Clark was a Louisiana native who had spent decades in the Senate. He was known in conservative circles as the Po’ boy Pitbull, so while there was some humor in his comment, Phillip knew he meant what he said. The joke around the Capitol was that Josef Clark never showered—he only took blood baths. That wink alone could keep a gun control bill from passing the Senate.
Across the room, Rudy Ray Mitchell was talking with Katherine, who had been preparing for a presentation that evening for the League of Women Voters when the Secret Service agents brought her down to the Center. Her hair was still in an after-shower ponytail, her face shiny and free of make-up. Rudy Ray caught Phillip’s eye and excused himself, and when he did, Phillip saw Clark wrinkle his nose.
The party hadn’t been too happy with Rudy Ray as Phillip’s vice presidential pick, claiming it had to do with his lack of political experience and not because he was black. The national committee had lobbied hard for Clark and a few other old-timers to be chosen as Phillip’s running mate instead, but in the end, there was something about Rudy Ray Mitchell, a certified financial planner by trade, that made Phillip feel like he could trust him. He thought again of the explosive device. Had he been wrong?
“You all right, Phil?” Rudy Ray asked in his southern drawl, and Clark winced. Rudy Ray rarely called Phillip Mr. President, and while it was no big deal to Phillip, the conservative forums wanted to hang him for it.
“Yes, fine. Thanks, Rudy Ray.”
Mitchell and Clark nodded politely at one another.
“Excuse me, Mr. President,” Clark said. “I’m going to have a word with the First Lady.” He stepped toward Katherine, who was talking now to the defense secretary. While most of Phillip’s staff did everything they could to avoid going face-to-face with Katherine Grand, Clark seemed to relish it. Even with Clark’s long and impressive resume, that alone should have qualified him for the position of chief of staff.
“Any word yet on what’s going on?” Rudy Ray asked.
“No, but I expect a briefing from Agent Fuller any minute. It shouldn’t be long now.”
Rudy Ray nodded and surveyed the Center. Despite the circumstances, he appeared relaxed—but, then again, Rudy Ray Mitchell always appeared relaxed. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many people in one room,” he said. “Not even back when I was a boy in my gramma’s small apartment for Thanksgiving!”
The Presidential Emergency Operations Center was a bunker that originally had been constructed for President Franklin D. Roosevelt during World War II. Phillip wondered how much the size of the government had grown since those days. “It is a bit tight in here,” he said.
“In more ways than one,” Rudy Ray said with his characteristic chuckle.
Phillip gave a small smile. His vice president was an outsider and, in many ways, the polar opposite of Josef Clark—he had few friends in the inner circles of Washington on either side of the aisle. Originally a Democrat, Rudy Ray had made waves in the black community when he jumped sides ten years ago, citing a lack of fiscal restraint in the Democratic Party. Since then, he had had to deal with being called an Uncle Tom by the NAACP and the Black Lives Matter activists while contending with the lingering racism of the Republican Party. Rudy Ray Mitchell might have been the only person in the Operations Center who wanted to bust out more than Phillip.
“The kids seem all right,” Rudy Ray said. Charlotte and Philly were sharing a sprinkled donut with the secretary of transportation.
“They’re tough kids,” Phillip said.
“They take after their father.”
“Have you met Katherine?” Phillip said with a smile.
“Ah, point taken. A strong family.” Rudy Ray patted Phillip’s shoulder. “You’ll get through this.”
Rudy Ray said the same thing during the election when the barbs had started slinging. Phillip had been accused by the media of placating to minorities with the appointment of a black man to the ticket, which Phillip thought absurd. Hadn’t he stood side by side in the military with men and women of every race and creed, and, as governor of New York, established a legal roundtable filled with new and diverse voices? Yes, a black man would bode well for Phillip in the South, but it was also a risky move in other parts of the country. In the end, Phillip had chosen with his heart, and he hoped that he had “gotten through,” as Rudy Ray remarked, because American voters had done the same.
