THE PRESIDENT 2 (21 page)

She wasn’t all that young, Max was thinking when his cell phone began to ring.
 
He stood and moved away from the table to answer it.
 
Ed Drake, National Security Advisor, only gave him a code.
 
He closed his phone and immediately turned to the president.

He was laughing at some joke Caroline had told.
 
“If you think the French people are arrogant, you should meet their president.
 
That man never talks to me when we’re together, he lectures me.
 
Loves to call me son.
 
He’s got a few years on me, yes, but not that many.”

“They treat me the same way some times,” Caroline said as Dutch began to turn his attention to Max.
 
“Americans, they seem to say,” she continued, looking at Max too, “what do they know?”

“Yes?” Dutch asked his best friend who now had that serious,
I’m the chief of staff
look.
 

“It’s nine o clock, sir,” Max said and it was all he needed to say.
 
The president immediately tossed his napkin on the table and stood to his feet.

“What’s the matter, son?” Victoria asked him.
 

“I need to get back to Washington.”

“Oh,” Victoria said, thinking fast as Dutch walked over and kissed her on the cheek.
 
Their relationship, ever since his marriage to Gina, had been quite contentious.
 
But even he had to admit that his mother was at least attempting to make some amends.
 

He turned toward Caroline next, who stood to her feet.
 
“I’m really happy, still shocked,” he said with a smile, “but happy to see you alive and well.”
 
He reached over, to also kiss her gently on the cheek, but she moved her mouth just enough that his kiss landed on her lips.
 
Victoria thought that such a move was very deft of her.
 
Dutch, however, stepped back from her.

Victoria looked at Max.
 
She had agreed to financially assist his political ambitions, but, as she also made clear, her money didn’t come free.
 
By that look on her face, Max had a sneaking suspicion that she was calling in one of those payments already.
 

“Sir,” he said to the president.
 
Dutch looked at him.
 

“I think she will need to come too.
 
So we can decide how we’re going to handle her return.”
 
Dutch looked puzzled.
 
“Caroline’s return, I mean.
 
The press could turn it into something we don’t need to have to deal with.”

Dutch nodded.
 
“Okay.
 
You’re right, of course. Handle that, Max.”

Fielding Reynolds, the president’s personal assistant, also known as his “body” man, entered the dining hall.
 
“It’s nine o’clock, sir,” he said.

Dutch began moving fast again.
 
“Has everyone been contacted?” he asked Fielding.
 

“Yes, sir,” Fielding said.
 
“They’re either on their way or in the Situation Room now.
 
You’re be briefed on Marine One.”

Dutch, without looking back at his mother or his ex-fiancée, walked and talked with Fielding and left the hall.
 

“Surely we can’t leave it like this,” Victoria said, thinking fast, glancing at Caroline.
 
Then she stood.
 
“Max!” she called out to the chief of staff, who was leaving himself.
 
“I wish to come too.
 
To Washington I mean.
 
To spend more time with my son.”

When Max gave her a rather doubtful look, she added: “Caroline and I can share the Lincoln Bedroom if they don’t have room.”

Max smiled weakly.
 
“Of course there’s room.
 
The president’s mother is always welcome at the White House.
 
There will always be room for you.
 
But we’ll have to leave now.”
 

“Of course,” Victoria said, moving from around the table, as she called for Nathan Riles.

Caroline quickly followed, but then touched Max rather sensually on his lower back to get him to stop walking while Victoria continued forward.
 

“What does ‘nine o’clock’ mean?” Caroline asked.

“Developments,” Max said, and that was all he was going to say about it.

“I need your support, Maxwell,” she said, her voice lowered.

“Support?”

“Yes.”

“And what exactly am I supporting?”

“My bid to win my man back,” she said without obfuscation.
 
“What else?”

Max stared at her.
 
“He’s happily married, Caro.
 
None of your wiles will work this time.”

“Let me worry about that part.
 
