by Josie Brown
“You must arrest the vice president immediately,” Roberta reasoned with him.
“But Roberta…I—”
She waved his hesitation away with an elegant hand. “He is committing treason, and framing innocent men for his crimes. And he has murdered his political opponent. It could just as easily have been you, Mr. President. After all, only you now stand in his way.”
Barksdale blanched at that thought, until she added, “Edward, you must protect your presidential legacy. Otherwise you too will be implicated, and you too will face impeachment and criminal proceedings, for high crimes, based on this evidence.”
Barksdale sighed. She was right. The last thing he’d want his enemies to chant was: “What did Barksdale know, and when did he know it?”
He buzzed for his chief of security.
When the man came, Roberta sat silently as the president growled, “Arrest the vice president.”
“Oh, and Mr. President? The young man who uncovered the scheme must be released immediately from Secret Service custody. I suggest he be brought here to you, so that he may fill you in on all he knows.”
Chapter 56
By the time Ben, Abby and Fred had been debriefed, there were less than five hours to go before the Pacific Time countdown to midnight.
Talbot was denying everything. He pleaded the fifth, and asked to see his lawyer.
Talbot was put in lockdown, but his staff and family were told that he had joined the president at Camp David. His cell phones and computers, both at his office in the Eisenhower building and in his official residence—Number One Observatory Circle, on the grounds of the United States Naval Observatory—had been confiscated, and were being searched for any incriminating evidence.
Fail-safe for Operation Flamingo was to be confirmed via text from Smith to Talbot, from a cell phone listed under the name of Talbot’s six-year-old grandson.
Smith would text: Grandpa, thanks for taking me to the movies this weekend!
The mission would be aborted if Talbot texted back, Sorry, Jimmy, I’ve got to work
Talbot never texted back.
Because he didn’t trust Talbot, Smith texted his mole inside the veep’s office to ask about his boss’s whereabouts. The response—with POTUS, at Camp David with families—made him breathe easier.
All systems were go.
He signaled the ranch operatives to load the human bombs into the vans, then he hopped into the one holding Digits. He would personally place the kid in the middle of a crowd on the center of the Las Vegas Strip. That way, he’d be certain that this would be Digits last night on Earth.
StratCom was in a bit of a quandary. If Special Ops swooped down in helicopters with bullhorns to warn the gathered crowds, pandemonium would ensue on the Vegas Strip, perhaps even a stampede.
And even if the crowd dispersed to hide in their hotel rooms, the bombers might actually go inside with them, making it even harder for Spec Ops to track them down before the bombs went off.
The president shook his head. “We’ve got to disarm the bombs quietly and covertly. Is that possible?”
General Pendergrass, StratCom’s senior commander, nodded. “Three of the hotels have rooftop helipads. We’re flying through secured military airspace, so we can by on the ground in four hours, tops. Since the human bombs are drugged and unwilling, the terrorists are using a radio frequency to detonate the bombs. Spec Ops will get as close as possible to the human bombs. They’ll have jammers that will block the signal. The ops team will be wearing plain clothes. They also have fake cameras equipped with face recognition technology, to seek out the human bombs. But there’s a problem: from what Mr. Brinker tells us, the teenager, Digits, is the only human bomb who was not pictured in the dossier. In fact, because of his covert nature and the fact that he is an illegal alien, no pictures of him exist.”
“Both Fred and I would know him, even if he were disguised,” Ben declared.
“I take it you won’t mind coming along then?” the general asked.
Ben shook his head. “I insist.”
It was the least he could do for Andy.
It was all that was left to do for Maddy.
“Promise you’ll come back to me,” were Abby’s last words to Ben.
He didn’t need any encouragement to stay alive. Still, her gentle kiss was icing on the cake.
It kept him from considering the consequences, should he fail to recognize Digits.
No, failure was not an option.
Chapter 57
Ben walked through the wall-to-wall humanity that cheered and shrieked and laughed in front of the Bellagio. Through his earpiece, he heard the Ops commander mutter, “God almighty, it’s like looking for a needle in a haystack. We’re at zero minus eight minutes, Green Team.”
He circled the man-made lake in front of the deluxe hotel, scanning every face as he walked through the crowd. Periodically, he’d hear a whoop in his earpiece as various other teams—Pink, for the one at the Flamingo; Blue, for the team monitoring the MGM Grand; Yellow, for Circus Circus; Brown, for Treasure Island; Purple, for the Venetian; and Orange, for the Stratosphere—identified their suspects, and ferried them out of the crowd, so that the process of disarming them can be done in the privacy of a van.
Still no Digits.
“Just two minutes to go, Green Team,” The mission commander warned.
Ben tried to stick to type: short, thin males. More than likely, Digits would be standing alone, despite a proximity to others. He wouldn’t be moving, despite the activity around him.
And he wouldn’t be talking. Ben had no trouble remembering his own reaction to the drugs Smith had injected in him—
Smith.
There was Smith, right in front of him.
With Digits.
Granted, the younger man’s hair was cropped shorter. He wore rounded glasses, and his hair was tipped blond. Still, it was Digits, alright.
