“Understood,” Veronika said, her voice caught under the roar of background noise from her phone being on speaker. She was driving, trying to get away from the scene of this disaster in what was – presumably – a stolen car. It wasn't a question Jaime needed to ask because really, car theft was the least of the crimes they'd committed today.
And failed to succeed on. That was...disappointing.
“Talk to you later,” Jaime said, and cut her off. It sounded like Phinneus was wounded, Tyler was dead, and the fates of Frost and Kristina were uncertain.
Disaster. Nearly unmitigated disaster.
He flipped into the Escapade app, marinating on his thoughts about all of this. His feelings were complicated, obviously, and he kept his temper well in check as he considered the possibilities and typed his initial missive.
CHAPMAN: We have a failure. A fairly disastrous one, in fact. At least one of our hires dead, two unaccounted for, another wounded.
JOHANNSEN: That's terrible news. When can I print it?
KORY: I'm going to press with it in like two minutes, lol. Catch up, dinosaur.
BYRD: lol you guys suck im not on air until 2nite and hell if i will break news for the network w/o my signatur on it
Sigh. With autocorrect, in theory Byrd should have been able to get at least one sentence out every now and again without the severe mess the man always seemed to spew directly into the app.
CHALKE: So...where are we at on this project? Abandon it?
CHAPMAN: I'm not the kind who quits after a single failure. I prefer to find a way to exploit it to my advantage. We do have a severe problem standing in our way, though, and you need to solve it before we move forward.
CHALKE: Nealon.
KORY: Nealon.
BYRD: genital warts lol
Chapman stared at the screen. No one typed anything for a long time.
BYRD: joke guys see the lol that means laugh out loud bc its funny
BYRD: srsly i definitely dont have genital warts
BYRD: or any diseses of teh sexual kind at all everythin runs great down there all the thyme
JOHANNSEN: And also all the parsley, sage, and rosemary, too. Can I change the subject for a moment? Since it seems we're at an impasse with our current main project?
CHAPMAN: Please do. Distract me from the failure.
And thoughts of Chris Byrd's communicable diseases, he thought, but didn't add.
JOHANNSEN: Our project to destroy Julie Blair seems to be going rather well. We've hit her with another body blow I think, turning her firing into a sex scandal. But this...well, this business with Gondry is going to be front page. For a while. But we can still elevate the Blair business with the right touches, keep it in the side column if we push properly. If we keep it on our front page, I think I can interest our fellow top tier newspapers enough to put it on theirs, and that will keep it in the public eye for long enough to do the damage we want.
KORY: I am so in. And I've had an idea about how next to hit her.
BYRD: i can def donate a block to this story 2nite if u guys keep it on your front pages at least 5 mins maybe even 7 if u have someting real gud
CHALKE: Don't keep us in suspense, clickbaiter. This isn't your website.
KORY: Har de har har. Here's my idea. Chalke – send the FBI out to investigate her on some bullshit premise. Ask her invasive and shitty questions. Then leak the transcripts to us. Massage them first, maybe, make them even more titillating. Or we can just make shit up from “sources.”
FLANAGAN: How does that work?
KORY: It's all cool. Chalke can tee up anonymous source confirmations for us. Right, Chalke?
CHALKE: You mean other than me? Yes. I have a former Director of the Bureau of Prisons who owes me...well, a lot.
KORY: See? Between Chalke and that yahoo, we have dual confirmation of whatever the hell we want.
FLANAGAN: But it's total bullshit. Lol. And I mean that mostly in the Byrd way.
Chapman's face grew heated.
CHAPMAN: What did you think was going to be involved in trying to change things for the better, Flanagan? Come on. You're a lawyer. Don't you put up the most strenuous defense possible for your client, regardless of their guilt? We're on the right side of history here, and if we want to change things for the better, we have to pay the price. Sometimes that means lies. Sometimes that means...more. Act as advocate for your beliefs here, and be willing to fight for them like a client.
