The Patriots Club (39 page)

69

Bolden collared the first police officer he saw. “Sir, I need to speak to a Secret Service agent. It’s urgent. It concerns the President’s welfare.”

The others were behind him watching, swallowed by the crowd. He didn’t care if he was risking arrest. There was no other way. If only he didn’t say the words “assassinate” or “murder,” maybe he could get his message through without being carted away.

The police officer was short and tubby, with two chins hanging over his collar. He took a long look at Bolden. “What about her welfare?”

“It’s imperative that I speak to a member of the Secret Service.”

The policeman shifted his weight. “You got something to say, say it to me.”

“I have some information that I think a Secret Service agent should hear. It’s very urgent.”

“And it concerns the President?”

“Yes.” It was difficult not to shout. Bolden wanted to grab this fat, badly shaven cop by his shoulders and shake some sense into him. He wanted to rip off his own shirt and say, “Look at my chest. This is what they’re capable of. They’re going to kill the President, and we have to stop them.”

The cop unclipped his radio and brought it to his mouth. But instead of calling for backup, he said, “When’s shift change?”

“One o’clock,” a voice squawked.

“Roger that.” The policeman stared dully at Bolden, as if saying, “You still here?”

President Megan McCoy was delivering her inauguration address. Her strong, vibrant voice carried through the air, offering a message of renewal and hope. Around him, all faces were raised toward the reviewing stand. Bolden spun away, sighing, the desperation rising in him. The sudden motion made him wince and he knew he’d opened up his chest again. He stepped toward the street. The nearest checkpoint was two blocks away. He would have to run.

“Sir, how can I help?”

Bolden looked over his shoulder. The man was dressed in a navy suit and overcoat, and wore the dark sunglasses and earpiece that had become the Secret Service’s uniform. “Something strange is going on,” Bolden said slowly, as if delivering a report. “All the men who work for Scanlon are leaving the area. They’re just getting the hell out of here. Moving off in every direction. I need to speak to the director of security. The guy who’s running the show.”

“How do you know this?”

“It doesn’t really matter right now. What’s important is that these men are leaving the area nearest the President’s podium. I believe they were hired to provide close perimeter security. They’re leaving. What does that tell you?”

“I don’t know, sir. What are you implying?”

Bolden look away in frustration. “You tell me,” he said, too loudly. His calm was slipping away, fleeing as surely and quickly as the last sands in an hourglass. “What would make you want to get away from where the President of the United States is standing? Figure it out.”

The agent stared at him for a moment, then grabbed him by the lapel of his jacket and dragged him ten feet away. “You stay here. What’s your name?”

“Thomas Bolden.”

“All right then, Mr. Bolden. You will not move one step. Understood?”

Bolden nodded.

The agent spoke into his microphone, relaying to his superior everything that Bolden had just told him. “Mr. Fiske’s on his way.”

Barely two minutes passed before a blue Chevy Suburban screeched to a halt and a trim African American man leaped to the ground. “You Bolden?”

“Yes sir.”

“What’s this garbage you’re spouting about Scanlon leaving the area?”

“Are you the agent in charge?”

“Ellington Fiske. This is my show.”

“Have you asked the Scanlon guys why they’re all taking a hike?”

Fiske’s mouth tightened. “We haven’t been able to raise them.”

Just then, a tall, red-faced agent ran up to them. “Thomas Bolden is wanted by the NYPD for murder. He popped some guy on Wall Street yesterday.”

“His name was Sol Weiss,” said Bolden. “I didn’t kill him. It was an accident. Another man shot him, a security guard working for my firm, Harrington Weiss, but actually, I think he works for Scanlon, too. Look, I’m turning myself in to tell you guys this. You’ve got to listen to me. There is going to be an attempt on the President’s life. And I mean now! Would you get off your asses and do something?”

The red-faced agent grabbed Bolden and spun him around, throwing cuffs on his wrist. “You bet we’re going to do something, mister.”

“Hold it,” ordered Fiske. He stepped toward Bolden. “How do you know this?”

“I just know.” He held the Secret Service agent’s eyes. “Can you afford to find out if I’m lying?”

Fiske looked away, the muscles in his jaw working overtime. “Okay, Mr. Bolden. You’ve got two minutes to convince me. Larry, take off the cuffs. Bolden, get in the car. You’re coming with me.”

