In the Weeds

by M. L. Buchman

  Colby groaned. He just wasn’t going to get a break today. He’d handed off Ivy to security and was gunning for the clean shirt he kept in a desk drawer. The Ready Room was the largest contiguous room in the West Wing. Only the Situation Room was bigger, but it was chopped into eight or ten spaces, or so he’d heard. Even though he walked by it every time he came in the west entrance, he’d never walked through those guarded doors—which was fine with him. He’d seen the looks on the faces of the people headed in and out of there. Merely grim meant it was a good day.

  “My office. After you’ve changed.” Baxter bullhorned again, then withdrew into his tiny cube of an office at the far end of the room.

  The head of the White House Uniformed Division—which included all of the dog handlers—was a fixture. Rumor was that, when FDR had the West Wing basement dug and built out beneath his fifth cousin Teddy’s original structure, they’d unearthed the Captain already at his desk—and built the Ready Room around him. Of course there were also rumors that he’d served in every conflict since the days of Genghis Kahn, so it was hard to tell if the basement rumor was true. Either way, he was as formidable as the bedrock he’d been carved from.

  Rex stretched out on his dog bed after Colby stuffed a couple of treats inside a Kong toy and then dropped it for the dog to wrestle with.

  Colby dug out a fresh shirt and stripped off the soiled one. He didn’t keep extra slacks here, so his knees were just going to be grass-stained all day. He got a round of applause and some catcalls from the eight other agents currently in the room as he stood bare chested by his desk. Whoops!

  He took a bow.

  And stood up to look directly into Ivy’s eyes as she passed by the Ready Room door on the way to the White House Military Office that lay another fifty feet down the hall.

  Her gaze on him lasted only for the two strides it took her to pass by. Not even a hesitation in her step despite her head turned sideways.

  As he was pulling the fresh shirt over his head, he heard a male exclamation of surprise. When Colby dragged the shirt down enough to see, he spotted a staffer now standing framed in the doorway, still stumbling to regain his balance. He looked as if he’d just been rammed by a pint-sized Marine juggernaut who hadn’t been looking where she was going. Colby found that strangely encouraging, though he had no idea why, as he hurried to Captain Baxter’s office while still tucking in his shirt.

  Two offices defined this end of the Ready Room: Baxter’s, the lair of the all-seeing eye; and the office of the head of the Presidential Protection Detail, which seemed to be rarely occupied. Harvey Lieber traveled with the President but also wasn’t an office sort of guy; he was always stepping out for meetings or to check on his detail. Colby saw far more of Harvey while he was on grounds patrol than he ever saw of Baxter—which was fine with him. Colby had worked for Baxter for four years at the White House and, still, he was scary.

  Colby knocked on the door and Baxter looked up from some report to eye him. “Yes?”

  “You wanted to see me, sir.” Correcting Baxter? Smooth move. Real smooth.

  The captain’s office was a study in military precision. His steel desk had precisely one file on it, closed automatically at Colby’s knock and exactly centered in front of the Captain. There was an inbox that was empty and an outbox in the same condition. Six secure file cabinets and a single folding metal chair for guests. One wall had portraits of the Captain with the last six presidents—all shaking hands, all signed—and the other had a small shelf bearing an American flag folded into one of those triangular wood-and-glass display cases. There’d been a lot of speculation among the agents about whose coffin that flag had originally covered, but no one knew. And sure as hell, no one asked.

  “And why would I want that, Thompson?”

  Colby had long since learned that Baxter hated people who spent too much time thinking before replying; he wanted his agents to move fast and decisively at all times. But Colby could think up no quick answer so kept his silence. Apparently it was the right choice as Baxter continued one breath later.

  “Now that you’re done rolling around on the grass and making a disgrace of the uniform…” His baleful gaze didn’t make it clear whether he was merely interpreting the stains on Colby’s uniform or had somehow used his all-seeing eye to glare when Colby had taken down Ivy Hanson.