FLANAGAN: Oh, I'm fine with whatever. Ethical lines are pretty soft for me. Just pointing out the funny part for our supposedly noble heroes in the press.
That made Chapman even redder.
CHAPMAN: This is the thing about having power and knowing when someone's doing something wrong wrong WRONG, like we're seeing Gondry do. You can either stand by and watch it happen, or you can do everything possible to act to keep it from turning into a trainwreck. I've made my decision. I thought we all had, too, even Bilson. Clearly I was wrong about him. Hope I'm not wrong about anyone else. Because I want to see this through, make sure everything we're fighting for doesn't dissolve into nothingness in the weak hands of Richard Gondry. I didn't sign on to a suicide pact to watch him kill our electoral chances this fall.
CHALKE: I think we're still all on board. It's just easy to find fault with each other and let cracks appear when we're under pressure. We've made some momentous decisions, and I don't see anyone backing off on those. I just see the normal fratricidal tendencies of groups to turn on one another manifesting in the wake of the China setback, Gondry's turn, and Bilson's murder. We're all still in this together, we've crossed the Rubicon, we just need to hold fast, hang tight, and see it through. To that end...if we need a breather on Gondry to readjust and come at it from a new angle, fine. Blair, though? We're good to go.
KORY: Blair's easy. You get her investigated by the FBI, we have two days' worth of juicy headlines. Gives us time to work on the next thing to hit her with. Like a chair in pro wrestling! Next: a ladder.
JOHANNSEN: What if you doxxed her?
KORY: LOL what the eff, prestige-boy? You handing the dirty assignment over to me because you're too good to get your hands dirty by printing her...what? Address? Cell number? Email address?
JOHANNSEN: Yes, I'm too good for that. But you're not. Am I wrong, or was I reading another Flashforce that did all those things to multiple people over the last few years after designating them as “retrograde,” “human garbage,” and – I'm going from memory here – “human fungus,” in the case of the Speaker of the House?
KORY: Okay, yes, that was me, and that was really funny. Also, Speaker Wade is pretty close to human fungus, just putting that out there.
Chapman smiled. This was what he was here for. A perfect distraction.
CHAPMAN: I can make anything you write about Blair go extra-viral. Will make it happen just after this chat, in fact. But I feel like we need to do more to ruin her. So far we're hitting her from outside.
He paused, thinking.
CHAPMAN: She has a husband and kids, right?
JOHANNSEN: Yes. Why?
Chapman chuckled, a delicious little thrill going through him.
CHAPMAN: Get me his name. I can funnel the worst articles right to his Socialite account and make them pop up in his search results on FindIt. Hell, I can chase him around the internet with our ad platform so he sees Kory's worst headlines about his wife everywhere he goes. I can assign one of our behavioral teams to him and Julie, and we can analyze how it's hitting them. See where to push next. And...
JOHANNSEN: Dominic Blair. That's his name. And she's Julie Henson Blair.
He opened up his laptop, and with a few tapped keys was inside the database of Socialite's users. He had Julie Blair isolated and her husband figured out moments later. Did they have the Socialite app on their phones...?
They did. He activated the microphone on both their phones, the cameras, then their computers.
Ah, there she was. He looked at
the live feed of a woman with bleary eyes and mussed hair, sitting at her keyboard, typing away. She touched her eyes with her sleeve, catching a tear. Soooooo sad. Chapman laughed, loudly, at her pitifulness. It did his heart good that she was suffering. She'd messed up his plans to save the China deal, and now the fruits of her labors, that damned Sienna Nealon, was screwing up his plans to save the US from an idiot at the helm of their foreign relations.
He chuckled as he flagged the accounts and sent them to Devin, his devious partner in crime on these projects. He'd help deliver precision body blows. Then, Chapman tapped out quick instructions to the search teams at both organizations about what results to inflate and sent those. It'd be implemented in minutes.
CHAPMAN: Okay, that's all done. I'll be able to deliver nearly real-time updates on his and her emotional states. And I've got people sifting their conversations for dirt, so...