Thirty-one pounds of RDX lined the hollow interior walls of the Triton Industries–manufactured podium. RDX, or Research Department Explosive, was as deadly an explosive as was currently manufactured, and used primarily in the destruction of nuclear warheads. In fact, so tightly controlled was the material that its chemical signature was not among those regularly screened for by the United States Secret Service. It was manufactured by the Olney Corporation of Towson, Maryland. Two years earlier, Olney had been purchased by Jefferson Partners.

James Jacklin took a last look at Senator McCoy as she began to deliver her inauguration address, then rose from his seat and scooted to the outside aisle. All eyes were on the President as he walked up the stairs and crossed the Capitol esplanade. He’d been told it was necessary to be at least five hundred yards from the blast site. The RDX had an effective kill radius of two hundred feet. It was not so much the force of the blast that made RDX so effective, but the tremendous heat it generated. At the time of detonation, temperatures at the core of the bomb would exceed three thousand degrees. Everyone on the reviewing stand would be cooked as crisply as a Christmas goose.

Jacklin checked his watch. He had two minutes to distance himself from the bomb. In reality, he was already safe. The stairs behind the podium would deflect the blast upward and back toward the crowd of spectators. Still, he wanted to make sure.

He reached the steps leading to the Dirksen building when President McCoy broke off her speech in midsentence. A hushed roar passed through the crowd. A siren began to wail, then another, and soon, it sounded to him as if every police car in the city were heading toward the presidential reviewing stand. He looked at his watch again. It was too late.

The time was twenty minutes past twelve. Ellington Fiske kept his foot on the accelerator as he turned the corner of Constitution Avenue and Second Street. “Goddamm it, would somebody get me one of those motherfuckers from Scanlon on the horn!”

“Their receivers are jammed,” said Larry Kennedy, his number two. “Probably just a short, boss.”

“Like the one that knocked out the microphone on the podium,” said Fiske.

“Do we clear the area, sir?” asked Kennedy.

Fiske shot Bolden a damning glance. “Go on,” he said.

“And so, we got the information out of a Scanlon operative,” said Bolden. “It’s called Crown. They’re killing her because she won’t join the club.”

“Jacklin is?”

“Yes sir.”

“The billionaire? The guy who runs Jefferson Partners? You’re making it hard on me, Bolden. Very hard.”

The Suburban rocked to the left as it came around the back of the Capitol building. They passed through a cordon of police cars and emergency vehicles, Fiske bringing the car to a violent halt. “Get out.”

Bolden opened the door and climbed out of the car, wincing and grunting. Fiske eyed him warily. “What’s up with you?”

Bolden didn’t think there was any point in answering the question. “Has anything out of the ordinary taken place in the last day or two? Anything near the President? Special guests, some new equipment that was put into place in the last twenty-four hours, something that could make a very big bang?”

“Just a podium.” Fiske walked briskly across the esplanade. Ahead, nearly a dozen policemen blocked the way to the top of the reviewing stand. Looking west toward the Washington Monument, the Mall was a sea of humans. Everywhere, there were American flags. Lining the snow-covered fields, gracing the government buildings, waving from the hands of thousands of spectators. A shower of red, white, and blue.

“A podium,” said Bolden, working to keep up. “Where’d it come from?”

“Virginia,” said Fiske.

“From Triton Aerospace?”

Fiske stopped in his tracks. “How do you know that?”

“Triton’s owned by the same group that owns Scanlon. Jefferson Partners. It’s Jacklin’s company. I’d say you have a problem on your hands.”

Fiske raised a hand to his forehead and mumbled “Shit.” He looked at Kennedy. “Anyone raise Scanlon?”

“Negative, sir.”

Fiske looked down, a cloud of anguish passing over his face. As suddenly, it was gone. “We have a code red,” he barked into his lapel. “Clear Eagle. I repeat, Clear Eagle.” He looked at Bolden. “Mister, you had better not be wrong.”

Bolden followed Fiske through the line of policemen to the top of the stairs. President McCoy was surrounded by a flock of Secret Service agents, all but invisible inside a sea of navy blue and black. The tight knot moved quickly off the stage and began a pained march up the stairs. Fiske ran down to meet them, shouting, “Hurry!” The crowd watched, no one moving, a sentiment of anxious horror playing on their faces.

She’s safe,
Bolden said to himself.