  Baxter often displayed an odd sense of humor in unlikely situations. Not the least hint of a smile this time. So he probably hadn’t been witness to the situation where he had totally embarrassed himself, otherwise Baxter would have made something more of it.

  “Sorry, sir. I snagged Rex’s leash and—”

  Baxter made a pinching motion to indicate Colby should close his mouth. As it seemed likely that Captain Baxter would consider it beneath contempt to have picked up the gesture from a Bruce Willis movie, Colby was left to wonder how Bruce Willis might have picked up his trademark hand sign from Captain Baxter.

  “You’ve been on site at the White House for four years with Rex, and one year as the head of the White House grounds dog teams.”

  “Lead Dog, yes sir. Four years here as of tomorrow. And four fine and fun years they’ve been, sir.” And when was Colby going to learn to keep his trap shut? Apparently on the twelfth of never. But he hadn’t thought that anyone would notice the anniversary except him. He’d been thinking about taking Rex out for a beer and two burgers to celebrate. He should remember that nothing got by the captain.

  “Sit down and shut up.”

  Colby double-checked that Rex was still on his dog bed. He wasn’t yet done wrestling the Kong toy into submission. The big boy really was a laugh riot—a dog as smart as Rex mesmerized by a toy that resembled a six-inch-high black-rubber snowman.

  He sat and Baxter kicked the door shut.

  “You’ve been a real asset, Colby.”

  The captain’s tone sent a chill up his spine. He’d been fired once in his life, from a teenage summer job doing pool maintenance. It didn’t get much lower than that. But now Baxter’s tone—

  “As much as I hate to do this…”

  Colby could feel his breath going arrhythmic, as if something far worse than Ivy Hanson was punching him in the solar plexus.

  “I’m taking you off Lead Dog.”

  Colby froze—afraid to move because he might shatter. Like really might. Making the Secret Service was the one thing he’d ever done really right. To leave, to lose Rex—who belonged to the Secret Service, not to him—meant that…

  “I need you in foreign travel.”

  “You need…what?” He felt whiplash as the conversation veered in a wholly unexpected direction. Baxter’s grimace said that he just might be enjoying himself.

  “Agent McPhee’s Rusty is retiring. He’s eleven and should have been retired two years ago, but he’s the kind of dog who hates to quit. Rex has proven that he doesn’t spook. The helos don’t throw him. You’ve had him around jet transports several times and the reports say there were no issues.”

  “There weren’t.” Colby was still as befuddled as his dog was by food hidden inside a toy.

  A lot of dogs, even the ones who had been trained to keep working through gunfire and explosions, hated helos and flying on jets. Colby often wondered if it was the high whine of the turbine engines—which hurt his own ears badly enough, never mind giant doggie ears—or perhaps they thought that an aircraft was like a car that was too big and fast to chase so they must be, plain and simple, wrong. Whatever it was, Rex seemed to look at any aircraft and just shrug.

  “Also, you’re single. Heading up the dog teams for the Presidential travel detail is brutal enough without maintaining a relationship in the middle of them. You’re not paired up with anyone I don’t know about?” Baxter, of course, knew everything about everybody.

  Colby could only shake his head. Elsie had given him the boot several months back because he “just wasn’t a long-term kind of guy.” Hell! He could have told her that…if she’d ever car
ed to ask.

  “McPhee broke his ankle stepping in a gopher hole out at Camp David about an hour ago. I was going to overlap you for a week, starting with the President’s return this afternoon, but that’s out. Effective immediately, you’re transferred. I’ve got Malcolm sniffing for the Motorcade, but I need someone on the helos. And I need someone to keep all the travel dogs out of my hair. That’s you and Rex. Here’s your primary contact.” He handed over the file he’d been reading. “Read that before you head over.”

  “Who will take over my former role?”

  “I figure Linda Hamlin and Thor can’t do any worse job than you two do.”

  Ouch! Thor was a scrawny mutt. Though Thor and Linda had saved the President’s life in his first month at the White House—which proved they had the chops. There were also a lot of other things to like about Linda, but she’d married the White House chocolate chef, so he’d been careful to only admire her from afar.

