First Family (30 page)

She gripped his arm. “What if they ask for something? Something in return for letting her go?”

Dan Cox let go of his wife, stood, and paced in front of her. He was still a very attractive man. As she watched him walk up and down, she took in the thick shoulders, the perfect hair, the solid chin, the nuggets of cheekbones, and the sparkle of eyes. Physically, he was an amalgam of JFK and Reagan with an intimidating heft of burly Theodore Roosevelt thrown in.

She had fallen in love with him on seeing the man for the first time on a college campus on a beautiful early fall day. He’d been a junior and she an incoming freshman. It was a day that now seemed a million years ago. And in many important ways, it was. That life had been over for a long time. She could hardly call it part of her history anymore, for so much of immense importance had come in the intervening years.

“It depends on exactly what they want, Jane. The nuclear codes? I can’t do that. One of the founding documents? I can’t do that either. In fact, in all candor, the president of the United States cannot give in to blackmail of any kind. The precedent that would set would be untenable for any future administration. It would emasculate the office.”

“So you’re saying that we’ll never see Willa again?”

He sat down next to her, rested a hand on her knee. “What I’m saying is that we will do everything in our power to get that little girl back safe and sound. We just have to keep thinking positive thoughts. We have the might of the United States behind us. That’s no small thing.”

“Will you be at the funeral tomorrow?”

He nodded. “Of course. I have an early rally in Michigan, but I’ll be back in plenty of time. Air Force waits for no one. And at moments like this family needs to stick together. And not to sound too crass about it, but it’ll let the country know that the Coxes put family first in periods of crisis. And that’s the truth.”

She put her magazine down. “I can see you’re still in full campaign mode. It’s late but I’m not really sleepy. Would you like to watch a movie in the theater? Warner Brothers just sent one of their latest over. I don’t even think it’s in theaters yet.”

He finished his drink, stood, and held out his hand.

“No movie. I missed you, love of my life.”

He gave her the same heart-stopping smile he’d flashed at the college freshman over twenty-five years ago. She rose obediently and followed him into the bedroom. He closed the door behind them. He took off his tie and shoes and unzipped his pants. She slipped off her dress and undid her bra straps. She lay back on the
bed, he on top of her. What followed was a private, intimate moment, an extraordinarily rare event for the First Couple. Sometimes, Jane thought, as he heaved and thrust above her and she moaned in his ear, that making love to her husband was the only privacy they ever had anymore.

When he was done he fell away from her, gave his wife a final kiss, and went to sleep. Air Force One was out the gate early the next morning and even the tireless Dan Cox needed a few hours of rest before hitting the road again.

The first time they’d made love in this very bed Jane had started to giggle. The newly sworn-in president had not been amused, interpreting her glee as aimed at something lacking in his lovemaking skills. However, when she’d told him why she was laughing, he’d joined in with her.

What she’d told him was, “I can’t believe I’m getting screwed by the president of the United States.”

Now Jane lay there for a half hour before rising, showering, dressing, and surprising the Secret Service agents by going back downstairs. She opened the door to her office, closed it behind her, unlocked her desk, and took out the letter and the key.

When would she get it? What would it say? What would she do then?

She looked at her watch. It was late, but she
was
the First Lady.

She made the call, woke him up.

Sean King said groggily, “Jane?”

“I’m sorry for the lateness of the hour. You’re coming to the funeral of course.” It was not even close to being a question.

“Ironically, I just attended one.”

“What?”

“Long story. Yeah, I’m planning on being there.”

“Tuck told me that you’d called.”

“Did he also tell you what we talked about?”

“That was a mistake, Sean. I’m sorry. We should have been truthful with you from the very beginning.”

“Yes, you should have.”

“I was concerned about the… the…”

“Your brother screwing around on his wife?” he said helpfully.

“That it would reflect badly on the president’s reelection campaign.”

“Well, we can’t have that, can we?”

“Please don’t be cynical. I don’t need that right now.”

“Your concern was well justified. But it took me down a detour I didn’t need to go down. A waste of time we couldn’t really afford.”

“So you think it has nothing to do with Willa’s disappearance?”

“Can I tell you that for sure? No. But my professional instinct is telling me that it doesn’t.”

“So what now?”

“Talk to me about Willa.”

“What about her?”

“Pam only had two children, both by C-section.”

Ice seemed to congeal in Jane’s bloodstream. “Pam had
three
children as you very well know.”

“Okay, but she didn’t give
birth
to all three. The postmortem confirmed that. I told Tuck about this. I thought he would have told you.”

Tuck of course
had
told her, but she had no intention of revealing this to Sean. “So what exactly are you saying?”

“That one of the kids was not Pam’s. Was it Tuck’s by another woman? And was the child Willa?”

“I can’t answer that.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

“Why is this at all relevant?”

Sean sat up in his hotel room bed. “Are you serious? It’s
relevant
because if Willa isn’t Pam’s daughter, then her real mom and/or dad could be behind her kidnapping.”

“Willa is twelve years old. Why would someone wait all this time?”

“I thought that too, but the fact is I don’t have the answer to that. And I’m convinced that I
need
the answer to that question if we’re going to solve this thing and find Willa. So can you help me out?”

“I don’t know anything about it.”

“Well, if she is Pam’s daughter, then the lady had to be pregnant with her all those years ago. Was she?”

“I… She… Now I remember, they weren’t living in the U.S. back then. They were in Italy. Tuck’s business. And now that I think about it, they returned shortly after Willa was born.”

Sean leaned back against the headboard. “Well, that was convenient. So you don’t know for sure if she was pregnant? Never saw any pictures? Mom and newborn in the hospital? No baby showers? Didn’t visit them over there?”

