“Can we give you a ride?” Melanie said.
“That would be great,” Brian said. She debated asking him to come back to her apartment for a drink. She didn’t want to misread his signs. He had ended the date, but he’d been the one pursuing her all week. She glanced down at her BlackBerry. He did the same.
“Anything good on yours?” he asked her, skimming his messages.
“Nothing,” she said, smiling at him, “How about yours? Anything good?”
“Nothing,” he answered.
As they rode the short distance to Melanie’s building, Walter and Sherry were doing their best imitation of invisible people. Brian glanced toward the front seat, but neither of them looked up. He moved closer to Melanie and leaned in to kiss her. She kissed him back.
They stopped at the last traffic light before Melanie’s building. What the hell, Melanie thought.
“I was wondering if you’d like to come up for a drink,” she said quietly.
“I would like that,” he said, smiling and kissing her again.
Walter and Sherry were silent when they pulled up to Melanie’s building, but Melanie could swear she saw Walter wink at Brian when he got out. She cringed.
“Good night, guys,” she said to them. “See you tomorrow.”
They waved. “G’night,” they said in unison.
Melanie felt some butterflies in her stomach on the elevator ride up. Once inside, he pulled her toward him and kissed her again. It was a long, flirty kiss that felt like the beginning of exactly what Melanie had been preparing for when she’d pulled out her lacy underwear.
He untied her wrap dress, and it fell open as they stood in her entryway kissing. It was so natural, but she needed to slow things down a bit. She pulled away from him slightly.
“Why don’t you open the bottle of wine on the counter, and I’ll just be one second?” she said to him.
“I can handle that,” he said.
She went into her bedroom and sat down on her bed. She slipped out of her dress and sat on the bed in her underwear. It had been so long since she’d had a man in her apartment. Charlotte would have gotten a kick out of the fact that Melanie had lured a younger man back to her place.
Thinking of Charlotte made her look at her BlackBerry. She saw an urgent message to call the Situation Room at the same time her cell phone and home phone rang. She heard another phone ringing that didn’t sound familiar to her. It was Brian’s cell phone. She heard him answer before she could get to her own phones. She opened the door to her bedroom and saw his face turn white before he hung up his phone.
“Marine One crashed in Afghanistan,” he said. “I need to confirm that the president is still alive.” He looked at Melanie as she stood in the doorway between her bedroom and the living room, suddenly feeling foolish in just her black bra and panties.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Dale
Dale heard voices, but she couldn’t make them out. She thought, at times, that they were talking to her, but she couldn’t be sure. She knew someone had been hurt. Something had crashed.
Was I in a crash? she wondered. She wasn’t sure. No, I’m fine, she decided.
But then she tried to open her eyes, and she couldn’t. She’d start to try to talk, but there were tubes in her mouth. She’d try to move her hands, but they were tied down. She felt panic growing in her chest and legs. Where was she?
But then the woman with the cool hands and familiar voice would put her hand on her arm or her face and talk in low, soothing tones. The woman would call for someone else, and that person would come into the room and put something into the bag hanging above her arm, and she’d sleep again.
Dale kept trying to make out her face. She recognized the voice but couldn’t place it yet. At first, she thought it was her mother, but it wasn’t her mother’s voice.
And her mother’s hands were always warm. Besides, her mother wouldn’t be this calm if someone had crashed.
Dale could hear the woman breathing in the chair next to her bed. The woman didn’t talk, and when she left the room, it was never for long.
She always came back and sat in the chair next to her bed.
Dale was tired again.
She’d figure it out the next time she woke up.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Charlotte
How is she?” she asked the doctor for the hundredth time.
“We don’t know, Madam President. We won’t know until she wakes up,” she said.
What she did not and would not say was that they didn’t know for sure if she would wake up.
Charlotte didn’t know how long she’d been sitting there. It felt like days, but there wasn’t a chance that she’d be left alone that long, especially after what had transpired. She’d stood in the operating room while they worked on Dale. It wasn’t like scenes of operating rooms in the movies or on television shows. It was quiet and calm. No one talked. The doctors just worked on her for what felt like twelve hours but was probably more like five or six. She had shrapnel in her lower abdomen. It had hit her just where her flak jacket stopped and had gone almost all the way through her body, from just below her belly button all the way through to her back. At first, they were concerned that she’d be paralyzed, but her spinal column had been spared. They worked to repair her stomach and intestines for hours, and just as they repaired one organ, they found bleeding in another. The doctors asked Charlotte to leave a few times, but she made it clear that she wasn’t planning on going anywhere.
Charlotte hadn’t been more than twenty feet away from Dale since they’d brought her in from the crash site. When they moved her to the ICU, where she’d stay until her condition was stable enough to travel to the military hospital in Germany, Charlotte sat in a chair in her room.
A military aide knocked on the door. “Madam President, Secretary Taylor would like to see you,” he said.
“Please tell him to stay away from this room.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“What time does Melanie Kingston land?” she asked.
“She left Andrews at one A.M., Madam President.”
“I don’t have any idea what time it is here, or in Washington. Please just tell me how much longer until she lands,” Charlotte snapped.
