by Dean Koontz
Eventually, she said, “We’d better stop in Copper Mountain, see if we can find new wheels. This truck’s too recognizable.”
“Okay.”
She switched off the computer. Unplugged it.
The mountains were dark with evergreens and pale with snow.
The moon was setting behind the truck, and the night sky ahead was ablaze with stars.
FIFTEEN
Eve Jammer hated Washington, D.C., in August. Actually, she hated Washington through all seasons with equal passion. Admittedly, the city was pleasant for a short while, when the cherry blossoms were in bloom; during the rest of the year it sucked. Humid, crowded, noisy, dirty, crime-ridden. Full of boring, stupid, greedy politicians whose ideals were either in their pants or in their pants pockets. It was an inconvenient place for a capital, and sometimes she dreamed about moving the government elsewhere, when the time was right. Maybe to Las Vegas.
As she drove through the sweltering August heat, she had the air conditioner in her Chrysler Town Car turned nearly to its highest setting, with the fans on maximum blow. Freezing air blasted across her face and body and up her skirt, but she was still hot. Part of the heat, of course, had nothing to do with the day: She was so horny she could have won a headbutting duel with a ram.
She hated the Chrysler almost as much as she hated Washington. With all her money and position, she ought to have been able to drive a Mercedes, if not a Rolls-Royce. But a politician’s wife had to be careful of appearances—at least for a while yet. It was impolitic to drive a foreign-made car.
Eighteen months had passed since Eve Jammer had met Roy Miro and had learned the nature of her true destiny. For sixteen months, she had been married to the widely admired Senator E. Jackson Haynes, who would head the party’s national ticket in next year’s election. That wasn’t speculation. It had already been arranged, and all his rivals would screw up one way or another in the primaries, leaving him standing alone, a giant of a man on the world scene.
Personally, she loathed E. Jackson Haynes and wouldn’t let him touch her, except in public. Even then, there were several pages of rules that he’d been required to memorize, defining the acceptable limits relating to affectionate hugs, kisses on the cheek, and hand holding. The recordings that she had of him in his Vegas hideaway, engaged in sex with several different little girls and boys below the age of twelve, had ensured his prompt acceptance of her proposal of marriage and the strict terms of convenience under which their relationship would be conducted.
Jackson didn’t pout too much or too often about the arrangement. He was keen on the idea of being president. And without the library of recordings that Eve possessed, which incriminated all of his most serious political rivals, he wouldn’t have had a chance in hell of getting close to the White House.
For a while, she had worried that a few of the politicians and power brokers whose enmity she had earned would be too thickheaded to realize that the boxes in which she’d put them were inescapable. If they terminated her, they would all fall in the biggest, dirtiest series of political scandals in history. More than scandals. Many of these servants of the people had committed outrages appalling enough to cause riots in the streets, even if federal agents were dispatched with machine guns to quell them.
Some of the worst hard-asses hadn’t been convinced that she’d secreted copies of her recordings all over the world or that the contents of those laser discs were destined for the airwaves within hours of her death, from multiple—and, in many cases, automated—sources. The last of them had come around, however, when she had accessed their home television sets through satellite and cable facilities—while blocking all other customers—and had played for them, one by one, fragments of their recorded crimes. Sitting in their own bedrooms and dens, they had listened with astonishment, terrified that she was broadcasting those fragments to the world.
Computer technology was wonderful.
Many of the hard-asses had been with wives or mistresses when those unexpected, intensely personal broadcasts had appeared on their television screens. In most cases, their significant others were as guilty or as power mad as they were themselves, and eager to keep their mouths shut. However, one influential senator and a member of the president’s cabinet had been married to women who exhibited bizarre moral codes and who refused to keep secret what they had learned. Before divorce proceedings and public revelations could begin, both had been shot to death at different automatic-teller machines on the same night. That tragedy resulted in the lowering of the nation’s flag at all government buildings, citywide, for twenty-four hours—and in the introduction of a bill in Congress to require the posting of health warnings on all automated tellers.