“You’re being cynical again,” she said coldly.

“No, I’m actually being politely probing.”

“Okay, I admit that I can’t tell you for sure if Willa is Pam’s daughter. I always believed that she was. Let me put it this way, I had no reason
not
to believe that she was.”

“Well, if you are withholding something from me I will get to the truth at some point and the results may not be to your liking.”

“Is that a threat?”

“Threatening any member of the First Family is a felony, as you well know. And I’m one of the good guys. See you at the funeral,
Mrs. Cox
.”

He hung up the phone.

Jane locked the letter and key back in her desk and nearly ran to the living quarters. As she undressed and climbed back into bed, she listened to the soft snores of her husband. He never had trouble going to sleep. Even after working the phones until the wee hours of the morning, he would finally put the receiver down after haggling over some mind-numbingly important national business, brush his teeth, and be asleep within five minutes. She, on the other hand, took hours to do so, if she ever managed at all.

As she lay on her side and stared over at the wall she imagined she could see Willa’s face there, the child beckoning to her. Pleading.

Help me, Aunt Jane. Save me. I need you.

W
HAT’S THE MATTER
, Gabriel? You look like you’re not feeling too good.”

Quarry eyed the little boy across the heft of the kitchen table.

“Haven’t been sleeping too good the last couple of nights, Mr. Sam,” he said miserably.

“Kids are always supposed to sleep good. You got something on your mind?”

Gabriel couldn’t look at him when he said, “Nothing important. I’ll be okay.”

“You got school today?” Quarry asked, as he studied the boy closely. “ ’Cause if you do, you’re gonna miss the bus.”

“Nope. Teacher day. I thought I’d help Ma, do some field work, and then get some reading done.”

“I need to talk to your ma after I go into town.”

“What about?”

“Personal business.”

Gabriel’s face fell. “I didn’t do anything wrong, did I?”

Quarry smiled. “You think the whole world revolves around you? Naw, just business stuff. You get a chance to clean out the toolbench in the barn some, that’d be real good. Get rid of anything that’s rusted up bad. And I got another stamp for you.”

Gabriel did his best to smile. “Thank you, Mr. Sam. Got me a good collection going. I checked on one you gave me on the computer at school. On eBay.”

“What the hell is that?”

“You buy and sell stuff on there. Like a bunch of stores on the Internet.”

Quarry looked mildly interested. “Go on.”

“Anyway, this one stamp you gave me is worth forty dollars!”

“Damn. You gonna sell it?”

Gabriel looked shocked. “Mr. Sam, I’m not selling anything you give me.”

“Piece of advice for free, little man. That stamp collection is gonna help fund your college education. Why you think I been giving ’em to you? And the old coins too?”

Gabriel looked puzzled. “I guess I never thought about that.”

“See, your brain’s not as big as you think it is, now is it?”

“Guess not.” They ate some more and the boy said, “You been flying up to the mine a lot.”

He grinned. “Trying to find me some diamonds.”

“Diamonds in the mine?” Gabriel said sharply. “Thought all those mines were in Africa.”

“Might have us some right here in Alabama.”

“I was thinking maybe I’d go with you.”

“Son, you been all over that mine with me. It’s still just dirt in a big hole.”

“I mean on the plane. We always went in the truck.”

“We always went in the truck ’cause you don’t like to fly. Hell, you told me every time you watch me take off you want to crawl inside the earth and never come out.”

Gabriel smiled weakly. “I’m trying to get over that. I want to see more of this world than just Alabama, so I’ve got to get on planes, right?”

Quarry smiled at the boy’s spot-on logic. “That’s pretty right, yeah.”

“Let me know then. I’ll be getting on with the chores.”

“You do that.”

Gabriel put his dishes in the sink and scooted out of the kitchen.

As he headed to the barn, Gabriel was thinking hard. Thinking about what he’d heard Mr. Sam talk about when he was drunk in the library last night. He’d heard the name Willow or something
like that, maybe like the weeping willow, he figured. And he’d heard Mr. Sam say the word “coal,” or at least it sounded like it, which had made Gabriel think of the mine too.

He wouldn’t ask Mr. Sam directly because he didn’t want him to know that Gabriel had been eavesdropping, even though he’d just come down for another book to read. Mr. Sam sure had been sad about something, Gabriel told himself while he was cleaning out the toolbench in the barn. And the other day he’d watched as Mr. Sam had rolled up his sleeve to help with washing the dishes. There were burn marks on his forearm. Gabriel wondered about that too.

And he’d heard Daryl and Carlos talk about things in the gunroom at night while they’d been cleaning their rifles. But none of it made much sense. Once they’d been talking about Kurt. When Gabriel had come in the room, they’d shut up real fast and then showed him how to break down and reassemble a pistol in under fifty seconds. And why go up to the mine every day? And why had Carlos and sometimes Daryl stayed up there overnight? Was there something going on up there? Gabriel didn’t think it was about diamonds.

And more than once he’d gotten out of bed in time to see Mr. Sam head down to the basement with a fat ring of keys. Gabriel had followed him all the way one time, his heart beating so hard he thought for sure Mr. Sam would hear it. He’d watched as the man had opened up a door down a long passageway that smelled foul. His ma had told him once that that was where the Quarrys used to keep their bad slaves. He hadn’t believed her at first and had asked Mr. Sam about it. But Mr. Sam had confirmed his mother’s statement.

“Your family had slaves, Mr. Sam?” he’d asked him once when they were walking the fields.

“Most folks ’round here did back in the old days. Atlee was a cotton plantation then. Had to have people to work it. A lot of people.”

“But so why didn’t they just pay ’em? Not keep ’em as slaves just ’cause they could.”