BYRD: lol remind me not 2 piss u off
KORY: Yessssss give me allllllll the DIRT. FEEEEEEED ME!
JOHANNSEN: I would be disgusted...but I'm too busy being amused. She earned this with her self-righteous meddling, anyway.
CHAPMAN: Exactly. We'd be in a whole different place right now if she hadn't interfered in the China business and blown this whole thing up. So...that's happening. Now...what do we do about Nealon?
CHALKE: I...I have some bad news in that regard.
JOHANNSEN: Do tell.
KORY: …?
Chapman stared at the screen. More drama queening. He sighed. Whatever. He needed to finish this out, then decide which of the members of the Network were reliable and which weren't. The ones that weren't needed to have a series of accidents. Like Bilson, but more deniable. He was feeling a little too exposed at the moment, and...
And the next thing Chalke posted didn't help.
CHALKE: This just came to Nealon in a messenger envelope. No FROM on it, but it's a picture of us...talking...
Chapman stared, eyes widening.
CHALKE: ...IN THE ESCAPADE APP.
BYRD: omg u guys
CHALKE: We're blown.
CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO
Sienna
“Blood pressure is a steady 115 over 75,” the Army doctor said. We were in a center office in a secure government building a block from where we'd ended up after our chase through Washington, and the president was being looked over by an Army doctor on scene while the Secret Service swarmed both here and along multiple routes back to the White House. We were going to be moving any minute now, as soon as we got the go ahead.
In my opinion, the sooner, the better. The less time Veronika, Phinneus, and any of the other conspirators had to regroup, the safer we'd be. Unfortunately, I was FBI, not Secret Service, so my opinion counted for little in this discussion.
“How are you feeling, sir?” I asked, an open line of O negative blood running straight into my veins. I'd been a little skeptical when the Army doc had suggested it, but I had to admit, I was already feeling right as rain. Way better than if I'd just mainlined a saline IV.
“Head's a little fuzzy,” the president said. There was a bandage on the top of his skull where he'd bumped against the back seat of the Geo Metro when I'd slammed us into the light pole, but otherwise he seemed good. He'd complained a little of joint pain and bruising from the seat belt – which had just been a lap belt – but that was it.
“ACADEMIC is moving in two minutes,” a Secret Service agent said ominously into his microphone.
I shucked off the blood bag IV, sticking a finger against the hole in my arm to staunch it. Ten seconds and I pulled it away to find it already clotted. “Okay. I'm good to go.”
The Secret Service agent looked me up and down. “You sure about that?”
I didn't have a full-length mirror to inspect myself, but I had a feeling I knew what he was talking about. Both my sleeves were shredded, small pieces of glass were still stuck in both wrists. I had bullet wounds in both calves, and I was still wet from my swim in the Anacostia.
Still, I made a great show of looking myself over before answering. “Yeah, everything seems five by five. Why? Is my hair not up to Secret Service standard?”
The Army doctor laughed, low and guttural, and he cut it off midway through. “Sorry.”
The president didn't bother cutting his off. He let out a belly laugh. “Good one, Sienna. But seriously...I'm going to need to have you talk to my hair and makeup people before you present yourself.”
“Yes, sir,” I said, and let the Secret Service agent lead the way.
“ACADEMIC is moving,” the Secret Service agent said, and we were, heading down the hallways of this government building. We encountered literally no one other than Secret Service agents. The building had been emptied before we'd been moved to it, and I preceded the president as the Secret Service physically carried him along, my Glock refreshed with fresh rounds courtesy of the DC PD, who had now pulled back to establish a perimeter and would be escorting...
Well, they'd be escorting all five convoys of Secret Service and police vehicles that were going to be leaving along all the probable routes back to the White House.
“How you feeling, sir?” I asked, stepping aside so the Secret Service could push him first into the waiting elevator.
“I haven't been handled this roughly since I dated that girl in college who majored in sociology but specialized in BDSM,” he quipped. Didn't know whether he was joking or not by his delivery. Didn't want to know.
