“What about your wife?” she asked Senator Reed, as she referred to him in her mind, not Wally, which was too intimate.
He turned to look at her. “What about her?”
“What if she finds out? About us?”
“She’s the daughter of a former senator. She knows how Washington works. She’ll stand by me through thick and thin, and from the back of the room like all good political wives do. She knows where her bread is buttered. She would never leave me. Did you think we married for love?”
“But every time you come here―”
“I’m here on unofficial business.” He gathered her into his arms. “Shall we get down to some more unofficial business? For instance. Where is Coyote? Do you know?”
“Somewhere in Indonesia.” She shrugged. “Well, that’s what we learned this afternoon.”
“But you don’t believe it.” He was one of the coolest and most calibrating men she had ever known, which was saying something, since she was acquainted with many.
“He’s too smart to be cornered. And he’s learning. We almost caught up with him in the Caymans. But he squirmed out of that trap like he squirms out of everything.”
He planted the side of his face on a propped fist. “Something you’re not telling me.” He wasn’t accusing her. He was stating a fact.
She stroked his chest with tentative fingers, feeling his muscles rippling beneath, and shrugged as if the details were unimportant. “We’re using several sources to get a bead on him. There’s really no way for him to get away. Eventually we’ll bring him in, either in chains or in a coffin.”
“You have it in for him.”
She turned away from him, bringing the sheet with her so he couldn’t read her face. She was committed now. Nothing would stop her. It was a matter of survival, her survival, though not necessarily Jack’s.
“I don’t think I’d want to get on the wrong side of you,” he said.
“You wouldn’t even want to get on the right side of me.” She tossed the covers aside. “I have a plane to catch.”
17
Republic of Nauru, Micronesia
Tuesday, August 19
MADELYN WAS WAITING for Jack at the Anibare Bay Marina. He almost didn’t recognize her, so different was she than the lady he encountered ... was it only yesterday? ... or a lifetime ago?
Her hair wasn’t as severely styled as it had been at the office, or even last night at dinner, the fine strands finding their own way without benefit of comb or brush. The wispy curls softened the hard edges of her jaw. Her skin was fine-pored and satiny, a refined element less noticeable under harsh lighting. She wasn’t wearing makeup this morning, only the light application of coral lipstick on her bowed lips. She seemed more flighty, nervous, increasingly self-conscious, as if seeing herself through the mirror of his penetrating gaze. Yet her movements came naturally, absent deliberate thought of how to pose or whether to move this way instead of that way. She had no mind to please him. He had already pleased her. Her relaxed posture made her seem less formidable and more welcoming. She had let her guard down in every way that counted. The woman who stood before him now was the real Madelyn Gibbons, not the artificial one of yesterday, the one who gave off airs.
Absurdly, there had been no kisses or welcoming hugs or even shy glances. In this awkward re-meeting, following hours of intimate solitude, the distance between them became immeasurable. Suddenly, and quite intentionally, she put on her mask of reserve. Jack suspected he had as well. Whatever they shared in the darkness of last night did not translate into the light of day. A barrier stood between them.
He noticed the straw beach bag clutched in her hand and the leather shoulder bag slung over her shoulder. “I brought everything we need to conclude our business. Afterwards, we can celebrate.”
Her eyes were more vivid out in the open, golden rather than brown, flecked with green accents and ringed in ebony, setting them apart from the ordinary eyes of ordinary women. She wore a sleeveless blouse and short shorts, her arms lightly suntanned and her legs positioned in a nonchalant stance, one leg bent at the knee. She wasn’t watching herself from the outside in, but rather looking at him from the inside out. A shell necklace encircled her throat, much more flattering than the many gold bangles and beads she wore the evening before. A floppy straw hat secured by a leather cord beneath her chin shielded her eyes. To further hide her eyes, and the emotions lingering behind them, she presently slipped on overlarge sunglasses that reflected a sapphire ocean shimmering beneath cloudless skies. Jack decided she was a study of contradictions. Friendly yet standoffish. Shy but bold. Confident yet masked. Accessible yet distant, as if she were standing way over there and he over here. Maddie Gibbons was a study of contradictions.
