Kendall rose to her feet, towering over those around her. “We are warriors.”
“Some of us are warriors, but not all of us.” Paige still had no idea why in the world they were looking to her and not to someone like the continental alpha. “We need to remember that.”
Paige read the room, and they seemed… relieved.
Relieved that she was about to declare war on the United States of America.
Tuck stood up. “The President is on her way. She’s being escorted now.”
“Do not threaten her life,” Paige told them. It would be too easy to take the President out right here and now.
“Why not?” someone shouted.
“Assassinate her now while she’s weak,” someone else yelled.
“That’s a bell we can’t un-ring,” Paige roared, using her alpha will to back her words. “Do we have someone to take the President’s place?”
“You.”
“No.” Absolutely not. “First of all, that’s not how the government works. There is a chain of command here and I’m nowhere on it. Nowhere. Secondly, I’m not fit to lead a nation. Thirdly, decide who is going to lead us. It won’t be me. I’ll run the protection side of things. I’ll help with the war, but the leader? That needs to be someone who actually knows what they’re fucking doing.”
The gym buzzed with this new update until Tuck disappeared and came back with a team of men in black, and the President of the United States.
The President came up to Paige and smiled at the gathered paranormals. “The children are just outside of town.”
“Excellent.” Paige kind of wanted to see how the President would react. She wanted to know what was at play here. What kind of woman was the President and just how far was she willing to go?
But was Paige willing to bet the lives of children on trying to see how far the President was willing to go?
She shouldn’t be. “I need to know if you intend on returning our children.”
Disappointment settled like a fine sheen of dust on the President’s face. “You do know that in refusing my offer, you’d be declaring war.”
“We’re declaring our rights, rights we were born with, Madam President. We’re declaring we don’t deserve to be treated like criminals. What’s wrong with that?”
“You’re dangerous.”
“As dangerous as you?” Paige turned to the President and squared off with her. “Will the children be safe? Will they be returned?”
The President narrowed her right eye, gnashing her teeth. “Yes.”
“Are you sure?” Because there was something in her expression, something that hinted the only reason the President was agreeing to return the kids was because she had something else up her sleeve.
The President ground her jaw. “Yes. They will be safe.”
Paige didn’t believe her.
Neither did a few of the others. “Where are they coming from?”
The President’s eyes went frigid. “They’re coming from Portland.”
Chuck and a few others got up and left.
“I want to formally let you know that your offer of ‘peace,’ as crappy as it is, is respectfully declined.” A thick knot wrapped itself in Paige’s chest as she said those words out loud. “We will not be herded onto your reservations. We will not be chipped and treated like cattle for the slaughter. We were born free American citizens, and that’s how we’re going to be treated.”
“How do you think that’s going to play out for you?” the President asked, turning to the gathered crowd. “I have armies. You have…” She sneered and gestured to the people. “Pets.”
Paige knew just how much fire power was at the President’s fingertips. She didn’t worry about nuclear attacks, but others? Missiles? Would her wards withstand a direct missile attack?
She’d have to make a few adjustments, if she even could.
“We will not live like that, Madam President. We are free people and we will be treated like it.”
The President took in a deep breath, straightening as she did so. Then she met Paige’s gaze. “I had more faith in you.”
“As I you.” The full force of those words hit her like a hammer in that moment. Paige’s entire world was shattered in those three words. She’d had complete faith that the President of the United States would look after them, would see their best interest, and would eventually find a real solution.
Not this. Never in a million years did she expect this.
“You will wish you’d taken my offer,” the President said as she and her security detail left.
“You’ll wish you’d heeded mine.”
They were now at war.
Paige had no fucking idea what the hell she was doing.
32
They managed to retrieve the kids safe and sound, but Paige knew something else was going on there. Something else was afoot. She didn’t know what she’d read on the President’s face, but she’d been smug when she’d said the kids would return. Something was going on.
She’d sent out Margo and Clem to see what they could find, but they’d come back with nothing. She didn’t want to stir up a bunch of trouble, not with the talks going on right then.
Paige knew something wasn’t right.
Four days, the President didn’t make another move on Troutdale. She didn’t make another move on the other paranormal communities either. Danny and Tru had managed to get their own network up and running. Tru was still building on the network that Paige didn’t understand. Danny’s network of dryads and information made sense. Tru’s network of jargon and “nets” didn’t.
They had information. That was what mattered. They had information.
And information was good.
They had a reprieve, and while that felt like a good thing, it probably wasn’t.
Paige needed to know what kind of army they had and who was going to lead it. Yes, she’d said she would, but she also believed that others were better suited for it. She’d be perfectly okay with following someone else.
