“Thank goodness you knew it was me, Maci,” the second Archer said. He turned to Chad and Logan with a smile on his face. “I knew that she wouldn’t forget something so importa-”
A shot rang out, and the second Archer fell to the floor, his face shocked. Logan and Chad both looked at Maci, their expressions mirrored one another.
“Maci?” Logan said in question.
“Neither of those men were Archer,” she said.
“Are you sure?” Chad asked, staring at her in shock.
“If they were me, they would have known that I was in fifth grade when Maci was in kindergarten,” a voice said from behind Maci.
They all swung around, Maci with her arm still around Leslie. He was trembling still. Another Archer stepped out of the hallway and into the room, an arm holding a gun to his head right on his heels. This new Archer looked at Maci, smiling that smile that all the clones had mastered, further proof that it was genetic.
“Pretty much everyone knows that Maci is six years younger than me, but I was born in December, and missed the cutoff for kindergarten by two weeks, and I had to wait a year. Maci was born in August, and she started kindergarten about a month after her fifth birthday. So we were only five grades apart. The clones should have known that. I was in fifth grade when I had my surgery. If they were me, they also would have known that Maci, who was always worried about doing everything right, brought me my homework. She knew Mrs. Sayers was mean and she would give me an F, even if I almost died, so she went to my fifth-grade classroom and collected my homework for the week. I remember because she missed the bus and her foster parents were furious, and my mom let her stay the weekend because my parents were worried that they would just scream at her all weekend.”
He smiled at Maci again, his eyes brilliant blue.
“You don’t forget the bravery of a little girl who risks getting into trouble like that to make sure that I had my homework. You’re the best friend I’ve ever had, Maci, and I knew that you would figure all this out and come to my rescue.”
“And what about Leslie?” Maci asked, still not able to see the owner of the arm that held the gun to Archer’s head. “Is he involved?”
“No, and he’s not a clone. He’s just Leslie,” Archer said.
Maci let Leslie go, instructing the man to go to the safe room that was hidden behind a bookcase to Chad’s left. Leslie nodded, running so fast on shaky legs that he almost fell as Chad undid the lock and let him in. The bookcase slid closed behind Leslie, and the bigger lock of the safe room tumbled into place.
“You should leave, Maci. He’s going to make me set off the nuclear missiles. He wants to destroy my reputation and my name, then take over Washington with the clones and rule what’s left of the world.”
“Who is he?” Maci asked, waiting for the man to reveal himself.
There was a laugh, and the man stepped forward, using Archer as a human shield. He laughed when he saw the look on her face.
“Didn’t expect to see me again, did you?” he asked, his laugh maniacal.
“Grant!” she said, staring at the aged man from their past, shocked. “You’re behind all this?”
“I’ve had decades to think of a way to destroy Archer and his lapdog Maci Brown,” Grant sneered. “Ever since you lost me the election and took over my spot as Mayor, I’ve been plotting.”
“From jail?” Maci said.
Grant’s face turned red with rage at the mention of jail.
“First, in jail, then when I got out and I was ruined. I lost everything. Well, almost everything. My parents died the year after I got out of jail, and I was their only son, so they left me everything. They were worth millions, and I invested that wisely, growing my fortune while I watched Archer climb up the ladder, doing all of the things I would have done if you two hadn’t destroyed my life.”
“You destroyed yourself,” Maci said, still pointing the gun in his direction. “Don’t blame us for your corruption and greed.”
“You haven’t seen the half of it,” he sneered, his smile a mix of self-satisfaction and hatred so deep that it had driven him mad. “I invested in clone research when they were cloning sheep. I went into business with a man name Andrew, first cloning dogs and cats for distraught owners who just wanted their pets to live forever. You would not believe how lucrative that business was. I eventually convinced Andrew to branch out to humans, growing humans from samples that I supplied for him. I claimed that they were volunteers, and he believed me. It wasn’t until he came face to face with his own clone that he realized what I was up to.”
“Where is he now?” Maci asked, even though she was sure that she knew the answer.
“I had to kill him. But the new Andrew was compliant and an excellent worker. You see, even when you clone someone, the first five years of their life are the most important, and I spent that time training all my clones to believe what I believed and to think what I did. They learned everything they could about the person they were cloned from, and one by one, I replaced the real politician with their clones. I waited, watching to see if anyone would notice. No one did, so I continued. I eventually replaced Archer, which was my crowning achievement. I can’t believe that it took you so long to figure it out.”
“You did all of this because he exposed you for the corrupt criminal that you were?”
“My wife left me, and she took the kids. My rights were terminated, and they went into the witness protection program after she testified against me. I missed my kids growing up and graduating because of the two of you. You took everything I loved from me, and now, I’m going to show you how it feels to be utterly destroyed by someone else’s actions.”
He pressed the gun to Archer’s skull, shoving the man over to the desk and yelling at him to open the hidden computer that was sunken into the desk. Archer slid his hand over the invisible fingerprint reader and part of the desk separated from the rest of the wood, opening up to reveal a computer screen with a map of the world and an empty passcode box.