The light was tremendous, a blinding torrent of oranges and blacks brighter than a thousand suns. An unseen hammer struck his body, lifting him into the air. Bolden lay on his back. Folding chairs clattered to the ground. He looked to his right. A man’s leg, naked except for a sock and shoe, lay next to him. He sat up and waited for his vision to clear. There was something in his eyes. He wiped at his face and his hand came away streaked with blood. Kennedy was on his back nearby, his face blackened, a gash laying open his cheek. He muttered something, then scrambled to his feet and ran down the stairs.

Bolden stood up unsteadily. The reviewing stand was in ruins. A pall of smoke hung in the air. The first few rows of seats no longer existed. A craggy black crater dug out of the Capitol stairs was all that was left. The blast had vaporized the stage. The podium. It had been the Triton podium. An American flag hung in tatters off to one side, flames devouring the red and white stripes.

Everywhere there were bodies, torn and rent and bleeding. Moans drifted through the air. Shouts for help, at first timid, then louder, strident. He staggered down a few stairs. The President of the United States pulled herself from the pile of Secret Service agents. Except for a scrape on her shin, she appeared unhurt. Immediately, two agents grabbed her arms and basically carried her bodily past Bolden up the stairs. Ellington Fiske lay crumpled over a row of chairs, his face a mask of blood, his head turned at an unnatural angle.

Bolden sat down and buried his head in his hands.

It was over.

The President was alive.

70

James Jacklin threw a last shirt into his suitcase and zipped it up. Walking to the dresser, he picked up his passport, his billfold, and an envelope stuffed with fifty thousand dollars and slipped them into the pockets of his blazer. It was just four-thirty. He should relax. He had plenty of time to make the eight o’clock flight to Zurich. Stopping in front of the mirror, he combed his hair, taking a moment to cut the part razor-sharp, then tightened the knot of his tie. He had an appointment with his banker on the Bahnhofstrasse the following morning at nine, and he wasn’t sure if he’d make it to the Baur au Lac in time to freshen up.

From the window, he saw the limousine pull into the driveway and advance slowly toward the portico. Dusk was falling. A crescent moon hung low in the sky. It was time to get out of Dodge. The investigation into the bombing had tied down the explosives used three days earlier as RDX. They’d even come up with a batch number. Connolly was dead, but Ramser, Logsdon, and Von Arx had survived the blast, though Von Arx had lost his right leg at the hip. Jacklin hadn’t spoken with any of them since the incident. The news about the RDX would do it. They’d know beyond a doubt that he was behind it, and he knew what actions they would take.

As Jacklin walked downstairs, he shook off one set of worries for another. His spies at the Securities and Exchange Commission had informed him that the head of enforcement had received certain confidential documents outlining massive payoffs from Jefferson Partners to a dozen former government officials, including the recently retired head of the FCC and a prominent four-star general. There was no indication of who had supplied the documents, but Jacklin knew well enough. It was Bolden. He had managed to fire off some copies to his friends, after all. Jacklin’s attorneys would handle the matter. In the meantime, Jacklin would repair to his private island. From there, he would direct the usual overtures. Promises would be made. Money would change hands. He was worth eight billion dollars, give or take. That kind of wealth bought lots of friends. Jefferson was too big to kill. It had too many secrets. In the meantime, he would see what he could do about Logsdon and Von Arx. It was just a matter of time before he was back.

Jacklin opened the front door. The chauffeur stood waiting, cap drawn low over his eyes. Jacklin noticed he had a strange scar on his cheek.

“Just the one bag,” Jacklin said. “I’ll be right there.”

“Take your time, sir. We’re in no hurry.”

Jacklin placed the note he’d written to his wife on the kitchen counter, then set the alarm and locked the door behind him. He took a last look at the house. Everything was secured. The journals had been packed up and sent to a safe place. Somewhere away from prying eyes. The heirlooms of Washington and Hamilton, likewise. He didn’t want them rotting in a museum. They were meant for privileged eyes only.

He took a breath of his beloved Virginia air—American air—and climbed into the backseat of the limousine. It was only when he sat back that he noticed the figure at the far end of the passenger compartment. A big man with dark skin and narrow, hate-filled brown eyes.

“That you, Wolf?”

“I came to wish you bon voyage, Mr. Jacklin.”

Jacklin’s hand flew to the door. He pulled at the handle repeatedly.

“Locked,” said Wolf.

“What exactly is going on? Hold it, right there! That’s an order.”

Wolf advanced across the compartment at a crouch. He held something sharp and angular in his hand. “Change of management, sir. The President sends her regards.”

The sun’s dying rays flashed off the knife’s honed blade.