Eve turned the air conditioner control to the highest setting. Just thinking about those women’s expressions when she’d put the gun to their heads made her hotter than ever.
She was still two miles from Cloverfield, and the Washington traffic was terrible. She wanted to blow her horn and flip a stiff finger at some of the insufferable morons who were causing the snarls at the intersections, but she had to be discreet. The next First Lady of the United States could not be seen flipping off anyone. Besides, she had learned from Roy that anger was a weakness. Anger should be controlled and transformed into that only truly ennobling emotion—compassion. These bad drivers didn’t want to tie up traffic; they were simply lacking in sufficient intellect to drive well. Their lives were probably blighted in many ways. They deserved not anger but compassionate release to a better world, whenever that release could be privately given.
She considered jotting down license numbers, to make it possible to find some of these poor souls later and, at her leisure, give them that gift of gifts. She was in too great a hurry, however, to be as compassionate as she would have liked.
She couldn’t wait to get to Cloverfield and share the good news about Daddy’s generosity. Through a complex chain of international trusts and corporations, her father—Thomas Summerton, First Deputy Attorney General of the United States—had transferred three hundred million dollars of his holdings to her, which provided her with as much freedom as did the laser-disc recordings from two years in that spider-infested Vegas bunker.
The smartest thing she had ever done, in a life of smart moves, was not to squeeze Daddy for money years ago, when she’d first gotten the goods on him. She had asked, instead, for a job with the agency. Daddy had believed that she’d wanted the bunker job because it was so easy: nothing to do down there but sit, read magazines, and collect a hundred thousand a year in salary. He’d made the mistake of thinking that she was a not-too-bright, small-time hustler.
Some men never seemed to stop thinking with their pants long enough to get wise. Tom Summerton was one of them.
Ages ago, when Eve’s mother had been Daddy’s mistress, he would have been wise to treat her better. But when she got pregnant and refused to abort the baby, he had dumped her. Hard. Even in those days, Daddy had been a rich young man and heir to even more, and although he hadn’t achieved much political power yet, he’d had great ambition. He easily could have afforded to treat Mama well. When she threatened to go public and ruin his reputation, however, he’d sent a couple of goons to beat her up, and she’d nearly had a miscarriage. Thereafter, poor Mama had been a bitter, frightened woman until the day she died.
Daddy had been thinking with his pants when he’d been stupid enough to keep a fifteen-year-old mistress like Mama. And later he’d been thinking with his pants pockets when he should have been thinking with his head or his heart.
He was thinking with his pants again when he’d allowed Eve to seduce him—though, of course, he hadn’t ever seen her before and hadn’t known that she was his daughter. By then, he had forgotten poor Mama as if she’d been a one-night stand, although he had been putting it to her for two years before he dumped her. And if Mama barely existed in his memory, the possibility of having fathered a child had been wiped off his mental slate completely.
Eve had not simply seduced him but had reduced him to a state of animal lust that, over a period of weeks, made him the easiest of marks. When she eventually suggested a little fantasy role-playing, wherein they would act like father and violated daughter in bed, he had been excited. Her pretend-resistance and pitiful cries of rape excited him to new feats of endurance. Preserved on high-resolution videotape. From four angles. Recorded on the finest audio equipment. She’d saved some of his ejaculate in order to have a genetic match done with a sample of her own blood, to convince him that she was, indeed, his darling child. The tape of their role-playing would unquestionably be viewed by authorities as nothing less than forcible incest.
Upon being presented with that package, Daddy had for once in his life thought with his brain. He was convinced that killing her would not save him, so he had been willing to pay whatever was necessary to buy her silence. He’d been surprised and pleased when she’d asked not for any of his money but for a secure, well-paid government job. He’d been less pleased when she’d wanted to know a lot more about the agency and the secret derring-do about which he’d bragged once or twice in bed. After a few difficult days, however, he had seen the wisdom of bringing her into the agency fold.