A hush came over the room, and a bevy of Secret Service agents entered the already crowded bunker. Leading the pack was Brandon Fuller.
“I’ll let you do your thing,” Rudy Ray said and stepped aside as Brandon reached them.
“I just received word, Mr. President,” Brandon said, without wasting any time. “It’s all clear. It’s safe for you and your family, and the cabinet members and the others, to return to the White House.”
“Thank God,” Phillip said and glanced around the Operations Center where just about every individual was looking at him expectantly. He took a step toward them and held up his hand. “Everyone, thank you for your patience,” he said. “I was just informed by Secret Service that there is no longer a threat to the White House and that you may all return to your offices.” A round of applause erupted. “Obviously, today’s cabinet meeting will be postponed, and I will provide more specific details as I learn them. Until then, just know that you are safe, thanks to the hard work of Agent Fuller and all the members of our Secret Service and security staff.” Phillip motioned to Brandon, whom he knew was not a fan of attention. Brandon cast his eyes downward and bowed his head slightly.
“Also,” Phillip added, “I urge you to please exercise caution and not speak to anyone about what happened this afternoon until we know exactly what has transpired here. No need to get the rumor mill worked up. I appreciate your cooperation. Thank you, again.”
As the crowd dispersed and made a move toward the exit, Katherine appeared at Phillip’s side. “What do we know?” she asked Brandon.
“According to preliminary reports, it looks like it was a simple improvised explosive device,” Brandon said. “Nothing complicated.”
“For the love of God, how did such a thing get into the White House?” she demanded in a strained whisper, attracting a few stares from the people leaving the Center.
“It didn’t,” Brandon said.
“I don’t understand,” Phillip said.
Brandon’s phone buzzed. “Excuse me, Mr. President.” He picked up his phone. “Fuller … All right.” He clipped the phone back onto his belt. “Sir, Special Agent Paul Wilcox is here.”
The sound of Wilcox’s name made Phillip relax in a way that reminded him of when he was a little boy and he heard his father’s car door slam at the end of the day—as if the cavalry had arrived to shoulder some of Phillip’s burden.
“Should I send him down?” Brandon asked.
“No.” Phillip took Katherine’s hand. “Let’s get the kids. If we’ve got the all clear, I’d like to get out of here. The quicker we can get back to normal”—he thought of Clark and his mention of the new normal—“the better.”
CHAPTER 4
Bob leaned back on his stool at the restaurant’s bar hoping someone would notice him. He was wearing his lucky deep purple business suit—the one he liked to wear on all the Sunday political shows as a symbol of nonpartisanship—but he didn’t seem to catch anyone’s eye except the butterface sitting at the far end of the bar whose heavily mascaraed stare he had been trying to avoid.
“Want another, buddy?” the bartender asked, sticking a white towel into a tumbler with his fist and swirling it around.
“Sure,” Bob said, “and it’s Bob.”
“What is?”
“My name,” Bob said with a confident grin, as if everyone should know it. “You must be new here.”
The bartender gave a small smile and a refill on his gin and tonic and then walked down the bar to greet a white-haired old couple dressed for the theater.
Bob took a slug of his dr
ink and slumped against the bar. It had been only five years since his book had come out about the abduction of little Charlotte Grand and Jamie—an international bestseller that had been the talk of practically every late-night talk show for a year—and he was starting to feel like he had little to show for it. Not so long ago, Bob couldn’t walk down the street without being bombarded with autograph, selfie, and interview requests, which was virtually unheard of for authors, whose profiles usually hovered in the Howard Hughes range.
Even sales of the paperback had dwindled to only a few a week and wasn’t doing much to get Bob’s name back in the news these days. And now with Phillip Grand in Washington, his New York legal roundtable disbanded, and Jamie on television virtually every day, Bob had been left out in the cold.