“Sighted Digits—and Smith,” he fairly shouted.
The bomb expert he was teamed with ran over. “Let’s go! Quick!”
They dove into the crowd, which was now counting down the seconds:
46…45…44…43…42…
Ben pushed his way through it—
“There he is!” Ben cried out. “Blue jacket, with argyle vest!”
As the bomb pro yanked the jacket off Digits and went to work, Ben rushed through the crowd.
Where was Smith?
Was that it? Was he going to disappear into the crowd, just walk away?
Over Ben’s dead body.
It was Smith who assassinated his friend, Andy.
And it was Smith who had murdered beautiful sad bittersweet Maddy.
No, Smith wasn’t going to get away. Not this time.
Yes there he was…
As if sensing Ben coming, Smith turned around—but it was too late.
With all his might Ben leaped through the air, landing on Smith’s chest.
He was prepared for Smith’s dirty punches. But he wasn’t prepared for the gun pulled from his back. He held it out and aimed it at Ben—
Only to get it knocked out of his hand by three very drunk women, who were whooping for joy at the hotel’s fireworks.
Both Ben and Smith scrambled on their hands and knees through the legs of the revelers.
It was Ben who came up holding it. Smith held out his hand as if it were a pistol, as if mocking him:
Bang bang, you’re dead.
He knows I’ll never shoot a gun in this mob, Ben thought, as he watched the man duck through the crowd, and saunter into the hotel—
No way in hell is he going to get away.
Ben sprinted into the hotel. The lobby was packed, but the revelers, hoping to catch the Bellagio’s signature fireworks before they ended were streaming out of the casino, in the opposite direction.
Ben ran to the elevator banks. If Smith had caught one, he could be hiding out on any of the hotel’s thirty-six floors. He was just about to
give up when it came to him—
The Bellagio’s botanical gardens.
He ran down the hall toward the garden room.
The sign on the door proclaiming that the gardens were closed, was swaying, if only slightly.
Smith was in there.
Ben opened the door slowly.
The garden was decked out for the holidays. The paths on the floor were lined with a sea of bright red poinsettias. Beautifully decorated Christmas trees flanked the walls. Three feet tall snowflakes hung from the ceiling. Six man-sized gingerbread houses fronted a Christmas tree tall enough to reach the stained glass atrium in the middle of the room.
So, where was Smith?
Ben raised his gun, only to have his arm kicked by Smith’s leg, so that Ben fired the gun skyward.
The bullet hit the glass ceiling.
Ben barely had time to duck into one of the gingerbread houses before a shower of glass shards fell on them.
Smith screamed as a jagged pane of glass pierced his leg.
Ben ran after Smith as he stumbled out the door.
His trail of blood led to the casino. Ben dodged in and out of the rows of one-armed bandits and the gamblers who sat in front of them. At first he didn’t see Smith. Then someone hit a jackpot.
All heads turned toward the bells and whistles. That’s when he saw Smith, dodging out a side exit.
When Ben opened it, he found himself back out in front of the Bellagio’s fountain.
He walked slowly to the left, glancing at all the faces he passed. Everyone was still and looking skyward at the fireworks.
But one man was limping toward the street.
When Smith looked behind, Ben took a girl in his arms and kissed her. Over her shoulder, he noticed Smith smiling, satisfied he had lost Ben The injured man slowed his gait. He even decided to take in some of the fireworks.
That was his big mistake.
Ben’s tackle threw them both into the hotel’s large, shallow pool. Smith tried to claw his way out of Ben’s chokehold that held him underwater for what seemed like an eternity, but Ben was too strong for him.
The lightshow above them illuminated Smith’s face through the water.
Ben enjoyed watching the fear in Smith’s eyes as the drowning man realized he wasn’t really a ghost after all.
It was Fred who finally pulled Ben off of Smith’s limp body.
Chapter 58
Talbot finally folded when he was told that the terrorist attack had been stopped, and that a rogue black ops asset named John Smith had been arrested at the scene. Besides verifying the names of the other DC power brokers in league with him, he insisted that Smith was the mastermind of the scheme; that the spook even went so far as to providing Talbot with false intel in order to justify the attack, despite its illegality, and the deaths that would be incurred.
Talbot’s formal defense plea actually stated: “However misguided, when it came to his love of his country and its people, it was the vice president’s conviction that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.”
It was the defense’s hope that there might actually be enough Star Trek fans on the grand jury to save his ass.
Talbot reasoned that when the others were also faced with indictments, they too would spill their guts. And like he, they’d follow through on their pact to make Smith the fall guy.
Maybe they’d get lucky and the SWAT team would take Smith out. For all their sakes, he hoped so.
On the flight home, it was confirmed that all the human bombs had been located and defused in time, without the New Years Eve crowd’s knowledge.
It was also confirmed that Smith had been resuscitated in the ambulance that took him away.
And that he had escaped after killing the EMT who revived him.
Ben frowned. “I guess I’ll always be looking over my shoulder for that ghoul,” he said to Fred.
Fred shook his head. “Nah. Spooks don’t hold grudges. It’s just business.”
Ben didn’t believe him. At this point, he found it hard to believe anyone who made his living inside the 202 Area Code.
