Shadow Woman: A Novel

Eleven p.m. The President and First Lady, Eli and Natalie Thorndike, had retired to their hotel suite for the evening. It had been a long day, beginning with the President’s cross-country flight, then going straight into a flurry of campaign speeches—supposedly
not
campaign speeches, but all of them really were—then culminating in a huge fund-raising dinner where each plate was ten thousand dollars. The First Lady had been by his side the entire time, so she had not only logged the same number of hours, she’d done it wearing three-inch heels.

Laurel Rose, an eleven-year veteran currently assigned to the First Lady’s detail, was so tired she could barely see straight, but at last her shift was over. She hadn’t been wearing heels, but her feet were killing her anyway. She tried her best not to limp as she made her way to her assigned room, down the hall but on the same floor as the President’s suite, so she would be swiftly available if needed. The on-duty agents were in two rooms, one directly across the hall, another with a connecting door to the suite, though that door was locked from the suite
side. She didn’t envy them the graveyard shift, but at least now, with POTUS and FLOTUS in for the night, they could relax somewhat.

Three entire floors of the hotel had been taken over, with the President and First Lady on the middle floor. Guests who lived in the hotel had been relocated to other rooms, the stairways and elevators were secured, the hotel staff had been investigated and cleared, and the buildings across the street had been secured; all known risks in the area had been contacted to let them know the Secret Service was watching them, though most had been judged incapable of carrying through on their threats. The First Couple was as safe as the Service could make them.

That didn’t mean nothing could go wrong; it just meant they had made it as difficult as possible for anything to happen. There was always an uneasy feeling deep inside Laurel’s gut that reminded her anything
could
happen, keeping some small part of her perpetually on edge.

“You’re limping,” observed her fellow agent, Tyrone Ebert, as he fell in beside her on his way to his own room. So much for hiding how much her feet hurt, she thought wryly. She didn’t bother denying it, because he’d just look down at her with one of those see-through-you-like-glass looks of his. There was something a bit spooky about him, his dark eyes seeing everything while he himself revealed nothing, but Laurel trusted his razor-sharp instincts. So far he wasn’t showing any signs of burnout, something she deeply appreciated, because she herself was hanging on by a thread.

“Yeah, it’s been a long day.”

Nothing new about that. The days were all long. Since the Service had been moved from Treasury to Homeland Security, in her opinion things had pretty much gone to shit. Not that they’d ever been great—Secret Service management was an oxymoron;
mis
management was more like it. But now the long
hours were longer, morale was in the crapper, their equipment was shit, and on another subject entirely, her mother, who lived in Indianapolis, was getting old and less able to do things for herself. Laurel had put in for a transfer to the Indianapolis area, but she had little hope of getting transferred even though there was a position open. That wasn’t the way things worked; unless you had some juice and knew someone who could pull strings, you weren’t likely to get what you requested.

Laurel didn’t have the needed juice. She hated office politics, so she’d never played the games, and now she was seeing far too clearly that her career with the Secret Service was nearing an end. That was another big problem with the Service: they couldn’t keep good people because of their asinine policies. And, damn it, Laurel knew she was a good agent, despite the underfunding, understaffing, outdated weaponry, and increasingly long hours. She just couldn’t take it any longer. Well, for not much longer, anyway. She hadn’t quite brought herself to the quitting point.

It was such a cool job, in some ways. Not great pay, but cool. She loved what they did, and was able to compartmentalize her emotions so it didn’t matter who sat in the Oval Office: the job was what mattered. She didn’t have to like the First Lady; she just had to protect her. The job would have been easier if the Thorndikes had been more personable, but at least they weren’t as horrendous as some of the previous First Families, if you believed some of the tales she’d heard. Natalie Thorndike wasn’t rude, or a lush, or hateful. It was more as if she didn’t see the agents protecting her as people; she was proud and cool and remote. Sometimes Laurel wished Mrs. Thorndike
was
a lush, which would at least have made for more interesting detail work.