“You’re a cunning little bitch,” he said when they had reached agreement. He’d put an arm around her with genuine affection.
He had been disappointed, after giving her the job, to learn that they would not continue sleeping together, but he had gotten over that loss in time. He really had thought that “cunning” was the best word to describe her. Her ability to use her position in the bunker for her own ends didn’t become clear to him until he learned that she had married E. Jackson Haynes, after a whirlwind courtship of two days, and had managed to put most of the powerful politicians in the city under her thumb. Then she had gone to him to begin discussions regarding an inheritance—and Daddy had discovered that “cunning” might not be a sufficiently descriptive word.
Now she reached the end of the entrance drive to Cloverfield and parked at a red curb near the front door, beside a sign that stated NO PARKING ANYTIME. She put one of Jackson’s “Member of Congress” cards on the dashboard, relished the icy air of the Chrysler for one more moment, then stepped out into the August heat and humidity.
Cloverfield—all white columns and stately walls—was one of the finest institutions of its kind in the continental United States. A liveried doorman greeted her. The concierge at the main desk in the lounge was a distinguished-looking British gentleman named Danfield, though she didn’t know if that was his first or last name.
After Danfield signed her in and chatted pleasantly with her, Eve walked the familiar route through the hushed halls. Original paintings by famous American artists of previous centuries were well complemented by antique Persian runners on wine-dark mahogany floors polished to a watery sheen.
When she entered Roy’s suite, she found the dear man shuffling around in his walker, getting some exercise. With the attention of the finest specialists and therapists in the world, he had regained full use of his arms. Increasingly, he seemed certain to be able to walk on his own again within a few months—though with a limp.
She gave him a dry kiss on the cheek. He favored her with one even dryer.
“You’re more beautiful every time you visit,” he said.
“Well, men’s heads still turn,” she said, “but not like they used to, not when I have to wear clothes like these.”
A future First Lady of the United States couldn’t dress as would a former Las Vegas showgirl who’d gotten a thrill out of driving men insane. These days she even wore a bra that spread her breasts out and restrained them, to make her appear less amply endowed than she really was.
She had never been a showgirl anyway, and her surname had not been Jammer but Lincoln, as in Abraham. She had attended school in five different states and West Germany, because her father had been a career military man who’d been transferred from base to base. She had graduated from the Sorbonne in Paris and had spent a number of years teaching poor children in the Kingdom of Tonga, in the South Pacific. At least, that was what every data record would reveal to even the most industrious reporter armed with the most powerful computer and the cleverest mind.
She and Roy sat side by side on a settee. Pots of hot tea, an array of pastries, clotted cream, and jam had been provided on a charming little Chippendale table.
While they sipped and munched, she told him about the three hundred million that her father had transferred to her. Roy was so happy for her that tears came to his eyes. He was a dear man.
They talked about the future.
The time when they could be together again, every night, without any subterfuge, seemed depressingly distant. E. Jackson Haynes would assume the office of president on January twentieth, seventeen months hence. He and the vice-president would be assassinated the following year—though Jackson was unaware of that detail. With the approval of constitutional scholars and the advice of the Supreme Court of the United States, both houses of Congress would take the unprecedented step of calling for a special election. Eve Marie Lincoln Haynes, widow of the martyred president, would run for the office, be elected by a landslide, and begin serving her first term.
“A year after that, I’ll have mourned a decent length of time,” she told Roy. “Don’t you think a year?”
“More than decent. Especially as the public will love you so much and want happiness for you.”
“And then I can marry the heroic FBI agent who tracked down and killed that escaped maniac, Steven Ackblom.”
“Four years until we’re together forever,” Roy said. “Not so long, really. I promise you, Eve, I’ll make you happy and do honor to my position as First Gentleman.”
