Flowerbed of State

by Dorothy St. James

  It was still drizzling. A freezing wind rushed in from the north, pelting my face with the cold rain from one of winter’s last gasps. Fresh green buds had already set on the trees. Cherry blossoms were just starting to brighten the capital city with their festive shades of pink. I smiled and waved at Fredrick, the bulky guard on duty at the northwest gate.

  “Keep an eye out for the new batch of crazies,” Fredrick stuck his head out of the guard hut to warn me. He had a head of bright red hair and cute round cheeks that were in conflict with his massive arms and broad chest. “They showed up last night and started harassing anyone they could find. We broke it up, but we expect they’ll be back.”

  “What are they protesting now?” I liked to be prepared in case one of them started lecturing me while my hands were half-buried in a flowerbed. Some protesters viewed any member of the White House staff as part of the problem. That’s free speech for you. I’m all for it as long as no one tramples my flowers.

  “Apparently they’re against the President’s meeting with the bankers this week.” He scratched his chin and shrugged. “Didn’t read their literature.”

  I spotted about a dozen protesters setting up at the edge of Lafayette Square, the seven-acre public park situated across the street from the White House’s iron gates. The protesters had arrived dressed in drab rags and burlap sacks. Several placards were scattered on the ground around them as they stood under streetlamps chatting and sipping their Starbucks coffees.

  I made my way through the security gate and crossed Pennsylvania Avenue, passing by the group without incident. At this early hour, most of Lafayette Square was still empty and shrouded in deep shadows and fog.

  Beyond the banking protesters, a sleeping woman hunched down in her makeshift tent. That was Connie, a nuclear arms protester who for the past three decades had lived in front of the White House among her large handmade poster board signs.

  In no time, I arrived at the far side of the park and the flowerbed where the mile-a-minute weeds with their distinctive triangular leaves had taken root. They’d wrapped their tentacles and curved barbs around the long ribbon leaves of the newly planted pink ruffled tulips. Like tiny hands, the weeds were slowly but surely choking the life out of the showy flowers.

  I unzipped my backpack and placed it on the ground so I could rummage through it. After pulling on my work gloves, I unwound the vines from the tulip leaves and teased their spider-vein roots from the soft, black earth. Ever mindful of my upcoming meeting, I took extra care to keep from splashing mud on my suit or pantyhose.

  The steady motion of my hands, along with the sounds of the city slowly coming awake, soothed my nerves. Soon, I was one with the flowers, trees, and chilly rain still falling from the ebbing storm. I was so totally lost in my work that I barely noticed the man dashing in the direction of Pennsylvania Avenue and the White House.

  Everyone in Washington, D.C., always seems to be in a hurry running here or there. I think he glanced my way. His suit may have been black. He wore a dark-colored baseball cap low on his head. But come to think about it, there had been something odd about him. He’d been carrying a silver briefcase.

  I shuddered. Just thinking about that shiny briefcase made my heart thump against my chest. A large, icy raindrop slapped my cheek, jolting me back to my present predicament. I rubbed the sting as I struggled to piece together the puzzle.

  SLOSH.

  I didn’t end up facedown in a flowerbed by accident. Which meant someone must have either hit me or pushed me there. And if that was the case, my attacker might be lurking somewhere nearby. What if he saw me moving and was coming back to finish me off? That’s what usually happened in the crime novels I read—the killer sticks around the scene of the crime to make sure he did the job right.

  My insides clenched. I held my breath and prayed Gordon had been right in thinking I’d been reading too many murder mysteries lately. Though I didn’t want to, I turned my head and peered over my shoulder to see if anyone was sneaking up behind me.

  Despite the deep shadows cast by the elm trees and the stormy fog, I spotted a blurry black blob jogging toward me, splashing through the puddles. The killer!

  I shouldn’t have ignored that sloshing sound I’d been hearing. But to be fair, with my thoughts jangling about in my head like loose change, I was having trouble figuring anything out, much less paying attention to odd noises. But everything suddenly turned crystal clear.

  The sloshing I’d heard had been from his boots.