His phone buzzed, and he pulled it eagerly from his jacket pocket, half-expecting it to be Chuck Todd from NBC, but his smile fizzled when he saw his mother’s name. He placed the phone on top of the bar. He was in no mood for another lecture about leaving Worcester, Payne & Leach to start his own practice. “Don’t you think you’re jumping the gun? Who resigns after being made partner?” she had asked during Bob’s last visit—a question to which his father had grunted, which was more than he usually said. Like they ever had anything to do with his professional success. If it were up to them, Bob would have had a “safe” career in his father’s automobile parts wholesale business, driven a used car, and lived in some godforsaken middle-class neighborhood on Long Island, spending his days trying to remember what days to take his trash to the curb. The only thing he had ever done that his parents had approved of was marry Jamie—because she was safe, he knew. Safe and—surprise, surprise—a total bore.
Luckily, he and Jamie had managed to avoid one another while they worked at the Albany Executive Mansion. It was not a surprise that she agreed with his parents about leaving Worcester, Payne & Leach. Like what she thought mattered. Bob had never listened to Jamie while they were married. He wasn’t about to start now.
More patrons filed into the restaurant, the five o’clock crowd having worked up its usual hard thirst. Bob finished his drink and reached into his pocket to put a twenty on the bar when he saw Butterface heading in his direction. That was another thing he seemed to notice lately: There was a direct correlation between his profile and the beauty of the women he attracted—the less recognizable he had become, the uglier the chicks were who dug him. Talk about some dog days, he thought, quickly returning his phone to his jacket pocket. He nearly had his arms through its sleeves for a quick getaway when he got a whiff of wine, and Butterface whispered into his ear: “Wanna get outta here?”
“Actually, I do,” he said, buttoning his jacket. “But not with you, hon.”
“Married?” she asked, her smile too wide.
“Not anymore. Just not interested. I got court in the morning.”
“Court?” she asked, pressing her breasts into the back of the barstool. “Judge, jury, or jackass lawyer?” She smiled again.
“The latter,” he said. “Without the jackass.”
“I’ll be the judge of that,” Butterface said seductively and put her hand on his forearm. “How’s about I help relax you for your big day in court tomorrow?”
Bob rolled his eyes. “Listen … I’m trying to be nice, but the truth is …” He pointed out the old woman standing at the bar with her old husband. “See that bitty over there? The one with so much foundation on her face that she looks like a cracked sidewalk and a wig that looks like she borrowed it from George Washington?”
“What about her?”
“I’d rather take her home than you. Actually, I’d rather take home George Washington.”
Butterface poked her tongue into her cheek like a lollipop. “You don’t have to be a dick about it,” she said, stiffening. “I only came over here because you looked down in the dumps. My mistake.”
“The only thing dumpy around here is you, hon,” he said, turning his back on her and worming his way through the crowd.
At the other end of the bar, a television screen was broadcasting CNN, which was showing the front of the White House, and a pretty but middle-aged reporter was muttering something that Bob couldn’t hear because the set was muted. He read the crawl at the bottom of the screen as he made his way toward the restaurant exit:
… unusual Secret Service activity at the White House. Sources say there may have been a security breach, but no word yet from the administration …
Outside the restaurant, the cold air whipped up some trash, and Bob pulled up his collar. He made a right and started walking toward Seventh Avenue, his mind on the words he had just read on the TV screen. Fucked-up shit seems to follow that Phillip Grand wherever he goes like a bad penny, he thought, even though Grand was quite possibly the most cautious person Bob had ever met. Bob couldn’t blame the guy, of course, after what had happened to his daughter. That middle-aged reporter better be ready to stand outside the White House all night, Bob thought with a chuckle; that old stalwart Phillip Grand would spill his guts about whatever had happened today only when he was good and ready.
Bob debated whether or not to take a cab home but decided to duck into the subway instead—he’d take one last shot that someone might recognize him, maybe boost his mood. He descended the stairs and got on the R train, which pulled in just as he emerged onto the platform. Inside the train car, there were a few scattered seats, but Bob decided to stand, which made him look chivalrous, he thought. And also more exposed.
