Split Second

by David Baldacci

  Secret Service. So what does your dad do? No one else had been arrested in connection with the assassination. The official conclusion was that Ramsey acted alone.

  Finished for now with the paper trail, she picked up the video that was part of the official record. She popped it into the VCR underneath the TV and turned it on. She sat back and watched as the scene from the hotel meet-and-greet during the Ritter campaign materialized on the TV. This video had been taken by a local television crew filming the Ritter event. It had put the final nail in King’s coffin. Despite taking great pains to make sure such a mistake was never repeated, the Service had chosen not to show this video to its recruits. Perhaps out of embarrassment, Michelle thought.

  She stiffened when she saw the confident-looking Clyde Ritter and his entourage enter the packed room. She knew little about Ritter other than that he had started life as a TV minister and made a considerable fortune. Thousands of people from across the country had sent him money, in amounts large and small. There’d been claims that numerous wealthy older women, mostly widows, had given him their life savings in exchange for his promise they’d go to heaven. Yet there was no hard evidence of that, and the furor died down. After leaving the quasi-religious life he ran for and was elected to Congress from a southern state, though she didn’t know which one. He had a dubious voting record on racial and other issues of civil liberties, and his brand of religion was over the top. Yet he was beloved in his state, and there were enough voters in the country dissatisfied with the direction of the major party platforms that Ritter had run for president, as an independent. That grand ambition had ended with a bullet in his heart.

  Next to Ritter was his campaign manager. Michelle had looked him up in the file too. He was Sidney Morse. The son of a prominent California attorney and an heiress mother, Sidney Morse had been, strangely enough, a playwright and stage director before turning his considerable artistic talents to the political arena. He earned a national reputation managing large political campaigns, turning them into media-driven extravaganzas with emphasis on sound bites and perception over any kind of substance, and his win rate was astonishingly high. That probably said more for the gullibility of the modern voter than the high standards of the modern candidate, Michelle thought.

  Morse became a troubleshooter for hire, crossing the political aisle when the money and situation were right. He joined the cause when Ritter’s campaign really started to take off and the candidate needed a more seasoned helmsman. Morse had the reputation for being brilliant, crafty and, when called for, ruthless. All sides agreed that he helped Ritter run a damn near perfect campaign. And from all accounts he enjoyed the hell out of rocking the establishment with his third-party juggernaut. However, Morse had been a political outcast after Ritter’s assassination, and his life had been in a downward spiral. Over a year ago Morse, his mind gone, had been committed to a state mental institution where he’d probably live out the rest of his life.

  Michelle stiffened again when she saw Sean King directly behind the candidate. She mentally counted off the agents in the room. There weren’t that many, she realized. She’d had three times that number on her Bruno detail. King was the only agent anywhere near Ritter. She wondered who’d come up with that lousy plan.

  As an avid student of her agency’s history, Michelle knew that the Secret Service’s mission had evolved over time. It had taken the tragic deaths of three presidents, Lincoln, Garfield and McKinley, for Congress to act substantively on the issue of presidential security. Teddy Roosevelt received the first real dose of Secret Service protection after McKinley was gunned down, although things were far less sophisticated back then. As late as the 1940s Harry Truman, Franklin Roosevelt’s newly elected vice president, didn’t even have a Secret Service agent assigned to him until one of Truman’s aides argued convincingly that a person who was a single heartbeat away from becoming the most powerful man in the world was damn well entitled to at least one professional lawman with a gun watching over him.

  As the meet-and-greet went on, she watched Agent King do all the right things, his gaze constantly moving. The Secret Service drilled that practice into you. Once, the Service had competed with other federal law enforcement agencies to see which of them was best at telling when someone was lying. The Service had won hands-down. To Michelle the reason was obvious. An agent on protection detail spent most of his or her time trying to divine the innermost thoughts and motives of people solely from their exteriors.

  And then the moment came. King seemed riveted by something to his right. So enthralled was Michelle at speculating on what he could have been looking at that she didn’t see Ramsey pull his weapon and fire. She jumped when the sound came and realized that, like King, her attention had also wandered. She rewound the tape and watched Ramsey slip his hand into his coat pocket, partially hiding the movement behind a Ritter sign he was holding with his other hand. You couldn’t see the gun clearly until Ramsey pointed it at the candidate and fired. King recoiled, presumably as the bullet exited Ritter and hit him in the hand. As Ritter collapsed, the crowd burst into complete hysteria. The cameraman filming the video had apparently dropped to his knees, and Michelle saw torsos and legs running helter-skelter. Other agents and security personnel were pushed back against the sides of the room by the mad rush of frightened people. It only took seconds and seemed like forever to her. And then the cameraman must have stood again, because Sean King returned to the screen.

  Blood streaming down his hand, King had his gun out, pointed directly at Ramsey, who still held his own weapon. It is a normal human reaction to flinch, panic and fall to the ground, immobile, when a shot is fired. Training at the Service was designed to override this instinct. When an unknown fired a shot, you moved! You grabbed the protectee and got the hell out of there as fast as you could, often physically carrying the person in the process. King did not do that, principally because, Michelle assumed, he had a man in front of him holding a gun.

