Lady Liberty

by Vicki Hinze

  He backed away, stood behind Mendoza, and visually scanned the inner hub. He glanced twice and then a third time at the steel-faced mail chute embedded in the wall. Fixing his gaze on the captain, Cap opened the chute, retrieved a clear cylinder, inserted something into it, and then returned the cylinder to the chute.

  Captain Mendoza hadn’t noticed a thing.

  Gregor grunted at the wily old senator’s audacity. His intentions were crystal clear. Plant the launch key inside the inner hub for someone else to find. This way Cap keeps his crimes secret and to himself. No one would know the key had been delivered to him or that he had kept it for months and failed to file the mandatory report. No one would know Cap was involved.

  Clever maneuver, but predictable. The good senator wasn’t going to be able to deny his affiliation with Ballast so easily. Smiling to himself, Gregor lifted a clear plastic bubble shield on the control desk, exposing two buttons: a green one on the left and a red one on the right. He lightly rubbed the pad of a fingertip over the red button, holding a fixed gaze on the screen.

  Cap stepped out of the inner hub and into the outer rim.

  Gregor depressed the button.

  An alarm inside A-267 emitted short, shrill bursts of sound. Red lights flashed throughout the outer rim.

  The steel door between the inner hub and outer rim slid shut.

  Between the outer rim and the elevator to the surface hangar, a sheet of metal slid down from the ceiling and locked into the floor, then six-inch-thick bolts slid into braces attached to the metal.

  Cap stood in the middle of the outer rim, gape-jawed and spinning in a slow circle. “Gibson.” He shouted to be heard over the alarm’s deafening peal. “What in hell is happening?”

  The young lieutenant paused running through the emergency-duties drill and tossed the senator a deer-caught-in-headlights look. “It’s a lockdown, sir.”

  Cap let out an impatient grunt. “Well, how long is it going to last?”

  Rushed and clearly irritated at the interruption, Gibson typed furiously at the computer terminal. “I don’t know, sir.”

  “You mean this isn’t a systems test?”

  “No, sir.” Gibson stopped cold. “It’s verified and confirmed. This is not a test.”

  “What does it mean?”

  Stark fear flooded Gibson’s eyes. “It means we’re under attack, sir.”

  “By whom?”

  “We don’t know.”

  Gregor smiled. An unknown attacker… and Cap was already late for his appointment with Mr. Shottley The remote-viewing device planted in the senator’s office was once again proving to be a valuable asset. Odds looked good that he would confess quickly. For his sake, Gregor hoped so. When diabetes went neglected, diabetics faced stiff, unforgiving penalties. Potentially lethal penalties. And Gregor had no intention of reversing the lockdown until Cap confessed.

  Something strange on the monitor caught Gregors eye. The inner hub was empty. Where the hell had Mendoza gone?

  An uneasy feeling shimmied up Gregors back. In six months of monitoring, he had never—not once—seen the inner hub empty. Not until now. Mendoza would have to be dead to breach protocol.

  Austin.

  Had all hell broken loose in Florida, too? Gregor spoke into the lip mike. “ET, status report.”

  “We’ve picked up two heat sources, sir. En route now.”

  Patch was going to object; he had a soft spot for Liberty. Gregor spoke into the mike. “Under no conditions is she to leave the swamp.”

  No response.

  Gregor frowned. “Did you copy that, ET?”

  “It’s a little crazy here,” Patch said. “Special forces are all over hell’s half acre, reining in the media and locals. At most, we’ve got half an hour on them.”

  Clenching his teeth, Gregor persisted, asked again. “Did you copy, ET?”

  Again, no response.

  Gregor stood up, glared at the swamp monitor. “I said, under no circumstances is she to leave the swamp. Do you copy me, ET?”

  “Yes, sir,” he said softly. “I copy you.”

  Dropping back into his seat, Gregor muttered a curse. Wasn’t it enough that he had Austin and Cap to worry about as well as all of the forces of the United States? Now he had to demand compliance from Ballast members, too?

