish setting the dining room table and then find a crystal bowl and a way to rearrange the professor's bouquet to make some sort of centerpiece that was low enough so they could all see each other across the table. All that, plus fishing the last of the slimy little lemon seeds out of the carrots and cooking the hell out of the chicken, along with the salmonella, so it didn't kill the president. She wondered bleakly what the prison term was for accidental assassination.
After tonight's trauma, she thought, the rest of her career in the Secret Service was going to be a breeze.
Jogging through the cornfield wasn't the stroke of genius or the relative piece of cake that Bobby had originally assumed. He had thought that cutting through the field would easily slice a quarter-mile off the distance to the Riordan house and allow him to get there faster, and he'd figured his only impediment would be the pain in his side. What he hadn't factored in, however, were the perils inherent in a mature cornfield.
He choked on clouds of gnats. He turned his ankle on a furrow, then tripped in a tangle of weeds and took out several seven-foot tall plants when he fell. Acre after acre of the broad green leaves that had appeared so docile from a distance smacked him and slapped him and cut the holy hell out of his hands and face.
None of that mattered, though. And, God help him, the fact that the president's life was in jeopardy hardly mattered either. His wife was in danger. That was all that mattered. Angela was all that mattered.
He couldn't lose her. He couldn't lose her. Not like this. Not ever.
The stalks of corn were little more than a blur as he charged through them, and somewhere in the recesses of his brain he realized that his vision was blurred because his eyes were filled with tears and that the pain in his chest wasn't purely physical, but emotional, too. As if some protective wall, some firewall, some ancient barrier, had shattered inside him. His heart felt raw and exposed and defenseless. It felt vulnerable. Mortal. It felt … real.
Ah, God. Suddenly he knew what Angela needed from him, all that he hadn't been able to give. This! Just this! All that he could give now, all that he would give.
If it wasn't too late.
By the time he crashed out of the field not too far from the surveillance trailer, he was soaked with sweat, bleeding from a hundred cuts, and barely able to breathe. They'd probably shoot him on sight if he headed straight for the rear door of the residence, so he hobbled across the back of the property and opened the door to the trailer.
When he walked in, he could see hands automatically moving toward holsters. Doug swiveled around from the bright, blinking bank of monitors, took one look at Bobby, and said, “What the hell happened to you?”
“I've got to get into the house, Doug,” Bobby said.
He'd already made up his mind, while he was breathing gnats and being sliced and diced by hybrid leaves, that he wasn't going to inform Doug or anybody else what he suspected was going on inside the house because that would only guarantee a full-blown assault, a fiasco with a score of armed agents racing inside the place, probably panicking the professor and certainly putting lives at risk, not the least of which was his wife's.
Doug was talking into his radio now, his voice calm but clipped, apparently soothing the concerns of agents who just a moment ago had seen a bleeding guy in a tattered suit limping across the backyard toward the trailer.
“I've got to get into the house, Doug,” he said again, more insistently this time, desperate for clearance; without it, some hotshot might take him down with a rifle before he ever got inside.
“That's a big negative, Bobby,” Doug drawled. “Angela's inside. Everything's going fine.” He scowled at his watch. “Dinner's in ten minutes. We plan to have Honcho out of here and on his way back to Washington by nineteen-thirty.”
In a casket, Bobby thought bleakly.
“Okay,” he said as casually as he could. “Well, I'll just walk around, maybe see if I can make myself useful in the yard or directing traffic or something.”
The special agent in charge swiveled back to his monitors and growled over his shoulder. “You just make yourself scarce, son. You're not on duty right now. You hear?”
In the living room, Daisy sipped her Manhattan and plucked at her strand of pearls, all the while sneaking small glances at Gerald, who seemed oddly and uncharacteristically nervous as he sat in the club chair adjacent to hers and directly across from the sofa where William was ensconced. Gerald was perspiring so dreadfully that she was certain his handkerchief was wringing wet by now.
It was true h
e didn't meet with the president of the United States every day, but on the other hand, during his long and successful career, Gerald had to have met with some very powerful and influential men. Of course, he'd never had to ask any of those powerful and influential men for the hand of their mother in marriage. That was, she assumed, what he was planning to do.
