And, twenty-four hours later, when Shahzad landed at JKF International Airport aboard a Lufthansa Airbus 300 from Frankfurt, he eased through Customs without the slightest hitch.
“Purpose of visit?”
“Broadway theatre. It’s the best in the world. The Lion King. Can’t wait to see it again.”
“How long will you be in this country?”
“Three weeks, perhaps.”
Stamp, stamp!
“Enjoy the show. Merry Christmas.”
Mindless fools, these people. Merry Christmas. Hah!
He took a cab to a small house in the Murray Hill section of Manhattan, got out and paid the cabbie.
“Merry Christmas,” said the cabbie.
“Merry Christmas,” he answered back with a smile and a wave. He wanted to kill the man. Stupid people.
He went in and embraced some of his men: Seyed Gilani was here, as were Saleem Malek, Kamran Hasan and Ali Nazir, as well as several of his handpicked recruits with fair skin that would accompany him in the final assault on Dumaine.
He found out that all of his men had made it through. All of them. He congratulated himself on his expert planning. His people were successfully scattered all over the country now.
“If we are successful in taking out Dumaine, the line of succession moves to the Speaker of the House, who is not a Democrat, but a Republican, and he is much more reasonable on the subject of Russian arms sales to foreign countries. The timing of Mowbray’s death could not have been more perfect.”
“The American system will not permit Dumaine to name a Vice President until after he is sworn into office, so if we take him out before that time, the next President would be the Speaker of the House, correct?” asked Hasan.
“Correct.”
“What’s the first thing you want to do?” asked Saleem Malek.
“Nothing,” Shahzad shrugged. “We watch the news, see how his schedule develops, choose our time, and act. We have to wait—wait until the time is right. No matter how tight security is now, it will be tighter when Dumaine is sworn in as President and he moves into the White House. Then we’ll never get to him.”
“That gives us a month,” said Kamran Hasan.
“Yes. It’s Christmas now. The Inauguration is the third week in January,” said Gilani.
“Not much time,” said Ali Nazir.
“No,” agreed Shahzad, “but time enough. We will have a chance. Only one, perhaps, but we will have a chance. Sometime between now and then when he’s in a weak position for a day or two. And when the chance comes—” he pounded the table “—we seize it!”
* * *
CHAPTER 74
Christmas Day all over Washington was a somber affair.
At the White House, St. Clair had Jack and Francesca with him, but Rafael had to get back to take charge of his cutter, the USCGC Tequesta. He would be on duty the day after Christmas and he wanted to spend time with Antonia and her family.
Can’t say’s I blame him, thought St. Clair. She’s a cute one, that Antonia.
After opening presents by a small tree in the East Sitting Hall upstairs in the Residence and enjoying a late breakfast, Jack and Francesca went out to drop in on a couple of families in Washington.
St. Clair cradled a cup of steaming café con leche in his hands as he sat cozily in his chair looking out of the arch-shaped window in the East Sitting Room at the sometimes fiercely gusting wind fighting its way through the bristling branches of trees that looked all but dead in the wintertime. He wouldn’t be sitting here next spring when the trees—and the thousands of flowers planted all over the grounds—came back to life.
St. Clair raised his eyebrows, twisted his lips into a wry smile. The nature of life, he supposed. His winter. Dumaine’s spring.
But what about that Tim Harcourt? And what in God’s name had these two guys been thinking about when they got into bed with each other? And what could St. Clair do about it? More important, what should he do about it?
“More café con leche, Mr. President?” said Lonnie quietly over his shoulder.
St. Clair took a deep breath.
“No, Lonnie. Think I’ll have one of those colladas I used to drink when I first came here.”
“The ones that make your stomach upset, Mr. President?”
“Yes, sir, that’s the kind. Just been thinking about my sweet Sofia.”
“I’ll bring it right away, Mr. President.”
“Oh, Lonnie?”
“Yes, Mr. President?”
“You ever think about moving to Miami?”
“No, sir, never give it a thought, sir.”
“Give it some thought. Two old men like us don’t belong in weather like this.”
“Yes, Mr. President.”
Later, he thought he’d go down and watch some football in the little study off the Oval Office, but his heart wasn’t really in it.
He thought of inviting Gloria over for Christmas dinner, but he’d done that for Thanksgiving, and besides, as much as he’d genuinely liked Douglas, he’d never really cared for the social-climbing Gloria Mowbray, the pushy broad.
* * *
CHAPTER 75
At the Dumaine residence in Georgetown, Bianca had canceled a huge party scheduled for Christmas Day, because it would be unseemly to go on with it so soon after Mowbray’s death.