And now, once again, her mercurial mood shifted. She removed the sunglasses, propped them on top of the straw hat like a hair ornament, and reached in for a kiss. “Business is business.” And another kiss. “But pleasure is pleasure.” And a third kiss. “Wouldn’t you agree?” And that artificial wall, as suddenly as it had been erected, was just as suddenly taken down.
“So noted, ma’am.”
He helped her climb aboard the small craft that would ferry them out to the sailboat. They took bench seats opposite each other. The boat shifted against the weather-beaten pier. The pilot hopped down and yanked the recoil starter amid the spewing of gasoline fumes. He steered the craft into a wide sweeping arc before heading on a straight course toward deep waters.
Holding onto her hat with a firm hand against blustery winds, Madelyn sent a timid smile in her lover’s direction. In this shy way, she acknowledged their evening together had been a pleasurable one and not just the prelude or culmination of business. The romantic interlude had weakened her position of haughty superiority, in her eyes as well as his. It put them on equal footing. She could relax.
Romantic relations were always a tricky business. Emotions inevitably stood in the way. The fiery coming together of a man and woman during nocturnal hours became something entirely different in the cool light of morning. Both may have uttered I love you during moments of passion, but it was a throwaway line to make the act believable. Once primal instincts take over, human love becomes what it is, the ultimate fulfillment of being attracted to a partner with the same needings and wantings, but also to celebrate life and dispel fear. The past fades away. The future does not exist. Only the present moment matters. What other men may mean when they invoke the word love, Jack had no idea. For him, it was the least gift he could offer a lady in exchange for an evening of intimacy.
To avoid saying what couldn’t be said, Madelyn rummaged in her bag. And Jack, avoiding the same awkwardness, allowed his eyes to drift seaward. Capes bordered the bay north and south. Sapphire waters stippled by white breakers filled the broad inlet. A fleet of pleasure boats bobbed up and down at their anchorages.
Once clear of the riptides, the skiff made a wide-angle approach toward the Annabel Lee, coming up portside on the sleek thirty-six-foot sailing yacht. The sailboat’s white perfection proved to be more weather-beaten up close, but it still held the promise of relaxation, adventure, and satisfying hours in the sun.
Jack grabbed hold of the swim ladder and hopped aboard the vessel via sandpapery swim steps, afterwards reaching down to assist Madelyn topside.
The captain greeted them with a loud, “Omo yoran,” followed by “Good morning,” a welcoming hand, and a large grin. “Call me Ken, short for Kennan, which only my mother calls me.” Somewhere in his forties, trim and fit, and deeply tanned, Ken looked the part of a sea captain, wearing a broad-billed white cap embroidered with the logo of his sailing sloop.
He gave them the grand tour above and below decks, but was especially proud of the teak-paneled saloon housing a fully equipped galley and modern amenities. Accommodations included three double-berth cabins, one fore and two aft, each with locking doors but a shared head. Sideboards were laid out with drink and food aplenty. Beach blankets and to
wels were ample.
While Madelyn stayed below, Captain Ken showed Jack topside, giving him the grand tour and pointing out instruments and gear. When later Maddie reappeared on deck, she had been transformed into a bikini-clad figure of exquisite womanhood. Her voluptuous body, solid limbs, wide hips, and ample breasts showcased the full glory of womanhood. Earlier, Jack had the impression her hair was a dirty blonde color, neither here nor there. But beneath the cloud-flecked sky, it appeared as a rustic light brown, sunlight bringing out reddish highlights. She stretched out on a padded bench seat, slathered herself with sunscreen, covered her eyes with sunglasses, and soaked in unpolluted sunshine cooled by agreeable easterly breezes.