“I know you will, darling,” she said.
“And by then, anyone who doesn’t like anything you do—”
“—we shall treat with utmost compassion.”
“Exactly.”
“Now let’s not talk anymore about how long we have to wait. Let’s discuss more of your wonderful ideas. Let’s make plans.”
For a long time they talked about uniforms for a variety of new federal organizations they wished to create, with a special focus on whether metal snaps and zippers were more exciting than traditional bone buttons.
SIXTEEN
In the broiling sun, hard-bodied young men and legions of strikingly attractive women in the briefest of bikinis soaked up the rays and casually struck poses for one another. Children built sand castles. Retirees sat under umbrellas, wearing straw hats, soaking up the shade. They were all happily oblivious of eyes in the sky and of the possibility that they could be instantaneously vaporized at the whim of politicians of various nationalities—or even by a demented-genius computer hacker, living in a cyberpunk fantasy, in Cleveland or London or Cape Town or Pittsburgh.
As he walked along the shore, near the tide line, with the huge hotels piled one beside the other to his right, he rubbed lightly at his face. His beard itched. He’d had it for six months, and it wasn’t a scruffy-looking beard. On the contrary, it was soft and full, and Ellie insisted that he was even more handsome with it than without it. Nevertheless, on a hot August day in Miami Beach, it itched as if he had fleas, and he longed to be clean-shaven.
Besides, he liked the appearance of his beardless face. During the eighteen months since the night on which Godzilla had attacked the ranch in Vail, a superb plastic surgeon in the private-pay sector of the British medical establishment had performed three separate procedures on the cicatrix. It had been reduced to a hairline scar that was virtually invisible even when he was tanned. Additional work had been done on his nose and chin.
He used scores of names these days, but neither Spencer Grant nor Michael Ackblom was one of them. Among his closest friends in the resistance, he was known as Phil Richards. Ellie had chosen to keep her first name and adopt Richards as her last. Rocky responded as well to “Killer” as
he had to his previous name.
Phil turned his back to the ocean, made his way between the ranks of sunbathers, and entered the lushly landscaped grounds of one of the newer hotels. In sandals, white shorts, and a flamboyant Hawaiian shirt, he resembled countless other tourists.
The hotel swimming pool was bigger than a football field and as freeform as any tropical lagoon. Artificial-rock perimeter. Artificial-rock sunning islands in the center. A two-story waterfall spilling into one palm-shaded end.
In a grotto behind the cascading water, the poolside bar could be reached either on foot or by swimmers. It was a Polynesian-style pavilion with plenty of bamboo, dry palm fronds, and conch shells. The cocktail waitresses wore thongs, wraparound skirts made from a bright orchid-patterned fabric, and matching bikini tops; each had a fresh flower pinned in her hair.
The Padrakian family—Bob, Jean, and their eight-year-old son, Mark—were sitting at a small table near the grotto wall. Bob was drinking rum and Coke, Mark was having a root beer, and Jean was nervously shredding a cocktail napkin and chewing on her lower lip.
Phil approached the table and startled Jean—to whom he was a stranger—by loudly saying, “Hey, Sally, you look fabulous,” and by giving her a hug and a kiss on the cheek. He ruffled Mark’s hair: “How you doing, Pete? I’m going to take you snorkeling later—what do you think of that?” Vigorously shaking hands with Bob, he said, “Better watch that gut, buddy, or you’re going to wind up looking like Uncle Morty.” Then he sat down with them and quietly said, “Pheasants and dragons.”
A few minutes later, after he had finished a piña colada and surreptitiously studied the other customers in the bar to be sure that none of them was unusually interested in the Padrakians, Phil paid for all their drinks with cash. He walked with them into the hotel, chatting about nonexistent mutual relatives. Through the frigid lobby. Out under the porte cochere, into the stifling heat and humidity. As far as he could tell, no one was trailing or watching them.