We were silent as we rode down to the parking garage on level B1. When the elevator dinged, we were greeted by fifty cars, logjammed and parked up the snaking ramp with barely an inch between each bumper.
“ACADEMIC is in transit,” the lead agent announced, and the first two convoys squealed tires and blew up the ramp out of sight toward the exit, leaving the remaining three behind. Two more eased up, slowly, and after about ten seconds, they, too, squealed tires and headed up, leaving us with one convoy...
And six armored cars lined up behind it.
“Think you might need this, ma'am,” the agent said, handing me a blue scrunchie.
I stared at it for a second, then shrugged and bound my messy hair together tightly with it. It wasn't perfect – or even within the same time zone as perfect – but it didn't look as bad as leaving my hair free in its current state.
“Convoy five moving,” the agent declared, and the last presidential motorcade squealed tires, burning the hell up the ramp, snaking out of sight and presumably – moments later, when they reached street level – out onto the roads of Washington DC.
The first armored car eased up to the curb in front of us, then squealed tires and blew out, skidding on the turns as it made its way up the ramp to follow the others.
“Sir,” the agent said, as the next truck parked and they opened the back door. Five of our agents squeezed in, then it blew out of there in a burning of rubber, the same as the previous ones had. The agent handed the president a T-shirt.
Gondry stared at it, then held it up. “Grateful Dead, huh?” He considered it a moment, then shrugged and put it on over his Kevlar vest and bare chest. I kept my eyes off him, other than giving him a glance. “Could do worse.”
The next armored car peeled out, followed by the fourth. The last rolled up next to the curb. Every single one had been crewed by the best drivers in the Secret Service.
Even with my lack of experience compared to them, though, my meta reflexes made me better.
“Sure you're up for this?” the agent asked, and now you could hear the tentativeness leak through in his voice. Doubt was settling in.
“Agent Nealon has saved my life multiple times today,” the president said, cutting off the debate for the Nth time and saving me the argument. “We're doing this her way.”
The agent wanted to argue. “Yes, sir,” though, he said finally. “Wig.”
They put a wig of long, gray hair on President Gondry's head. It wasn't fancy, it wasn't even particularly good, nor was it held in
place by anything other than gravity and pure luck. But it rested there, making him look like a hippie.
He looked at me and my messed-up ponytail. I looked back at him and his terrible wig. We both looked like we'd been through hell today. Because we had.
A black new model Corvette squealed into place in front of us, and the agent at the wheel popped out, leaving the door open for me. Another opened the door for the president.
“Remember, keep your distance,” I said. “I'll call you to converge if there's a problem, but our best bet is to sneak through without being noticed.”
Our Agent Smith-alike stared at me. “A Corvette is unnoticeable?”
I gave him a toothy smile. “When it's being driven by a gold-digger, it is.”
“FN SCAR 17H and an Uzi behind the seat, ma'am,” the agent holding my door said. “Just in case.”
“Thanks,” I said, “but the idea is to not use them.” I would have crossed my fingers for luck, but by now they were wrapped around the smooth leather steering wheel. I glanced at the president. “Ready, sir?”
“Feeling a little more 'Take Me Home, Country Roads,' than, 'Dire Wolf,'” the president said. “But yes. I'm ready.”
“Far out, dude,” I said to the president as I gunned the Corvette's engine. We blazed out of that garage onto the street, where I throttled back – but only a little. Because hell if I was going to drive the president home in a Corvette without at least giving it a little juice.
CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE
We made it back to the White House without incident, sliding under the portico after clearing the gate with absolute ease. Aware of our arrival thanks to a tracker in the car planted by the Secret Service, we slid through traffic unnoticed and safe. No Veronika, no Phinneus, no trouble except an annoying red light just before the last turn.
“Smooth ride, Sienna,” the president said as a Secret Service entourage hauled him bodily out of the car and charged into the West Wing with him. I hustled to keep up, my boots still sloshing as I tossed the keys to an agent who remained behind.
Control: Out of the Box (The Girl in the Box Book 38) Page 19