  Worst of all, Gregor now had doubts that his own second-in-command would obey his orders. Hearing and acknowledging the mandate didn’t guarantee that Patch would execute Lady Liberty.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Friday, August 9 First-Strike Launch: 32:41:12

  Are you being honest or sarcastic?

  Are you saying you can’t tell?

  Holding up the briefcase, Sybil slid underwater in the cold creek, hoping Westford knew what he was saying when he swore the thick, matted sawgrass at the shore meant the food chain had moved on. It was the rainy season, and fresh water ran down the rivers to the coast. The wildlife would follow it.

  The water smelled more brackish than fresh to her, but she hadn’t seen one of those gator slides Westford had pointed out earlier, when he had warned her to watch out for cottonmouths and rattlesnakes. Both, evidently, thrived in the area. Yet minnows darted at her legs, and where there were minnows, there were those creatures Mother Nature had feeding on them. The thought alone raised a shudder.

  The narrow creek wound to a bend and then disappeared out of sight. To the north, small clumps of cypress stood in water. There the water had to be fresh. But West-ford still had insisted they drink only rainwater. Considering the deluge, that hadn’t been a problem. Fish were also plentiful, but sushi wasn’t on the menu, and that brought them back to the fire/smoke challenge so, with the exception of nibbling on berries and some kind of root that had all the sensory appeal of the chunks of bark, they’d fasted. That was fine with Sybil, too. She was hungry but too worried and anxious to eat without being sick.

  Branches stretched over the rain-swelled rush of water like a canopy. Stones, fallen limbs, and heavy brush littered the shore. Cooled by all the rain, the water felt frigid against her bare skin, but she welcomed the feeling, and rubbed at her arms, washing away the quicksand grit.

  Surfacing, she dragged her hands over her face and blew out a long-held breath. The briefcase thudded against her chest.

  You need me.

  Okay, I need you.

  Are you being honest or sarcastic?

  Are you saying you can’t tell?

  Why was that exchange nagging at her? Why couldn’t she just forget about it? Forget about him?

  Wait a second. Wait. How could she forget about Westford? The man had guarded her, protected her, and repeatedly risked his life for her. She was human; of course she couldn’t forget him. God help her if she could ever become so cold and callous and ungrateful.

  But Gabby had to be wrong. Westford had taken the risks he’d taken for his veep, not for her. Hadn’t he taken a bullet for the previous veep?

  He had. She rubbed at her right thigh, gently brushing the grit away from the catbrier scratches, then noticed the bruise at her ribs. Dark purple, sore to the touch, it cut a wide swathe from her side to the center of her stomach.

  The jab from the limb in the quicksand pit. She had to think straight about Westford. No rationalizing or delusions or playing ostrich. Realistically, she was just another assignment, and he was only with her by David’s personal request. He had always been devoted to David but not to her. He had transferred to get away from her.

  And his kisses? What about those?

  Trauma-induced. Affirming life. Proximity.

  True. All true. An empty ache hollowed her chest and she stiffened against it, fighting a dawning truth: She didn’t want to be just another assignment to Jonathan Westford. She wanted to be … more. And not just in her professional life, but in her private life.

  In her private life? Shocked still, Sybil stood in the water, the mushy bottom curling around her toes and heels. This couldn’t be true. It just
couldn’t… be true. Good God, Austin had deceived her for fifteen years, and she had let him. Hadn’t she learned anything from that? How could she be feeling passion, desire, longing for any man? How could she even consider wanting a man in her life? Had she lost her mind?

  Shaking, she splashed water onto her face, hoping it would clear her head. She was a woman on a political mission. Okay. Okay, so she was human. It was lust.

  It’s not lust.

  Of course it’s lust. And for anyone except her, lust was good. Great. Lust was acceptable. It was normal to feel physically attracted to Westford. By anyone’s standards, he was incredible, and she’d been without a man for a long time. But she couldn’t be attracted to him mentally or emotionally, and she sure as hell didn’t want to feel lust for him personally. She had a promise to David to keep. No, no lust. She was just affirming life, too. There had been a lot of shocks. Who wouldn’t seek someone strong to hold on to?

