The First Lady Escapes

by Verity Speeks

  “Digame,” said a man’s deep voice on the phone. “Quien es?”

  Gretchen quickly hung up the phone. What if Conner got mugged? she thought. What if a Mexican low-life had ripped off his cell phone with a private White House number on it? As if it were burning her fingers, she pressed the “Off” button and threw the phone into the wastebasket. She didn’t know what to do next. At least the press hadn’t bagged a shot of her trashing her phone. If a photo like that ended up a meme on the Internet, she knew it would make her look as whacked out as her father.

  Chapter 52

  Rosarito Beach, MX

  December 20, 7:00 a.m.

  Natalia awoke to the roar of a helicopter. She sat up in bed with a start, terrified that it was Marine One. Had the Secret Service found her?

  Vaclav wasn’t in the motel room. Where was he? She ran over to the window: A helicopter was circling above the beach. It was much smaller than Marine One, she realized. Maybe it was taking tourists on a scenic flight over the ocean, like she had seen helicopters do in Palm Beach. It straightened out and flew north along the coast.

  She noticed a lone figure on the beach. Vaclav. He was watching the helicopter disappear into the brightening sky. Wearing his jogging clothes, he launched into a series of post-run leg stretches. She wondered how far he had run this morning. She had slept so soundly—she was exhausted from their marathon lovemaking—that she had no idea when he had left their room. She admired his tall, lean, muscular body as he continued to stretch. She was thrilled that Vaclav was into exercise. It was something they could share. She pictured them running together on the beach in Todos Santos.

  Natalia longed to join Vaclav, but she had no workout clothes. She didn’t even have clean underwear. She saw him turn and walk toward the bluff. She hoped that he would spot her plastic Target shopping bag on the sand and bring it up to their room.

  As she awaited his arrival, she picked up their discarded clothes on the floor, swept the sand off the bed, and straightened the tangle of sheets. Her body was still buzzing from last night’s sex. The sheets were coarse, maybe not even cotton, let alone 1000-count, 100-percent Egyptian cotton. Instead of Italy, where her soft Frette sheets at the White House came from, they were probably made in China. Still, she had a crazy notion to steal the sheets and take them when they drove to Todos Santos, a souvenir of their momentous reunion.

  She could hear Vaclav’s footsteps on the second-floor landing, walking toward their room. He was singing a rock song in Slovak, one that she didn’t recognize. It sounded like a cross between the Rolling Stones and… Natalia realized that she hadn’t listened to pop music in the past fourteen years. I have so much to experience in my new life with Vaclav, she thought.

  He walked in carrying a box of Dunkin’ Donuts. A cardboard carrier balanced on top held two paper cups of coffee. “The coffee might be cold,” he said. “I drove over and picked up breakfast before my run, then left it on the porch.”

  “No problem,” she said, though she couldn’t remember the last time she ate a doughnut—empty calories—and she hated drinking coffee out of a paper cup. “Thank you.”

  “Since it’s already cold…” He put down the box and walked over to her. “Good morning, my love.” She could see the outline of his erection against his nylon jogging shorts. It reminded her of the first time they kissed in the Žilnia Catholic School gym. He fondled her naked breasts, and then thrust his tongue into her mouth. Feeling unprepared, even slightly offended, she broke away from him.

  “Shouldn’t we get going? Angel said it’s a whole day’s drive to Todos Santos.”

  He drew her closer, pressing his erection against her naked body. “We have time.”

  Natalia felt aroused, but she sensed it would take more foreplay than he might have in mind to get up to his level. Besides, there were practical matters to attend to. “We must leave. We must disappear before Rex finds out where we are.”

  With a sigh of frustration, he stepped back, pulled off his shirt, and then his shorts, socks, and thong underwear. Seeing this naked Adonis in front of her, his vták erect, Natalia felt a sudden urge to wrestle him to the floor and climb on top of him.

  As if to punish her for rejecting him, he walked into the bathroom. She heard the shower turn on and Vaclav singing the Slovak rock song again. Hovno, she thought. How can I pass up a chance for ecstasy? I haven’t experienced bliss in so many years, as my mamina would say, “I’m entitled.” She followed him into the bathroom. She giggled, knowing that her mother would have a stroke if she saw her with Vaclav right now.