“About an hour and a half.”
“Please send her straight here,” Charlotte ordered.
“Yes, ma’am.”
Charlotte looked at Dale. She was breathing through a ventilator, and various other machines and monitors surrounded her. Even with a sheet and a blanket covering her wounds, Charlotte could tell that her body was swollen and mangled. Charlotte stood up and walked to the table where they had set up a secure phone for her to use. She picked it up and asked the military operator to connect her to Melanie on the military transport plane that was rushing her to Afghanistan.
“I have Ms. Kingston on the line, Madam President,” the operator said.
“Melanie, can you hear me?” Charlotte asked.
“Yes, Madam President, I can hear you. How are you?” Melanie asked.
“I’m fine. Come see me as soon as you land. We need to do a statement soon.”
“I’ve been working on a statement on the plane. I spoke to Roger, and—”
“You spoke to Roger?” Charlotte asked.
“Yes. He went over the fact pattern for me. We’re going to need to brief the press on the entire operation. The military will brief after you, and—”
“Operational briefing? Melanie, do you have any idea what happened?” Charlotte said, her voice rising.
“I think so. There was sniper fire on the airstrip, so Roger put you in the closest helicopter to get you out of there, and then the helicopter with the press pool on it was hit. Dale is in critical condition, but the others are OK. She’ll be moved to the military hospital in Germany as soon as she’s stable enough to travel,” Melanie recited.
“God, Melanie, no. No, that is not what happened,” Charlotte moaned.
“I’m sorry. What am I missing? I have been on secure video conferences for the last seven hours. What did I get wrong?”
“That is not what happened. They told us to cut the trip short. They told me on Air Force One, and I didn’t listen,” Charlotte said. “Melanie, are you there?”
“I’m here, Madam President. I’m listening.”
“We left the interview location, and we were heading back to the helicopters. I got on Marine One, but something was wrong—or that’s what I thought, but now I don’t know. Roger grabbed me, literally pulled me out of Marine One before the agents could even get to me. There was sniper fire. Did they tell you that?”
“Yes, that’s what I said, Madam President. Listen, you might be in shock. Have you been checked out by the doctors?”
“Stop talking to me like I’m a fucking idiot. Listen to me,” Charlotte insisted.
“I’m listening,” Melanie said.
“Melanie, we knew it was too dangerous. The intelligence suggested that there was an uptick in violence, and Albert suggested we cut the trip short, but Roger said it would be OK. And then, as we were taking off, they just came out of nowhere and started firing. The base was under attack. I was on Marine One, but Roger made them land, and then he pulled me out and put me on the other helicopter. He told them the mechanics didn’t sound right, but I was told that Marine One was fine. I didn’t know, Melanie. And it all happened so fast. I didn’t know what was happening until we lifted off the ground on the press chopper, and I saw them. I saw them running toward Marine One. They must have fired a shoulder-launched grenade. I saw it go up in flames and crash. They thought they had killed me and they were celebrating. But Roger left Marine One on the ground as a decoy. Do you understand what I’m saying, Melanie? Roger left Marine One there as a target. He used Dale and her crew so I could escape on another helicopter. He left them on Marine One to die.” Charlotte’s voice started to strain with emotion, but she steadied herself. “Melanie, are you there?” she asked.
“I’m here.”
“Melanie, I need you to ask Roger for his resignation as soon as you get here.”
“Charlotte, you need to do the statement as soon as I land. The public hasn’t seen or heard from you in nearly twenty hours. All they know is that Marine One went down, and word is getting out that Dale was hurt. There are rumors that she’s dead. We need to get in front of this before it’s too late.”
“Melanie, for once, this isn’t about getting ahead of the press. If that girl dies, our administration has blood on its hands. Roger nearly killed her. We need to announce his resignation,” Charlotte insisted.
“We’ll talk when I get there. He thinks he saved your life, Charlotte. He thinks he deserves your gratitude, and he can’t figure out why you won’t see him.”
“What he did was not brave. He traded one life for another. That’s not heroic—it’s criminal.”
Melanie sighed. “I’ll be there in about an hour. Don’t do anything until I get there, Charlotte, OK?”
“Yeah. OK. See you soon,” Charlotte said.
She hung up the phone and asked to be connected to Peter’s cell phone. A military aide had called Peter and her parents immediately following the crash. They were told that there had been an unanticipated security breach and that Charlotte was safe and being taken to an undisclosed location from which she would call as soon as she could.
“Charlotte, are you all right?” he asked on the first ring.
“Yes, I’m fine. Are you with the kids?”
“Yes, we’re all here. They want to talk to you. Let me put them on.”
“No, not yet. I need to tell you something, Peter.”
“What? Were you hurt? Are you OK, Char?” he asked.
“Yes, yes, I’m fine. It’s Dale,” she said.
She heard him take a breath.