  King fired once, twice, calmly it seemed; he didn’t say a word that Michelle could tell. And then as Ramsey fell, King simply stood there, looking down at the dead candidate as other agents finally dashed forward and grabbed Ritter and, their training still working, rushed off with him, leaving King behind to face the music.

  Michelle would have given anything to know what the man was thinking right at that moment.

  She rewound the tape and watched it again. The bang came as Ramsey fired. But there had been a sound before that. She rewound the tape again and listened intently. There it was, like a beep or a clang, or a ding. That was it. A ding! It was coming from the direction where King was staring. And she seemed to hear a slight hush or whooshing sound.

  She thought rapidly. A ding in a hotel almost always meant that an elevator car had arrived. And the whooshing sound could have been the elevator doors opening. The diagram of the room where Ritter was shot showed a bank of elevators. If an elevator door had opened, had it revealed anything to Sean King? And if so, why hadn’t he said? And why hadn’t anyone else seen something? Lastly, why hadn’t anyone picked up on what she had just noted after having watched the tape a couple of times? But why was she so interested in Sean King and his plight from eight years ago? And yet she was interested. After days of tedium she wanted to do something. She needed action. Impulsively Michelle packed her bag and checked out of the hotel.

  CHAPTER

  14

  LIKE MICHELLE MAXWELL, King had also risen early and was also out on the water. He was, however, in a kayak, not a scull, and was going considerably slower than Michelle. The lake was ripple-free at this hour, and the quietest it would be all day. This was the perfect place to think, and he needed to do a lot of that. Yet it wasn’t to be.

  He heard his name being called and looked up. She was standing on the rear deck of his house, calling out to him and holding up a cup of what he assumed was coffee. Joan was wearing the pajamas he kept in the guest bedroom. He took his time paddling back in and then walk
ed slowly up to the house where she met him at the back door.

  She smiled. “Apparently you were the first up, but no coffee was on. That’s okay, I live to provide suitable backup.”

  He accepted the coffee from her and sat at the table after she insisted on making him breakfast. He watched her prancing barefoot around his kitchen in the pajamas, apparently playing the role of the happy vixen housewife with aplomb. He remembered that Joan, though one of the toughest agents the Service had ever produced, could be as feminine as any woman, and in private moments she could be downright sexually explosive.

  “Still prefer scrambled?”

  “That’s fine,” he answered.

  “Bagel, no butter?”

  “Yep.”

  “God, you’re so predictable.”

  I guess so, he thought. He ventured a question of his own. “Any news on Jennings’s death, or am I not cleared for it?”

  She stopped cracking eggs. “That’s FBI territory, you know that.”

  “Agencies talk to each other.”

  “Not any more than they used to, really, and that was never a lot.”

  “So you know nothing.” He said this in an accusatory manner.

  She didn’t answer, and instead scrambled the eggs, toasted the bagel and presented the meal complete with silverware, napkin and more coffee. She sat across from him and sipped orange juice while he ate.

  “Not having anything?” he asked.

  “I’m watching my figure. Apparently I’m the only one here doing that.”

  Was it his imagination, or did her foot graze his leg underneath the table?

  “What did you expect? After eight years we just jump back into the sack?”

  She tipped her head back and laughed. “In an occasional fantasy, yes.”

  “You’re crazy, you know that? I mean certifiable.” He was not joking.

  “And I had such a normal childhood. Maybe I’m just a sucker for a man in shades packing heat.”

  Okay, that time it was clear. Her foot had touched his leg. He was sure of that because it was still there and currently heading toward certain private areas of his person.

  She leaned forward. Her gaze was not soulful; it was predatory. Clearly she wanted him, here, now, on the kitchen table in the middle of his “predictable scrambled eggs.” She stood and slid off the pajama bottoms, revealing flimsy white panties. Next she slowly and deliberately undid the pajama top as though challenging him to stop her at each button. He didn’t. He just watched as the pajama top opened. She wore no bra. Joan dropped the pajama top in his lap and with one hand swept the dishes off the table and onto the floor.

  “It’s been way too long, Sean. So let’s just do something about it.” She climbed up on the table in front of him and lay on her back, her thighs spread. Joan smiled as he stood, towering over her in her glorious, pandering near-nakedness.

  “You going mainstream on me?” he asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  He glanced at the light fixture on the ceiling. “You didn’t go for the three-pointer with your underwear.”

  “Oh, but the day’s still young, Mr. King.”

  Her smile disappeared as King picked up the pajama top and laid it delicately over her private parts.

  “I’m going to get dressed. I’d appreciate if you’d clean up this mess.”

  As he walked away, he heard her laughing. By the time he got to the top of the stairs, she called out, “You’ve finally grown up, Sean, I’m so impressed.” He shook his head and wondered what insane asylum she had escaped from.