In a flurry of activity, Captain Ken pulled anchor, hoisted the mainsail and jib, secured the winches, and grabbed the leather-wrapped wheel. He headed due east. Speaking in a patois mixing Nauruan and Australian accents, he gave Jack a brief overview of his biography. Having spent years crewing and captaining vessels across the Pacific from Australia to Mexico, he eventually returned to the place of his birth, wooed and married a local girl, and immediately started a family. He planned to stay on the island for the rest of his days. He didn’t want to live anywhere else unless the rising tides of climate change finally and forever covered their tiny island paradise.
“Until New York City or Sydney sink, no one will do anything. Meanwhile, I have my boat and my dreams. The Annabel Lee is the best of its type on this island, or anywhere else as far as that goes. I make a good enough living to want for nothing but the sun and the stars. And if, God forbid and man be damned, the seas should rise, I have an escape plan. I will be the Adam to my Eve, and our children will repopulate the world in the coming generations.” He guffawed in a cheery way and winked. He was a very practical man.
A half-hour later, Captain Ken pulled into a cove and set down anchor, explaining the surrounding rocks and reefs, along with the shipwreck lying beneath, made it the perfect spot for experiencing his small island. “Nature has provided a haven for every species in the food chain. It’s beautiful down there. Free from predators and rough currents. That it survived last year’s typhoon proves it. The wreck is an old one, probably from the seventeenth century. No doubloons since it was picked clean more than a century ago, but home to a variety of sea creatures you will never see anywhere else on the planet.”
After swimming with the fishes and snorkeling over crystal-clear waters, Jack and Madelyn took a quick shower in the head, face to face and chest to chest. Her shy ways returned. They were endearing, encapsulating a brash woman with human frailty. In the cramped quarters, they slid soapy hands along the dips and rises of each other’s bodies, wallowed in the cautious tenderness of newly met lovers, exchanged kisses and caresses beneath the prickling spray, moved their bodies in sync with the slapping pitch of the sailboat, and cooled their rising fevers with chill water. They wound up on one of the bunks and finished off what was clumsily started in the head. Both had something to release and get out of their systems. It was a fever. Afterwards, they yielded beneath a satisfying afterglow, limp as rags and wrapped snuggly in each other’s arms.
They slept, each in their own way. Madelyn surrendering into his embrace. Jack yet vigilant, troubled, even in this luxuriant cocoon with a lovely lady in his arms. The events dogging Jack for weeks refused to leave. Like always, the round white trusting face of Milly invaded his dreams followed by a thinner more calculating face belonging to a woman with green eyes and platinum blonde hair.
Madelyn’s voice brought him back from the land of ghosts. “Jack? What’s wrong? What is it?”
He slowly came awake, his eyes peering past cloudy confusions and alighting on a lady’s concerned face. She was brushing back his hair, dusting his lips with kisses, and stroking his hot cheeks with cool hands. “You had a nightmare. I’m here. You’re safe with me.”
“Am I?”
“Why not?” A simple question with a complicated answer she would never understand. “Hungry?”
“Always.”
She slapped him light across the face. “I meant for food.”
“Same answer.”
Her smile was a secretive one that simultaneously welcomed him into a very private part of herself but also kept him at an emotional distance. Old habits couldn’t be broken, evident in her stiff mannerisms and chill insolence. Jack could only think she had been hurt in the past, probably by a man, no doubt the motivating factor that brought her to an isolated island in the South Seas. She had run away, seeking new adventures where she could start again and leave her old life behind, only to discover she was the same person with the same problems, and living with the same disappointments and letdowns. Madelyn Gibbons wasn’t a trusting woman. It could easily be seen, even on her impenetrable face, behind which lay bitterness. Jack sensed defensive in everything she said and did, the way she turned on and off, hot and cold, lively and remote.
She traced on his thigh a thin white line, livid on the edges, a fresh scar acquired in another tropical paradise, and looked quizzically into his eyes.
