The Gambit (45 page)

“So, you think a man who helped kill seventeen and injure nearly a hundred is innocent?”

“Yes,” I spat, “because I think he was never supposed to make it out of that debate alive.”

I thought her eyes were going to pop out of their sockets they grew so wide, and her nostrils flared. She didn’t yell. She didn’t scream. She just leaned down to where her mouth was inches away from my ear, and I could feel her hot breath on my neck.

“If you even
think
of those words you just said again, you will be considered a threat to National Security and a traitor of the United States. You and your family will be deported to some foreign country where you will have no way to support them because we will wipe your slate clean. You will have nothing.”

I clenched my jaw, trying to suppress my anger. I could have done it right now. I could have broken her neck as close as she was. I was trained to kill someone with my hands—she wouldn’t have had a chance. Then I saw an image of my wife and kids in my head. I
couldn’t
…if I killed Veronica, we really would have nothing. We’d be toast.

She leaned up for a second and glanced at my last name embroidered on my pullover, and returned beside my ear.

“Mr. Bolden, I suggest you stop being so unabashed and return to just doing your job. If you prefer the contrary, you can hand me your badge and ID card now.”

She stood up and stared down at me. She had told me all of that in the quietest of whispers. I didn’t respond. I was still mulling over that bitch’s words. She threatened my family—not just me. That was the final straw. When she mentioned turning in my badge, it gave me an idea. I wouldn’t lose my cool now. It wasn’t worth it. If I blew up, she won, and that was the
last
thing I wanted. I had to stay calm and do as she said because I needed my badge. She might have had the power to keep me quiet temporarily, but the patriot in me couldn’t be tamed. I watched my brothers sacrifice their lives to a pointless war, the same war I served in. I had been a marionette for far too long, and people like Veronica were the ones pulling the strings. Obeying blindly was easy, so easy that I could have continued drawing my government checks forever and kept my eyes closed…but I couldn’t. My eyes were open, and I could finally
see
.

My office door swung open. Sharon stood in the opening with a crazed look on her face.

“Ian! Come look at the news! It’s Owen. The air marshal arrested him on a flight headed to Moscow.”

I almost spilled my coffee as I bolted out of my desk chair.
Moscow. Russia doesn’t extradite to the US. Smart choice
. When I entered the main office space, all the employees were crowded around the sixty inch flat screen we kept for news purposes. The station was set to CBS and a male reporter sat in front of a glass table.

“Miami PD has the entrance of the Miami International Airport surrounded. He will be escorted to Dade County Correctional Department, where he will be held temporarily until he is transported to the District of Columbia.”

My stomach sank at the thought of Rachel in handcuffs. I wondered if she was with him, and whether or not she was safe. So
this
was why she couldn’t tell me where she was at on the phone. They were planning to get Owen out of the country. What a shame, he was already
on
the plane when he got caught.

“We will be bringing you an aerial view of the transport via our CBS affiliate in Miami.”

The chatter began when the newscast went to commercial.

Sharon ran her fingers through her poufy hair, brushing the curls over her shoulder.

“They’re in big trouble, aren’t they?”

I nodded and pressed my lips together.

“Yes, they are in
very
big trouble…”

I felt numb…like this was all some horrible nightmare. The last time I felt this trapped was the night I was taken to the Confinement Camp. This time, though, was worse. It would have been different if I had been caught back in Midlothian, or Raleigh…but this was torture. We had made it so far. I was just short of home plate. I could have only imagined what was going through Rachel’s head. Maybe if I had a window seat I would have been a fourth of the way to Moscow by now.

It was too late for what-ifs. My road was a dead end. I had nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. The whole time I was on the run, I had imagined what it would feel like if I was caught, but I wasn’t prepared for the reality. Whoever created this lie had won. It was like a sick game of hide-and-go-seek, and they found me. My party’s hopes of winning the election were shot. Last night in the penthouse, out of curiosity, I turned on the news when Rachel fell asleep. The democrats had taken the lead in the election. It crushed me, seeing that. I imagined that if Cole were watching, somewhere up above, that he might have slammed a glass filled with whiskey and yell as it shattered on the ground. He would have known what to do to get me out of the trouble I was in. He knew people. He probably knew the person who orchestrated this atrocious lie. The past swirled around in my mind like a long lost dream, but reality was sharp as a knife. It was a little too late to wonder what
could
have been.

I adjusted my hands in the cuffs which were beginning to irritate my skin. They dug deep into my wrists from the air marshal putting them on too tight. When we turned a corner I would slide slightly on the leather seats. There were two men sitting in the front, completely silent. I was being escorted in a black Tahoe. At this point, I knew I was royally screwed. Now, all I was concerned about was the welfare of Rachel and the others.

The deep, grumbling sound of an engine filled my ears. In my peripheral, I saw a yellow Hummer about to T-bone us. Glass everywhere. The noise was deafening. My body jerked in different directions as we rolled. Over and over, crash after crash. I hung by the seatbelt at my waist as I was flung around like a ragdoll. I felt warm blood run down from my nose. Shots from automatic weapons filled the air, and behind the earsplitting sounds of crushing glass and metal, I heard something I was
very
familiar with.

Street bikes.

I stared at the TV screen with my mouth agape. No one spoke—just gasps as the black Tahoe transporting Owen slowly screeched to a halt. The Hummer had a massive metal guard along its grill, and it backed up and began plowing into the nearby cop cars that were firing shots out of the windows. The men on street bikes were wearing head-to-toe black, and they were shooting at any of the cops brave enough to step out of their vehicles. Who
were
these people?

There were probably a dozen street bikes. Four of them used what looked to be AK-47s to keep the surrounding cops at bay. The other eight or so bikes converged on the Tahoe. Their movements almost seemed coordinated.

Whoever these rogue men were—they were Owen’s last hope.