“Type in the code,” Grant said, pushing Archer again.
“I won’t,” he said. “I’m not going to obliterate an entire nation because your wife left you.”
“I’ll kill you.”
“And you won’t have the codes.”
“I’ll get them another way.”
“That is fine. I’d rather die.”
“And leave your kids without a father?”
“Elaine is a spectacular mother.”
“She’s a clone,” Grant said, laughing. “She’s been a clone for more than a year.”
Archer stared at him, into the man’s eyes, a moment of doubt flickering across his face. Maci didn’t know whether to believe Grant either, but this time the week before, she didn’t even believe in clones. She had to believe that anything was possible, and that included that Elaine was not herself anymore.
Archer shook his head.
“They’ll die anyway,” he insisted. “If I do this, someone will shoot back, and they’ll die anyway.”
“No, they won’t because I’m going to shoot you and claim that I stopped you from causing more harm. I’ll be hailed a hero, and I’ll be elected President in a landslide.”
“What about us?” Maci said.
“I have that taken care of,” he said, nodding his head.
On cue, clones dressed as SS agents stepped in through the open doors, each one holding a gun pointed at Maci, Logan, and Chad. Maci looked around, and her dismay was evident on her face. There were so many of them, and there was no way that they were going to get away.
Maci kept her gun trained on Grant, calculating her chances of getting off a good shot before she was killed and deciding that any chance was better than no chance at all.
“Don’t even think about it,” Grant said, smiling sadistically at Maci. “You’ll miss and hit Archer.”
“Archer is going to die if I die. And hitting you would be worth dying for,” Maci shot back, her voice never wav
ering.
“You’re insane,” Grant said, still laughing.
Maci looked at Logan, who was watching her and waiting for her to make a move. The clones were close, and even if one was aiming for Chad and missed, they would likely hit Logan. They were trapped, with no way out.
Logan smiled at her and winked, throwing his head back and letting out a loud, mournful howl that bounced off the vaulted ceiling and echoed down the hall.
“What the hell was that?” Grant asked, staring at Logan.
“That,” Logan said with a wry smile, “was the beginning of your worst nightmare.”
CHAPTER 15
Logan’s howl was still echoing off the walls when Maci heard answering howls that seemed to come from every corner of the building.
Maci smiled at Grant, taunting him.
“You’re in trouble now,” she said. “You think jail was bad, wait until you see this.”
“What, are you sending a pack of dogs my way?”
Grant was staring at her, turned slightly and not looking at Logan. Grant motioned to the clones with his head.
“Go see what that is and take care of it,” he said.
They left as one, not even questioning Grant’s rule over them. Maci smirked at Grant, drawing his attention to her.
“So, what happened, Grant? You sent one guy to kill Archer and that failed, so now you need an entire army of mindless clones? That is kind of pathetic.”
Rage flashed in his eyes at her words, and he turned his gun on her, then thought better of it and put the gun on Archer again.
“Shut up!” he screamed, spittle flying out of his mouth. “You’re nothing but a mouthy little witch. I should have sent the man after you and not Archer. Archer is nothing without you.”
“Then why didn’t you go after me? You should have cloned me first. That would have made sense. But, like everything else, you do things ass backwards. It’s why you never amounted to much. Small minds have small dreams.”
He was furious now, his eyes locked on hers, his attention totally focused on her. Archer was looking at her, too, his expression confused even though he was waiting for her to tell him what to do. This was her Archer. The Archer who could have a gun pointed to his head and still trust her to save him. He didn’t need to beg her to listen or try to convince her of who he was. The real Archer knew exactly who he was, and he knew exactly who she was. He trusted her with his life, and she wasn’t about to let that trust go unanswered.
“Stay out of the way,” she said quietly.
“What did you say to me?” Grant asked.
“I wasn’t talking to you.”
She swung her gun up, aiming it at Grant as Archer dropped to the floor and rolled, getting behind and under the desk in record time. Grant raged, turning the gun on Maci as a blur of dark brown fur sailed through the air and collided with Grant. Grant’s shot went wild as he went down, his screams drowning out much of what was going on around them.
Maci rushed around the side of the desk, grabbing Archer’s arm and staying low.
“Let’s go,” she said, tugging his hand even though he was already getting on his feet.
She ran by Chad as the shots in the hallway rang out and the snarls and growls of Logan’s pack echoed in the marbled halls. She stopped, turning and going back into the office, to the bust of Martin Luther King, Jr. that sat on an ornate table. She pulled on the bust, which flipped to the side, opening a secret corridor in the wall.
“Chad, come with us,” she said, quickly leading Archer into the corridor.
“I didn’t know this was here,” Archer said.
Chad came in behind them, breathing hard.
“Is this new?” Chad asked Maci.
“No,” she said. “It’s always been here.”
She grabbed a lever in the wall and pulled it, closing the hidden door behind them and turning on the lights down the entire tunnel.
“We need to hurry before the military gets here,” Maci said.
“What about Logan?” Chad asked.