“I had a disagreement with someone.”
“About what?”
Reluctant to explain, he tossed off the usual excuses. “Money. Women. Life. Death.”
“You don’t want to talk about it.”
“Nothing to say.”
She found other scars and faded bruises, hurts he had soon forgotten or quickly discounted. She gave him a hard stare, her eyes almost filling with tears. “What have they done to you?”
He didn’t want her pity. He didn’t need it. “Nothing I can’t handle.”
She considered his dismissive statement. A slight smile rose on her lips. It wasn’t a smile of giddiness but one of concern. “Like hell.” Her mouth pulsated with other words she wanted to say, words that would bring no comfort to him or solace for her. Then she found the scar on his forehead, just above his eyebrow, an old scar barely visible.
“Skittish horse. Bucked me when I wasn’t watching.”
“You’re a tough man.” When he said nothing, she said, “You don’t have to prove yourself to me. Or anybody else.”
They made love again to the gentle rocking of the sailing craft, blending movement with movement until it was difficult to distinguish whether their oneness came from each other or from a mighty sea rolling like a monster beneath them.
18
U.S. Naval Observatory, Washington D. C.
Tuesday, August 19
VIKKI STARTED SMOKING again. Truthfully, she never stopped smoking, sneaking fags in her office while pacing back and forth, and trying to figure out posers and problems. Such as where Jack Coyote was now, what he was finding out, and whether he was even alive.
She drove to Number One Observatory Circle, the official residence of the Vice President of the United States, and pulled up to the electronic security gate, there presenting her press credentials. While her appointment was being confirmed, birds tweeted in nearby shade trees and Vikki puffed away, feeling an unaccountable satisfaction. It must have been the fine weather that contented her, along with a certainty that she was doing the right thing for the right reasons. Using words to shine a light on truth is who she was and what she was made for, overtaking everything else. Day-to-day happenings were fleeting. What she did for her life’s work endured. It had meaning. It changed outcomes. It made people think. It gratified her to the core of her being.
She waited no more than a minute before her credentials were briskly returned and the gate lifted. She parked in an area designated for visitors, several yards away from the Victorian mansion. When she stepped outside, the cloudy skies of a gloomy Washington morning greeted her. The air was strangely cold, the chilliness having less to do with the weather than with the place and the mission. She felt eyes upon her as she made her way to the front door. Taking in the turret, the shutters, the manicured lawns, and the rose garden, everything attended to with the highest of standards, she was mostly struck by the startling priv
acy. The man who lived here with his wife and young sons must have felt isolated, cut off from the commonplace problems of ordinary citizens, a prisoner of his own choosing.
Vikki passed beneath the portico. A Marine guard opened the double doors with precision, stepped back heel-to-toe, and stood at attention. Vikki entered the residence, nodding pleasantly towards the young woman who possessed the requisite stoicism befitting her duties. She made no acknowledgment but briskly secured the door and quietly disappeared into one of the many ground-floor rooms.
Immediately Vikki sensed the presence of Secret Service, little more than shadows hulking in dark corners but quite real, viewing her through security cameras, matching her face via recognition software, and watching every move she made. She passed through the elegant yet understated foyer and sauntered across the Oriental rug, admiring the elegant furnishings and noting the security chain blocking entrance to the upstairs living quarters. She waited. Soon a placid-faced woman wearing a turquoise pantsuit and matching pumps came through a distant door and held forth a stiff arm. The greeting was polite and brisk. She showed Vikki into the library. Her manner was taciturn but efficient. She left.
Victoria Kidd—war correspondent and investigative journalist who had been to war zones and camped out with the best of them—now sat primly on a floral-upholstered settee, its ornate frame and scrolling sidearms created for formality rather than comfort. She arranged her posture at an angle, knees pressed together, hands folded on her lap, and face tranquil with anticipation. All she needed to complete the image was a tea service and china cup lifted from a saucer to her lips.
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