  I could feel it in my bones. He was coming back to make sure I stayed planted in the mud.

  Why would anyone want to kill me? I’m a gardener. An assistant gardener, at that! Never mind, he’d already hit me once. With his silver briefcase, I think. I tightened my grip on my bottle of homegrown pepper spray, which suddenly felt inadequate. It was in a travel hairspray bottle that didn’t have much of a range.

  I should have bought a better bottle. I should have called for help right away. I dug around in my backpack for my cell phone. I found my garden shears, a small spade, the novel I’d been reading. Where was my phone? I should have stayed put. I should have kept my head down in the mud until I understood exactly what was happening. And now it was too late . . .

  SLOSH. SLOSH.

  He was directly behind me. His presence loomed like a heavy hand pressing down on me. I turned just as he grabbed my arm.

  What transpired next happened so fast perhaps I should skip over it. It’s not really that interesting. And, well, I didn’t exactly live up to Miss Marple’s standards.

  I screamed like a girl. Who wouldn’t? Adrenaline surged through me. Throwing my arms out, I leapt to my feet and pressed the plunger on my pepper spray bottle. Who could blame me? I kept squirting the man with my fiery concoction until he grabbed my wrist and twisted it with such force my hand went numb and the bottle dropped to the ground.

  He was dressed from head to toe in villainous black. Black military boots, black combat pants, black flak jacket, even his hair was the color of the midnight sky. Not only that, a large assault rifle was slung over his shoulder and a menacing pistol jutted out from a black leather leg holster.

  I tried to twist away from him to break his crushing hold on my wrist. I’d learned in a self-defense course I’d taken in college that the purpose of pepper spray is to blind your assailant long enough to escape him. I’d even perfected my quick dodge technique during the class’s mock attacks. I should have been able to sprint several blocks away by now. But I couldn’t go anywhere because this guntoting bully stubbornly refused to play by the rules and let go of me.

  Why wouldn’t he let go? In a blind panic, I let loose a Xena Warrior Princess battle yell and landed a bruising kick to his shin.

  “Ow!” he shouted, but his grip held firm. I kicked him again.

  With a disgusted grunt, he twirled me around until my backside was pressed against his muscular legs and chest. He cinched his arm around my waist, pinning me so close to him I had no hope of using any kind of leverage against his brute strength.

  “Let go,” I wheezed.

  “Not until you stop attacking me.” He swore under his breath while I twisted and turned and wore myself out. “This is what I get for playing the Good Samaritan, a hellcat with claws. If you don’t stop scratching me, I swear I will—”

  “Wait a minute.” He thought I was attacking him? I’m the good guy here. What would make him think I would willingly attack anyone? “Wait a minute.”

  As soon as I stopped kicking and punching and, yes, scratching him, he released his crushing hold. I stumbled forward a few steps before regaining my balance. Breathing hard, I grabbed my knees and tried to sort out what had just happened. Was it possible I’d overreacted? He hadn’t actually attacked me. He’d only touched my arm. I was the one who’d—

  “Let—let me get this straight,” I huffed, still unable to fully catch my breath. “You’re not trying to kill me?”

  He didn’t seem to b
e listening. With his shoulders hunched forward, he clamped his straight white teeth tightly together. Hopping on one foot, he cursed his existence and mine. I winced. His bloodshot, unfocused eyes were watering like a faucet because of me. He was blinking wildly, clearly suffering because I’d reacted too quickly and had thoroughly doused him with the potent, red-hot pepper oil.

  Despite his arsenal, he didn’t look that much like a killer, not really. His muscular yet trim physique was much more reminiscent of a heroic Roman warrior. His square jaw spoke of strength. His brows, though creased with intense pain, suggested a man of compassion and, I hoped, forgiveness. Because he wasn’t a killer. His distinctive black uniform identified him as a member of the Counter Assault Team, which was no ordinary branch of the Secret Service, but its most elite military arm.

  “You—you’re Secret Service?” I asked, suddenly hoping I was hallucinating. Assaulting a Secret Service agent was most likely a felony.

