The Governor's wife

by Mark Gimenez

  Mandy arrived with an armful of clothes and a cowboy hat on her head. She reminded Bode of his big sister, Emma, when she was a teenage queen of the Kendall County Rodeo. Then she died. Bode removed his Armani coat and silk tie and put on a denim rancher's jacket and the cowboy hat. The director positioned Bode against the green screen again.

  "It'll look like you're standing right on the border above the Rio Grande."

  Bode recited his lines. "Juan Galvan, a Mexican national, crossed the border into Texas, traveled to Houston, and robbed and murdered Sarah Brown, a thirty-eight-year-old mother of four. He was convicted and sentenced to death. The Mexican government appealed to the State Department for a stay of execution. The Feds agreed. I didn't. The State of Texas executed Juan Galvan last month. But ten thousand other Mexican nationals still sit in Texas prisons, some on death row, all convicted of violent crimes against Texans. And more Mexican criminals cross our border every day. Because the president refuses to finish the wall and secure the border. Vote for Bode Bonner, and I'll secure our border. I'll make sure Mexican criminals stay in Mexico."

  "Cut!"

  One take. He was that good.

  "We'll intercut shots of the dead woman and her kids," the director said. "Guaranteed tear-jerker."

  "That was a bad crime."

  Bode had signed the death warrant. Mandy returned with a. 357-Magnum handgun. It looked like a cannon in her small hands.

  "Where'd you get this from?"

  "Cabela's," Mandy said. "I never knew how many women buy guns. I charged it to the campaign account."

  Bode held the gun like Marshal Rooster Cogburn charging the bad guys in True Grit and read his lines: "Romero Polanco, a Mexican national, entered the U.S. illegally and traveled to Amarillo to work in a meat-packing plant. A month into the job, he was fired for showing up drunk. He left the plant and went directly to the home of Edna Smith, a sixty-six-year-old grandmother. He broke into her house and tried to rape her. But Edna had lived in the harsh Panhandle of Texas all her life, and she was as crusty as the land. She pulled her. 357 Magnum and shot Romero six times in the chest. Mr. Polanco's criminal days are over but Edna's days are not-because she owned a gun. Guns don't kill-only bad people with guns kill. But liberals in Washington want to take your guns away and let your grandmother get raped by illegal Mexican immigrants. As your governor, I won't let that happen. Vote to keep your guns. Vote for your grandmother. Vote for Bode Bonner."

  "Cut!"

  The director came over to Bode.

  "You like that one, Governor? We combined immigration and gun control."

  "I never heard about this Polanco case."

  "That's because it didn't exactly happen."

  "It didn't?"

  The director shook his head.

  "Well, what did happen, exactly?"

  "A grandmother shot a burglar."

  "Illegal Mexican?"

  "White boy on meth."

  "So how the hell did he become an illegal Mexican?"

  "The Professor. Literary license, he said."

  Bode grunted then gestured to his political strategist. When Jim Bob arrived, Bode said, "This Polanco case is fiction?"

  Jim Bob glanced at the director, who offered only a lame shrug in response.

  "It's a good spot," Jim Bob said. "It'll play with the tea partiers."

  "It's a lie."

  "Riding the wave, Bode."

  Lindsay had bandaged the boy's chest and was now checking his pulse and studying the intricate tattoo on his left arm-a large LM in fancy script-when the boy's eyes abruptly blinked open. The doctor had removed the ET tube, and the boy now coughed as if he had a sore throat, which he surely had.

  "Doctor, he's awake." Lindsay wiped sweat from the boy's face and said in Spanish, "How do you feel?"

  "Tired," the boy said. "Where am I?"

  "The clinic, in Colonia Angeles. Your friends brought you here."

  "Where are they?"

  "Outside."

  "I must speak to them."

  The doctor went to the front door and stepped outside. The two men soon entered and came over to the boy. But they looked at Lindsay.

  "Uh, I'll leave you alone."

  She walked over to the congressman, who was sitting at the doctor's desk in the corner eating yogurt. The doctor returned and joined them.

  "Jesse, I stole a yogurt," the congressman said. "I missed lunch, which is not good for my low blood sugar. Will the boy be all right?"

  "Yes. With rest, he will live."

