First Lady (26 page)

“You’ve got to be shittin’ me.”

“That’s another fifteen minutes for inappropriate language. Do you want to try for longer?”

Lucy looked toward Mat as if she expected him to rescue her from what was clearly Nell’s latest insanity, but he jerked his head to the back. “You’ve got it coming.”

“This sucks! I haven’t even had breakfast!” She stomped away, then banged the door as hard as she could.

Mat set Button down. “I’m sorry. You shouldn’t have to deal with that.”

“Why not? I’ve been dealing with it since Wednesday.”

“Yes, but—”

“Stop treating me like a guest,” she snapped. “I’m going to fix Button’s cereal. If you have something intelligent to say, then say it. Otherwise, just shut up.”

As she stalked over to the sink, she decided that Nell Kelly might not be dead after all.

Mat smoldered. He was the one who’d been wronged, but she acted as if this were his fault.

The fact that his emotions were still getting in the way of his journalistic detachment only made it worse. The biggest story of his career was unfolding right in front of him, and all he wanted to do was grab his subject by her shoulders and shake her until those aristocratic little teeth rattled.

His self-control snapped a few hours later as he was paying for some groceries at a combination service station and convenience store in rural southern Illinois and realized that Nell—Mrs. Case—had disappeared. A chill shot through him. For the first time, it hit him that this woman should be protected by a cadre of Secret Service agents, and she only had him.

He grabbed the groceries and shot outside. She hadn’t gone into the motor home. It was parked right by the door, and he would have seen her. He took in a collection of dusty vehicles, a gas pump, and a mean-looking German shepherd. Where in the hell was she?

The dire predictions of all the conspiracy nuts he’d heard on the radio came rushing back to him. He hurried to the side of the building and saw a weedy field and a scrap heap of old tires, but no runaway First Lady. He raced for the other side and found her standing at the pay phone that was mounted next to an air hose.

“
Damn it!
”

Her head shot up as he dropped the groceries and charged toward her. She spoke quickly into the telephone, then hung up.

“Don’t you ever do that to me again!” He knew he was yelling, but he couldn’t help himself.

“I hope there weren’t any eggs in those sacks. And what did I do?”

“Disappear like that! I thought you were— Damn it, Nell, when we’re not in that motor home, I want you stuck to my side, do you hear me?”

“Won’t that be a little uncomfortable for us both?”

First Lady or not, they were going to get a few things straight. He lowered his voice to a hiss. “You may think this is goddamn funny—playing the runaway princess, amusing yourself with the hoi polloi—but it isn’t a game. Do you have any idea what could happen if some kind of extremists got hold of you?”

“I have a better idea than you,” she hissed back. “And you’re the only person who knows where I am. Granted, your behavior can be a little extreme at times, but—”

“Don’t you dare start making jokes!”

She smiled at him and whispered, “This is more like it.”

His blood hit the boiling point. “You think this is funny?”

“Not funny. It’s just nice to have you back to your normal arrogant self again.” Her smile faded. “And I’m not amusing myself with the hoi polloi.”

“What else would you call it?”

“Freedom!” Her eyes flashed. “It’s the basic right of every American citizen unless she happens to be First Lady. You listen to me, Mat Jorik . . .” She stunned him by jabbing his chest. “In the past year, I buried my husband and got maneuvered into keeping a job I didn’t want. I’ve lived in the spotlight since I was born, doing the right thing, putting everybody’s interests in front of mine. If I’m being selfish now, well, that’s tough! I’ve earned it, and I’m going to enjoy every minute.”

“Is that so?”

“You bet it is, buster!”

He was the one who should be yelling, and he couldn’t figure out how he’d managed to lose the upper hand. “Who were you calling?” he snapped.

“Barbara Bush.”

“Yeah, tell me another—” He broke off as he realized it was entirely possible she had called Barbara Bush.

Her expression was annoyingly close to a smirk. “Do you know what she said just before I hung up?”

He shook his head.

“She said, ‘
You go, girl.
’ ”

“Uh . . . did she?”

“And Hillary Clinton said words to the same effect when I called her yesterday from that gas station.”

“You called Hillary—”

“You may not understand why I’m doing this, but they certainly do.”

“Did you—did you call them for a reason?”

“I’m not irresponsible, despite what you think. I’ve called someone nearly every day so the White House knows I’m still alive. Now if you think you know more about national security than I do, maybe you’d better tell me about it.”

He had a long list of questions he wanted to ask about that very topic, starting with how she’d managed to escape the White House, but they’d have to wait until he’d straightened her out. “I’m not saying that you’re irresponsible. I’m just saying that I don’t want you going anywhere without me. That’s the deal. Take it or leave it.”

“Maybe I’ll leave it. Don’t forget I have money, and I can go off on my own anytime I want.”

He gritted his teeth. “You’re not going any-damn-where by yourself!”

She smiled again, which nearly drove him wild. He took a couple of deep breaths and tried to reconcile this bratty lady in the khaki shorts and buttercup-yellow top with the cool, sophisticated First Lady.

He tried to regain lost ground. “Who sent you the money?”

At first he didn’t think she’d answer, but she shrugged. “Terry Ackerman.”

Ackerman had been the President’s chief advisor as well as Dennis Case’s oldest friend. No time to examine
that
relationship at the moment, so he filed the information away. “How do you know he hasn’t told the White House where he sent it?”

“Because I asked him not to.”

“And you trust him?”

“As much as I trust anybody.” He suspected that she meant her words to come off as flippant, but they sounded sad.

He could fight her when she was being haughty and unreasonable, but it was hard to fight sadness. His frustration boiled to the surface. “I don’t even know what to call you!”