But the girls, as usual, were up at the crack of dawn, screaming with joy. After a couple of hours, they were exhausted from opening all their presents.
Phil had come over bright and early to bring presents to put under the tree. He had a present for everybody, even the three nannies. Everybody except Tim.
He was still there in the kitchen having coffee when Bill and Tim went off on their morning run, tailed by eight Secret Service agents in sweatpants and packing iron, and a van following behind. With the girls opening presents and everything else, they ended up getting a late start for the morning run.
Tim was up with the whole family, because he’d stayed there last night—in the cottage on the far side of the four-car garage.
Their nanny was watching the girls. Bianca had had to engage a third nanny because of the brutal schedule she was working with, and even nannies needed a little time off. So she had them working in shifts.
The cook came into the kitchen with some potatoes from the basement pantry. Bianca jerked her head for Phil to follow her.
“Let me top off my coffee,” he said, then followed her down the hallway to Bill’s study. They went in and she closed the door behind them.
They both put down their cups, then held each other in a tight embrace, then kissed.
“Merry Christmas.”
“We’ve got forty minutes,” said Bianca, all business.
“Good. We have to make good use of it.”
“What are we going to do about Tim?”
“I’m going to be straight with you, honey,” Phil said, his face hard. “I’ve met with him twice and begged him to reconsider. He tells me to fuck off, basically.”
“This is bad.” Bianca chewed her lower lip and sipped from her scalding cup of coffee.
“I think we ought to get rid of him,” Phil finally said.
“Get rid of him?” said Bianca, sitting down on a leather couch across the room.
“You know what I mean.”
“I know you know people who can handle things like this, Phil,” said Bianca, “but how can we be sure we’re not connected with any of it?”
Phil found himself admiring how incredibly cool Bianca was being about this whole business. He knew she was ruthless. It was one of the many things he found attractive in her personality. But this?
“I know people who will do a clean job.”
“It’s already Christmas. We only have a few weeks.”
“I have to wait for the right scenario before I make final plans, but I already have the right people in place.”
They paused as they locked eyes, taking each other in.
“Not that I see.” Phil came over and sat down next to her, more animated now. “The thing is this: my only hesitation, and I mean my only hesitation, has to do with if Bill knows anything about us.”
“Tim has told you more than once that he hasn’t gone to Bill about us.”
“That’s correct. He’s told me—twice he’s told me, the most recent time being last week.”
“And?”
“And I want you to dig deep into your woman’s intuition and tell me you’re sure—absolutely sure—that you think Bill’s not on to us.”
“I’ve had no indication—nothing—not the slightest hint that he suspects anything.”
“The whole idea here being that if he does suspect anything, and then something happens to Tim, he’s going to come at us like a fucking shit storm, you know? And we’ll be history. We’ll be fucked.”
“Well, Tim’s been using the threat of telling Bill to keep us in line, basically. Isn’t that right?”
“Yeah, that’s right.”
“To accept him, into the family, so to speak.”
“Yeah.”
“He puts up with us and we put up with him.”
“Right.”
“And we all live happily ever after.”
“Right,” said Phil, “except we’re not all gonna live happily ever after because sooner or later someone’s gonna catch on and this whole thing will explode in our face, ya know?”
“Yes,” said Bianca, nodding gravely. “But we’re the ones talking about killing the guy. Isn’t that worse than the world finding out about him and Bill?” she asked. But it really wasn’t a question.
“Or you and me?”
“It’d ruin us all.”
“How is Bill gonna react after Tim’s, uh, out of the picture?”
“What do you mean?”
“Would he ever come back to you, the sex, I mean?”
“No,” she shook her head emphatically. “That part of our life is over.” She handed her coffee mug to Phil. “Top this off, will you, Phil? And yours, too.”
“Yeah, I need a refill.”
She looked at her watch as he left the study.
“We still have a few minutes. I’m going to check in with my mother real quick.”
Phil shook his head.
“Hope she’s feeling better.”
“Me, too. The last thing I want to do is leave Washington right now.”
She picked up the desk phone as Phil went off to the kitchen.
* * *
CHAPTER 76
As soon as Bill and Tim left the house to begin their jog, a light drizzle began to fall, and combined with the high wind, the wind chill factor had to be thirty degrees, cold for Washington.
Bill turned to Agent Rodriguez.
“A little space, please, Carlos. Wanna talk to Tim about something.”