  Feeling better about this, she shook off her fears about him, let go of them, and nearly smiled. How in the world had she fancied herself falling in love with any man, even Westford? After Austin, it was ridiculous. Outrageous. Not to mention impossible.

  Love?

  Shockwaves rocketed through her, and she locked her knees to keep them from buckling, then splashed herself more. Oh, no. No. Love wasn’t logical. It wasn’t an option. Not to her. Not now. Not ever again. Lust was bad enough, but love? Love was just impossible.

  You’re human, Sybil. Love is a human emotion. Why should it be impossible? Why should you be exempt?

  She wasn’t. She had tried loving a man and had failed miserably. Balancing on one foot, she rubbed the grit from her calf. She refused to be an emotional idiot twice in one lifetime.

  An emotional idiot? Since when does loving someone make you an idiot?

  That comment brought her up short and she stilled to consider it. Good God, had she become that twisted? That cowardly? She tilted her head back, let her jaw fall loose, and stared up beyond the tall pines and ancient oaks to the dismal gray sky. What had happened to her out here—hormonal overload? Swamp fever? Something had happened in this hellhole. That or she’d left her sense in Geneva.

  Stop rationalizing, Sybil. It’s cowardly After Austin, you began hiding—from him, from men, and from yourself.

  Had she really? Moving through the water, she stepped ashore and retrieved her clothes. As she dipped them in the water and scrubbed out the gritty sludge, she relived her life from the moment Cap Marlowe had confronted her with his accusations of her ethics violations on Austin’s vasectomy Relived the shame and anger that she had been lied to and betrayed and duped for so long by a man who was supposed to love her. Relived the inferiority she had felt as a woman, the humiliation of Cap Marlowe—her nemesis, for God’s sake—knowing intimate things about her private life she didn’t know. Her emotions had been strong then, and they were strong now. She had intentionally distanced herself from Austin.

  But you distanced yourself from everyone else, too. Doesn’t the fact that you refuse to call Westford by his first name prove it?

  His first name, for God’s sake. It was such a simple intimacy. What kind of person allows someone to put his life on the line for her time and again but keeps him at a distance by refusing to call him by his first name?

  Finished rinsing her underwear, she put it on. The wet silk clung to her thighs like plaster. She had divorced Austin and had reclaimed some of her self-esteem, if not her personal confidence. At least she thought she had reclaimed her self-esteem. She eased her bra straps up on her shoulders. But in refusing to trust others and shielding herself from caring too much for anyone else ever again, had she really been protecting herself?

  Or were you still hiding?

  Wringing out her skirt at the water’s edge, she paused and dragged her fingers over her skull, through her wet hair. The truth wasn’t pretty, but she had to face it. She had shut down her personal life, and she had been grateful to feel compelled to give David her promise on her conduct. It gave her a license not to risk loving anyone again. And she honestly had convinced herself that her career would be enough—that she would feel fulfilled. But she had been wrong. Gold help her, she had been so wrong. This thing with Westford wasn’t just lust.

  “Sybil.” Westford appeared between two fat bushes. “Hurry.”

  Sensing his urgency, she scrambled into her shirt and jacket, slipped to her knees in the wet sand, jerked on his socks, and then rushed to him.

  He crossed his lips with a fingertip, dropped to his knees in a thicket of mature palmettos, and whispered. “We’ve got company. Dig.”

  Dig? She fell to her knees beside him, scooped mud into a heap. Following his hand signals, they dug two trenches under the lush leaves of dense, spiny bushes. He motioned for her to lie in the first trench. Twisting, she slid inside, for once grateful for the recent downpour and thick brush.

  Silently, intently, Westford shoved dirt over her. “Smear your head and face,” he said, his voice a faint whisper of sound.

  They worked quickly, methodically, until they both were under the bushes and buried up to their necks in mud. The birds chirped in the treetops and the squirrels leapt branch to branch, tree to tree. Sybil’s heart pounded in her ears, and the reason for Westford’s drastic measures appeared from around the bend.