“She was in a helicopter, and it was hit by a shoulder-launched grenade. They went down, and she was brought to the hospital here, in Afghanistan. She was in surgery for, I don’t know how long, a long time. I was in there the whole time, Peter. I was in there, and they took really good care of her. She’s in the ICU now. She hasn’t woken up yet.” Charlotte’s voice cracked. She couldn’t cry. She wouldn’t cry. She took another breath. “Peter, a plane is waiting for you at Andrews. It will take you to the military hospital in Landstuhl, Germany. They’re going to move her there as soon as they can,” she said. “Peter, listen to me. She’s tough, and she’s going to be fine.” Peter still hadn’t said anything.
“I’m in her room now. She’s resting, and she looks really peaceful. I am going to call her parents next and have them meet you at Andrews.” She could hear him breathing. “Peter, say something,” Charlotte said.
“Why are you in her room?” he asked.
“What?” Charlotte was stunned by the hostility in his voice.
“Why are you with her? You don’t sit at the kids’ bedsides when they’re sick,” he said.
His words were like body blows. Peter’s resentment had been building up for so long that even he seemed surprised by its ferocity.
Charlotte took a breath and spoke calmly. “You’re right. I’ve missed a lot of colds and flu bugs over the years. But we both know that’s not what this is about, don’t we?”
He was silent.
“You think I put her in danger. You think that I am so petty that I put your girlfriend in harm’s way, what, to punish you? Give me a fucking break, Peter. For once, give me a break.”
“I wish I could,” he said.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Melanie
The president has been in the room the whole time,” the military aide said. “She hasn’t left to eat, and she didn’t go to bed last night. Just slept sitting in a chair by the bed.”
“Really? The president has been in there the whole time?” Melanie asked as they walked down the hospital corridor. She doubted that the president had done any sleeping.
“Yes, ma’am,” he said, pleased to be briefing the White House chief of staff on the president’s actions.
They came to a stop. “Thanks for your help,” Melanie said.
“My pleasure,” he said.
She gently pushed the door open.
Charlotte was sitting next to Dale’s bed with her head in her hands. Her clothes were uncharacteristically disheveled, her face was ashen, and her hair was pulled back in a messy ponytail.
Charlotte gave Melanie a weary smile when she saw her. “Hi, Mel,” Charlotte whispered. “Let’s talk in the hall,” she said, pointing at Dale. She stood up and walked into the hallway.
“Madam President?” Melanie asked.
“I’m fine, Melanie. Thanks for coming.”
They went into a room that had been set up as an office for Charlotte. Secure video-conference equipment lined the wall, and secure phone lines had been installed. A computer and printer had been set up on a desk against one wall, and a small sofa had been pushed against the opposite wall.
They walked slowly over to the sofa and sat down.
Charlotte looked at her hands and cleared her throat.
Melanie braced herself.
Charlotte didn’t say anything, so Melanie spoke first. “Madam President, we really need to get you in front of the press. It’s important that the American people see you take charge of the situation, especially right now.”
Charlotte stared off into space. Melanie was starting to worry that she wouldn’t be able to pull off the press statement.
“Melanie, I need to tell you something.”
“What is it?” Melanie asked.
“I don’t think I want to do this anymore,” Charlotte stated.
Melanie didn’t know if it was the tension created by their extraordinary circumstances or the simple truth Charlotte had spoken, but she started to laugh. She couldn’t help it.
“I’m sorry, Madam President. I just, you just, you took the words right out of my mouth,” Melanie said.
Charlotte looked at her for a few seconds, and then she laughed a little bit, too.
Melanie was relieved.
Charlotte was back.
With the tension broken, they leaned toward each other, and Charlotte told Melanie what had happened. Melanie took notes so she could turn Charlotte’s words into the framework of the press statement. Charlotte was calmer than she’d been when they’d spoken by phone, and her account was clear about one thing: Roger had dramatically altered the chain of events on the landing strip by ordering the pilot of Marine One to land the helicopter after it had taken off. What was unclear was whether Roger had actually believed there was something wrong with Marine One and whether he knew for sure that the Black Hawk they were using to transport Charlotte was the target. According to Charlotte’s account, the pilot’s log showed no mechanical defects with Marine One. If Roger did, in fact, land Marine One as a decoy so Charlotte could escape, then Charlotte was correct—he’d been willing to trade the lives of the news crew for Charlotte’s.
“Melanie, we don’t save anyone—not even the president—by sacrificing another life,” she said.
“I understand how you feel about this, Charlotte,” Melanie started to say.
“How I feel? This isn’t about my emotional reaction. This is clear-cut to me, and I think it will be to most of the American people. Do you disagree? Are you taking Roger’s side, Melanie?” Charlotte stood up.
“No, of course not,” Melanie soothed.
“Good,” Charlotte said.
“I’m just saying that it’s a big deal to force Roger’s resignation less than twenty-four hours after something like this. And not that this figures into your decision making, but the political reality of forcing Roger to resign before any investigation is done is devastating. The press will say you threw him under the bus, and Republicans will probably attack the hell out of you for letting him take the fall. I know it’s sexist, but some of them think he’s the only reason you’ve been successful here and in Iraq.”
Charlotte stood and walked across the small room. “I meant it when I said that I don’t want to do this anymore,” Charlotte said.
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