  “You’ll show her the ropes. Any questions?”

  “Yes, sir. No, sir.”

  “Out, Thompson. And try not to disgrace the Secret Service any more than usual.”

  “I wouldn’t ev—”

  “Out.”

  Colby got out and headed to his desk to study the file. Rex had finally freed his snack from the toy’s interior and made quick work of it. He now watched Colby intently as he crossed the room.

  “It’s gonna be good, boy. It’s gonna be good.” He knelt down to give Rex a big scritch. And it was going to be good. Presidential travel. That meant he and Rex would be off to see a bit of the world, domestic and foreign. “Sounds like an adventure.”

  Rex didn’t seem upset by the change. Of course, he had always been the steady one of their team—the elder statesman. He’d left puppyhood behind while he was still under a year old and now took everything right in stride.

  Colby was less certain. He’d been born and lived his whole life in Maryland. College had been in Baltimore and his Secret Service training had been at the James J. Rowley Training Center just outside DC in Laurel. Other than the two three-month trips to FLETC—the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Georgia—he’d never been out of the state.

  “About time we did a little adventuring, huh, boy? Stretch our legs? Maybe ride the big plane with the main man? Could be fun.”

  Rex appeared ready for it.

  Colby glanced at the file Baxter had handed him.

  No way was he ready for it. He didn’t need to open the file; the label alone already told him too much about who he was reporting to.

  Colby didn’t turn to look at Baxter. He didn’t need to see or hear him. Colby could feel the captain laughing his ass off.

  3

  Major General Markham of the United States Air Force offered a “Welcome Aboard” greeting that Ivy quickly discovered was indistinguishable from a Drill Sergeant’s first day briefing of new recruits, except with less yelling. He was concise, to the point, and he required one hundred and twenty seconds to impart his sage wisdom. Even appropriate “yes, sir” and “no, sir” comments were superfluous and she abandoned them inside the first fifteen seconds of the one-twenty.

  Three minutes after entering the near silent White House Military Office, she was sitting at her desk—one cubical in a pod of four—and feeling a case of vertigo. Her head spun like she was the first-ever person through a starship’s experimental transporter. One moment she’d been flying aboard an HMX-1 Sea King. The next wondering if this…this was what she’d been looking forward to?

  Markham had made it clear that HMX-1 should do its job and not bother him because he was busy with “important” matters. The fact that she was female was a crime. The fact that the Marines had allowed her in was a travesty. The fact that she had served four tours flying forward combat with the most decorated and most blooded Marine Expeditionary Unit of the seven MEUs was irrelevant. She was in the White House now and was not to disturb him with such minor shit as Marine One—a job that should belong to the Air Force anyway as they were the ones who were supposed to do all the flying for the US military.

  She’d barely managed to not point out that the Army, Navy, Marines, and Coast Guard had all fought hard with Congress to keep flying elements because the Air Force was such a pain in the ass to work with. The USAF was territorial, officious, and…

  Ivy sighed.

  And Markham was a prototypical two-star general in any service. Too old and passed over too many times to ever make three-star except as a retirement bump, which should have been done a decade ago no matter what the man’s age was. He was old-school military, with no respect for anyone who’d come on board since the elder Bush’s war to free Kuwait from Saddam.

  There was a line of demarcation in the military. Oddly, it wasn’t at the end of the Vietnam War—they’d all hit mandatory retirement by now and even fossils like Markham didn’t go back that far. Rather it was at the start of Afghanistan and Iraq Wars in 2001. The earlier Desert Shield and Desert Storm conflicts had been traditionally fought battles for the most part. Fought with equipment not all that different from Vietnam—heavy bombers and massive troops with Special Ops mostly under the radar.

