Frank's Independence Day

by M. L. Buchman

  He popped the glove box with the back of his thumb and wiped the knife on his pants before dropping it in and knocking the little door closed with his knee. No gloves, which would have stood out on the mid-summer night, so he was limiting where he left fingerprints. She made a bet with herself that he’d use a shirttail to wipe the seatbelt buckle and the door handle as he exited the car.

  This kid was careful. Which reaffirmed her first instincts.

  At this time of night she made it all the way downtown in under twenty minutes and the guy didn’t say a word. Halfway there, she’d asked his name.

  “Frank.”

  No last name offered. He didn’t look nervy, again just being careful.

  She flew down to 7 World Trade Center and whipped into the downward-spiraling ramp of the underground parking garage with a bright squeal of tires. Her parents had given her the car as a make-up present when she’d been named a field agent last week. She’d retired the very old gray Honda, probably only days before its final collapse. She’d named it Witherspoon, for what she thought Michael Caine might have called his Aston Martin in The Italian Job. She was thinking of naming her new BMW Jean Claude, after Van Damme’s kicking performance in Bloodsport. But that had only been released a few months ago and didn’t have the classic feel of the 1969 heist movie. She’d find its name eventually.

  Her parents felt that a federal job was beneath their only daughter. They’d worked hard to get out of the same poor-ass neighborhood where she’d just found Frank. That their daughter hadn’t taken her Columbia University education to become a doctor or lawyer, or at least marry one, had made them more than a little bit crazy. After a year of simultaneously completing her Secret Service training and managing to finish her degree in criminal law, they’d felt contrite and given her the Beemer. She wasn’t any less pissed at them for all the hassle they’d dished out over the last year, but she did love this car.

  It practically stood on its nose when she hammered the brakes at the control booth of the restricted section of the underground parking. She lowered the window.

  “Hi Beatrice,” Harry popped the button inside his booth to raise the steel gate and lower the tire punchers into the pavement surface. “Knew it was you when I heard the wheels hit the upper ramp.”

  She flashed her ID at him for form’s sake. Added a grin of thanks and goosed the gas, spinning down two more layers to her assigned spot.

  Beatrice kept an eye out as the kid climbed out of the car. Sure enough, Frank applied his shirttail to belt buckle and both the inside and outside door handles.

  # # #

  “Any record?”

  Frank didn’t “huh” this lady as he tucked his shirt back in as smoothly as he could. Didn’t pretend to not understand. He looked at her over the top of her car, kinda surprised at how far down he had to look. She’d seemed so damn big with the fancy car, the shiny damn gun, and the total lack of fear. She couldn’t stand more than five-seven or eight, but there was no question which of them was holding the power at the moment.

  And he didn’t like that it was her. Not one lousy little bit.

  He shook his head. No record, no time, no juvie.

  “Not even detention, much.”

  He’d been top twenty at the high school, which only said he wasn’t as out-and-out lazy as everyone else there. College hadn’t been all that high on anyone’s to-do list in his class. He’d had some idea that the chop shops might eventually pay him enough to hit Columbia or City University, but he’d never figured that as real likely.

  The “no detention” line got a laugh he hadn’t expected, and he had to reassess her again. Bright white teeth, and hair as dark and shining as those eyes. The smile also made her look younger than the thirty he’d originally tagged her with. Low twenties. He moseyed around the rear of the car and tried to make no big deal out of checking her up and down.

  Red Converse sneakers and faded jeans that showed hard use and good quality. Certainly not Goodwill or Woolworths. High-necked yellow blouse. Black leather vest, dressy kind that wasn’t for warmth, but instead for looks… and hiding damn big guns. The combo promised a slender waist and a serious enough chest that the gun in the shoulder holster didn’t show much under the soft leather. If he didn’t know it was there, he might not have thought anything out of place. And a whole lot of things were in the right place on this woman.

  “Do I pass?”

  He went for a safe shrug. Okay, so he hadn’t pulled off much in the way of smooth, but she was a woman who deserved a long look.

  “Turn around.” She didn’t make it a request.

  He narrowed his eyes at her and she twirled a finger. Well, he knew that his looks didn’t leave him nothing to worry about in that department. He and his boys worked out together every day ’cause there sure wasn’t shit else to do in the projects, and he’d received more than his fair share of fine benefits from the ladies to keep him working the iron.

  “Describe what I’m wearing.”

  Some kinda test. So, he stared at the row of cars parked across the way, lined up neat as bowling pins. They were all driven by skilled drivers like her, each car slid into its spot sweet and straight. This wasn’t no office-bozo kinda parking. The garage was all pretty quiet on this side of that security gate up there. Not much in the way of traffic. ’Course it was one in the morning on July Fourth. The place smelled of garage, oil, fuel, and rubber. Where the hell was he?

  So, he described her. Got into it. She’d left a damn clear impression. She didn’t stop him after her clothing, so he got into her high cheekbones and full lips, her black hair, long, straight but threatening to curl madly, and the thin gold chain around her neck with no ornament dangling on it. And she didn’t need anything more to look seriously fine. No rings or bracelets and...