He couldn’t wait to get home to Abby and tell her he loved her.
He wondered if she’d believe him. One way or another, he’d prove that was the case.
Eight Months Later
“Hand me those hedge clippers, will you Benjamin?” Roberta asked, as she wiped the sweat off her brow.
Ben gladly obliged. He’d been on his knees in that flowerbed all morning. Any excuse to stretch his legs worked for him.
As he handed them to her, he warned, “Don’t trim that hedge too low. Abby likes her privacy.”
Roberta guffawed. “I’d say she’s got nothing to worry about. Alquith Hall is the middle of nowhere.”
“That’s fine by us,” Abby piped up from her Adirondack chair. “We like life in the slow lane.”
Roberta laughed. “In your condition, I guess you would. How far along are you now?”
“Four months and six days,” Ben said, as he patted Abby’s rounded belly.
Their guest smiled. “Have you thought about names?”
Ben and Abby exchanged glances. “Andrew and Maddy,” Abby murmured.
Roberta sighed. “I see. Then for your sake, I hope it’s a girl.”
It was Ben’s turn to laugh. “Oh it is, Roberta. And a boy. Twins.”
Roberta stopped mid-clip. “Well, you’ll certainly have your hands full! No wonder you turned down Ferguson’s request to handle his senatorial campaign.”
“Nope, I turned him down, because of his voting record.” Ben shrugged. “Not to mention his finance sources.”
“You’re right. He doesn’t deserve you. Then again, according to the latest poll, he may not have needed you after all. Seems that all the Democrats are having a cakewalk this time around.”
“With the GOP’s presidential frontrunner in prison, and so many of their backers indicted, I guess it was inevitable.” Ben smiled.
“Abby, how’s Lavinia doing these days?” Roberta’s clippers stopped for a moment, so that she could look back and assess her handiwork.
“Just fine, I guess. We so rarely see her. She’s so used to the city now, it’s almost impossible to convince her to spend any time out here with us.”
“I sent flowers to the house, after Preston’s death. I got back the sweetest note from her.”
“She truly appreciated them. She didn’t get many,” Abby explained. After his indictment, she found out pretty quickly who her real friends are.”
“Well, you know what they say. If you want a true friend in Washington, get a dog.” Ben speared the ground with a hoe.
“Frankly, I think Preston got off easy,” Abby murmured. “His fatal heart attack couldn’t have been timed more perfectly: just a few days after his indictment.”
“Abby’s got her own conspiracy theory,” Ben explained. “She thinks he made a pact with Smith to kill him before he went to trial, and now Smith is off on some tropical island with his blood money. Frankly, I can believe it.”
Roberta shuddered. “I hope she’s right. I’d much rather have that killer a million miles from here.” She patted Abby’s hand. “I’m also happy you don’t have to testify.”
Abby nodded. “Me too. I guess we were lucky that the files on the digital dossier provided enough evidence to convict the traitors.”
“That, and all the video feeds of Talbot plotting and scheming in his limo with some shadowy figure,” Ben added. “It was sent in from some anonymous source. My guess is that both are the same man: Mr. Smith.”
“I’m too smart to take that bet,” Roberta laughed. “Tell me, Abby, does anyone even suspect you aren’t really Maddy?”
Abby shook her head. “No. And that’s fine by me. Maddy may have had many things wrong, but she had one thing right: you don’t need to live in the spotlight to be happy.”
Ben laughed. “Oh yeah? Then what do you need?”
“That’s easy. All yo
u need is a man who proves his love for you, every day.”
Ben scooped his wife into his arms and held her tight.
That may have been enough for him, but not for her. She cupped her palm behind his neck and drew his mouth to hers. Her lips grazed his, for one tantalizing minute, before the kiss deepened into the bliss he ached for whenever she was within view.
Eventually he drew back, but his eyes didn’t want to leave her. Instead, they took in everything he loved about his wife. Her open laugh. Her broad, welcoming smile. Her steady, adoring gaze from those deep blue eyes.
Even with her hair still dyed Maddy’s dark auburn, whenever he looked at her, Maddy’s ghost never stared back at him.
He now realized she has all the traits he had sought but had found missing in her emotionally bereft sister.
Appreciation. Respect. Trust.
Love.
And when in love, as she once was with Andy, as she was now with Ben, Abby was capable of doing any.
Even saving the world.
Even saving Ben.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I owe a lot to the following people, whose love and support gives me the courage to write, every day:
Karin Tabke, who first fell in love with this book, and pushed me (quite adamantly; what are friends for?) to make it a priority; Andy Brown, who is a go-to guru for anything technical and metaphysical. Andy, thanks making the virtual a reality; Austin Brown and Anna Brown, who are my emotional touchstones, in so many ways; my agent, Holly Root, for her unwavering support; Andree Belle, Darien and Don Coleman, Linda May and Ben Brown, and Mario Martinez and Patricia Steadman, who are always there to encourage, nurture and feed me.
And always last but never least, Martin Brown: you complete me.
Dear readers: If you liked The Candidate, I’d be honored to get a review from you! We authors live by them, and they are always appreciated.