I just need you to stay out of my way.
 
Put in an occasional encouraging word in his ear.
 
Or,” she added, straightening his always crooked tie, “that wondrous night we spent together all those years ago, while I was clearly still Dutch’s woman, may just be revealed.”
 
She smiled after she said this, and walked away.
 

Max, knowing such a revelation would ruin him in every way possible, could barely stand.

***

By the time Max, Victoria and Caroline had arrived at the helipad on the outer edge of the Harber compound, Dutch was seated on Marine One and being briefed, on a secure phone link, by Ed Drake.
 

“Okay, Eddie, I’ll see you shortly.
 
And tell the team good job.
 
Finally some good news.”
 
And then Dutch hung up the phone, feeling hopeful for a change, as his body man removed the phone from his grasp.
 

He leaned back, looked at his mother and his resurrected former fiancée.

“Good news?” Caroline asked.

“Yes,” he said.
 
“I should rather think so.”

Then she smiled that sexy smile he used to adore.
 
And, to his horror, his penis began to throb.

***

The convoy of five SUVs left the Alan B. Polunsky prison with Gina, LaLa, and Christian in the fourth one.
 
Gina was on the phone, with famed defense attorney Roman Wilkes, asking if he would get involved.
 
When Roman agreed to look into the matter and then get back with her, she beamed.
 
And hung up.

“Think that’s a good idea?” LaLa asked her.

“You heard his story, La,” Gina said.
 
“I can’t just hear him declare his innocence with information that could so easily be checked out, and do nothing.”

“But even he admitted he used to sell drugs.”

“Yes, he used to.
 
But if his story is right, he turned his life around, had a legitimate job.
 
Let’s not forget, LaLa, that that’s what Block by Block Raiders was all about: helping criminals make a new start.
 
Marcus Rance would be a textbook example of what we were trying to do.”

“If his story is true,” LaLa pointed out.

“Right.
 
If it all checks out.
 
That’s why I called Wilkie.
 
He’s the best defense attorney around.
 
He’ll get to the bottom of it without alerting the press and turning this into some kind of a media circus.”

Christian snorted.
 

Gina looked at him.
 
“What is it, Christian?”

“I mean,” Christian said, smiling, “he’s known as creating a circus around every case he tries.”

“That ain’t all he’s known for,” LaLa threw in.

Gina ignored her.
 
“That’s because the cases he tries are generally poor people already declared guilty in the court of public opinion.
 
Mr. Wilkes has to change that perception, and the only way he can do it is to court the court of public opinion, so to speak.
 
Trust me, he knows what he’s doing.”

“But do you?” LaLa asked.

Gina looked at her.
 
“Our past relationship will have nothing to do with this.
 
This isn’t about us.
 
This is about Marcus Rance.”

“But that man couldn’t keep his hands off of you when y’all used to date.”

“If what Marcus said to us is true, he could have been falsely accused, La.
 
I can’t turn my back on that.
 
And I can’t hire just anybody. Because the attorney who takes on a case like this can’t just be good.
 
He’s got to be great, like Roman Wilkes, because if there was any man that was guilty as sin in the court of public opinion, it’s Marcus Rance.
 
I have to make sure that he didn’t go the way so many of our BBR clients went and was found guilty just because of his past sins.”

Bam
!!!

It sounded like a rocket hit and the SUV just in front of Gina’s flew into the air, flipped over and over and dropped in a crash on the side of the road, and then began to roll like a mighty toy.
 
The secret service agent riding in the front seat of Gina’s SUV jumped to the back and threw her violently to the floor.
 
The driver swerved to avoid the hit SUV, and just as he did the SUV behind them was hit too.
 
It, too, flew into the air and flipped over and over.
 
All Gina could hear, as she huddled on the floor, as LaLa and Christian huddled with her, was the sound of acceleration as her SUV seemed to go from fifty miles per hour to a hundred in a matter of nervous, heartrending seconds.