  Three men walked down the narrow shore and then fanned out into the brush. Through the leaves, she watched them move. All were dressed in black and were carrying equipment that, she assumed, included heat-seeking sensors, since they kept glancing at them. And all three men were heavily armed.

  President Lance finished taping his weekly public radio chat and removed the mike from his lapel. Whether they did more harm than good was a topic of hot debate among his staff, since they aired on Friday nights and gave the weekend talk-show circuit fresh fodder that gathered steam by Monday.

  Barber stepped over to him, bent low, and whispered. “They need you in the Sit, sir.”

  “Thank you, everyone,” David said, then headed toward the Situation Room.

  Sam Sayelle rounded the corner. From his rumpled look, he had been as overworked as the rest of them in the last few days. He’d also had a collision with a cup of coffee and, judging by the stain on his shirtfront, he’d lost. David whispered to Barber, “Any new word on the Dean family?”

  “Not yet, sir.”

  “Sam.” David slowed his steps. “I understand you alerted us to the Dean family situation. I appreciate your taking the initiative and checking it out.”

  “Any luck locating them, sir?”

  “I’m hoping so. We’ll keep you posted.” David increased his pace, to avoid having to talk around more questions he couldn’t answer, then entered the Situation Room. The two dozen men and women seated around the conference table rose to their feet. “Please, sit down.” David took his chair at the head of the table.

  Commander Conlee cleared his throat. “Mr. President.”

  David had always liked Conlee. He was in his fifties with short, spiky gray hair and a face that had seen too much misery and too little laughter. Conlee was dependable and forthright, and he never licked boots. He called things as he saw them, which was no small part of the reason he wore a chest full of medals and deserved every one of them. Conlee didn’t impress easily, and he never backed down if he was right. Not such good traits on the diplomatic side of government business, but admirable traits for a commander. No one on the planet understood covert operations or operatives better than Donald Conlee. “Go ahead, Commander.”

  “Minutes ago an unknown party locked down A-267. So far there has been no interference with operations or any attempt to infiltrate our systems. We have nine authorized personnel locked in their individual offices in the outer rim and two locked in its reception area: Lieutenant Gibson and Senator Marlowe.”

  “What was Cap doing there?”

  “Pulling a no-notice inspection, sir,” Conlee said. “There’s an added
complication with the senator, sir. Dr. Richardson will brief you on that.” Conlee gave Richardson the go-ahead nod.

  “Without getting into medical jargon and double-talk, please.”

  “Of course, Mr. President,” Richardson said. “Simply put, Senator Marlowe is a diabetic and he’s overdue for an insulin injection. He can’t get out of the outer rim, and we can’t get in to give him one. Right now the senator isn’t feeling well, but unless we can get some insulin into him soon, he is going to get worse. The longer the delay, the more severe his condition will become. Bluntly speaking, sir, he could crash.”

  Another complication David did not need. “Define crash.”

  “He could lapse into a diabetic coma, sir. Or he could die.”

  Richardson sat down, and David laced his hands on the tabletop and shifted his gaze to Conlee. “Can’t we override this infiltrator’s lockdown commands?”

  “No sir,” Conlee said. “Our controls have been rendered useless.”

  “So we’re sitting ducks?”

  “That’s a fair assessment of our current position, sir.”

  “Someday someone is going to have to explain to me why the most powerful nation in the world is so vulnerable it loses control of its own assets.”

  “Forty percent budget cutbacks for three years in a row has a formidable impact, sir,” Conlee said. “Vulnerability is just one of many challenges created.”

  Agreeing, but not inclined to debate, David returned to the matter at hand. “Is the inner hub intact?” He was almost afraid to ask.

  Conlee cleared his throat, obviously not eager to respond to this one. “Intact but empty, sir.”

  “What?” The inner hub was never empty.

  “Captain Mendoza was on duty,” Conlee explained. “Immediately after Senator Marlowe left the hub, the site locked down. Mendoza was at his station then. But when the lockdown completed, he was gone.”

  “That’s impossible,” a puzzled Barber interjected. “There is only one way in or out. Mendoza had to have walked past the senator.”