  “Yes,” he hissed through gritted teeth.

  Even if it wasn’t a felony, I was sure blinding a Secret Service agent wasn’t something Gordon or Ambrose Jones, the White House’s chief usher, would likely forgive. I rushed to my backpack and quickly found my environmentally friendly, BPA-free water bottle. Moving as fast as possible, I unscrewed the lid and tossed the water into his face.

  He gave a startled yelp when the icy water hit him.

  “Give me that.” He grabbed the water bottle and dumped the remaining water on his mottled forehead and brow. The cold water caused him to shiver like the leaves on the saucer magnolia trees above us. Then he scrubbed his eyes with his coat sleeve. He still looked miserable. The skin around his eyes was puffy and turning an angry shade of red, but he didn’t seem to be blinking as furiously anymore.

  “Thanks.” He dropped the water bottle and grabbed my shoulders. He squinted at me, his eyes unfocused. “Are you okay?” he demanded, his voice unnaturally calm considering the situation.

  I nodded.

  “Answer me. Are you okay?” he repeated. Apparently, he couldn’t yet see well enough to make out my gesture. “Do I need to call EMS?”

  “No,” I croaked, and quickly cleared my throat, which burned as if I’d been shouting at the top of my lungs for hours.

  “Good.” He released me and started to pace. Limp, step, limp, step. Turn. Limp, step, limp, step. He stomped with that awkward gait through the middle of my flowerbed. The helpless tulips and fragrant grape hyacinths were no match for his heavy boots.

  I winced both for my plants and for him. He wouldn’t be limping if I hadn’t kicked him. He wouldn’t be growling with every step if I hadn’t blinded him with my pepper spray. He stumbled a couple of times, proving his eyesight wasn’t even close to being back to normal. But I had enough experience with men’s egos to know to keep my mouth shut. An apology right now would not be appreciated.

  He stopped at the edge of the flowerbed. “Before I radio for backup . . .” he began, before turning his gaze heavenward. Muttering a curse to the heavy clouds above, he dredged his fingers through his wavy black hair. “There’s no way around it. I’m going to have to file a report about this . . . this . . .” he grumbled more to himself than to me.

  In my three short months at the White House, I’d seen the Counter Assault Team, or CAT, as they liked to call themselves, only a few times. They were one of the least visible segments of the Secret Service. They traveled everywhere with the President like the Secret Service agents who dressed in neatly pressed suits. But unlike their suited counterparts, CAT agents didn’t make regular security sweeps of the President’s Park.

  “And look at this.” He held up a loose wire that had been attached to his earpiece. “You’ve broken my radio.”

  I’d always found the regular Secret Service agents easy to work with. They always had a smile and a polite manner. Not one of them had ever growled at me.

  CAT agents, on the other hand, only ventured outside their tight protection circle when they were taking part in a training exercise or responding to a specific threat against the First Family. They were a very serious group.

  I doubted I would fare well in his report. While mentally drafting my résumé, I started to move away from him to gather my backpack and gardening tools. He snagged hold of my arm. “Let’s start with you giving me some basic information, like your name.”

  “Casey—Casey Calhoun.” My heart was really pounding now. I wished he’d just shoot me and put me out of my misery. His grip tightened on my arm. “I’m Gordon Sims’s new assistant.” Everyone knew Gordon. He was a fixture, a one-man institution. But the agent’s pained expression remained unchanged, which only made me more nervous. Was it possible? Did he not know Gordon? “I—I’m a gardener.”

  My slightly eccentric but altogether lovable aunts, Willow and Alba, and Grandmother Faye back in Charleston, South Carolina, had instilled in me a love of gardening as well as an absurd fondness for ice cream desserts. But I suspected he didn’t care to hear about any of that.

  I decided to take the initiative. “I’m kind of in a hurry. So if it’s okay with you, I’d like to clear up this misunderstanding as quickly as possible. I have a meeting scheduled with the First Lady this morning to present my plans on how to transform the White House gardens into the White House organic gardens.”