  He was peeing into the toilet, his back to her. She was tempted to bend down and kiss the heart tattoo on his right butt cheek. Before she could, he flushed the toilet, pulled back the torn opaque shower curtain, and stepped into the shower. It was tiny, barely large enough for one person. For a moment, she remembered the image that still flashed in her dreams from time to time: her father, who was as large a man as Vaclav, taking a shower when she was a little girl in their apartment bathroom in Žilnia. In order to catch the bus in time to get to school in the morning, on her mother’s instructions she peed and washed up while her father was showering. The shower was so small and the cheap shower curtain so thin, that the curtain stuck to his skin. While she was brushing her teeth, in the mirror she could see the outline of her father behind her in the shower, washing his balls as carefully as if they were jewels. When she told her mother it disgusted her to see this, she made light of it: “Papa’s balls are jewels,” she said, chuckling. “The family jewels.”

  Natalia could see Vaclav washing his balls through the shower curtain now. She felt a pang of disgust, as she did when she had watched her father.

  “Come in and join me,” he called.

  “The shower’s too small.”

  “I’ll make room.” He pulled back the curtain, as if the shower were a stage and his erection was the star of the show. He pulled her into the shower, turning her so that they were face-to-face. He thrust his vták between her thighs. Natalia felt aroused, but she was also uncomfortable. The water was tepid and came down in rivulets, and she glimpsed dark patches of mold staining the tiles. This was not the romantic shower-for-two she had envisioned. “Uncomfortable” won.

  She stepped out of the shower. “Vaclav, we really need to get going. We need to talk about our life in Todos Santos too.”

  “Natalia, are you sure you want to live in Baja for the rest of your life?”

  There was an undercurrent to his voice that troubled her. “Angel says Baja is beautiful,” she replied. “Laid-back. You can play music at clubs in Cabo and go surfing. I can raise goats.”

  “Goats? Goats stink!”

  “And children. I want to have your children.”

  He climbed out of the shower and gestured for her to take a turn. She reluctantly stepped under the lukewarm spray. He picked up the miniscule bar of soap and washed her body, scrubbing hard, as if she were a child covered in mud.

  “Natalia, I don’t want to live in Todos Santos.”

  “What? When did you decide this? Why didn’t you tell me?”

  There was a long pause. Then he replied, “I wanted to tell you now, when we are together.”

  She stepped out of the shower, grabbed the one flimsy towel off the rack, and hurriedly dried herself off. “What’s wrong with Todos Santos?”

  “It’s fucking hot in Mexico and everyone’s poor as fuck. And I don’t speak Spanish. Do you?”

  “No, but I can learn. We can learn.”

  “I don’t give a shit about Spanish.” Vaclav grabbed the towel away from her and dried himself off.

  Even though the bathroom was steaming, she felt a chill. “Where do you want to live if not Todos Santos?”

  He playfully swatted her with the towel and walked out of the bathroom. “Get dressed and I will tell you. It will be a surprise, like the caviar and vodka!”

  She felt the blood rushing to her cheeks. It was as if she and Vacl
av were driving in a car, trying to pass a gasoline truck on the highway, but they didn’t have the time or the space to make it alive.

  As she finished drying herself off, she saw Vaclav pulling on a green velour tracksuit, like those that Rex’s Russian oligarch friends wore on the Beau Rivage golf course. All he needs to look like one of those thugs is a heavy gold chain around his neck, she thought. When he grabbed one out of his backpack and put it on, she winced. He took his mobile phone from his pocket and began texting.

  “Did you find my Target bag on the beach?” she asked, trying to control her mounting panic.

  “No,” he said, without looking up at her. “Someone must have ripped it off.”

  “We should have searched for it last night.”

  “I’ll get you a new phone. It’s all good. Get dressed.” He finished his text and pushed “Send.”

  “I don’t have clean underwear.”

  “Then wear dirty. Let’s go.” He looked out the window and searched the sky.