  He spotted a reflected motion on the flat rear glass of a Ford Bronco parked across the way.

  Her reflection pulling out that damn big gun.

  He dove for the ground and rolled between a couple of cars.

  Sweat poured off him even as he regained his feet in a low squat and began thinking on the best direction to run. Blown away in a parking gara—

  That laugh again. It stopped him cold.

  She wandered around the car until she was facing him, hands empty. Out where he could see them plainly. Did nothin’ to calm his nerves.

  “You recall what you see accurately, are exceptionally aware of your surroundings, and have good reaction time.”

  “Which means what?” He managed to make it come out more as an angry shout he meant than the choked squeak he was feeling. He stood slowly, his heart still pounding against his ears.

  “Which means I was right. Let’s go.”

  She walked off toward the steel-faced garage elevator set in an unadorned concrete wall. He glared at the low pipes wandering along the garage ceiling, but finding no kinda clue up there, he followed her.

  # # #

  Beatrice pressed the button that brought the elevator down, but didn’t say a word. She stayed quiet to let Frank stew in his own juices. He stalked into the elevator like a grizzly bear who’d just crawled out of its den and found no food anywhere. Seriously grumpy. She keyed in the lock code to take them up to the seventh floor.

  “You like being right.” Frank didn’t make it a question and he didn’t waste time asking her where they were going.

  Beatrice had to grant that the kid had the patience to figure out that he’d find that out soon enough. And also enough smarts to know that she wasn’t likely to tell him before then.

  “Damn straight!” She loved the feeling. “Being right is fun. It’s one of my favorite things. And if I were blond and could sing, I’d be Julie Andrews.”

  His look told her that his education in movies needed some serious fixing up.

  For the life of her she couldn’t figure out why
she so enjoyed messing with this kid.

  Kid. He was seven inches taller than she was with a workout chest big enough that he made the elevator feel small. Nor had she missed how fine a form he had when he’d turned away from her. That she’d even noticed was interesting in itself, but she absolutely wasn’t going to think about that.

  The door opened and they stepped into the inner building’s lower entrance foyer, the one which lay seven stories above the front-entrance street-level signs for brokerages and banks that filled the bulk of 7 World Trade Center, New York, New York.

  Frank grunted when he saw the sign above the desk. But no more than that. Steel letters on dark wood: United States Secret Service. She remembered the feeling the first time she’d seen this sign, as if the world had just become a great deal more serious. Of course that had been on her new recruit tour, she’d known what building she was in. She gauged Frank’s reaction. “Adapts rapidly to changing situations,” was added to her initial assessment.

  He eyed her sideways for a moment, then nodded to himself as if she finally made sense in his world. Of course a Secret Service agent would outsmart a simple carjacking scheme.

  She’d spent the last year training in driving, weapons, investigations, research, and a dozen other skills. She’d also been trained in unarmed combat and wanted to see how Frank Adams did. It was stupid to take on an unknown street fighter twice her size, which made it just her style.

  She signed in at the desk and signaled one of the guys to come out and pat Frank down, which he submitted to but clearly didn’t like.

  “Escort him through. Find him some sweats.” She glanced down. His feet were as big as the rest of him and there probably weren’t any loaners that size. “Barefoot is fine.”

  She turned and headed into the women’s locker room to change. She considered handing him to someone else for testing, which is exactly why she didn’t. Her instructors were always telling her she was much too impulsive, too quick to leap into the fray. But one of the old-timers, one who actually used to ride on President Ford’s protection detail, the only PPD agent she’d met so far, told her never to stop doing that. From then on she ignored all instructions to back off and had graduated top of her class. Maybe it was part of some test to see if she’d comply. She hadn’t.

  She wandered into the gym. They told her it was nothing as nice as the one in D.C., but it worked fine for her. A row of weight machines down one side and a gray foam mat that covered the rest of the floor. She knew from experience that it wasn’t as soft as it looked.

  When Frank arrived, he looked amazing. The black t-shirt with large white U.S.S.S. stretched tight across his chest and showed actual six-pack abs. Black gym shorts revealed legs that rippled with muscle. She could feel the heat rising through her body, so she turned away and led him onto an open corner of the mat.

  He tried to turn so that it was his back facing the wall, rather than hers, but she didn’t let him. It left him watching the other agents over his shoulder, keeping an eye on them. There were only a couple working out. Things were quiet on July Fourth night, these few were probably just killing time before their shift started. She knew one of them well enough to wave, but that was all.

  She herself was glad of the reason to be missing the party at her parents. That was the main reason she’d been cruising up to Columbia to check on a posted summer class schedule she could have just as easily called on tomorrow.

  “Hit me.”

  Frank goggled at her so she repeated herself.

  “Ladies first,” he replied.

  She shot a rabbit punch at his sternum without hesitating. She’d thought to drop him as a lesson, but her fist mostly bounced off a tight gut, though the breath did whoosh out of him. He’d also managed to twist enough to make it a partially glancing blow.

  Beatrice went for another punch and Frank, predictably, went for the block.

  But she didn’t land the punch, instead she went low and swept his leg.