“I’m going to stop them at the gate. Well, Archer is. That’s why we have to hurry. I’m sure that they’ve already been called.”
Chad and Archer ran behind her, both men struggling to keep up with her as she sprinted down the stone hallway, turning right at the end and stopping to wait for them. She pulled another lever, and another door opened.
They stepped out, and Archer looked back, laughing when he saw where they had come from.
“I always wondered why that ugly statue was there,” he said.
“Come on,” Maci said, running toward the group of reporters which had almost doubled in size.
Archer and Chad followed her as she yelled to be heard over the crowd.
“The President is here; move!” she yelled.
The crowd parted, and she led Archer to the front gate moments before General Patrick showed up.
“We need to get in,” the General said gruffly to Maci.
“Stand down,” Archer said, his voice firm.
The General was startled, looking at Archer and then recognizing him despite his rough appearance.
“Sir, are you alright?”
“I am now. I need your men to stand down. They are not to shoot, no matter what.”
“Understood,” the General said, calling out to his men over his megaphone.
Archer turned to the press, and somehow, several microphones appeared out of nowhere as he began to speak.
“My fellow Americans, three months ago, I was kidnapped, and a man was sent in my place. A look alike. You might even call him a clone. Through the diligent and dogged determination of my security team, and the help of a special group of people, I was rescued, and the man responsible has been taken care of, as well as those that worked with him to try to overthrow our government. This man had nefarious plans, and he was attempting to force me to turn over the launch codes for our nuclear weapons. I would have died first. Thanks to Agents Brown and Hardwick, as well as others, I was not put in a position where I had to choose between my life and the lives of the people I serve.”
Maci watched Archer as he spoke, her heart swelling with pride as he laid out what had been going on and how many traitors there were in the place of the real politicians. He touched on everything that had happened, explaining things in a way that didn’t alarm. He left a lot of information out, but it was when he turned his focus to the werewolves that Maci felt so proud of Archer that she thought her heart might burst.
“I want to share with you a secret that has been kept since before my time, and before the time of most of our parents and grandparents. Almost one hundred years ago, the government secretly entered into one of the first of many treaties between the humans and werewolves.” He paused for the collective gasp, then continued. “Because of falsehoods that have been spread about wolves and their families, they have largely lived out of the public eye, building their villages in remote parts of the wilderness and living among us in secret when they were allowed by the latest treaty several years before my time.”
“But aren’t we in danger?” one reporter shouted out.
“Doesn’t the public deserve to know who these wolves are?” another added.
Archer shook his head.
“The things that you’ve been told are outright lies, and I, for one, am no longer going to stand by and pretend that a registry of werewolves is an acceptable way to treat citizens of this country. They’ve been here as long as humans have walked on this soil, living in harmony among us and protecting us when the timing was right. As we speak, there is a pack of wolves in the White House, neutralizing the most ambitious threat to national security that there has been in decades. They put their lives on the line, knowing that the military would be called in to clean up when Secret Service was out-manned. They knew that their lives were in danger, yet they came here without hesitation to ensure that this land is safe for you, for me, and for our children. I think loyalty and patriotism like
that deserves recognition beyond secret treaties and clandestine meetings with politicians that are too ashamed to admit that they tap the wolf resources whenever they have a problem that is too big for a human to solve. To me, that deserves more than we’ve been giving them. Starting tomorrow, I’ll be reworking the orders that deal with werewolf/human relations. Our laws are archaic and based off fear and ignorance. That is not who we are.”
Archer paused, looking back at the house when the first of the werewolves stepped out of the house, each still in wolf form. Some were injured and limping, but Maci was relieved that everyone was accounted for except for Sam and Sara, who were still in the pickup truck a short distance away.
The wolves walked forward slowly, as if unsure of whether they should run the other way or not. Maci held her breath, her eyes darting back and forth between the wolves and the crowd that had gathered. Maci picked Logan out of the crowd, waving to him when she saw him looking her way.
The crowd was watching the wolves when the first person began clapping, and others quickly followed. Maci sighed, feeling a huge weight lift off her shoulders that she hadn’t even known was there.
Logan rushed forward, and Maci opened her arms to him, hugging his shaggy face against her chest. Archer stepped forward, putting his hand on Logan’s fur covered shoulder and smiling at the crowd.
“We can live in harmony,” he concluded as the cameras flashed and the crowd took countless pictures. “All we need to do is understand that our biggest enemy is fear.”
There was a shout from the crowd, and a man rushed forward out of nowhere. Maci saw the light reflect off the gun before it registered in her mind that another Archer had stepped forward out of the crowd.
Maci dove for Archer, the real Archer, her gun stowed in her holster and no time to aim and fire into the crowd.
Her body connected with Archer’s, and she felt Logan’s body vault over her, and heard the sickening thud as his body collided with the clone. Logan took the clone down in one smooth motion, and just like that, the threat was gone, and the crowd was cheering.
Maci crawled off of Archer, catching Chad’s eye and smiling.
The Wolf In The White House Page 16