“You’d better keep calling me Nell. Or maybe you’d rather call me Mrs. Case, and tip off all those extremists lurking in that cornfield over there?”

“This isn’t anything to joke about.”

“Just worry about yourself, all right? I’ll take care of me.”

As she bent over to pick up the groceries, he heard the squeal of brakes, the blast of a radio, and what sounded like an explosion.

He didn’t even think about it. He just threw himself at her.

They both flew through the air, away from the sidewalk, into the weeds. He heard a small “Oof” as the air rushed from her body.

“
Don’t move!
” He wanted a gun. He needed a gun!

A long silence, followed by a croaky gasp for air . . . “Mat?”

His heart was pounding so hard he knew she had to feel it.

And then he got an uneasy prickling along his spine. That explosion he’d heard . . . now that he could think again he realized it hadn’t sounded all that much like a gunshot.

It had sounded like a car backfiring.

R
AIN PUMMELED THE
Winnebago as they crawled across the flat Illinois landscape toward the Iowa border. Nealy gazed out at the fields of corn and soybeans, gray and lonesome under the dreary afternoon sky, and smiled to herself. It really had been valiant of Mat to try to protect her from that vicious backfire, and with the exception of a scrape on her shin, she wasn’t any the worse for wear.

A passing car tossed a rooster tail of water at the windshield. Mat flicked to another radio station for an update on her disappearance. Although he barely spoke to her, when he did, the awful formality had disappeared. And he hadn’t made any move to turn her in. This morning she’d believed her adventure was over, but now she wondered.

“Why don’t you let me drive for a while?” she asked.

“Because I don’t have anything better to do.”

“Except sulk.”

“Sulk!”

“I know it was a bitter blow to you that the car had rowdy teenagers in it instead of a band of armed militia coming to take me hostage, but I’m sure you’ll get over it.” She grinned. “Thanks, Mat. I really do appreciate the gesture.”

“Yeah, right.”

Just then Lucy reappeared from the back of the motor home. She’d been restless ever since they’d left the service station, alternating between entertaining Button and sealing herself in the back. “It’s so weird, ” she said. “We kept talking about Cornelia Case, and now all they’re saying on the radio is how she disappeared.” She was wearing one of the sundresses Nealy had bought her and only half her customary makeup. She looked darling, but she’d shrugged it off when Nealy had told her so.

Now she retrieved the Beanie Baby walrus from the floor and handed it back to Button, who was fussing because Mat wasn’t paying attention to her. “Wouldn’t it be cool if somebody at that lookalike contest thought you were really her in disguise, and we had all these army guys chasing us?”

Mat shuddered.

“Very cool,” Nealy managed.

“What’s that noise?” Mat cocked his head to the side. “It’s coming from the back now.”

“I didn’t hear anything,” Lucy said.

A flying Beanie Baby walrus hit Mat in the shoulder. Nealy turned around to see that Button had stopped fussing. She looked smug.

Nealy regarded her suspiciously. “That had to be an accident.”

“You just go on believing it.” He glowered at the baby.

“
Gah!
” She glowered back, and her expression so perfectly matched his that it was hard to believe he wasn’t her real father.

“How much farther?” Lucy asked.

“The Mississippi’s just ahead. We’re going to cross at Burlington, then go north along the river to Willow Grove. Probably another hour or so.”

“Let me drive. I know how to drive.”

“Forget it.”

She began chewing her thumbnail. Nealy regarded her with concern. “What’s the matter, Luce? You’ve been acting nervous all afternoon.”

“I have not!”

She decided the time had come to pry a little deeper. “You haven’t said much about your grandmother. What’s she like?”

Lucy abandoned her orange juice and sat down in the banquette. “She’s like a grandmother. You know.”

“No, I don’t. There are all kinds of grandmothers. How do the two of you get along?”

Lucy got that familiar belligerent look. “We get along great! She’s the best grandmother in the world. She’s got tons of money, and she’s this real nice college professor, and she loves me and Button so much.”

If she loved them so much, why hadn’t she flown back the moment she learned her daughter had died? And why was Lucy working so hard at matchmaking if they got along so well? “She sounds almost too good to be true.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“I mean that Mat and I are going to meet her ourselves very soon, so you might as well be honest about it.”

“This isn’t any of your damn business!”

“Lucy.” Mat’s voice sounded a low warning note.

“I’m
going
.” She flounced to the rear of the Winnebago and banged the door.

“I’m getting a really bad feeling about Grandma,” Nealy said.

“She’s a college professor. How bad can she be?”

“What are you going to do if she doesn’t measure up?”

“She will. Don’t worry about it.”

She wondered who he was trying to convince.

Just then, a loud yip came from the back.

“That’s not an engine noise!” Mat swore under his breath, braked, and pulled off onto the shoulder. “Lucy! Get out here!”

The door at the rear slowly opened. Her head was down, shoulders slumped. She crept forward. “What’d I do now?”

Mat regarded her stonily. “You tell me.”

A mournful howl echoed through the Winnebago.

He vaulted up from the seat and charged to the back.
“Son of a—”

“I guess he found Squid,” Lucy mumbled.

“Squid?” Nealy said weakly.

“That’s what the guy at the service station called him. I’d like to give him another name, but I don’t want to confuse him.”

Another curse from the back, then Mat stalked forward, followed by a dirty, malnourished dog that appeared to be part beagle and part everything else. It had a mottled brown coat, long droopy ears, and a mournful expression.

“I didn’t steal him!” Lucy pushed past Mat to kneel by the dog. “The guy at the service station said he was going to shoot him! Somebody dropped him off on the side of the road yesterday, and nobody wanted him.”

“I can’t imagine why.” Mat glared down at the pathetic animal. “Shooting him would be a gift to humanity.”