The President was pretty much the same way, cool and remote, disconnected from everything except politics. On camera, or in campaign mode, he exuded warmth and likability,
but he was a superb actor. In private, he was calculating and manipulative—not that Mrs. Thorndike seemed to care. Occasionally they were on the outs with each other; the agents could always tell because the typical coolness would become downright glacial, but other than that there was no outward sign of discord, no loud arguments, no verbal sniping, no slamming doors. For the most part, though, the political power couple marched in lockstep. Their unity had already gotten them to the White House, where they planned on spending another term. With the President’s ruthless instincts and the First Lady’s powerful family behind them, they would be part of the nation’s inner political circle for years to come, amassing wealth and power, even after he was no longer in office.

“See you in the morning,” Tyrone said as they reached his room.

“Good night,” she said automatically, a little surprised he’d said as much as he had. He wasn’t much on small talk, or on socializing. She actually knew very little about him, other than that he performed his duties impeccably. She’d worked beside him for two years now, since he’d come on the First Lady’s detail, and—come to think of it—she still didn’t even know if he was married or not. He didn’t wear a ring, but that wasn’t necessarily indicative of anything. If he
was
married, or involved with anyone, he’d never mentioned it. On the other hand, he never hit on her either, or on any of the other female agents. Tyrone was … solitary.

As Laurel continued to her room, two down from his and on the opposite side of the hall, she realized for the first time that something about him gave her a little thrill in her stomach. She’d blocked it out because of the job, but now that she’d admitted to herself she probably wouldn’t be here much longer, it was as if she’d given her subconscious permission to bring the attraction to her attention.

She liked him. He wasn’t a pretty boy, but he was damn striking,
in a take-no-prisoners, dangerous kind of way. Tyrone would never blend into a crowd. He was tall and muscled, and moved with the kind of graceful power one saw in professional athletes, or trained special forces soldiers. Physically, he did it for her. She liked being around him, even though he wasn’t much of a talker. And she trusted him, which was big.

She slid her key card into the slot and turned the handle when the green light came on, stepping into the cool of her room. The bedside lamp was on, and the bathroom light, just the way she’d left them. She still took a moment to check her room, because double-checking was what she did. Everything was normal.

Wincing, she toed off her shoes, then groaned with relief as she rotated each ankle in turn, arching her feet, stretching the ligaments. The soles of her feet still burned, though, and nothing would help that other than getting off them for the next few hours, which she planned to do as fast as possible.

She stripped off her jacket and dropped it on the bed, and was starting to shrug out of her shoulder holster when she heard a faint
pop-pop-pop
. She didn’t have to stop and listen, didn’t have to think; she
knew
what the sound was. Adrenaline seared her veins in a huge rush. She wasn’t aware of leaping for the door, only of surging into the hall and seeing Tyrone right ahead of her, doing the same thing, his weapon in his hand as he charged full speed down the hall toward the President’s suite. They weren’t the only ones. The night shift had erupted from the room they occupied and the head of the President’s detail, Charlie Dankins, was kicking in the double door.

Oh my God
. The shots had come from
inside
the suite.

The doors and locks were sturdy; Charlie had made several attempts by the time Laurel and Tyrone and a swarm of other agents had reached them. Tyrone positioned himself beside Charlie and said, “Now,” and they kicked together, the combined force finally crashing the doors inward. The agents went
in high and low, weapons ready, rapidly sweeping the parlor for the threat.

The room was empty. She couldn’t hear anything, which was even more horrifying, but her heartbeat was thundering in her ears so maybe it was drowning out any sounds. To the right, the door to the First Lady’s bedroom stood open, but Laurel controlled her instinct to rush toward it. Right now, their priority was the President, which meant Charlie was in charge.

The door to the President’s bedroom, on the left, was closed. Charlie rapidly assessed the situation; until they knew where the President was, they could assume nothing. He pointed at Laurel and Tyrone and the rest of the First Lady’s detail, indicating they should check her half of the suite, while he and the others swept the President’s quarters.

His tactics were sound. The detail moved toward the First Lady’s bedroom in an endlessly rehearsed procedure.