She wished like the very dickens that he'd hurry. If Angela had everything under control in the kitchen— Dear Lord, please let her have everything under control in the kitchen!—then dinner would be served in fewer than ten minutes, and Gerald wouldn't have much opportunity to say anything once they were seated at the table. William, even in his high chair, had always had a tendency to concentrate fiercely on his plate during a meal, making any sort of conversation difficult if not impossible.
If it was going to happen, it seemed she was going to have to take matters into her own unasked-for hands, although she was loath to do it, considering that Gerald hadn't officially popped the question. She didn't want to ruffle his bright male feathers or trample on his dignity. Most of all, she didn't want to humiliate herself if it turned out that he didn't actually have marriage on his mind.
She nearly laughed out loud, imagining the look on William's face if Gerald broached the subject of their living together without benefit of clergy.
William was eyeing his watch again.
“Dinner will be served in five minutes, William,” she said rather testily, hoping that Gerald would take the hint.
The chicken breasts were perfectly browned, worthy of a photo in Bon Appetit, if Angela did say so herself. If they were a tad overcooked, at least they weren't lethal. And, what the hell, the president ate so much rubber chicken at campaign fund-raisers that he'd probably forgotten what tender and moist chicken was supposed to taste like anyway.
The carrots may have gotten a little mushy, but they were julienned to perfection and absolutely glistened in their sauce of butter and lemon juice under a light sprinkling of parsley and lemon zest. She added a tad more salt and pepper for good measure. What the hell.
If only the stupid rice would get done. Angela had worried about burning it, so she'd added an extra cup of water—maybe a cup and a half, she wasn't exactly sure—to the pan simmering on the stove. But now, with just a few minutes to go before dinner was expected on the table, she peeked under the lid of the saucepan again, then cursed the soggy, bloated kernels in their soupy white liquid. Dammit. She needed a sieve.
Just as she was pulling one from a drawer by the sink, she heard the back door open and close, and the next thing she knew, Bobby was rushing into the kitchen. She hadn't expected to see him again. Maybe not ever. At least not here. Certainly not now. Her heart was bounding up into her throat at the very same time that she was taking in his appearance.
He looked terrible, like someone who'd just been run over by a convoy of trucks. Twice. His face and hands were scratched and bleeding. His tie was torn and tattered. His suit was ripped and stained. The left sleeve of both his jacket and shirt had been sliced open, disclosing his tattoo. The little red heart seemed to be beating, wildly. The look on his face was fierce, nearly frightening. His hazel eyes had an almost feral gleam.
“My God!” she exclaimed. “What happened? You're not supposed to be here, Bobby. Does Doug—”
He grabbed her by the upper arms, practically shaking her. “Listen to me. I think the president's in trouble.”
“You think—” His pupils were dilated, she realized all of a sudden. He really did look crazed. At the edge of control, which wasn't like Bobby at all.
“Where are they, Ange?” He tightened his grip and really shook her now, nearly rattling her teeth. “Where? Are they in the living room?”
She nodded.
“Who's sitting on the couch?”
“The couch? Who's sitting on the couch? Bobby, are you crazy?” She looked from his wild eyes to the clock on the stove, and watched the bright blue numbers change from six-twenty-six to six-twenty-seven. Oh, God. She batted at him with the sieve. “Let me go. I've got to drain my rice.”
“Forget about the fucking rice. Tell me who's sitting on the couch.”
“President Riordan,” she said. “At least I think so. He was when I was in there a couple of minutes ago.”
“Okay. Good. That's good.” He seemed to relax just a bit. His harsh grip on her eased, and he didn't look quite so crazed anymore. If anything, he began to look uncertain, even slightly confused.
Suddenly the mixed and muted voices in her earpiece gave way to Doug's clear and urgent tone. “Agent Holland? Angela, do you copy? Is Bobby inside?”
She lifted her arm, spoke a soft “Affirmative,” then winced as she heard her supervisor explode.
At the moment, Daisy was far more concerned about Gerald than she was about the possibility of dinner being late or even edible. Her erstwhile fiancé was perspiring more than ever and seemed quite uncomfortable in his chair beside her, crossing his legs, recrossing them, shifting this way and that. It was more than mere nerves or proposal jitters, she concluded with some alarm. Even William, who was normally oblivious to everything around him, seemed aware of the man's discomfort.
“Are you feeling all right, Professor?” he asked. “You're looking a little pale.”