The gathered paranormals—with more arriving every day for the talks—voted that she would lead them.
A real vote. With delegates and the whole nine. She didn’t campaign, but she’d won.
As the war effort commander and as their leader.
She didn’t want that. She wanted someone else to be the leader. So, she made Kendall her second-in-command and gave her a lot of the actual leading duties.
Paige didn’t necessarily like Kendal. She had this attitude that was a little off-putting, but she had more experience leading a group like this. Paige had no idea why or how she’d gotten all the votes. She was this big unknown to a lot of these people. Shit, she was a failed parent. The things people did know about her should have thrown their votes to someone else.
And, frankly, they nearly had. She’d barely won the vote. It wasn’t like a landslide or anything.
But the other votes had given them a cabinet of sorts. They were no longer ruled by some secret council. The Elders didn’t even have a member on board. None of them had been voted in.
She stood in the corner of the room, watching this new council bicker in the conference room of the Red Star Division. Suzanne had said she’d give up her offices, but Paige had insisted that wouldn’t happen. The town still needed their mayor and her offices. They’d become the beating heart for the town and that’s how it needed to stay.
Originally, she’d let everyone meet at the Whiskey home, but Leslie had started showing signs of wear. Their home was no longer the sanctuary it had once been.
So, Paige had taken it to the only other place she could think: Red Star.
But this wasn’t going to work either. Eventually, Dexx and his team—his entire freakin’ team. Where in the hell were they?---would be back and they’d need their space back. But for now?
For now, they were dividing the U.S.
“We have Montana,” Rory sai
d. He was a big, burly dryad from a grove that was apparently bigger and more powerful than Troutdale’s grove. “They’re ready to pull out.”
Paige still didn’t understand what exactly was going on here. They were making a bid to secede from the union, an act that Paige was fairly certain had failed a couple of times before. Texas had attempted it once before. She thought. And maybe someone else? She didn’t even remember. Was that even being taught in school anymore?
So far, they had Texas, California, Oregon, Washington, Alaska, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, the Dakotas, Colorado, and Nebraska. Then, there were the three odd ball ones; New Hampshire, Vermont, and Florida.
How was that supposed to work?
They had a lawyer, Nancy Niesgal. Paige remembered her name as “Nice Gal,” even though that wasn’t how it was pronounced. She had a lot of names and faces to remember and she had to somehow build relationships with all of them. This was… ridiculous.
“We file for the right to secede,” Nancy repeated as everyone else bickered, squabbled, and threw out wild ideas. “That should buy us time.”
Paige knew they weren’t going to be able to buy a lot of time and they weren’t wasting it. They’d set up locations for people to relocate to in the wilderness of Northern California, Montana, and Oregon. The President had offered camps or reservations. So far, the paranormals weren’t offering much more than that.
But she’d also set up people to watch over supplies, and others to help them build new homes, new power grids.
No fences, though. Anyone could come in and out as they wanted.
But each of these hubs would be protected with a ward tree. The wards weren’t connected to a chip in their head though. They wouldn’t die if they ventured outside the perimeter.
So, that was better? Somehow?
So far, Paige wasn’t certain they were offering much more than the President had.
They hadn’t invaded any other prisons, though. That would come next, but in this time of “peace,” she knew that the best thing she could do was to offer a peaceful relocation for those who hadn’t done so yet.
She knew that others were setting up refugee camps elsewhere. There was a growing one in New Mexico that was making the news, but so far, New Mexico hadn’t opted to join their bid to secede.
“How will this work?” Paige asked again. She’d heard the words. She just needed them repeated so they’d drive home and become reality.
“Legally, the Union is indestructable.”
“Which means this is a waste of time.”
“No. If we secede, then other states might as well.”
“Like?”
“The Confederate states. If the west pulls out and then the south pulls out, the north will be all that remains.”
“But they’ll still have all the spending money, the power, and the military.”
“Legally, yes.”
There was no “legally” to it. Paige was sitting as a leader to a nation with no money, no military, no support. This was a nightmare. The President was going to win with that alone.
There were so many things she could do. She could withhold medicine and then all the people with chronic illnesses would die.
She could “allow” a supply shipment in, and then poison the food.
She could bomb the shit out of one the refugee camps.
The President had all the power.
So, how could they get that back? “Look, this is a waste of time and energy. I know that you’re doing what you think is best, and I get that. I do. But seceding when it’s already been proven to be ‘illegal’ isn’t going to do us any good.”
“Are you going to stop us?”