  "You're a very good doctor," Lindsay said.

  "I worked the ER during my residency at Boston Mass-I handled many gunshot wounds. As you did. I had forgotten how valuable a skilled nurse is-and you are a skilled nurse, Mrs. Bonner. Do you still work?"

  She shook her head. "I'm the governor's wife now."

  "Ah." His eyes turned down. "I am afraid you have ruined an expensive suit."

  She looked at herself for the first time since the boy had arrived; blood stained her linen skirt.

  "Would you like to clean up? The restroom is there."

  "You have a restroom?"

  He nodded. "I installed a septic system and a two-hundred-gallon water tank, when I built the clinic. Electricity, water, a toilet-all the comforts of home."

  The congressman wiped sweat from his forehead with a handkerchief.

  "Except air conditioning."

  Lindsay glanced over at the boy, who was pointing a finger at the men, as if he were giving orders. She turned back to the doctor.

  "You don't have a nurse?"

  "No. Inez is helpful, when she shows up. But she is not a nurse. And I cannot afford one. Of course, what nurse would work in the colonias? "

  The congressman stood. "It is late, Mrs. Bonner. We have been here four hours."

  " Four hours? Oh, my gosh-my Ranger will be frantic."

  "Do not worry. While you and the doctor worked on the boy, I went back and told them what you were doing. And that you were safe. Of course, Ranger Roy, he wanted to come in after you, but the local police assured him that would not be a wise move."

  She nodded. "He really hopes to shoot someone before he retires."

  "Well, who would not?"

  They all smiled, and she said, "Thank you, Congressman." She turned back to the doctor. "And thank you, Dr. Rincon."

  "For what?"

  "For letting me be useful again, if only for a day."

  They shook hands, and he seemed to hold her hand longer than necessary.

  "Uh, Jesse," the congressman said, again breaking the spell, "should they be doing that?"

  He nodded at the men, who were attempting to lift the boy from the bed.

  "?Todavia no! " the doctor said.

  He released her hand and went over to them. Lindsay and the congressman followed.

  "What are you doing?" the doctor said in Spanish. "He must rest."

  "He will rest across the river," the big man with the gun said.

  "Driving him across the river will rip the sutures out."

  "No drive," the man said.

  "He still has a chest tube in him-it must come out in a day or two."

  "Do not worry, Doctor," the smaller man said, "we will bring nurses in for Jesus."

  " Gracias, Doctor," Jesus said.

  The big man slid his arms under the boy like a forklift and raised him as if he weighed nothing. The doctor surrendered, but grabbed two bottles of medicine.

  "Here, give him one pill every twelve hours. It is an antibiotic, to prevent infection. And this pill is for the pain, it is morphine. He is going to hurt. And move his legs, so he does not get a blood clot."

  The smaller man took the pills and said, "Okay, we will do that. Muchas gracias, Doctor. We will not forget this."

  They followed the men outside; Pancho trailed them. The man with the pills got into a black Hummer. The doctor shook his head.

  "I told them, driving him across the river will tear the sutures."
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  "How do they get through the gate in the border wall?" Lindsay asked.

  "They do not. They cross upriver. With the drought, they can drive that Hummer across." The doctor scratched his chin. "I would note in the file that his check-out was against medical advice, but then, I do not have a file for the boy. I do not even know his last name."

  The Hummer abruptly drove off-without the boy. The big man carried the boy around to the back of the clinic where the land was open. They followed, and now Lindsay heard a WHUMP WHUMP WHUMP sound overhead. In the blue sky appeared a sleek black helicopter flying in low from across the river, the kind of helicopter often used by corporate executives who came to Austin to lobby her husband; its nose lifted and the helicopter landed in the desert a hundred feet behind the clinic, blowing up a cloud of dust. The big man carried the boy to the helicopter. The pilot opened the back door and helped load the boy. The big man climbed aboard, the pilot shut the door, and the helicopter then rose from the ground in a gush of wind that threatened to blow her over. They stared as it banked south and flew back across the river.

  "Well," the doctor said, "you do not see that every day in the colonias."

  "See, Mrs. Bonner," the congressman said. "On this side of the wall, it is another world entirely."