  Her stomach clenching, Natalia hurriedly dressed in yesterday’s panties and bra, and the Mexican peasant outfit. She caught her reflection in the window: she wasn’t wearing a wig. She had lost it on the beach and completely forgotten about it. “Hovno!”

  Vaclav put his arms around her and kissed her fuzzy head. “No worries. You look beautiful!” He escorted her out of the room.

  “Where are we going?”

  “You’ll see.” He led her down the steps from the second-floor landing to the pool patio.

  In the sky, she spotted the helicopter she had seen earlier. It was flying in their direction. “Vaclav, I don’t like this. I don’t understand where we’re going.” She stopped cold. “Tell me where you want us to go.”

  He rolled his eyes, as if she were a little girl questioning her father’s authority. “Okay, you really want to know?” He glanced at the helicopter. It was hovering over the beach, preparing to land.

  She fought the panic rising in her throat. “Vaclav, please! Tell me!”

  “Okay, so I have this Russian friend, Sergei, in Prague. Sergei owns the club where my band plays. His brother, Ivan, lives in Moscow. Ivan has lots of money, lots of influence. He’s like this with President Popovich.” Vaclav held up his hand and pressed his index and middle fingers tightly together.

  Natalia’s heart was pounding. “So?”

  “So Ivan has a club in Moscow. He wants us to become partners. He’ll get us a big apartment. My band will play in the club. You’ll be, like, the hostess. We’ll make big bucks. Can you picture it? The former First Lady of the United States running a club in Moscow? It will be huuuuge…”

  The way Vaclav prolonged the word “huge,” he sounded like Rex!

  Fuming, she grabbed Vaclav’s raised fingers. “You know what I think of your plan to live in Moscow and make big bucks?” She wrenched his index finger aside, so that only his middle finger was pointing to the sky. She bit it hard, tasting blood, then ran down the rickety staircase to the beach.

  “Suka!” he yelled, shaking his hand to stop the pain. He hustled down the staircase and ran after her down the beach. He quickly caught up with her. He grabbed her roughly from behind and spun her around to face him. “It’s happening, Natalia!”

  His eyes glowed with wrath, like Rex’s eyes when he was angry. On impulse, she did what she had long wanted to do to Rex, but never dared: She spit in his face.

  Vaclav shook her hard. “You fucking bitch! It’s fucking happening!”

  The helicopter was descending rapidly toward the beach, its rotors whirring up a gale. When he glanced over at it, Natalia wrenched free of his grasp. She turned and ran.

  “It is not fucking happening, you maniak!”

  “Natalia, wait! I will give you good life! Great life!” He charged after her.

  “You are not going to use me, Vaclav! I will not be used!”

  “But I love you!”

  “Bullshit!”

  Vaclav started shouting in Russian at the top of his lungs.

  Natalia turned around to see who he was shouting to: Two hulking men in red velour tracksuits, gold chains around their necks, jumped down from the helicopter. They ran toward Vaclav.

  “I love you, Natalia!” Vaclav yelled. “I’ve always loved you!” The Russians caught up with him. The three men conferred and then took off after her together.

  “I don’t love you, Vaclav!” she screamed. “You are a self-centered, egotistical asshole, just like Rex! Worse than Rex! I hate you!”

  She ran faster down the beach, not knowing where she was going, not knowing what her choices were. All she knew was that she had to escape the ogres behind her. She pictured the glee on Boris Popovich’s pinched face as he greeted her in Moscow. The “First Lady of Russia,” Izvestia would label her. It made her run faster.

  “Madame First Lady!”

  The voice she heard behind her wasn’t Vaclav’s. There was no trace of a Slovak or Russian accent. She turned around. Behind her, and behind Vaclav and the Russians, a man was galloping down the beach on horseback, the backpack slung over his shoulder jolting against his body each time the horse’s hooves hit the sand.

  Riding a bony dappled-gray horse with a scraggly tail, the man galloped past Vaclav and the Russians. They shouted at him to stop. He kicked his mount, urging it forward. As he neared her, Natalia saw that he clenched the pommel of his saddle with one hand, hanging on for dear life. With the other hand he clutched the reins of an equally skinny brown horse without a rider. The horse was following the dappled-gray’s lead. They may be scrawny, she thought, but they sure can run!