  “We’ll see about that.” His red-rimmed gaze traveled up and down my mud-caked legs. I had a sinking feeling he was plotting to make my life at the White House a living hell. I bit the inside of my cheek. He couldn’t really get me fired, could he?

  He narrowed his bloodshot eyes and leaned toward me. “Now tell me, Ms. Calhoun, why did you attack me?”

  Chapter Two

  I chewed my bottom lip and wished I’d stayed in my little cubicle, letting the tick, tick, tick of the institutional clock that hung on the concrete block wall chip away at my sanity. The ticking was in my head now, counting down the minutes before my meeting with the First Lady was scheduled to start.

  “Well, I’m waiting,” the unhappy agent said.

  “Really, I didn’t attack anyone,” I drawled, my voice dipping a little deeper into my Southern heritage than normal.

  His dark brows rose with incredulity.

  Undeterred, I flashed him my winsome, slightly crooked smile I’d tempered with a healthy dose of humility. “You see, I was protecting myself from whoever hit me. I’m sorry for it, but I’m afraid it was you who got in my way, Agent . . . Agent . . .”

  “Special Agent Turner,” he supplied, his brows furrowing. “I got in your way?”

  “Yes.” I nodded, glad to have cleared that up. “We can talk more about it later. Right now I have to prepare for my meeting with the First Lady.” This wasn’t a presentation I could easily postpone. The White House Grounds Committee, a collection of nationally renowned nurserymen and horticultural professors, would also be present to provide their input. I needed to make a good impression. Showing up caked in mud wouldn’t be the best place to start. “I’ll need time to clean myself up.” There would be no saving my mud-stained pantyhose. And my new pencil skirt had suffered several mud splatters as well. Perhaps I could—

  “Nice try, Ms. Calhoun. But you can’t just brush what happened under the rug. This is a serious—”

  “I’d rather plant it in a garden. It’s good natural fertilizer, you know.”

  He didn’t laugh.

  “I’m going to have to report what happened to you and what you did to me. Come along.” He scooped up my backpack from the ground and headed toward the White House.

  Stunned, I just stood there watching Turner’s determined stride, my backpack swinging in his hand. He wasn’t even going to discuss what we should do? He wasn’t going to let me explain why it was imperative that I make it to my meeting on time?

  Filing a report and filling out reams of paperwork could wait. Certainly he understood that. Besides, paperwork had never been my strength. I liked to think of myself as a woman of action, a woma
n who rolled up her sleeves and got the job, any job, done—as long as that job didn’t include paperwork.

  Assistant Usher Wilson Fisher, with his slicked-back hair and hawk-like nose, was constantly following me around, waving sheaves of forms that I needed to fill out for this or that. I cringed as I pictured the mountain of paperwork Mr. Fisher would find for me from his oversized filing cabinet dedicated strictly to his official forms.

  “Perhaps we can work something out,” I called to Special Agent Turner. He kept walking. I gathered up the gardening gloves, bottle of pepper spray, and water bottle from the muddy ground before trotting after him. “Give me an hour—two at the most—with the First Lady. I promise you, this is a very important meeting. Members of the Grounds Committee have flown in from all around the country to listen to my report.”

  He stopped in the middle of the red brick path and glanced at his watch. “What time is your meeting?”

  “Nine thirty.”

  “It’s seven twenty-three,” he reported with the kind of precision that, if Mr. Fisher had been listening, would have had him puffing up with pleasure. “That gives me two hours.”

  “Don’t forget my clothes. I can’t go into the meeting looking like this,” I said as I caught up with him. I flapped my dirty garden gloves, hoping to emphasize my point. “I’ll need to get cleaned up, not to mention the time it’ll take to set up my presentation boards. I figure that should take at least an hour.”

  Apparently the sorry state of my clothes was of no concern to him. He turned away, seemingly much more interested in the protesters gathering ahead of President Bradley’s banking summit. The crowd had more than doubled in size since I’d passed them earlier. They looked like a harmless bunch, most of them dressed in a ridiculous hodgepodge of old ripped and worn clothes and burlap sacks. And yet Turner stared at them as if he were watching a hive of assassins.