  NINE

  Bode Bonner's body teemed with testosterone and endorphins, hormones and morphine-like brain chemicals that magically washed away the pain and twenty years from his body and guilty thoughts of his wife and budget deficits from his mind.

  He felt good.

  It was the end of another day in the life of a Republican governor up for reelection in a red state: easy, if not exciting. At least his schedule allowed him plenty of free time to stay in shape. He had just finished pumping iron at the YMCA fronting the lake; now he was running five miles around the lake. Blood still engorged his arms and chest; consequently, he was running without a shirt-not a recommended practice for most middle-aged men and certainly not for a politician up for reelection.

  But Bode Bonner wasn't like most middle-aged politicians.

  First, for all intents and purposes, he had already won reelection. And second, he didn't look middle-aged. His belly was still tight and his abs still sharply etched. His shoulders were still wide and his arms still thick with muscle. His legs were still strong, even if his right knee burned with each step. So he ran with Ranger Hank but without a shirt.

  "Hank, don't fill out your daily logs anymore. Reporters can get hold of them. Damn nosy bastards."

  The State Capitol sat on a low rise at the northern boundary of downtown Austin. Eleven blocks down Congress Avenue, the Colorado River marked the southern boundary. In town, the river was called Lady Bird Lake, in honor of President Lyndon Baines Johnson's beloved wife, Claudia Alta Taylor Johnson, known to the world as Lady Bird. A ten-mile-long hike-and-bike trail looped the lake. Bode jogged the lake almost daily. He wasn't alone. The trail was crowded with walkers, joggers, bikers, dogs, and especially "Praise the Lord," Ranger Hank said.

  — young, hard-bodied, barely-dressed women.

  Bode glanced back at the girl who had just jogged past. She wore Spandex shorts that appeared painted on her tight buns and a tube top that barely constrained her prodigious chest.

  "Amen, brother."

  Running the lake was the part of living in Austin that Bode enjoyed the most, even if he and Hank were the only Republicans on the trail that day. Or any day. Point of fact, a Republican living in Austin was lonelier than a white guy in the NBA. Texas was Republican, but the capital of Texas was Democrat. Austin was the liberal, leftist, loony blue hole in the bright red donut that was the State of Texas. The newspapers, the UT faculty and students, the residents, even the homeless people-everyone in the the whole damn town was a Democrat. The only Republicans in town lived in the Governor's Mansion or worked at the Capitol.

  Which drove the Democrats in town nuts. They couldn't stand the fact that Republicans outside Austin-which is to say, every Texan who didn't live in Austin-kept sending Bode Bonner back to the capital. To their city. To live among them. To govern them. So they vented their anger by writing scathing letters to the editor of the local left-wing rag that masqueraded as a newspaper and scathing messages posted on blogs no one read, so desperate to be heard-the Internet gave everyone a voice, but no one was listening. At least not to Democrats in Texas. So they consoled themselves with their abiding faith that they were morally and intellectually superior to the vast majority of Texans who pulled the Republican lever, assured that they voted Republican only because they weren't smart enough to vote Democrat. That's it! We're not wrong! They're just not smart enough to know that we're right! Satisfied with that explanation to this perplexing human condition, they patted each other on the back and got stoned. But they couldn't deny a simple fact: they lost. They always lost.

  Which made jogging among Democrats in Austin considerably more enjoyable for the leader of Republicans in Texas.

  "Sweet female," Ranger Hank said.

  He pronounced female as if it rhymed with tamale. Ranger Hank wore jogging shorts and the massive leather holster packing his gun, cuffs, Mace, and Taser. He sounded like a car wreck with each stride. He gestured at the firm bottom of the girl jogging just a few strides in front of them. With the buds inserted into her ears and connected to the iPod strapped to her narrow waist, she was oblivious to their conversation.

  "What do you figure?" Bode said. "Junior?"

  "Sophomore."

  Since Democrats constituted your nonviolent offenders for the most part, Ranger Hank served more as Bode's personal driver, caddie, jogging partner, and fellow appraiser of the female anatomy than his bodyguard. Hank likened their jogs around the lake to an episode of American Idol, except the girls weren't singing.

  "Damn, she's only a year older than Becca. I kind of feel bad for staring."

  "But she's not your daughter."

  "Good point."