As the doors closed and the train car lurched forward, he caught the eye of a cute brunette who was sitting near the door. She smiled, just a little. So did he until he spied a large portfolio slanted against her knees. After being married to a writer, the last thing Bob wanted was another artist type in his life, although it was debatable whether what Jamie did was considered art. He unbuttoned his jacket, shifted his body, and faced the end of the train car, a big ripped poster for a medical alert company staring him in the face as more riders pressed their way into the subway car at the next stop.
He had seen on TV that the Metropolitan Transit Authority was finally planning on modernizing the subway system and rolling out open gangway cars, the city’s way of packing even more sardines into these cans. The new cars were going to feature USB ports, flipped seats, digital displays, the works, but, knowing the speed with which things worked in New York City, Bob was doubtful he’d see them in his lifetime.
As the train pulled into Thirty-Fourth Street, he leaned against the grab pole, letting the passengers flow around him. Phillip Grand had been the impetus behind the MTA modernization when he was governor, an initiative spearheaded by that pushy broad he called a wife. “No great city had an outdated public transportation system,” she had announced at one of the last news conferences the Grands gave before their move to Washington. Bob could still see Katherine Grand standing there like a queen—arms gesticulating around her, pearls tight around her neck like a noose. How Grand put up with that woman, he didn’t know. As far as Bob was concerned, Katherine Grand had way too much access. Was it really necessary for her to attend every meeting of the legal roundtable? Phillip Grand wasn’t one of those empty-headed politicians whose brains were filled only with the objectives of the people around him. The guy was Ivy League and a war veteran. What did he really need Katherine Grand for other than to pop out a few heirs? Bob had gotten sick of seeing Jamie at the beginning and end of every day; he couldn’t imagine having to work with her all day too.
At the last stop in Manhattan, a horde of passengers got on, and Bob pressed himself against his grab pole as limbs, bodies, and backpacks leaned against him. Here he was, he thought, back in the subway again, amid the sweat and the urine stench, the last place he thought he’d be once Phillip Grand won the presidency. He had been as excited as anyone, not for Grand necessarily, but for his own prospects. Bob had been sure that Grand would ask him to be a member of his transition team after the roundtable had been disbanded
and Grand announced he’d be taking a few of the lawyers with him to Washington. Considering all the help Bob had given him during Charlotte’s abduction and his legal input over the years, he thought he was a shoo-in. Yet, Grand had gone all politically correct and hired two female attorneys—one Chinese American, the other black. Combined, they didn’t have the years of law experience Bob did. Besides being poor choices, it was a slap in the face.
When the train got to his stop in Brooklyn, Bob got out with what seemed like half the subway car and jogged up the stairs, two by two, as if running an obstacle course with the guy next to him. The cold air quickly brushed away the subway soot, and Bob again buttoned his jacket and pulled up his collar. He had forgotten how this subway crap was for the birds. Hot, cold, hot, cold. He should have gotten an Uber.
“Excuse me?”
A woman hurried toward him from the subway station.
“Hi, I’m sorry to bother you, but we were just on the same subway car, and I saw you get out …”
Bob did his usual quick assessment: Judging by the light wrinkles around her eyes and mouth, the woman looked like she was in her midthirties. However, she was wearing a beanie, which pushed her blonde bangs into her eyes, making her look younger, but not young enough to fool him. Her carefully manicured hands were wrapped around a Starbucks coffee cup that had lipstick stains on the lid—signaling enough disposable income to get regular manicures and overpriced coffee.
“Yes,” Bob said, suddenly interested. “What can I do for you?”
The woman hesitated, as if feeling foolish. “Are you, by any chance, Robert Scott? You know … the author?”
A surge of heat ran through Bob’s body. “Yes,” he said with a smile. “I am.”
“I thought so!” said the woman, her smile exposing a row of straight white teeth. “I googled you on the train when I saw you, and your Amazon page said you lived in Brooklyn, so I had a feeling …” She took a breath. “I know you’re going to think this is crazy …”
Baby Carter (Baby Grand Trilogy, Book 3) Page 3