  Far behind the horses and the thugs, she spotted an old Mexican man trotting after them on a donkey. She remembered seeing him yesterday on the beach when two blonde teenagers were riding the same two horses. She assumed that the horses were his.

  Natalia had no idea who her rescuer was. She didn’t care. She ran toward him. He pulled back on his reins, yelling “Whoa!” No use. The dappled-gray was running away with him. He dropped the reins of the brown horse that he was leading and pulled back with both hands on his horse’s reins.

  “Whoa!” he screamed. “Whoa!”

  Maybe it was because the dappled-gray horse saw Natalia running toward it, or that the rider was pulling back on the reins so hard that the bit hurt its mouth, but it slowed down. Behind it, the brown horse slowed too.

  “Whoa, you motherfucker!”

  The man’s voice was stronger now, more self-confident, as if he were gaining control over his mount. Natalia didn’t know for sure, but she guessed that it was his commanding tone of voice that made the dappled-gray, and then the brown horse, slow to a halt.

  She could see that Vaclav and his Russian thugs were running toward them. She had only a few seconds before they would catch up. She forced her mind to remember everything she had learned from her short-lived riding lessons in Central Park. She walked calmly over to the brown horse, speaking to it in a soft, high, feminine voice: “You’re so beautiful, horsey! I’m not going to hurt you, beautiful horsey!” The animal snorted and shook its head, as if eager to break into a run again.

  Natalia scooped the horse’s reins up from the sand, threw them over its neck, and hoisted herself up into the saddle. She wished she were wearing jeans instead of a Mexican peasant skirt. The good news was that the horse was a lot shorter than the thoroughbreds she rode in Central Park. If it threw her, she wouldn’t have far to fall, and the sand was soft.

  She made the clucking sound that her riding teacher had taught her and kicked the horse with her bare heels. Her heart pounded as the animal heaved its body forward, jolting into a gallop. She was both terrified and elated as the horse raced down the beach. “Elated” won.

  “Yee-haw!” she couldn’t stop herself from screaming. “Yee-haw!”

  The dappled-gray took off after her mount. “Yee-haw!” the rider shouted.

  Natalia looked behind her: Vaclav and the Russians were far behind. The me
n stopped running and leaned over, hands on knees, to catch their breath.

  As she urged her horse on, out of the corner of her eye she caught a glimpse of the dappled-gray catching up with it. For the first time, she was close enough to see the rider’s face. To her amazement, it was Phil, the creepy paparazzo she called her “shadow.”

  “Well, fuck me,” she said out loud, because she knew that’s what Angel would say right now. “He really is my fucking shadow!”

  Suddenly Phil didn’t look so creepy to her. He pointed to a sand dune up ahead. “That way!” Clucking and kicking, she pressed her horse to climb the dune. Its hooves sank into the deep sand, but it barreled upward. She urged it forward, clucking louder and kicking harder. Finally, nostrils flaring, it reached the top.

  Below, Phil struggled to force his horse to follow.

  “Kick him!” she shouted. “You’re the boss!”

  Phil kicked and clucked. Finally, the horse got the message. It lurched, hooves sinking into the sand, toward the top of the dune.

  From the top, Natalia had a view of the whole beach. In the distance, she spotted Vaclav and the Russians scrambling into the helicopter. It lifted off, rotors whirring.

  “Yee-haw!” she shouted, triumphant. “Yee-haw!”

  Her moment of relief disappeared when she saw the helicopter turn and swoop their way. She feared that the Russians had guns, and that they would shoot her. As it bore down on them, she spotted Vaclav leaning out of the open side.

  Was he holding a pistol?

  As it drew closer, she saw that he was giving her the finger. She could see his lips moving. Over the roar of the engine, she couldn’t hear what he was saying or even whether he was speaking Slovak, Russian, or English. But in any language, she was sure that Vaclav was shouting, “Fuck you!”

  Natalia didn’t bother to flip him the bird in return. Instead, she turned to her rescuer as his horse caught up with hers. “Phil, right?” He gaped at her, as if amazed that she knew his name. Breathless from the exertion, he simply nodded. She reached out and shook his hand. “Thank you, Phil!”