  He stared. She was a brunette with deeply tanned skin. Her tight buns were mesmerizing. Hypnotic. Bode's concentration was so complete that when she abruptly pulled up to tie her shoe, he almost plowed into her. He grabbed her by the shoulders to prevent knocking her down. He lifted her up, and she turned to him, close, almost as if she were in his arms. He inhaled her scent. She smelled of sweat and estrogen and youth and vitality and animal urges that ignited his male body. She looked even better from the front. But she wasn't tanned; she was Hispanic.

  "You okay, honey?"

  She removed one ear bud and gave him a once-over-the fine March day had turned warm so sweat coated his chest and no doubt made him look younger than his forty-seven years-and he saw the recognition come into her eyes. He expanded his chest and tightened his arm muscles and waited for the expected, "Oh, my God-you're Bode Bonner!" But it didn't come. Instead, she pulled away as if he had a poison ivy rash. Her eyes turned dark.

  "You're a fucking Nazi!"

  She replaced the ear bud, pivoted, and jogged away. Bode watched her tight buns bob down the trail.

  After a long moment, Ranger Hank said, "You want I should arrest her?"

  "For what?"

  "Being a Democrat."

  Bode exhaled and felt all the hormones and endorphins drain from his forty-seven-year-old body.

  "If only it were a crime, Hank. If only it were a crime."

  Ranger Hank drew the Taser from his holster.

  "Can I at least Tase her? Fifty thousand volts, she won't speak in complete sentences for a week."

  Eleven blocks north, Jim Bob Burnet sat in the Governor's Mansion watching Fox News, which ran 24/7 on the television in his office. He pointed at the screen.

  "You want to go national in the Republican Party, that's the ticket."

  Eddie Jones slouched on the couch.

  "You can't get the boss on?"

  "Another governor from Texas is the last thing the party wants at the top of the ballot."

  Consequently, Jim Bob did not encoura
ge Bode Bonner in that direction. What was the point? Just as he had wondered when his father had encouraged chubby little Jimmy Bob Burnet to play football at Comfort High.

  "So this is it for him?" Eddie said. "Governor of the great State of Mexico?"

  "If he were governor of Montana or Colorado or even Okla-fuckin'-homa, he'd be the leading presidential candidate. He's a regular Roy Hobbs."

  "Who?"

  "From that baseball movie, The Natural. Bode Bonner's a natural. He's got it all. The looks, the style, the voice-the man was born for the White House. But he was also born in Texas. And after George W., that disqualifies a candidate."

  "That don't seem fair."

  "This is politics, not preschool."

  But it wasn't fair. Jim Bob Burnet had long ago accepted the fact that he would live and die in Bode Bonner's considerable shadow. But he could not abide the fact that he would also live and die in Karl Rove's shadow. Rove took his man to the White House; Jim Bob would not. When people spoke of politics and the making of presidents, Rove would always be the man from Texas. It seemed so unjust. Jim Bob had a Ph. D. in politics; Rove had never even graduated college. But Rove had George W. Bush-a candidate with a pedigree-and in politics that was a hell of a lot more important than a college diploma. A political strategist was just a jockey-he was only as good as the horse he was riding. Rove rode George W. from the Governor's Mansion all the way to the White House where they proceeded to make LBJ look good when it came to presidents from Texas, and that was full-time work. When media types asked Jim Bob about Rove's political genius, he always wanted to say, "Well, Rove proved his genius advising one American president-how'd that work out for America?" But Rove still cast a dark shadow over Texas, so Jim Bob kept his mouth shut. And his dreams shuttered.

  There would be no White House for Jim Bob Burnet.

  So, even though his candidate regularly repeated his desire to jump into the national political waters, Jim Bob talked him down from the ledge every time. Because the only thing worse than not taking your candidate national was taking him national and watching him fail spectacularly. Consequently, Jim Bob had resigned himself to a career of getting the Republican governor of Texas reelected every four years for the rest of his life-not exactly the work of genius-and teaching a class on politics at the LBJ School of Public Affairs. State politics. Not federal politics. Texas, not Washington. Minor leagues, not the majors. He often felt like a baseball pitcher with a ninety-eight-mile-an-hour fastball stuck in the minors his entire career. Sure, he was playing baseball, but…