  “Thanks for breakfast,” he called back.

  As King was coming back downstairs after showering and dressing, there was a knock at the door. He glanced out the window and was surprised to see a police car, a U.S. Marshals van and a black SUV. He answered the door.

  He knew Todd Williams, the police chief, since Sean was one of Todd’s volunteer deputies. Todd looked distraught as one of two FBI agents stepped forward and flashed his credentials like he was brandishing a switchblade.

  “Sean King? We understand that you have a pistol registered to you.”

  King nodded. “I’m a volunteer deputy. The public likes to see us armed in case we have to shoot any bad guys. So?”

  “So we’d like to see it. In fact, we’d like to take it.”

  King glanced sharply at Williams, who looked at him and shrugged and then took a huge, symbolic step backward.

  “You have a warrant?” King asked.

  “You’re a former federal agent. We hoped you’d cooperate.”

  “I’m also a lawyer, and we’re not a real cooperative breed.”

  “It’s up to you. I’ve got the paper right here.”

  King had pulled that same trick before as a fed. His “search warrant” was often a photocopy of a New York Times crossword puzzle neatly folded. “Show it to me,” he demanded.

  The warrant was produced and it was for real. They wanted his service revolver.

  “Can I ask why?”

  “You can ask,” said the agent.

  Now the deputy U.S. marshal stepped forward. He was about fifty, stood about six-five and was built like a professional boxer, with broad shoulders, long arms and huge hands.

  “Let’s just cut the cute shit, okay?” he said to the agent before looking at King. “They want to match it against the slug taken out of Jennings. I’m assuming you don’t have a problem with that.”

  “You think I shot Howard Jennings in my office and used my own service revolver to do it? What, as a matter of convenience, or because I’m too cheap to spring for another gun?”

  “Just eliminating possibilities,” said the man pleasantly. “You know the drill. Being a Secret Service agent and all.”

  “Was. Was a Secret Service agent.” He turned. “I’ll get the gun.”

  The big man put a hand on King’s shoulder. “No. Just show them where it is.”

  “So let them in my house and they can go merrily along picking up evidence to build a case against me?”

  “An innocent man has nothing to hide,” the deputy marshal shot back. “Besides, they won’t peek, Scout’s honor.”

  An FBI agent followed King inside. As they walked down the hall, the agent looked in surprise at the mess in the kitchen.

  “My dog is kind of wild,” explained King.

  The man nodded. “I got a black Lab named Trigger. What’s yours?”

  “Pit bull bitch named Joan.”

  They went to his den, where King opened the lockbox and then motioned the agent to inspect the contents. The man bagged the pistol, handed him a receipt for the weapon and followed King back outside.

  “Sorry about this, Sean,” said Todd. “I know it’s all a crock.” The good police chief didn’t sound like he meant it, King noted.

  As the men pulled off in their vehicles, Joan came down the stairs, fully dressed.

  “What did they want?”

  “Collecting for the policemen’s ball.”

  “Uh-huh. Are you a suspect or what?”

  “They took my gun.”

  “You have an alibi, right?”

  “I was on patrol. I saw nobody and nobody saw me.”

  “Too bad I wasn’t here earlier. I could have given you a hell of an alibi if you had just played your cards right.” She raised her right hand and placed her other on an imaginary Bible. “Your Honor, Mr. King is innocent because at the time of said murder, yours truly was getting seriously banged on the kitchen table by the said Mr. King.”

  “Maybe in your dreams.”

  “It has been in my dreams. But now I think I’m too late.”

  “Joan, do me a great favor: get out of my house.”

  She stepped back, her eyes searching his. “You’re not honestly worried about it, are you? The ballistics won’t match and that’ll be it.”

  “You think so?”

  “I’m assuming you had your gun with you while you were on patrol.”

&nb
sp; “Of course, I did. My slingshot’s broken.”

  “Jokes. You always made stupid jokes when you were the most nervous.”

  “A guy is dead, Joan, in my office, dead. None of this is really funny.”

  “Unless you murdered the man, I don’t see how your gun could have done it.” He didn’t answer and she said, “Is there something you haven’t told the police?”

  “I didn’t kill Jennings, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

  “I wasn’t thinking it. I know you too well.”

  “Well, people change, they really do.”

  She picked up her bag. “Would it be all right if I came to visit you again?” She added quickly, “If I swear not to do that.” She glanced over at the trashed kitchen table.

  “Why did you do it?” he asked.

  “Eight years ago I lost something important to me. This morning I tried to get it all back, using a method that turned out to be embarrassingly stupid.”

  “What’s the point of our seeing each other again?”

  “I actually have something I want to ask you.”

  “So ask.”

  “Not now. Another time. I’ll be in touch.”

  After she left, he started to pick up the kitchen. In a few minutes everything was clean and back in order. If only he could do the same thing to his life. However, he had a feeling that a lot more things were going to be broken before this was over.