  On his way down, he was fast enough to snag a hand behind her leg and take her down as well. She landed on top of him and almost got the nerve pinch on his hand, but he was strong enough to wrench free, despite the pain that must have caused.

  They pushed off each other and rolled to their feet.

  “Damn,” Frank shifted lightly on his feet circling.

  Now he was going to be predictable and gripe about surprise attacks.

  “You smell wonderful.”

  It flustered her enough that when he went for the takedown, she landed hard on her back before she could recover.

  Frank knocked the air right out of her.

  Chapter 4

  Frank: Now

  I can’t begin to tell you how good that lady was,” Frank massaged his chin where Beatrice’s elbow had surprised him twenty-five years before, after he’d slammed her to the mat. Even now, he could remember the scent of her as clearly today as if no time had passed at all. Like midnight and roses. Dark, mysterious, and lush.

  And then she’d clipped his chin with her elbow and planted his face in that stone-hard mat of the Secret Service gym.

  The White Hawk was circling down to the Manhattan Downtown Heliport. Nine a.m., exactly on schedule. Frank looked down to check the dock.

  They’d cleared the pier of other flights. A quick scan below showed that the police boats had cordoned off the part of the East River that flowed by the heliport.

  The heliport itself was a pier and a barge near the south tip of Manhattan. The tiny parking lot off South Street that could hold about a dozen cars was presently blocked by half-a-dozen black Secret Service SUVs. They’d closed a short section of the street, and the rest of the Presidential motorcade waited for them including a pair of Humvees with turret guns and an ambulance, surrounded by a phalanx of New York’s finest mostly on motorcycles.

  A long pier stuck out from the shore separated from the land by the terminal building. His earpiece confirmed what his eyes could see. The “all secure” mirrored by the agents in dark gray suits standing watch outside the terminal’s doors. The long pier stretched out into the East River. Brooklyn rose on the far shore, bridges soaring above the boat traffic on the bright water. The four helipads were empty, and a pair of Beasts, the Presidential limousines, were parked there. Then the big barge, that looked little different from the pier, floated to the north. About a third of the ten helicopter parking spots on the barge were taken, but the only guys near them were agents.

  “Merlin inbound,” Frank announced over the radio.

  President Matthews grinned at him as he did every time he heard his Secret Service codename. If the main man got a kick out of being dubbed a wizard, that was fine with Frank. And it fit. Youngest President in history, he’d fostered more peace accords than anyone had pulled off in a whole lot of terms. Halfway through his first term and he’d already visited the United Nations more times than any other prior President in their entire incumbency.

  And being there on July second, right before the July Fourth holiday would look good in the press. He knew that wasn’t what motivated the Man, but neither was he going to be stupid and miss the chance to leverage the opportunity a bit.

  They circled as they descended toward the pier, providing Frank one last look in all directions. Nothing caught his eye, nothing pulled his attention. The only thing he noticed was that the ambulance was behind the rearmost Humvee. It was supposed to be in front so that the Humvee’s gunner would have a clear field of fire and the ambulance would be inside the bubble with the President if they had to crash down a defensive perimeter. He called down and they started shuffling it as the Marine One helicopter settled at the outmost spot on the main pier, the most defensible spot.

  “Check the drivers, ambulance and Humvee. They should both know better.”

  As the wheels kissed the pier, the answer came back into his earpiece. “Ambulance bro
ke down, they had to send their second team. Rolled in late, but they’re on my cleared list.” Then after a brief pause. “He won’t forget next time.” He could hear the laugh in Hank Henson’s voice. Hank took deep pleasure in making rookies suffer. Probably been hell on new pledges at whatever Ivy League fraternity he’d belonged to. Frank had done night school at NYU.

  Even before the helicopter’s rotors stopped, Beast Two was backing up close to the door. They alternated which was the decoy car. Once the rotors halted, a Marine opened the side door which rolled toward the back. Frank stepped out first, scanned once more, receiving nods from the key agents.

  Second day of July in New York City. The heat rolled across him like an old friend, hot, thick with flavor, the smell of home. No other city smelled like it. He tugged at the jacket of his custom-tailored suit to make sure it both hid his weapon and offered easy access. Damn suits cost a fortune, but he didn’t look armed in them, so it was worth it. No need to remind the President more than necessary that he was surrounded by armed men every minute of the day.

  He let Merlin down, making sure he was between the President and the bulk of the Manhattan buildings. Two more agents to either side flanked him for the thirty-foot walk to the car. Human shield in place.

  In moments, he and Merlin were locked in and the motorcade was moving. That was one of the secrets of Presidential security, never stay still, a moving target was much harder to hit.

  Frank hated this next stretch. For the next four-point-one miles there was no question about where the Presidential motorcade would be. There were alternate routes through the city. However, up the FDR was the safest and fastest, but it meant being predictable.

  “You said meeting Beatrice Belfour was like Men in Black?” President Peter Matthews was ignoring whatever crises he carried in his briefcase. He’d snapped it shut halfway through the flight and asked Frank about how he’d ended up head of the PPD. Boss’ prerogative.