“No.” Paige took in Nancy for the first time. Really took her in. She was human, but she looked like a powerhouse. It wasn’t her slight frame. She looked like she was one of those people who could eat almost anything and not gain a single pound. Her personality, though, was formidable. She had a steel will of her own. “You do what you have to, and I’m going to see what we can do to shore things up here.”
Nancy nodded and left.
Paige wasn’t going to be any more help here. They were talking about war plans, and that was great. But without other structures in place, they would lose. They needed planes, boats, weapons. They needed medical supplies and food.
They needed infrastructures.
So, she located people, working with them, coming up with ideas—real ideas—and the implementing plans that would actually work.
Another two days spent.
It wasn’t perfect, but it was a start.
When she checked back with the war room, as she called it, the council seemed to have a plan as well, and a rough Declaration of Independence.
Oh, how history repeated itself. This nation had been born from the bootheel of tyranny, and it was being destroyed by it as well.
Apparently, they had put together a call for a vote. She didn't understand how the house and the Senate worked, but she didn't know that it had something to do with one or the other or both. There had been emergency votes to get everyone's input from each of the states. The government officials might be okay with a course of action, but they needed the numbers of voters on their side.
In most cases, the states were divided. However, they were divided on the side of secession, though only barely.
It was obvious, however, that everyone was making up the rules as they went along. It looked as though no one truly knew what they were doing. Was there a way to do this legally?
Paige had invested time two nights in a row trying to figure out the answer to that question. And the answer was resoundingly no. No states were legally able to secede from the union. So, this whole thing was nothing more than a popularity scheme. They knew they would not could not secede from the union.
But standing in that room with all of these leaders, she finally understood what it was they were after.
They wanted to strong arm the President of the United States into giving them a few of their own terms.
And, apparently, she was supposed to hand deliver those terms when the official declarations were issued.
Paige reviewed the terms that were handed to her. She was supposed to arrive there. Provide the terms, and then come back to await the President's response.
This was a ballsy move that could potentially be rather empty if they didn't have the infrastructure in place. She just hoped that the ball she had started rolling would actually make a difference.
She put on her most professional outfit, which happened to be a pair of jeans, her cleanest and nicest button up shirt, and a blue business jacket. She just wasn't a politician and didn't believe she was ready for this. She took her own reporter and her own dryad. She wanted someone she could trust to speak the truth as it had been said instead of trying to interpret it and put their own spin on it.
The door that was open spilled onto the White House lawn. Technically speaking, they could have made the attempt to open the door into the Oval Office, but Paige didn't want to be that forceful, nor did she want to force the President into overreacting. The White House lawn was quite close enough. She also wasn't going to allow herself to be collared this time.
Security personnel reacted immediately.
She had already been prepared for that. She called up her magick and relieved everyone she saw of their weapons. "We are not here to fight," she said in as load a voice as she could. "But I will be seeing the President now."
She did not make an advance on the White House. She didn't want it to look like she was storming the castle or attacking them. They were offering their terms and nothing more.
Eventually, the President came out, with a whole new set of Secret Service who were still armed. "I trust my agents are able to keep their weapons this time?"
"As long as they don't open fire."
"And what about you? I see you still have your magick." The President gl
anced at Paige's neck.
Paige wasn't about to tell the woman that those collars didn't affect her magick. She didn't want to set off that reaction either. She didn't want to have the President or DoDO delving into a how to use the collars to dampen her magickal abilities. "I've released it."
"I guess I will have to take your word for it."
"I suppose so. I don't want to waste your time. I am just here to deliver our terms."
"Your terms?" The President stood tone was laced with condescending scorn.
Paige knew that the President knew what they were doing. There was no way to hide their intent. They’d called for emergency votes of the people, after all. "Please don't play dumb. You put us into a bad situation. We are officially declaring our independence from the United States of America. We are seceding from the union."
"You have to know that won't work."
"You have an opportunity here. You said you wanted peace. This gives you that. Instead of reservations, we’re taking a few states. States with resources. This way, we’re not draining the nation in order to support our people." She just hoped that would matter to the President, though she knew it wouldn't.
She still didn't understand a lot about government. It would take more than two days’ worth of research on Google and skim reading several e-books on how governments worked in order to fully understand what "infrastructure" even really meant. The only thing she really understood was that they did not have nearly as much power as the President did, even if they succeeded in pulling their resources from the United States government to create their own.
She also understood that the President of the United States was well more versed in all of this then she would ever be. Government had been the President's only career choice in life. It had never even been a blip on Paige’s life map.
The President assessed Paige. "Do you have any idea how you would function? How vulnerable you will be without our protection? If you succeed in this — which you won't — you will be vulnerable to attacks."
Whiskey Storm Page 28