Agent Rodriguez, bundled up against the cold, nodded and fell back about twenty paces, motioning with his hand to two of his detail to move well ahead of the President-elect, but not to crowd them. These two sprinted up well ahead of Bill and Tim and once they had settled into a leisurely pace, Bill turned to Tim.
“I wish you’d reconsider, Tim.”
“Bill, my mind’s made up. I’m going to do you more harm than good by staying on.”
“I can get you a great job in the Administration, if that’s what you want.”
“I couldn’t have a better job than your Body Man. I’m with you all the time. It’s just that I can’t touch you, you know? I’m with you, but I can’t be with you.”
“Well, Tim, how the fuck do you think I feel? I’m going through the same agony you’re going through.”
“Phil’s met with me a couple of times pushing me to get out of the way.”
Bill snorted a derisive laugh.
“Oh, sure. It’s okay for him to be fucking my wife, but not for me to be fucking my boyfriend.”
“Well, either one or both are bad for business, right?” said Tim.
“If it gets out, sure. And I’m fucked if it gets out about them, so either way, I’m a loser.”
“It’s just easier if I leave now, don’t you think? Give you plenty of room. No worries.”
“Tim, I know it’s not perfect. Not good, that it sucks, the whole situation. Last night was good, though, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah, last night was real good.”
After Thanksgiving, Bill had made it a point to ease Tim into family life, bit by bit, little by little, not too obviously, at least not obvious to anybody but Phil and Bianca.
Since their affair began on the campaign trail, they were always traveling, catching a minute here, an hour there, a quickie in a storage room, that kind of thing. No one was ever home for more than a night or two.
After the election was over and everybody returned to what might be called a “normal” schedule, although no such thing existed for a high-level politician like Dumaine, Tim had been spending more and more of his nights in his apartment on Wisconsin Avenue, getting picked up in the mornings by a staff car, and getting more and more depressed about the whole situation.
After the Thanksgiving dinner, Bill had arranged a series of really early morning appointments, so when he suggested Tim stay over in the old, disused servants’ cottage out back, no one thought anything about it—except Bianca and Phil, who kept what they were thinking to themselves.
With Tim there early in the morning, they were able to get the standard morning run out of the way and move on with their day.
The thing about the servants’ cottage that made it perfect for their needs was that it connected to the other side of the four-car garage Bill had built when he moved his family into the house. It had been a separate structure, but when the garage went in, a door was added to the cottage so anyone could walk from the laundry room behind the kitchen into the garage and cross over into the cottage without being seen from the outside.
And since the Secret Service had set up trailers outside for their staff and patrolled the perimeter of the Dumaine property, there were no agents inside the house.
Bill had sneaked over almost nightly since setting up this arrangement, and they’d been together more than ever.
“Tim, just give me a little more time, okay?”
“I can’t say the last couple of weeks haven’t been great, Bill, but it still makes an awful lot of sense for me to just—go.”
“What if I sit down with Phil and Bianca and level with them and read them the riot act and tell them to back the fuck off or they’ll have to deal with me? What do you think of that approach?”
“Well, they don’t think you know anything about them. I’ve made that point all along to them.”
Bill was silent for a good thirty seconds before speaking.
“You know, Tim, there might be something there—something useful—with them thinking I don’t know about them.”
“What do you mean?”
“I might be able to work on this since they don’t know that I know.”
“I’ve been trying to use that as some kind of threat so they’ll leave me the fuck alone. And it’s worked so far. The only problem is me.”
“No, the problem is them, not you.”
“Well—”
“Listen—the minute, the fucking minute I’m President, I can send Bianca on more foreign trips than Hillary Clinton made when she was secretary of state. I’ll keep that bitch out of our lives by the week and by the month. And I can reassign Phil to go with her. Once I’m settled in, I’ll make sure we get some time. This isn’t an easy job I’m going into, you know, and besides loving you, I need you to get through it.
“I—” Tim started.
“We’ll practically live at Camp David. I’ve even looked at the floor plans and there’s a coupla cabins that have the same set-up as we have now with the garage. The Secret Service would never know a thing.”
“Well—I’ll stay th
rough the Inauguration. That’s all I’m gonna promise. Then I think it’s best for me just to get lost.”
“We’ll talk some more.”
“It’s fuckin' cold out here.”
“Don’t whine, Tim,” Bill laughed. “We’re almost home.”
* * *
CHAPTER 77
Back in the Dumaine house in Georgetown, Phil came back with the coffee refills just as Bianca was hanging up the phone.
The Running Mate (A Jack Houston St. Clair Thriller) Page 27