“I'm a bit warm, actually,” Gerald said in a voice that sounded quite feeble. “And a little dizzy. It's nothing serious, I'm sure, but I wonder if I might trade places with you, Mr. President. Perhaps if I could put my head down—”
Daisy's arthritic knees didn't keep her from shooting straight out of her chair. “Get up, William,” she snapped. “Get up, for heaven's sake. Let Gerald have the couch.”
Bobby was racking his brain, trying to decide what to do to insure that everybody got out of the house alive, knowing full well he was being derelict in his sworn duty to protect the president and only the president. In the meantime, Angela was obviously listening to instructions on her earpiece while she looked at him as if she had a big net or a goddamned straitjacket concealed behind her back.
“Listen to me” he said, reaching out and plucking the device from her ear.
“Bobby!”
“Listen. Bootsie hired Gerrard to kill the president.” When she began spluttering, he said, “Don't ask me how I know. I just know.”
“Bobby, honey.” Her voice was soothing, as if she were speaking to an overexcited child. “That can't be true. And even if it were, the professor doesn't have a weapon. They searched him before he came in. McCray did a pass with the metal detector. I saw him do it.”
“He stashed a weapon last week. The night he threw the rocks at the window. Mrs. Riordan brought him in. That's when he secured it.”
“You're wrong,” she said. “That's impossible. Tricia frisked him.”
He shook his head. “No. Mrs. Riordan called her off. Remember? Gerrard came inside and sat on the couch. That's where he hid the gun.”
She stood there blinking at him now, wanting to believe him, not wanting to believe him. Beautiful in her confusion. The bravest woman he knew. He wanted to pull rank on her and order her out of the house this second. Out to the trailer. Away. He had no choice but to risk her life, though. He figured—God, he prayed—that he was quick enough, agile enough to take two bullets. One for Angela and one for the president. Like Billy.
Billy! The sudden thought of his brother nearly swamped Bobby's brain. He missed him. God, how he missed him, but that wasn't what had been eating at him these past two years since Agent Billy Holland had taken that bullet in the course of duty. It was that he'd never told Billy how fiercely proud he was of him, or how he—the big brother, the one who bullied their way into the world, the one with the brawn and the brass balls—didn't trust his own ability, his own reflexes, his own courage to give it all up in a single moment for the job.
“Bobby?” Angela's voice brought him back into the moment.
It was time to find out. He focused on his wife's worried face, the green mis
t in her eyes.
“I love you, Ange,” he whispered, then he turned her and aimed her toward the hallway. “Gerrard might panic if he sees me, and we don't want him to panic. Go in and tell them dinner's going to be a few minutes late. I'll be right behind you. If Riordan's still on the couch, sit down beside him. Reach under the cushion and see if you can find the gun.”
“Bobby, I … “
“Do it, Angela.”
Well, she didn't have much choice, she thought. Especially when, just behind her, she heard Bobby slide his gun from his holster.
Oh, my God. If he was right—was he right? how could he be right when nobody else had a clue?—then this was some horrible, bizarre nightmare in which President Riordan was about to be assassinated right under the very noses of two dozen Secret Service agents. If Bobby was wrong—please let him be wrong!—it would undoubtedly be the most horrendously embarrassing moment of her life when she plopped down on the couch beside the president of the United States, smiled, and casually inquired, “So, how's it going, sir?”
She heard Bobby's labored breathing at her back. Maybe he was crazy. Maybe the pain in his left side had driven him over some invisible edge. Maybe she had.
Then, as they neared the living room, Angela heard Daisy Riordan exclaim, “Don't just stand there, William. Help him, for heaven's sake.”
“He's up,” she said over her shoulder to Bobby. “Honcho's up from the couch.”
They were all up—the president, Daisy, the professor—standing in an awkward little group like three people trying to dance. The president looked dismayed as he stood holding the professor's elbow. Mrs. Riordan looked distraught. And the professor was looking desperate, and staring at the couch, where Angela could see the polished wooden curve of a pistol grip peeking from the cushions.
“Oh, God.”
She reached for the gun at her ankle just as Bobby went flying past her.
It happened so fast that Daisy Riordan couldn't even summon up a scream. Suddenly Gerald didn't appear ill at all, but angry—all red-faced and wild-eyed and teeth-gnashing—as he wrenched his arm out of William's grasp, then lunged for the couch.