  But in Afghanistan and Iraq, tanks and Humvees fell to cheap-ass, homemade IEDs, and it was up to the MRAP to change ground warfare. Marines and Special Ops stalked in where Army grunts used to stroll. The Air Force found no major military installations to bomb in those pitifully downtrodden nations. Helicopters had taken larger roles than jets, and air-to-air dogfights were a thing of the past because it was only a matter of a few minutes’ work before neither country had any air force at all. The allies quickly achieved supreme command of the air—if you didn’t count surface-to-air missiles—leaving the Air Force with too little to do. Few of the old-schoolers understood the fundamental changes, and officers like Markham denied the shift with every breath and action.

  Ivy had never known anything else. She’d joined the Corps years after the jets flew into the Twin Towers and the Pentagon to light the fuse in Afghanistan. There, the Marines led the way with the unstoppable kind of force only they could bring. They also led the way on innovative technology like her MV-22B Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft. At long last, a full decade behind the Marines, the Air Force was finally getting serious about the best helicraft in the sky.

  And HMX-1 was the best helicopter squadron flying anywhere. That was the reason they were entrusted with the President’s life. The USAF’s 1st Helicopter Squadron—who’d once shared the Presidential transport role with their even more ancient Hueys—had been given the boot decades ago. So long ago that only the Air Force even remembered it or kept mentioning it. She’d damn well make sure that HMX-1’s reputation continued no matter what the director of the WHMO said or thought. She was going to ram the Marine Corps right down the throat of every stuck-in-the-mud, narrow-minded, misogynistic—

  “Don’t let the old man get to you.”

  Ivy flinched. Despite being a Marine, she actually flinched.

  “Hi,” a handsome blond man held out a hand as he sat in the chair across from hers.

  She gave it a Pavlovian shake, still too jarred from her unexpected dismissal to respond normally.

  “Major Steve Curnow. Air Force One liaison. Don’t let the old man get to you. He doesn’t micromanage unless you screw up.”

  “I’m a Marine.”

  “Which means when you screw up, you do it at full speed. Good. That’s the way we like it here. Special Agent Tish Tolman, there to your right, is Motorcade and Secret Service liaison. McPhee is our traveling dog man, but he’s out at Camp David with the First Family so we usually just ignore him. As long as the four of us keep our noses clean and get the President where he needs to go, Markham leaves us alone.”

  Ivy allowed her shoulders to sag with relief as she shook Tish’s hand and it earned her a laugh from the other two. She didn’t like ignoring a superior officer unless he was a superior asshole. Actually, they were the most dangerous to
ignore as they typically took offence so easily.

  Tish could be short for Morticia from The Addams Family. Her hair was straight and dark and her complexion fair enough that she’d burn instantly if ever exposed to the Maryland sunshine. The fact that she wasn’t burnt told Ivy just how many hours this team spent at these desks. After nine years of working and flying more outdoors than in, she wasn’t sure that she liked the sound of that.

  Was it too late to approach General Arnson about dropping into the pilot’s seat the next time one opened?

  No challenge is too tough for a Marine. Not one of McKinnon’s Laws, it was a Marine law, ground into her soul by the bootheel of nine years of service and a twenty-five-year Marine Corps mother.

  Their four cubicles were all open toward a small table that would automatically be the center of any conversation. It was just a chair spin from her own desk to the team desk. There were a dozen pods like it crammed into the room. What she’d first taken for Markham-cowed silence, she could now hear was the soft buzz of professionals doing their jobs. That made her feel much better.

  “So, what’s on the boards?”

  “Are you always all business?” Tish asked in a surprisingly high and sweet voice, making her seem gentle and soft. But she was Secret Service, so the soft part was probably only skin deep.

  “I’m a Marine,” Ivy repeated her earlier answer. It was a Marine Corps trademark: absolute focus and commitment to each and every task.

  “Yep! She’s a laugh a minute,” a deep voice sounded behind her.

  Ivy closed her eyes. She really didn’t need this.

  “Go away, Colby.” She opened her eyes and looked straight into the deep brown gaze of Colby’s German shepherd. His breath smelled like doggie treats. “I don’t need you either.”

  The dog rested his muzzle on her knee, probably shedding a million hairs that would never come out of her dress uniform slacks.